CCDD 122112—Panic Elemental

Cool Card Design of the Day
12/21/2012 - I didn't design this for today, nor even consciously select it for today, but it does seem appropriate for the day the world was supposed to end.

CCDD 122012—Deep Contemplation

Cool Card Design of the Day
12/20/2012 - I'm guessing Deep Contemplation is broken in a couple combo decks and nearly unplayable in everything else. Of course, that's true for most cards made to be combo pieces.

Somewhere between Hatching Plans and Cloudshift, I can see this getting some decent use in Limited. Bounce an ETB creature so you can recast it with a cantrip attached. Maybe two if you're mad for value.

CCDD 121912—Gnarly Aurakin

Cool Card Design of the Day
12/19/2012 - Force of Savagery is a pretty awesome Johnny card. It comes with a great big hoop and an equally sized reward. I was curious to see if we couldn't make a version with broader appeal by making it significantly easier to use (at the cost of some raw power). One of the questions casual players ask is if they can enchant Force before it dies to keep it alive. They can't. But maybe they should be able to:

CCDD 121812—Consult the Dragon

Cool Card Design of the Day
12/18/2012 - What happens when you ask a Dragon for advice? If you're lucky or clever, it might give you a powerful secret. If you're not, it'll likely kill you on the spot. You'll learn something important either way, though that may be cold comfort to a dragon's meal.

Consult the Dragon will always draw you a card, and might help you hit hard or remove an opposing creature. Which one is entirely up to fate. Or, if you're a blue mage, you.

CCDD 121712—Headstrong Tutor

Cool Card Design of the Day
12/17/2012 - I think the inspiration for this design was probably, "What kind of Tutor can we get for four mana? What's an effect worth 1 less than Diabolic Tutor?" The only other possibility I can imagine is that I was thinking about how all the good black cards cost 4 and how cute it would be to have an efficient way to tutor them up. 

All I'm saying is, if this was a top-down design, lock me up immediately.

What makes a major set mechanic?

The final pitches are due tomorrow at midnight, so I thought I'd say a bit about what I consider to be the most important questions in determining what makes a good central mechanic for a set.

CCDD 121312—Nessian Battalion

Cool Card Design of the Day
12/13/2012 - Affinity got a bad rap in Mirrodin because it enabled one of the most broken Standard decks ever. We all know that the keyword has potential in another form. Many of us have messed with it a bit, and today is one of my attempts.

There are a few ways you can go with Affinity. Remember, it's a reward for getting a bunch of a certain type of permanent out. You could choose something ubiquitous like Affinity for lands, but that's silly; Lands are already a metric for how much you can cast and that ability would just mean "this card costs half what is says it does" most of the time. The Oxidda Golem cycle keyed off specific basic land types and while that's similar, it's kind of halfway toward Imperiosaur, Spectral Procession or Leatherback Baloth where we're asking the player to build her land base—and thus her deck—in a particular way.