Click
through to see the illustration and design requirements for your
single card submission, due Monday morning. Every submission warrants
feedback, which you may use to revise your submission any number of
times. I will aim to review the most recent submission from each
designer.
Design a card for this illustration.
For bonus points, avoid all the words used in the design from the commenter before you.
I guess I'll start us off:
ReplyDeleteEvilbane's Light
W
Sorcery - Common
Target creature gains lifelink, vigilance, and first strike until end of turn.
Solid.
DeleteThis is a neat common. It seems like a lot of bonus, but as a sorcery it will only eat an opposing card when it would otherwise kill your opponent. On a small target, it just helps you steal a couple life and maybe not even that. On a large target it could help a good bit, but not more than a card is worth, and that's no small condition for a white deck. Good flavor too.
DeleteI feel it could give a +2/+0 too, to be more playable, even if it would lose elegance.
DeleteIlluminating Path RW
ReplyDeleteInstant - U
Scry 3
Exile the top card of your library. You may cast that card. If you don't, gain life equal to that card's converted mana cost.
I'm going to say gain and gains are different words, like common and uncommon
DeleteInterestingly, this is almost identical to a card I designed... except for the last sentence of rules text and the W in the mana cost.
DeleteTotally agree on gain vs. gains.
I like scry-into-impulsive-draw, and I like impulsive-draw-with-life-gain-alternative. The three together feels muddy to me. That said, they all work for the flavor, even together.
DeleteInstant is a dangerous speed for impulsive draw because you can be stuck with a card that can't be cast at instant speed. (Obviously the life-gain alternate helps here.)
Stand and Fight 1R
ReplyDeleteEnchantment - R
Whenever a creature would deal noncombat damage to a player, it fights another target creature instead.
This is pretty wacky! How much of the design is adhering to the challenge?
DeleteYou took "may", "that", and "if", sadly. My original design was more "ensnaring bridge for activated ability hate" in the style of Burning-Tree Shaman and with a "close quarters" flavor.
DeleteI realize a lot of it's constrained by the challenge, but this design is super-weird. At first the ambiguity of "target" made me think the fight target was chosen by the original creature's controller. But no, actually it's always controlled by you. So I guess this becomes a weirdly narrow anti-pinger sideboard card that's also an uber-Johnny build-around.
DeleteI feel the reverse - whenever fight, deal damage instead - would be an easier but still rewarding build around.
DeleteThat's interesting. I was thinking this would be a hoser for a kind of kiki-jiki-pinger combo (a la icatian javelineers+rev or lightning crafter loops) or an afflict-style set mechanic, but fight->player damage is a more interesting flavor profile.
Delete"Whenever a creature you control would fight another creature, it deals its damage to target player instead."
Something interesting there, but probably best as "it also deals its power to the player", or even more left-field, "deals damage to target player, then that player deals damage to the creature = their life total", but neither will fit the challenge this week.
It's not a home run for the illustration, but it is an interesting ability. Rules question, if I cast Pounce targeting my creature and yours, did yours fight mine and trigger this card? The intuition is yes, but we don't say "A and B fight each other," we say "A fights B."
DeleteI do think it makes more sense to have this deal additional damage when you fight, because it's going to be hard to profit from or even have much with this current version. Given how infrequently fighting happens, I might even give you an ETB Prey Upon.
Elf-wrought Blade 2
ReplyDeleteArtifact - Equipment
Equip 2
Equipped creature gets +2/+0. If an opponent controls a goblin, it gains first strike.
I try to avoid hosers, but the flavour of Sting or Glamdring was too powerful a pull. I didn't try to fulfil the bonus challenge.
Nice.
DeleteThe goblin gains first strike? I think the equipped creature does, but it's not clear.
DeleteIf we need to make a more Tolkien-than-usual reference, this is a good one.
R&D generally avoids effects that depend entirely on your opponent's deck. Given how much better this is against goblins, I wouldn't give this an exception.
Slightly safer, btw, would be
Delete"Equipped creature gets +2/+0.
Whenever equipped creature blocks or becomes blocked by a Goblin, equipped creature gains gains first strike until EOT."
Mysterious Knoll
ReplyDeleteLand - Uncommon
Tap for green
Sac ~: scry 1.
There's a long-standing design rule that strictly-better-than-a-basic-land is a no-no.
DeleteI'm sick of ETBT, though, so I'm going to propose adding legendary and/or "ETB: you lose 1 life".
Maybe this doesn't add G to your mana pool, it just has "t: this land is green until eot".
DeleteI guess technically if the text is "T: Add G to your mana pool" then my design doesn't fit the bonus-point challenge, because of "mana".
DeleteSo I'll lobby to make the type line Legendary Land - Forest so that "mana" ends up in the reminder text. :-P
Solid fit.
DeleteThis is better than a Forest, only slightly so, since it lacks the basic subtype and sacking a land for scry 1 is bad until land is worthless to you and even then it's just a scry 1. Does this violate the better-than-a-basic guideline? Yes. If R&D were ever to do that, though, this is the power level they'd do it at.
DeleteI'm also not feeling any connection to the art. This looks more like a Pendelhaven then a New Benalia.
Regarding the legendary version: The thing that makes this forest legendary is that you can sack it to scry 1? It has play value, to be sure, but we want our legends to be splashier, even our lands.
Was definitely just trying to stick within the challenge of not repeating text lol
DeleteThat was a good one :)
Kick Down the Door 3R
ReplyDeleteSorcery (Rare)
Choose target creature you control. Target opponent reveals the top card of his or her library. If it's a creature, that opponent puts it onto the battlefield under his or her control and the chosen creature fights it. Otherwise, exile the revealed card. Until end of turn, you may play that card without paying its mana cost.
(Sorry... took advantage of Kevin's entry to troll the bonus-points category a little.)
DeleteRevised design:
DeleteKick Down the Door 2R
Sorcery (Rare)
Choose target creature you control. Target opponent reveals the top card of his or her library. If it's a creature, that opponent puts it onto the battlefield under his or her control and the chosen creature fights it. Otherwise, exile the revealed card You may play that card without paying its mana cost as long as it's exiled.
I really love the idea here, it's like playing Munchkin. But I feel you should get something for winning. Maybe have the opponent reveal a card from their hand at random or something so they're down a card?
DeleteYeah, I have some balance concerns-- there's a lot of variance depending on what you flip. But there's only so much room in the text box and red tends to be pretty randomness-friendly anyway, so I'll keep it as is.
DeleteSo if I've got a big creature, and I cast this and you reveal a smaller creature, I have successfully milled you for 1. But if you reveal a bigger creature, I've given you a creature (a big one) and lost mine. And if you don't reveal a creature, then I get to cast the top card of your deck for free. Or if it's a land, play that. And if I don't have a creature, I can't cast this at all.
DeleteI guess hitting their Cruel Ultimatum might be worth that risk, if I knew they had some, but otherwise I can't imagine playing this card. Can you make it more upside?
That's a fair ask.
DeleteKick Down the Door 2R
Sorcery (Rare)
Target opponent reveals the top card of his or her library. If it's a creature card, that opponent puts it onto the battlefield under his or her control and you may have a creature you control fight it. Otherwise, exile the revealed card. You may play that card without paying its mana cost as long as it's exiled.
I opted to reduce the downside by making the fight a "may". And yes... against many decks, casting this will be a terrible idea. But against control / combo it's potentially a lot of value. Kind of a "loot your lair" themed incentive for decks to keep some creatures around.
DeleteMuch improved
DeleteLuminous Halo 1W
ReplyDeleteEnchantment Aura (Uncommon)
Enchant Permanent
Enchanted permanent has lifelink and hexproof.
Wow, nice! Bonus points indeed. And it fits the art perfectly! I especially like how both keywords are potentially relevant on any kind of permanent.
DeleteThe color pie would like a word with you, though.
Oh that's super sweet...my inner Johnny loves this.
DeleteWhite used to give protection ;), but sure: 1W->GW
DeleteI guess you could replace "hexproof" with "protection from spells and abilities"...
DeleteThanks for not using very many words!
DeleteIf it just granted hexproof, enchanting any permanent would make sense, but it's so awkward to give lifelink to non-creatures. They might do artifact or creature in a set with a bunch of vehicles.
DeleteOther than that niggle, yes. This is a solid card and fits the art.
Feels like it needs to be Blue for granting hexproof. Then it would fit the color pie of text changing like Magical Hack. This may also be totally broken as it could totally nullify the disadvantage on some enchantments. Think Pestilence in EDH.
DeleteHexproof was green before it suddenly became blue. The pendulum of "all cards are blue" swings back the other direction with time.
DeleteThat came off a little more standoffish than I intended. The Pestilence/Pyrohemia combo sounds like fun, though!
DeleteBlue and Green are both primary in hexproof, I believe. This art looks green and not blue, though.
DeleteI agree on the art looking more green. But the enchant permanent feels more blue. There are only two green enchant permanents and they make mana or turn things into forests. But Green does have Privileged Position which gives permanents hexproof so I guess it's not really out of color pie. I'd assume cost would end up something like 3WG to 5WG.
DeleteFuel for the Fire 2G
ReplyDeleteEnchantment R
At the beginning of your upkeep, create a 0/2 green plant creature token.
Sacrifice a Plant: Add R to your mana pool.
XR, Sacrifice CARDNAME: CARDNAME deals X damage to target creature or player.
That's a spicy awakening zone!
DeleteThis is a bit too much better than Awakening Zone, but Dev can adjust that. This card lets you fireball in a mono-green deck, and that's not okay. But if we make the mana cost {1}{R}{G}, we've solved both of the problems above.
DeleteThis doesn't fit the art, though it's only two big details off, and you can see the mental throughline.
Ah, thanks! 1RG sounds like a great solution and mana cost.
DeleteSomehow the color pie breakage of saccing plants to pay for the fireball in a green deck didn't occur to me.. too much EDH and thinking about color identity.
Khalil, Scourge of the Darkness – 2WG
ReplyDeleteLegendary Elf Warrior (Rare)
Trample, Reach
Whenever [CARDNAME] blocks or becomes blocked by a creature with Lifelink, she gains First Strike until end of turn.
5/4
I'd be very curious to see what the story is that explains this anti-lifelink trinket text. It would need to be significant to warrant this ability (which will never actually trigger b/c your opponent can choose not to fight this with their lifelinkers): Would Khalil defeating some X/5 legendary lifelinking villain be sufficient?
DeleteIgnoring that red herring, I am surprised no one else made a creature here, so nice get. Reach and a big body work for white-green. I feel like vigilance would fit this art and card title better than trample.