Wow. It's just about possible that a Greed without the mana payment is printable, but it should definitely be rare.

Amongst the risks: any instant-speed win combo can be done with 120 life loss worth of triggers on the stack; similarly Seismic Assault. "You can draw as much of your deck as you like if you can win with it at instant speed" is a pretty hair-raising thing to print.

(It's also pretty mad with Peace of Mind, but that's just a fun combo rather than madly broken.)

Hmm... You're definitively right about the "win with it on the stack" problem. I'm pretty sure that I missed this the first time around. That's rather unfortunate... I thought I solved "drawing a card as a cost", but I guess I didn't.

As it stands, 20XD6 is meant to be drafted, while it could be busted in a lot of formats, this card gets less impressive if you are only here to draft it. But I understand the argument that this feels rare, so it should be rare. Bumping a largish creature down to uncommon and sliding this guy into rare.

Hmmm... Maybe if I flipped the two abilities? It's still insane, but now the amount of cards drawn is controlled, at least, by the toughness of all creatures in play...

I think the intent is obvious, but I agree the templating is messy. Maybe, "whenever you would draw a card, you don't unless you pay 2 life", or "At the beginning of your turn, lose two life. // Pay 2 life, put a -1/-1 counter on a creature: Draw a card".

(Come to think of it, other niggles in templating this are that you don't want 'target' in the cost, and yet if the -1/-1 counter doesn't target, it can bypass protection and hexproof, and if the -1/-1 is part of the effect instead of the cost, it's too complicated to remember the order things come in.)

Ah... Jack, you got the same idea I did. This one was bugging me. The current version also doesn't work with -1/-1 counters as cost. Originally, I thought it would be fine, because you would have to pass priority, and when you pass priority, state based effects check, and when state based effects check, the creature would be in the graveyard and can't get a -1/-1 counter anymore. All of that, though, is unfortunately wrong, though, because players don't need to pass priority between activations. That's the thing that stops people from asking if their opponent wants to respond to every activation of Firebreathing. They can just keep activating the thing, then ask the opponent if they want to respond after they are done putting it all on the stack. sigh

But, yes, the clause about "whenever you draw a card" seems to cut right through this and make the card work again. My original thought was "Whenever you draw a card, you instead draw a card and lose 2 life." I'm not sure which of our versions are better, but I'll just take yours just cause.

Oh, also, all that stuff about 'this card is meant for drafting and is therefore not subject to the rules of constructed'. I use it as an excuse a bit too much. The intention for the set may be for drafting, but if the cards don't look like real Magic cards in some capacity, then the final result is a failure. It also is evidently wrong in 20XX-land. I realized while driving away today that Scent of Cinder was an underdrafted common in 20XX. Evidently, these two cards together, and 20 other red cards in your deck, would have created a turn 6 auto-kill.

FWIW, although players don't need to pass priority between activations, a player does get priority between one and the next, which means SBAs do happen in between each time.

But I think the current solution is good.

That is some good to know.

Okay...so if you don't pay 2 life, the "draw a card" cost is replaced with "do nothing", and you get to throw around -1/-1 counters for free?

I wrote a bunch about how this works, then deleted it. I got to admit, SadisticMystic, that I don't know. I went back to the comprehensive rulebook, and pulled these two parts out.

from 602.2e ...Once the total cost is determined, any effects that directly affect the total cost are applied. Then the resulting total cost becomes “locked in.” If effects would change the total cost after this time, they have no effect...

My interpretation of this is that the player activates the cost: Draw a card. Then an effect would change that cost. He must pay 2 life to draw that card, so it is added to the cost. He may have activated the ability without being able to pay the 2 life, but then this happens...

from 602.2 ...If, at any point during the activating of an ability, a player is unable to comply with any of the steps listed below, the activating of the ability is illegal; the game returns to the moment before that ability started to be activated...

And all is right with the world. I'm no judge, though, so I could very well be wrong. This is also a fair reminder as to why this card must be rare or mythic... probably not even mythic. Mythics have more exposure than normal rares, oddly.

I'd point out that even if it DOES work that way, it doesn't LOOK like it.

Might be better as something like: Whenever you would draw a card, you choose to either lose 2 life and you may put a -1/-1 counter on target creature, or to not draw a card. 0: Draw a card.

Which is... clunky. But clear.

I hear you, Vitenka, but I think there's something to be said about the player's ability to parse how a game should operate, versus what the card looks like it is saying you should do. The vast majority of players, upon first reading this card would say to themselves "Well, this looks like I can abuse this ability and continuously put -1/-1 counters on all opponents creatures. Of course, that would be insane... it probably doesn't do that."

There is, I admit, a hold out of people who would still read this wrong. Anyone under the age of 12 would probably willfully read it wrong, but I can't help that group, because they willfully read everything wrong. New players, however, could be immediately turned off by this card. They have no idea how to gauge what is normal, and, as far as they know, completely unfair abilities like this could exist on occasional cards in the game. In fact, they already do... we just think cards like Lightning Bolt are fair, when they are not.

This card is going to need to get a trial by fire, I suppose. When 20XD6 is drafted, I'll be looking to see who is confused by this card, who asks the obvious question that they already know the answer to, and who is downright insulted by this card. It's probably best to be hopeful, and test the best case scenario, and go back and edit it if that isn't doing what I want it to do.

Yes, an effect would change the cost. Rule 117.12a tells us just how to apply that effect: "[Do A] unless you [do B]" means "You may [do B]. If you don't, [do A]." From this, B is clearly optional, and not forcefully shunted onto the cost. It's the player's choice if they want to turn "Draw a card" into "Pay 2 life and draw a card" or into "Don't draw a card", which makes an ability with a choice between those costs obviously broken.

As a somewhat similar analog, with an empty hand, it's possible to satisfy the upkeep on Psychic Vortex by milling cards with Chains of Mephistopheles also out, even though the upkeep "cost" on Vortex says to draw cards, and Chains replaces it with either "discard then draw" or "mill a card and no draw". Nothing requires the final cost to be something that retains that "Draw a card" instruction.

Ooh, using Chains of Mephistopheles as an example card! I'll have some goodwill, and assume you're not trying to confuse me out of this discussion. ;)

By the by, have you seen the textless version of that spell?

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You're point is well made, and is probably correct. Luckily, my backup clause works, since it doesn't give players a choice... it just replaces one event (draw a card) with another (draw a card and lose 2 life). Thank you for being patient with me, and feel free to knock me over the noggin' if I go south again.

That does work, but I'll still point out that Necrotic Ooze finds this guy to be extremely tasty.