Original Card: Narwhal ­

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• Changed name to plural
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• Changed from rare to uncommon.
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• Removed First strike, added flash.
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• Increased power and toughness by +1/+1.
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Edit: I originally made these a 2/2 first strike, pro red for . ­

I tinkered with Narwhal quite a bit, but found it hard to simplify. Part of the problem is the card is well received. It has a 3.8+ rating on Gatherer, owning to its color-pie breaking abilities, and the pretty Narwhals art. Any changes I make would probably only reduce the star rating. Even decreasing the original card by would probably only serve to highlight how inefficient this card is.

Ideally, I think I would have preferred this version:

Narwhals
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Creature - Whale
Protection from Red
Narwhals gain first strike as long as you control a Plains or a Mountain.
2/2

But it kind of highlights the fact that I'm taking something away from Narwhal, and I'm not sure people would like that. Hmm.

Too many options. I gots the analysis paralysis. Time to step away from the whale.

Narwhals had to change, unfortunately, because it was stepping on Truces toes. I really didn't want to remove first strike because it seemed somehow integral to the card. But blue don't get that, even when it makes sense flavor-wise.

So instead I gave the Narwhals the closest analog to first strike I could think of: flash. Still feels like you got hit first somehow. And it matches the artwork, so that's cool. Still seems wrong to see these guys be anything but Narwhal, though.