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CardName: Deflecting Palm Cost: RW Type: Sorcery - Instant Pow/Tgh: / Rules Text: Flash The next time a source of your choice would deal damage to you this turn, prevent that damage. If damage is prevented this way, Deflecting Palm deals that much damage to that source's controller. Flavour Text: Set/Rarity: East vs West None |
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Instant as a subtype and flash? Instant as a supertype is the usual suggestion. What's up with this? I would get one or the other, but both?
Also, REPRINT: Deflecting Palm.
I thinking have multiple supertypes is self-defeating. A supertype should be the broadest possible category something [a card] can fall under, so having two supertypes doesn't make any sense to me. I also dislike it aesthetically.
The idea of making instant a subtype seems much more natural to me, and the point of having Flash is that the subtype draws attention to the rules text and the two become linked, generally. This is the design Fantasy Flight Games (FFG) adopts with their Living Card Game (LCG) model. In Android: Netrunner, the subtypes almost always come with particular rules text associated with them. I will link you examples if you are curious.
This idea of making Instant a subtype of Sorcery is something I'd been thinking about for a while, as well as some other subtypes for the Sorcery type. Cantrips always have 'draw a card' after all other text. Arcane cards could have something unique to them... I'm not quite sure yet. Charms could always be on cards that offer two or more modular options; Rituals always play with mana, either adding it or filtering it, etc. Trap is another example - it always has a specific rules text associated with it.
WotC does a lot of weird things I don't understand. For example, the only subtypes of Enchantments are Auras and Curses, and as you'll notice Auras always come with specific rules text: "Enchant X". Curses work much the same way, always affecting a specific player. But then there were the 'Quest' Enchantments from 1st Zendikar block which would've been a really cool subtype for Enchantments except they weren't legitimized as a subtype.
(IDK, I've always wanted to design my own card game, and I do a lot different from WotC. That's exactly why I've been out of Magic for so long and I've gotten more into FFG's LCG model. I think they've learned a lot from WotC, but WotC is in such a position that they can't really change their model or retcon cards. I think their model is toxic for players, but it sure makes them a ton of money. /rant)
What do you mean with two supertypes? You are aware that sorcery is not a supertype, right?
Right, my mistake. Sorcery is the base type. Even so, I dislike supertypes aesthetically and I dislike having multiple base type cards: I think like it clashes with the idea of the base type.
Are these supposed to be two duel decks? Seems odd for them to be 3+ colors each.
Supertypes are used for functional types such as legendary, snow, and basic. Why would you undo that tech? Ie. Would you rather have "Creature - Goblin Legend" or "Legendary Creature - Goblin" or whatever that "Counts as a Goblin" shenanigan was back in the day? Mixing functional types with nonfunctional types would be a mistake IMO. Since base types are the ones that tell you how to play with it, isn't logical to apply all types that would affect that play as a super type, a modifier if you will, before the said basic type? Subtype, as indicated by "-" before, tells it something that comes after all that, in an abstractly rules hierarchy way.
To me it looks clear that subtypes are preferably the flavorful ones, though they might have tribal implications. So for spells, stuff like "ritual" or maybe along the lines of d&d spell schools such as "necromancy" or "illusionism". Perhaps "elementalism", "psychic/mental", "Fire/ice/lightning", etc? This is actually something I've spent a lot of time thinking - as in, what kind of environment would properly play into this so as to justify this kind of "grand noncreature type update".
Sorcery is a card type... and nobody suggests that you put sorcery as a card type and instant as a card type on the same card. But clearly you are changing the rules here in a way that makes instant no longer a card type, so the question is why you turn it into a subtype rather than a supertype?
The problem with making it a subtype is that using it as a linked marker for flash only works on sorceries, while flash will continue to appear on permanents sans marker. That's why usually a supertype is used.
I do not understand the criticism of artifact creatures and legendary creatures.
(BTW: With Wizards now releasing more supplemental preconstructed products that are meant for standalone play (Archenemy: Nicol Bolas, Explorers of Ixalan) it mimics the distribution method of LCGs, so maybe... Topical Constructed/PreConstructed is interesting?)
As for why things like quests don't get subtypes, Wizards has a strict policy of only giving non-creatures subtypes if they're mechanically relevant. I think that's dumb, subtypes should be for flavor
@Mal: I was thinking West would be W/G and East would be WUBRG. Making that work though is challenging me.
@Tahazzar: I just really don't like the aesthetic / visual design of having two or more types before the "-" separating them (either the [supertype] [basetype] model or the dual [basetype] [basetype] model). However, I want to point out that Snow doesn't have any actual rules associated with the supertype. It is used merely as a tag for certain spells or card effects. You make an interesting point though about having "Creature - Goblin Legend" or "Legendary Creature - Goblin" or "Counts as a Goblin". The ideal aesthetic, for me, is having "Legendary" be rules text, i.e. Legendary (No more than one creature with this name can be on the battlefield.) Or something to that effect, anyways. Let me pose a hypothetical to you then, a counterpoint: Why not have "Devoid Creature"? Why is Devoid rules text and not a supertype? Similarly, why have 'color indicators' and not just say 'Red Creature' when needed? (I personally think that would be hideous visually, but as you can see I'm against having supertypes.) :P
@SecretInfiltrator: The suggestion has always been "Instant Sorcery" in the MTG community (MaRo himself prefers this, but I think it's ugly design.) As I explained to Tahazzar, I think supertypes preceding basetypes or having two basetypes (i.e. Artifact Creature) is just not pleasing to me. I think basetypes should be the base and that any further differentiation should come from subtypes. I had considered the effect of linking 'Instant' with the Flash keyword and what that means for creatures with Flash but I don't think it'd really be a problem because the subtype 'Instant' is only partially as a marker for Flash on Sorcery cards, the other part of it is as a tag for relevant effects, i.e. "number of Instants in your graveyard", etc. An example might be how all Walls have Defender but not every creature with Defender is a Wall.
@dude1818: I also think that subtypes should be for flavor, but I think it's distasteful to have subtypes appear only as a 'one off' thing, like 'Shrines' or 'Cartouches' for Enchantments.
> "Why is Devoid rules text and not a supertype?"
That's a good question. Devoid was poorly received and MaRo agrees that it might have been better as a supertype:
http://markrosewater.tumblr.com/post/161121156268/do-you-think-devoid-would-have-been-better
> "Similarly, why have 'color indicators' and not just say 'Red Creature' when needed? "
You mean colors as supertypes? What? You would always have to have them for consistency's sake so they would be horrendous with multicolored creatures. Besides, the card's colors are determined in vast majority of cases by the mana used to cast them so it would be pointless.
@Tahazzar: I'm surprised Devoid was poorly recieved - I was pleasantly surprised when I saw the mechanic and I thought it was a cool idea. I think Devoid Creature would be hideous. Also, the color indicator is what precedes some card types where the creature has no casting cost but still retains a color, i.e. Ancestral Vision.
Devoid: "This doesn't have a thing which is irrelevant in modern magic? Woo."
Colour-hate isn't really a thing, so what did devoid actually bring to the table that artifacts with "sacrifice this:" did not already do?
Colour as supertype - I can see it. We already say "Red Creature" and (sometimes) have a little colour blob where the word red word go. It does seem a bit redundant, though.
Anyway, regarding this card. Literally Reverse Damage but dual-colour and one cheaper? Seems legit.
Really, they just should have used a specialized color indicator rather than a keyword or supertype. The only reason they failed at making a good colorless indicator is because they backed themselves into a corner by their insistence not to introduce the colorless symbol one set earlier - if they introduce the symbol for colorless in the same set (highly visible on all the Scions) and use it to create a symbolic (color-blindness friendly even) indicator they save space bost on type line and text box - of all the small accumulated misses of that block the one I'm probably most bitter about.
And I don't even "hate" devoid.
There is nothing wrong with introducing subtypes as one-ofs. Some you will pick up again sooner, some later. Curse was introduced for use in a single set once, now it appeared in the return to the plane, another plane and a supplemental product.
But not every type has the same pickup rate. We got a lot of Atogs, but only one Sable. How many years were there between the first Gremlin in Antiquities and the second in Mirrodin Besieged?
Really surprised about the hate for Obsianus Golem.
I really think there are better subtypes to plaster on your cards than "Instant". Heck, I'd consider renaming the keyword before the proposed solution.
Reminder: Deflecting Palm is a REPRINT.
Irrelevant, but snow does have rules meaning. Snow mana costs can only be paid by mana produced by snow permanents.