Chaos of Tarkir

[Ulka]

While I will eventually go and finish designing the whole set I wanted to start off with wanting some feedback on the idea in general:

The set is a planar chaos version of Dragons of Tarkir. A great What if... and the biggest what if is that rather than the Allied colored Dragonlords coming to power instead Enemy colored Dragons took power from the Khans instead. This means each wedge gets moved to enemy colors and I get to reimagine the set a bit.

Abzan would go to WB rather than GW
Jesaki Would go to UR rather than UW
Sultai would go to GB rather than UB
Mardu would go to WR rather than BR
Temur would go to GU rather than GR

Set size will be the same as Dragons: 264 cards (101 Commons, 80 Uncommons, 53 Rares, 15 Mythic Rares, 15 Basic Lands)

Given each Shard had a mechanic from Dragons of the Mechanics List I think I would want to go back and adjust those:
Bolster - GW
Rebound - UW
Exploit -UB
Dash -BR
Formidable -GR
Megamorph- rainbow

Currently my mechanics are looking to be shifted to the following to try to show the opposite side of the clan.
UG - Mysticism - Whenever ~ becomes the target of a spell or ability you control, X happens.
WR - Battle Cry
GB - Grim - Whenever a nontoken creature you control dies, X happens.
UR - Scry
wB - Exalted
I also left morph as a mechanic here.


Overall I'm looking for feedback on the overarching mechanics here before I begin the set design more.

[void_nothing]

Nice concept. Obviously this is a popular thing to do - switching something about a group of factions around - but from the beginning of Tarkir block I wanted the dragons to be enemy colored. We got something like that in Strixhaven of course but I think this would be nice to see and kind of fulfill a wish.

As for the mechanics -

Mysticism - This is heroic++, with the additional development problem (mostly for EDH, but still) that everything goes infinite with en-Kors, Lightning Greaves, etc. It also doesn't feel all that... mystical? Back to the drawing board with this one.

Battle cry - Fine choice! Underexplored, and a good go-wide mechanic. Might present some development problems, but I want to see it.

Grim - The second "boilerplate triggered ability with an ability word" mechanic, but I think this one could stay. A bit generic, sure, but it's highly workable imho. Lots of design space, plays well with others with the same mechanic but isn't parasitic...

Scry - Odd to see what's technically an evergreen ability on this list. Would these be, like, scry-matters cards? Maybe this would call for a scry variant mechanic instead, similar to surveil?

Exalted - The exact opposite of battle cry, pretty much - that's definitely odd, especially in color combos that overlap - white seems to be getting the short end, mechanically speaking, with two incompatible abilities. Since there are many more existing exalted cards than battle cry ones, I'd scrap this one and do something different for the colors.

Final suggestion: Maybe come up with a new name for the original version of megamorph? That was initially going to be a 4 cost to cast a 2/2 face down creature that entered with a +1/+1 counter, instead of putting the counter on when flipped.

[Sporegorger_Dragon]

Mysticism - This is heroic++, with the additional development problem (mostly for EDH, but still) that everything goes infinite with en-Kors, Lightning Greaves, etc. It also doesn't feel all that... mystical? Back to the drawing board with this one.

Wacky suggestion; "triggers only once per turn" clause?

Scry - Odd to see what's technically an evergreen ability on this list. Would these be, like, scry-matters cards?

I think that's what he means; like the ur equivalent of Dimir Spybug

[Ulka]

Nice concept. Obviously this is a popular thing to do - switching something about a group of factions around - but from the beginning of Tarkir block I wanted the dragons to be enemy colored. We got something like that in Strixhaven of course but I think this would be nice to see and kind of fulfill a wish.

As for the mechanics -

Mysticism - This is heroic++, with the additional development problem (mostly for EDH, but still) that everything goes infinite with en-Kors, Lightning Greaves, etc. It also doesn't feel all that... mystical? Back to the drawing board with this one.

Battle cry - Fine choice! Underexplored, and a good go-wide mechanic. Might present some development problems, but I want to see it.

Grim - The second "boilerplate triggered ability with an ability word" mechanic, but I think this one could stay. A bit generic, sure, but it's highly workable imho. Lots of design space, plays well with others with the same mechanic but isn't parasitic...

Scry - Odd to see what's technically an evergreen ability on this list. Would these be, like, scry-matters cards? Maybe this would call for a scry variant mechanic instead, similar to surveil?

Exalted - The exact opposite of battle cry, pretty much - that's definitely odd, especially in color combos that overlap - white seems to be getting the short end, mechanically speaking, with two incompatible abilities. Since there are many more existing exalted cards than battle cry ones, I'd scrap this one and do something different for the colors.

Final suggestion: Maybe come up with a new name for the original version of megamorph? That was initially going to be a 4 cost to cast a 2/2 face down creature that entered with a +1/+1 counter, instead of putting the counter on when flipped.

Thank you so much for the feedback. I didn't think beyond my set which while is fine for development of a set for my own uses only, doesn't push my skills as a developer and designer so with Mystical, I hadn't thought about equip 0 and such so I think I have a few fixes:

1. Remove the or ability section of the ability which makes it heroic+ given it gets around needing to cast said spell . makes it feel very meh. I think pass on this.

2. Tack on the following text to the ability as Sporegorger suggests: "triggers only once per turn" clause. I think this is workable all be it more meh.

3. I'm not sure the fix beyond those two but I will likely think of something.

Scry given it was granted evergreen status after Dragons of Tarkir in Magic origins Scry could have been a coreset mechanic here and I really wish it had been. I plan to use scry like surveil was used and have things that trigger when you scry or how much you scry, or where you scry the cards to ect.

As to exalted, I hadn't considered the split in identity that it might cause white. I think Exalted is probably the mechanic I would replace between battlecry and exalted. this one will need me to think on the lore and worldbuilding I would want to see for the set as removing the bolster and all for one theme of Abzan leaves me with spirits and veneration of the dead but that is getting danger close to what Sultai has become. I will need to think more on this but your feedback has given me a lot think about so I hope you keep providing me feedback as I go as this has been very helpful.

Mysticism - This is heroic++, with the additional development problem (mostly for EDH, but still) that everything goes infinite with en-Kors, Lightning Greaves, etc. It also doesn't feel all that... mystical? Back to the drawing board with this one.

Wacky suggestion; "triggers only once per turn" clause?

Scry - Odd to see what's technically an evergreen ability on this list. Would these be, like, scry-matters cards?

I think that's what he means; like the ur equivalent of Dimir Spybug

Correct on scry. It is meant to be cards with whenever you scry do X ect. I think that may be my fix to mystical. its either that or remove ability from the text. Either way I will have some adjustments to make.

[Sporegorger_Dragon]

Tack on the following text to the ability as Sporegorger suggests: "triggers only once per turn" clause. I think this is workable all be it more meh.

Hey, wait, keep the ability trigger, you can open up the possibility for a chain reaction!

Trigger one Mysticism, have that ability target another mysticism permanent you control, and so on. The "once per turn clause" should prevent it from being too broken.

[spacemonaut]

The critique so far has been pretty poignant. If I may, I want us to propose some additional lenses we might examine as we consider options for what the clan mechanics might look like.

Preamble: Our color options

Let's look again at the enemy colors available: every one has two pairs to choose from, with different implications for the fate of the clan. We have to choose Column A or Column B. Both are valid and solid choices. I raise this only to highlight our options again. This proposal took Column A, but in the course of examining stuff we might discover Column B works even better, but I'm not about to advocate for it unless it comes up as a very good idea.

Abzan WBG can become WB or BG
Jeskai URW can become UR or RW
Sultai BGU can become BG or GU
Mardu RWB can become RW or WB
Temur GUR can become GU or UR

Column A keeps the focus color of the clan but picks a different secondary color to what we got.

Column B drops the focus color, changing the clan's narrative dramatically.

The Lenses

The Clan pair lens: An additional layer to examine, whichever column you chose, is that the color pair should work backwards with both clans of that color. In Khans of Tarkir (the set), players were prompted in various ways to build enemy-color decks: an enemy WB deck would benefit from both the Mardu and Abzan card pool, but an ally RB deck would benefit only from the Mardu card pool. In this universe, we could look at it like KTK comes out, then Chaos of Tarkir comes out, and we still keep building our enemy decks but now have new tools to play with. (I don't know if Chaos of Tarkir is a years-later revisit or a drop-in replacement for FRF, but either way this might be a useful lens.)

The Clan trio lens: If this is a FRF drop-in, then the clan mechanics should maybe also pass this measure: if I build a Mardu deck, I should be able to use the WB mechanic and the RW mechanic as drop-ins and they'll work well with what I've got. If I build an Abzan deck, I should be able to use the WB mechanic and the BG mechanic as drop-ins. Etc.

The Synergy lens: A really important test that @void_nothing brings up and that we hear about in Ravnica design etc: any one mono color should be able to combine both mechanics in its pair, and any two clans (sharing one color) should be able to be combined without a clash.

Bringing the lenses together means we wind up with these tests that each mechanic must pass.

WB must connect with Abzan and Mardu, narratively and mechanically. It must be compatible with the BG and RW mechanics.
UR must connect with Jeskai and Temur, and must be compatible with RW and GU mechanics.
BG must connect with Sultai and Abzan, and must be compatible with GU and WB mechanics.
RW must connect with Mardu and Jeskai, and must be compatible with WB and UR mechanics.
GU must connect with Temur and Sultai, and must be compatible with UR and BG mechanics.

All these rules narrow down our options a lot. This is good: restrictions breed creativity and it ensures we have narrative and mechanical cohesion.

Mechanical Review

Now, let's look back at the mechanical list to review things. I don't have solutions for everything, but some things stand out from applying all these lenses to it.

WB — ❌ Exalted does not sound like Mardu, and only sort of like Abzan, and like @void_nothing said, white shouldn't be both Battle Cry and Exalted since they're mutually incompatible. I would instead put 🔀 Battle Cry here (yes, really) to represent the massive companies either clan might attack in. Battle Cry's team +1/+0 buff combines with both colors having archetypes of token spam (warriors and zombies respectively), and the lack of toughness boost works well with Grim—you want some of your nontoken stuff to die, and if your opponent is blocking your nontoken stuff they're not blocking your tokens.
UR — ❓ Building around Scry seems weak mechanically and in terms of identity. Whatever this color pair uses must connect to the ideas of ferocity and wisdom we see embodied in Jeskai and Temur, and I'm not sure Scry meets that bar—it's entirely blue and not red. You reference Surveil, but Surveil was blue in card advantage and black in self-mill. Blue and Red are basically on the opposite ends of the spectrum of who gets scry and how much, so this is kind of a bad combination. Scrying has some synergy with Sultai though, which was about self-mill, so you now get to pick what you mill.
BG — ✅ Grim fits exceptionally well. Abzan would honor their fallen ancestor, commit them to the kin-tree, and let the loss strengthen them as a clan. Sultai would see an opportunity, possibly one they created by killing that guy. It works with Sultai's delve and compensates Abzan for their losses.
RW — ❓ If we move battle cry up, this needs something else that matches both Mardu and Jeskai, and that is about ferocity and togetherness. This opening means we have the opportunity to give RW a mechanic that isn't a "turn creatures sideways" mechanic for once, and I'd challenge that this is something to aspire to. If we keep Battel Cry here though, it does have compatibility with Mardu (which wants to attack with all it's got) and Jeskai (which has prowess anyway).
GU — ❓ Mysticism fits green better than it fits blue, since when blue is targeting a permanent it's more often to bounce it, nerf it, or steal it than it is to buff it. It gets a couple of evasive tricks each set, and blue got Triton Tactics|THS that one time, but that's kind of all I can think of. 🔀 Exalted could move here—GU has no overlap with WB—although it's just one of the options. It might clash with BG's grim, or it might work for it—you nominate an attacker, your opponent will probably try to kill it, it dies, all your Grim triggers happen, or all your Grim triggers act like a rattlesnake forcing them to not kill your Exalted attacker.

Tarkir lives rent-free in my head so I'll be thinking about this list further and might have one or two suggestions.

[Sporegorger_Dragon]

Whatever this color pair uses must connect to the ideas of ferocity and wisdom we see embodied in Jeskai and Temur, and I'm not sure Scry meets that bar—it's entirely blue and not red. You reference Surveil, but Surveil was blue in card advantage and black in self-mill. Blue and Red are basically on the opposite ends of the spectrum of who gets scry and how much, so this is a bad combination.

I think he means to give a unique scry identity, like scry a random number, or scry off damage dealt. Plus I can see scry itself focused heavily in , while has something more open-ended (like maybe "whenever you put one or more cards on the bottom of your library"), a bit of Grenzo influence.

Mysticism fits green better than it fits blue, since when blue is targeting a permanent it's more often to bounce it, nerf it, or steal it than it is to buff it.

Well, u can grant hexproof, flying, or unblockable, or more importantly self-bounce. Nothing better than rescuing your creature while triggering its mysticism trigger. Plus there are always Auras, both colors have plenty of useful Auras.

But I think the best u effect would be untapping; plenty of untap target permanent effects.

[spacemonaut]

Re mysticism: True, and as of the very recent color pie blue can now work with vigilance. I could see a flash aura that untaps something and grants it vigilance.

[Venedrex]

Wouldn't grim just be called Morbid? Deathreap Ritual
Although I suppose it works better if you want to care about a lot of creatures dying instead of one per turn. But if so, maybe change the name to avoid confusion.

[spacemonaut]

Personally I think the name is different enough it avoids confusion already.

That said, Morbid and Revolt (Fatal Push) have an advantage Grim lacks: they can care about tokens.

[Venedrex]

Personally I think the name is different enough it avoids confusion already.

That said, Morbid and Revolt (Fatal Push) have an advantage Grim lacks: they can care about tokens.

True. On the plus side, not caring about tokens might help with balance, since Grim isn't restricted to once per turn. 😀

[barbecube]

I agree with spacemonaut's evaluations in pretty much every way, so I'm just going to talk through how I might build up from that foundation. I can't balance all those constraints in my head at once so I'm going to go about it with a slightly different approach.

We have, as a starting point (I'm about to start using FRF khan names as faction shorthand), grim (or morbid or revolt) in GB Tasigur and battlecry in WB Daghatar. That is a tidy synergy for that also suggests a secondary theme: disposable token creatures with low durability to maximize pressure from battlecry and opportunities to trigger (a token-friendly version of) grim.

So let's follow that around the color wheel — the next color pair we'll discuss is Alesha, which needs to pivot around W's subtheme with battlecry on the other side. Since we have disposable tokens in B, let's steer away from that. I'm going to suggest that we make our W theme "spells that scale on your attacking creatures" so you're paid off for maximizing battlecry, but you need to do spells to get the payoff. Maybe for sorceries we can do tapped-creature scaling.

So that gives us two ways to go wide. Let's make Alesha also a spell mechanic, but steer away from anything that explicitly says "turn sideways." I propose:
Cremate (As an additional cost to cast this spell, you may exile a creature card from your graveyard.)
...with the usual kicker-style payoffs, but also maybe we have some design space for 'whenever you cremate a [characteristics] creature card...' to highlight other avenues for players to explore (and incidentally leads the way for some Lorehold enabling.) This is a fairly narrow kickerlike, since the fixed cost means the range of effects isn't big, but I think that's fine for a faction mechanic and gives it thematic cohesion. Again we're relying on the relative fragility of creatures in battlecry-amplified attacks to generate value, either by delivering damage or by dying and making firewood for cremate.

So we've got a cool thematic symmetry here about Tasigur being excited when people beef it and Alesha finding ways for the dead to help the living and I find that charming.

Let's keep working through in that direction, which brings us to the UR color pair and the Shu Yun clan. As a reminder, cremate is the known neighboring mechanic, and we haven't pinned down a monocolor theme for red yet. I feel like I'm trying to put a saddle back on a dead horse here, but I do love prowess for this slot and its synthesis of "ferocity and wisdom." If we want to shelve that, though, I have a second proposal: let's build around cards entering your hand. I don't have a name for this one yet, or a specific implementation, but let's just say "there is a payoff for a card besides the one you draw on your draw step entering your hand" and leave it at that.

This does nonbo very sadly with impulsive draw, so red's card advantage in this environment might have to be rummage based, which conveniently has a positive synergy with cremate. Maybe we give rummage a fairly large presence and that's R's thing.

So that leaves us with the Yasova clan mechanic and pinned in between "ferocity and wisdom" to its neighbor and grim on its side. That means we've said a lot about 'cards moving to different places' in GU already; let's not be too obsessive about spells for Yasova. Maybe heroic is actually good in this slot? We can try to include cantrips that target creatures to link up with f&w, and if we use a grim/morbid/whatever variant that is an on/off switch, protecting our creatures today can mean opportunities to bump them off to trigger that mechanic tomorrow, so that all seems nice to me.

I don't know what that says about holistically so I leave that as an exercise for the next poster. Maybe something about "do ETB value a lot so you can get value off flicker type %$#% and don't feel as bad when your dude pops."

[Ulka]

I will take a chance later today to reply to each of you but I'm very happy to see this much feedback and honestly this much interest in my project. I'd be very open to making this a group project of people were interested.

[spacemonaut]

So compiling what @barbecube said:
WB Daghatar — Battle Cry
BG Tasigur — Grim/Morbid/Revolt, but specifically whatever it is, it also cares about tokens
GU Yasova — Heroic/Heroic+
UR Shu Yun — Cards entering your hand matters. I'm calling this Insight. This features lots of rummage (red) instead of impulsive draw. It follows that the blue side might also do lots of looting.
RW Alesha — Cremate (as an aditional cost, exile a creature card from your graveyard) as an optional kicker, possibly also featuring cards that care about what you cremate.

Mono color themes:
: Battle cry, creatures die, we cremate them when it's permanents.
: Cards enter your hand and you cast them on your stuff.
: Be aggressive and attack with creatures and let them die to fuel Tasigur's triggers.
: Cycle through lots of cards and fill your graveyard with creatures to cremate.
: This might be beef up your guys then let them pop, which means heroic triggers that include token creation and grim triggers that care about power.

Reassembled clan themes:
Abzan WBG: Battle Cry (Daghatar) & Grim/Morbid/Revolt (Tasigur)
Jeskai URW: Insight (Shu Yun) & Cremate (Alesha)
Sultai BGU: Grim/Morbid/Revolt (Tasigur) & Heroic/Heroic+ (Yasova)
Mardu RWB: Cremate (Alesha) & Battle Cry (Daghatar)
Temur GUR: Heroic/Heroic+ (Yasova) & Insight (Shu Yun)

I will take a chance later today to reply to each of you but I'm very happy to see this much feedback and honestly this much interest in my project. I'd be very open to making this a group project of people were interested.

I think you're going to need to lead the charge. Group projects create hesitancy & the bystander "this isn't my responsibility" effect, and we saw the effect that had on The Shattered Realms. We'll all be here watching excitedly to give you feedback on whatever direction you go in.

[void_nothing]

UR Shu Yun — Cards entering your hand matters. I'm calling this Insight. This features lots of rummage (red) instead of impulsive draw. It follows that the blue side might also do lots of looting.

As in "whenever a card is put into your hand from anywhere"? Iiiinteresting.

[void_nothing]

Might be helpful for conceptual purposes to go through why the Dragonlords were against a particular color. For some of the clans it was spelled out, and for others, uh, it's pretty vague.

WBG Abzan --> GW Dromoka: Dromoka has a principled hate for necromancy. Why on a deeper level is unclear, maybe just because she's a being born of pure green and white mana in a sense.
URW Jeskai --> WU Ojutai: Ojutai had all the ghostfire adepts killed, but I can't recall him specifically persecuting the bloodfire ones. It does kind of follow that he would, though, because that's not part of his teachings, which he wants to impose as the only truth.
BGU Sultai --> UB Silumgar: No idea on this one. The Sultai always seemed to kind of only use green mechanically, and less so for flavor.
RWB Mardu --> BR Kolaghan: Kolaghan wanted the Mardu to get rid of their code of honor, as she believes it got in the way of both the thrill of battle and of her "anything to win" policy.
GUR Temur --> RG Atarka: This one is also not that clear. Maybe it's just that Atarka herself is purely instinctual and has no concept of higher thought? Or that she hated and feared the Whisperers?

[Ulka]

Oh boy its finally time for me to respond and I've been itching to reply all weekend but between class and wedding planning, this weekend was too full. But now it is my coffee break time at work and I've hyped.

Tack on the following text to the ability as Sporegorger suggests: "triggers only once per turn" clause. I think this is workable all be it more meh.

Hey, wait, keep the ability trigger, you can open up the possibility for a chain reaction!

Trigger one Mysticism, have that ability target another mysticism permanent you control, and so on. The "once per turn clause" should prevent it from being too broken.

I think I will keep the ability especially after looking at some of the cards I had designed for the mechanic. I do think the once per turn actually makes it more balanced and realistically more fun with possible chaining results.

The critique so far has been pretty poignant. If I may, I want us to propose some additional lenses we might examine as we consider options for what the clan mechanics might look like.

Preamble: Our color options

Let's look again at the enemy colors available: every one has two pairs to choose from, with different implications for the fate of the clan. We have to choose Column A or Column B. Both are valid and solid choices. I raise this only to highlight our options again. This proposal took Column A, but in the course of examining stuff we might discover Column B works even better, but I'm not about to advocate for it unless it comes up as a very good idea.

Abzan WBG can become WB or BG
Jeskai URW can become UR or RW
Sultai BGU can become BG or GU
Mardu RWB can become RW or WB
Temur GUR can become GU or UR

Column A keeps the focus color of the clan but picks a different secondary color to what we got.

Column B drops the focus color, changing the clan's narrative dramatically.

The Lenses

The Clan pair lens: An additional layer to examine, whichever column you chose, is that the color pair should work backwards with both clans of that color. In Khans of Tarkir (the set), players were prompted in various ways to build enemy-color decks: an enemy WB deck would benefit from both the Mardu and Abzan card pool, but an ally RB deck would benefit only from the Mardu card pool. In this universe, we could look at it like KTK comes out, then Chaos of Tarkir comes out, and we still keep building our enemy decks but now have new tools to play with. (I don't know if Chaos of Tarkir is a years-later revisit or a drop-in replacement for FRF, but either way this might be a useful lens.)

The Clan trio lens: If this is a FRF drop-in, then the clan mechanics should maybe also pass this measure: if I build a Mardu deck, I should be able to use the WB mechanic and the RW mechanic as drop-ins and they'll work well with what I've got. If I build an Abzan deck, I should be able to use the WB mechanic and the BG mechanic as drop-ins. Etc.

The Synergy lens: A really important test that @void_nothing brings up and that we hear about in Ravnica design etc: any one mono color should be able to combine both mechanics in its pair, and any two clans (sharing one color) should be able to be combined without a clash.

Bringing the lenses together means we wind up with these tests that each mechanic must pass.

WB must connect with Abzan and Mardu, narratively and mechanically. It must be compatible with the BG and RW mechanics.
UR must connect with Jeskai and Temur, and must be compatible with RW and GU mechanics.
BG must connect with Sultai and Abzan, and must be compatible with GU and WB mechanics.
RW must connect with Mardu and Jeskai, and must be compatible with WB and UR mechanics.
GU must connect with Temur and Sultai, and must be compatible with UR and BG mechanics.

All these rules narrow down our options a lot. This is good: restrictions breed creativity and it ensures we have narrative and mechanical cohesion.

Mechanical Review

Now, let's look back at the mechanical list to review things. I don't have solutions for everything, but some things stand out from applying all these lenses to it.

WB — ❌ Exalted does not sound like Mardu, and only sort of like Abzan, and like @void_nothing said, white shouldn't be both Battle Cry and Exalted since they're mutually incompatible. I would instead put 🔀 Battle Cry here (yes, really) to represent the massive companies either clan might attack in. Battle Cry's team +1/+0 buff combines with both colors having archetypes of token spam (warriors and zombies respectively), and the lack of toughness boost works well with Grim—you want some of your nontoken stuff to die, and if your opponent is blocking your nontoken stuff they're not blocking your tokens.
UR — ❓ Building around Scry seems weak mechanically and in terms of identity. Whatever this color pair uses must connect to the ideas of ferocity and wisdom we see embodied in Jeskai and Temur, and I'm not sure Scry meets that bar—it's entirely blue and not red. You reference Surveil, but Surveil was blue in card advantage and black in self-mill. Blue and Red are basically on the opposite ends of the spectrum of who gets scry and how much, so this is kind of a bad combination. Scrying has some synergy with Sultai though, which was about self-mill, so you now get to pick what you mill.
BG — ✅ Grim fits exceptionally well. Abzan would honor their fallen ancestor, commit them to the kin-tree, and let the loss strengthen them as a clan. Sultai would see an opportunity, possibly one they created by killing that guy. It works with Sultai's delve and compensates Abzan for their losses.
RW — ❓ If we move battle cry up, this needs something else that matches both Mardu and Jeskai, and that is about ferocity and togetherness. This opening means we have the opportunity to give RW a mechanic that isn't a "turn creatures sideways" mechanic for once, and I'd challenge that this is something to aspire to. If we keep Battel Cry here though, it does have compatibility with Mardu (which wants to attack with all it's got) and Jeskai (which has prowess anyway).
GU — ❓ Mysticism fits green better than it fits blue, since when blue is targeting a permanent it's more often to bounce it, nerf it, or steal it than it is to buff it. It gets a couple of evasive tricks each set, and blue got Triton Tactics|THS that one time, but that's kind of all I can think of. 🔀 Exalted could move here—GU has no overlap with WB—although it's just one of the options. It might clash with BG's grim, or it might work for it—you nominate an attacker, your opponent will probably try to kill it, it dies, all your Grim triggers happen, or all your Grim triggers act like a rattlesnake forcing them to not kill your Exalted attacker.

Tarkir lives rent-free in my head so I'll be thinking about this list further and might have one or two suggestions.

Holy heck. You've given me a lot to think about. I think the biggest thing I need to think about is this a replacement to DTK or as an Add on or supplemental set. Additionally thank you for helping me consider which lens to look at each of these tribes in. I do think that keeping it in Column A feels the best given my view that its just a different dragon lord taking the tribe forward instead rather than overhauling each tribe but that said I do love the idea of what if we dropped the focus color.

I think that you make good arguments for shifting the mechanics around a bit. I think that Battlecry could make for a very nice WB mechanic especially given the Warrior token subtheme that came prior for WB. I think I might need to explore my scrying in UR a bit before I nix it completely as its one that has sat in my head for so long but I can see where you are coming from. That said I very much am planning on keeping Mysticisim in UG as this and grim were my first two mechanics of the project and they are what really have pushed forward this project for me.

Grim I feel like everyone has agreed is a decent fit for Sultai so that leaves Mysticism to more explain why I like it. My big thing with Mysticism is that it removed the necessary aggression of the Temur clan/Atarka brood and leaves them in the shamanistic hands. This means they are going to be more spell focused rather than beat face which is where the idea of the pump spells/ aura/ abilities become the key focus to winning came from. While it may not be the most shoehorned into UG of a mechanic I personally feel most UG mechanics have fallen short in the past of being part of both colors.

But again I really do appreciate the feedback because it forces me to consider this project from other angles and Really has helped me adjust or clarify what I'm seeing.

Whatever this color pair uses must connect to the ideas of ferocity and wisdom we see embodied in Jeskai and Temur, and I'm not sure Scry meets that bar—it's entirely blue and not red. You reference Surveil, but Surveil was blue in card advantage and black in self-mill. Blue and Red are basically on the opposite ends of the spectrum of who gets scry and how much, so this is a bad combination.

I think he means to give a unique scry identity, like scry a random number, or scry off damage dealt. Plus I can see scry itself focused heavily in , while has something more open-ended (like maybe "whenever you put one or more cards on the bottom of your library"), a bit of Grenzo influence.

Mysticism fits green better than it fits blue, since when blue is targeting a permanent it's more often to bounce it, nerf it, or steal it than it is to buff it.

Well, u can grant hexproof, flying, or unblockable, or more importantly self-bounce. Nothing better than rescuing your creature while triggering its mysticism trigger. Plus there are always Auras, both colors have plenty of useful Auras.

But I think the best u effect would be untapping; plenty of untap target permanent effects.

So with UR on scry, It was a lot of effects like whenever you scry a card to the bottom of your library deal 1 damage to any target. whenever you scry, exiel the top card of your library. you may cast it until the beginning of your next turn ect. it was basically scrying matters effects but I will post some of those tonight when I create the set thread for cards as i don't want individual cards coming up here in general thematic talks.

Sporegorger has the right mechanical effect that blue was to have in the set with mysticism. Stuff like a flying cantrip, Call to Heel, hexproof all were things I was expecting to place in the set.

Re mysticism: True, and as of the very recent color pie blue can now work with vigilance. I could see a flash aura that untaps something and grants it vigilance.

Yep vigilance is one I've been considering in the cards of blue when designing.

Wouldn't grim just be called Morbid? Deathreap Ritual
Although I suppose it works better if you want to care about a lot of creatures dying instead of one per turn. But if so, maybe change the name to avoid confusion.

The big reason I'm going Grim not morbid or revolt is that I want it to be a nontoken creature you control. this limits how frequently it can be triggered, how many unintentional combos become a result of the set, and further explores what mechanics can take place in death.

Personally I think the name is different enough it avoids confusion already.

That said, Morbid and Revolt (Fatal Push) have an advantage Grim lacks: they can care about tokens.

Correct.

Personally I think the name is different enough it avoids confusion already.

That said, Morbid and Revolt (Fatal Push) have an advantage Grim lacks: they can care about tokens.

True. On the plus side, not caring about tokens might help with balance, since Grim isn't restricted to once per turn. 😀

Also correct!

I agree with spacemonaut's evaluations in pretty much every way, so I'm just going to talk through how I might build up from that foundation. I can't balance all those constraints in my head at once so I'm going to go about it with a slightly different approach.

We have, as a starting point (I'm about to start using FRF khan names as faction shorthand), grim (or morbid or revolt) in GB Tasigur and battlecry in WB Daghatar. That is a tidy synergy for that also suggests a secondary theme: disposable token creatures with low durability to maximize pressure from battlecry and opportunities to trigger (a token-friendly version of) grim.

So let's follow that around the color wheel — the next color pair we'll discuss is Alesha, which needs to pivot around W's subtheme with battlecry on the other side. Since we have disposable tokens in B, let's steer away from that. I'm going to suggest that we make our W theme "spells that scale on your attacking creatures" so you're paid off for maximizing battlecry, but you need to do spells to get the payoff. Maybe for sorceries we can do tapped-creature scaling.

So that gives us two ways to go wide. Let's make Alesha also a spell mechanic, but steer away from anything that explicitly says "turn sideways." I propose:
Cremate (As an additional cost to cast this spell, you may exile a creature card from your graveyard.)
...with the usual kicker-style payoffs, but also maybe we have some design space for 'whenever you cremate a [characteristics] creature card...' to highlight other avenues for players to explore (and incidentally leads the way for some Lorehold enabling.) This is a fairly narrow kickerlike, since the fixed cost means the range of effects isn't big, but I think that's fine for a faction mechanic and gives it thematic cohesion. Again we're relying on the relative fragility of creatures in battlecry-amplified attacks to generate value, either by delivering damage or by dying and making firewood for cremate.

So we've got a cool thematic symmetry here about Tasigur being excited when people beef it and Alesha finding ways for the dead to help the living and I find that charming.

Let's keep working through in that direction, which brings us to the UR color pair and the Shu Yun clan. As a reminder, cremate is the known neighboring mechanic, and we haven't pinned down a monocolor theme for red yet. I feel like I'm trying to put a saddle back on a dead horse here, but I do love prowess for this slot and its synthesis of "ferocity and wisdom." If we want to shelve that, though, I have a second proposal: let's build around cards entering your hand. I don't have a name for this one yet, or a specific implementation, but let's just say "there is a payoff for a card besides the one you draw on your draw step entering your hand" and leave it at that.

This does nonbo very sadly with impulsive draw, so red's card advantage in this environment might have to be rummage based, which conveniently has a positive synergy with cremate. Maybe we give rummage a fairly large presence and that's R's thing.

So that leaves us with the Yasova clan mechanic and pinned in between "ferocity and wisdom" to its neighbor and grim on its side. That means we've said a lot about 'cards moving to different places' in GU already; let's not be too obsessive about spells for Yasova. Maybe heroic is actually good in this slot? We can try to include cantrips that target creatures to link up with f&w, and if we use a grim/morbid/whatever variant that is an on/off switch, protecting our creatures today can mean opportunities to bump them off to trigger that mechanic tomorrow, so that all seems nice to me.

I don't know what that says about holistically so I leave that as an exercise for the next poster. Maybe something about "do ETB value a lot so you can get value off flicker type %$#% and don't feel as bad when your dude pops."

Thank you for your feedback also! I like the expansion on Space's thoughts. I am coming around to BW becoming battlecry over RW. That said I do like the possibility of shifting to cremate in WR but most of all I liked your expansion on what each mono-color should contain as an identity which has had me reworking and adjusting things see were everything I have so far falls and where I can go forward from here.

So compiling what @barbecube said:
WB Daghatar — Battle Cry
BG Tasigur — Grim/Morbid/Revolt, but specifically whatever it is, it also cares about tokens
GU Yasova — Heroic/Heroic+
UR Shu Yun — Cards entering your hand matters. I'm calling this Insight. This features lots of rummage (red) instead of impulsive draw. It follows that the blue side might also do lots of looting.
RW Alesha — Cremate (as an aditional cost, exile a creature card from your graveyard) as an optional kicker, possibly also featuring cards that care about what you cremate.

Mono color themes:
: Battle cry, creatures die, we cremate them when it's permanents.
: Cards enter your hand and you cast them on your stuff.
: Be aggressive and attack with creatures and let them die to fuel Tasigur's triggers.
: Cycle through lots of cards and fill your graveyard with creatures to cremate.
: This might be beef up your guys then let them pop, which means heroic triggers that include token creation and grim triggers that care about power.

Reassembled clan themes:
Abzan WBG: Battle Cry (Daghatar) & Grim/Morbid/Revolt (Tasigur)
Jeskai URW: Insight (Shu Yun) & Cremate (Alesha)
Sultai BGU: Grim/Morbid/Revolt (Tasigur) & Heroic/Heroic+ (Yasova)
Mardu RWB: Cremate (Alesha) & Battle Cry (Daghatar)
Temur GUR: Heroic/Heroic+ (Yasova) & Insight (Shu Yun)

I will take a chance later today to reply to each of you but I'm very happy to see this much feedback and honestly this much interest in my project. I'd be very open to making this a group project of people were interested.

I think you're going to need to lead the charge. Group projects create hesitancy & the bystander "this isn't my responsibility" effect, and we saw the effect that had on The Shattered Realms. We'll all be here watching excitedly to give you feedback on whatever direction you go in.

Sounds good and thanks for compiling.

Might be helpful for conceptual purposes to go through why the Dragonlords were against a particular color. For some of the clans it was spelled out, and for others, uh, it's pretty vague.

WBG Abzan --> GW Dromoka: Dromoka has a principled hate for necromancy. Why on a deeper level is unclear, maybe just because she's a being born of pure green and white mana in a sense.
URW Jeskai --> WU Ojutai: Ojutai had all the ghostfire adepts killed, but I can't recall him specifically persecuting the bloodfire ones. It does kind of follow that he would, though, because that's not part of his teachings, which he wants to impose as the only truth.
BGU Sultai --> UB Silumgar: No idea on this one. The Sultai always seemed to kind of only use green mechanically, and less so for flavor.
RWB Mardu --> BR Kolaghan: Kolaghan wanted the Mardu to get rid of their code of honor, as she believes it got in the way of both the thrill of battle and of her "anything to win" policy.
GUR Temur --> RG Atarka: This one is also not that clear. Maybe it's just that Atarka herself is purely instinctual and has no concept of higher thought? Or that she hated and feared the Whisperers?

This was very helpful.

Jeskai's UR thematically the dragon could be making your own truth.
WR's dragon very much I feel like would be "there must be honor in what we do" and then could stay combat focused or I need to look at where I can adjust the thrill aspect away from the clan.
For atarka, I always thought she got rid of blue due to the predatory instinct was the greatest thing to them going forward. Instead my UG tried to get rid of the needless violence.

the other two are where I need to look story wise how to correct the new dragon lord's desires and hates.

[spacemonaut]

Aban's green was all a connection to the kin trees, the cycle of life, and honouring their ancestors and the path laid before them. Perhaps their dragon burned the kin trees, and replaced honouring the cycle of life and ancestors with exploitation of them—she saw all those bodies and souls tied to the trees and decided it was time to harvest.

[void_nothing]

Aban's green was all a connection to the kin trees, the cycle of life, and honouring their ancestors and the path laid before them. Perhaps their dragon burned the kin trees, and replaced honouring the cycle of life and ancestors with exploitation of them—she saw all those bodies and souls tied to the trees and decided it was time to harvest.

That's a WB motivation alright. The Obzedat would nod their approval unanimously at this undertaking.

It would be cool if there was also some (maybe misguided, maybe genuine) altruism there: giving the things taken by the dead, who have no needs, back to the living.

[Sporegorger_Dragon]

the other two are where I need to look story wise how to correct the new dragon lord's desires and hates.

Well, for the dragon, it could be a warped version of Dromoka, in that the clan cares only about the well-being of its own members, similar to the xenophobia of the Kithkin in Shadowmoor. Members altruistic and willing to sacrifice themselves, but only for the benefit of the clan. Outsiders are considered non-persons as far as they are concerned. The dragon itself might have like a cult-leader personality, where it enjoys the adulation and devotion of its followers.

For the bg dragon, we can look at what the exclusion of u does. For the Sultai and Silumgar, death and the undead are a means to an end; tools to exploited (hah!) for personal gain and power.

For the bg dragon, what if death is not a means to an end, but the goal itself? A fatalistic dragon that thinks everything's better off dead (with the possible exception of itself); or maybe it sincerely believes that undeath is a higher, superior form of existence. Death and/or undeath is a state one aspires to achieve, or ascension through undeath. A whole bunch of nature liches. Lots of monks that practice self-embalming (look it up).

[Venedrex]

the other two are where I need to look story wise how to correct the new dragon lord's desires and hates.

Well, for the dragon, it could be a warped version of Dromoka, in that the clan cares only about the well-being of its own members, similar to the xenophobia of the Kithkin in Shadowmoor. Members altruistic and willing to sacrifice themselves, but only for the benefit of the clan. Outsiders are considered non-persons as far as they are concerned. The dragon itself might have like a cult-leader personality, where it enjoys the adulation and devotion of its followers.

For the bg dragon, we can look at what the exclusion of u does. For the Sultai and Silumgar, death and the undead are a means to an end; tools to exploited (hah!) for personal gain and power.

For the bg dragon, what if death is not a means to an end, but the goal itself? A fatalistic dragon that thinks everything's better off dead (with the possible exception of itself); or maybe it sincerely believes that undeath is a higher, superior form of existence. Death and/or undeath is a state one aspires to achieve, or ascension through undeath. A whole bunch of nature liches. Lots of monks that practice self-embalming (look it up).

Good point. isn't normally thought of as particularly moral, but it has lines it doesn't want to cross. You take blue out of and you end up with a firm belief in destiny rather than making your own way, and an unchecked desire for power. Which as you say, seems to translate pretty well to a zombie/lich natural horde of undead that doesn't believe in restraint.

I guess it could be summed up as, wants power for itself, wants power for everyone, whether everyone wants that power or not, as you mentioned.

[Ulka]

Okay So I've given the lore a bit of thought during a staff meeting and my drive home.

Abzan is taken over by Dragonlord Igsena who is Xenophobic and is very much all for those of the clan but nothing to those outliers.

Jeskai is taken over by Dragonlord Khashgira who's ideals are to create your own truth. He pushes changing destiny and Sarkhan join him when he returns from his trip to the past.

Sultai is taken over by Dragonlord Ukhel who is obsessed with perfection in death. They ruthlessly pursue the perfect unlife and focus on necromancy.

Mardu is taken over by Dragonlord Dainkri who is still a fighter at heart. However she pushes that the best warriors fight with Honor and fight for their kin. I am still needing to find a mechanic to work around this or adjust the lore here to fit a mechanic but I did have the stupid idea of making her a lover of horses and making horsemanship the mechanic here especially to show homage to the Mongol's that inspired the Mardu.

Finally we find the Temur clan who are now lead by the Dragonlord Oorcho. A true hermit and shaman, She find that unlocking magic and your own inner abilities are the way to find greatness.

[spacemonaut]

Hot take suggestion: Dragonlord Ukhel emerged from the dragonstorm dead already and sees the condition of living as something that comes with tons of problems she can fix.

[Ulka]

Hot take suggestion: Dragonlord Ukhel emerged from the dragonstorm dead already and sees the condition of living as something that comes with tons of problems she can fix.

I love this take

[void_nothing]

And just when all the factions have been figured out nicely and it's no longer relevant, I figured out why Silumgar isn't green: The Sultai have an ethic of reciprocity. They believe in mutual back-scratching until someone becomes an obstacle or turns on them. The rakshasas are what you might call "pact demons" as well. All in all, there's some balance to it, and a back-and-forth order.

Silumgar skips to the betrayal.