I think that this is a pretty solid mechanic all things considered. It turns your creatures into reverse slivers in a way, sharing their penalties among all hexed creatures.
But it was rightfully raised by a number of people that this mechanic effectively forecloses our ability to use other types of counters in the set at common, most notably +1/+1. For a very long time, and especially under NWO, Magic has avoided throwing too many types of counters around, especially at common. In fact, the only types of counters currently on common cards in Standard are +1/+1 counters. At rare, things get a little more diversified: we get Muster, Filibuster, Despair, Blaze, Study, Slime, Pressure, Eyeball, Hatchling, Phylactery, and Petrification counters. The main reason is that the things people traditionally use as counters (dice, beads, torn-up primal visitations) are not good at distinguishing between counters of different types. If I have a creature with three eyeball counters, two +1/+1, and a pressure counter, it becomes cumbersome to start figuring out what exactly we did to that creature.
I love +1/+1 counters. One of my favorite decks to play is my Experiment Kraj EDH deck. They're a great tool - aside from making simple changes to combat math, four keywords in standard put the counters on your creatures and a number of cards care about their presence. But maybe its worth designing an environment where these are the exceptional counters instead of the norm.
Zendikar-block is the last time non-P/T modifying counters were used in mechanics in a set. There we had quests and level up. Zendikar was pre-NWO, but it was definitely moving in that direction. Zendikar and Worldwake had quests alongside a number of common cards that involved +1/+1 counters. Rise had already shifted +1/+1 counters to rare to keep them from getting too confused with the level counters.
I'm going to continue this discussion through the lens of Suvnica design, but even if you're not really interested in that project I'll try to keep ideas abstractable to general Magic design.
On Suvnica, what if we relegated +1/+1 counters to rare and kept Hex counters as the standard "marking" counter that various cards care about? It's a much narrower design space, since unlike +1/+1s, they don't carry any mechanical weight in and of themselves, but we can probably squeeze a few different mechanics out of it.
NOTE: This is not meant to be a preview of mechanics I'll be offering down the line for other guilds (unless I really like the way they look), just as a thought experiment to see what kind of mechanics we can tease out of this on a world like Ravnica.
The first mechanic I came up with is a variation on persist and undying. The idea is that he enters the battlefield from your hand with a built-in regen shield, but unlike persist and undying, his stats stay the same after his first death.
Incidentally, the condemn mechanic would be changed to burden creatures with fate counters instead of hex counters. This way, although the counters we would be throwing around wouldn't have any built-in rules baggage, they can be used a number of different ways by various guild mechanics.
The second idea I had for other uses of fate counters was this. Initially I had these abilities conflated, but keywords really don't want to be activated abilities, so I decided that Inner strength just granted the counters, and a second activated ability would be used to pump it. Of course, that opened up some more design space for things we could do aside from temporary PT boosting.
As far as Suvnica goes, a few different guilds that have mechanics that care about a new common type of counter would be a fun space to play in. But even outside of that project, it may be a cool idea to develop independently of the guild model.
What do you guys think? Is the design space that opens up by utilizing counters without inherent rules baggage worth the cost that the resonant and intuitive (and fun) things that +1/+1 counters do across a set?
I think you need to lock in whether fate counters are good or bad. it will be incredibly awkward to have your patiant nulmage out when your opponent has zhavi illwisher. each upkeep my guys gets weaker until he dies before using his ability even once. awkward.
ReplyDeleteI agree, but, at least in my examples, different colors want to use them differently. It's a lot more difficult to keep the already narrow design space viable if we limit ourselves. If you think back to Shadowmoor/eventide, that setting used them both offensively and as a resource to bolster your own dudes.
DeleteI like the idea of a set or block with its own counter type, but I'm not sure Suvnica is the best place to do that. The optimal scenario would be one where the counters had a strong mechanical connection to the world concept, and I don't think that exists here. Instead we would probably end up with 3+ mechanics that each care about fate counters in a different way. Additionally, to prevent things from becoming horribly linear, most cards that care about fate counters will need 2 abilities: one to create the fate counters and one to do something with them. This is probably too much complexity for a set that is already doing a lot with guilds and multicolor.
ReplyDeleteIn some ways you're right - guild sets really have enough going on without the additional learning curve of new counter types. But on the other hand, the limited nature of guild keywords and the sheer amount of keywords these sets invite allows us to play with them in different ways, so in some respects, a setting like Suvnica, that has a number of small mechanics to interact with new types of counters, may bolster it despite the lack of inherent mechanical meaning.
DeleteI'd be curious to try out the model where one type of counter means different things. The concern is that'll be just as confusing as using different counters and much more complex.
DeleteFor instance, if I put a fate counter on a creature, that counter might act like totem armor, a tide counter, a spore counter, or who knows what else at some point, and possibly all of the above at once.
Then again, maybe it's awesome. We'd have to try it.
Although NWO limits what counters can be at common, it doesn't restrict them at higher rarity. ROE had level counters only at common and uncommon, but it had charge and +1/+1 counters at rare.
ReplyDeleteCouldn't we have the abilities count and trigger off of +1/+1 or -1/-1 counters instead of coming up with a new type?
ReplyDeleteWe could, but it definitely kills certain interactions. Take Inner Strength for instance (or thallids, which it riffs off of). A +1+1 counter every upkeep is a sick effect, even without the sorts of interactions that want you to spend it or threshold triggers that can go off as it grows.
DeleteI like +1/+1s. I just think that counters can be used in different ways without the rules baggage that they bring to any mechanic that interacts with them, and that's worthy design space to explore.
Right now we have 3 guilds that migth want to flavorfully use fate counters: Zhavi, Sahleen and Kisme. This is in line with the number of RTR guild mechanics that use +1/+1 (simic, Golgari and Rakdos). While WotC has never done a full block with a non-stat counter at common, they HAVE done a large set (Rise of the Eldrazi), so that, at least, is possible.
ReplyDeleteExactly. The biggest difference is that Rise only Used Level counters in one way. It actually really bothered me that they didn't use quest counters on leveler cards to parallel the similar mechanics in Zen/WW.
DeleteHow much can we toy with making a few cards that get +1/+1 or -1/-1 for each fate counters? It would allow the fate counters to substitute for stat counters.
DeleteA little late to the party here, but it seems relevant to the discussion. I've seen one custom card set designed with rules-agnostic counters on creatures and other permanents: Arcunda, by Chris Howlett. The commons and a few uncommons can be seen here: http://multiverse.heroku.com/cardsets/14/visualspoiler
ReplyDeleteHe wanted an accumulation-over-time mechanic, so he designed Accumulate. This led him to having neutral counters (he went for charge counters, but they could have equally been fate counters) which could be referred to by a lot of cards in a lot of different ways. He also set out ways that each colour would interact with counters directly:
* White and Blue can Add counters to my permanents
* Blue and Black can Remove counters from my permanents for my gain
* Black and Red can Remove counters from your permanents for your loss
* Red and Green can Count your counters for your loss
* Green and White can Count my counters for my gain
(This means in turn that White can only affect my stuff incrementally; Blue can only affect my stuff; Black can only remove counters; Red can only harm you; Green can only count, not manipulate.)
So many counters! So much book-keeping.
DeleteThat's my big concern with any execution of this idea.