I've been catching up with Mark Rosewater's drive to work podcast. In Podcast #6 (Gold), Mark says that it's a mistake to design a card with two abilities that don't have some sort of connection to each other. That's because players assume synergy, and if your card doesn't have synergy, those players are going to create their own synergy out of the card playing it their own way (also, people like to see synergy, so by not providing it, you're alienating your audience.)

He's right, but this maxim can't be right 100% of the time. Design a card with two couplings that do not link up, and give it some intrinsic value (and I suggest staying away from the Silver-Bordered joke cards. That's too simple an answer.) By the by, I consider this an expert challenge... so don't feel frustrated if you're having a hard time making your card work. I can think of a few good attack strategies, but I'm going to keep mum. I'm not one for spoilers.

Does it count if there's a flavour connection only? For instance, split cards are expected to have two different abilities, which are often mechanically unconnected, but fit together in the name. Or Form of the Dragon, the classic top down card, has three abilities with no mechanical connection to each other, but a big flavour connection :)

Another way is cards like Morphling where part of the point is that the creature has a variety of abilities.

I'll submit a card with a flavour connection in due course, but I'm mulling over other ways of making unconnected abilities seem natural too.

My "Cheaty" suggestion was the lands with tap ability. You can get mana, or you can use the ability. There's no synergy at all there; it's outright tension. But it feels like a complete cop-out.

This is a toughie of a challenge though.

I think cards with deliberate tension would count as "connected", even though they're not synergistic, because the "one or the other" aspect is normally obviously intentional.

But I think lands with a useful ability would be a good example of basically unrelated -- just one that's so natural we've basically forgotten about it. (Similar examples would be many cards with cycling.)

@Vitenka: Oops, sorry, I read the comment before reading the challenge. I think cards with obvious anti-synergy are an exception to Rosewater's guideline because it doesn't look odd, it looks deliberate. But anti-synergy cards would still count for the terms of the challenge.

PS. An example of a flavour-driven card with unconnected abilities, Boromir

Top down flavor is definitely a path... My go to would have been Form of the Dragon as well. That card breaks a lot of rules.

Incidental breaking the color pie is also an option. Vitenka mentions etb tapped lands. I was going to suggest Sun Titan (Vigilance has nothing to do with the ability... it's just part of a keyword cycle). This option is an odd answer to the challenge, but if you can make it work, go for it.

It's funny... it seems that this challenge can be answered by going super-Vorthos, or super-Melvin, but not by having Vorthos and Melvin agree too often. Crushing Vines is another option which features two abilities that both destroy things, but there's no real connection between what's being destroyed. Vision Charm and most other charms don't really have any connection between their modes, either. People like these type of cards because of the diverse options they provide, not because they 'make sense'.
­

I also get the impression that tribal is likely to do this (creatures of my tribe get this sort of boost. I do something completely different) but I'm having a hard time coming up with one off the top of my head. I'm sure they're out there.

Then there's the real oddballs. I can't think of many cards in modern Magic with an utter lack of synergy, but old school Magic has a bunch. Krovikan Elementalist and Witch Hunter seem like good go-to cards.

­Feast or Famine was the first thing I thought of. Then I wondered whether Rix Maadi Guildmage would count... but I think the idea there is that she's explicitly got an ability for situation A and an ability for situation B, so the opponent is damned if they do damned if they don't.

Of course, the classic examples are things like Ranger en-Vec and Ancient Spider, but I'm not sure they count as "good" cards, which is another important part of the challenge.

Created Swarmlord. And now I've just spotted the "at least" in the challenge's wording. How many unconnected abilities can we get onto one card? Probably not as many as Cromat. His regeneration helps with a couple of the other abilities, but apart from that he's impressively disconnected.

I was going to mention "destroy X or Y" cards and charms too, but I wasn't sure if they were cheating.

"it seems that this challenge can be answered by going super-Vorthos, or super-Melvin, but not by having Vorthos and Melvin agree too often"

I think the thing is, the challenge isn't necessarily in the abilities, but the style in presenting them. It's like, I'm assured that clothes which contrast colours can work, and clothes that match colours can work, but clothes that have colours which are similar but different often just look like they were supposed to match but were a mistake.

So two abilities which don't have any reason to have anything to do with each other (eg. charms, titans) are ok. As are abilities which are obviously in tension. But the worst is abilities that look like they're supposed to synergise but don't, and may even get people to play them wrong, assuming that because the first ability says "regenerate" and the second says "when this dies", that it must die and then regenerate.

Come to think of it, something like Sorin's Thirst is an even more blatant example of flavour-justification than Form of the Dragon

Vorthos and Melvin both love the symmetry, because it carves out a specific niche of the colour pie for one particular colour, fits the flavour, and makes it easy to remember that the numbers are the same on both sides.

But there's no actual interaction between the abilities, they just fit together so well that everyone always thinks of them as one single ability.

Sorry to keep posting, but for existing unconnected abilities, how about Staff of Domination?

Mm, I was thinking about Obelisk of Alara similarly. Staff of Domination's first ability ties in very nicely with the others, although yes, the rest are very disconnected.

Wow, good call on black lifedrain, though. Originally they were tied more closely together, back on Drain Life and its Ice Age homage Soul Burn. Wizards rightly simplified it with Consume Spirit, but in the process broke any tie between what you could see as two completely disconnected abilities.

Hmm. There are other cards that are composed of two parts like that, usually "do something to a target" and "get a secondary benefit". There's the Flight of Fancy cycle, effects like Thundermaw Hellkite's, Vedalken Anatomist, Heal the Scars, Gore Vassal, Aurelia's Fury...

Oh yeah, Flight of Fancy is a good example, because it looks unconnected, but it's common to like it when you see it, even if you're surprised by it.

­Drain Life is interesting, I'd forgotten they'd tried to make it more like actually draining. I think the simpler version is fine, because the symmetry does make it look expected, even if it doesn't literally drain. I think the key there is symmetry. If it was "do 3 damage, gain 5 life" you'd ask "huh?", but because the numbers are equal, it looks like it's supposed to be like that. (It works for non-drain effects too, like Smallpox where the effects are related mostly by being nasty, but because they're all "1" the card as a whole looks deliberate.)

It turns out this challenge became more of a discussion than an actual challenge. I'm pretty cool with that, to be honest... though, it's about time I designed something for my own challenge.

Added Salvation // Perdition. It seems we forgot to mention split cards, which are often two cards stapled together. I mean, really? Wax // Wane? There's barely any connection flavor-wise on that card, nevermind mechanical.

I like Sal//Per, but I'm pretty sure I can do better. Will come back and try again.

Split cards were the first thing I thought of, but I couldn't actually think of any examples. Salvation // Perdition is a good example.

I think split cards are fine if there's no connection between the halves, that being what they're supposed to do. Ideally there'd be two effects which mirror each other thematically (if "wax" and "wane" fit the names a bit more specifically), but don't have any mechanical connection.

I've been trying to think of an example like Swarmlord, with two on-the-board abilities which don't synergise (or complement) each other, but those are naturally the hardest to do without misleading players (either "wait, I thought those two abilities would interact" or "I can't play this, the second ability has nothing to do with my deck").

OK, after a lot of mulling, how about Sceptre of the Veil?

Added another entry: Warlord's Staff.

I'm impressed at squeezing five abilities on! :)

I added Ogre Spirit Spear

Added Rishadan Spellsword.

And a fairly unspectacular Forest Fixer

I made Shard Tether, and a long time ago I made Elsana, Master Evasionist. I'm not sure they really fulfill the "good card" requirement, though.