Dear Ornithopter,

<3

I love you. You used to be known as an Affinity staple. Carrying Cranial Plating on your way to yet another victory. But on the 25th of March 2024 that all changed. On that day Lucky Paper Radio released their episode about Andy Mangold’s 100 Ornithopter Cube. The way cube lets the unofficial designers of Magic the Gathering reimagine cards, lets them reimagine the whole game, fills my heart with love and joy. 

My friend Tom built his own copy of the 100 Ornithopters cube. I played the cube for the first time on the 28th of May 2025. What an amazing cube, what a way to reimagine how Magic can look, feel and play. I’m a conservative drafter, and looking around the table that day, I just knew most people were going to try to abuse Ornithopter as combolicious as possible. And after opening an Aura Shards, my path was set. A boring midrange deck with very strong interaction. And it worked like a charm, cruising to an undefeated run. But the beautiful thing was though, that even a boring midrange deck with very strong interaction, wasn’t boring at all actually that day. Because this reimagining was so powerful, mesmerising, inspiring. And then I’m not even taking the amazing addition of the numbers, tally marks, naming and altering of the Ornithopters into account. 

But I do have some criticism. That criticism came later, after a couple of drafts. After the novelty wore off. In my experience there is one big problem with this cube. Ornithopter doesn’t impact the game directly. Normally only lands don’t have an impact on the game other than drawing too few, too many or the wrong ones. But they are only a resource, nothing more. And Ornithopters are the same in this cube, they act as just another resource. With the result that only a third of your deck actually impacts the game. As a consequence games sometimes lack complexity, and I love me some Magic complexity.

I love you, Ornithopter, for helping Andy Mangold reimagine our game in such an amazing way. And maybe someday, just maybe, I get the chance to reimagine the 100 Ornithopter cube into a complex beauty. Just maybe. 

With love, 

Hanjo