Out of half-baked ideas for a design challenge, I spun the "random card" wheel and got Loam Dweller. That is... certainly a Magic card. It reminds me a little of Ranging Raptors and Migratory Greathorn in that it's a ramp payoff for building your deck around a theme of the set. One could argue that Whisperer of the Wilds and Khalni Heart Expedition are also examples of this. Ramp payoffs are tricky to balance because they need to turn on early and reliably to have full value, while satisfying the theme early and reliably is difficult by design.
So here's your challenge: Pick a set mechanic or theme and design a green card (common or uncommon) that rewards that theme by ramping. For bonus points, use a novel mechanic or theme, or at least one that we haven't yet seen a card like this for.
Good luck and have fun!
Ah, interesting. Do you mean, either an existing set, or a hypothetical or fan set?
ReplyDeleteEither!
DeleteIt's right, it is a hard niche to identify though. Usually ramp OR theme is a deck archetype, so there's not that many decks that want both.
DeletePerson Who Turns Swords to Plowshares 2G
ReplyDeleteCreature - Human Artificer
T, Unattach an Equipment from a creature you control: Search your library for a basic land card, put it onto the battlefield tapped, then shuffle your library.
2/2
Cool concept! "Unattach" being repeatable makes the gameplay even tougher to balance-- this is a better Frontier Guide as long as you control an Equipment-- and I'm not sure it fits the flavor. (Also, Mono-green caring about equipment is kind of unusual.) But requiring a sacrifice would make this too often not worth it, and the need to build a deck with a critical mass of equipment is a great choice of a hoop to jump through.
DeleteMagus of the Swell GU
ReplyDeleteCreature - Elf Wizard (U)
Whenever you copy a spell, you may search your library for a basic land card and put it onto the battlefield tapped.
2/2
OK, themes want ramp? Ones that can make use of the extra mana. Let's say, replicate. That could be green with a flavour of "overpowering vastness spell" instead of "tricky quick spell". Although I realized the same idea would work for other mechanics that copy a spell as lots of them rely on having mana to copy an expensive spell.
Probably I shouldn't do that, making the uncommon more open ended makes it more johnny-fun but less limited-signpost. It could always be tweaked to call out the mechanic in the current set.
I tried to make this a spell that had replicate and awarded you for any spells with replicate, but it was too fiddly. So instead it just has a body, but gives you an extra reward for replication, even once.
Copying a spell is a fun choice and I agree with your reasoning about how to implement it. As a theme it would require a lot of environmental support but there are definitely sets that might want it. Nice work!
DeleteKraul Composter 2GB
ReplyDeleteCreature-Insect Shaman (Uncommon)
Undergrowth-When ~ enters the battlefield reveal the top X cards of your library, where X is the number of creature cards in your graveyard. Put all land cards revealed this way onto the battlefield tapped and the rest into your graveyard.
4/4
That's a neat way to do a ramp reward with a scaling effect! It's a big payoff on an already efficient card, too, which makes up for how tough it is to set up. To get full value this requires multiple creatures in the graveyard plus something to do with 6+ mana, so it's running into the classic ramp-payoff problem I described. Making it a 4/4 for 4 even in the worst case goes a long way toward addressing that issue, though.
DeleteRemaha's Reclaimer 2G
ReplyDeleteCreature - Human Druid
Survivor - When ~ 's damage is removed, you may search your library for a basic land card and put it in play, tapped.
2/4
That's a cool mechanic idea-- like a narrower version of Enrage or Inspired. Triggering it won't be reliable, but it also won't require any additional setup (the same as Ranging Raptors) and the stats are good on their own, so the card is plenty appealing. That plus being an effect that makes sense on the end step makes this a great choice of ramp payoff card. One quirk of Survivor is that it's mostly up to the opponent whether it triggers, even more so than Enrage, so while the ability does provide value it mostly does so in the form of encouraging the opponent not to attack or block.
DeleteHermit Troll 1G
ReplyDeleteCreature - Troll (Uncommon)
When Hermit Troll enters the battlefield, create a Food token. (It’s an artifact with “{2}, {T}, Sacrifice this artifact: You gain 3 life.”)
Whenever you sacrifice a Food, you may pay {2}. If you do, you may search your library for a basic land card, put it onto the battlefield tapped, then shuffle your library.
0/3
You can see the card here: https://mtg.design/i/hhps12
I'm sorry I'm so late :( I designed the card in the weekend but forgot to post it here.
Hi~! I'm new here :) I'm gonna try make an account because I'm posting as Unknown. Anyway, I'd love to hear feedback from you guys.
DeleteStay safe out there!
This is a good design. I think that it would be fine if it had {2 or 3} Sacrifice a food: Search your library for a basic land card, put it onto the battlefield tapped, then shuffle your library.
DeleteWelcome!
DeleteThe food theme is a smart choice because it's both a mana sink (so the deck is more likely to use its extra lands) and a life-gain effect (so the deck is planning to have the game go longer anyway).
For similar reasons I think the mana-intensive trigger is a mistake: it's asking the player to commit a lot of mana as the precondition to getting more mana. What about rewording the second ability as "3, Sacrifice a Food: Search..."?
oh wow, I just realized that I reached the same conclusion as AS14... sorry I didn't read the reply carefully! :-)
DeleteShaping the Garden
ReplyDelete2G
Instant(Uncommon)
Convoke(Your creatures can help cast this spell. Each creature you tap while casting this spell pays for 1 or one mana of that creature's color.)
Search your library for X basic land cards and put them onto the battlefield tapped, where X is equal to the number of untapped lands you control.
This might be rare. Without playing it, I’m unsure.
I also considered making the number of lands equal the number of creatures you tapped to convoke it. I think that is more balanced overall. I fancied the idea of counting untapped lands. But after playing a game it is insane on any turn past turn 3. If you have three creatures you search for four basic lands and this gets worse every turn. So I would change it to the number of creatures tapped to convoke it. It still may be a rare.
DeleteAlso I missed the obvious shuffle effect, so imagine I didn’t forget please.
DeleteNeat use of convoke! The "army" theme is a good choice to pair with the ramp payoff since it'll satisfy the condition early if the deck is working at all.
DeleteWith the scaling effect this design does seem rare; after playing a creature on turns 2 and 3 this would fetch 3 lands on turn 4 and still leave 3 mana to cast a spell, which is tons better than something like Explosive Vegetation. Even if this just fetched 1 basic land it would be a fine uncommon, and I'd still count it as a build-around payoff since the upside of casting it on turn 2 is so high.
Dryad Outcast
ReplyDelete{3}{G}
Creature - Dryad (Common)
Affinity for nonbasic lands (This spell costs {1} less to cast for each nonbasic land you control.)
When Dryad Outcast enters the battlefield, until end of turn, you may play an additional land.
2/2
In some ways this almost works like a turn restriction timer. By turn two, someone might be willing to spend two mana on a bear and get an extra land out of your hand. By turn three it's probably a pretty decent bargain for getting any other lands that you've searched up out of your hand more quickly.
This would probably shine best in conjunction with other cards which put lands into your hand, like Expedition Map or Sylvan Scrying.
I'm guessing this could still pass for an uncommon, especially given its power/toughness, but I'm honestly not sure how valuable this ability might be in some constructed formats.
Oops! Can't edit it. That's supposed to be (Uncommon) after the creature type.
DeleteSow the Sands
ReplyDelete{1}{G}
Sorcery (Common)
Untap up to one target land.
Clash with an opponent. If you win, you may put a land from your hand onto the battlefield. (Each clashing player reveals the top card of his or her library, then puts that card on the top or bottom. A player wins if his or her card had a higher converted mana cost.)
Early in the game, in a set that encourages green to have expensive spells (which should probably be most sets?) this can be a good inclusion for decks with lots of large creatures by giving you better odds to win the clash and more mana on the battlefield to summon your big beasts faster.
In other decks, it might be more valuable as a sort of Manamorphose-ing effect, helping you filter one of your lands' colors into another.
I'm assuming this isn't too strong for common.