June CCL, Final Poll

[void_nothing]

It's time to vote for the winner of the June CCL! As a reminder, the two finalists faced this challenge:

Design each of the following:

A new card for a legendary creature first printed in Legends

A card that mechanically references, by name, a nonbasic card first printed in Alpha

A "Magus of" - that is, a Human Wizard that exactly replicates the effect of an older artifact, enchantment, land, instant, or sorcery

A card with both a non-evergreen mechanic that was first printed in or before Scourge and one that was first printed in or after Mirrodin

A card that uses either physical dexterity or ante

In response to this, here are their entries:

• A new card for a legendary creature first printed in Legends

Ramirez DePietro

Ramirez, Immortal Pirate 2UB
Legendary Creature — Spirit Pirate (R)
Menace
Whenever Ramirez, Immortal Pirate enters the battlefield, you draw a card and create a Treasure token.
1, Sacrifice three Treasure tokens: Return Ramirez from your graveyard to the battlefield tapped.
"Have I lost my loot? Again?!?"
3/3


• A card that mechanically references, by name, a nonbasic card first printed in Alpha

Elvish Growth-Mage 2G
Creature — Elf Wizard (U)
At the beginning of combat on your turn, choose one —
• Create a copy of Giant Growth. If you do, cast the copy. (You still pay its cost.)
• Other creatures you control get +1/+1 until end of turn.
"Individuals grow. Environments grow. It's just a matter of how to best let nature do its job."
2/2


• A "Magus of" - that is, a Human Wizard that exactly replicates the effect of an older artifact, enchantment, land, instant, or sorcery

Magus of the Mine 3U
Creature — Human Wizard (R)
At the beginning of each player's draw step, if Magus of the Mine is untapped, that player draws an additional card.
Fearful howls resound in the abandoned mine.
2/3


• A card with both a non-evergreen mechanic that was first printed in or before Scourge and one that was first printed in or after Mirrodin

Arcbound Feline 2W
Creature — Cat (U)
Modular 2 (This creature enters the battlefield with two +1/+1 counters on it. When it dies, you may put its +1/+1 counters on target artifact creature.)
Amplify 1 (As this creature enters the battlefield, put an additional +1/+1 counter on it for each Cat card you reveal in your hand.)
It strikes with the strength of all its pride.
0/0


• A card that uses either physical dexterity or ante

Luckling 4U
Creature — Shapeshifter (M)
Remove Luckling from your deck before playing if you're not playing for ante.
As Luckling enters the battlefield, each player puts a creature they control, a creature card from their graveyard, or a creature card they own in exile into the ante zone.
Luckling has all supertypes, card types, subtypes, and abilities of cards in the ante zone.
Luckling's power is equal to the total power of creature cards in the ante zone and its toughness is equal to those cards' total toughness.
*/*

Rubinia, the Whispersong GUW
Legendary Creature - Faerie Wizard (R)
Flying
q: Gain control of target creature for as long as Rubinia, the Whispersong remains untapped.
A beautiful voice echoes faintly among the trees, drawing curious travelers ever deeper into the woods.
3/3

Nesting Bowerbird 1GW
Creature - Bird (R)
Flying
T: Add one mana of any color.
Whenever Nesting Bowerbird deals combat damage to a player, create a 0/1 green Bird creature token named Birds of Paradise. It has flying and "T: Add one mana of any color."
2/2

Magus of the Tomb BG
Creature - Human Wizard (R)
T: Add CC. Magus of the Tomb deals 2 damage to you.
"I do not seek glory for myself, but rather to preserve the splendor of those long dead."
2/2

Last Words 1B
Sorcery (U)
Draw a card. Each player loses 1 life.
Fateful Hour - If you have 5 or less life, this spell has storm. (When you cast a spell with storm, copy it for each spell cast before it this turn.)
It is said that in their final seconds, men speak the truest words of their entire lives.

Jenga!™ 1UR
Enchantment (Un-R)
At the beginning of each end step, use one hand to remove a card from the middle of target opponent's library (without separating it into two distinct libraries) and exile it. You may play that card from exile as long you control Jenga!™
Whenever you cause the top card of an opponent's library to touch you or the table, sacrifice Jenga!™

(N.B.: yes, Hasbro owns Jenga!)

Poll will run for 5 days and anyone may vote. Good luck to both contestants!

[void_nothing]

Some quick comments! All the entries are actually very good so all I can do here is nitpick.

bravelion83 -
Ramirez looks like he'd play very nicely; he's kind of an engine, but not a perpetual one and he parasitically requires outside support to self-recur. That being said, I'm not excited flavorwise by another Ramirez; he just came back as a ghost after all. And that menace could be first strike instead!

Elvish Growth-Mage is interesting but something feels kind of off - maybe it's that one mode has a cost associated with it and the other not? I feel like this would be better as a GW card creating copies of Giant Growth and Charge - probably with a bit of reflavoring.

Magus of the Mine is absolutely genius design on one level, and frustrating on another. The continuous artifacts from the early days that turn off when tapped are perfect Magus fodder because of the nature of creatures, but Howling Mine's cmc is 2, not 4, and all the Magi that emulate something other than a land have the same mana value as the original.

Arcbound Feline is - totally serviceable. It feels totally like an MH2 card. I'm not sure why Cat was the type of choice here specifically.

Luckling mechanically is so very neat. And confusing. But mostly just plain cool. Ante's not a very fun (and sometimes not very, uh, legal) mechanic, and I prefer the original Avid Gambler flavoring, but in a very casual context with good friends at the kitchen table I'd love this card.

slimytrout -
Rubinia 2.0 is absolutely ingenious. Q costs without anything else in the ability cost are developmentally problematic, but hey, other two-card infinite combos exist, and I'm so pleased with the idea of using the untap symbol in a variant of the Rubinia/Old Man of the Sea/Callous Oppressor/a bunch of others ability.

Nesting Bowerbird looks potentially crazy strong but at least it's relatively slow to get going. Nice ornithological bonus in the name and generally an exciting card.

Magus of the Tomb is missing something, I think; it's playable for sure but I don't know if it has that "this is too efficient to be allowed" Ancient Tomb feel (without being legitimately overpowered of course). With that in mind I feel like I'd make this a 2/3 or even a 0/4.

Last Words is a lot of fun, the flavor's on point, and I like that it's self-limiting. No notes on this one, it's good as-is.

Jenga!™ does pretty effectively mimic the actual game, and we have gotten Nerf War, but I feel like this card needs to be (like Nerf War) flavored as something that's happening in a mage duel rather than a literal game of Jenga.

[void_nothing]

And on that note... we have a tie! Congratulations to co-winners @bravelion83 and @slimytrout!