CFAC 03 Season 2 Entries -- Part 1
Dirty Paws by Tess Garman
I asked you for mono-colored designs this week and you are delivering. Under the cut we have two white designs, two green designs, and a black design. One of all the white designs I get this week will get a bonus point. Same for the green designs. While it won’t be shown today, I do currently have another mono black submission so one of all the black designs will get a bonus point when the week is over. I have yet to receive any red or blue designs.
@amtgplayer
no commentary
This is a cool bit of removal that almost skirts the edge of what could be green removal. Green does get one-sided fighting sometimes and while I don’t think it would get it at 1 CMC like this, I could totally see this design being bent into green in the right environment. But in black it absolutely works as is.
Two points!
@gitblog-monster
This art really looks like some kind of Giant Growth to me. I also wanted to capture the look of fear on the mouse’s face through the unblockable clause
This is pretty solid. Looking at Kaseto and Korozda Guildmage, I think this may be every so slightly overpriced. Those aren’t perfect correlations but they do show similar boosts and unblockability that’s repeatable and cheaper. As is I think this could be bumped to an instant to provide a little extra utility for the cost.
Two points!
@sphinxs-revelation
Ever wondered how a squirrel with a knife can outmaneuver a dragon? This fantasy game obviously defies common sense, let’s fix that. The effect looks rather simple, but wording it without breaking the game in corner cases proved a bit tricky. The current wording is supposed to mean “skip +N/+N and -N/-N effects” (or skip Layer 7c&d for the rules savvy). While green is probably second in providing pump effects, it’s also the color of the natural state and fighting with what you’ve got, so the effect seems fine in this colour.
I love that flavor text! I love his name! Great job there!
This design is incredibly unique and since I saw it I have been trying to think of those corner cases but haven’t come up with anything myself. So at least on this initial pass it seems you’ve come up with some solid rules text. My second thought was “Does a color with so many pump effects really want this?” I tried to think of another color that would (perhaps blue? but that undermines some of its combat tricks that reduce power) and ultimately decided that yeah, the color that also gets the most efficient creatures as far as mana-to-size goes would enjoy a card like this, so good choice there.
Barring those weird corner cases coming to light, there’s a lot to like here.
Two points!
@rafiqueofthemany
I keep meaning to get in on this, and now I finally have. A simple little combat trick with a restrictive cost.
Woo! Welcome to the party! This is perfect for the army color. This combination of abilities has actually never been done before in mono white which seems absolutely crazy to me. They don’t have a huge amount of mechanical overlap that causes them to make sense together, but they are both in white’s wheelhouse and applied like this, can tilt the crux of a game in the right direction. It’s deceptively powerful and I think costed close to appropriately. The +3/+0 is my only real hang up. Even just +1/+0 would work (and doesn’t make your meek creature much less meek) at the same cost.
Two points!
@thanatyr
A hard to pin down informant helps with training the troops. One that can tell you troop movements, even more so. Before the mentors can train their soldiers, even they need intel. And so this informant of the Meek, an inverse Mentor of the Meek in his own fashion.
This is an interesting head game card. You opponent has to choose to give you a chance to find an answer when they play big stuff. This is essentially a white weenie deck saying “meet me in a fair fight.” This really depends on the environment it’s in as to whether it will do a lot of work for you or not--and I’m cool with that.
More from a flavor perspective, I kind of want this mouse to be a 1/1 and also for it to actually be a Rat on the type line. Magic has had rats before and mice are similar enough that I wouldn’t split the tribe by printing mice. As for the P/T, that’s more derived from how I feel about the art, but isn’t necessarily a hard constraint you’d have to deal with if this were actually seeing print--meaning the design would come first and then art that might depict a more appropriate creature to be a 2/2.
Two points!
