Custom Block Help
Custom Cards forum
Posted on Sept. 12, 2018, 1:50 p.m. by dbpunk
Hey guys, so I'm making a custom block and I need some advice based on keywords:
So the block has 5 factions, each one being four colored. In each set, they'll have a seperate keyword and I need to know which keyword you think works best from the ones I've come up with.
Essentially, the setting of the set takes place in a Roman Empire style world with each of the factions representing a nation state who are coming together to battle a giant enemy, (who I haven't quite come up with yet). Each of these essentially represent an empire with their own flavors based on empires or groups who would've interacted with Rome.
The factions are:
The Sylphiad : A society of overt religious beliefs and extreme belief in the betterment of the group versus the whole. They tend to avoid conflict amongst the groups, but will turn their blades towards others when the whole is threatened. Their gameplay is more based around fortifying themselves, keeping a steady tempo and controlling their environment. Their artwork is more based on Asian influences, specifically Indian designs and creatures from that region.
The Diro Empire : This group believes that the betterment of their world is only possible through the advancement of technology, and the creation of new magics. They tend to spend their time advancing their knowledge and technology. Their play type tends to be more focused on responding to threats, creating combos and burning their opponents to death. This group is more based on Roman/Greek creatures and designs.
The Calcion : A group who believe that they must win through any means necessary, and that to survive the world is only a start to entering into the next life. Their playstyle focus around cheating in creatures, using alternative ways to cast spells and using cards in graveyards/exile to their advantage. Their design comes from Egyptian influences primarily.
The Night Horde : Although not an empire within it's own rights, the Night Horde is an assemblage of tribes who have united, albeit temporarily, to fight against the coming evil. They also tend to be outcasts from other societies, and often were prosecuted creatures who escaped slavery or other fates. They prize their freedom, strength and unity above all else. Their game play focuses on fast combat, casting extremely large spells with ramp and using large creatures to fight back. They're primarily influenced by Russian, German and Euroasian steppe cultures.
The Tyropan Empire : An empire that believes that knowledge and compassion are required to move the world forward, and the only way to true strength is to learn more of the world and those who inhabit it. Although similar to the Diro Empire, the Tyropan don't care to invent new technologies so much as use current living things grown to their full potential. Generally, their play comes across as boosting creatures, playing large number of tokens and having access to high numbers of cards. They're largely based on Middle Eastern groups, specifically the Arabs and Persians.
That essentially explains the five factions I thought of. I wanna know which keywords you think work for which, of which I have 11 (2 for each faction, 1 that spans all colors)
Memory: "Whenever you cast an instant or sorcery spell, you may pay this spells mana cost. If you do, you may cast this spell from your graveyard until end of turn."
How it's written: "Memory"
Grievance: "When you cast this spell, you may ___. If you do, each opponent does the same."
How it's written: "Grievance: action"
Halberd: "Prevent all damage dealt to this creature by creatures with converted mana X or less."
How it's written: "Halberd X"
Dispose: "As you cast this card, you may reveal the top card of your library. If you do, this spell cost X less, where X is that spells converted mana cost."
How it's written: "Dispose"
Summon: "When this creature enters play, you may pay it's summon cost."
How it's written: "Summon: mana cost.
When you cast - for it's summon cost, put (variable number of creature tokens)"
Mortal Enemy: "When this creature enters play, declare target creature an opponent as it's Mortal Enemy. Whenever either creature dies, the other's controller sacrifices it's Mortal Enemy."
How it's written: "Mortal Enemy"
Rage: "You may cast this creature from your hand for it's rage cost. If you do, it gains haste and attacks this turn if able. Sacrifice it at the end of turn."
How it's written: "Rage: mana cost"
Strike: "You may pay this creatures strike cost while this creature attacks. If you do, this creature gets +X/+X until end of turn. It doesn't untap during your next untap step."
How it's written: "Strike X: mana"
Tithe: "Play with the top card of your library revealed." Then some sort of ability.
How it's written: "Tithe-If the top card of your library is an , ."
Offering: "At any time, you may ___ (Offering cost). If you do, put X charge counters on this permanent."
How it's written: "Offering X: cost"
The final keyword is for all factions, and it's stated as:
[NEW NAME NEEDED}: "Cast this spell for it's [NEW NAME NEED] cost if you control at least one multicolored permanent."
How it's written: "Freedom: mana"
Which effects do you think belong with each faction? Should any of them be changed to work functionally better or for clarity?
I think eleven new keywords is way too many. Since you're in four colours, you're going to already have a pretty complicated set--it's probably best to stick with one keyword per faction, then flesh out the rest of the cards with vanilla keywords.
My thoughts on each of the mechanics:
Memory - This has some weird timing issues that might confuse new players. Further, if it works as I think you intend, it would be crazy powerful--turning a pre-blocker Lightning Bolt into a kill spell AND a creature flashed into play.
I'd probably streamline it "Whenever you cast an instant or sorcery spell, you may cast this card from your graveyard until end of turn."
That prevents any flash shenanigans, and is fairly simple to understand.
Clearly - the colours of graveyard recursion.
Grievance
This would be written: "Grievance - Action" rather than as you've styled it.
I think this is a mechanical nightmare--while you have to balance the action against the reward an opponent receives, you will still be the active player, and thus generally have the ability to benefit from "any number" before an opponent.
I would change this to you may take a single action, which your opponent does, removing the "any number" issue.
The colours it fits in can be anything, depending on what actions are received.
Halbeard (do you mean halberd?) - this seems fine, if not too exciting. Seems like something with .
Dispose - this seems way too difficult to balance, and is always going to lead to cards that, on their own, are too expensive to cast. I'm not a fan of this. You'd want to put this in since that's the colour that cares about top of the deck.
Summon - I don't like this ability. Different colours make different types of tokens (Knights, Soldiers, Goblins, Plants, etc.)--it seems strange just just create "creature tokens."
That said, , , and are good colours for tokens.
Mortal Enemy - I think this might be more fun as an evil version of Soulbond, where both creatures get an equal detriment. As it stands, this is just adding additional complexity (keeping track of the creatures bonded), without really doing anything interesting.
Clearly and in nature.
Rage - A more aggressive unearth is kind of fun. I'd probably exile the creature instead of sacrifice it--otherwise its basically just an upkeep cost.
and , possibly .
Strike - I don't really like this either and think it needs an "Activate this ability only once per turn" to help with balance.
Tithe - I think this is a bit too complicated for a keyword. Fun ability and might be good on a card, but not multiple cards in the set.
I think it should also be worded "If you do, you may put the top card of your library on the bottom of your library. Otherwise, draw a card."
Offering - the multiple modes for permanents/non-permanents is problematic. I'd stick with either one or the other. This would be very, very powerful on a creature, particularly if it can be used multiple times.
You also don't need to say "at any time." Unless stated otherwise, it is assumed activated abilities can be used at instant speed.
Freedom - seems a fine ability. Not sure on the name--it seems influenced by the flavour of your set--I'm not really a fan of keywords whose names and flavour make it hard to use in other sets (here's looking at you Ascend's referencing the "city's blessing").
One final note, you're going to have a lot of problems designing The Diro Empire in four colour.
Four colours pretty much demand colour fixing--that means Green is disproportionately necessary. I don't see these cards being run as you intended--Green will always be splashed out of necessity.
Further, related to the above, this set will not be fun to draft. Even if there are lots of colour fixing options, those will, out of necessity, be top picks, meaning you are building around your mana base, not around the cards. That doesn't seem all that appealing.
September 12, 2018 2:32 p.m.
luther I think that would be really interesting.
It's essentially going to be split between two sets, which is why I chose 11 keywords.
Memory: Change until end of turn and focus on
Grievance: I like that idea better, "taking out any number of times, change it to once". Or do you think I should just toss this one out all together? I rather like this ability, so I do want to keep it. Which faction should I add it in?
Halbeard: It's meant primarily to be simple and I do think it should be placed on a faction with in the colors. I'm wondering if I should add it to , or ?
Dispose: I really planned on this being the "high mana costs" card style, but I also wanted there to be a component. Once again, I think it's viable in the same way that other cost reduction ways are viable.
Summon: Should I do or though? And I had an alternate way of writing it which made it so instead you put a certain number of tokens in a new color/creature type too, so maybe I should use that?
Mortal Enemy: This is actually really like Soul Bond, but more meant to punish the enemy for killing your or their creature. Or for having larger creatures or better creatures enter play for cheaper, and then having an opponent be able to kill that creature much more easily. Once again, it can fit into a few different factions, but which do you think would be best?
Rage: I didn't think of Rage quite like Unearth, but more like Dash from Dragons of Tarkir, or like the ability of Sneak Attack. Maybe I should change it so that it says "From your hand" instead?
Strike: I don't like the idea of adding "once per turn" to strike since it's meant more to be a mana sink, but that's fair. Maybe "only activate this ability as the creature is attacking"?
Tithe: That's... a good point. Maybe I could simplify it to have an effect similar to Ascend where the effect only works if the top card of your library is the same card type but can't be switched out so easily?
Offering: I definitely think I should change it to charge counters tbh, and then have an ability based on the number of counters. Also that's good to know.
Freedom: Yeah I kinda suck at naming things, but it's meant to represent freedom from any of the factions and their laws.
Drafting: This set isn't necessarily meant to draft along with the factions (although people can if they want). Instead, it'll primarily be 1-2 colors on cards with a keyword or ability related to the group they align with and the strategy of that color/guild that focuses on it. For example, there could be a cards that use four seperate keywords, but they'll use them only in white ways.
Also, there's only going to be about 1 card per faction each set that's four colors, and it's going to be a legendary. The same is true for three colored cards.
September 12, 2018 3:21 p.m.
I like Grievance and would keep it. I've always been a fan of mechanics that require you to think ahead and weigh the cost of your advantage vs. that of an opponent.
Halbeard - I'm thinking RGWB - Blue has a number of creatures that prevent combat damage, and Green has fogs. That's probably enough to justify it.
Dispose doesn't really feel BG to me, but arguably top deck matters also is found in B and G (Bob; Collected Company), so I suppose that can work. I'm a little concerned with balance, just because cards like Emrakul, the Aeons Torn and Brainstorm exist. I think internal balance for the set will be hard--you can't just think of the card itself, but the cost of all the other cards in the set, and how well these will be in a draft. I was probably a bit harsh on this one, but it is going to be very challenging to get right.
Summon - have you considered using Manifesting the top X cards? Then it should fit firmly in R/W/G/B, and not lead to strange tokens or anything.
Mortal Enemy - I think you should use both, I still just don't find it that interesting of a mechanic. I think you've listed the two areas it can be used in, and everything will just be a variation of those.
Rage: I like this a bit better from the hand, since it keeps it from being as easy to loop.
Strike - I think that is a pretty decent limitation.
Tithe - Thought about this more, and might change the name and rework this some. I like the idea of it changing based on top card of your library, and rewarding you for building a deck based around certain permanent types. I'd probably remove any cost element (hence the need to remove the word tithe), and just make it top-card-matters. Something like Vampire Nocturnus, but caring about permanent type, not colour.
Instead of charge counters, which don't feel very "offering" you could use something unique, like contribution counters? That also helps get over the "charge counters are an artifact thing" so you can put the ability on both creatures and artifacts.
Can't think of a good name for Freedom either, but I'll put in a bit of thought and see what I can come up with.
September 12, 2018 8:44 p.m.
The problem I have with this is that it is a four color set that has no business being a four color set. Four color decks do not have a defined identity, because the only way to really distinguish them is by the color they are not. You cannot point to something, say "this is not a car" and know what that something is. In this example, the thing is "anything but a car".
Thus, 4 colors are extremely hard to do, because they have 0 identity on their own. To make mechanics, a world or a set for anything without an identity is not a good idea.
Why are the syphaids black and at the same time, a strongly united tribe that does cares about the group as a whole? This is philosofically opposed to what black thinks. Why are the calcion red or blue, when they do not care about the things they describe or why are the Tyropan empire red? The night horde are described as outcasts from other tribes, so they can theorically work in any combination of colors, even all 5 - they lack any identity.
You can fit those descriptions within one or two colors each, but they do not work like that.
TLDR: A multicolor card is a card on which the colors come together achieve something they cannot or are unlikely to do on their own. In order to make a successful set, make sure to have a stable basis for it.
September 13, 2018 8:01 a.m.
Boza although your partially right in that 4 color identities don't necessarily have a singular identity outside of what color they don't have, I think there's no reason why I can't design cards around four color factions.
The first thing I'm going to mention is that I haven't fully fleshed out flavor still, but what I did write was a starting basis. A lot of these tribes traits I have so far are actually basing them on the combination of previously created tri/dual color factions of the past, specifically Alara and Tarkir factions for each of them. Here's a more fleshed out version.
The Sylphiad are supposed to be a combination of both Bant ideology and Abzan ideology. Essentially, hierarchal orders and large groups protecting each other. To go more in depth in how each color achieves these, the representing members protect each during life through the use of hieromancy and small armies, primarily, while the protect each other to the point of self sacrifice.
The Diro Empire's focus is primarily on new magic being used to increase their power, and follow the ideologies of the Esper and the Jeskai. The members will invent spells and artifact aimed at gathering any secrets the enemy may have, while the build artifacts of great power and spells which could decimate millions. They use this to not only conquer new places, but to turn their life into the ultimate life of leisure.
The Calcion believe in achieving anything by any means necessary, and are based on the ruthless ideologies of both the ideologies of Grixis and the Sultai. They focus on a number of different skills to enact any purpose they desire, and have a penchant for killing, stealing or using necromancy to achieve their goals. The parts of this faction are rogues and magicians who tend toward using their environment as a way to form ambushes or create traps, while the are often necromancers who sell their own souls to create huge armies of the undead or to attain unstoppable power.
When I described the Night Horde as merely outcasts, that may have been a bit too vague. They're more like a horde of bandits who couldn't fit in due to violent tendencies and their need to move from place to place, similar to the Jund and Mardu ideology. They focus on both a connection with death and the loss of life and the strength of the wild, dangerous lands. Their members tend to become more closely related to beasts as time passes, while the members tend to be self serving mercenary warriors who wish to gain glory and power through battle.
Finally, the Tyropan Empire's obsession with knowledge far surpasses the Izzets, Simics or others. They hold knowledge of any sort as a way to get closer to godliness, but in reality their ideology falls into the Shamanistic ways of the Naya and the Temur. Rather, they have a tendency to study animals and nature to strengthen themselves or to control how they live, while also emphasizing studying ideas such as the chaos of storms on the ocean or the flow of mana through the world. The faction primarily exists of members who wish to learn of the natural world through living things and use them to their advantage, while the study storms, ocean currents and elementals coming from lava or other extreme area in their territories to understand their world.
Hopefully this makes it more clear how they're going to be thought of, since I didn't describe it well earlier.
September 13, 2018 9:33 p.m.
Also a simple idea of how I might do keyword distributions:
The Sylphiad: Memory in the first set, Dispose in the second.
The Diro Empire: Tithe in the first set, Grievance in the second.
The Calcion: Rage in the first set, Mortal Enemy in the second.
The Night Horde: Strike in the first set, Halberd (with a new name) in the second
The Tyropan Empire: Offering (might change the name now too) in the first set, Summon in the second
Also, I have an idea for a rare land cycle where dual colored lands with two basic land types enter untapped if you don't control another land of that type. (For example, the one enters untapped if you don't control a Plains or a Swamp)
Thoughts?
GhostChieftain says... #2
I think your sylphiads should instead of bolstering themselves with +1/+1 counters, they should focus on having the biggest booties. For example you could have a creature that for each aura or equipment attached to it, it gets +0/+1. Then you could have payoffs for having a high toughness also. That way you are still on theme of fortifying themselves. In my opinion +1/+1 counters have been a little bit overdone as of recently.
September 12, 2018 2:30 p.m.