Conversation: Recent Activity
| Conversation: Cardlist | Visual spoiler | Export | Booster | Comments | Search | Recent activity |
| Mechanics |
Recent updates to Conversation: (Generated at 2025-09-05 19:58:24)
| Conversation: Cardlist | Visual spoiler | Export | Booster | Comments | Search | Recent activity |
| Mechanics |
Recent updates to Conversation: (Generated at 2025-09-05 19:58:24)
@jmgariepy, it STILL is in green as far as I can tell (Avalanche Tusker, Lurking Arynx, Culling Mark). Clearly R&D don't see the need to use it any further (much less bring back provoke as a named mechanic) with fight as part of their green toolbox.
Supertypes are pointless and needlessly take up valuable space on the type line. Turn existing super types into keywords.
The ensuing issue is how to address them since older cards reference them directly. So a companion rule is that keywords may be referred before a card type. So not only can rules still say basic land, but they can also say flying creature and indestructible creature.
Ex. ((C74338))
An alternative suggestion is to put the supertypes above the type line. They sit on top, extending into the art. The type-line box will have a tab to house supertypes as necessary. Separates clearly supertypes from card type and makes sorting cards easier.
On a side note: I miss provoke. How come that isn't evergreen and based in green?
Nobody's saying green is only allowed to interact via creatures. It's just only allowed to interact with creatures using its own creatures.
Divergent transformations should have been green instead of red. Polymorphing creatures is Simic, not Izzet. Red could transform lands and artifacts as alternative to losing land destruction. Transforming spells would be even more interesting for Izzet.
Restricting green to only creature -based interaction is the entire problem. People saying green pie is too small compare to blue. The problem is designers are shutting out an entire form of interaction from green. So of course it will be limited in its share of the pie. There are 7 card types, and you're saying green is only allowed to interact via 1 card type. Yeah that makes sense, no balance issue at all.
So in the end green has narrow card designs, narrow flavor, and narrow decks.
Incorrect. In order to have the partners match the color identity of the 4 color legend, they are required to follow the pattern MN, MN, OP. Your example doesn't actually work, since the first one can't be paired with either of the other two to make a 4 color identity. The partners are prohibited from sharing colors due to the nature of the product.
Because the two color pairs share no color, but share a common enemy. By joining forces they fight a common enemy. Such union then unifies the 2-color and 4-color pies.
Also look at the way they fit the commanders into the decks. Each deck has four commanders. One is 4-color and three are 2-colors. The 2-colors have a specific pattern. One is ally color and two are enemy color. But note the ally and enemy pairs share no colors. For instance, one
and two 
. They go together in the no-red deck. This precisely conforms with my theory that these two color pairs are anti-red.
One reason they claim was for convenience of spreading out colors evenly. However they could have different enemy colors and still achieve this goal. For instance,
, 
, and 
. Such that two different decks can share an enemy color pair, and the colors will still have same representation across all decks. But it wasn't done this way. They specifically used the same pattern as proposed in this topic.
Because in the end, this pattern is intuitive, practical, flexible, and ultimately printable.
Four colors (i.e. anti-one-colors) vs. anti-enemy-pairs are very different beasts, so I really don,t see how this is supposed to inform our conversation.
I actually also did something very similar to precisely what R&D did (though I arrived at different conclusions since I was looking for factional flavors rather than individual card designs)
Let's see how near or far my philosophy matches with WotC on 4-color design.
Anti-White
Anti-Blue
Anti-Black
Anti-Red
Anti-Green
Conclusion
Only our ideas on anti-black themes diverged. All other themes seem to hit the same vein. Nevertheless, WotC still very much thinks that forming colors into factions and pitting them against one or more colors is still a great, viable way to get out of design roadblocks. Moreover, such methods are fully capable of uniting mechanical design with creative flavor and concepts.
Izzet is the pair of creativity. It seeks answers haphazardly, enjoys the experience of experiments, lives for the visceral thrill of discovery. It prefers to stumble on the solutions, go on quests to quell the quandaries.
On the other hand, black says "I have what you want. You can have it. Take it." Blue/red doesn't want these handouts. That's no fun. Moreover black will disrupt Izzet's creative process (via discard and extract effects.)
Ex. ((C72972)), ((C72976))
Simic strives to improve upon nature and believes in evolution. It understands that randomness is a factor of evolution and nature. Thus it tolerates chaotic red and black elements necessary to foster systems of change, including mutations and transformations.
However white believes that a divine entity created the universe, including every organism and their environments. It sees Simic as disrupting and distorting this perfect design and order that was painstakingly created by a perfect being, which is tantamount to blasphemy.
ex. ((C72668))
Orzhov uses superstition and religion to control the masses. Unfortunately Blue is too smart and skeptical to fall for these unfounded beliefs. However, Green and Red's ignorance and naivete provide perfect targets for white and black.
Orzhov gives answers as right or wrong. Blue seeks any answers, but doesn't judge them. So blue is indifferent to white-black dilemma. In fact, Blue will use reason and facts to disprove the lies and propaganda Orzhov wants to spread.
White-black has the most removal, while red-green has most aggressive creatures. Thus W/B can easily put R/G under control. Lost life can be easily healed. On the contrary, W/B is not used to blue's eccentric creatureless game plan.
ex. ((C72493)), ((C72606))
They went the complete opposite direction of my steampunk set though, which is convenient.
Yeah, I often don't notice first announcements, but was excited when I finally saw this one.
I did feel several long predicted things have shown up recently: egypt, steampunk, vehicles.
It was announced, what, a month ago? welcome to the club!
SO glad I didn't bother keeping on with Ankh-Duat. I mean, not that there was nothing good there, but that's like, the third significant theme I was planning for that set that is announced now XD (Delve was in Tarkir block, exile matters was in battle for Zendikar, and now Egypt theme XD).
http://magic.wizards.com/en/content/amonkhet-info
Ooh! They went ahead and sneakily make an ancient egyptian set while I wasn't looking. That looks really cool :)
Golgari is the color pair of decay. But to destroy, there must be things created. Thus it welcomes blue and white who create targets for Golgari. Golgari enjoys the war of attrition with Azorius.
But Golgari despises red. Red is color of destruction, which encroaches on what Golgari already does. Furthermore red's game plan doesn't always involve permanents for Golgari to take advantage of. Red can go directly to the player to end the game, for which Golgari may not respond in time. Also such burn spells can't be resurrected by Golgari.
ex. ((C72124))
Dimir employs a type of combat and strategic skill that Boros acknowledges. Sun Tzu's Art of War gives the same advice to get the advantage over your enemies.
"Strategy" is the name of Boros' philosophy. Demoralizing enemies and ruining their plans is a huge part of warfare that any great general will acknowledge. Boros is prepared for Dimir machinations and can couteract accordingly.
Philosophically Green is the least strategic color. It's all about charging head-in with the biggest beast. Which are sometimes immune to Boros tactics, which would work better on sentient beings. Brute force is the a general's last resort.
"Therefore the skillful leader subdues the enemy's troops without any fighting; he captures their cities without laying siege to them; he overthrows their kingdom without lengthy operations in the field."--Sun Tzu's Art of War
Sure, sure, Boros has a different strategy than Green does. But that doesn't equal philosophical hatred for the color. If Gruul offered Boros a couple of Battering Wurms, Boros wouldn't be horrified by the idea. They would just struggle to understand how to use them properly.
If, however, Dimir offered to lend a couple of vampire spies to Boros, a number of high-ranking officials would be incensed and outraged by the prospect of housing and relying on such underhanded criminals. It would be a much more difficult. Boros loves open conflict; it hates two-faced secrecy.
Guild-vs-Guild has been covered by Maro in his guild philosophy articles, and they mostly check out. However that is not the goal here.
If color pie were a disk, like a coin is a disk. The main color pie that we know, the allied pie, is heads. Then the tails side of the coin would be enemy pie. It is identical in structure as allied pie, except colors are rearranged to represent new pairings. The two pies complete, complement, and coexist with each other.
Why Boros dislikes Green. Boros main archetype is weenies and combat abilities. Here you have green cheating in monsters on steroids that overcome most of Boros combative skills. Thus Boros wants to punish Green by Smite the Monstrous and Traitor's Roar. Green also cheats land into play. Boros can tax Green for having too many lands and prevent lands not played from hand.
ex. ((C72069)) , ((C72070))
I think of it in term of "what guild specifically undermine's another's typical activities". In that regard, philosophical opposition does not lead to enemy status, and they don't even need to be both ways. I'd assume that both Azorius and Orzhov really hate the Dimir, but I don't think Dimir sees any other guild as actual enemies.
On the other hand I wouldn't be surprised if Rakdos somewhat returned the likely animosity that Azorius and Boros have for them. (same with Azorius and Gruul)
Finally, I have some doubts that Simic (and probably Golgari) consider any other guild specifically as enemies (or the otehr way around, even). They just don't seem to have obvious clashing points with other guilds in the course of their typical guild activities. Maybe somewhat between Golgari and Selesnya?
Boros, a clan built around openly keeping order, hates Dimir, a clan around secret orgainizations with potentially malicious intent. Checks out.
Simic, a clan built around remaking the natural order to achieve a higher state of perfection, hates Rakdos, a clan built around celbrating random acts of violent death for hedonistic purposes. Checks out.
Selesnya, a clan built around the belief that slow cultish groupthink is spiritually superior, hates Izzet, who believes that individual sparks of genius is the ideal. Checks out.
Gruul, a clan that believes in anarchy in an attempt to revert urban environments back to their natural violent order, hates Orzhov, a clan that believes that individuals are beholden to a church created via intricate social dynamics which maintain the peace, and that parishioners are so entrenched in the system that they must pay homage both in this life, and the life hereafter. Checks out.
The Azorious, a clan built on the bureaucratic belief that life should be maintained within a set system of rules, and that order can only be kept as long as inaction among individuals is the rule, hates the Golgari who believe in the worship of power by subverting the system through transformation, often involving death, a state that puts one beyond the realm of the law. Checks... well... four out of five ain't bad.
In my opinion, white-red's enemy definitely isn't green. That's their mutual friend who brings them together. The enemy of white-red is generally going to be blue-black, or whichever of blue and black is more of an enemy to the white-red faction in this particular world.
Fabricate did indeed remind me very strongly of Tinker :) Well done you guys for finding that!
And the energy mechanic reminded me rather strongly of my power types as on Refractive Cagemail, Amber-Preserved Relic and friends. Especially the Module three-card cycle is directly analogous to my Refractive Cagemail five-card cycle and aiming at the same feeling.
Their implementation of vehicles is pretty interesting. P/T on noncreatures is cool but I wonder how confusing it'll be.
I love the visuals to it - I couldn't resist adding them to Multiverse :D See Unstoppable Roadhowler. Multiverse will now assume that anything with type "Vehicle" should have the brown P/T box, but you can override this by setting Frame "Artifact" rather than "Auto". (And you can force it by setting Frame to "Artifact - Vehicle" on any other card.)
I hear some of what you're saying, but it feels like, creature combat is THE most interactive part of the game, how is it that green isn't providing enough interaction?
Even cards like green removal and green card draw, which I like, feel like... surely there'd be a way to solve this creature with creatures. It's not like you don't have a creature-based removal -- fight on bigger creatures. It's not like you don't have creature-based card advantage -- multiple tokens, creatures that come back to life, auras which come back round again, etc.
I suppose that to move away from green's creature emphasis there could be an focus on lands and enchantments, or at least find new ways to utilize lands and ramp. I think the hard part would be finding ways for green to be interactive and innovative and now tread upon other colors' territories. I always like punishing mana bases and I would put non-damage or destruction punishment for lands in green.
To test some these ideas I created ((C72010)), ((C72011)), and ((C72012)).
Part of the problem with Green is that it's the color with the most upside on its creatures. This idea that Green isn't very interactive could be solved by making a number of riddle creatures. For example, the Tribute mechanic from Born of the Gods, or a number of Sphinx abilities would add a lot of depth to potentially powerful Green creatures, and open the door to player interaction. But thinking itself seems to be antithesis to Green's slice of the color pie, so that doesn't happen to often.
Personally, I've always liked Monger-type abilities: Abilities that can be used by any player, but are probably best for the player controlling the creature. For example, something like this:
Armor-Weaving Spider
: Put a +1/+1 counter on target creature. Any player may use this ability, but only when they could cast a sorcery.
Creature - Spider
Reach
3/6
Letting everyone share the abilities seems 'green-ish' (especially when the player with the most mana is the one being the most rewarded), while opening up the possibility for players to interact with each other more. Not much, I admit, but it's at least more interactive than just stapling trample and vigilance on this creature.
One-sided fight is one-sided fight. Not much to say, it's not new interaction. It's just upgrade like shroud to hexproof.
Green being way too creature-focused is a huge liability and frankly stale. Like you just said, you want more green card draw, but must be creature based. Everything from green must be creature based. Why so narrow and one-dimensional?
By interaction I mean dealing with opponents' creatures directly. Not indirectly through combat, not creature-based like fight.
Ideally is to make mono-green control viable. One crazy idea to differentiate it from other control is prison-style. The least oppressive way is to force opponents to pay more mana to do stuff. Since green is color of ramp, then these prison could affect the green player as well, to feel less oppressive and fairer.
Again steps on white's toes, but again white already has too many control effects which aren't used to their potential.
When talking about the pie, color combination don't have enemies.
Then what are Llanowar Knight and Monsoon cycles? Guttural Response.
Why are
the colors that get anti-blue "can't be countered by spells or abilities." Why are 
the colors that get anti-black counter-measures to discard: "If a spell or ability an opponent controls causes you to discard".
I don't know why you bring up pair-to-pair or 3v3 enemies. My idea of 2v1 is because that has the most flexibility in terms of flavor and mechanics, and easiest to conceive and pull off.
"are unlikely to ever be placed in opposition to monocolor factions"
Who knows officially what WotC will or will not do. But this is a place for fostering ideas, regardless of whether they will run with it. Moreover you proposing a 6-color pie is even more work and less likely to happen.
Whereas the alternate color pie isn't anything drastic, it's merely an extension to the existing color pie. No more than Planar Chaos. At worst, it's a one-and-done deal, contained within its own set or block, if one would do it that way but later find it is unpopular. Doesn't even have to full blown sets. Merely a singleton or cycle here or there when the time calls for it.
Especially on here, it is very easy to imagine alternate color pies and put them onto cards. But also hard to have a meaningful discussion because the ideas and comments are so spread out in many places.
I suggested that green be tertiary for prowess though none were receptive to the suggestion.
I think green's draw could be pushed a little, since (though it has been some time since I've checked Blogatog) green is supposed to be the second best color at drawing cards. Of course creature and combat based mechanics should have conditions through which green can draw, and its draw should of course be secondary to blue. Something like a creature with trample having "whenever this creature deals 3 or more combat damage to a player you may draw a card" could be a rare? Draw X cards where X is the number of creature tokens you control?
For what it's worth in Deshub I switched Break, a non-creature morbid, to be centered green instead of red since the mechanics were shard-colored and break had no business on mono-black cards.