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Recent updates to Community Set: (Generated at 2025-12-19 11:09:26)
Black needs fortification tutors if we're to move forward with the plan. This is a fortification tutor, meant to invoke Demonic Tutor and Burning Wish. Funny thing is, made a sorcery like this, it doesn't look common... but the simplest execution of this is a plain common, so if this works, it will works like this.
Banding is a pretty nifty pair of abilities, oddly smooshed together. The Defensive Formation ability is jolly useful. The attack-in-a-band bit is confusing.
I would like to, and I'll try to find time, but over the next few days, and perhaps longer, I'm going to be very busy with school and very stressed out. That's why I've been posting so many random card ideas: because I can't concentrate on anything in-depth right now.
The red, blue and green skeletons have been provisionally roughed out. We're still thinking over black. We seem to have enough ideas for white to do the skeleton, does anyone want to take charge of soliciting and winnowing ideas? L2i0n0k7?
Another comparison might be Tribute to Hunger or Cruel Edict. That suggests sometimes Thrun will indeed just get screwed by a timely uncommon. Although this is obviously somewhat more swingy.
I just know that if your opponent sacs a Sakura-Tribe Elder into a round three Thrun, the Last Troll and you followed up with this, there'd be a lot of swearing. Whether that's fair or not, though, is a development issue... but there will be times when this card is much better than Mind Control. Just saying.
Heh. I'm going to have to devote some mindspace to this...
Oh yeah, a battering ram would be a good idea in some set. You'd have to say the creatures can't be equipped to anything else (or at a minimum, can only be equipped to one multi-equipment), but it would be cool.
Yeah, some more mechanical alternatives to "building up a big fortification over time" would be good to hear.
In fact, another way to capture the "building an edifice" flavour would be artifacts or fortifications that get counters in a pseudo-level up fashion. "Sacrifice a creature: put a pyramid counter on ~. If ~ has N or more pyramid counters on, you're the pharoah and everyone respects you."
Yeah. I think having +1/+1 on green, and -1/-1 on black is a possibility (not a very good idea, but normally it's not even a possibility). No, wait, green probably still wants to put +1/+1 tokens on black creatures so maybe it doesn't work unless we can retemplate.
I like the "-1/-1 counter" version a lot for flavour reasons, which is where this card was originally coming from, but I agree we often have to compromise, and the other possibilities (including mechanical stuff like being able to unearth the creature once without haste, or something) work equally well mechanically.
Thank you. Good point about Enslave, it fits the flavour perfectly, it should be in provisionally.
Costing needs playtesting. I think getting the worst creature, rather than eliminating their best, is considerably worse, but I don't know for sure and I don't know how often you'll hit something giant anyway. Like Slave Auction, I really liked the "mean" flavour, it'd be nice if we can keep the feel without overpowering the card -- after all, taxing you for being in the same room is very black :)
Oh, hey, that's a good idea. It's probably too cheap (considering that your next best option is Enslave), but that can be changed. By the way... how come no one's offered reprinting Enslave yet? Too obvious?
I smiled. I was looking for a follow-up to my "Too many Spikes!" card called "Too much Melvin!" This sentence feels like it belongs somewhere on that card.
It's kooky, but I like it, and wouldn't kill it for that. We'll see if we have the room for it. I'll have to think about some sort of early maths card myself. "Travel the Hypotenuse" sounds like an awesome name for a card...
While I spelled out why I don't think banding is wise on Harsh Taskmaster, I got to give you some credit for not trying to dig up the keyword, and, instead, only using the terminology "in a band". It certainly makes this a more likely option, but I fear the reminder text would still be daunting.
I've got a big box, and it 'in theory' contains one of every card for drafting. Whenever a card with banding pops up, I got to stop everything and explain exactly what banding does. It takes, like, 4 minutes. It's got a lot of rules baggage, and often requires creating examples up to explain what's going on.
It's also incredibly powerful. After Double Strike, I'd say banding is one of the most powerful keyword abilities you can slap on a creature. Despite that, people see a card with banding and fly right past it, not considering it an option, because they don't want to think about it. That's got to be a bit telling.
That being said, you're right, chain gangs feel like they should have something like banding. We could use that... banding is full of nooks and crannies, and we can focus on a part of banding and pull that apart (for example, this creature may attempt to divide combat damage among blocked creatures if it is attacking... just not part of a band). Players who've played the game may recognize it and smile, as well. I don't think Banding is right out as a mechanic anymore, and, in theory, I think it could come back... in the same way that no one ever thought Bucky Barnes, Captain America's sidekick would ever come back, because it was a sacred cow. Given enough time, breaking the taboo will seem more exciting than dangerous. But if it was to happen, it would absorb much more of a set's design than we'd be willing to give to it. It would need to be more present than Bushido in Kamigawa. If we aren't willing to warp our set that much, we shouldn't touch it.
Oh, yes Dude, that's much better. Switched.
Also, yes, Mammoth Support Beams is reason enough to give this a Fortify cost. Someone is bound to complain if we didn't. Added absurd Fortify cost, so that people don't accidently do it, then read the card.
Also, I've been thinking about this card, and realized that maybe it is a common. It isn't really better than Onyx Goblet after all. The way the mechanic is built seems contrary to the needs of draft... but, the end result probably won't be as dramatic if the card isn't achem good. I don't know. Maybe it needs to be tested. Changed to Uncommon anyway (and will probably shave a
off the cost when it hits the file) but if we need common number 10, this may be okay.
Man, I've been wanting to see a "Battering Ram" style piece of Equipment, which equips to multiple creatures, for a while now. I have to assume there's a reason why they haven't done it yet. My best guess is because of board complexity more than rules issues (though, the rules issues are obviously there).
Can we get the same feel without resorting to multi-attach? I'd say something about putting counters on lands... but... well... the flood mechanic. That's a shame. Maybe we just have bad timing with this.
Cloning fortifications may be okay... I don't know if it's a bit much for their first appearance, but it seems okay to me. I wouldn't advocate a card that can mix and match cloning artifacts, however. If you have three different fortifications in play and four minions, this is a mess. It's best not to give players this much of a headache the first time they see a mechanic get implemented. But if this was a etb or a sac with one fort-clone? Yeah, we can see what people think.
What if it read like this?:
Whenever you sacrifice ~, put a 0/2 Centaur Minion token into play.
I've been avoiding token creatures because of green... but I've also been avoiding +1/+1 or -1/-1 counters because of it as well. That green is pretty hungry for counters. I don't think there's a real reason to take token creatures away from the other colors, however... it isn't green's thing. On the other hand, if there was any set that advocates the use of both +1/+1 counters and -1/-1 counters, it would probably be this one. -1/-1 counters are a logical way of stopping things from being fungus... and these five mini-planes don't really know each other, so it feeds the "doesn't happen on the same world" rule.
I like these questions. I'd respond, but you know... I'm the arbiter, so that would be unfair. I'm definitely listening, though.
I like it, but it probably will create a lot of unfun scenarios. Would it be better if it cost
, always exiled a creature, and gave you the ability to cast it if X? Or is that too far from source?
Well, I guess we could make this say "...defending player controls a land with the same name and/or type..." It's a bit weird to say, but it covers both categories, and I think I like that. Normally, I'd aim for simpler, but penalizing predictable players, shaking up the meta-game while supporting the set's mechanics.... they seem like things to support.
Yeah, it's probably not a good idea, but I wanted to consider it :)
A similar twist to Slave Auction, providing a creature for cannon-fodder–ness but only sometimes being tactically useful.