September CCL, Signups/Round 1: Resurgence of Elements

[void_nothing]

CCL September Signups/Round 1

"Resurgence of Elements"


Rooftop Storm, taken from magicthegathering.com, by John Stanko and Wizards of the Coast

Welcome to the Card Creation League! Everyone is free to participate in either or both of the first two rounds. Come join us!

Theme

It's time for Elements Month to return with a vengeance! Last appearing over two years ago on MTGSalvation, this flavor-based month of challenges is a guaranteed fun, if strange, time. All will be explained below, but let's get on with the show.

The magic of the natural elements is some of the most primal and mysterious there is - simplistic though it may seem, appearances can be deceiving, and the "elements" can include more abstract and powerful forces than most mages imagine.

This month, you'll be theming design around your picks from the following lists. Choose wisely, as your picks will carry over round-to-round.

White

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Light
Grain
Moon
Energy (Static)
Sand
Holy
Metal

Blue

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Water
Wind
Time
Energy (Potential)
Ice
Mist
Thought

Black

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Darkness
Void
Disease
Energy (Negative)
Blood
Poison
Soil

Red

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Fire
Stone
Speed
Energy (Kinetic)
Lightning
Dust
Magnetism

Green

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Wood
Storms
Life
Energy (Positive)
Seasons
Flesh
Wild

Challenge

Choose one of the elements from the list above, then design a monocolored enchantment card that ISN'T the color of the list you chose from.

Clarifications

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• For example, a poison-themed card can be any color except black and a lightning-themed card can be any color except red.
• For everyone's convenience, please note the element you picked in your post.
• Make sure to include a rarity.

Anyone can enter this first round! Your submissions are due Saturday, September 7th, 23:59 EST.

Schedule

• Round 1 — Open to Everyone (September 1st-7th)
• Round 2 — Open to Everyone (September 8th–14th)
• Rounds 1 and 2 Critiques (Due September 16th)
• Top 8 — Open to top 8 finishers (September 17th–20th)
• Top 8 Critiques (Due September 22nd)
• Top 4 — Open to top 4 finishers (September 23rd–26th)
• Top 4 Critiques (Due September 28th)
• Final (End of month, winner determined by public poll)

[bravelion83]

comment and inspiration

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I do remember that month. It was fun indeed. I'm all for doing it again.
I expected "soil" in the green list, seeing it in the black list instead gave me an idea.

Nonblack "soil"

Fruitful Soil 3G
Enchantment — Aura (U)
Enchant land
When Fruitful Soil enters the battlefield, draw a card.
Whenever enchanted land is tapped for mana, its controller adds an additional one mana of any color. If enchanted land is a Forest, its controller adds an additional two mana in any combination of colors instead.

[Krishnath]

Comments and theme

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Sounds fun, let's hope it goes better for me this month than last one. :laugh: Anyway, after thinking about it for a while, I think I'll go with Sand as my choice.

Theme: Sand

Shivering Sands 2B
Enchantment (Uncommon)
Desertfall - Whenever a Desert enters the battlefield under your control, create a 1/1 black Scorpion creature token with deathtouch.

[slimytrout]

Theme

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Whoops, meant to do this but forgot. Theme is storm(s), if you couldn't tell.

Stormcloud Mantle 1R
Enchantment – Aura (U)
Enchant creature
Enchanted creature has prowess and "Whenever you cast a noncreature spell, enchanted creature gains prowess until end of turn." (Whenever you cast a noncreature spell, a creature with prowess gets +1/+1 until end of turn. Multiple instances of prowess trigger separately.)

[void_nothing]

Just updated clarifications because I forgot to mention this: Please mention the element you picked in your post, it just makes things easier.

[zdtsd]

My theme is metal.
Metallic Echo
Enchantment (R)
Whenever a nontoken artifact enters the battlefield under your control, create a token that's a copy of it, except it has haste. Sacrifice that token at the beginning of the next end step.

[BeneTleilax]

Poison

Nocuous Spread 3G
Enchantment [R]
Whenever an opponent casts a spell that targets a creature you control, that player gets a poison counter.
1G, Remove a poison counter from target opponent: create a 2/1 green Beast token with Infect.
As the ichor spreads, the swarm grows. As the swarm grows, the ichor spreads.

[netn10]

Moon - White

The Moon Befalls 3U
Enchantment (Rare)
Nonbasic lands are Islands.
At the beginning of each upkeep, if a player cast two or more spells last turn, transform The Moon Befalls.
"The stars and the moon will always need the darkness to be seen..."
//////////////////////////////////////////////
The Sun Rises
*Enchantment (Rare)
Basic lands are plains.
At the beginning of each upkeep, if no spells were cast last turn, transform The Sun Rises.
"... But the darkness cannot be appreciated without the sun that comes after."

[barbecube]

Non-blue wind

Wind of Needles 2RR
Enchantment (U)
At the beginning of each end step and whenever a nonbasic land enters the battlefield under your control, Wind of Needles deals 1 damage to each creature and player.

[RaikouRider]

Element: Blood (Non-Black)

Bloodshot Frenzy 1RR
Enchantment - Aura {U}
Enchant creature
When Bloodshot Frenzy enters the battlefield, draw a card.
Enchanted creature gets +X/-X and has trample, where X is its base toughness minus 1.
Enchanted creature gets +1/-1 for each +1/+1 counter on it.

[Ink-Treader]

Element: Ice (Non-Blue)

Ice Slick RR
Snow Enchantment (R)
Snow creatures have haste.
Nonsnow creatures enter the battlefield tapped.
Alvold slipped and fell. He looked back in terror to see his pursuers almost gliding across the frozen river towards him.

Precedence

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Ashling's Prerogative and Urabrask the Hidden suggest that -though very rare- red can do the second effect, but it needs to be tied to also giving other creatures haste,

[Subject16]

Element: Dust (non-red)

Curse of Erosion 2WW
Enchantment - Aura Curse (Rare)
Enchant player
When Curse of Erosion enters the battlefield, put three time counters on each nonland permanent enchanted player controls.
Nonland permanents enchanted player controls have Vanishing 3 (At the beginning of a player's upkeep, that player removes a time counter from each permanent with vanishing they control. When the last counter is removed from a permanent this way, its controller sacrifices it.)
Vanishing 4

[Jimmy Groove]

Non-black Poison elemental card

Ergot Visions 1R
Enchantment - Aura (U)
Enchant creature
Enchanted creature has "At the beginning of combat on this creature's controller's turn, this creature deals damage equal to its power to another target creature they control."
2RR: Target player gains control of enchanted creature until the beginning of your next turn. Activate this ability only any time you could cast a sorcery.
There are no friends or loyalties when the mold takes hold.

[void_nothing]

Please be aware, everyone, that the challenge does call for an enchantment card.

A bit over 30 hours remain to submit or edit!

[Gateways7]

Element: Seasons (non-green) (more specifically, went with Spring for this first card.)

Rains of Restoration 2U
Enchantment (Rare)
As long as you've drawn two or more cards this turn, prevent all noncombat damage that would be dealt.
4UU: Draw a card.
When the springtime comes, the death of winter is wiped away in both the mind and the body.

[marioguy3]

My theme is non-red speed. So I went with green because animals can be very reactive to situations.

Nature's Reaction
Enchantment (Rare)
Nonhuman creatures you control have haste.
Whenever a nonhuman creature you control deals 4 or more damage to a player, draw a card.
At the sight of vulnerability, animals can get quite "squirrelly."

[Henlock]

Element: Grain

Tainted Bread 1b
Enchantment (r)
When Tainted Bread enters the battlefield, replace all +1/+1 counters on each creature with that many -1/-1 counters.
, sacrifice a Food: Replace all +1/+1 counters on target creature with that many -1/-1 counters.

[kwanyeegor-ii]

Nonblue Ice

Freeze Breath 3RR
Snow Enchantment (Rare)
Creatures you control have "T: This creature deals 1 damage to target player or planeswalker"
Whenever a snow creature you control deals damage to a player, tap target land that player controls unless that player pays 1 life

[void_nothing]

Round is closed; please critique and make a top 3 for the six contestants below you on this list, looping to the top as necessary.

bravelion83
Krishnath
slimytrout
zdtsd
BeneTleilax
netn10
barbecube
RaikouRider
Ink-Treader
Subject16
Jimmy Groove
Gateways7
marioguy3
Henlock
kwanyeegor-ii

Round 2 to come shortly.

[Krishnath]

slimytrout
zdtsd
BeneTleilax
netn10
barbecube
RaikouRider


slimytrout (Stormcloud Mantle): This card looks simple at first look but is surprisingly complex. Depending on how you stack the triggers, the creature could either get +1/+1 or +2/+2 for the first noncreature spell you cast after it enters the battlefield. Then +2/+2 or +3/+3, etc. It could probably cause some confusion for newer players who don't yet understand the stack, however for established players this is really a nonissue. It can also get really silly, really fast with things like storm. I like it.


zdtsd (Metallic Echo): Simple, elegant, on point, and in color. Card could easily have been blue/red, but it works in monored. It plays in similar space as Sneak Attack and reds recklessness. It could be abusive with some artifacts (like Meteor Golem or similar), but the high cost of those artifacts feel like it balances it out.


BeneTleilax (Nocuous Spread): This card is interesting. It removes poison from an opponent (something which is allowed), in return for potentially poisoning them more later. Not really a competitive card for constructed play in standard/modern, but I could see this card getting played in multiplayer as a weird combo piece in a poison/proliferate deck. Poison one opponent, remove the poison counter, make a creature to poison another opponent. Looks fun.


netn10 (The Moon Befalls//The Sun Rises): This card doesn't seem very blue, changing nonbasics into something else is in reds part of the color pie, and the other side really wants to say "in addition to their normal land types.", because colorscrewing other players is not cool. This card is entirely too oppressive to be fun, and entirely out of color. Sorry.


barbecube (Wind of Needles): This one is interesting, red doesn't usually care about nonbasic lands, but this card rewards you for playing nonbasics. While at the same time, the dual red cost balances it out by almost forcing you to run some basics to prevent your deck being to slow. Very interesting control concept from red. Because the card only triggers on nonbasics, it is very difficult to abuse as well. All around a balanced card that plays in new space for red while feeling very red.


RaikouRider (Bloodshot Frenzy): Nice callback to one of my favorite cards from the early days of MTG, Blood Lust, but as an Aura. The card could easily have been black, but it is in reds part of color pie, although a rarely used part of it.


Votes:

#1: zdtsd
#2: BeneTleilax (gotta love those weird combo pieces)
#3: barbecube.

Honorable Mentions: slimytrout, RaikouRider

Notes

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Difficult field today, lots of good entries. netn10, I am sorry, but your entry was entirely out of color and the second side was extremely oppressive, even if it was only temporary, you could effectively lock your opponents almost entirely out of the game with the card. That does not make for good card design.

[Gateways7]

marioguy3 - Nature's Reaction is a cool take on a green speed card, but the choice of nonhuman is a bit weird, as it gives many humanoids (Zombies, Vampires, Vedalken, Kithkin, Goblin, Elves) the boosts. I do really like the the second ability, but the choice of power 4 or greater seems unnecessary - it could just be a damage trigger.

Henlock - Tainted Bread is a really cool concept, but it doesn't feel like it does enough, and the condition of other creatures having so many +1/+1 counters isn't that likely. Also, I don't think that you can word the ability with "replace" - it needs to be "Remove all +1/+1 counters... Put that many -1/-1 counters..." or something along those lines.

kwanyeegor-ii - Freeze Breath is a pretty cool card, and the ability to make all your creatures Prodigal Pyromancers seems like it could lead to interesting gameplay. However, that second ability seems weird, and tapping lands down feels a lot more blue than red. Maybe if it had a more powerful version of the effect for just nonbasic lands, it would feel more red.

bravelion83 - Fruitful Soil is a really good uncommon, and I like that it's just a simple boost to lands and better for your Forests, which is something a lot of similar Auras do. Great job!

Krishnath - Shivering Sands has a really cool ability - while Desertfall is a bit of a weird name, having a stronger Deserts-matter theme is pretty cool. The effect of the card seems very strong, as you're going to be killing a lot of creatures with your Deserts, but it's a cool idea!

slimytrout - Stormcloud Mantle is a super-interesting card, but it doesn't feel like an Aura was the right choice - this effect would fit a lot better on a creature. That said, storming off to get a combat bonus is a fun idea, so I like the card.

1 - Krishnath
2 - bravelion83
3 - slimytrout

[Ink-Treader]

Critique time

Subject16

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Pretty cool, and seems appropriately flavored. The different Vanishing values annoy me a bit, I wonder if it even needs its own Vanishing.

Jimmy Groove

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Flavored appropriately, and seems kind of brutal. I do like that stealing it for yourself does open yourself up to the drawback if you don't have a creature prepared to take a hit. Might need to cost more.

Gateways7

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I can understand the flavor, though I will say that damage prevention like this is highly unusual for blue. It's not a busted card, it just doesn't feel in pie.

marioguy3

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It's amusing how broad 'non-Human' is in Magic. It's a bit bendy color wise, but I think this isn't unreasonable.

Henlock

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Cute use of an upcoming token type. I know Magic doesn't like to mix counters in the same set, but it doesn't bother me. I kind of wish the activated ability also added a -1/-1 counter on top, but then the whole enchantment would probably need to cost a little more.

kwanyeegor-ii

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This seems... dangerous. It has a bunch of limiters compared to Lightning Volley, but it also sticks around, and has a very nasty bonus if you build around it.

Top 3

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1. Subject16
2. Jimmy Groove
3. Henlock

[slimytrout]

zdtsd: Metallic Echo - Could easily have just been parallel design, but this is very similar to the largely-unused Kaladesh mechanic that Maro refers to as "reverse engineer" (see this article, specifically the part about Cogwork Assembler). The two remaining cards are Cogwork Assembler and Saheeli Rai, and, other than a few templating differences, this card is just an enchantment that does that effect once for each artifact you play. Also, since the trigger is mandatory, it could probably use a nonlegendary rider as well to avoid confusion.

BeneTleilax: Nocuous Spread - I love SAT words as much as the next guy, but since nocuous is literally a synonym for noxious, I'm not sure why you couldn't have just used the more common word that is also a near-homophone. Otherwise, though, I like the card. Fairly useless until you get it started, but hard for your opponent to stamp out once you do.

netn10: The Moon Befalls - This seems like forbidden territory. You're not allowed to punish people for playing basic lands, even if it's on the backside of the card. Also, a much more minor note, but it sure feels like the backside of the card should have a white color identity, although I suppose you might not have wanted to do that for fear of violating the challenge.

barbecube: Wind of Needles - I don't quite get the flavor here. Is it a literal wind of needles, or a figurative one? There was definitely room for text, which would have really helped out, especially in a flavor-forward challenge like this one. Also the mechanics don't really match the flavor: what do nonbasic lands have to do with the wind, or, for that matter, with needles? As for the substance of the card, it's a little odd to see Red *rewarding* nonbasics instead of punishing them (I mean, I assume you're playing this because you *want* the trigger to happen) -- seems like that would be more of a green thing.

RaikouRider: Bloodshot Frenzy - Think it could have done without the +1/+1 counter rider, especially since it doesn't have a corresponding -1/-1 counter ability, but definitely a fun card.

Ink-Treader: Ice Slick - Love it. No critiques.

Top 3:
1) Ink-Treader
2) BeneTleilax
3) RaikouRider

[zdtsd]

BeneTleilax(Noxious Spread): I really like this card. I think it could be 3CMC(maybe at 1GG), but the design is nice and I really like the doubling mechanic being capped by mana.

netn10(The Moon Befalls): I really liked the card until I got to the basic land hosing. One reason to play 1 color is to avoid being punished by Blood Moon/B2B/Wasteland effects, and this card ruins that.

barbecube(Wind of Needles): I like this design, being a kind of recurring sweeper when you play lands. I'm a bit confused about red boosting nonbasics rather than hosing them, but the design is cool.

RaikouRider(Bloodshot Frenzy): This card is very interesting. It's possible that instant removal is a blowout, but if this sticks it can be a strong buildaround. I really like it as an uncommon draft buildaround, and it seems like a fringe-playable standard card.

Ink-Treader(Ice Slick): I really like this design for a mono-red snow aggro deck. Currently there isn't much to do with it, but it has the potential to be extremely powerful, and appeals to both Johnny and Spike.

Subject16(Curse of Erosion): I think this is an interesting "wrath" effect. I think it could actually be 1WW and be playable, because currently it's a turn 6 wrath.

Top 3:
1. Ink-Treader
2. RaikouRider
3. BeneTleilax

[BeneTleilax]

netn10

SPOILER

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I don't actually begrudge the basic-hate here, as it limits its own duration, and so seems like more of a tempo move than a soft-lock. There are, of course, ways to turn it into a soft-lock, but that can be said of plenty of "fair" cards. Where I do find issue is that none of the effects are blue. Nonbasic land hate isn't, temporary LD isn't, the werewolf mechanic isn't. What's more, color was part of the initial challenge. This would have been a great red card.

barbecube

SPOILER

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Firstly, points for making a strong and interesting uncommon. Responses tend to skew rare, so making an uncommon that feels uncommon, strong without being OP, interesting without being complex, that gets points in my book. As for the effect, it's an interesting build-around that adds nicely to some existing strategies. Any Scapeshift-Field decks would be interested in this. My one complaint is that it doesn't feel connected to "wind" except in in name, and the name doesn't tie particularly well to the mechanics.

RaikouRider

SPOILER

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Nice callback to an old card, and it plays in the risk-reward space that makes red shine to me. However, I think the card gets lost in its own complexity. The first two lines of text would work great, and already be somewhat mathy, doing weird stuff with +1/+1 counters seems both irrelevant and confusing.

Ink-Treader

SPOILER

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Good build-around, and strong, if obvious, connection of theme and mechanics.

Subject16

SPOILER

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This strikes me as the best combination of element and mechanics of all of them, as well as just an interesting card. I like how alone it combines two very white things, slowness and wraths, but becomes a black thing (plague wind) if you run some black counter-removal.

Top 3
3 Barbecube
2 Ink-Treader
1 Subject 16