November MCC, Round 3 - Creeping Venom

Locked Previous topicNext topic
User avatar
void_nothing
Look On My Sash...
Posts: 14924
Joined: 4 years ago
Answers: 124
Pronoun: he / him
Location: Tal Terig, Zendikar

Post by void_nothing » 2 years ago

Image
Banner based on Deadly Insect by Scott Kirschner and Wizards of the Coast. Thanks to bravelion83 for the "Core Set Style" MCC Logo
November MCC, Round 3 - Creeping Venom

Welcome to the November MCC! It's Deadly Month here at the MCC.

Main Challenge: Design a card that can directly cause one or more players to get poison counters
Subchallenge 1: Your card is not a creature.
Subchallenge 2: Your card mentions some other kind of counter in its rules text.

DEADLINES

Design deadline: Friday, December 3rd 23:59 EDT

Judging deadline: Sunday, December 5th 23:59 EDT

Clarifications
Show
Hide
Main Challenge: No, proliferate without a separate ability that gives poison counters such as infect or poisonous, or an activated or triggered ability causing poison counter placement, does not count.
MCC Rubric
Show
Hide
Design
(X/3) Appeal - Do the different player psychographics (Timmy/Johhny/Spike) have a use for the card?
(X/3) Elegance - Is the card easily understandable at a glance? Do all the flavor and mechanics combined as a whole make sense?

Development
(X/3) Viability - How well does the card fit into the color wheel? Does it break or bend the rules of the game? Is it the appropriate rarity?
(X/3) Balance - Does the card have a power level appropriate for contemporary constructed/limited environments without breaking them? Does it play well in casual and multiplayer formats? Does it create or fit into a deck/archetype? Does it create an oppressive environment?

Creativity
(X/3) Uniqueness - Has a card like this ever been printed before? Does it use new mechanics, ideas, or design space? Does it combine old ideas in a new way? Overall, does it feel "fresh"?
(X/3) Flavor - Does the name seem realistic for a card? Does the flavor text sound professional? Do all the flavor elements synch together to please Vorthos players?

Polish
(X/3) Quality - Points deducted for incorrect spelling, grammar, and templating.
(X/2) Main Challenge (*) - Was the main challenge satisfied? Was it approached in a unique or interesting way? Does the card fit the intent of the challenge?
(X/2) Subchallenges - One point awarded per satisfied subchallenge condition.

Total: X/25
*An entry with 0 points here is subject to disqualification.
Judges:
void_nothing
slimytrout

Players:
@kwanyeegor-ii
@vishamon
@Lorn Asbord Schutta
@netn10
Psst, check the second page of Custom Card Contests & Games! Because of the daily contests, a lot of games fall down to there.

The greatest (fake) pro wrestling on the internet - Collaborative Create-A-Booster - My random creations (updated regularly)

Important Facts: Colorless is not a color, Wastes is not a land type, Changeling is not a creature type

netn10
Posts: 3933
Joined: 4 years ago
Pronoun: Unlisted

Post by netn10 » 2 years ago

Curse of Eternal Pox 5BB
Enchantment - Aura Curse (Mythic)
At the beginning of enchanted player's upkeep, for each curse attached to them, that player loses 1 life, discards a card, sacrifices a creature, sacrifices a land, mill five cards, get a poison counter, then put -1/-1 counters on each creature they control.

kwanyeegor-ii
Posts: 1912
Joined: 4 years ago
Pronoun: Unlisted

Post by kwanyeegor-ii » 2 years ago

Teratogenesis 4GG
Enchantment (Rare)
When Teratogenesis enters the battlefield, you get a poison counter.
At the beginning of your upkeep, you get a poison counter for each poison counter you have.
Creatures you control enter the battlefield with an additional +1/+1 counter on them for each poison counter you have.
Creatures you control have trample and hexproof as long as you have eight or more poison counters.
畫龍點睛

I'm a simple Magic player since several years ago from China. Now I live in New Jersey.

User avatar
vishamon
Custom Card Connoisseur
Posts: 109
Joined: 2 years ago
Pronoun: he / him

Post by vishamon » 2 years ago

Tainted Periapt 1
Artifact (U)
Tainted Periapt enters the battlefield with a charge counter on it.
Whenever a creature you control dies, put a charge counter on Tainted Periapt.
, Remove a charge counter from Tainted Periapt: target creature gains infect until end of turn. ( can be paid with either  or 2 life.)
"The path to perfection is not for the weak."
—Sheoldred, Whispering One

User avatar
Lorn Asbord Schutta
Posts: 959
Joined: 3 years ago
Pronoun: he / him

Post by Lorn Asbord Schutta » 2 years ago

Glistening Powershard
Artifact (U)
At the beginning of each upkeep, put a charge counter on Glistening Powershard.
When Glistening Powershard leaves the battlefield, add for each charge counter on it. You gain that many poison counters.
Mirrans heard stories about otherplanars artificers using those to combat phyrexians. They couldn't know how intertwined with their enemies those stones were, until it was to late.

User avatar
void_nothing
Look On My Sash...
Posts: 14924
Joined: 4 years ago
Answers: 124
Pronoun: he / him
Location: Tal Terig, Zendikar

Post by void_nothing » 2 years ago

And the round is closed. This is the versus round - both judges will evaluate the following two pairings. From each pairing, the one contestant who has the highest total score moves on to the finals.

netn10 vs. vishamon
kwanyeegor-ii vs. Lorn Asbord Schutta

@slimytrout Let us both shoot to have this done by 23:59 Eastern on the 8th?
Psst, check the second page of Custom Card Contests & Games! Because of the daily contests, a lot of games fall down to there.

The greatest (fake) pro wrestling on the internet - Collaborative Create-A-Booster - My random creations (updated regularly)

Important Facts: Colorless is not a color, Wastes is not a land type, Changeling is not a creature type

slimytrout
Posts: 1861
Joined: 4 years ago
Pronoun: Unlisted

Post by slimytrout » 2 years ago

@void_nothing I'm sorry -- I have several meetings on the 9th that I need to prepare for so probably won't be able to get them done on the 8th, but I can do them the evening of the 9th (EST). Hope that's ok.

User avatar
void_nothing
Look On My Sash...
Posts: 14924
Joined: 4 years ago
Answers: 124
Pronoun: he / him
Location: Tal Terig, Zendikar

Post by void_nothing » 2 years ago

slimytrout wrote:
2 years ago
@void_nothing I'm sorry -- I have several meetings on the 9th that I need to prepare for so probably won't be able to get them done on the 8th, but I can do them the evening of the 9th (EST). Hope that's ok.
Sure thing, no rush. We'll call it the 9th then.
Psst, check the second page of Custom Card Contests & Games! Because of the daily contests, a lot of games fall down to there.

The greatest (fake) pro wrestling on the internet - Collaborative Create-A-Booster - My random creations (updated regularly)

Important Facts: Colorless is not a color, Wastes is not a land type, Changeling is not a creature type

slimytrout
Posts: 1861
Joined: 4 years ago
Pronoun: Unlisted

Post by slimytrout » 2 years ago

As promised:
netn10
Show
Hide
Curse of Eternal Pox 5BB
Enchantment - Aura Curse (Mythic)
At the beginning of enchanted player's upkeep, for each curse attached to them, that player loses 1 life, discards a card, sacrifices a creature, sacrifices a land, mill five cards, get a poison counter, then put -1/-1 counters on each creature they control.

Design
(2.5/3) Appeal – Timmy wants to pile a bunch of curses on their opponent and grind them to nothing. Johnny sees a lot of different effects to play around with. Spike is a little concerned about a 7-mana card that takes a little while to get going, but they'd love to have it against a control deck.
(2/3) Elegance – Just a ton of effects to remember, several of which involve choices, and it will really slow down the game to have this happening every turn.

Development
(3/3) Viability – Sure, all of these are black effects, and definitely mythic.
(2/3) Balance – This seems like a card that would just make some decks concede when it was played on them. It's better in almost every way than Cruel Reality, which was already fairly punishing. Curse of Misfortunes getting this just seems like game over in EDH. I don't know that it's actually unbalanced, since it is 7 mana, but it's certainly not properly balanced for fun.

Creativity
(2/3) Uniqueness – Most (but not all) of the effects have been done before on curses, and we've had Curse of Surveillance and Curse of Thirst that punished players for having other curses attached.
(2/3) Flavor – Clearly supposed to be a continuation on Pox and Smallpox, but also adds some extra effects? I guess poison makes sense with the overall flavor, and maybe -1/-1 counters, but really not sure what mill is doing in there.

Polish
(1.5/3) Quality – Missing "enchant player" (-0.5). Several instances of subject/verb problems and a missing "a" (-1).
(2/2) Main Challenge (*) – Yep.
(2/2) Subchallenges – Yep yep.

Total: 19/25
vishamon
Show
Hide
Tainted Periapt 1
Artifact (U)
Tainted Periapt enters the battlefield with a charge counter on it.
Whenever a creature you control dies, put a charge counter on Tainted Periapt.
, Remove a charge counter from Tainted Periapt: target creature gains infect until end of turn. ( can be paid with either or 2 life.)
"The path to perfection is not for the weak."
—Sheoldred, Whispering One
Design
(2.5/3) Appeal – Spike enjoys the resource management aspect and that it can be activated at instant speed. Johnny is absolutely looking to come up with some combos involving pinging and/or death triggers. It's a little low-impact and fiddly for Timmy but they do enjoy infect.
(3/3) Elegance – Sure, simple enough.
Development
(3/3) Viability – We've seen infect on artifacts, and uncommon seems right.
(3/3) Balance – Being able to give infect to anything at instant speed strikes me as a little dangerous, but I guess it's not that much different from double strike, so probably works out OK, and we've had Tainted Strike as a precedent.

Creativity
(2.5/3) Uniqueness – This is one of those unusual cards that doesn't actually feel that unique, but honestly I couldn't find much that was similar. Still, how much it "pops" does matter.
(3/3) Flavor – I learned a new word today! Nice and clean overall.

Polish
(2.5/3) Quality – Missing a capital letter after the colon – which is not the grammatical rules, but the magic-ese.
(1/2) Main Challenge (*) – I would argue that "directly" is not quite satisfied by giving another creature infect. Not bad enough for a DQ, but I don't think full points is appropriate.
(2/2) Subchallenges – Yep yep.

Total: 22.5/25
kwanyeegor-ii
Show
Hide
Teratogenesis 4GG
Enchantment (Rare)
When Teratogenesis enters the battlefield, you get a poison counter.
At the beginning of your upkeep, you get a poison counter for each poison counter you have.
Creatures you control enter the battlefield with an additional +1/+1 counter on them for each poison counter you have.
Creatures you control have trample and hexproof as long as you have eight or more poison counters.
Design
(2/3) Appeal – Timmy tends to love high-risk, high-reward cards, and the fact that it turns their team into enormous untargetable tramplers is a great payoff. Johnny can definitely imagine some sort of combo with this and Melira, Sylvok Outcast. Spike hates that this can just kill them if their opponent has a sweeper.
(2.5/3) Elegance – Requires a little bit of math to understand how the sequence goes, but nothing too complicated.
Development
(2/3) Viability – Enchantments that cause you to lose eventually are pretty squarely in black's slice of the color pie, so I really think this should be BG. Rarity seems fine – mythic might be okay too given the overall power level, but rare is probably best.
(3/3) Balance – Probably fine – obviously it's very powerful when you're at 4 or 8, but the fact that it costs six mana, takes several turns to get there, and then kills you means that it's likely not busted.

Creativity
(3/3) Uniqueness – Yep, I'll give full points for this.
(1.5/3) Flavor – Obviously the creative team has been willing to show some fairly dark and twisted things on cards, but I still think that embryonic malformations is beyond the pale and would not be appropriate for a magic card.

Polish
(3/3) Quality – All good.
(2/2) Main Challenge (*) – Yep.
(2/2) Subchallenges – Yep yep.

Total: 21/25
Lorn Asbord Schutta
Show
Hide
Glistening Powershard
Artifact (U)
At the beginning of each upkeep, put a charge counter on Glistening Powershard.
When Glistening Powershard leaves the battlefield, add for each charge counter on it. You gain that many poison counters.
Mirrans heard stories about otherplanars artificers using those to combat phyrexians. They couldn't know how intertwined with their enemies those stones were, until it was to late.
Design
(1/3) Appeal – Johnny is definitely into a strange card that isn't obviously useful. Much too fiddly for Timmy, and Spike sees three substantial downsides (have to wait several turns to get the mana, have to be able to sacrifice the shard, and then get poisoned) which is at least two too many.
(3/3) Elegance – Definitely a bit unusual, but I don't think it's confusing.
Development
(3/3) Viability – Artifact is definitely fine. Rarity is a little harder to determine, but probably uncommon is okay.
(2/3) Balance – This is vastly unplayable in the majority of decks. Assuming you can sacrifice it on your next turn for negligible value, you've turned 1 mana into 2 and waited a turn and gotten two poison (plus spent a card). If you sacrifice it the following turn, you've turned 1 mana into 4 and waited two turns and gotten four poison, so at that point it's looking something like a Lotus Bloom. After that it starts to be quite a big burst of mana but is also starting to get dangerous. The only deck that seems interested in this sort of thing in non-rotating formats is something like Ad Nauseam, but I don't think they're interested in playing much in the way of artifact sacrifice.

Creativity
(2.5/3) Uniqueness – Feels very vaguely like Lotus Bloom, but still fairly fresh.
(2/3) Flavor – This is one of those cards that just over-explains things. "Glistening" plus poison should be enough to immediately point people towards the Phyrexians, and then once you start talking about "otherplanar artificers" folks just ignore you.

Polish
(2/3) Quality – You don't "gain" poison counters, you "get" them. And a few minor capitalization/typo problems in the flavor text.
(2/2) Main Challenge (*) – Yep.
(2/2) Subchallenges – Yep yep.

Total: 19.5/25
Results
Show
Hide
netn10: 19
vishamon: 22.5

kwanyeegor-ii: 21
Lorn Asbord Schutta: 19.5

User avatar
void_nothing
Look On My Sash...
Posts: 14924
Joined: 4 years ago
Answers: 124
Pronoun: he / him
Location: Tal Terig, Zendikar

Post by void_nothing » 2 years ago

netn10
Show
Hide
Design
(3/3) Appeal - Txmmy likes how huge the effect is, Jxnny wants to do Curse tribal, Spike likes something that will wipe opponents' boards while killing them.
(1.5/3) Elegance - There is a lot going on here. Seven separate procedures at the beginning of the upkeep, three of which actively involve a choice. While this will kill players quickly, it will also take a while to do it.

Development
(3/3) Viability - Black and mythic is where this should go.
(2/3) Balance - Even on its own this card is backbreaking (although seven mana is a lot), and with even one other Curse it may as well just end the game. It seems pretty much to outclass Cruel Reality, a very similar card.

Creativity
(1.5/3) Uniqueness - Very much a Curse of Thirst++. The sheer number of negative effects does make this card unique.
(2.5/3) Flavor - Name works but is kinda on-the-nose. Short flavor text might have helped.

Polish
(1/3) Quality - Unfortunately quite a lot wrong here. Missing "Enchant player." "Curse" should always be capitalized as a subtype. The last few clauses should be "mills", "gets", and "puts" - it seems like you changed halfway through between "that player" and "they."
(2/2) Main Challenge (*) - Done.
(2/2) Subchallenges - And done.

Total: 18.5/25
kwanyeegor-ii
Show
Hide
Design
(3/3) Appeal - Txmmy obviously likes huge numbers of +1/+1 counters. Jxnny has plenty to do with this. Spike sees a very calculated risk that could easily be a good finisher.
(1.5/3) Elegance - This card's pretty wordy and heavy on both math and tracking (eventually there's gonna be a LOT of counters thrown around).

Development
(2.5/3) Viability - Self-poisoning is a little odd in green but it's unusual enough that it's not actually a bend or break per se. Rare looks right.
(3/3) Balance - Nothing objectionable - the amount of counters eventually becomes quite powerful, but that takes time. There is a heavy drawback - losing the game - but that also takes time - four turns, assuming no outside shenanigans.

Creativity
(3/3) Uniqueness - Quite a lot that's new here.
(3/3) Flavor - Looks good to me.

Polish
(3/3) Quality - Looking good.
(2/2) Main Challenge (*) - Done.
(2/2) Subchallenges - And done.

Total: 23/25
vishamon
Show
Hide
Design
(2/3) Appeal - It's all a bit small-scale for Txmmy. Jxnny sees a lot to fiddle with. Spike likes that this is a very cost-efficient way to win via poison.
(2.5/3) Elegance - Slightly wordy but an easy card to understand - the overall effect is simple and clean.

Development
(3/3) Viability - Uncommon is definitely right and the black Phy-mana fits.
(3/3) Balance - Nothing to object to - an individual activation is relatively minor and the card needs charging up.

Creativity
(1.5/3) Uniqueness - Technically this card "just" grants infect, but the specific setup has not been done before.
(3/3) Flavor - Very nice. Good flavor text writing.

Polish
(2.5/3) Quality - One capitalization problem.
(1/2) Main Challenge (*) - Granting infect is not quite "direct" but infect does mention poison counters.
(2/2) Subchallenges - And done.

Total: 20.5/25
Lorn Asbord Schutta
Show
Hide
Design
(2/3) Appeal - Txmmy is excited about the big mana potential but not the drawback or the, well, doing nothing. Jxnny salivates. Spike likes b0rken combos, but not ones they have to wait for.
(2.5/3) Elegance - A puzzle card that's fairly elegant despite involving some tracking.

Development
(2.5/3) Viability - Uncommon is a stretch; however, Dominaria should teach us all that sometimes rare artifacts do end up at uncommon.
(2/3) Balance - Rather swingy. If you're pulling the wombo combo off this card can get degenerate, but it needs some specific support cards. Otherwise, it's a dead card.

Creativity
(2.5/3) Uniqueness - There are definitely "store up mana over time" artifacts out there, but this one has multiple new wrinkles.
(3/3) Flavor - Excellent. Love the reference to the powerstones from whence the trouble began.

Polish
(2/3) Quality - You "get", not "gain" poison counters. Also, the flavor text is a little ungrammatical in places. "Otherplanars" isn't quite the word you were looking for - "extraplanar" is the term. "Phyrexians" should be capitalized and "too" should be used instead of "to".
(2/2) Main Challenge (*) - Done.
(2/2) Subchallenges - And done.

Total: 20.5/25
Psst, check the second page of Custom Card Contests & Games! Because of the daily contests, a lot of games fall down to there.

The greatest (fake) pro wrestling on the internet - Collaborative Create-A-Booster - My random creations (updated regularly)

Important Facts: Colorless is not a color, Wastes is not a land type, Changeling is not a creature type

Locked Previous topicNext topic

Return to “Contest Archives”