Custom Cards and MTG Discussion

[loreholdlesbian]

Art by Rey-venscar

Card transcription

Arete, All-Knowing Oracle 2UU Legendary Creature- Sphinx Wizard [mythic] Flying Arete enters prepared. (While it's prepared, you may cast a copy of its spell. Doing so unprepares it. The copy becomes a token.) Whenever Arete attacks, draw a card. 4/4 // Omniscience 7UUU Enchantment You may cast spells from your hand without paying their mana costs.

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[loreholdlesbian]

Art by BlueLantern

Card transcription

Cortex Pump 3B Artifact [rare] Imprint- When this artifact enters, look at target opponent's hand. You may exile a nonland card from it. T: Copy the exile card. You may cast the copy and and mana of any type can be spent to cast it. (A copy of a permanent spell becomes a token.)

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[loreholdlesbian]

Card transcription

Borborygmos Engaged 2RRGG Legendary Creature- Cyclops [rare] Vigilance Soulbond (You may pair this creature with another unpaired creature when either enters. They remain paired for as long as you control both of them.) T, Tap an untapped creature you control paired with Borborygmos Engaged: Create a token that’s a copy of that creature except it’s a 7/7 legendary Cyclops in addition to its other types, has vigilance, and is named Babyrygmos. 7/7

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[loreholdlesbian]

Art by Arnd Empting

Card transcription

Darksteel Smith W Creature- Human Artificer [rare] First strike, lifelink T: Put a hone counter on target Equipment. Activate only as a sorcery. (Each hone counter on an Equipment grants +1/+0 to equipped creature.) 2W, T: Put an indestructible counter on target Equipment. Activate only as a sorcery. 1/2

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[loreholdlesbian]

Dragon, Saint, and their universes within versions

Art links

Dragon's art by u/ElCuervoBorracho

Shi's art by simon bradley james went

Saint's art by u/v_wind

Axil's art by Victor Lozada

Card transcriptions below

Card transcriptions

Four cards

Dragon, Super Intelligence

2WU Legendary Artifact Creature- Artificer Hero [rare] Flying Other innovative creatures you control have flying. (Creatures that are Artificers, artifacts, or equipped are innovative.) 2WU, T: Create a token that's a copy of target nonlegendary artifact you control, except it's a Vehicle artifact with crew 2. 2/4

Shi, Benevolent Manufactor

The same as above, except with a different name and art.

Saint, the Dragonslayer

1R Legendary Creature- Human Mercenary [uncommon] Innovative creatures you control have haste. (Creatures that are Artificers, artifacts, or equipped are innovative.) Exhaust- 2RR: Exile target artifact card from a graveyard. Create a token that's a copy of it except it's a 4/4 Vehicle artifact with crew 2. (Activate each exhaust ability only once.) 2/2

Axil, Scrapper for Hire

The same as above, except with a different name and art.

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[loreholdlesbian]

My VTM character and her universes within version

Art:

Jessie's made in piccrew

Crimexa's by Jean_Phi

Card transcription

Two cards

Jessie, Cyberstalker 2UB Legendary Creature- Vampire Rogue [mythic] Whenever you cast an artifact or Vampire spell, create a Blood token. Whenever an artifact is put into your graveyard from the battlefield, target player loses 1 life and you gain 1 life. 1/4

The second card is the same as the first, except it has different art and is named Crimexa, Bloodvoid Renegade

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[loreholdlesbian]

Art by Mónica Rodríguez

Card transcription

Hard Time's Feast 1 Artifact- Food [common] Whenever this Food enters or leaves the battlefield, exile target card from a graveyard. 2, T, Sacrifice this Food: You gain 3 life and draw a card. The people of Kessig know not to question a meal in the dead of winter.

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[loreholdlesbian]

The Endbringers

Art links

Khonsu's by DerTodesbote

Leviathan's by Sandara

The Simurgh's by Sandara

Behemoth's by Sandara

Tohu and Bohu's by Blastweave

Card transcriptions below

Five cards

Khonsu, Time Scourge

4WWW Legendary Creature- Bringer [mythic] Flying Ward—Tap three artifacts and/or creatures you control and put a stun counter on each of them. When Khonsu enters, for each opponent, tap up to one target artifact or creature that player controls. Artifacts and creatures your opponents control don’t untap during their untap step. 5/5

Leviathan, Coast Scourge

5UUU Legendary Creature- Bringer [mythic] When you cast this spell, copy it, except the copy isn't legendary. Vigilance, trample, ward 3 Leviathan, Coast Scourge's power and toughness are each equal to the number of Islands you control. */*

The Simurgh, Mind Scourge

2BBB Legendary Creature- Bringer [mythic] Flying, lifelink Ward- Sacrifice a creature Whenever The Simurgh deals combat damage to a player, until end of turn, you may look at the top card of their library any time, you may play the top card of their library. If you cast a spell this way, pay life equal to its mana value rather than pay its mana cost. 5/5

Behemoth, Tectonic Scourge

6RRR Legendary Creature- Bringer [mythic] Trample, haste Ward- Pay 3 life (Whenever this creature becomes the target of a spell or ability an opponent controls, counter it unless that player pays 3 life.) 1: You may choose new targets for target spell or ability. 9/9

Tohu and Bohu, Twin Scourges

3GGG Legendary Creature- Bringer [mythic] Ward- Sacrifice two lands 1: Exile cards from the top of your library until you exile a creature card. Tohu and Bohu become a copy of it until end of turn, except they’re a 6/6 legendary Bringer named Tohu and Bohu, Twin Scourges and have “Ward—Sacrifice two lands”. You may play lands exiled this way for as long as you control Tohu and Bohu. 6/6

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[loreholdlesbian]

Art by Doris Zhang

Card transcription

Champion of Naktamun W Creature- Human Warrior [rare] Ascend (If you control ten or more permanents, you get the city's blessing for the rest of the game.) Eternalize 1WW. Activate only if you have the city's blessing. (1WW, Exile this card from your graveyard: Create a token that's a copy of it, except it's a 4/4 black Zombie Human Warrior with no mana cost. Eternalize only as a sorcery.) 2/1

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[loreholdlesbian]

My Stormlight RPG character and her spren, and their universes within versions

Art links:

Ashel's made in Hero Forge

Corantir's art by Pavel Terekhov

Cipher's art by Caio Santos

Trixie's art by Koldmilk

Card transcriptions below

The first

Ashel, Ghostblood Agent

3B Legendary Creature- Crab Rogue Knight [mythic] Sacrifice another creature: Put a +1/+1 counter on Ashel, Ghostblood Agent. If this is the second time this ability resolved this turn, draw a card. Radiant (You can have a spren as a second commander.) 2/2

The second

Corantir, Betrayal-Bound

The same as above, except it has a different name and art, and instead of Radiant and its accompanying reminder text it has

Hauntsworn (You can have a veilsworn as a second commander.)

The third

Cipher, Cryptic Agent

2U Legendary Creature- Spirit [mythic] Whenever you draw a card other than the first one you draw in each of your draw steps, put a +1/+1 counter on Cipher, Cryptic Agent. If this is the second time this ability resolved this turn, create a 2/2 blue Illusion creature token. Spren (You can have a radiant as a second commander.) 2/2

The fourth

Trixie, Charlatan Spirit

The same as above, except it has a different name and art, and instead of Spren and its accompanying reminder text it has

Veilsworn (You can have a hauntsworn as a second commander.)

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[loreholdlesbian]

Art by Max Frorer

Card transcription

Kin-Tree Shrine G Artifact [rare] Outlast G (G, T: Put a +1/+1 counter on this artifact. Activate only as a sorcery.) Whenever another creature you control with +1/+1 counters on it dies, put those counters on this artifact. 2G, T, Remove all +1/+1 counters from this artifact: Amass Warriors X, where X is the number of counters removed this way.

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[loreholdlesbian]

Art by Ivan Fomin

Card transcription

Neanderthal Poet 1R Creature- Human Bard [rare] Whenever a player casts a spell, they may explain what it does. If that player doesn't or if they use any multi-syllable words to do so, this creature deals 2 damage to them. 2/2 "When cast spell, me hit you for two if you say long word or no word." Border: Silver

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[loreholdlesbian]

Art by Even Amundsen

Card transcription

Spellbinder Mage 2U Creature- Human Wizard [uncommon] When this creature enters, create an artifact token named Wand. It has "1, T, Sacrifice this token: Exile target instant or sorcery card from your graveyard. Copy it. You may cast the copy. Activate only as a sorcery." 2/2

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[loreholdlesbian]

Art by Donato Giancola

Card transcription

Urza and Mishra 3UR Legendary Creature- Human Artificer [mythic] Artifact creatures you control get +2/+0. Whenever one or more artifact creatures you control deal combat damage to a player, draw a card. Specialty- Ornithopter (As long as this card is your commander, your starting deck may include any number of cards named Ornithopter.) 4/5

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[loreholdlesbian]

Art links:

Chicken Jockey's by Destructoid

Tenacious Nestmother's by Adamdeda

Card transcription

Two cards

The first

Chicken Jockey 1B Creature- Bird Zombie [uncommon] This creature can't block. When this creature dies, create a 1/1 white Bird creature token with flying and "When this creature dies, create a Food token." (It's an artifact with "2, T, Sacrifice this artifact: You gain 3 life.") 3/2

The second is identical to the first, except it's named Tenacious Nestmother and has different art. Additionally, it has the following flavor text:

It may have lost its wings and its life, but it still protects its children as long as it stands.

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[loreholdlesbian]

Art by Ishmael Hoover

Card transcription

Eumidian Pioneer G Creature- Insect Scout [common] When this creature enters, create a Lander token. (It's an artifact with "2, T, Sacrifice this artifact: Search your library for a basic land card, put it onto the battlefield tapped, then shuffle.") 1/1

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[loreholdlesbian]

The Energy Scale of Artifact Tokens

Since their big debut in shadows over innistrad, we've gotten a number of sets where one of that set's mechanics is an artifact token. These artifact tokens all have some intrinsic use- usually but not always requiring sacrificing them. Often, though, in addition to this intrinsic use case, there are some number of cards that are designed to use that artifact token for an alternative purpose. The more the player is expected to use a given artifact token for alternative purposes, the more that artifact token approaches being energy.

The energy mechanic is the purest form of an alternative resource in the game. Energy has practically no intrinsic value. If you play a card like Attune with Aether in your deck with no other energy cards, the energy you gain from it is going to do nothing. The only value of energy is in cards that specifically care about it. This means that designers of a set using energy have to consider the "energy economy"- what is the value of an energy counter compared to other resources? The more an artifact token has alternative use cases, the more it has its own alternative resource economy that the designers must consider. A vanilla artifact token with nothing but a subtype and no inherent ability- something very similar to Farid Enterprising Salvager's Scrap tokens, but with a subtype that could be specifically refered to by other cards- would be used in very similar ways to energy, as a resource for cards to care about and little else. The main difference is that there are far more generic artifact and permanent synergies than there are generic player-counter synergies, and so even with no inherent use case, Scrap tokens could not be given out as freely as energy counters are. The economy is less self contained.

Some existing artifact token mechanics are closer to this hypothetical than others. Food is at the far end of this scale. Any set with a Food theme tends to give lots of alternative use cases because a) gaining 3 life for 2 mana isn't worth a lot and b) if Food is used too frequently for its intrinsic use case this slows the game down in a way that isn't particularly fun, so providing an alternative helps avoid this negative result.

On the opposite end of the scale, I would place Junk tokens. Junk has very strong intrinsic value, which means it cannot be given out as freely as some other tokens, and because it is less common it is difficult to build an alternative resource economy around it. An effect that costs "Sacrifice a Junk:" would have to be strong to offset what the player is losing out on. (Though admittedly, many pre-op trans people would not see sacrificing their junk as much of a cost at all.)

Every artifact token exists somewhere on this scale. Landers, Maps, Mutagens, and Powerstones exist closer to the Junk end; their effect is desireable and well costed, and there are not many cards that use them for an alternative resource than the one they intrinsically provide. (Of course, any artifact token is subject to generic artifact synergies such as the cost of sacrificing an artifact, but because these kinds of synergies are universal to all artifact tokens, they are less relevant to this kind of comparison.) Blood exists closer to the Food/Energy end of the scale; a more significant portion of its value as compared to Junk, at least in its debut set, was in cards that wanted to sacrifice it for other effects. It is certainly closer to the Junk end than Food though, because its intrinsic use case is a bit more valuable and is less problematic in large doses. Clues and Treasures exist closer to the middle of the scale; their intrinsic value is more than food, but not so high that it is difficult to use them for alternative effects.

So if you are a custom magic card designer making a set, and if you are using an artifact token, think about where you want it to fall on this scale. How much is its intrinsic effect worth, and how often should your players be using it for that effect vs an alternative? The answer will have important ripple effects on what else you want to be doing in your set. Having multiple alternate-resource economies in a single environment, for example, is quite complicated, so a set probably shouldn't have both Food and Energy as a major theme.