CCL April, Top 5/Round 4: Bring In the Specialists

[void_nothing]

CCL April Top 5/Round 4

"Bring In the Specialists"


Twinshot Sniper, taken from Art of MtG, by Brent Hollowell 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 Blocking Month here at the CCL. The less-appreciated half of combat - let's let it shine.

Challenge

Design two creature cards that are one or more colors: a nongreen creature with reach and a nonwhite creature with vigilance.

Clarifications

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• Make sure to include a rarity.

Contestants:
@slimytrout
@Henlock
@RaikouRider
@MonoRedMage
@barbecube

Your submissions are due Wednesday, May 18th, 23:59 EST.

Schedule

• Round 1 — Open to Everyone (March 31st-April 8th)
• Round 2 — Open to Everyone (April 12th-18th)
• Rounds 1 and 2 Critiques (Due April 20th)
• Top 6 — Open to top 8 finishers (April 25th–28th)
• Top 6 Critiques (Due April 30th)
• Top 4 — Open to top 4 finishers (May 15th-18th)
• Top 4 Critiques (Due May 20th)
• Final (May, 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.

[void_nothing]

Bump for entries: If tonight is not feasible, I'd like to ask everyone get their cards in by 23:59 Eastern on Thursday.

[barbecube]

Card Images

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Text Versions

A nonwhite creature with vigilance
Asio Skybender 2U
Creature — Owl Wizard (U)
Flying, vigilance
Whenever Asio Skybender blocks, put a +1/+1 counter on it.
2/2

A nongreen creature with reach
Tal Terig Challenger 2RW
Creature — Kor Scout (R)
Reach
Acquire — Whenever a nontoken artifact enters the battlefield under your control, Tal Terig Challenger gains your choice of flying, lifelink, or haste until end of turn. Untap it.
3/2

[slimytrout]

Deathbow Devil 1BR
Creature - Devil Archer (R)
Reach
Whenever a creature dealt damage by Deathbow Devil this turn dies, put a +1/+1 counter on Deathbow Devil.
1BR, T: Deathbow Devil deals damage equal to its power to target creature.
2/3

Loria, Artful Deceiver 2UB
Legendary Creature - Faerie (M)
Flying, vigilance
2UB, T: Create a token that is a copy of target creature an opponent controls. If Loria, Artful Deceiver dealt damage to that creature's controller this turn, destroy that creature.
3/3

[RaikouRider]

Glissa's Crawler
Artifact Creature - Spider {U}
( can be paid with either B or 2 life.)
Reach, deathtouch
Infect (This creature deals damage to creatures in the form of -1/-1 counters and to players in the form of poison counters.)
1G, Sacrifice Glissa's Crawler: Destroy target artifact or enchantment.
1/3

Watchwurm 4GG
Creature - Wurm {U}
Vigilance, trample
Whenever Watchwurm becomes blocked by two or more creatures, tap it.
6/6

[void_nothing]

Checking in another time - @Henlock @MonoRedMage

[MonoRedMage]

Crazed Rockhurler 2RR
Creature - Ape {R}
Vigilance
Crazed Rockhurler attacks each combat if able.
T, Sacrifice a land: Crazed Rockhurler fights target creature.
At the beginning of your end step, if Crazed Rockhurler is untapped, it deals 2 damage to you.
4/3

Magneticloud Weird R
Creature - Weird {R}
Reach
Whenever Magneticloud Weird attacks, it deals 1 damage to target creature with flying defending player controls.
Whenever you cast an instant or sorcery spell, you may pay R. If you do, create a token that's a copy of Magneticloud Weird.
1/1

[Henlock]

Heated Guardian 1rr
Creature - Efreet Warrior (u)
Haste, vigilance
Heated Guardian attacks and blocks each turn if able.
4/1

Dark Widow bb
Creature - Spider (u)
When Dark Widow deals damage to a creature or planeswalker, exile that creature or planeswalker.
1/1

[void_nothing]

And that will end the round - please critique and provide a top 3 for all other contestants.

[void_nothing]

Bump - get these in please!

[slimytrout]

barbecube

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Skybender is mostly a Tempest Drake with minor upside, which is fun but not revolutionary. The Challenger is a cool idea but the reach feels like a bit of an afterthought, especially because a creature with both flying and reach is pretty odd.

RaikouRider

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Infect plus deathtouch is a bit of an odd combination that might confuse people -- otherwise I like Glissa's Crawler quite a bit. The Watchwurm is fine but I don't know how often you're going to want to double chump just to tap it down; I think it would be a more interesting decision if it only required one blocker to tap it.

MonoRedMage

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I admire your dedication to your name, but red just doesn't get vigilance -- this is a straight-up color pie break. The weird is very fun, I like it a lot.

Henlock

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Once again, red and vigilance just don't mix, even in this sort of way. Also, the widow is clearly supposed to have reach, but it's not on the card so it doesn't meet the challenge.

T3

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1. RaikouRider
2. barbecube
3. MonoRedMage

[RaikouRider]

barbecube>
Asio Skybender: This feels right at home in a Planar Chaos-style set, as vigilance does not exist in blue otherwise. This is probably first-pickable in Limited but a little too weak for Constructed. I'd play this in every blue draft deck though!
Tal Terig Challenger: Zendikar-flavored kor make the most sense to have reach. This should probably be uncommon or 3 MV, though; other than that, no complaints.

slimytrout>
Deathbow Devil: This is such good flavor for a Rakdos-colored archer. Probably too slow for Constructed formats, but this is a huge Limited bomb. This probably could be mono-red in a Planar Chaos-style set, as there were mono-red Spiders in that set.
Loria, Artful Deceiver: Repeatable copying is very strong, though appropriately costed for a 3-toughness, 4 MV card. This cannot exist outside of a Planar Chaos-style set, as vigilance in this color combination is a pie break.

MonoRedMage>
Crazed Rockhurler: This is justifiable use of vigilance in mono-red, but I still feel this is a significant pie bend. The package looks fun to mess around with, but this probably won't make too many waves in any format at its current mana value.
Magneticloud Weird: The flavor carries this design; without the Izzet context implied in the creature type, this is 100% a green card with a red activated triggered ability. This multiplies very quickly in any sort of spellslinger deck.

Henlock>
Heated Guardian: This is such a clean design and easily my favorite of the nonwhite vigilance creatures. This is going to trade with *something*. Very playable in aggressive Limited and even Constructed decks.
Dark Widow: This feels like it came straight out of War of the Spark. Perhaps one of Vraska's critters? Flavor text on both of these would have been nice. Does not meet the challenge though, as it does not have reach.


1) barbecube
2) slimytrout
3) MonoRedMage

[barbecube]

Feedback

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Deathbow Devil 1BR
Creature - Devil Archer (R)
Reach
Whenever a creature dealt damage by Deathbow Devil this turn dies, put a +1/+1 counter on Deathbow Devil.
1BR, T: Deathbow Devil deals damage equal to its power to target creature.
2/3

Loria, Artful Deceiver 2UB
Legendary Creature - Faerie (M)
Flying, vigilance
2UB, T: Create a token that is a copy of target creature an opponent controls. If Loria, Artful Deceiver dealt damage to that creature's controller this turn, destroy that creature.
3/3

Deathbow Devil is fine. 'Archers have reach sometimes' is kind of played out in my opinion, but it works. Maybe it's a bit self-solving since it can easily pick off a weenie every turn even if it blocked that turn, which is ... concerning.

The fairy is, I don't know, seems pretty strong for repeatable creature steal.

Glissa's Crawler
Artifact Creature - Spider {U}
( can be paid with either B or 2 life.)
Reach, deathtouch
Infect (This creature deals damage to creatures in the form of -1/-1 counters and to players in the form of poison counters.)
1G, Sacrifice Glissa's Crawler: Destroy target artifact or enchantment.
1/3

Watchwurm 4GG
Creature - Wurm {U}
Vigilance, trample
Whenever Watchwurm becomes blocked by two or more creatures, tap it.
6/6

Not a fan of the spider. Good on you for trying to make an uncommon but I think you overloaded it.

The wurm is fun. I like this design a lot.

Crazed Rockhurler 2RR
Creature - Ape {R}
Vigilance
Crazed Rockhurler attacks each combat if able.
T, Sacrifice a land: Crazed Rockhurler fights target creature.
At the beginning of your end step, if Crazed Rockhurler is untapped, it deals 2 damage to you.
4/3

Magneticloud Weird R
Creature - Weird {R}
Reach
Whenever Magneticloud Weird attacks, it deals 1 damage to target creature with flying defending player controls.
Whenever you cast an instant or sorcery spell, you may pay R. If you do, create a token that's a copy of Magneticloud Weird.
1/1

Maybe I'm just not a red player at heart but I'm having a really hard time imagining when I'd play Rockhurler, and at the same time I think this has vigilance just bc the challenge asked for it. Since it's not really offering youo a choice in the matter, it would feel less weird to do something like,

~ attacks each combat if able.
Whenever ~ attacks, sacrifice a land. If you do, ~ fights target creature. If you don't, ~ deals 2 damage to you.

I'm not sold on this weird.

Heated Guardian 1rr
Creature - Efreet Warrior (u)
Haste, vigilance
Heated Guardian attacks and blocks each turn if able.
4/1

Dark Widow bb
Creature - Spider (u)
When Dark Widow deals damage to a creature or planeswalker, exile that creature or planeswalker.
1/1

This efreet is what I was waiting for this whole challenge.

The spider I assume was meant to have reach, but it's not actually written on the card, so I'm going to have to take off points for that.

Top 3

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1. Slimytrout
2. Henlock
3. RaikouRider

Asio Skybender: This feels right at home in a Planar Chaos-style set, as vigilance does not exist in blue otherwise

As of the 21021 Mechanical Color Pie article, blue has secondary vigilance. Also see this blogatog post. Some further digging indicates that we'll see blue vigilance in print in the near future: one of the previewed CLB legendaries.

[Henlock]

In progress

barbecube-
Skybender :This is ok, only thing is that vigilance is not used in a "blue way". This could be easily white or Selesnya.
Challenger: Fit for boros. Reach on a creature that can untap looks nice.

slimytrout
Devil: I like that the counter ability also works nice on defense against awide attacks. Probably a bit underwhelming as a rare.
Deceiver: I think fñying works a bit against this card. Repeatablr tokens is very powerful but the mana investment is steep here.

RaikouRaider
Spider - Quite similar to my idea (That I foegot to write the reach part in XD) A black spider is definitely a good coice for this challenge.
Wurm - Considering Colossal Dreadmaw, upping the rarity for vigilance + a small drawback is fine but certainly not very exciting.

Monoredmage-
Weird : Cheap, but the fact that it copies itself can be quite dangerous, as two copies would make 4 and 4 copies will make 8. I geel that this is quite fun as an antifliers tech.

[Henlock]

Cab't edit for some reason...

Monoredmage- The Ape looks a bit unwieldy. The floor.is a 4/3 that d3als 2 magae to you and at its best is an attacker that can pick on the small. I like the idea of using vigilance as a drawback here.


Top

1. Barbecube
2. slimytrout
3. RaikouRaider

[MonoRedMage]

Top 3 -
1 - slimytrout
2 - RaikouRider
3 - barbecube

[void_nothing]

And your finalists are slimytrout and barbecube! Final round thread to come hopefully tomorrow.