September MCC Round 4 (finals) - In loving memory of Ajani Goldmane

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bravelion83
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Post by bravelion83 » 1 year ago

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September MCC Round 4

In loving memory of Ajani Goldmane



As is tradition by now, this month we will celebrate the latest set, in this case Dominaria United, by exploring its mechanics and themes, as usual in this kind of MCC months.

This round I will tell you all a story. Or better, I know someone who wants to tell you a story. You all might have already met him before. If you haven't yet and you want to know more about him, or if you want to refresh your memory about him, you can check out his name in my signature. If you go to the "my projects" spoiler there, you will find a link at the very end of that Blogger post that will bring you to the other times you might remember him from. Several years have passed, but he's still alive and kicking.

Just a story
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Somehow, I found myself in a place I had never been before. I didn't know where I was, but that's not actually that unusual to me, being a planeswalker myself. I wasn't worried. It had already happened several times before in my life, nothing new to me. I had been on the run for quite a long time, being wanted on my home plane of Theros for killing my boss just to help a stranger, like if you trying to help other people were actually a good reason to chase you through the Multiverse and want to kill you in return. I had seen somebody needing my help and I helped them. Does it really matter whether I knew them or not? Whether they were a friend of mine or not? No, it doesn't. All that matters is that they were a living being and that they needed help. Yes, they were invoking the name of a human god, and we leonin theoretically don't believe in human gods, or at least somebody had decided ages ago that we weren't supposed to, but... you know what? It could have been me. What if I were the one needing help and you were the stranger who happened to pass by? Would you have helped me? Would I have helped myself? I took a deep dive into my own conscience and I had no doubt in answering yes to that question, so I did. My boss didn't want me to, insisting in his stubbornness to apply some old kind of outdated belief that might have been our tradition, and he was right about that. We should value our traditions. They are our past, they are the living testimonies we have of our ancestors and their ways, but there are things that come before them. And someone that could have been you being in deep need of help is one of them. So I faced my boss, and I ended up regretfully and unwillingly dealing him the fatal blow. Luckily, on our plane, death isn't the end. There is an Underworld. A god takes you there, another one is the ruler of that place, and another one makes sure that your destiny is fulfilled. See? How could I even mention gods I'm not supposed to believe in? Anyway, I hope he's well wherever he might be. I didn't actually want to kill him, and those gods know it.

Who am I? My name is Jeff Lionheart. You might have heard of me and my boss Okite before. I am a leonin, I am a planeswalker, Theros is my home, and that was the time when my own spark ignited. Of course, I didn't know anything about it back then. I just found myself in an unknown place, just like in the story I had started to tell you a few minutes ago, but it wasn't the same place. That time, in the end, I managed to make my way back home, and in my quest to understand whatever it was that had just happened to me, I met a fellow leonin planeswalker that we knew very well back in Oreskos while I was walking the streets of Meletis. His name is Ajani Goldmane, you might know him too. He understood me. He understood what had happened to me, because it also happened to him years before in his own life, and he explained it to me, strongly inviting me to try to make my own path rather than trying to be what I thought others wanted me to be. It's there and then that I understood my true nature: that of being a planeswalker. We didn't spend a lot of time together, but he was the one who shed light on who I really am and made me see it. I still consider him my mentor. He's been one of the most influential people in my own life. We haven't met again since then. I still have no idea of what might have happened to him after he left Theros. I hope he's getting all the love and good things he deserves in his life.

I've also left Theros behind me, even though I will always be nostalgic of my home. Of Oreskos. Of my family that is still there, and I can't go there anymore because if my own pridemates ever see me there again, I will be dead. And I don't want to die. Does anybody want to die? Not me. And neither did that stranger on my road. And neither wanted my boss, I'm sure about it. And yes, I do regret that, but I had to make a choice in that moment, between my boss and that stranger, and I chose the one most in need of my help. But I've already told that story. The one I was about to tell is another one, and I'm going to tell it to you right now.

As I was saying, I found myself in yet another unknown place. Everything around me was dark, like if covered by heavy shadows. I could barely see in very dim lights, but all I was able to see were shades of black and grey. No ordinary lights whatsoever. Somehow, I was standing on water, able to walk on it. Or at least, I thought it was water, but maybe it actually wasn't. To be able to walk on it, it must have been dense enough to carry my weight, and I know that I'm not exactly the smallest guy in town. Another hint that it might not have been actual water was that I couldn't see any image reflected in it, not even my own, or any ray of light traversing it for that matter. Yes, there weren't many lights in that place and time, certainly not enough to form a whole ray of light, but I thought that I should have been able to distinguish that liquid as transparent anyway. Instead, it looked more like some strange kind of dark oil unlike anything I had ever seen before. That oil was the substance of everything around me, the walls forming the huge room I was in, the sky that somehow I was able to see through the ceiling of that room, and even the very liquid ground I was walking on. It felt very strange. I didn't know what to think about it.

I tried to focus on the gesture of walking. The physical motion, like if I were just some being made of metallic gears, those of my legs spinning in unison to make them lift one foot, bring it forward, put it down on that strange floor, then lifting the other one, bringing that forward and then down, and then again with the first one, and so on, in an endless, flawless, perfect movement of synchronized cogs in a machine. I hated that feeling. I'm not a machine. I am a living being, I have my own identity, my own conscience, my own will, I would never want anybody to strip them away from me. It's who I am. I don't want to die, but I feel like if one is depriving you of them... Well, you might as well be just dead. Maybe it would be better. I'd never give those up. I'll never give up myself for no reason. At least not before finding my true home, a place where I feel welcomed and not wanted, you know, somewhere I belong.

Then I needed to shake that feeling out, so I focused on something else. I tried to look around me. The walls of the room weren't made of ordinary materials. It wasn't stone, or bricks, or clay, or anything like that. It looked like they were made of that same strange dark substance, in the form of very long filaments twisted around each other, like the single threads that make a rope. The surface of the walls looked like a huge drape made out of cloth woven with that rope. I tried to focus first on the cloth, then on the rope, then on the threads, trying to investigate its true nature like a chemist would do if they were to analyze it to find out its composition. What was its composition? What was it made of? Those were very good questions, but unfortunately with no evident answer, no matter how good your investigation skills are.

That feeling of uncertainty was also very unsettling, so I tried to shake it off as well, focusing on something else once more. This time I looked directly in front of me, and I saw something lightly colored that stood out against all the darkness around it. It was still a small dot in the distance, but maybe there was a light after all. With no better options available, I decided to run towards it, hoping that dark liquid floor could still resist with me not just walking on it, but running on it as fast as I could. It did. I ran so fast that I could feel my fur bending behind me, like if surrendering to the flow of a sudden breeze, that quickly became a windstorm.

As I ran towards that light spot in my field of vision, the only bright one there, I was able to distinguish more and more details. First, it looked like a white reef rock in a sea of darkness, still distant in front of me. Then I was able to see a humanoid figure standing still and motionless like if whoever that was, they were sleeping supine laying down with their back sustained by that liquid dark dense floor. Then I saw arms and legs, and they were furred. The contrast between that white fur and all the darkness around us was astonishing and definitely caught my attention. Then I saw a tail much like my own. Then I was able to make out the details of the hands and feet, and I saw claws. Ok, fur, tail, claws... I have all of those as well. That had to be a fellow leonin. Another person in need of help, and that I needed to help as soon as possible. They were probably dying, if not already dead. I kept on running straight, even faster, never changing direction until I was able to see something I... something I regret seeing.

A double axe. I knew that. I had seen it before. It was in that moment that I understood who he was. My own mentor. My friend. Ajani.

I suddenly froze. I instinctively looked at his left eye to check whether it was closed and scarred, as if doubting it was really him and looking for even the smallest details to prove me wrong, because I wanted to be wrong. But the more I looked around for clues, the more they were proving me right. Everything matched. Every feature I could remember of his face, body, and armor. Even the white cloak that I remembered him always bringing with himself, the one that he was showing to everyone in Meletis as a memento of his lost friend while telling them that Heliod, one of those same gods we Theran leonin were supposed to refuse, had killed her with the same weapon that the god himself had forged for her. Some believed Ajani's words, most didn't. In the end, he gave up and went away.

But now there he was himself in front of me. He was her friend, and I knew I was supposed to be his. I had to be to Ajani now what Ajani himself had been to his friend back then. I had to be there and help him just like he had strived to help her, like he always does with everybody he meets. That's one of the things I like so much about him, that it wasn't that he just helped me or her when I or she needed it the most, he just does that with everybody he meets. He's one you can always count on. He's the best friend you can ever hope to have. He's the shoulder you can always cry on, and that you know will always be there at least to listen to you, even if he might or might not be able to heal you or just do anything about whatever is causing you sorrow and sufferance. He doesn't want anybody to suffer. Neither do I.

But I had no idea of how exactly I could help him in that moment. I didn't even know where we were, on what world, or if that place even existed for real. Maybe we were in some alternate reality. Maybe he wasn't dead, and I wasn't the real me. But wait! Was he actually dead? He sure looked like that, but I thought to check his pulse just to be sure. A sudden wave of relief hit me as I felt the veins of his left wrist actually pulsing, though very, very faintly. I let go of his hand. Maybe there was still hope after all, even in that dark and hopeless place. I asked myself again in my thoughts what kind of place that was. Did it have a name? But most of all, how could I revive Ajani, whatever might have happened to him? Who did this? Who had been to almost kill my mentor? In that moment, an inner voice I had never heard before, one that sounded almost metallic, spoke a name to me.

Phyrexia.

What the hell is that? I still don't know what that name means up to this day. All I know is that it looked like some kind of hell indeed. Or was that the name of a person, maybe the name of whoever did all this and almost killed my mentor and dear friend? I didn't know in that moment, and I still don't know now. I'm also not sure how much I care about it. All I cared about in that moment was him. I thought of checking his pulse again. I took his left wrist back in my hand and waited.

And then I waited some more.

And more.

Wait.

Nothing.

Nothing? Like if that same inner voice had killed him exactly in the moment while it was whispering that unknown name to me? I had enough of this nonsense. That voice had killed Ajani? Well, then I had to kill it. I had to kill that unwanted voice in my mind. So I did. No, it's not easy to get rid of an unwanted thought, but I tried that with all my strength in that moment, still hoping in the deep of my heart that somehow that scene that I had in front of me wasn't real. I wouldn't want a place like that to ever be real.

I checked his pulse again. Nothing. Then again. Still nothing. And again, and again, countless times, but every time I felt nothing. "Nothingness" must have been the real name of that place. I didn't know what more I could do. I could only keep on checking. And waiting.

I don't know how long I waited or how many times I checked. I had to accept his loss, but I didn't want to. It wasn't a conscious choice. It was something someone, who knows who, had imposed to me against my will. And in that moment, somehow I could feel that whatever happened to Ajani had also occurred against his own will. Yet, that didn't help me. I let go of his hand again. His other hand, his right one, was holding his double axe on his chest. Still bent over him, I took a deep breath, then I tried to take it in my own right hand. Maybe I could have kept it as his memento just like he kept his friend's cloak. But his hand was refusing to give his axe to mine. It was in that moment that I finally took an actual look at his right arm, the one that was holding his axe.

It was... not right at all. It was unnatural. Twisted. Bent in an impossible way. Either his bones had been broken or some kind of unspeakable horror that I wanted nothing to do with had to be behind that. I really hoped it was just the former. I tried again to take his axe in my hand, but to no avail. It wasn't until I tried with both my hands at once that I was able to actually manage to do it.

With his double axe in my own hands, I took a last look at his still face. His eyes were both closed. Not just his left one, which would have been perfectly normal, but his right one too. Again, like if he were just sleeping. But by then I knew the truth. Suddenly, I saw a flash of red light coming out of both his closed eyes. I didn't know what was going on, but I felt like it wasn't a good omen. Then I took a look at his mouth. As his still closed eyes flashed red again, his upper lip lifted up to show his teeth underneath it. It wasn't a nice gesture. I knew that something was up, but I couldn't understand what exactly was happening. While holding his double axe in my left hand, I checked again his pulse with my right one. Still nothing. I let go of his hand and I chose to wait again. Maybe his eyes would have flashed again or his mouth would have moved again. Maybe he would have shown a random sign of life, despite how faint it could be.

So I waited. A lot. It felt like a whole lifetime, and nothing moved. I had to give up my hopes. I had to move on with my life. I came really close to vowing to take revenge for him. I would do to whoever did this the exact same thing that they did to him, whatever it was. I would have discovered exactly what it was first. That could become my mission, revenge. In that moment, "Jeff Vengeant" didn't sound bad as my own title. In that moment, I thought that I could turn my own life into a continuation of his own. With a sense of resolve that I had rarely felt before, I turned my back to his presumably dead body and slowly walked away holding his double axe against my own chest with both hands.

I had walked several steps away from him when I looked at his double axe and I stopped walking away. Something didn't feel right to me. This wasn't what he taught me. I thought back to what he told me in Meletis. He told me to make my own path, and that my own path shouldn't be that of others, whether it was my own ancestors, my boss, or that stranger I helped on a random Theran road back when my spark ignited. It should just be my own.

It was there and then that I realized that I was making the exact same mistake. My path wasn't supposed to be Ajani's one. It was supposed to be my own, even if I haven't discovered it fully yet. What I really had to do was to keep looking for my place in the Multiverse, a plane to call home, and a life to live. My own. Not somebody else's.

A thought crossed my mind.

"What I need is not his weapon, but his teachings."

I turned back and I went again towards Ajani's body. When I reached it again, I bent again over it, his eyes still closed but no longer flashing red, and I put back his double axe in his right hand, closing his fist around it and putting it back on his chest, just like I found it. Then I made the most natural gesture that came to me. I hugged him. I hugged my friend first, and only then my mentor, with all my heart. Not in hopes to heal him, but just as a show of friendship, mourning, and thankfulness for everything he did to me, now that he was no longer with us. Actually, I didn't even know if his death had been real, or natural, but I didn't care. All I cared about was him. Maybe he wasn't actually dead. For sure, he wasn't dead in my memories and he will never be. But if I couldn't even talk to him anymore, what use was for me to stay there? What use is for me to stay here? Is this really a game that I'm still supposed to play? Or is it just not a game for me anymore?

As I thought that, I took another last look at his eyes. They were still closed. As I did that, mine opened.

He might as well just be dead.
He has told you a story. I have just let him tell you a story. Now how about you tell us all one?


Main Challenge - Design a Saga enchantment card with read ahead.

Subchallenge 1 - Your card has four or more chapter abilities.

Subchallenge 2 - Your card has the word "planeswalker" in its rules text.


Clarifications
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Main Challenge
• The card must have the "enchantment" card type and the "Saga" subtype natively. Gaining them conditionally or granting them to itself and/or other things does NOT count.
• The card can have any additional supertypes, card types, and subtypes.
• The card has to have itself read ahead. Gaining it conditionally or granting it to itself and/or other things does NOT count.

Subchallenge 1
• It should be self-explanatory. I might have quoted the CR definition of "chapter ability" here, but I don't have neither the will or time now. Let me know if you need me to edit this post and put it in.
• Good luck making them all fit in the Saga frame with read ahead taking a good chuck of the text box column. That's actually the intended difficulty of this Subchallenge. MSE might help you check whether everything fits in the frame.

Subchallenge 2
• The name, type line, and flavor text (if you find a way to put it in the Saga frame) do NOT count. Only rules text counts.
• Any form or conjugation of the word "planeswalker" counts. For example, you can say "planeswalkers" (plural) or "planeswalker card".
• The word "planeswalk" as a verb does NOT count. It's neither the same spelling nor the same meaning. "Planeswalker" is one that's able to do the action to "planeswalk". The former is the actor, the latter is the action. Different things.


If you have any questions, post them in the MCC discussion thread.


DEADLINES

Design deadline: Friday, October 14th 23:59 EDT

Judging deadline: Monday, October 17th 23:59 EDT


RUBRIC
MCC Rubric
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Design
(X/3) Appeal - Do the different player psychographics (Timmy/Johhny/Spike) have a use for the card?
(X/3) Elegance - Is the card easily understandable at a glance? Do all the flavor and mechanics combined as a whole make sense?

Development
(X/3) Viability - How well does the card fit into the color wheel? Does it break or bend the rules of the game? Is it the appropriate rarity?
(X/3) Balance - Does the card have a power level appropriate for contemporary constructed/limited environments without breaking them? Does it play well in casual and multiplayer formats? Does it create or fit into a deck/archetype? Does it create an oppressive environment?

Creativity
(X/3) Uniqueness - Has a card like this ever been printed before? Does it use new mechanics, ideas, or design space? Does it combine old ideas in a new way? Overall, does it feel "fresh"?
(X/3) Flavor - Does the name seem realistic for a card? Does the flavor text sound professional? Do all the flavor elements synch together to please Vorthos players?

Polish
(X/3) Quality - Points deducted for incorrect spelling, grammar, and templating.
(X/2) Main Challenge (*) - Was the main challenge satisfied? Was it approached in a unique or interesting way? Does the card fit the intent of the challenge?
(X/2) Subchallenges - One point awarded per satisfied subchallenge condition.

Total: X/25
*An entry with 0 points here is subject to disqualification.

JUDGES

bravelion83
void_nothing


PLAYERS

@kwanyeegor-ii
@slimytrout


A reminder to everyone:
In the MCC, putting rarity on cards is mandatory! If you don't put a rarity on your card, expect huge deductions in both Viability AND Quality.
Please check out the MCC Guidelines and FAQ if you have the will and time. Link in my signature. Among the many things you can find there are a detailed explanation of the rubric (section 6.2) and the recommended card formatting (section 4) that you should use to format your text cards. Expect deductions in Quality otherwise.
Last edited by bravelion83 1 year ago, edited 4 times in total.
Author of the MCC Guidelines and FAQ. | For my projects, including Jeff Lionheart, my murder mystery story "One pierced heart, two mindful horns", and republished articles from my series "The Lion's Lair", see Leo's content index (Last updated on March 24th 2024 - Added OPHTMH Episode 4).
After I'm done republishing my articles I want to reprise the series focusing it more on editing, wording, and templating. Suggest potential future article topics here.
My CCCG Resume (Updated on February 27th 2024)
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Blue = MTGSalvation Green = MTGNexus
MCC - Winner (9): Oct 2014, Apr Nov 2017, Jan 2018, Apr Jun 2019, Jan Mar 2022, Apr 2023 || Host (30): Dec 2014, Apr Jul Aug Dec 2015, Mar Jul Aug Oct 2016, Feb Jul 2017, Jun Nov 2018, Feb Jul 2019 (last on MTGS), Aug 2019 (first on MTGN) Oct 2019, Jan Jun 2020 Apr Oct 2021, Feb May Sep Dec 2022, Mar Jun Sep Dec 2023, Mar 2024 || Judge (58): every month from Nov 2014 to Nov 2016 except Oct 2015, every month from Feb to Jul 2017 except Apr 2017, then Oct 2017, May Jun Nov 2018, Feb Jul 2019 (last on MTGS), every month from Aug 2019 (first on MTGN) to Feb 2020, May Jun 2020, Mar Apr Sep Oct 2021, Feb May Sep Dec 2022, Mar May Jun Sep Dec 2023, Jan Mar 2024
CCL - Winner (4): Jul 2016 (tied with Flatline), May 2017, Jul 2019 (last on MTGS), Jun 2021 (tied with slimytrout) || Host (5): Feb 2015, Mar Apr May Jun 2016
DCC - Winner (3): Mar 2015 (tied with Piar), Feb Apr 2022 || Host (12): May Oct 2015, Jan 2016, Jun Sep Dec 2021, Mar Jun Sep Dec 2022, Mar Jun 2023

slimytrout
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Post by slimytrout » 1 year ago

The False God's Devastation 1WBG
Enchantment — Saga (R)
Read ahead (Choose a chapter and start with that many lore counters. Add one after your draw step. Skipped chapters don't trigger. Sacrifice after V.)
I - Destroy target planeswalker.
II - Destroy target land.
III - Destroy up to one target enchantment.
IV - Destroy up to one target artifact.
V - Destroy up to one target creature.

kwanyeegor-ii
Posts: 1912
Joined: 4 years ago
Pronoun: Unlisted

Post by kwanyeegor-ii » 1 year ago

Commodore Guff Rewrites History 5W
Enchantment - Saga (Mythic)
Flash
Read ahead (Choose a chapter and start with that many lore counters. Add one after your draw step. Skipped chapters don't trigger. Sacrifice after iv.)
(i) Return any number of other historic permanents you own to your hand.
(ii) Each player draws three cards.
(iii) You may put a planeswalker card from your hand or graveyard onto the battlefield.
(iv) Your life total becomes equal to your starting life total.
畫龍點睛

I'm a simple Magic player since several years ago from China. Now I live in New Jersey.

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bravelion83
MKM MCC going on now
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Location: Florence, Italy

Post by bravelion83 » 1 year ago

The round is closed. My own judgments won't being until tomorrow night.



Judgments complete. I don't have the time to check for typos now, so I apologize if there are any here. I will take a look and fix them later, but now I wanted to just get these out asap.
slimytrout
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slimytrout wrote:
1 year ago
The False God's Devastation 1WBG
Enchantment — Saga (R)
Read ahead (Choose a chapter and start with that many lore counters. Add one after your draw step. Skipped chapters don't trigger. Sacrifice after V.)
I - Destroy target planeswalker.
II - Destroy target land.
III - Destroy up to one target enchantment.
IV - Destroy up to one target artifact.
V - Destroy up to one target creature.
Design
Appeal 2.5/3 - Timmy likes blowing things up, just not his own lands and planeswalkers. Johnny can manipulate the counters and/or destroy his own stuff for benefits. Spike likes the flexibility that read ahead gives to this card as she's not forced to wait, say, until the third turn if she wants to get rid of an annoying enchantment, or five whole turns to have creature removal. She can just have what she needs right now even if at the cost of course, that of having to give up the previous chapters.
Elegance 2.5/3 - MSE shows me that the abilities are short enough to actually fit all together and with read ahead and its reminder text in addition to that in the Saga frame. It's NOT microtext. Impressive job! That was the actual intended difficulty of this round if you wanted to meet all challenges. I thought you could do that with four chapter abilities if they were short enough, but I didn't even think you could do it with five, yet you managed to do it. I wouldn't be surprised to learn that using all the different possible "destroy target (insert permanent card type here)" sentences was the very first inspiration for this card. There is only a single strike against this card here: the asymmetry between the last three chapters having the "up to one" part and the first two chapters not. I would have made them all the same: either make all of them "up to one" or none of them.
Development
Viability 2.5/3 - "Up to one" being there or not is also functionally relevant: if it's not there, like in the first two chapters, you have to target something of yours if your opponents don't have anything of that card type, while if it's there, like the last three chapter, you can just choose no targets in that case. Why do planeswalkers and lands need to function differently from the rest? As for the color pie, everything's fine here, but I will point out that this doesn't need to be all three colors, it could be just white-black or black-green. Black can destroy every permanent type but artifacts now that it's also allowed to deal with enchantments, and either white or green would have been enough to allow this card to also destroy artifacts by itself, even if they absolutely do it together of course. Even red could do it, this card could even have been black-red in the color pie, even if it would have felt strange to me indeed if it were. I could see this at mythic too, but rare is definitely fine.
Balance 3/3 - I like a lot the order of the chapters here. The ones you probably want the most are last, so you will have to wait several turns to get there or give up the other ones if you want to get to what you need right away. There is a hidden cost anyway, one that might not be apparent as you first read the card, and I really like this. I don't like how you're forced to destroy your own planeswalkers or lands if your opponents have none though, I think you could also use the "up to one" wording for those, after all we're still talking about four mana in three different colors at sorcery speed. But that's also a problem that gets solved by read ahead: if that's the case, just go straight to chapter three. If you can pay the three-colored mana cost, this is a must play in limited. I can easily see this being a very high pick there and a card that sees quite a lot of constructed play, especially in Standard but I wouldn't exclude other formats too. Casual players will definitely like this one too. In multiplayer you can target things controlled by different players for the different chapters, you're not locked to the player you picked for the first chapter you chose or anything like that, and that's relevant there. If one player controls an annoying artifact and a different one controls an annoying creature, in two turns you will be able to hit them both. You could even see this as a political card: "I'll destroy our common opponent's permanent that's really annoying especially to you if you allow me to destroy your own permanent that's annoying to me first." I personally hate politics in Magic, but I know there are players who love it, especially Commander players, and if you can use this card in a way they also like, well, good for them.
Creativity
Uniqueness 3/3 - Among all 83 existing Sagas, according to Gatherer, only 3 have four chapter abilities (all from THB), and none have five or more. Removal is a basic effect in the game, but this is absolutely a new and very original twist on it.
Flavor 3/3 - As a note, I'm writing this right after having written kwanyeegor-ii's Flavor section. Yes, I usually do not go in order while writing my judgments, I have a spreadsheet that I fill up with my thoughts in various areas of the same or different players and then when I have filled them all up I reorganize them if need be. That's just my own method, certainly there is no requirements for every judge to do this, in fact I think nobody else judges the MCC in this way. Anyway, that's why I'm writing this after kwanyeegor-ii's Flavor section but I already know as I'm writing this very sentence that you all will actually read it first. I'm mentioning this because this is actually the THIRD lesson in Dominarian history to me. I knew the card name had to refer to something and that "false god" had to be someone existing in Magic lore that I didn't know about, someone that, once again, was involved in the story before I personally started playing Magic (original Ravnica, 2005, never stopped since then). Maybe I could have heard of them too, whoever it was, in Time Spiral, but that would have been it. I didn't even follow the story yet in Time Spiral, I was still fully focused on the mechanical aspect of the game. It wouldn't have been until Lorwyn that I started caring about the story, so I don't know much about the characters mentioned in Time Spiral either, just some names with very vague ideas of who they might be. So, I went to the Wiki once again and I made a search for "the false god". I just spent the last hour or so reading Karona's story and following most of the links there for further readings. You've just taught me, maybe unwillingly, the whole history of Jeska, which is, just as I expected, a character and story from before my time, being from Onslaught block. You've just taught me about how she became first Phage, then Karona, then Jeska again. You've just showed me how several characters I had heard of (Akroma, Phage, Jeska herself, Kamahl, Teferi, the Primevals, Yawgmoth, Karn, and even more) are connected. You made me learn about the Numena which I don't even remember having ever heard the name of before, even if it might just be my faulty memory. Karona is mentioned several times as spreading destruction around her in that story, and this card fits very well with what I've just read. I only have a single doubt, about her colors: if I've understood correctly, Jeska has been born red, then became black as Phage (and we all know Phage, the Untouchable is a black card, I obviously knew that before learning about this storyline, I just didn't know Jeska and Phage were actually the same being), then became all five colors as Karona. At no point I've seen her being Abzan-colored, though obviously a character who is a color combination (in this case, all five colors for Karona) can be represented by a card that's only a subset of those colors (Abzan in this case). Yeah, I'll just have to say for the third time: thanks for the lesson and get your full points here. I'll move to a different area now, which will NOT be Quality, as I've already written that, Polish is usually the very first section I write as it's the easiest to me. I tend to save the more difficult stuff (at least for me) for last. EDIT - In the end I went to Elegance next if you care about it.
Polish
Quality 3/3 - All good.
Main Challenge 2/2 - Good.
Subchallenges 2/2 - Both met.
TOTAL 23.5/25
kwanyeegor-ii
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kwanyeegor-ii wrote:
1 year ago
Commodore Guff Rewrites History 5W
Enchantment - Saga (Mythic)
Flash
Read ahead (Choose a chapter and start with that many lore counters. Add one after your draw step. Skipped chapters don't trigger. Sacrifice after iv.)
(i) Return any number of other historic permanents you own to your hand.
(ii) Each player draws three cards.
(iii) You may put a planeswalker card from your hand or graveyard onto the battlefield.
(iv) Your life total becomes equal to your starting life total.
Design
Appeal 2/3 - Timmy likes the first chapter to save his things from death and also the last one as he's the one out of the three that likes life gain the most. He doesn't really care too much about the mutual draw and he wishes he could also drop or reanimate creatures in addition to planeswalkers. A very open ended card for Johnny with many different things he could be interested in. Spike likes flash and read ahead here but six mana is a lot to her unless we're talking something Titan-like power level.
Elegance 1.5/3 - The chapter abilities feel just like a list of "good enough" stuff to me and too unrelated to one another. I would have liked to see something more connected, even if I admit that most read ahead Sagas in DMU also feel that way at least to me. Also, looking at this in the Saga frame of MSE, it probably fits but the font does need to be quite small. It's had to judge microtext on a card with a vertical layout and an MSE frame that's made for three abilities, but I don't think this is it. The text is definitely long enough to cause the font size to shrink though, even if probably not beyond limits.
Development
Viability 3/3 - White is tertiary in flash, it can do it on occasion. Self-bounce, mutual draw, reanimating planeswalkers, and life gain are all certainly white effects. Getting a permanent directly from your hand to the battlefield feels more green than white to me personally, but I think white could do that for planeswalkers. This does feel like a mythic to me. I see no problems with the rules.
Balance 2/3 - I honestly see no need for this to have flash. All the chapters are things that are usually done at sorcery speed, and each for its own reasons. Let's go chapter by chapter. Chapter one: I like very much the word "other" here as Sagas are historic themselves so this could have totally returned itself without it. This is also the chapter where flash feels the most appropriate, to allow you to self-bounce things that are about to die, but it doesn't need it if the intended purpose was to allow you to, say, reuse ETB abilities or reset a planeswalker's loyalty, you could have done that just fine at sorcery speed. Chapter two: instant card draw is very strong, even if other players also get to benefit from it. Secret Rendezvous is a sorcery for example. Fascination, Prosperity, and Skyscribing also are. The most cards I've found the "each player draws N cards" effect for by itself at instant speed is two. Chapter three: dropping permanents directly from your hand for free is also a very powerful effect. Reanimation is also usually done as a sorcery. Both effects usually being at sorcery speed helps preventing you from getting (back in the case of the graveyard) big things while circumventing their mana costs. Mana cost is a gate and a balancing tool, you don't want players to be able to ignore it too easily or too cheaply. It's true this this particular ability only allows you to do this with planeswalkers and not creatures, but planeswalker are maybe the most impactful card type in the whole game. Chapter four: life gain is usually regarded as a weak ability, but gaining potentially 19 life at once (if you're playing an ordinary Magic duel and you're at 1 life) looks quite relevant, and there are also formats where you could do even better: Two-Headed Giant starts at 30 life and Commander at 40. Just imagine playing a game of Commander, the whole table allies against you until you're at 1 life, and you suddenly gain 39 life. It looks very strong. It also would cause the game to go much longer, as if Commander games weren't long enough already... Yes, that's one of the reasons I personally dislike Commander, the sheer length of the games. In two hours I could play a single Commander game or at least five or six regular duels if not more... but I digress. I know many players love Commander instead and that's good. I'm happy it makes them happy even if it doesn't make me happy personally. Back to this card, yes, it's six mana, but I think it would also need to cost quite some mana at sorcery speed already, if you also keep into account the additional flexibility that read ahead gives you, turning this from a fixed sequence of effects into an almost modal card. At six mana I don't think flash makes this a broken card or anything like that, but I do think this might be stronger than it looks. This is mostly true in any format really, including limited (even though you won't see much of this there as it's a mythic), constructed, casual, and multiplayer.
Creativity
Uniqueness 2.5/3 - None of the 83 existing Sagas have flash and only 3 of them, all from THB, have four chapter abilities. All the chapter abilities here are essentially things we've seen before but most come with a different new added twist.
Flavor 3/3 - Last round MonoRedMage taught me a lesson in Dominarian history, this round you did it. You also taught the teacher a lesson. It's clear that both of you know a lot about it, certainly more than I do. I had just heard of the name "Commodore Guff" somewhere, maybe he was mentioned in Time Spiral or something like that, I can't remember exactly now, but anyway I knew that name, but I had no idea about who he was until now that you kinda forced me to look up his Wiki page. Ok, according to that, rewriting history is pretty much the most important thing he ever did in his life. If I've understood correctly what I've just read there, if he hadn't done that the original Phyrexian invasion of Dominaria would have been successful. The abilities also fit well with what I've read: his focus on history is expressed by the use of the mechanic historic in chapter I, his focus on knowledge and research by card drawing in chapter II, him being one of Urza's Nine Titans by caring about planeswalker cards in chapter III, and him actually ending up being the one who saved Dominaria by saving you as a player through a reset of your starting life total in chapter IV. The Wiki doesn't mention which colors he is, though all the cards listed there as referred to him are either white or blue except for Wild Research which is red but has both a white and a blue ability. His description and history also feel white-blue to me. This card being white fits, but I would have liked to see also some blue here. That's still not a problem though, if a character is white-blue it can definitely have a mono-white card. I don't really understand why this card has flash and read ahead from a purely flavor standpoint, but I also have no problems with those keywords being there. I think this is the best job you could do in this area while having to work without flavor text, so, just like MonoRedMage last round, you also get your full points here.
Polish
Quality 2/3 - The Roman numerals should be capitalized. Normally I would deduct half a point for each instance of a mistake, which would make five times half a point here (don't forget the instance of "IV" in the reminder text of read ahead), but I don't really feel like deducting two points and a half for this. A single -0.5 including all instances in a single deduction feels much fairer to me, so I'll go with that. Another thing that feels fair to me but goes against what I normally do in this area is deducting -0.5 for using a hyphen instead of an em dash in the type line. I'm doing that because I want to acknowledge that your opponent did it right instead. If both of you had used a hyphen I would have deducted no points for that for either of you. Where you definitely got it right though is by NOT including reminder text for historic here in the first chapter. There is no way there is room for it here and this is a mythic, so that's definitely the right choice and no deduction for that.
Main Challenge 2/2 - Good.
Subchallenges 2/2 - Both met.
TOTAL 20/25
Results
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slimytrout: 23.5
kwanyeegor-ii: 20
Author of the MCC Guidelines and FAQ. | For my projects, including Jeff Lionheart, my murder mystery story "One pierced heart, two mindful horns", and republished articles from my series "The Lion's Lair", see Leo's content index (Last updated on March 24th 2024 - Added OPHTMH Episode 4).
After I'm done republishing my articles I want to reprise the series focusing it more on editing, wording, and templating. Suggest potential future article topics here.
My CCCG Resume (Updated on February 27th 2024)
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MCC - Winner (9): Oct 2014, Apr Nov 2017, Jan 2018, Apr Jun 2019, Jan Mar 2022, Apr 2023 || Host (30): Dec 2014, Apr Jul Aug Dec 2015, Mar Jul Aug Oct 2016, Feb Jul 2017, Jun Nov 2018, Feb Jul 2019 (last on MTGS), Aug 2019 (first on MTGN) Oct 2019, Jan Jun 2020 Apr Oct 2021, Feb May Sep Dec 2022, Mar Jun Sep Dec 2023, Mar 2024 || Judge (58): every month from Nov 2014 to Nov 2016 except Oct 2015, every month from Feb to Jul 2017 except Apr 2017, then Oct 2017, May Jun Nov 2018, Feb Jul 2019 (last on MTGS), every month from Aug 2019 (first on MTGN) to Feb 2020, May Jun 2020, Mar Apr Sep Oct 2021, Feb May Sep Dec 2022, Mar May Jun Sep Dec 2023, Jan Mar 2024
CCL - Winner (4): Jul 2016 (tied with Flatline), May 2017, Jul 2019 (last on MTGS), Jun 2021 (tied with slimytrout) || Host (5): Feb 2015, Mar Apr May Jun 2016
DCC - Winner (3): Mar 2015 (tied with Piar), Feb Apr 2022 || Host (12): May Oct 2015, Jan 2016, Jun Sep Dec 2021, Mar Jun Sep Dec 2022, Mar Jun 2023

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void_nothing
Look On My Sash...
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Post by void_nothing » 1 year ago

slimytrout
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Design
(2.5/3) Appeal - Enough sheer destruction for Txmmy and enough flexibility AND card advantage for Spike. The only one who is not fully on board is Jxnny but even they have some affection for Decimate type effects.
(2/3) Elegance - Something that bothers me irrationally here is that two of the chapters are non-optional and the rest are not. I understand that you'll always have an opponent's land to target unless the circumstances are exceptional and you would at least want to make the enchantment chapter "up to one target" so that self-destructs don't happen, but why is planeswalker not optional?

Development
(3/3) Viability - Colors and rarity look right.
(2.5/3) Balance - Something that can immediately destroy any permanent and potentially destroy many more down the line is very strong, but it's four mana, three colors, and sorcery speed - and obviously each chapter ability usually take a full turn cycle before the next.

Creativity
(2/3) Uniqueness - Obvious inspo is the aforementioned Decimate and Casualties of War but this presents its effects in a new way.
(3/3) Flavor - Karona being the False God in question? Sure, I definitely buy this.

Polish
(3/3) Quality - Looks good.
(2/2) Main Challenge (*) - Done.
(2/2) Subchallenges - And done.

Total: 22/25
kwanyeegor-ii
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Design
(3/3) Appeal - Txmmy, Jxnny, and Spike all have plenty of reasons to like this.
(1.5/3) Elegance - A couple of these chapters are relatively wordy, and the addition of flash does complicate it further.

Development
(3/3) Viability - Definitely a mythic, pretty sure all the chapters are white.
(2.5/3) Balance - Six mana is expensive, but flashing in for just the last chapter versus the alpha strike can absolutely turn a loss directly into a win.

Creativity
(2.5/3) Uniqueness - None of the abilities is totally new but them in combination, with flash, makes this interesting.
(3/3) Flavor - This 100% feels like what Guff did in the library that fateful day during the First Phyrexian Invasion.

Polish
(3/3) Quality - Good.
(2/2) Main Challenge (*) - Looks fine to me.
(2/2) Subchallenges - And done.

Total: 22.5/25
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bravelion83
MKM MCC going on now
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Post by bravelion83 » 1 year ago

Final results

slimytrout: 23.5 + 22 = 45.5
kwanyeegor-ii: 20 + 22.5 = 42.5

@slimytrout wins September. Congratulations!
Author of the MCC Guidelines and FAQ. | For my projects, including Jeff Lionheart, my murder mystery story "One pierced heart, two mindful horns", and republished articles from my series "The Lion's Lair", see Leo's content index (Last updated on March 24th 2024 - Added OPHTMH Episode 4).
After I'm done republishing my articles I want to reprise the series focusing it more on editing, wording, and templating. Suggest potential future article topics here.
My CCCG Resume (Updated on February 27th 2024)
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Blue = MTGSalvation Green = MTGNexus
MCC - Winner (9): Oct 2014, Apr Nov 2017, Jan 2018, Apr Jun 2019, Jan Mar 2022, Apr 2023 || Host (30): Dec 2014, Apr Jul Aug Dec 2015, Mar Jul Aug Oct 2016, Feb Jul 2017, Jun Nov 2018, Feb Jul 2019 (last on MTGS), Aug 2019 (first on MTGN) Oct 2019, Jan Jun 2020 Apr Oct 2021, Feb May Sep Dec 2022, Mar Jun Sep Dec 2023, Mar 2024 || Judge (58): every month from Nov 2014 to Nov 2016 except Oct 2015, every month from Feb to Jul 2017 except Apr 2017, then Oct 2017, May Jun Nov 2018, Feb Jul 2019 (last on MTGS), every month from Aug 2019 (first on MTGN) to Feb 2020, May Jun 2020, Mar Apr Sep Oct 2021, Feb May Sep Dec 2022, Mar May Jun Sep Dec 2023, Jan Mar 2024
CCL - Winner (4): Jul 2016 (tied with Flatline), May 2017, Jul 2019 (last on MTGS), Jun 2021 (tied with slimytrout) || Host (5): Feb 2015, Mar Apr May Jun 2016
DCC - Winner (3): Mar 2015 (tied with Piar), Feb Apr 2022 || Host (12): May Oct 2015, Jan 2016, Jun Sep Dec 2021, Mar Jun Sep Dec 2022, Mar Jun 2023

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