Homelands Restored: Recent Activity
| Homelands Restored: Cardlist | Visual spoiler | Export | Booster | Comments | Search | Recent activity |
| Skeleton |
Recent updates to Homelands Restored: (Generated at 2025-08-06 23:42:49)
| Homelands Restored: Cardlist | Visual spoiler | Export | Booster | Comments | Search | Recent activity |
| Skeleton |
Recent updates to Homelands Restored: (Generated at 2025-08-06 23:42:49)
I'm pretty sure "enchanting" can't be right. "enchanted" possibly. But I think my response to "players don't realise that Aura spells target" would be the opposite: make it deliberately use the word "target" so that players learn. See the reminder text on "enchant" the most recent time it had reminder text such as on Treetop Bracers.
I love toughness-matters. I just came here to say that Vulshok Battlegear is considered rather above the curve; there are more recent cards that are strictly worse like Greatsword and Warlord's Axe. Which is fine and doesn't actually interfere with your point.
Original card.
Continuing the theme of toughness matters. I know the wording is a little weird. I'm pretty sure it works; targets are chosen before players pay the cost to cast a spell. So the player first chooses which creature they are enchanting, then looks at that creature's toughness and reduces the cost.
The fudgy-ness comes into play when I opted to avoid using the word 'target', since I don't think many players realize they are targeting when they are enchanting. The grammar isn't perfecting, but hopefully it gets the idea across without having to lift the mechanics curtain.
As for the cost, I wanted
, since that's what Abbey Matron does on activation, and using the highest toughness common as your stopping point seemed like a fair guide. But I'm not sure if I made this potent enough, or if it's already a bit much. Both lifelink and protection from instants were considered... but I thought I might be going a little too far for an aura that could regularly cost 
with little effort (I should point out that many of these toughness matters cards combo quite well off a single Giant Growth.)
On the art: I hate using WoW. But sometimes, it's spot on.
I like it.
Original card.
Card #2 in the 'toughness matters' uncommon slots. Since this strategy is supposed to be in white, I was leaning toward this being a white enchantment. But it seemed weird choice with Feast of the Unicorn in the same set. Hopefully, the overlap won't be as noticeable as a piece of equipment. And I'll have to live with green drafting these away from the white player on occasion.
As with any scalable card, this is hard to cost. My reasoning was that Vulshok Battlegear is a reasonable uncommon piece of equipment, and +3/+3 is about equivalent to +5/+0. In a normal deck, a five toughness creature is a little on the high end... you got to work to make this worth more than it costs. Though, not too hard.
All I know is that any card that makes Kami of Old Stone look good is cool in my book.
I've been watching this problem all throughout the set, sometimes giving random defensive creatures a power boost, like Aysen Bureaucrats, and sometimes changing a blocking-only restriction, to an attacking only restriction, like on Serra Inquisitor.
Still, it seems pretty obvious that white wants to do a lot of blocking in this set. So I'm throwing it a bone in the end. I suppose I'll have to wait for playtesting to come through to see if I accidentaly reset the needle to 'boring' mode.
Also I'm aware this doesn't break the stalls, it just reinforces the theme. I got cards that break the stalls coming. But I figured there should be at least one card that reinforces stalling while using 'touhgness matters' tech, and this is that slot.
yeah cards like this don't seem like a recipe for fun interactions. toughness matters decks need a way to break through stalls, and this isn't it
I like this; it's nifty. Not sure it really makes toughness matter - since it just makes toughness make more toughness, but it's a decent enough wall and white likes those too.
Does mean, what with the aforementioned toughness pumpers, that white has a lot of stall going on; which I know is its thing, but might need an eye keeping on.
Oh, yes, also the Reflection token was chosen because Broken Visage is in the set, and it seemed kind of lonely.
Original Card.
Alright, back to work. In the last of the Uncommon white slots, I'm slipping in a 'toughness matters' theme. Partly because it goes so well with Abbey Matron and Mesa Falcon.
I did a quick check to look through all the Magic cards that include the words toughness, but not power, with a focus on white. Far too many of them make you gain life equal to a creature's toughness. Not that that's a bad ability, but some other abilities need representing too. Creature tokens were definitely underrepresented, so I made this one, and got another in the wings.
In most decks, this shouldn't be much better than a flashing 0/4 wall for
. Activate an Abbey Matron, and you got a bonus 0/8 wall for 
. Not shabby.
Increasing to Foot Soldiers with bonus, because why not? Plus it's going to send a number of 'toughness matters' cards into overdrive, and I can get behind that.
Each color and artifacts needs about 5 more uncommons. But I'm kind of at a loss for where to begin. Meanwhile, the strategies of drafting Homelands isn't clear. So my plan here is to find 10 strategies (2 for each color) that already kind of represented and ramp them up. Basing a side strategy on a single common might be okay... especially if that card wouldn't normally be drafted high (like Jinx.) Some of the existing new commons can always be changed to represent the new strats anyway. Let's do this color by color:
White:
- "Whenever a creature you control increases toughness" 4 cards. Watch out for Mesa Falcon.
- Enchantments matter. 3 cards, plenty in other colors, and all three with an enter the battlefield ability... so maybe bouncing enchantments?
- 2 Power or less Creatures. All but one creature in White before bonuses. Aligns with Aysen Bureaucrats
- Soldiers Matter. Zero. But Castigating Caste can have its flavor changed, Sacred Duty can turn a creature into a soldier, and Aysen Crusader is already in uncommon. I can focus on making uncommons that dumped Soldiers on the board while including bonus lines for soldiers to matter.
- Clerics matter. Two already in common, three in uncommon. Baris, Serra Inquisitor and Murat, Death Speaker already feed into this at rare.
- Birds matter. Though, Soroya, the Falconer is probably not reason enough to go down this route. 3 birds in set is nice... but only one in white. Probably a good time to add a bird, even if I'm not doing this one.
You know, Dude, I wrote something about the word order of Dash Hopes and Browbeat as opposed to Mana Leak... but I think I'll go with your wording anyhow. It's just less words that way.
Editing 'target' to 'that', ty Alex.
I think standard template would be "Counter target spell unless its controller has you draw two cards."
Templating: Second "target spell" should be "that spell", unless you want player C to be able to choose whether or not you counter B's spell.
Name: Aetheric Haggling? Essence Negotiation? Yeah, I can't quite find a sensible name either :)
Oh yeah, seems good. Conditional spells are hard to make both modes balanced, but this seems like it will usually be interesting.
Original Card
I was aiming for a counter that cost
to add to the set, and stumbled on this... but it just seemed too good at 
. I tried making the benefit be an Impulse, but it was too many words. So I shrugged and costed it at 
. The set doesn't have any two cost counters anyway.
Art's a little weird. I just couldn't find anything that looked like a 'bargain', so I started digging for generic 'spells'. Got this (which is cropped from a larger piece.) The name and flavor don't quite match... but I'm not sure what flavorful name matches the art and the mechanic. Something Pandora-ish? Can't quite seem to get there.
Yeah, editing to 2 damage. I was thinking of waiting 'till playtest, but I'm sure I'd only end up proving what I already know.