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Mechanics |
Recent updates to Conversation: (Generated at 2024-04-28 09:04:43)
Conversation: Cardlist | Visual spoiler | Export | Booster | Comments | Search | Recent activity |
Mechanics |
Recent updates to Conversation: (Generated at 2024-04-28 09:04:43)
Aether Influence - Whenever you cast an instant or sorcery ~ gets your choice of +1/+0 or +0/+1 until end of turn.
Feel U/R and good for common.
Not a keyword and L2i0n0k7 already said it, but Frostburn Weird.
High flying, just like flying, except:
1. can only be blocked by other creatures with flying and high flying (not reach).
2. can't block creatures without flying or high flying.
3. spells that affect flying can also affect high flying (e.g. Hurricane also hurts high flying.)
4. mostly occurs in blue, white, and red
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Pathmaker:
1. creatures with different power than this creature can't block it.
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Powershift:
1. whenever this creature attacks or blocks, you may switch its power and toughness until end of turn.
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Possibility:
Shift {N} ({N}: This creature gets your choice of +1/-1 or -1/+1 UEOT.)
Although really, I don't see the point of keywording this. It's just a suggestion.
My thoughts on this depends on whether you want a keyword mechanic, or a mechanical identity. For example, I think it would be cool to see blue/red have a lot of power and toughness switchers in one set. That's not really a keyword, but people would start to notice it if done in abundance.
Alternatively, p/t setting could be kind of neat. That's kind of every color's keyword ability, but blue is number one, and if you chose one static 'reddish' creature that the creatures kept turning into "Target creature becomes a 4/1 red and blue elemental until end of turn.// When this creature attacks, it becomes a 4/1 red and blue elemental until end of turn.// All creatures opponents control become 4/1 red and blue elementals until end of turn" it would start to feel blue/red.
Also, I think you could get some mileage on 'hurts to target and to block'. So something along these lines:
Creature - Illsusion
Whenever this creature is blocked or targeted by a spell or ability an opponent controls, you may draw a card.
2/2
Same deal on the red cards, but they deal damage, or maybe sacrifice permanents or something. Again, not really a keyword. More a mechanical identity. Though, I admit that that last ability borders on evasion.
not evergreen, but discount for each instant or sorcery you cast this turn. where black has delve and green/white has convoke.
Depreciate (This spell costs less to cast for each instant or sorcery spell you cast this turn.)
it doesn't have to go on instants or sorceries. you can put it on creatures and enchantments, too.
We're looking for an evergreen keyword that could appear on a creature? Well, if looting were keyworded, it would be a good fit. The Alluring Siren/Heckling Fiends ability fits in both colors, as does forced blocking, but I'm not sure how the first might be keyworded, and the second is too similar to provoke.
Perhaps something like "Evade (Whenever this creature becomes blocked, return it to your hand.)" Or the opposite, "Glare (Whenever this creature becomes blocked, return the blocking creature to its owner's hand.)" The second stretches the pie more because of the red bounce. The first can be justified in red by things like Archwing Dragon or possibly Norin the Wary. I think people would view it as a draw back, though.
Honestly, coming up with a new evergreen mechanic is very difficult, because what's been established works so well already.
Taunt (At the beginning of each opponent's combat, target creature that player controls attacks if able.)
I do appreciate Blood Scrivener, especially as a reference to both Dark Confidant and Hellbent.
I mean, I really enjoy the set. It is super complex, which I could see being a problem for newer players, but it's cool for me lol. And yeah, I mean there are a few duds but c'mon, there are duds in every set. OG Ravnica had Bloodletter Quill and Zephyr Spirit and Cyclopean Snare and just about every Radiance card was purely poopy. There are some really awesomely designed cards in here though!
Deadbridge Chant: I cannot design splashy enchantments for the life of me, and this one seems awesome.
Split cards: I personally always hated them (I dislike most mechanics that mess with the frames), but most of these make my inner Melvin squeal in delight.
Blood Scrivener is a cool fixed Bob. Plasm Capture is new Mana Drain. Progenitor Mimic should have been done years ago. And some of the legends are wimpy, but all serve purposes in at least casual decks, and guys like Varolz and Ruric Thar are awesome buildarounds.
And also with keeping rarities constant.
Actually, there are 11 mythic rares, because of Maze's End. I believe that it has to do with how the cards are printed, though.
I'm sad that Armadillo Cloak was replaced by Unflinching Courage. I realise that the cloak had a bit of a silly name, but it's one of the cards from before I started playing that really stood out to me as really beautiful, and the new name is just rather generic.
About the guild champions, I've not seen all of them, but assuming people are right that they're less awesome than they might be, I don't understand (i) why rare cards have to be less awesome -- we've definitely had sub-par mythics before, surely it's ok if we have some fun rares for once? (ii) why the number of mythics is so constrained to be exactly 10, not 11.
They really screwed that up, IMO. Especially with her art clearing depicting that token.
Oh, and in case anyone missed it: here's the story of why some of the maze runners are so overcosted.
I didn't notice that about Simic until you pointed it out, Alex, but it's true. I think it says something about the other guilds that Simic is still more interesting than them.
Scion of Vitu-Ghazi is "if cast from your hand" in order to prevent the easy infinite combos with Cackling Counterpart, Séance, Progenitor Mimic etc.
I was rather pleased to see Obzedat's Aid as well, especially since the Generator has been generating that effect for quite some time. I thought it'd cost 4 (by comparison with Zombify/Breath of Life/Argivian Restoration), but I guess 5 makes some amount of sense.
Zhur-Taa Druid is just awesome, isn't it? I love it.
Tithe Drinker is one of my favourite cards in the set. Such good value Extort. I like the Extort lord too, especially in conjunction with Crypt Ghast.
The Simic cards are rather one-note (both in Gatecrash and Dragon's Maze). Yes, you can convert +1/+1 counters into drawing cards. We get it. Seriously, how many Simic cards do that one way or another? About six?
Of course, this all happens with pretty much every set, so Maro and others probably prepared her well...
To help quell my own negativity, I've decided to make a list of cards from the set that I like.
Scion of Vitu-Ghazi is nice. I don't understand their "if you cast it from your hand" logic. Even if it didn't have that, would it really compare to Thragtusk? No.
Wake the Reflections is so pleasingly simple.
Bane Alley Blackguard isn't exactly exciting, but it does provide some interesting implications for us custom designers. Namely, that black will be getting more creatures with higher toughness than power.
Hired Torturer is a great top-down design, even if it's not a great card.
Pontiff of Blight is nice to see because it was expected.
I'm extremely excited for Possibility Storm because it means I can have a variant of my Knowledge Pool/Curse of Exhaustion deck back in Standard for a while. Yay!
I really like Blaze Commando. I feel like Boros got a huge portion of the cool stuff in this block. I'm also excited by Boros Battleshaper, even though it costs seven mana. I'm way more excited by this than by Emmara Tandris.
Council of the Absolute looks like a card I would design. Therefore, it has my approval... except for the "other than a creature" clause. I'm really tired of Wizard's huge push for creatures to be so much more powerful.
I love Dragonshift.
I like Gleam of Battle alright, but damn, does it need to cost less.
Jelenn Sphinx may be one of my favorite designs in the set. I LOVE the combination of vigilance with this ability. It's so pleasing.
Legion's Initiative is another cool Boros card. Clearly someone on the design team at Wizards loves Boros (and clearly, none of them love Dimir).
Obzedat's Aid is really neat. I want to build decks around it.
Plasm Capture and Progenitor Mimic are great. I think Progenitor Mimic may actually be my favorite card in the set.
I like Ral Zarek, and I hope I pull one at the prerelease.
Render Silent is beautiful.
I wish that Emmara Tandris was Trostani's Summoner. That card is so much better than her.
Zhur-Taa Druid is great. It's such a perfect fusion of and , to me. And it's so useful!
I feel sorry for Alexis Janson. I would not have wanted this to be the first set I led, and I would not enjoy seeing all the community reactions to the set, either.
Small rare creatures are an enigma. I agree that card looks kind of silly. "I don't know if this card hates the meta-game enough." "Well, then just add Pro-Blue."
It sure does make Ashcoat Bear look dumb. I understand why they're doing what they're doing, but I hate it when whole swaths of cards become unplayable because of a $20 rare.
And by the way, why is Skylasher okay? If I designed that I would get lots of comments about it being too much for a 2/2.
I hate how hard cipher got nerfed. It's a very interesting mechanic, and yes, it could very easily have been broken, but I would have liked to see some "pushed cipher" cards. Sometimes I feel like Wizards pushes all the wrong things. The guild champions, as the focus of the set, should have ALL been pushed. Cipher should have been pushed. I understand that power creep is a very dangerous thing, but so is disappointment, which is what playing it too safe leads to.
Also, story-wise, what the hell happened to the Gateless movement? I loved how the cards and flavor text in Gatecrash were setting it up.
I think that Dragon's Maze has to much text on it. Even for an expert set. This makes it very interesting but there will be alot of reading for newer players.
There's also the fact that we have Manalith, Vessel of Endless Rest, Chromatic Lantern, the Keyrunes, and now the Cluestones all in standard right now.
To be honest, I think I'd rather play Boros Cluestone than Boros Keyrune… but I'd rather play Sphere of the Suns than either of them.
My first thought was the same as link's. They're good design, and I'm happy to have them, and having that much mana fixing at common is awesome, and if that's exactly the card you need it's great it's finally been printed and I don't think there's anything wrong with them. But having just seen the keystones, the first look at the cluestones was underwhelming.
Perhaps "boring" was the wrong word. My main issue with the cluestones is how incredibly similar they are to the keyrunes. They are both ten card cycles at (3) that fix you/accelerate you with two colors of mana and have an activated ability that costs one of each of those colors. They bore me because they are in the same block as the keyrunes. I know that the role they play is necessary for limited. Honestly, my problem win them would be solved if they just cost (2) and ETBs tapped, or something. Mix it up a bit, Wizards. How many 3cmc mana-fixing artifacts do we need in Standard?
I should definitely arrange a Gatecrash draft. Dragon's Maze I'm waiting to see what it's like at the prerelease before I see whether we have a draft of it. (You could always come along to the prerelease yourself? Sat 27th or Sun 28th, here.)
Three mana is the very top end of what I'll pay for mana fixing though - if I've got 3, I probably don't need the fixing. If I have to pay three, I want something as good as Kodama's Reach.
I agree that cycling is powerful. It's just not interesting. It feels like "Oh, you drew this card you don't need? Well, pay some mana and try again." When I'd much rather not have drawn the disappointment, and not have to pay the cost, and only have the fun stuff in my deck.
From play is better; it means it can be something I got some benefit from, and then got rid of. But it's still not interesting. It's a "start of my turn, do I have mana? Ok, I guess I'll pop it" kind of not-a-decision.
Anyway; when're we playing it? :)
I'm startled to hear Link call cycle-from-battlefield boring. The ability to turn your manafixing into a new card when you don't need it any more is absolutely golden. I love cycling lands, but they ETBT. I love Mind Stone and have it in loads of decks, but it only makes colourless. Now 3 mana is a lot different to 2, but nonetheless, manafixing that's able to cycle-from-battlefield when you don't need it any more sounds very useful to me.
Dedicating 10 uncommon slots in a small set to them is eyebrow-raising, I'll agree, and I'd almost expect them to only exist for some arbitrary 5 guilds. But my EDH decks will be glad that all 10 exist.
And yes, many of the guild champions are horrible and fail massively.