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 mono-black noncreature card.
Paincatcher
ReplyDeleteB
Enchantment - Mythic Rare
Whenever you sacrifice a creature, put a blood counter on ~.
Remove X blood counters from ~, Sacrifice ~: Search your library for any number of Demon cards with total converted mana cost X or less and put them onto the battlefield. Shuffle your library afterwards.
Paincatcher tracks your sacrifices (as opposed to making/letting you sacrifice, or counting deaths) and when you're ready, fetches you one or more demons. It puts them directly OTB, which is great, but it's also pretty expensive, getting you one mana's worth of demon for each creature sacrificed.
DeleteRakdos, Lord of Riots seems to be the most efficient get, but a couple of Rakshasa Deathdealers wouldn't hurt. It's unlikely Paincatcher would just fit passively into a deck already sacrificing and summoning demons; You'd want a deck with a huge/infinite sacrifice engine so you can get ALL the demons out of it.
So we've got a Jenny combo card that's maybe Limited playable 1 in 10 times provided the set has a couple good demons and a ton of sacrifice enablers. Not all cards have to be relevant to Limited.
Good flavor.
Unwinnable Bargain
ReplyDelete1B
Sorcery
Search your library for a card. Target opponent may pay any amount of life. Shuffle your library, then put the card in your library X from from the top where X is half the life paid this way (rounded down).
This looked like some sort of demonic invitation. I looked for something where both sides had a potentially interesting decision to make. Do you go for your best card, or a card you can cast now? How scared should your opponent be?
Probably should be "beneath the top X cards of you library", otherwise I'm not sure where the card goes if my opponent pays 1 life.
DeleteI'll stick with unwinnable bargain as my entry, but I couldn't resist toying with other ideas too.
DeleteTempting Offer
4BB
Sorcery
Search your library for two cards and exile them. Shuffle your library. An opponent may cast one of those cards without paying its mana cost. Then you may cast one of those cards without paying its mana cost.
This is the sort of card that usually ends up broken *and* useless. But I'm intrigued in the idea of finding the right spell that helps you but not opponent, not just the most powerful one?
Likewise, another alternate non-submission.
Delete2B Dreamcatcher
Enchantment
If a permanent would be exiled from the battlefield, put it into its owner's graveyard instead.
Partly to fight removal, or to combo with blink effects. Partly as a sideboard against suspend-like abilities, or to enable weird combos.
I know Mark would probably frown on it, but I love Dreamcatcher and would definitely try to use it with Gonti's Aether Heart or Mangara of Corondor, just off the top of my head.
DeleteI love Unwinnable Bargain except for the word 'half.' Development might find it necessary to do that, but it detracts from the purity of the design. I would reject any speculation that it needs to be half, because it's up to the player to be putting enough pressure on to make any life payment relevant and/or to help them dig to buried cards faster.
DeleteThank you both.
DeleteI think preventing exile is more acceptable than undoing it (there are always counterspells). Though Mark may still have questions :)
Or rather, this only turns exile into death; I'm not sure Mark would ok a card that prevented exile (but didn't prevent destruction).
Half is ugly. I tried several different wordings. I considered just not doing that, but it seemed to have too high a risk it would just be useless. If it's one life = one turn delay, four life is likely to be "never" in many games (especially if you're searching for an answer, not a bomb). If it's "1b, pay four life", is that a card people would find useful to play?
Could be "target opponent may pay 2 life any number of times"
DeleteDemonic Ritual 3BB
ReplyDeleteSorcery (R)
Search your library for a non-legendary demon card, put it onto the battlefield, then shuffle your library. You lose life equal to its converted mana cost.
Fair. I mean, without the life cost, this is obviously nuts because it not only acts as demons 5-8, but saves you some or a ton of mana, and lets you silver-bullet some. It might still be problematic, but I won't assume so without testing. It's certainly attractive for Spike.
DeleteIs non-legendary there to cap the tippy-top of the power level?
Bloodgate 1BB
ReplyDeleteSorcery (R)
As an additional cost to cast CARDNAME, pay X life.
Reveal the top X cards of your library. You may put a creature card with converted mana cost X or less from among them onto the battlefield. Put the rest into your graveyard.
A cheap, black Genesis Wave/Genesis Hydra. I don't know. Pay 10-19 life on t2 or t3 to largely guarantee you get something dumb like Iona, Shield of Emeria, Griselbrand, or Progenitus. Seems problematic.
DeleteSeal of Danzalthar BBB
ReplyDeleteEnchantment (R)
At the beginning of your upkeep, put a blood counter on Seal of Danzalthar, then draw a card and lose 1 life for each blood counter on Seal of Danzalthar.
Sacrifice Seal of Danzalthar: You lose 5 life.
Is that meant to be "draw a card, lose N life" or "draw N cards, lose N life"? The latter case seems broken at first glance, but the former case would make this an almost-strictly-worse Phyrexian Arena...
DeleteIts intended to be the latter.
DeleteCumulative Upkeep. Always trying to do huge things while killing its player. This compares pretty well with Phyrexian Etchings which gives you the cards without hurting you as long as you can pay the mana. Seal of Danzalthar doesn't eat up your mana, but it will deal more total damage to you, and sooner.
DeleteThe last ability makes the card read worse, even if it's strictly upside. I'm torn: I want to say leave it off, both for elegance and blackness, but since this card requires a heavy black commitment, and black can't kill its own enchantments, it might just be necessary. It'll feel bad to use, except when Spike does it at the exact optimal moment.
I think the card is already aimed at the Spikes of the world on the surface. Knocking off the last clause makes it more friendly to Johnny since it can lead to Demonic Pact type shenanigans. It is trying to pay an amount of homage to Buffy with the last clause. It might be better for the game overall if its more dangerous.
DeleteDemonic Charm B
ReplyDeleteInstant- Rare
Destroy target creature. That creature's controller chooses one-
- You sacrifice a creature.
- You discard a card.
- You lose 4 life.
Alternate version:
DeleteDemonic Charm B
Instant- Rare
Target creature gets -4/-4 until end of turn.
As an additional cost to cast CARDNAME, choose one--
- Sacrifice a creature.
- Discard a card.
- Pay 4 life.
Not sure whether the modal template works as part of the casting cost-- depends on the spell-casting timing restrictions.
This is neat! The opponent doesn't choose what awful thing you do to them, you're guaranteed your effect; instead they choose which drawback you suffer.
DeleteIf it's printable, the first is cleaner and more clearly worthwhile, but one-mana conditionless removal might not be printable, even with such a drawback.
Rearrange Viscera {3}{B}{B}
ReplyDeleteSorcery - Uncommon
Put three -1/-1 counters on target creature.
If it doesn't die, its controller loses 6 life.
The template for "if it doesn't die" is more complex, but that's not a huge concern. I'm more concerned with the power level of making a creature much smaller and getting a better Lava Axe for the same price. But with a couple tweaked numbers, this is an interesting card. Nice.
Delete