September CCL, Signups/Round 1: Resurgence of Elements

[Subject16]

Bravelion83: Very balanced design. The extra mana for forests help convey the abundance of nutrients in the soil, and the card draw offsets the extra mana this card costs compared to things like Weirded Wood or New Horizons.

Jimmy Groove: I had to look up Ergot and I think this is an interesting take on it. I'm picturing amplified paranoia and untrustworthiness for this card for sure. I think it might be too good for only 2 mana though, especially as you can immediately enchant an opponent's creature and unless they are also playing a red deck this would be very hard to get rid of.

Gateways7: This is fairly new territory, but I don't think damage prevention is a particularly blue effect (especially noncombat damage). It's a nice engine though, and I think it's faily balanced if perhaps overcosted on the ability. (4U would be fine too I think).

marioguy3: This seems fairly strong as a card, but aside from the haste not especially speedy. The 'power 4' conveys more of a feeling of strength to me than speed. I think giving them flash (or making flash creatures draw a card) would fit the element a lot better.

Henlock: This makes me think of the "eat me" and "drink me" potions in Alice in Wonderland, and it's an interesting idea to transform +1/+1 counters into -1/-1 counters (although I've never been a fan of mixing them together). I don't know if 'replace' is the correct wording, but it's an interesting design.

kwanyeegor-ii: Turning all your creatures into permanent pingers is a very strong effect, and I like the snow synergy as extra frostiness. I feel like this can get quite oppressive in the right decks though.

Top 3:
3: Jimmy Groove
2: kwenyeegor-ii
1: Bravelion83

[Henlock]

Benetlilax: Interesting take on infect. This looks specially useful in multiplayer. The first ability is truly very cool, as it will serve as an poison insurance for your little beasts. Green is great at proliferating and populating so this might be a solid support for infect. As with other submissions, choosing poison and green is not risky at all.

kwanyegor: I think this is an interesting design but it's a bit too opressive. Giving all your creatures the ability to ping is nice but paired with the second ability it can become problematic, as you'll be pinging twice as hard with some of your creatures. I feel the second ability conveys icy-ness well.

bravelion83: I play Dawn's Reflection in a couple of decks (Estrid commander & pauper Arcane) and I'm pretty positive that the limitation to forests for full ramp and upshif makes for a good balance point as to have it cantrip, Only complain is that green soil was probably the safest and less interesting choice of the whole unch.

Krishnath: For some reason the whole flavor reminded of a Nick Cave's lyric line "At night the desert writhe with diabolical things" and the idea of having scropinos pop up from the desert sand is solid. The effect is very powerful bit demands a strong compromise of your mana base.

slimytrout: Dangerous and fun. Each prowess trigger will get the guy big and big. This is a card to go off and kill. The numbers seem relatively safe at lower spell counts So with three spells we have +1/+1, +2/+2 and +3/+3. If those spells are pump, we are talking about huge numbers. This card is very powerful but very fragile. I like that.

zdtsd: This looks very powerful and I'm sure it could fuel some pretty nasty comboes.. As with such kind of effects demands, playstesting is what will tell us more on viability, I do think that metal on red is a very safe choice.

All very good submissions.

1. Krishnath
2. Slimeytrout
3. Benetlilax

[marioguy3]

Henlock (Tainted Bread) This card could only be printed in supplemental sets, which is what might be the intention of this design. Replacing counters is not something I am sure works within the rules, but it does explore new design, which is a plus.

bravelion83(Fruitful Soil) This card meets the flavor challenge. It is a standard enchantment that has had variants printed multiple times. Not completely unique, but the cost and rarity is appropriate.

kwanyeegor-ii(Freeze Breath) A cool and very strong card that makes good use of the theme. However, the card is slightly oppressive to play against considering the creatures can tap during the opponent's upkeep. Expect some frosty remarks from your opponents. Cost and rarity of the card is appropriate.

Krishnath(Shivering Sands) This sounds like a fun card to play. It encourages use of the lands we all saw in the Amonkhet block. It is also a simple and elegant design that explores the theme of "black" sand really well. A card that would definitely see play in Standard.

slimytrout (Stormcloud Mantle) This card's templating is weird. It would confuse new players who would have many questions about how more powerful the creature becomes. This card is too powerful and confusing for an uncommon. Red storm has lots of potential, however.

zdtsd (Metallic Echo) The positive thoughts echo through my mind with this card. It is relatively simple compared to other cards I judged. I think I would add one or two more generic mana to the cost since this card is borderline vintage playable in it's cheap form. Double black lotus for free, anyone?

Top 3

3 kwanyeegor-ii (Frost Breath)
2 zdtsd (Metallic Echo)
1 Krishnath (Shivering Sands)

[kwanyeegor-ii]

bravelion83 - looks like a really fun and well made ramp card but not a super original design

Krishnath - desertfall is a good variation on a mechanic that already exists, and the card is super flavorful, good job

slimytrout - I really love the stacking effect here, exponential prowess is great

zdtsd - very cool and unique card that somehow seems abuseable

BeneTleilax - I think there shouldn't really be poison counter removal but interesting mass pseudo hexproof card

netn10 - cool takeoff on blood moon and the werewolf ability but I don't think cards should hose basic lands like this

1. slimytrout
2. Krishnath
3. zdtsd

[void_nothing]

Going to extend the critique period for the first two rounds by 24 hours - you have until 23:59 Eastern tomorrow, so get your critiques and top 3s in!

[bravelion83]

Going to extend the critique period for the first two rounds by 24 hours - you have until 23:59 Eastern tomorrow, so get your critiques and top 3s in!

I misread the critique deadline, I thought it was the 18th, not the 16th. I've just realized my mistake now, so this is much appreciated.

Critiques (done)

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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.

Ability words are in italics. Good and elegant card, very flavorful, and it fits the theme quite well. The only thing is that I just can't see them using the name "Desertfall" on a real card, despite this being a variant of landfall. In fact, there is a precedent: what was "enchantmentfall" in design became "constellation" on real cards. I'd just have the rules text with no ability word here.

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.)

I get what you were going for, and I appreciate your attempt to recreate the mechanic storm but for creatures, but I do see a couple problems here. Let me get the easiest one out of the way first: the reminder text is ambiguous. It looks like you have to choose a single creature that has prowess, and only that creature gets the +1/+1 bonus. We all know that's not how prowess works. The other is a potentially unintended interaction with the rules. Let's say you have this on the battlefield enchanting one of your creatures that doesn't naturally have prowess (to make it simpler, it could also already have prowess on its own and that wouldn't change anything). You cast a noncreature spell. Two triggers go on the stack (you choose the order): the first is prowess from "enchanted creature has prowess", no problem with that. The other is "get the second instance of prowess". That needs to resolve for the creature to get the second instance of prowess, so that second instance of prowess will NOT trigger off of that noncreature spell you've just cast. This recreates how storm works on instants and sorceries very well, but I can easily see it being confusing and unintuitive to some if not most players.

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.

The name should be bolded, and this is a big thing. The design itself is perfectly functional, nice, elegant, and flavorful.

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.

The name should be bolded, and this is a big thing. The ability of the token should not be capitalized ("infect"). I have no big problems with this card, but they'd never print it as is. They made a big deal out of the fact that Leeches was a mistake, and that poison counters can't be removed to make them feel different than just a second life total. That's part of their identity by now. Maybe this could be an acceptable exception, like Processors from BFZ, because you're doing it to an opponent and not to you, but I still think they would want to avoid this effect... Sorry, this cost technically.

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."

Excellent work. I really like the piggybacking on Blood Moon and the implicit connection between a moon-themed card and werewolves, using the same transformation trigger but in different colors. And I just love the flavor of this card. My only little remark is that the color indicator on the back face is barely visible (I had to check the source code to see that is was blue), but mostly that I would have made it white actually. "Basic lands are Plains" feels like it wants to be white, not blue, even though blue can technically do it mechanically.

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.

I've got nothing to say about this card, it's just fine. It works, it's in color, no problems with either flavor or mechanics. I only wish there were some flavor text here, there is plenty of room for it on this card.

Top 3

1st place: netn10
2nd place: barbecube
3rd place: Krishnath

[barbecube]

RaikouRider

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This is really messy! I see what you're doing with it, of course, but it just isn't an execution that I can get behind.

Ink-Treader

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This is elegant and flavorful, although exceedingly strange.

Subject16

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A slow wrath like this could probably cost one less, even though it hits most permanent types. I'd expect its environment to have ways to deal with it.

Jimmy Groove

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Honestly I'm not convinced that this amount of verbiage would fit on a card. It's mildly amusing, but I think it suffers from overcomplicating the issue.

Gateways7

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This needs to be at least partially white, IMO, and should say "prevent all noncombat damage." The fact that it mainly hoses red is a problem, as it's so narrow.

marioguy3

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The wording you want is "Non-Human," I believe.

Top 3

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1. Ink-Treader
2. Subject16
3. marioguy3