#tarniyo

[magicjudge]

How do cards with directly conflicting rules text interact? Like if you have Venser's Journal and Midnight Oil out at the same time

Here are the three golden rules of card interaction:

If a card contradicts the rules, the card wins.

If one card says something can’t happen and another card wants that thing to happen, that thing can’t happen. Can’t beats can.

Except for can’t vs can situations, the card/effect that’s more recently played wins when two cards contradict each other.

[blackdeckwins]

CFAC #45 Showcase (part 2)

I love art pieces that have multiple things going on at once, so you can choose what you want to focus on for your design. There are several different parts of this piece of artowrk, like the elderly man lounging against the tree, the bird bringing him a gift, the wolf basking in the shade, the multiple birds in the background. This week’s designs have also come from many different directions: token creation, damage prevention, and legendary creatures have all shown up. Follow the jump to check out today’s cards, which go every which way for inspiration, and check out the challenge here if you want to submit your own idea!

Art by Manuel Castañón

@custommagiccardswithnonmagiclore:

The art depicts a druid in a trance, feeling deep in tranquil, which is why I use one of the earliest flavor for enchantment destruction.

The idea of price comes from the fact that the druid holds the crow (raven?) with light coming out of its mouth, with slightest faint, the whole trance would be done.

The white part comes from the fact that the abilities have taxing, which is a white thing.

Green also gives you access to slightly-more-powerful enchantment destruction, which this is. In fact, I would call it far too cheap for an enchantment boardwipe that can destroy more enchantment later on. I would want it to be at least 2WG, especially because the set that would want to play this would also have enchantment creatures. I also probably have them pay X where X is the creature’s converted mana cost rather than just say “its mana cost” so there isn’t much fretting for paying the right colors.

Thanks for the submission! Two points!

@tarniyo:

For this card I wanted to try out something that had the flavor of an old, wise man who lives in the forest - he has a solution for every problem. I thought  a card where you can choose modes best fit that flavor, and escalate is a really fun mechanic i’ve wanted to design around for a while now

This is a solidly-designed card: the first and last abilities are spot-on for the costing. Unfortunately, there is a problem with that ability: Green and White don’t get to copy creatures that aren’t tokens. Green can have other creatures copy it, but it can’t go the other way. 

Now, if you wanted to add Blue to the mana cost, maybe that effect could work, but properly fixing the Escalate cost to reflect three colors would be a bit nightmarish (and it’s no fun if we leave out Blue!). Triple-Hybrid mana might would do the trick, but that’s gonna be pretty small...

Thanks for the submission! Two points!

@amtgplayer:

So, basically this is a green Ancestral Recall (aka cheap Harmonize) that demands you to jump through a few hoops. I actually made this card before the challenge, and it was named Summoner’s Quest. It turned out to fit the artwork pretty well, so I just changed the name to fit better.

Quest is an enchantment type with rules baggage (“each triggered ability printed on this card only triggers once”). I decided to make it a subtype instead of an ability so that referring to it is more natural: “Exile target Quest, then return it to the battlefield under your control” instead of “Exile target enchantment with quest…” If I ever want this ability on a creature, I can just have an Enchantment Creature - Quest Human Scout.

I dislike Harmonize being in Green, but this is an execution I can get behind. I love the “activates only once” aspect of this, though I think I would keep the subtype off of creatures because a creature being a “Quest” is a bit awkward to conceptualize. Also, “Enchantment Creature - Quest” already takes up a lot of space:

I don’t think you’ll be printing that.

I do really like the card, though I can imagine costing 2G would be a lot more likely.

Thanks for the submission! Two points!

@commandtower-solring-go:

The flavour is that an old friend of his had passed away (exiling the creature) but they still remain in contact. I feel that, while it may seem like a very powerful card, getting a creature into your bin before turn 2 is not only hard, but in any deck designed to do it wouldn’t want to them exile it. So I feel there is some balance within that.

I think there are more ways to meet that requirement than you think, and there are also ways to slip this onto the battlefield to get around that trigger. Plus, two-mana card draw engines are just too powerful, even ones with downsides like this.

However, this card did give me an idea for a cool design that’s super close to this, but gets around the pesky cast trigger to exile the creature (I would also bump up the mana cost to at least 1BB because Phyrexian Arena is a heck of a card):

At the beginning of your upkeep, exile target creature card from your graveyard. If that card is exiled this way, draw a card.

Boom. Recycles creatures in your graveyard into cards in your hand, one at a time, once per turn. It’s worded a bit awkwardly to make sure you don’t draw the card if this enchantment didn’t exile it.

Thanks for the submission! Two points!

@thekillershrub:

Immediately reminded me of Dosan the Falling Leaf. I know this is weird. I know this breaks the fundamental rules of magic. I know this is powerful. I know this causes shenanigans. I know other legends allow you to cast creatures with flash without opponents having access to it. However, I like the design and hope it inspires others.

So now, it’s sort of an anti-Dosan. Interesting. I can imagine the phrase “at your end step” would become very common in a format with this card. I feel like I would want the ability to be completely symmetrical, so you can’t play spells on your own turn, either, but I would love to make this part White and give it flash: imagine jamming it down at your opponent’s upkeep, Silencing them for an entire turn. That’s pretty powerful, and I’d love to see how constructed-worthy that may make this card.

Thanks for the submission! Two points!

@outerspace-messiah:

This card was entirely designed with limited in mind where early creatures can net you some life if your opponent is playing a slower game and 7 mana to draw three late game can be of use as well.

With a druid just chilling in the woods with his animal friends, I thought a flavorful way to have your creatures not attack or block. I went with that over preventing damage your creatures deal because that could lead to serious board stalls if both players happened to have one.

The druid also looks like he’s harmonizing with animals, so I thought that he harmonizes more if there’s more creatures there, hence the life gain. However, that’s a really weak effect for only once on your upkeep, so I had the life gain be every upkeep since you’re open to attacks from your opponent.

And of course there’d have to be a way to get rid of the enchantment, so I added Harmonize as the sac ability as a shoutout to it and a flavorful way to say “I learned a lot through that mediation” as green likes to do.

I personally hate Harmonize in Green: its card advantage is supposed to be tied to creatures or lands, so just getting “pay mana, draw cards” isn’t something Green should do. I’d rather this be a regrowth or maybe make some tokens instead of straight drawing cards, or you could keep the card draw and add Blue to the cost. 

I’m really not sure about the power level of this effect; it could be quite powerful if your opponent isn’t aggressive enough, but roughly two points per creature could be an easy rate to keep up with (depending on how wide you’re going on creatures). My biggest concern is that, if this card is working well, it’s just going to prolong the game in an agonizing way, so that’s something to keep an eye on.

Thanks for the submission! Two points!

[blackdeckwins]

CFAC #40 Winners!

After a week of wisdom, and dragons, and wise dragons, it’s time to declare this week’s winners! Each one was careful chosen after poring over each individual design, and there were no dartboards, dice, or deals with dragons involved with the decision (probably). 

Our first winner is my favorite Dragon design. Sometimes, Dragons can get really complex, doing a lot of crazy things. However, the best design isn’t always the most complicated one. This week’s winner designed a simple card that’s probably only a limited bomb, but it was such a cool take on typical dragon design that I had to give it the credit it is due. This category’s winner is...

Heavensbreath Long by @sofacoin! Congratulations, you’ll be awarded one bonus point!

Up next, we have my favorite submission that showed wisdom through Magic’s classic wisdom mechanic: drawing cards. The card I chose was, again, simple in design, but I was a fan of its take on the hand size mechanic from Kamigawa as a take on wisdom. This category’s winner is...

Wisdom from the Ancients by @voicesofchaos! Congratulations, you will be awarded one bonus point!

Third, I created a category for cards that weren’t Dragons and didn’t draw cards, but were still cool designs that I wanted to recognize. There were only a few entries for this category, but all of them were quite good. In the end, I chose a card that really went for something unique, and though I believe it fell short, it has a base for a fun design. This category’s winner is...

Dragon’s Wager by @thanatyr! Congratulations, you will receive one bonus point!

Finally, as always, we have my favorite submission for the week. This submission was a cool, fun take on Dragons; the kind of card I could see a Commander deck built around. It’s power level was also fairly pushed, so it would probably see some Standard play, but we’re here for cool designs, not format powerhouses. This week’s CFAC winner is...

Raseth, Dragonic Champion by @tarniyo! Congratulations, you’ll be awarded two points and your card will be added to the CFAC Hall of Fame!

Thanks to everyone for your participation this week! I hope you all enjoyed this challenge; keep your eyes peeled for the next one tomorrow!

[markrosewater]

why do humans all look the same on every plane but merfolk look different on different planes?

Because Humans really exist and actually look a certain way.