Creature type chosen as a mode with associated abilities

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BOVINE
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Post by BOVINE » 3 years ago

Cardname G
Creature - Human
Path (Choose Cleric or Druid as this creature enters the battlefield. It has that additional type and those abilities.)
Cleric — Whenever a creature enters the battlefield, you gain 1 life.
DruidT: Add G.
1/1

Cardname G
Creature - Human
Path (As this creature enters the battlefield, choose Cleric or Druid. It has that additional creature type.)
• Cleric — Whenever a creature enters the battlefield, you gain 1 life.
• Druid — T: Add G.
1/1

Not sure if either works. I'm also aiming to minimize word count. If you can help me with that, thanks :grin:
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WizardMN
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Post by WizardMN » 3 years ago

Your cards seem to work fine. They are reminiscent of the Siege cycle: Citadel Siege for example. So the rules already exist for these to mostly work.

It seems you want Path to be a keyword but I might lean against that. Either you lock yourself into only allowing Cleric or Druid or the ability becomes more wordy to accommodate other types.

I would just say something like:

"As this enters, choose <one of two types>."
"This creature is the chosen creature type in addition to its other creature types.".

It clearly doesn't minimize word count, but I think adding the creature type is just going to result in that. Using the keyword would allow you to hide some of the wording though. Maybe:

"Path - Cleric or Druid (As this enters, choose one of the types. It has that type)"

Since "has that type" isn't text I am aware of existing, it might be vague enough to allow for you to omit the "in addition to its other types" for people to understand what it is doing. And you can just hide the full rules text in the rules. I still prefer the first approach as it is clearer about what is happening, but, as a result, is wordier.

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spacemonaut
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Post by spacemonaut » 3 years ago

I agree with WizardMN some adjustment is needed around how you're handling these.

The relevant rule here is 614.12b Anchor words:
MTG Comprehensive Rules (November 20, 2020) wrote:614.12b Some replacement effects cause a permanent to enter the battlefield with its controller's choice of one of two abilities, each marked with an anchor word and preceded by a bullet point. "[Anchor word] —[ability]" means "As long as [anchor word] was chosen as this permanent entered the battlefield, this permanent has [ability]." The abilities preceded by anchor words are each linked to the ability that causes a player to choose between them. See rule 607, "Linked Abilities."
As we can see on Frontier Siege, the text is not italicised; it isn't an ability word:



Sticking strictly to this template with no upgrades, you might have this:
As Cardname enters the battlefield, choose Cleric or Druid.
• Cleric — Cardname is a Cleric in addition to its other types. Whenever a creature enters the battlefield, you gain 1 life.
• Druid — Cardname is a Druid in addition to its other types. It has ": Add ".
But that's some redundancy! WizardMN's second suggestion looks like this, which is a lot better.
As Cardname enters the battlefield, choose Cleric or Druid. Cardname is the chosen type in addition to its other types.
• Cleric — Whenever a creature enters the battlefield, you gain 1 life.
• Druid — : Add .
If you use Path I super agree with not locking yourself in to exactly one pair of classes, and instead using the "Path — Cleric or Druid" approach.

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BOVINE
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Post by BOVINE » 3 years ago

Cardname G
Creature - Human
As ~ enters the battlefield, choose Cleric or Druid. It's that type in addition to its others types.
• Cleric — Whenever a creature enters the battlefield, you gain 1 life.
• Druid — T: Add G.
1/1

Say I have the creature above. Where/how would I give it keywords like Trample, vigilance, etc per mode?


This would give the keyword in both modes...

Cardname G
Creature - Human
Reach
As ~ enters the battlefield, choose Cleric or Druid. It's that type in addition to its others types.
• Cleric — Whenever a creature enters the battlefield, you gain 1 life.
• Druid — T: Add G.
1/1

But what about...

Cardname G
Creature - Human
As ~ enters the battlefield, choose Cleric or Druid. It's that type in addition to its others types.
• Cleric — Reach and whenever a creature enters the battlefield, you gain 1 life.
• Druid — +1/+1 and T: Add G.
1/1

Put a self buff in there too. How'd that work?

Thanks for the help everyone
B O V I N E

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spacemonaut
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Post by spacemonaut » 3 years ago

BOVINE wrote:
3 years ago
Say I have the creature above. Where/how would I give it keywords like Trample, vigilance, etc per mode?

(...)

Cardname G
Creature - Human
As ~ enters the battlefield, choose Cleric or Druid. It's that type in addition to its others types.
• Cleric — Reach and whenever a creature enters the battlefield, you gain 1 life.
• Druid — +1/+1 and T: Add G.
1/1

Put a self buff in there too. How'd that work?

Thanks for the help everyone
Right now anchor words only grant one ability line, and typically these kinds of effects go on different ability lines, so it looks like we're going off the beaten path. That said, I don't think Wizards would ever write "+1/+1" on its own on a card like that.

I think there's a handful of options here...

Option 1: Strictly sticking to existing templating, and using the anchor text to express abilities we'd see even without anchor text:

• Cleric — This creature has reach and "Whenever a creature enters the battlefield, you gain 1 life."
• Druid — This creature gets +1/+1 and has ": Add ."

Option 2: Compressing things a bit by breaking the rules about what we'd usually see on one line.

• Cleric — This creature has reach. Whenever a creature enters the battlefield, you gain 1 life.
• Druid — This creature gets +1/+1. : Add .

Option 3: We could handle it in a way that ditches anchor words completely.

As ~ enters the battlefield, it becomes your choice of Cleric or Druid in addition to its other types.
As long as ~ is a Cleric, it has reach and "Whenever a creature enters the battlefield, you gain 1 life."
As long as ~ is a Druid, it gets +1/+1 and has ": Add ."

(This has a strong interaction with type-granting effects, which might be a plus.)

There's also the option of a custom frame treatment that has a "choice A zone" and a "choice B zone" on the card, like how Mutate had its own decorative "zone", or like Levelers, which had a tiny bit of space for two separate ability lines (Transcendent Master).

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BOVINE
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Post by BOVINE » 3 years ago

Option 1 uses the anchor-word approach I was going for and IMO I think it has better readability than Option 3 (especially as an opponent) but I tend to enjoy Option 3 if I go the route of each mode adding more dimensions. Either way, your response is helpful in many ways to me. Thank you.

Edit: Actually I used the Leveler frame once when first imagining this "path" ability. So it's funny you mention it
B O V I N E

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barbecube
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Post by barbecube » 3 years ago

For a binary choice I honestly can't think of a better solution than MDFC for this.
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