A top-down design. Rebels are causing chaos all over Queen Cecilia's city, and she won't tolerate that kind of subversion. The rebels are about to be caught by Cecilia's guards, and so a brave member, the brother of leader Matteo, offers to distract the guards while the others flee. He is caught, probably given an Exile Order, and wishes the rest can someday win the war for freedom.
For flavor reasons, this used to cost , and it was obligatory that a creature died this turn. At some point, the rare white Adapt spell was cut. I decided to look if there was any card already made that made sense with adapt before making a new one. I figured that it should be possible to cast this when you're winning. So, if you have an extra , maybe the guards won't get Lorenzo!
Finally, I like how this foreshadowed Harmony's CMC-1-or-less theme.
A lot of people would like red to have looting effects (draw, then discard). Some think it should be "discard at random", some think it should be regular discard but never draw more than the amount discarded. About a year ago, however, I didn't see it that much. So this isn't about that.
This is like a Black Knight kind of card. I made a red card that did Mask of Memory's effect to mirror Face of the Mermaid's "discard to draw two". Then I saw the effects made more sense switched. I'm happy that looting is gradually being more accepted as a thing red could do. While this card involves a random action to avoid people complaining red shouldn't get this, it now seems it was always a step in the right direction.
I'm also happy that red managed to get an evasion ability, which helped this particular mirror.
At some point, both this and Face of the Siren were uncommons. And the effects were switched (red still keeping the "at random" line). When I made a pass to clean some things, blue uncommon was a bit tight, so I looked for cards that could go down a rarity. And I saw this. This is perfeclty common in blue. But the mirrored pair kinda restricted me.
I then thought about Black Knight. Black doesn't get 2/2s with two abilities for two mana. But it exists because of White Knight. It is strange, however, that not even in higher rarities does black get creatures of that kind if not mirroring a white knight. I think Black Knight would be still exciting (and make more sense) costing , but, more importantly, I think it should be rare. Cycles (and pairs, too) are meant to show how one thing varies across colors, but when the effects are hinting at one color more than the other, I think it's okay just to let rarity do its job. This is what I did here.
As with Sharp-axe Dwarf, this was me trying to balance som things that weren't quite right. Unlike the dwarf, though, this made less sense. Not even in higher rarities does blue get bodies like this for one mana. Even though it's not going to break anything, I now think this was actually a poor choice. I do support cards like Kraken Hatchling, though.
Not quite colorshifted, yes, but I'm surprised this wasn't done in Shadowmoor (Stalker Hag could have been the reason, though). I like how hybrid is often the same thing done by either color but with abilities like these it gets a new meaning. In this case, this is regular for black but an enemy hoser for green. Since this set tried to use hybrid to get those conflicts noticed, I think this does a good job.
When I made this card, I was trying to make development decisions. The game now has better creatures, so, I figured, this kind of changes are reasonable (if for you can get a 2/2 with benefits, a bear should be okay). I didn't understand, however, that vanilla creatures in their majority serve as a basis. Now, I know I wouldn't want to print this.
As a fun fact, though, Patrol Siren is strictly better than this. I actually didn't relize I had made not only a red bear but two, and a blue one!
Heh, quite a fun tweak on Ruins of Trokair. Wizards probably wouldn't print it because that's potentially a lot of shuffling for not much gain. But I like it.
Cool. Probably fractionally better than Shock Troops, but not always. Nice cycle. I like the flavour text mirror on the white-blue-green ones; could the red and black match them a bit more tightly?
Horizontal cycle with Forteplazian Grounds, Mertinian Bog, Moongrove Meadow, Heavenlake Waters.
Horizontal cycle with Forteplazian Grounds, Mertinian Bog, Moongrove Meadow, Irecliff Mountain.
Horizontal cycle with Forteplazian Grounds, Mertinian Bog, Heavenlake Waters, Irecliff Mountain.
This is probably the weakest of the cycle by far both power wise and, in comparison with the others, theme-wise. Otherwise the cycle is quite cool.
Horizontal cycle with Forteplazian Grounds, Moongrove Meadow, Heavenlake Waters, Irecliff Mountain.
Horizontal cycle with Mertinian Bog, Moongrove Meadow, Heavenlake Waters, Irecliff Mountain.
Cycle with Clear Field, Clear Lake, Clear Marsh, Clear Hills.
Cycle with Clear Field, Clear Lake, Clear Marsh, Clear Trees.
Cycle with Clear Field, Clear Lake, Clear Hills, Clear Trees.
Cycle with Clear Field, Clear Marsh, Clear Hills, Clear Trees.
Cycle with Clear Lake, Clear Marsh, Clear Hills, Clear Trees.
Horizontal cycle with Relic of Authority, Relic of Trascendence, Relic of Respect and Relic of Imagination.
Horizontal cycle with Relic of Authority, Relic of Trascendence, Relic of Respect and Relic of Inspiration.
Horizontal cycle with Relic of Authority, Relic of Trascendence, Relic of Imagination and Relic of Inspiration.
Horizontal cycle with Relic of Authority, Relic of Respect, Relic of Imagination and Relic of Inspiration.
Horizontal cycle with Relic of Trascendence, Relic of Respect, Relic of Imagination and Relic of Inspiration.
A top-down design. Rebels are causing chaos all over Queen Cecilia's city, and she won't tolerate that kind of subversion. The rebels are about to be caught by Cecilia's guards, and so a brave member, the brother of leader Matteo, offers to distract the guards while the others flee. He is caught, probably given an Exile Order, and wishes the rest can someday win the war for freedom.
For flavor reasons, this used to cost
, and it was obligatory that a creature died this turn. At some point, the rare white Adapt spell was cut. I decided to look if there was any card already made that made sense with adapt before making a new one. I figured that it should be possible to cast this when you're winning. So, if you have an extra 
, maybe the guards won't get Lorenzo!
Finally, I like how this foreshadowed Harmony's CMC-1-or-less theme.
Alex: See my comment on Face of the Mermaid.
A lot of people would like red to have looting effects (draw, then discard). Some think it should be "discard at random", some think it should be regular discard but never draw more than the amount discarded. About a year ago, however, I didn't see it that much. So this isn't about that.
This is like a Black Knight kind of card. I made a red card that did Mask of Memory's effect to mirror Face of the Mermaid's "discard to draw two". Then I saw the effects made more sense switched. I'm happy that looting is gradually being more accepted as a thing red could do. While this card involves a random action to avoid people complaining red shouldn't get this, it now seems it was always a step in the right direction.
I'm also happy that red managed to get an evasion ability, which helped this particular mirror.
At some point, both this and Face of the Siren were uncommons. And the effects were switched (red still keeping the "at random" line). When I made a pass to clean some things, blue uncommon was a bit tight, so I looked for cards that could go down a rarity. And I saw this. This is perfeclty common in blue. But the mirrored pair kinda restricted me.
I then thought about Black Knight. Black doesn't get 2/2s with two abilities for two mana. But it exists because of White Knight. It is strange, however, that not even in higher rarities does black get creatures of that kind if not mirroring a white knight. I think Black Knight would be still exciting (and make more sense) costing
, but, more importantly, I think it should be rare. Cycles (and pairs, too) are meant to show how one thing varies across colors, but when the effects are hinting at one color more than the other, I think it's okay just to let rarity do its job. This is what I did here.
As with Sharp-axe Dwarf, this was me trying to balance som things that weren't quite right. Unlike the dwarf, though, this made less sense. Not even in higher rarities does blue get bodies like this for one mana. Even though it's not going to break anything, I now think this was actually a poor choice. I do support cards like Kraken Hatchling, though.
Not quite colorshifted, yes, but I'm surprised this wasn't done in Shadowmoor (Stalker Hag could have been the reason, though). I like how hybrid is often the same thing done by either color but with abilities like these it gets a new meaning. In this case, this is regular for black but an enemy hoser for green. Since this set tried to use hybrid to get those conflicts noticed, I think this does a good job.
When I made this card, I was trying to make development decisions. The game now has better creatures, so, I figured, this kind of changes are reasonable (if for
you can get a 2/2 with benefits, a bear should be okay). I didn't understand, however, that vanilla creatures in their majority serve as a basis. Now, I know I wouldn't want to print this.
As a fun fact, though, Patrol Siren is strictly better than this. I actually didn't relize I had made not only a red bear but two, and a blue one!
Heh, quite a fun tweak on Ruins of Trokair. Wizards probably wouldn't print it because that's potentially a lot of shuffling for not much gain. But I like it.
Cool. Probably fractionally better than Shock Troops, but not always. Nice cycle. I like the flavour text mirror on the white-blue-green ones; could the red and black match them a bit more tightly?
Obsoleting Glorious Anthem?
Scary card, but probably printable. Half a Flash-Hulk :)
Wow, this will really gum up the ground in Limited like anything.
Nice mirror. Is there any way the rarities could match as well?
Surprising to see you pushing blue weenies - there's a reason only green and white have got this size before. But it's not going to break anything.