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CardName: Trained Warhorse Cost: 1W Type: Creature - Horse Pow/Tgh: 2/2 Rules Text: Escort (See comments -- help me decide which mechanic to submit for the Goblin Artisans weekend design challenge) Flavour Text: Set/Rarity: Cards With No Home None

Trained Warhorse
{1}{w}
 
Creature – Horse
Escort (See comments — help me decide which mechanic to submit for the Goblin Artisans weekend design challenge)
2/2
Updated on 04 Jun 2018 by Jack V

History: [-]

2018-06-02 12:38:43: Jack V created and commented on the card Trained Warhorse

Help me decide which mechanic to submit for Goblin Artisan's weekend design challenge.

Ok, mechanics! I trawled through my old cards (mostly on AlexC's multiverse site) looking for the best mechanics I've come up with.

Usually the mechanics that have the most design space are combat mechanics. Ideally, something where you can slap it on a french vanilla creature and get an interesting result. I know this mechanic doesn't HAVE to be that broad, but it would be nice if it could, and if it's supporting that many commons, a deep, broad mechanic would be desirable.

The most promising I have is "escort", another (alas) spin on "fixed banding" or "a mount mechanic". There are surprisingly few mechanics that care about who a creature is attacking with at all. And I particularly like one that CAN be used to show a rider and mount, but doesn't HAVE to be.

But as it turns out, I had two different versions and I'm not sure which to go with, or to go with a combination of both.

  1. Escort N (Whenever CARDNAME attacks, you may have another target attacking creature get +N/+N UEOT. [Further details])

(N is always equal to the creature's printed power, but is spelled out to avoid extra math if the creature is pumped, and to allow future sets to change the number.)

  1. Escort (Whenever CARDNAME attacks, target attacking creature can't be blocked this turn unless CARDNAME is also blocked. [details])

  2. Escort N (Whenever CARDNAME attacks, target attacking creature gets +N/+N UEOT and can't be blocked this turn unless CARDNAME is also blocked. [details])

In all cases, there are templating tweaks to make it clear what happens if there's multiple creatures with escort, but they are slgihtly different in each case.

In all cases, what I like is that the creature provides a bonus which is useful if you just swing, but MORE useful if you can use it in the right situation. And that your opponent can limit its usefulness by killing either creature, but that usually still helps you, and because your creature helps another creautre get through.

In all cases, extra effects can be tacked on (e.g. the blocking restriction version can have some cards that also give +N/+N, and the power pump mechanic can have some flying cards that also grant flying, and you can add other effects too like with soulbond).

Examples include mounts of all sorts (small ones, big ones, mythic ones, flying ones), bodyguards, scouts, outriders, army vanguards, supernatural guides, etc.

Which version sounds best to build on?

In fact, the new damage assignation rules might possibly make an actual mount mechanic like equip or crew that much closer to being plausible. Although I doubt it will work out, it's too ambitious for this challenge.

The principles are something like (i) a mount may attack or block ridden by a single creature (which is itself neither mounting nor mounted) (ii) blocking restrictions on the rider are ignored, the rider blocks/is blocked when and only when the mount is (iii) damage is assigned to mount before rider (iv) it may be a "form a pair when you attack" thing or a "pay equip-like cost, become rider" thing.

I think that covers all the necessary things, and it's quite intuitive. And I don't think there's a lot of edge cases. However, it's still a bit too much for reminder text, sadly.

I've personally never found the mechanics of 'mounting' compelling solutions and these are no different. On the other hand, I still find 'crewing' to be a bit 'off'.

Maybe some pseudo-bestow variant could work?

Recently a mount mechanic appeared on /r/custommagic, but it suffers from increasing the board complexity too much: https://www.reddit.com/r/custommagic/comments/8o5aub/mounting_custom_mechanic/

Actually a simple "assign damage before others" variant of banding may solve quite a few problems with banding - including working the same way for attackers and blockers - at least if the flavor defines who is the escorted and who is the escortee.

"When this creature attacks, you may have it escort target non-escorting attacking creature as long as this creature is still on the battlefield. Escorted creatures cannot be blocked. If this creature is blocked, creatures escorted by it are considered blocked."

Yes, this wording means that an Escort with flying effectively passes on flying to creatures it escorts. This should probably be implied in the flavor of flying escorts.

I kind of like how my version flips banding on its head. Benalish Hero used to be one of the best banders because it was so effecient, altering combat for just a single mana. A 1/1 creature with JMEscort doesn't do so much. It falls to Grizzly Bears. And the escorted creature ends up neutralized and tapped (It still might make a reasonable escort if your opponent has a Blade of the Sixth Pride, though.)

JMEscort relies on big bruisers, or evasive vehicles, or just plain nastiness like deathtouch to get the creature escorted through. Flavor-wise, this makes more sense to me than a scrawny doofus impishly providing a +1 bonus.

FWIW I went with the "can't be blocked unless" version but tied "also get a P/T pump equal to power" to being flavoured as a mount. Examples here: http://goblinartisans.blogspot.com/2018/06/weekend-design-challenge-060118-finding.html?showComment=1528061178019#c6944005548868676343

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