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Recent updates to Community Set: (Generated at 2025-12-19 17:42:57)
I assume this is supposed to be an instant?
I put forward an idea in Senate Jurist that I like. It's an evolution of cycling that hasn't been done before, so there's some bonus points there.
I like the Skyshroud Elf variant, but it isn't helping multicolor. Or, at least, I would choose to play Mountain over it in a multicolor deck. Certainly spectacular in mono, though.
What if we got closer to Skyshroud Elf? I'm no fan of ETBT, but I can't dodge it here.
: Add 
to your mana pool.
: Add 
or 
to your mana pool.
~ Enters the battlefield tapped.
"Manacycling
- 
(
, Discard this card: Add 
to your mana pool. Draw a card.)"
I don't know, it seems like this ability's actual power level would be hard to judge.
I mentioned it because it's what sprang to mind, but I'm pretty sure that I don't like it. Telling players that they should throw away resources sounds bad, unless it was a minor subset of cards. But Gold stretches across all colors, and this ability is activated using colorless. I rescind my proposal.
Though, I do admit it would be kind of neat to get the opposite reaction with a bit of cycling involved. "
, Discard ~: Add 
to your mana pool, and draw a card." is a cool ability. And it works with Enlighten.
I like almost all the green common designs. But this one may be a candidate for moving to uncommon, following Simic Guildmage's lead.
Frankly, I don't like the current direction of green, mechanically or flavorfully, despite the fact that (I think?) I came up with it. To me, the similarity between the green and blue mechanics is not a good thing: all of the other colors feel very distinct from each other. I really like what blue is doing, so that leaves green to change. Maybe you guys disagree with me, but I'm just taking jmgariepy's suggestion and saying something about what I don't like.
@Alex: By Link, did you mean dude1818?
I don't know if I have an opinion right now either way on this ability adding to mana vs. just recoloring it.
While my internet is working, I want to suggest something: What if the first set isn't about the creatures of the Gloaming attacking Aer, but instead about Aer discovering the Gloaming? In this scenario, Aer is an observer of the conflict between the five monocolor lands, and is just discovering where they've been drawing their mana from. The conflict between Aer and the Gloaming doesn't truly start until the second set. This allows us to make it feel more like the focus of the block, though in basic shape, it will resemble the story of the Scars of Mirrodin block.
I don't think that we should make them more similar. If anything, we should work to differentiate them.
Actually, I'm not sure the "no better than a basic land" is a problem here, even though we usually run up against it when designing dual lands. I think most of the suggestions could be limited somehow without significantly impairing them.
I think "
: 
. 
: Any color to play red spells" or the similar "
: 
. 
: Add C or D (or E?), only to play multicolor spells" are still my favourite.
Although the "
:" variants also make sense, if a multicolor deck is struggling to play multiple different color combinations at a lower cost, and a monocolor deck is struggling to assemble as much R as possible, then they will help multicolor more, while not being completely useless in mono.
Good idea. You're right about the cost, though; in a blue deck, this will almost always be Cancel, and otherwise it'll vary. Maybe it'd do well.
Hm, or maybe "1U. Counter target spell unless its controller pays
for each two islands on the battlefield?" Then it's similar to mana leak: less good on turn 2 (which is probably good) and a bit better on turn 8 (which is also reasonable), but also gives you the option to turn it into Counterspell by using flood?
How about that as a soft counter? Should interact nicely with flood. Possibly needs to cost slightly more; I think it's a bit too much better than Power Sink right now.
Hmm, the mtg article on designing counterspells suggests 3U would be too much; it's less good than counterspell, after all.
I'm tempted to suggest "You know what? That 'be no better than a basic land' limit? Forget that limit."
Having said that, if you do want a limit - how abut triggering off of flyers in play, rather than off of other lands?
I was looking at jmg's suggestion of a land with "
: Add 
or 
" and also "
: Add 
or 
". I think the latter would feel somewhat undesirable. It's bumping up the costs of all your spells you need to use that ability on.
How about a land with ETBT, "
: Add 
" and "
: Add 
"? I always liked the Skyshroud Elf's manawash ability. It might not be quite what we want - if anything it facilitates splashing a 
card into a blue-black deck, which may not be quite what we want. But it's an idea.
Flying buffalo. The wings are the best eating.
I like the idea of a nice simple "This is a big flyer. Very big." card.
The last suggestion is the Sungrass Prairie cycle. That was quite weak; I always thought it would have been fine with "
: Add 
" as well. That would then be similar to the Graven Cairns cycle.
I agree it'd be good to ETB untapped. I don't have a problem with it helping with monocolour decks.
Like a gold Battle Squadron? Yeah, seems reasonable. But no, this was concepted as a literal beast of burden, like an ox or something, but used in the flying city.
Coloured cycling is a definite idea. I think if we had it on gold cards we'd probably want it on monocoloured cards too, but I'm sure we could do that.
Would you be thinking "Cycling
", "Cycling 
", or "Cycling 
"? The first would definitely evoke memories of the Glassdust Hulk cycle. In either of the first two cases, it'd be better than that cycle we might get people who literally couldn't cast the cards maindecking them in order to get instant-speed Enlighten triggers, which is kinda awesome.
If we went for more expensive cycling,
or 
or more, then we could have cycle triggers as well, like Renewed Faith and Primal Boost. That'd make them feel more like they provided value when cycled even without an Enlighten trigger out.
Designing dual lands is surprisingly hard, I think because it's very hard to get a view of what you want limited mana fixing to be like. Although I think we're nearly right.
What do we want this cycle to do?
Does that sound right?
If so, it sounds like the effect of the land (even if we can template it with only one ability) will be something like:
: Add 
to your mana pool.
: Add [some mana] to your mana pool. [This is explicitly or implicitly only useful for multicolor spells]
The "any color, only to play red spells" version would lend itself to playing a three-color multi deck (perhaps with a splash for 4th and 5th), since it will combine with a mountain to pay for any BR or RG cost, so you could make a mana base out of half mountains, and enough forests, swamps and these.
Alternatively, it could be "
, 
: Add 
to your mana pool." That would pay for BR spells. The "not working on turn 1" doesn't matter as all multicolor spells cost >=2. If your mana base has other colors of basic land, it will help you pay for UB or RG.
What makes most sense?
Good point. I'd assumed that the cost would have to be higher than that for something like Viashino Fangtail for it to be printed, and then it would be too expensive for what it was, but I was wrong, Viashino Fangtail looks very good, and by extension, the cost for Spellscorcher is also fine.
Viashino Fangtail was a very solid card; for that matter, so was Kamahl, Pit Fighter.
Is it a problem that G and U both have a theme of "turning opponent's stuff into other stuff with counters"? Will people be puzzled they're similar but different?
I'm not sure if it is, and even if it is, it's probably best to just live with it, as both themes are good.
But if people think it's a problem, are there any other suggestions? I don't think expanding either theme into another color is likely to work well at the moment. One possibility would be to give green a very minor "turn lands into forests" theme and blue a very minor "turn creatures into fish" theme, so they mirror each other?
@Link: If we call it manacycling, then yes, basically, if the rules for it are chosen sensibly then it will trigger Astral Slide. OTOH if we call it channel or something else then it won't.
@jmg: The reason I didn't do that was I wasn't wanting to create a whole new cycle of Simian Spirit Guides. But what do other people think?
A minor point: Green normally gets a rampant growth and a llanowar elves. Should the green mana fixing here help you play multicolor cards or not? On the one hand, we need plenty of mana fixing so playing multicolor cards is plausible. On the other hand, that detracts from the mono-vs-multi theme if it's specifically useful to have a green enabler in a mostly multi deck.
Perhaps it makes sense for one enabler to accelerate more efficiently without fixing (eg. my "G. Sorcery. Search for a (basic?) forest" spell) and the other to be multicolor and enable mana fixing? Possibly, if we can find some way to do it, the mana fixer should be a multicolor card you can actually play with just G (a bit like the way the borderposts are multicolor cards, but also act as lands).
Heh. We might be forcing players too much into the red zone with 'all-in-red' to begin with. It's probably a good idea to not enforce it when the mechanic isn't present. I do like the idea of a sorcery that gives a power bonus, but forces all creatures you control to attack. I'll have to keep it in my toolbox.