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Post by SecretInfiltrator » 4 years ago

: )

Card of the Day 2019-08-13: >

Jelenn Archivist {W/U}
Creature – Human Advisor (R)
Whenever you cast a spell from exile, if it's the first spell you cast this turn, you may put that card into your hand rather than another zone as it resolves.
1/1

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Post by user_938036 » 4 years ago

Rebuying suspend and rebound seems very dangerous. Almost certainly too cheap, probably a 4 or 5 cost effect.

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Post by void_nothing » 4 years ago

It is dangerous as a one-mana effect, I agree; this card seems more like a 2/3 for 1{W/U}{W/U} or 3/3 for 2{W/U}{W/U}. However, the Jelenn in the name and the hybrid mana in the cost both seem to imply an Azorius mechanic, and none of the existing ones allow you to cast from exile; that means you have come up with a custom mechanic (or a reuse of an old mechanic) for the guild of Azor. May we see that for context?
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Post by spacemonaut » 4 years ago

Also rebuys madness, but I'm sure the Azorius haven't succumbed to that...

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Post by SecretInfiltrator » 4 years ago

The context is indeed giving rebound to Azorius themed as persistence of the law or from an outsiders perspective the annoying repetitiveness of of bureaucracy. At some point I surmised that an Azorius spell mechanic would make instants and sorceries more "lasting" and enchantment-like and rebound does this as some sort of funtional equivalent to a two-turn Saga.

I noticed it should be "its owner's hand", too.

Card of the Day 2019-08-14: >

Bloodquill Notes {U/B}
Instant (C)
Draw two cards, then discard two cards. You lose 2 life.

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Post by spacemonaut » 4 years ago

This is neat. I like it, and it feels dimir and UB. And hey, it's Faithless Looting but it actually does looting!

It isn't strictly blue or strictly black, but I read recently Maro's revised how they approach multicolor cards: this post, then also this post, then also this one. I think last month before reading those posts I would've said "this feels more like it should cost UB" but in light of those posts think it's great as a hybrid.

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Post by user_938036 » 4 years ago

spacemonaut wrote:
4 years ago
This is neat. I like it, and it feels dimir and UB. And hey, it's Faithless Looting but it actually does looting!

It isn't strictly blue or strictly black, but I read recently Maro's revised how they approach multicolor cards: this post, then also this post, then also this one. I think last month before reading those posts I would've said "this feels more like it should cost UB" but in light of those posts think it's great as a hybrid.
I'd just like to say that it's very strange to look at a change in philosophy in how multicolor cards are handled and then apply it to hybrid cards when they are deliberately different things. Also, faithless looting does looting, it was made when they first started sharing that ability with red and hadn't yet decided that red would get rummaging instead.

That said the card is simply bleeding some inconsequential effects into other colors which can always be justified by a plane's theme. However, I don't think it is a good card because I don't think Faithless Looting is a good(Healthy) card

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Post by spacemonaut » 4 years ago

user_938036 wrote:
4 years ago
I'd just like to say that it's very strange to look at a change in philosophy in how multicolor cards are handled and then apply it to hybrid cards when they are deliberately different things.
I know they're different things. I don't mean to straight-up apply one to the other unthinkingly. However, lessons about one can still have lessons about the other.

Prior to those articles, I may have thought: "we wouldn't print this in strictly blue, and we wouldn't print this as strictly black, so we wouldn't make this a black-blue hybrid." After all, Hybrid still needs to do something it's possible to do in either hybrid color.

However, Maro's talking about fitting an identity. This card does feel like it matches a blue-black identity. It allows blue to do something it can do (loot) but with something we wouldn't normally see in blue (life loss). It's a problem when hybrid cards let a color do something it couldn't normally do because of reasons including potentially mitigating that color's weaknesses in a harmful way, but this isn't really doing anything that's a problem there. Meanwhile everything the card does is something black can do (draw cards for life loss, or get card advantage for life loss, and also discard cards) but the pattern of how it does them feels quite blue because it's looting. We wouldn't see any of those on a monocolor card, but it's okay since it fits the identity of blue-black the card appears in without undermining either color's weakness.
user_938036 wrote:
4 years ago
Also, faithless looting does looting, it was made when they first started sharing that ability with red and hadn't yet decided that red would get rummaging instead.
Whoops, you're right, it does do looting. Why did I have it registered differently in my head? (Probably because it's red I guess.) So I guess it's Faithless Looting but with life loss. Valid concern about Fatihless Looting as a card of course.

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Post by NUMBERS » 4 years ago

Really appreciating the context on multicolor provided herein.

Also I particularly like Jelen Archivist's ability, though I can see the concern about it being on a 1CMC card.
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Post by SecretInfiltrator » 4 years ago

Some good discussion, let me add my perspective on it by elaborating on how I figured this card is appropriate to hybrid. From my point of view hybrid effects are allowed to do things if for each color it is something that the color could do, but less. We often see this applied by taking away options e. g. Aethertow, where white could outright permanently remove an attacking or blocking creature or blue could bounce any creature to the library but here only gets to target attacking or blocking creatures. Fire at Will is another example where the effect is entirely fine in white, but the red side gets reduced from direct damage to anything to direct damage to creatures in combat which is a subset.

Since here we have a nontargeting spell reducing options was not the way to go, but for both colors you can see an entire in-color spell in the effect and can clearly define the part they get "less". Blue gets Careful Study but with 2 life less and black gets Night's Whisper, but at two cards less.

Though there is an added bonus that you wouldn't see this effect in either color alone in normal circumstances which is what I call "hybrid pie": Effects that technically are just weakened versions of either color, but wouldn't be printed in either because the combination of effects steps into how the colors usually differentiate themselves from each other. I feel they are perfect for hybrids though since there they don't forget to mention the color they actually belong into.

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Post by void_nothing » 4 years ago

I was literally about to say both 1) it's wrong to extrapolate hybrid design rules from traditional multicolor design rules and 2) you can give hybrid cards """color pie bends""" as long as it's inferior version of effects that both colors get - blue gets drawing cards often with the drawback of also discarding cards, and black gets drawing cards usually with the drawback of losing life, meaning that Bloodquill Notes can easily cost {U/B}. The most questionable part is blue getting the self life loss, but I think every color can occasionally pay life - it's on colorless but color oriented cycles like painlands, shocklands, and fetchlands.

One thing about traditional multicolor is that it can never produce 1CMC cards, and Bloodquill Notes would be quite bad at UB.
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Post by SecretInfiltrator » 4 years ago

Card of the Day 2019-08-15: >

Desolate Anarchist {B/R}
Creature – Human Rebel (C)
{B/R}, Exile a card named ~ from your graveyard: ~ deals 3 damage to target creature.
We celebrate as heroes today the martyrs of tomorrow.
1/2
Last edited by SecretInfiltrator 4 years ago, edited 1 time in total.

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Post by spacemonaut » 4 years ago

That one is shiny, but seems like a break on account of giving burn to mono black. R&D is careful not to do that because red having burn and black not is one of the ways the two colours get differentiated at a point they strongly overlap (creature removal).

Given I can't use the activated ability more than a couple of times most games, what about bumping up the ability cost to 2 mana and also bumping up the damage?

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Post by SecretInfiltrator » 4 years ago

Black and red differentiate themselves from each other in several ways e. g. -N/-N vs. direct damage to creatures, life loss vs. direct damage to players and "can't block" vs. "attacks each combat if able" etc.

Nevertheless on hybrid cards such effectively similar abilities often get consider "close enough" and we get cards like Ashenmoor Gouger, Poison the Well and Spiteflame Witch. (Edit: The last one was a bad example due to gold activation cost; let's pretend I wrote Ashenmoor Liege...)

As a consideration I made certain not to step on red's flexibility ("any target"). The effect to me is a restriction of black's "drain" and red's "damage to any target" though entirely available only to red by itself.

To me 3 damage already seems plenty. But I'm not saying this has been fine-tuned. There is currently no environment for it to be balanced against.

Card of the Day 2019-08-16: >

Feral Warren {R/G}
Enchantment (U)
At the beginning of your end step, if an opponent was dealt damage this turn, create a 1/1 red Goblin creature token.

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Post by void_nothing » 4 years ago

Feral Warren is a neat card. Quite pushed for one mana but you have to work for it, even if the work is just "be a hyperaggressive deck and always be triggering."

Aesthetically if this is a Ravnica card I'd use the current token and if it's a Shadowmoor card I'd use the Wort, the Raidmother 1/1 red and green Goblin Warrior.
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Post by SecretInfiltrator » 4 years ago

Yeah, the card was created as part of a whole batch of Ravnica-themed cards. I don't know whether the term warren is in usage on Ravnica though. Anyway that informed the choice of token.

The whole batch of cards was adjusted towards the powerful end of the curve more often than not.

Card of the Day 2019-08-17: >

Conclave Elf {G/W}
Creature — Elf Shaman (C)
Whenever you cast a creature spell, untap ~.
1/1

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Post by Dragonlover » 4 years ago

Not sure if that feels like a card that would be printed for w, but it definitely feels like a Selesnya card. Maybe a 2/2 for WG instead?

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Post by void_nothing » 4 years ago

May I ask why you think Conclave Elf can't be white? It's very close to just being a small Midnight Guard with less combo abuseability.
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Post by Dragonlover » 4 years ago

Man, I'm 0 for 3 today. I've really gotta start looking rules text up on Scryfall before I open my mouth. Crack on with keeping it hybrid!

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Post by SecretInfiltrator » 4 years ago

Card of the Day 2019-08-18: >

Venerable Ghast {W/B}
Creature — Spirit (C)
Tribute 1 (As this creature enters the battlefield, an opponent of your choice may place one +1/+1 counters on it.)
~ can't be blocked unless tribute has been paid to it.
1/1

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Post by void_nothing » 4 years ago

Huh. Tribute in Orzhov. Unexpected, but it works with the guild flavor.

I don't think Venerable Ghast is a white card - white simply doesn't get straight-up unblockability even if there's the opponent's choice involved like this.
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Post by SecretInfiltrator » 4 years ago

The idea was that your opponent gets to choose between giving you a white-ish efficient weenie (2/2 for one) or a more black-ish evasive dude (1/1 unblockable). Since you cannot decide which you get, you get the worst of the two colors, so hybrid.

I actually expected the unblockable creature in black to be more of an argument starter sine I eshewed "~ can't block" for a shorter wording. Though adding that might help either way.

Card of the Day 2019-08-19: >

Trainee Chemister {U/R}
Creature — Human Wizard (U)
Sacrifice ~: Put target instant or sorcery card from your graveyard on top of your library.
1/1

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Post by spacemonaut » 4 years ago

It would be on color (in either color) to give Venerable Ghast flying if tribute wasn't paid. Straight up "can't be blocked" isn't really a black effect like you seem to be describing; it's blue.

Re: Desolate Anarchist — seeing Arrows of Justice I realise the hybrid design there is fine.

Trainee Chemister is pretty.

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Post by SecretInfiltrator » 4 years ago

spacemonaut wrote:
4 years ago
It would be on color (in either color) to give Venerable Ghast flying if tribute wasn't paid. Straight up "can't be blocked" isn't really a black effect like you seem to be describing; it's blue.
Well, since I'm describing it as something that would probably fare better if I added "~ can't block" the linked cards provide plenty of examples of that.

But looking through that link, black does get Bloodmist Infiltrator, which is straight unblockable as a triggered ability, does get Hooded Horror which has a similar static unblockability depending on the game state/opponents' actions (and does get both "~ can't be blocked except by Walls." and "~ can't be blocked by Walls." though that's on old cards).

I think, I'm more satisfied with the effect after checking out these cards than before.

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Card of the Day 2019-08-20: >

Bloodbond Rite {B/G}
Sorcery (C)
Search your library for any number of cards with the same name as target creature card in your graveyard. Put one of them into your hand and bury the rest.
Last edited by SecretInfiltrator 4 years ago, edited 2 times in total.

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Post by Krishnath » 4 years ago

Black is secondary in "can't be blocked/is unblockable"

As for Bloodbond Rite, it feels very golgari, plus it helps all the Golgari keywords by putting cards into the 'yard, which is what said keywords need.
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