#cfac 48

[blackdeckwins]

CFAC #48 Showcase (part 4)

And so, our week of staring at a villainous snake-mountain of lava with a sorcerer forlornly staring from a distance draws to a close. We’ve had some fantastic designs so far this week, and we’re not quite done yet! Follow the jump to check out the last batch of designs; any that come in after I complete it will be appended to the end Friday night.

Art by TacoSauceNinja

@mtg-philocalist:

This was quite an interesting challenge and captivating artwork to go with it. The card type “Land” jumped out at me right away and I went from there. In accordance with this week’s bonus challenge, I thought of it as shrine-like structure that demands your life’s blood in order to grant you part of its magic, but simultaneously grows in power the more you make use of it, until you finally unleash all of its force to either wipe the board or swing in for one last blow with your armada of buffed-up creatures.

Ooh, wow, a potential boardwipe stapled to a land, but it’s going to take a while to get there and cost you a chunk of life in the process. Interesting. It’s unusual enough that the power level is difficult for me to gauge, but I can certainly say it’s powerful. One qualm: neither Red nor Black get +X/+X to your whole team; both tend to do pumping as strictly power. I would recommend changing the choice to +X/+0 or -0/-X for symmetry and color-pie reasons.

Thanks for the submission! Two points!

@zelosmilder:

My CFAC 48 submission! The “building up” theme reminded me of the various quest cards, and so I designed such a card that involves building up power through short-term sacrifices in order to achieve a strong effect in the late game. Not entirely sure if the power level is perfectly on-curve, but fine-tuning the life paid, cards drawn, or experience counters needed could be done to keep it balanced.

I, um, I’m going to hope you meant to use “quest counter” in both places, because currently, this card just draws you cards for a hefty life cost. You’re right that there are a lot of nobs to turn, and I wouldn’t be surprised if most of them did get turned. I also hate that your opponent does the opposite of you with cards (Discard as opposed to draw) but does the same in terms of life (losing 6). If it let your opponent gain 6 it would be pretty bad, of course, but a part of me is still saddened by it.

Thanks for the submission! Two points!

@t-a-c:

The main thing I thought of looking at the prompt was something that charges up over time and can be cracked to finish off an opponent. I kind of wanted this to fill a role similar to Valakut in terms of a land that creates inevitability.

This was so close to being a cool utility land, but I’m afraid you’ve forgotten something: this, mechanically, isn’t a land. There’s no mana-producing effect, and by definition lands need to be able to add mana, or they’re just 0-cost artifacts or enchantments. And without a way to add mana, there’s not even a real reason for this to enter tapped, is there? I would definitely add “T: Add {C} to your mana pool.” to the card.

Outside of that, a very interesting and potentially powerful land. I don’t really like that this is going to encourage players to sit on it and wait until they have enough counters to sacrifice it and kill their opponent; that’s going to be miserable gameplay while your opponent waits to die to a land that they can’t interact with. Have you ever had to wait for your opponent to hit you ten times with a Mutavault to end the game? It’s miserable, and it isn’t good gameplay to encourage. I would probably lower the mana cost by, like, {1}, and make it just hit creatures.

Thanks for the submission! Two points!

@thricexandvii:

My inspiration for this card was twofold: the small character in the foreground of the art (who I took to be contemplating the long walk to the mountain), and “growing enchantments” like Rumbling Crescendo. (In fact I almost made it an Enchantment Land but decided against it due to not really adding anything but complexity and balancing issues to the design.)

It would be more succinct to have it ETB with 3 counters and remove one each turn… but each step is added to a previous one to make a Journey; they don’t take away from it.

Interesting; a dual land that isn’t a duel land until a few turns later. And this is actually a lot easily to balance unlike having counters and removing them, because it’s easy to have other cards do that, and proliferate is already nicely costed to work with this. Three might be a bit too much, because that does make it quite a delay before this produces colored mana; perhaps just two counters would be fine and still be balanced.

It’s pretty straight-forward, and I think it works well. Thanks for the submission! Two points!

@noyan-dar:

no commentary

 Interesting; a removal spell that has to build over time, but can potentially be a tremendous effect. Seems quite fun in multiplayer, as it really dissuades the opponents from killing your creatures. It also does that in a normal game, but your opponent also doesn’t have a lot of choices, you know?

I’m iffy on the costing here, because you’re presumably getting something from those creatures dying; at least saving some life by chump blocking or trading it for a removal spell. Getting to blow this up later and get more value off of those fallen creatures is quite powerful, so I would probably want to bump up that base mana cost. I may also restrict it to sorcery speed, but that would be more based off of testing.

Thanks for the submission! Two points!

@commandtower-solring-go:

no commentary

This is definitely an interesting card, though it seems incredibly weak. I mean, it’s a board wipe that’s available on turn 3, but it takes exiling cards from your hand to fuel it: you’re basically guaranteed to be down on card advantage, which is really the opposite of what you’re looking for in a board wipe (especially a three-color one). I think this certainly is the start of a cool design, but it needs a bit more work before it clicks.

Thanks for the submission! Two points!

[blackdeckwins]

CFAC #48 Showcase (part 3)

At first, I was worried that this artwork wouldn’t inspire many of you to participate this week. Boy, was I wrong! With 18 designs showcased (counting today’s) and more on the way soon, this has proven to be a popular piece! I’m excited to see what comes in at the last minute before the final decisions are made. Follow the jump to check out six more awesome designs!

Art by TacoSauceNinja

@linvala-the-memer:

We don’t have many Ooze lords so heres one. It was originally not a lord, and you just gained life equal to the converted mana cost of what you destroy. But i forgot about the challenge! So i changed it and made it flavorful. This ooze is moving in so it can make room for a bunch if little oozes. Less room for little oozes, less oozes. 

Kind of weird to call this a “lord” when it doesn’t directly buff or help or care about Oozes at all, but I see what you’re getting at. I like the homage to Acidic Slime, and I like that it gives you a bit of help towards filling your opponent’s graveyard. It’s not obnoxiously slapping you in the face with its ability, but it’s got some synergies there and it lets you decide if you want to go removal-heavy or do more of a mill-your-opponent style.

Thanks for the submission! Two points!

@runeofecstasy:

So my first thought was silver border because there are so many fun ways of tracking how long the game’s been going on. Then I thought about the piece and challenge itself, and what’s more villainous than taxes? And what happens when you don’t pay your taxes? So we have an evil (and probably overpowered) card. For awhile, this card was just named ‘Rhystic Study on Steroids’, and I think that’s a pretty accurate description.

I played Rhystic Tron a few times; it’s clunky and takes forever to play (especially online) and isn’t fun for anyone involved.

And you are correct, this card is far too overpowered as it stands, and other than the name referencing literal tax collection this card doesn’t feel very silver-bordered to me; an easy name swap and this is a Black-bordered card.

The first ability is really awkward to me: they cast a spell and you either get a counter or a card that you probably can’t do anything with, since you can’t cast spells outside of the color of mana you have and you can’t get the lands off of it (which is basically what they’re going to exile) so it makes weird, swingy situations like landfall did. I would actually cut the exiling and casting thing entirely, and just put a counter on this when your opponent casts a spell, no choice.

I actually like the second effect, even if it’s obnoxiously overpowered: I would probably have your opponent choose a certain number of permanents (five, perhaps) and you gain control of them, because leaving them with one land is basically ending the game in a way that’s going to draw it out for everyone.

I get the thought process behind the card, but like taxes, it ends up unwieldy and unnecessarily complicated.

Thanks for the submission! Two points!

@custommagiccardswithnonmagiclore:

The vibe of the card tells me to make a Soul card from M15, but the Soul doesn’t fit with the idea of slow growth so instead I came up with this idea.

Its first ability is how the red part of creature and player damage interwined with black’s gain life.

Its second ability is the reason it used +1/+1 counter, animating the soul to fight. I don’t think animating enchantment is a blue thing, but I chose blue because it’s the most proper color for the card after the other two color has been taken.

I think the last ability being blue is perfectly fine; it’s animated things before. Hey, if Awaken can be pushed into the color, I’m sure this is acceptable.

What I’m actually not so sure about is the first ability. It scales up so much over time, I would be afraid it would be run just as repeated creature removal that you don’t have to invest any more mana or resources into: pay three and let it do its thing, and even though it may be behind curve for when it hits the field, the fact that you’re gaining life will keep you alive long enough for this to spiral past your opponent’s creatures. It’s a very powerful effect, and ultimately detracts from what this card was going for.

I like the putting a +1/+1 counter on it, and I like paying to animate it, but there needs to be a different effect occurring when the counter goes on: what that could be, I’m not sure of, but it should definitely be something other than a slow-building repeatable removal spell.

Thanks for the submission! Two points!

@voicesofchaos:

So a land would make the most sense with this art but then the power level would be capped unless it had some massive drawback and art this cool feels like it needs some power to it. The next logical choice would be my beloved land aura or even the Futrue Sight mechanic Fortify but neither really fit the idea I had. So we are going with the actual tower being an artifact which is a little bit of a flavor stretch but it has been done before.

So Ferocious was one of the lowest rated mechanics in Khans Of Tarkir but that set had a lot of awesome stuff going to distract from it and I think in a more proper environment it could shine here.So here if you have a big villain (a creature with power 4 or greater) you can fill your base fodder minions or activate deadly traps.

I almost took the life loss off because this card has a lot of text and it felt a bit Black but I felt it helped balance it a little and made an interesting choice where you don’t automatically put the counter on if you don’t need another villain. The first effect was almost a Black skeleton but again wanted to keep this card colorless. The mana ability originally was going to have the rider that the mana could only be used to cast spells or activate abilities that target attacking creatures to really represent setting off “traps” but it seemed unnecessary as anything could be a trap, even summoning big creatures.

There is a lot going on here and a lot I almost changed but this time around I decided to trust my gut quite a bit.

I like this, I really do. It feels like an artifact, does a lot of cool things, and shows off a mechanic in a way that it couldn’t in its first execution. You’re right, though, that paying a life for the counter feels really weird, and I don’t think it needs that balancing touch: you could cut it and be just fine. I feel like I might have called it something other than “Villain’s Lair” because that sounds very land-like, but that’s something that can be roughed out over time; cards rarely keep their names forever when they go through design.

Thanks for the submission! Two points!

@thekillershrub:

Silver Border card. A good cartoon villain always has an unnecessarily large Doom Cannon and witty banter. Cheap and nonlegendary because the evil villain always has more, and always gets away! Think weird Darksteel Reactor.

I rarely ever get silver-bordered cards, and now I have two in one post! This must be a new record.

I definitely like the flavor you’re going for here: the big mastermind invention that the villain is going to (eventually) use to destroy the world, and like the classic cartoon hero, your opponent will have plenty of time to deal with you (or this) before it goes off. Ideally, the lava would be oozing out of the frame and into the textbox, but I don’t have the time to fancy it up like that.

Really, my biggest problem with this card is that you don’t have to say “Muhahaha” every time you put counters on it. I mean, come on! We’re going for an Un-card here, right? Keep the wackiness up!

And for those following along at home, it would be ten turns of doubling (without any tampering) for this to reach 1000. So if you played it on turn one, it goes off on turn 11. As a serious balancing concession, since most control decks wouldn’t be able to deal with this, I would have to push the mana cost up to three so there would be a reasonable chance of countering it.

Thanks for the submission! Two points!

@randomita​:

no commentary

Pretty interesting design, essentially gathering counters from your creatures as they fall of, and eventually turning them into a massive effect. My first real qualm with it, though, is that they need to be some kind of counters, not just “counters;” charge counters is the default, but you can also use a custom one, as long as the name doesn’t bleed over onto another mechanic. Second, it feels like you have the power level of the two abilities completely backwards: it costs a ton and you have to sacrifice it for a little life drain, while it can be repeatedly used as a reanimation tool, as long as you can keep the counters flowing. The reanimation ability is the one that should be one-shot, and the draining really shouldn’t cost ten mana. 

Thanks for the submission! Two points!