21 Ways to Design a Card Part 8: Design an Answer to a Card

I would like to applaud Wizards of the Coast for its epic, brave choice today, announcing to ban Jace, the Mind Sculptor and Stoneforge Mystic.

There are many factors leading up to the dominance of those two cards in Standard. Some of them couldn't be helped, at least with the knowledge at the time. But one of the contributing factors that could have been avoided was the lack of general-purpose answer cards like Pithing Needle to fight problem cards.

In today's post, I'd like to discuss designing cards that answer other cards.

A few weeks ago, I was thinking about cards that can hurt Jace, the Mind Sculptor - hopefully in a way that doesn't hurt all planeswalkers. I thought, it had to be good even when it got bounced by Jace, and it wanted to punish the Brainstorm ability:

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You could cast this in response to the Brainstorm effect, or...

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I was thinking along these lines, and was not sure how effective they would be, when I saw an elegant card idea by Kirblar024 posted on Twitter:

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This is a clean and elegant way to hose Jace! It can also be a sideboard card against draw-heavy decks in general.

Kirblar's tweet:

"...it's a design I've had kicking around my head for a long time. Turning Brainstorm into -3 cards = hilarious."

Since hybrid tends to be reserved for special occasions, I made a slightly edited artifact version:

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I also designed some cards that give players ways to fight planeswalkers in general.

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If this guy just deals damage to a planeswalker, it doesn't get sacrificed.

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I wish Hex Parasite was more along these lines. Why does the Parasite only boost itself for one turn?

As for these hasty guys, I guess the format already had some strong Jace-killers like Hero of Oxid Ridge and Thrun, the Last Troll, which Aaron Foresythe mentioned in his explanation of the developments of the Jace issue.

For purposes of providing safety valves, we've got to regard the metagame as something inherently unpredictable, since the point of Magic environments is that they don't come pre-solved. If it happens that the metagame doesn't favor the decks that proactive answers like Vengevine go into, those cards can't suppress the card they're intended to suppress.

So those creatures I designed have a decent chance of being misses, even if I tweaked them to get their power level right.

I tried to make some general purpose answer cards in the vein of Pithing Needle. Ideally, there should be some kind of fluctuating, self-correcting metagame where a strategy that gets dominant can be hated out. In real life, I think it's hard because threats tend to be stronger than 1-for-1 answers in modern day Magic. Threats in constructed often provide card advantage or some immediate impact by the time they hit play. But even so, as a bare minimum, there still need to be tools for fighting every kind of card in the environment.

Torpor Orb was a great addition in New Phyrexia. The inclusion of Dismember was so fortunate, even though it warps the color pie forever, since it provides a way to fight the Splinter Twin - Deceiver Exarch combo, a combo which was off of R&D's radar. But the format could probably use tools for other categories, including tools for fighting tutor effects (tutoring is so rampant!), as well as lands with special abilities (such as Valakut).

Here's one for activated abilities:

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I don't want sideboard cards to just be one-on-one answers, so I made it so this one can hinder multiple cards in the opponent's deck.

At the same time, hoser cards shouldn't be too universally useful. If they get maindecked on their own merit, that doesn't constitute an adaptive, self-correcting metagame.

Also, if the card's effect is too wide, it might incidentally hate out other cards. When people start putting it in their boards to fight the dominant deck, its presence could potentially end up hurting another underdog deck more.

So I need to be careful that a card isn't too generally useful. At this point, I have no idea whether the power level for this one is too strong or too weak.

Next up, a card that hurts tutoring:

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I think it's harder to design anti-tutor cards because you don't want an environment that's hostile to fetch lands and other land fixers. Aven Mindcensor only weakens tutor effects, Mindlock Orb costs 4, and Leonin Arbiter can be ignored at a cost.

I didn't want to make one that costs 4, because even nonland tutoring often takes place on turn 2 these days. Also sideboard cards must be flexible and fit into decks of many different builds. Not every deck has the luxury of swapping out a 4-drop to accommodate a 4cc answer card.

I made the next one as a card that hurts both Jace and tutoring:

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This one hates out a named card, but also does more harm if the opponent tutored for a card:

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I love cards where you name a card, like Meddling Mage. They have the potential to be flexible answer cards to anything that's currently ravaging the metagame. They can hurt netdecks that are too predictable, as well as ubiquitous cards that always get played in a deck of its color.

Naming cards also reward skill. The caster has to figure out what the opponent has in hand as well as what card would cause the most impact based on the current board. (Although I'm speaking more based on theory rather than experience here.)

Next, a card that fights Equipment:

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Finally, here are some cards that stop lands with special abilities like Valakut:

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There need to be cards that handle land abilities effectively, but without turning into a mana denial strategy.

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This one can also stop planeswalkers and other cards that have immediate impact.

Designing cards to fight other cards is a great exercise. It makes you think about what kind of effects can hurt what strategies. It also makes you think about the dynamics between decks of different styles, and the rock-scissors-paper battle of metagaming.

Constructed isn't my forte and I was only able to scratch the surface of those points, but I hope you enjoyed it.