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Recent updates to Conversation: (Generated at 2025-07-06 00:07:56)
| Conversation: Cardlist | Visual spoiler | Export | Booster | Comments | Search | Recent activity |
| Mechanics |
Recent updates to Conversation: (Generated at 2025-07-06 00:07:56)
Never, although sometimes it might have a similar effect in some cases.
To me, rarity should be set to improve the Limited game for that specific set (which means that rarity of the same card can be different in different sets), in order to affect the variance of specific kinds of game play for that set.
If you are playing Constructed, or are not designing cards for a specific set, then the rarities are irrelevant and can be omitted.
(Note, however, that when I import cards from TeXnicard, there is a SQL DEFAULT clause which sets the rarity normally to "common", so the rarity will be set even though it may not be appropriate. I could change the default, but at this time I had not done so.)
I had used the term "conventional basic land" to mean one of the five (database) cards Plains, Island, Swamp, Mountain, or Forest.
I should think it would be better to mention ability counters explicitly as such a thing, perhaps by writing "ability counter" or by putting the ability in quotation marks; this way it cannot interfere with other uses, with newly added abilities and/or counters, etc, can add more without adjusting the rules, and be less confusing to know whether or not it is a ability counter. (Although if they didn't do that, I would instead prefer to not define them as counters at all and instead just write "target permanent gains shroud" or whatever; you can still place physical markers on them to keep track.)
About mutate, I would have generalize it, so that the existing mutate will be "mutate non-Human creature", but some cards can specify different qualities in which case it can target any permanent with the appropriate qualities that has the same owner as the spell.
Auras can be attached to stuff other than permanents; they may potentially be attached to any object or player. Therefore, the "enchant" ability should not be omitted. I think that the rules are OK how it is (although I dislike the rule that creatures can't be attached to anything).
If based on some story (e.g. "Ziveruskex and Strixan" story that I play a GURPS game), they will be mostly based on that (changed as necessary to fit the game effects), and will add additional creature types if it seems right to do so, but usually the existing creature types can be used (Elf, Bird, etc), mostly how Magic: the Gathering is already doing. If it matches an already existing card, then that card will just be used instead.
A set does not necessarily need humans, although it would probably be common. However, neither Human nor any other will necessarily need to be "default"; it can be selected individually for each card. They can then be adjusted as needed if it is wanted to work specific kinds of game effects that care about creature types, or if it would fit the story better, or if the artist had drawn something or is better to draw something else. (These can affect things other than sutypes too, though.)
I happen to like banding and "bands with other", mostly as they are. There was a problem with the "bands with other" rules which was fixed, but even the new rules, also requires a creature with "bands with other X" to itself be "X" to be able to work, and my rules do not have that requirement, I think is better. There is also the potential confusion of some kind of interactions with ordinary banding and with bands with other, although I tried to fix that too in my variant rules; it rarely makes any difference, though.
I think ante is not too bad either, although I should think that what (if anything) happens to ownership and other game effects after the main game is finished, should be beyond the scope of the game rules (they can be a part of the match rules instead). My rules are that "by default", all changes to anything (other than which player wins, loses, or draws) are reverted when the main game ends. You can still, if you want to do, play a match where such ownership changes are retained until the end of a match, or until the end of a tournament, or to put them back immediately but to adjust the scoring based on ownership changes.
The other problem with ante is interaction with subgames and team games. My suggestion involves two things: One is that the ante zone is retained across subgames and does not change ownership at the end of a subgame (but changes made due to other effects during a subgame will persist during the main game); I had seen this used in a puzzle, and I think it can be interesting to use in puzzles. The other is to delete rule 800.4n; if a player leaves the subgame without ending the subgame, cards owned by that player cannot be seen by the subgame; and if a player leaves the main game, the cards may physically remain there (if you are playing that the winner can keep the cards), but whether or not they do, they have ceased to exist as far as anything in the game is concerned, so no game effects can find them, move them to another zone, etc.
Madness also is not bad. I think the newer rules for them are better (discarding to exile is mandatory), but the older rules (where it is optional) can also be significant sometimes. It is possible (and I had made a puzzle where it is the case) that it is helpful to discard it to exile even if you will not cast it, and it might also be possible (to make a puzzle of) that is relevant whether it is mandatory or optional, too.
Dexterity effects could sometimes be used in Un-cards; they should never be in the non-Un-cards.
Just like forecast. The key is that it is not in italics. this is consistent with the idea hat italics can be removed from the text without a functional change to the card.
The em dash is just a separator keyword abilities use for complex parameters (e. g. nonmana costs where there is usually a mana cost as seen on Aboroth and Deepcavern Imp) and multiple parameters (e. g. suspend).
A full activated ability is clearly a complex parameter.
It certainly looks like one, given it appears before an ability separated by an em dash
Boast isn't an ability word though. That would be a mistake indeed.
Boast was a mistake for being an ability word that has rules meaning
"Timing costs"? You mean timing restrictions?
I argue my method is correct and submit as evidence: Boast (as seen on Arni Brokenbrow).
amuseum is partially correct, but since "sorcerous" is actually not part of the cost, it wouldn't be part of the comma-separated list, but added even before.
The word would separated from the list by a dash in a similar fashion to ability words and favor words, but not in italics since it has actual rules meaning.
Before boast we had another kind of keyword mechanic that worked like that: forecast. Both mechanics denote a "special kind of ability", i. e. their parameter (after the dash) is an entire ability, that gets altered by the keyword.
Set mechanics must go before the costs, including timing costs, which must not be confused with set keywords or vainwords.
ex. Channel -- Sorcerous, Pay 1 life
They are definitely moving to simplify wording over the last years!
Very nice
I also really love the idea of 'freeze'. Unfortunately, it definitely carries some flavor burden. Then again, IIRC, a lot of cards that 'freeze' are actually Snow cards or are
cards with frost related names/abilities.
Also a fan of 'defeat' since it is used on quite a few cards (starting with the good old Sengir Vampire, i think?)
Not sure I like withdraw, since it would cause some asymmetry between bouncing and returning from graveyard to hand, or from any zone other than (battle)field to hand.
Field > battlefield
Like the idea of Sorcerous, but think Alex is right on how to apply it.
they finally did it. now it's just "then shuffle." (no longer says "library.")
I like Mimicry as a concept, though Red isn't the first color I'd think for it, I could see it on UR gold cards. The problem would be memory issues, unless Mimicry triggers each turn.
Subsurface seems unnecessary- not that it'd never come up, but that it's so fringe it's gonna be irrelevant most of the time. Sure, you could put Subsurface on auras and equipment to give the ability to flying creatures, but that's even more fringe (and something I believe green already does).
Ambush- This is just jankifiedd flash with no real upside to creating a separate mechanical other than maybe pushing some sorceries to be more versatile.
Demise seems the best, since it recalls Ball Lightning type abilities. I'd tweak the concept so the creature sacrifices at the end of the turn it attacks or blocks, since blue might want some one-use defenders with this as the ability seems too aggressive for blue creatures. That, and without such an attack or block cause, you're just evoking and may as well be designing sorceries 99% of the time.
actually they were created in accordance with canon MTG.
I assume these make sense in your re-balanced world, but you can probably see why they don't answer the question very well in regard to canon MtG.
In my quest to 'balance' the evergreen keywords for every color pair, I assigned three positive and one negative keyword to each pair.
I feel U/R are the masters of trickery, uncertainty, and imitation. Thus I assigned them Mimicry, Subsurface, and Ambush.
= Mimicry = As this enters, it gains a keyword from another creature on the field.
= Subsurface = Can't be blocked by flyers
= Ambush = You may cast this spell as though it had flash if you additionally pay its ambush cost.
= Demise = Sacrifice this at end of turn.
Reasons:
Mimicry effect must be evergreen rather than only appearing in specific sets. So that it can copy keywords in any set, in any format, from every set and every card from the beginning of time until the end of time.
Subsurface replaces similar older blue and red evasion. Namely landwalk, where Islandwalk and Mountainwalk were the most common forms thereof. Subsurface adds some tension against flying (the most common keyword). Flavorwise, blue creatures dwell below the surface of water, and red creatures below the surface of earth.
Ambush can be put on creatures, artifacts, enchantments, and even sorceries. Compared to flash, the base mana cost of the spell should be equal to or lower than the curve, and ambush is a straight-up bonus.
Demise is the negative keyword. Represents red's flash in the pan, and blue's fragility. Appearing more in red offensively and blue defensively.
Considering the small numbers itwould be useful to the discussion to actually list the cards (as I did) to help me understand the situation e. g. I specifically did not count cards that only animate Vehicles due to the special situation of Vehicles, but of the five cards I reviewed for black none fulfilled the animation criteria.
I didn't find any of the hybrid cards you mention.
Black is not the absence of color. You probably mean the absence of (visible) light.
I have given you the reason colorless is not covered in the color pie. If you want to argue the reasons, you should goto the person who determines them, not me.
Mono black = 3 (1 old)
Mono green = 2 (1 old)
Mono white = 2
Mono red = 3 (mainly vehicles)
U/B = 3
U/G = 1
U/W = 1
WUB = 1
Black has a clear lead over other nonblue colors in terms of animating artifacts.
Green has a card that is an exception in an artifact-flavored set. Which is frankly less flavorful than an old black card (also from artifact set).
White also has more recent animate artifact cards than green. Moreover, white and red can reanimate artifacts (and by extension, artifact creatures).
Technically black isn't a real color because it's the absence of color. Doesn't make black less important in our lives.
Freezing lands didn't work for red (not surprising). Instead, such anti-land control/tempo could be focused on blue/green. To enable soft-lock prison decks, in the same veins as Turbofog and Stasis.
I assume that's more a reference to what colors have gotten that ability historically rather than a new addition (unless we're going to get asurprise soon???). Titania's Song and Lifecraft Awakening mean that this is accurate. Green is indeed the next best color to animate artifacts. No mention of black for Xenic Poltergeist though.
The color pie does cover colors. Colorless is not a color. Simple as that.
According to MaRo's interpretation they want to use "cleave" as a synonym for "cut", as in "cuttign out the words". The reason I (and others replying to him) consider this unsatisfactory is because - as Vitenka states - cleaving is not just a simple synonymfor cutting, but means "split"/"sever"/"divide"/"cut in twain" etc. which doesn't work well with the more surgical excision of text that it actually refers to.
There is a perfectly fine word for this kind of cutting that they could hae used instead and sounds equally gruesome (and hence suitable for Innistrad): "carve" means to "cut with care or precision". So close in letters, yet all the difference IMO.
Cleave as in cutting in twain - you're literally cleaving the text apart.
It's STILL terrible word usage. But they probably didn't want to waste 'cut' on something that's so niche.
@amuseum: I wish, I knew, who you are refering to and what you want to say.
you mean 'loquaciousized'. it narrows the goalpost, the goalpost is still vulnerable from other corner cases.
Well, I made a whole set based on the token names being identical to the subtypes and those will now have the amazing Oracle test "create a 1/1 blue Faerie Rogue creature token with flying named Faerie Rogue" etc.
:/
It looks like they fixed the rule for implicit token names, which is something that I had wanted fixed for a while. So, now it is good that they fixed it.
One blatant disagreement I have is how green is now secondary in animating artifacts. Where Green philosophically hates artifacts, but now is an enabler? Even though all these years, Tezzeret, who is blue-black, is one of the most popular methods of animate artifacts strategies. If not black, then red should be considered since it loves to tinker with artifacts. Even white may be more likely than green, both philosophically and mechanically (who loves equipment). He also omitted artifacts animating other artifacts (for that matter, entire article neglects where colorless and artifact partake in the mechanical pie.)
By Mark Rosewater
https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/making-magic/mechanical-color-pie-2021-changes-2021-10-18
Ah, amuseum: I missed the part where adding custom cards to Forge is (relatively) easy.