CardName: Challenge # 094
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Pow/Tgh: /
Rules Text: Design a card that can only be cast at sorcery speed.
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Set/Rarity: Multiverse Design Challenge None
Challenge # 094
Design a card that can only be cast at sorcery speed.
This is a very tricky challenge. Partly because my mind wants to come up with something very different. But there seems to be only so many reasons why you would use a sorcery specifically. I'm listing them for my benefit. Feel free to correct/add others I forgot.
Power level considerations. Smoldering Tar for example. I get the impression that ability needed to be sorcery speed so that Lightning Blast still had value in R/B. That reason is outside the scope of the challenge.
Meta-textual context. Inspiriation is a worse card than Divination. Except when it's better, like in a world full of flash creatures. Also, outside the scope of the challenge.
Simplicity's sake. Stun doesn't really need to be an instant. It makes it a better card, but, personally, I think the card makes more sense as a sorcery (though, I agree that it's nice to have an occasional card that bucks the trend.) This seems like it's inside the scope of the challenge, though, it's a very light touch.
Gives the opponent a chance to respond. Discard is the obvious poster-child for this, with some discard cards becoming insanely expensive if you sped them up to instant speed (Mind Peel with buyback, for example, would be brutal at anything less than 9 mana.)
Conceptually, only a sorcery would make sense. amuseum and I went after this ground with cards that were themed around doing things the slow way. Both cards could be instants... but that would kind of defeat the point of the card.
Being able to respond with the card in question would be game breaking. Worldfire is a good example of this sort of card. If Worldfire was an instant, you could shoot a Shock at your opponent, and respond with Worldfire. That would be kind of stupid, though... not because a 2-card combo that cost 10 mana is broken so much that wasn't what Worldfire intended to do, yet it would be the way everyone would play the card from that point on.
It feeds other sorceries. Recoup would be broken at instant speed for a similar reason that Worldfire is broken at instant speed. (Occasional cards like Quicken break this rule... but that was the point of Quicken.)
I don't think jmg's list includes something for why the big splashy "gorilla" cards like Wrath of God are sorceries. I'm having a little difficulty putting it into words myself... something like: Wizards prefer it if big spells that impact the board or players' hands in a big way are sorceries because the game's better if not everything happens in the end step?
That's a good point. I think it's more like "When a spell is so important that you want to stop everyone and tell them what you are doing, you want to do it on your turn." It's like you're playing host to a critical event. We don't wipe the board/start a mini-game/gain control of all my opponent's creatures/gain twenty life any old time. We do it on my turn, while sitting on my throne, as I laugh maniacally at the heroes scrabbling against the walls of my sanctum. Those are the Dragonball Z moments where everyone stops and gawks at Goku while he goes Super Saiyan. It's totally a Vorthos reason, but it seems pretty legit to me.
There may be another reason why Gorilla splashes need to be played on your turn, though. I still feel, even if we didn't count the coolness factor of playing it when you're in your base, that there's something unbalancing about too many Gorillas being Routs. But that might be a bit of grandfathering talking.
That is, a card whose effects makes little sense to be cast at instant speed.
At first, I couldn't think what that would be. Then I thought of Surge of Zeal and Geosurge. Entry to follow...
actually geosurge makes a lot of sense as instant due to its combo potential. i think they made it sorcery to hold back that potential.
instant haste might have some corner uses if the creature has an ability that requires tapping.
most things to do with playing lands, like Summer Bloom makes sense as sorcery-only.
Added Dire Monologue.
See Path of the Sorcerer
This is a very tricky challenge. Partly because my mind wants to come up with something very different. But there seems to be only so many reasons why you would use a sorcery specifically. I'm listing them for my benefit. Feel free to correct/add others I forgot.
Did I forget anything?
Added Devil's Do.
Claws of the Abyss
I don't think jmg's list includes something for why the big splashy "gorilla" cards like Wrath of God are sorceries. I'm having a little difficulty putting it into words myself... something like: Wizards prefer it if big spells that impact the board or players' hands in a big way are sorceries because the game's better if not everything happens in the end step?
That's a good point. I think it's more like "When a spell is so important that you want to stop everyone and tell them what you are doing, you want to do it on your turn." It's like you're playing host to a critical event. We don't wipe the board/start a mini-game/gain control of all my opponent's creatures/gain twenty life any old time. We do it on my turn, while sitting on my throne, as I laugh maniacally at the heroes scrabbling against the walls of my sanctum. Those are the Dragonball Z moments where everyone stops and gawks at Goku while he goes Super Saiyan. It's totally a Vorthos reason, but it seems pretty legit to me.
There may be another reason why Gorilla splashes need to be played on your turn, though. I still feel, even if we didn't count the coolness factor of playing it when you're in your base, that there's something unbalancing about too many Gorillas being Routs. But that might be a bit of grandfathering talking.
While we're talking about this kind of thing, it's worth noting that of course Mark Rosewater has written an article on it.
If everything is an instant, why even have turns?
I approach it that everything should be sorcery speed unless it really has to be faster to be its thing.
Letter of Rejection is my attempt sat my own challenge.
Added Welcome the Void.