Premodern Cube V1

Sat, 01 Aug 2026 20:09:04 +0200

It is time that I start telling you my passion for Magic the Gathering (MtG) and my MtG Cube. For people who live in normal houses: What is Magic the Gathering?

History

Magic the Gathering is trading card game invented by Richard Garfield and released in 1993 by Wizards of the Coast. It is the oldest trading card game there is.

I was born in 1991 and so I only learned about Magic around 2001. We were in primary school and an older brother of a friend taught me the game and gave me the first cards (much appreciated Sven!).

Years later the game went through of new editions, rule changes and most notably visual changes. One big visual change was from what became retro to the modern style of cards. The change was introduced with the Eighth Edition. Here you see an example of the same card printed before Modern and after:

Retro	Modern

Modern wasn’t only a change of style, it was also the introduction of a new format within MtG.

Premodern

The creation of Modern made such an impact that player talked about Magic before and after Modern. Premodern a constructed format that includes all cards with retro frames from 1995 and 2003. In terms of editions it is from Fourth Edition to Scourge.

This format has become very popular. Even though the card pool stays the same and the type of decks you can build are limited (by the archtype) players around the world love Premodern. And so do I.

Cube

As you might have learned there are many formats and ways to play magic. You can play it casually or competitive in selected formats such as Commander, Vintage, Legacy or Standard, just to name a few. Heck you can even build your own format and edition right now!

Building your own edition is called a Cube (collectible card game variation). In order to build a MtG Cube you choose 360 or 530 cards from selected editions put them into packs of 15. The result is a drafting Cube.

Premodern Cube

At beginning of this years I felt nostalgic for the MtG cards we used the play and how simple the game was at the time. It is a fact the game has become more complicated. Older cards only had a few lines of text. New cards required new ideas and therefore more text. Here is an example:

Simple	Complicated

The “Questing Beast” has also become a meme in the MtG community. Almost nobody can recall what is does from memory. More effects on cards has also changed the way MtG is played.

So anyway, the Premodern card pool fixes the issue. And going back to play this kind of Magic led me to building a Premodern Cube. Here is a link to the current list of cards of my Cube: https://moxfield.com/decks/Ed5T2DDSnUeyCwbyerVJ8Q

This post might only be the beginning. The Cube is not finished yet. I am going to write a primer (short guide) and once we start playing it I will get feedback and replace cards.

Trading-Cards on Janik von Rotz

Premodern Cube V1

History

Premodern

Cube

Premodern Cube