Weekend [Art] Challenge Review 021414—Imitation is the Sincerest Form of Flattery

Weekend Art Challenge Review
Here's the challenge we're reviewing today. Note that blogger had some technical difficulties, partially inhibiting our usual back-and-forth.

Gitaxian Implantation is a griefer card in the style of Ken Nagle (known to be one of R&D's biggest griefers along with Tom LaPille and Aaron Forsythe). It coincidentally uses a mechanic Richard Garfield once gunslinged with. There are substantial logistical impediments to actually printing something like this, but you can't deny the idea is very invasive in a way that is perfect for the Phyrexians.

This card is designed in the style of Skaff Elias back in the time of Ice Age: "He seemed to like strong answers, cards that hosed narrow strategies, and the give and take that can come from that." Green Knight can block blue's flying creatures and black's fear creatures.

I personally wish it had first strike (like White Knight and Black Knight) because trading with Silver Erne doesn't qualify as 'hosing flying' in my book, but then again creature were pretty bad back then.

Ignore the rarity symbols on this and the upcoming old style cards. I didn't see an easy way to remove those.

Highbranch Wood is designed in Richard Garfield's style, where "Cards don't have to be good, just flavorful!" The last line affects, like, just Scryb Sprites, but that kind of trinket text was not unusual in the early days.

This card is utterly unprintable by today's standards, and a lovely homage.

Havelock enjoys the honor of being the only designer from this site to have his style referenced. Jousting Steed further explores an idea from a recent A Set in Four Cards. I like how this is fine on its own, and better when you  pair it with a Knight. That said, it's kind of bonkers when you do, as instant-speed, no-mana Giant Growths that last indefinitely and don't cost you a card when the targeted creature dies tend to be.

Keranos's Stormcloud is "based on Mark Globus's style of cards that form a pair." I'm guessing Festering Newt / Bogbrew Witch and/or Marauding Maulhorn / Advocate of the Beast were Globus designs. The similarity to Whelming Wave is notable too. Regardless, some players will love this and some will hate it*, witch means Chah hit this nail on the head.

*Limited players who lack perspective will be upset that some of the named cards don't exist in Theros, but if you consider that they are bonuses above Lightning Strike, and for Commander players you might see it's all upside. Not that that'll stop complainers.

Ordrox Hill Siege-Beasts illustrates Zac Hill's "drive toward flexibility and efficiency" and it's clear that this card is both efficient and flexible. I'm less convinced Zac loves modal spells, but I sure don't know that he avoided them—a big part of what made this challenge so hard is that we only hear a tiny portion of who makes what in R&D, and that only be ravenously consuming DailyMTG.

On its own, this is a card a lot of players would enjoy. I do wish both modes were red-and-green. Apart from being too efficient for a red creature of this rarity, it could easily be mono-red.

Perfect Specimen is an homage to Mark Rosewater, giving us both a Clone and a card that spews counters  like a geyser. Neat to see one of these that rewards you more for duplicating your own creatures without making that a hard restriction. This could also be a lot of fun in multiplayer. What's the brokenest persist creature we can play this with?

Sanctuary of the Wandering Mind aims to evoke Dave Guskin as a rattlesnake card to steer players away from attacking you in multiplayer. In that world, the attacker will likely choose to let you draw unless she's holding absolute chaffe. It's nice that it also works in a duel, though it will play quite differently there.

I'll link to Spell Magic Card Play It so you can see it, but I won't show it here because I suspect it's a joke at the expense of amateur designers in general, and that's not GA's style.

I made four different cards (all pretty decent) trying to emulate Ken Nagle's style of designing sick green fatties with impressive abilities. Ultimately, I think I'm still off the mark and don't think I availed the challenge well. But hey, free CCDDs.

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This challenge was very different and while that proved quite difficult for most of it, that's exactly the kind of thing I want to do more of. Coming at Design from different perspectives is wildly constructive and it's these from-left-field challenges that challenge us most. If there's any value to a challenge, there's more value to a challenging challenge.

I already hit the other major takeaway: That it's often hard to know a particular designer's style since so many cards are designed by committee, or we never see their credit.