Saturday, May 8, 2021

Weekend Design Challenge 050721 - Dungeons and Dragons

Happy Friday Artisans! Click through to see this weekend's design challenge. Your mission is to design a custom Magic card that follows the guidelines. Over the course of the weekend, give feedback to your fellow designers on their designs and incorporate their feedback to iterate on your own. I'll try to offer some feedback of my own starting on Monday.

A few cards from the upcoming D&D-themed set were spoiled this week. One was "Power Word Kill", a well-known D&D spell. For this weekend's challenge, choose a D&D spell (here's one list) and design an uncommon instant or sorcery card for it. Watch out that the name doesn't conflict with an existing Magic card (though if you find an appropriate reprint I'd be excited to hear it).

Good luck and have fun!

10 comments:

  1. Create food and water || {1}{G}{W}
    Sorcery
    Create a food token and two drink tokens (Drink tokens are Food artifact tokens with "{1}, {T}, Sacrifice this artifact: You gain 1 life, scry 1")
    Draw a card

    I saw an opportunity to make drink tokens and i took it.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I like it. Is it intended that the Drink tokens also have the base "2, T, Sac: gain 3" Food ability? That doesn't make flavor sense to me.

      Delete
  2. True Strike {R}
    Instant
    Choose target permanent or player. The next spell you cast this turn that targets that permanent or player costs {2} less to cast.
    Draw a card.

    True Strike is known for being... let's say "situational" in D&D, but I tried to make it fairly decent here while still keeping the flavor.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. minor wording thing: couldn't this just use "choose any target..." ?
      though, i can see this having a lot of potential. neat job!

      Delete
    2. As far as I know, "any target" is shorthand for any target that can be dealt damage, i.e. creature / player / planeswalker. So that can't be used here.

      It's really cool how this sits in red's color pie as a kind of situational "ritual"-- one could also template it as "Add CC. Spend this mana only to cast spells that target a permanent or player. Draw a card."

      Given the flavor, would it make more sense to restrict this to opponents and permanents you don't control?

      Delete
  3. Oh, those examples are fairly good.

    I'll try:

    Efteran's Sleep 3U
    Instant
    Tap any number of target creatures with combined toughness 4 or less
    Each creature tapped this way doesn't untap in their controller's next untap step unless their controller pays 2.

    I'm not sure if the right way to balance it. Not tapping a big creature is a big step down but the flexibility makes up for it. Not sure if I should change the cost or the toughness limit or remove the next turn rider

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The balance issues here are definitely interesting. Instant speed lets you stop 2 turns of attacks versus 1 from OG Sleep, but the drawbacks neuter that advantage substantially. I like how you turned the total-HP mechanic of the D&D spell into a Magic equivalent. My guess is that the combined-toughness limitation is harsher than it looks, and that balance should focus on tuning that. I would suggest dropping the "unless their controller pays 2" part to shed complexity.

      Delete
  4. Bones of the Earth {2}{U}{B}
    Instant
    Tap up to six target creatures. Those creatures don’t untap during their controllers’ next untap step. Put a -1/-1 counter on each of those creatures.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. That's cool, and seems crazy strong. It doesn't really give me a feeling for the spell's flavor, though. What about something like:

      Bones of the Earth 2UR
      Instant
      For each creature that's attacking you, create a 0/3 red Wall creature token with defender. It blocks that creature this turn if able. At the end of combat, sacrifice it and it deals 3 damage to each creature it blocked this turn.

      Delete
    2. This does convey the idea better than the version I submitted indeed. As for the power level, I was aiming for something close to Sleep, and I thought setting a maximum number of creatures would compensate for the counters. Maybe if I worded it like "Tap up to six target creatures target opponent controls"?

      Thank you for the feedback, cheers!

      Delete