December CCL, Top 4: Innovation in Ritual

[void_nothing]

CCL December Top 4/Round 4

"Innovation in Ritual"


Patron of the Moon, taken from echomtg.com, by Scott M. Fisher 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 Mages of Many Colors Month here in the CCL! Each color has a characteristic creature type and an iconic creature type. Now a lot of people theorize they each have a spellcaster creature type as well! This month will make use of those five types.

Challenge

Design a card with a new named mechanic (keyword, ability word, or keyword action) utilizing the Cleric, Wizard, Warlock, Shaman, or Druid creature type.

Clarifications

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• You must create a new, custom, mechanic.
• Your card's own card type/subtypes don't matter as long as the new mechanic somehow mentions one of these creature types.
• Make sure to include a rarity.

Contestants:
@slimytrout
@Ink-Treader
@MonoRedMage
@Pygyzy

Your submissions are due Monday, January 4th, 23:59 EST.

Schedule

• Round 1 — Open to Everyone (December 1st-8th)
• Round 2 — Open to Everyone (December 10th-16th)
• Rounds 1 and 2 Critiques (Due December 18th)
• Top 6 — Open to top 6 finishers (December 23rd–26th)
• Top 6 Critiques (Due December 28th)
• Top 4 — Open to top 4 finishers (January 1st-January 4th)
• Top 4 Critiques (Due January 6th)
• Final (January, winner determined by public poll)

Please note: For this month we will continue asking first and second round contestants to evaluate seven other contestants during the critique and top 3 period, in order to increase the total number of evaluations each contestant gets.

[Ink-Treader]

Stormscarred Ancient 2RG
Creature - Treefolk Shaman (U)
Vigilance
T: Target creature you control gets +2/-1 until end of turn.
Tutelage - Other Treefolk and/or Shamans you control have vigilance and "T: Target creature you control gets +2/-1 until end of turn."
"What doesn't burn you down only makes you stronger."
1/4

[Pygyzy]

Spell Spiral 1UU
Instant (U)
Counter target spell.
Magecraft - If you cast another Wizard or noncreature spell this turn, draw a card.

[slimytrout]

Archpriest of Blessings 1WW
Creature - Human Cleric (R)
Lifelink
Pious - Whenever you gain life or another Cleric enters the battlefield under your control, untap Archpriest of Blessings.
1WW, T: Put a +1/+1 counter on target creature.
2/3

[MonoRedMage]

Earthwound Ritual 2RR
Sorcery {U}
Destroy target land.
Witchery RR (At the beginning of your upkeep, if this card is in your graveyard, you may pay RR and sacrifice two permanents or a Warlock.)
Whenever you commit Earthwound Ritual's witchery, Earthwound Ritual deals damage to target player equal to the number of land cards in their graveyard. If you sacrificed a Warlock, that player can't gain life until your next turn.

[void_nothing]

Round is closed. Go ahead and critique the other contestants and organize them into a top 3.

[Ink-Treader]

slimytrout

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Sure, makes sense for the ability word. As for the card itself, this seems rather dangerous. No one is going to play this fairly when it has innate lifelink. Slap Viridian Longbow or similar Equipment/Auras on this and win the game.

MonoRedMage

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Have to give you an extra nod for being the only one of us not to go the ability word route. Witchery seems neat, though depending on the effect, it could singlehandedly end games. The base effect of Earthwound Ritual is fine. The witchery effect has a lot of potential oomph, but it is reliant on your opponent's graveyard in a color that lacks mill, and only had land destruction as an angle for ramping it up. Probably has a lot of potential in Commander though.

Pygyzy

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Sure, that's a nice simple ability word. Pretty basic, but elegant. The card itself can be somewhat tricky to take advantage of, since you'll have to cast some other spell first, which is not innately likely for a counterspell, but it does seem solid in a mirror match.

Top 3

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1. MonoRedMage
2. Pygyzy
3. slimytrout

[MonoRedMage]

Ink-Treader

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I love the utility of the activated ability. I would actually prefer if the other creatures weren't granted vigilance - if it's just an activated ability granted it feels more like a technique being taught.

Pygyzy

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This pretty much is just an ability word for the small theme Wizards had in Zendikar Rising. I think this is the most balanced and printable card here but it's not exciting at all. Flavor text definitely would have helped.

slimytrout

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I do like the dual trigger here. I feel like this card could be too much of an engine with itself. It definitely easily enables the pious triggers of other cards you'd be playing.

1 - Ink-Treader
2 - slimytrout
3 - Pygyzy

[Pygyzy]

SPOILER

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Stormscarred Ancient 2RG
Creature - Treefolk Shaman (U)
Vigilance
T: Target creature you control gets +2/-1 until end of turn.
Tutelage - Other Treefolk and/or Shamans you control have vigilance and "T: Target creature you control gets +2/-1 until end of turn."
"What doesn't burn you down only makes you stronger."
1/4

Nice. Keywording ability sharing is a lot of fun but i worry that too many of these types of abilities could lead to a lot of game tracking errors or missed abilities which could be unfun.

Archpriest of Blessings 1WW
Creature - Human Cleric (R)
Lifelink
Pious - Whenever you gain life or another Cleric enters the battlefield under your control, untap Archpriest of Blessings.
1WW, T: Put a +1/+1 counter on target creature.
2/3

Clericfall with an additional lifegain trigger makes total sense for cleric tribal.

Earthwound Ritual 2RR
Sorcery {U}
Destroy target land.
Witchery RR (At the beginning of your upkeep, if this card is in your graveyard, you may pay RR and sacrifice two permanents or a Warlock.)
Whenever you commit Earthwound Ritual's witchery, Earthwound Ritual deals damage to target player equal to the number of land cards in their graveyard. If you sacrificed a Warlock, that player can't gain life until your next turn.

Now this I like. Graveyard shenanigan and a very flavorful ability.

T3
1. Monoredmage
2. Slimytrout
3. Ink-Treader

[slimytrout]

Ink-Treader

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Yikes, soooo much tracking here. This would be like Lorwyn-block draft but way worse. This is a fun idea for a card, but not for a mechanic.

Pygyzy

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Fun, simple card. I like it. Obviously not a terribly exciting mechanic, but it was a difficult challenge.

MonoRedMage

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Man, repeatable LD is not a terribly fun mechanic for the game, so I have trouble imagining this card getting printed -- especially given how abusable it is with Young Pyromancer and Monastery Mentor. Also, I think it's a bit of overkill to go for the "commit witchery" part, when "cast from the graveyard" is a much more grokkable alternative. That being said, it is a novel mechanic idea, so kudos for that. Totally misread the card, which changes how I see it entirely. It now strikes me as a bit too swingy -- if you're playing it fairly, it's a bad Demolish that can turn into an awful impression of a Sulfuric Vortex, but if you're abusing it it's an uncounterable Lava Axe every turn that's impossible to stop without graveyard hate. Still, I maintain (or even strengthen) my feeling that it's a novel mechanic idea.

T3

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Ranking is unchanged by my misreading, as it turns out.
1. Pygyzy
2. MonoRedMage
3. Ink-Treader

[void_nothing]

And your finalists are MonoRedMage and Pygyzy! Final round to come soon.