Community Set Building
Custom Cards forum
Posted on May 14, 2019, 10:18 a.m. by Diddle
This is an idea I've had for a while. After numerous failed attempts to design sets with friends, I'm moving the task over to here. I have no plans, so the setting, mechanics, lore, and everything else is up to the community. Please don't bombard the forum with cards you make alone, instead talk about your ideas and design as a group. Please mention me with any questions and I will get back to you ASAP.
Most of our designing is done on discord, with this forum documenting the process and summerizing development details for any wishing to join. The discord link can be found below.
https://discord.gg/cxeEkH2
First, I think it is important to decide what sort of set you are designing. Is this supposed to be a Standard-legal set? A set like Modern Horizons, that skips directly to Modern? A set like Conspiracy or Battlebound, which both skip directly to Legacy? That's a pretty important decision that has repercussions on the general power level of the set and on what mechanics you can feasibly get away with.
Of your concept ideas, I think both the Steampunk and the Angel-dominated plane are both feasible. I do not think a planeswalker-plane would work well--you'd have issues with character design, balancing, and a general lack of creatures (all problems I felt were rampant in WAR).
May 14, 2019 11:10 a.m.
Standard legal, i wasn't a fan of the walker only plane either but it was an idea that i wanted open, my personal preference is the steampunk plane since kaladesh was pretty disappointing on that front and still felt very high fantasy. These ideas aren't set in stone btw, feel free to suggest your own setting ideas.
May 14, 2019 11:18 a.m.
I think you should make an executive decision regarding setting, and not open that aspect up to committee. It's really hard to start designing a set when you don't know the set's flavour, as that permeates all manner of set design.
For example, a steampunk plane could foreseeable have Fabricate and an artifacts-matter theme; that would not work for many other planes. An angel-based plane would likely have a heavy life-death theme, likely with a heavy focus on recursion and sacrifice.
May 14, 2019 11:22 a.m.
I will make an executive decision when the time comes, before the end of the day tomorrow at the latest, but for now I want to gather ideas for setting from the community before ultimately deciding.
May 14, 2019 1:55 p.m.
JANKYARD_DOG says... #7
Funkydiscogod building on your idea, Walkers for such a set I think would include Tezzeret, Karn, and possibly Saheeli. Wouldn't do many more if any at all besides that. One mechanic to return for sure would be Phyrexian Mana, infect though I think would have to be done differently... either rebranded or very limited being it's going to be a standard set. Oh and because we can... Phyrexian Vehicles. Lol
May 14, 2019 2:17 p.m.
Deadpoo111 says... #8
I think the set combines two incredibly powerful sets and that's not necessarily a good thing. Design would simply be, how can we make this more broken? I for one like the angel themed plane because it allows us to explore a design space of evil angels that we got a glimpse of in Shadows over Innistrad. However, unlike Innistrad these angels could be more subtle, not just big purge engines.
Ideas for the evil angels: A phyrexian angel (hell maybe Atraxa) has gotten onto the plane and corrupted the angels, the spirit of Serra has manifested on the plane but something is wrong with the spirit and it corrupts the angels. We could make the plane Ulgrotha and have Baron Sengir make an angel like Sorin did and it spawns a new host of evil angels, Innistrad where Soring tried to recreate Avacyn but messed up and it's like shadows again.
Finally, I think the set (seeing as this is the first time we've done this) could be much like a core set in terms of mechanics. Maybe making one new one or bringing one back.
May 14, 2019 2:52 p.m.
Not much we can do balence wise other than peer review and discussion, that's why I asked people not to just post a card and leave, I enjoy the card creation challenge but I don't want that. Setting wise I'd rather have an original plane so we have a fresh start and so people don't push a favorite character or faction.
May 14, 2019 6:48 p.m.
Deadpoo111 says... #10
Diddle I agree that it should be a new plane, but the only problem is the work it takes to actually world build a plane from the ground up. Using a previous plane not only makes designing cards easier (because we have established cards) but also allows for takes on that plane by people other than wizards.
In relation to balancing card power, it's simply saying yes or no to cards. Did somebody suggest reprinting a mox or making a 4/4 infect with proliferate and energy counters? No. A new angel with haste? Sure
Back to why the Angel plane is going to be easier on either an existing plane or with an existing character:
1) No huge worldbuilding needed if we go with an existing plane
2) Brings back an existing character which is a point of excitement for many players
3) Many ideas on how to do it.
Now for one idea that I really like. It's a new plane and some planeswalker (or other character) is investigating like how Jace did on innistrad. Naturally, players will think: "oh so some outside is causing this to happen, I wonder what it is?" Then we drop the bomb: there was nothing affecting the angels, they're just evil. A perfect thing simply was not, any reason for something so pure to turn evil simply doesn't exist, they didn't turn in the first place. Case in point it throws the players for a loop but also opens up a new design space. Maybe it'll even break a few hearts. This also allows for a new plane like you said you wanted.
Onto the Kaladesh/Phyrexia plane idea. The concept is cool, who wouldn't think a phyrexian invasion is epic? But I repeat myself: Those blocks were just...incredibly broken. Sure design space in a forum is still hard to put a power meter on, but at least we have restrictions on what should or shouldn't be ok. If we do the kaladesh/phyrexia door we combine two things that were already problems into a huge one.
Anyway that's just my opinion, I don't really enjoy the steam punk because it's not exactly original like the angel plane is. It also raises the question of how far we are willing to take magic. Was Kaladesh already a stretch on high fantasy? or do we want to break from high fantasy entirely?
May 14, 2019 9:02 p.m.
JANKYARD_DOG says... #11
So if Angel's it presents the opportunity to create lower costed Angels. Not many low cost Angel's as it is in magics history. A majority are cmc 4+. If angels are the Antagonist, who will be the protagonist be? A world of mixed races, humans as it mostly was in SoI/INN, or as a twist make demons the good guys of the plane?.
May 14, 2019 9:39 p.m.
I'll run with the Angel theme for now--I think it fits more with Magic's general aura than Steampunk does, and has a greater potential for doing something new.
Okay, so, what have we nailed down so far? Angels = Bad. That's a good start--it's something new. No humans. Also something different and new.
At this point, it's time to take a break from dealing with the story. Story is important, but mechanics and Colours are equally so. We can presume there will be some form of conflict on the plane. I think the next most important step is to determine what our factions are, with a consideration for their colours.
We have one faction--Angels. Angels are primarily white-aligned, so we know the "bad" faction is going to be White.
Let's add two more colours--that way the Angels, the dominant force on the plane, control the majority of the colour wheel.
There are 30 multicoloured angels in the game. Each and every one has white as one of its colours. The distribution of other colours is as follows (some have more than 2 colours, so it does not add up to 30):
Blue: 9 Black: 8 Red: 11 Green: 8
So, fairly evenly distributed among the colours, so we are free to do pretty much whatever we want.
Personally, I'd say Red/White/Green is the way to go; that tri-colour combination has never been done on an existing angel card.
Okay, so what would a totalitarian Naya angel force look like?
From White we get Order. From Red we get Action. From Green we get nature. We can sketch out a basic plot with that. Thousands of years ago, the angels of [Plane] used to be peaceful creatures, overseeing the plane's natural bounty. However, something bad happened, likely inflicted by the non-angels of the plane, and the angels began taking a more active role to preserve natural order, developing an element of Red. Over time, they subjugated the world's people and installed a strict totalitarian regime, which exists to the day.
From this, we also have our first three legends.
We have the Angel, who is the leader, a Mythic Rare. We have a lieutenant, likely in charge of the natural side of the angel's regime. We have a , the military commander. These could be either Rares or Mythics, depending on the set's design needs.
That leaves us with Black/Blue as our "Good" colours. These are colours of personal ambition and logic--a good foil to a naturalistic order. Let's lean into the perversion of nature as a "good" thing with these colours--it provides us a solid foil for nature-as-bad-angels.
We can do that with Artifacts (blue) or undead (black). Either would really work, though undead is probably the better option--we've seen artifacts as good before; necromancy as the good thing (beyond Lili) is a bit new.
__
Moving onto the non-evergreen mechanics, let's go for two per faction--one new mechanic and one older one. At this point, I'll just offer a suggestion for an old mechanic for each faction:
My nominations for would be Banding. It's an interesting ability that has been a bit unfairly maligned, and fits well with the whole "we are trying to bring people together, but through force" aspect of the Angels.
For my suggestion would be Transfigure - corrupting the natural order to get ahead.
Next step would be to design the two new mechanics, then work on fleshing out the cards and the world itself simultaneously, using the basic framework of the mechanics.
Even if this is not the plane/colours/etc. you go with, the general outline laid out above is probably a good way to approach the issue.
- Decide the plane and basic idea.
- Decide the factions in light of their colours.
- Decide the mechanics.
- Flesh everything out, playing it by ear based on the needs that come up during design.
May 14, 2019 10:16 p.m.
you run into serious design problems with dedicated tri-colour sets, which is why Wizards does not tend to make them. There are balancing issues galore, difficulties making each colour feel distinguished, and too much of the set being focused on things like fixing as a necessity.
Two colours do not have that issue as much, but we have already seen a world where every two-colour combination is represented. To do that again would draw comparisons to Ravnica, which is a difficult mantle to live up to.
Not every plane needs all combinations equally represented. Ixalan did fine with two tri coloured factions and a two-colour faction. In fact, unless the colours themselves are the defining focus of the set (Ravnica, Alara, Tarkir), there’s really no reason for all similar colours to be represented in kind.
May 14, 2019 11:36 p.m.
Angels will obviously be white, but i don't think Naya is a great color for them as its typically associated with emotion and I think angels would be a bit more calculating and tactical. Esper () would be a better fit and allow for red to be a hero when it is typically seen as an "evil" color. Naya antagonist are interesting but i don't think angels are a fit for the colors. As for mechanics, banding is ungodly complicated and is at the top of the storm scale for a reason, and transfigure is interesting and we could do some work with it, but it only really works in black and that will limit design space, it doesn't make sense for blue or red to be sacrificing creatures to cheat out others. Ultimately there will be more than two factions, I'm thinking every color should be represented by 2 tribes, so we will need to find/make more. Right now I'd like to focus on how we want to divide the color pie before narrowing down on keywords or mechanics. My thought is
// Kithkin
// Angels
/ Elementals
/ Zombies/Skeletons
This gives and even distribution of colors to tribes and all the color combinations have very different characteristics. If we want to talk mechanics than I'd say give the Kithkin Renown ( Topan Freeblade ) as it fits their past incarnations lore wise and hasn't been used to its full potential, give the Angels a new mechanic to fit with them being a departure from the norm, give the Undead Transfigure ( Fleshwrither ), and give the Elementals either something new or possibly Suspend ( Rift Bolt ), Overload ( Mizzium Mortars ), or Forcast ( Skyscribing ).
I'm not 100% on these mechanics, but I think this is a solid base to work off.
May 15, 2019 9 a.m.
Or, if we want to cut 3 color entirely,
/ Angels
/ Kithkin
/ Undead
/ Elementals
/ Something, id rather not have merfolk just so we can make this a set focused on underdeveloped tribes. Possibly Snakes.
May 15, 2019 9:04 a.m.
Deadpoo111 says... #16
Diddle I agree with the two color idea and the colors associated (it's been too long since we've gotten to see kithkin). As for the simic combination, maybe we don't need one?
May 15, 2019 9:16 a.m.
That would leave green and blue with only one tribe where as every other color has 2, it would leave the color pie unbalanced and i don't want that. we could just make them a neutral color focused more around a mechanical synergy than a tribal one, but that would still feel like we were leaving the two colors out.
May 15, 2019 9:19 a.m.
On Transfigure, that was my mistake--I meant the similarly worded keyword Transmute, which is firmly a Blue/Black identity.
I'd also suggest banding only is so high on the storm scale because of the way it was introduced--in an era before reminder text, and without any cards that are particularly competitive. A few commons with Banding and reminder text would work wonders.
Even if we do not want to use Banding, I think Banding's defensive side is particularly neat, as it serves as a full stop to Trample. A more simple ability, whose text reads "If any creatures with [ability name] are blocking a creature, you divide that creature's combat damage, not its controller, among any of the creatures it's blocking" could be pretty nifty. This is still a pretty White-aligned ability; you'd want an opposing faction to have Green, so you can juxtapose Trample and [ability name].
With regards to Naya not being appropriate for evil Angels, you are falling into the trap of thinking in terms of the existing Shard, not in terms of what the colours can do. The shard of Naya, for example, was designed with a primary focused on Green, with White and Red as the supporting colours. By shifting the focus to White, you can get a very, very different characterization of those same three colours, with Order, rather than Nature being the core component. Red and Green then become supporting colours, defining the shape Order takes.
I'll reiterate my earlier point that you have to be very careful if you're making a set where all the factions are two colours--you'll only be drawing a direct comparison to Ravnica, and that's a hard position to be in. You've made this comparison even more pronounced with some of the proposed colour choices--specifically Izzet Elementals and Golgari undead are already things that exist on Ravnica.
Either of your suggestions are something we could work with, but I think it's important to recognize the potential danger of falling in-line with already-done characterizations of the colours.
May 15, 2019 9:44 a.m.
JANKYARD_DOG says... #19
Given that angels fly I think there will have to be a lot of Reach/Flying specific spells in the opposing colors. Spiders would be a thing..., mixed with some shamans or something.
May 15, 2019 11:30 a.m.
Amonkhet was not a "2-color set" as you were suggesting. It would be more accurate to say Amonkhet's story was based around two general factions, neither of which were split along a 2-colour line.
The first faction was primarily Grixis aligned. At its head was Bolas, a Grixis card, with the three evil Amonkhet gods representing the three derivative two-colour pairings of Grixis. There were also natural eternals (i.e. cards that were already eternals without having to eternalize) which were found in Grixis. The "evil" mechanic, Afflict, was also exclusively found in Grixis.
There were some White/Green cards with Eternalize, and some other story cards, such as Approach of the Second Sun in White/Green that represented parts of Bolas' army and plan, but the overall theme of this faction was still pretty solidly Grixis.
The other faction also had cards represented across all the colours, as this was an entire plane, with a god representing each mono-coloured pair, fighting against Bolas.
The simple fact is, Ravnica is the only plane where we see the two-coloured pairs so explicitly divided along certain lines. Doing the same here, albeit on racial, rather than guild, lines would be sufficient to result in comparisons to a plane that has already been seen.
I'm not saying that it can't be done--just that it needs to be done carefully and the comparison has to be at the back of the mind when designing the set. After all, you don't want people seeing the divides along racial, rather than guild, lines as just being pseudo-guilds, with less internal diversity.
May 15, 2019 12:08 p.m. Edited.
Amonkhet wasn't a two color set, thats what he said. No one compared them because there is nothing to compare.
May 15, 2019 12:32 p.m.
making a set full of tribes that take up 2 colors each would be very similar to Ravnica in a players eyes so if we want to go that way we would have to try very hard to give the tribes identities distinct from the guilds.
May 15, 2019 12:33 p.m.
Amonkhet was not a two-colour plane; as such, you cannot use it for the proposition "a plane revolving around two-coloured factions will not draw comparisons to Ravnica, the existing plane revolving around two-coloured factions." You're trying to use oranges to show that a Fuji apple will not draw comparisons to a Granny Smith.
You're also putting words into my mouth--I very clearly stated that I believe a two-colour based set can be done, just that you have to be cognizant of the fact people are going to debate whether they enjoy Fuji apples or Granny Smiths more.
Again, to make this very clear--I believe that two-colored factions could be done in a way that would make them interesting and distinguishable from Ravnica, provided the set designers are cognizant of the fact the comparison exists and are careful to distinguish the factions from Ravnica's guild.
To expand on Diddle's above-listed suggestions:
The Black/White angels run the risk of being similar to Orzhov--a religious Black/White group.
The Red/White Kithkin would likely take a different shape than the Boros legions, so that has potential.
Green/Black with a focus on death is very close to Golgari, presenting possible problems.
Red/Blue elemental are something the Izzet tend to have; so, again, you'd have to be very careful to make sure they feel different from the Izzet's elemental.
To sum: If that is the route this set tries to take, then it would be silly not to be cognizant of the parallels, and act accordingly to ensure the set is sufficiently distinguished in an interesting way.
May 15, 2019 12:44 p.m.
GhostChieftain says... #24
Instead of bg undead and ru elementals, maybe br skeletons and ug elementals
May 15, 2019 1:11 p.m.
Skeletons sounds good to me, and elementals is pretty solid.
May 15, 2019 1:23 p.m.
Honestly why don't we just make it factions but the factions both run through all 5 colors?
Angels already appear in all five colors as long as they're correlated with white. And it could be interesting to see nonwhite angels.
Then the other faction could be nonangel creatures who are a rebellion force against them, with each color having a different reason to be against the angels.
This also opens up the possibility of a five color angel lord as the villain.
May 15, 2019 6:07 p.m.
I really don't want to deal with trying to balance that, there's a reason there hasn't been a true WUBRG matters set. It also strips each color of their unique identity if they are all represented by the same factions. Its really dull to see the same creature types and abilities across the entire color pie.
May 15, 2019 8:10 p.m.
Yeah exactly. Like instead of having a ton of tribes and factions, it's just two with the full color wheel in their power. Plus that opens up the possibility of nonwhite angels, similar to how KTK block had non red dragons.
May 15, 2019 9:08 p.m.
I know, and that idea is very hard to balance and strips colors of their identity. Having only two sides that are split across all 5 colors is the reason BFZ failed so badly.
May 16, 2019 7:49 a.m.
KTK block still had multiple color associated factions, it was not every faction in all colors like you are suggesting.
May 16, 2019 10:49 a.m.
So, now that we've talked more about it, here is my new suggestions for tribes
Angels/Kithkin
Demons/
Skeletons
Elementals
I think these are all really neat tribes and will help to distance these color pairs from their respective shards/guilds. It also makes a neat contrast of the demons fighting against the angels so that the other inhabitants of the world can continue living in freedom. I also like the idea of the kithkin being worshipers of the angels and trying to help them in their conquest. As for the Skeletons, i think that this can be a world where skeletons are made of enchanted rock rather than the typical reanimated corpse thing. The elementals are forgotten guardians that keep the balance of the world and have awoken in response to the threat of the angels.
May 16, 2019 2:36 p.m.
I really don't like a 5 color tribe, but if you want to try that balance nightmare than we can go for it. There's a reason that we don't have many tribes that span the full color pie.
May 16, 2019 6:35 p.m.
We can probably go back-and-forth on the merits of different tribes and colours indefinitely. As captain of the thread, I think it is up to you Diddle to pilot the ship to port and make a decision on which tribes will be featured and how each will be aligned. Otherwise, we will languish in these doldrums for a while yet, and no cards will be designed.
May 16, 2019 6:50 p.m.
I'm going to say no to the 5 color tribe for now, though I'd be willing to try if we ever do this type of project again. Lorwyn tried 5 color elementals and it didn't work and I don't want this to feel like Lorwyn 2.
May 16, 2019 6:53 p.m.
JANKYARD_DOG says... #35
Instead of weird skeletons perhaps with all this reality twisting of angels and demons being on flip sides we make RB Elves and/or Fae creatures of a darker nature?
May 16, 2019 7:17 p.m.
I feel like angels vs demons have kinda been played out in general, and that was a huge part of Innistrad. I think angels versus everybody would be a lot more interesting.
Like I think we need to think more into the setting. The angels being there is one thing, as is having the villains. But what are they trying to do? Take over the plane? Revive some ancient deity? Are they at war with the other inhabitants of the plane? Are they subjugating them? Are they searching for something? All of this should come into play when we're thinking factions/sides and motivations.
One idea I like is the idea that the angels aren't native to the plane, or that area of the plane. But they're trying to subjugate it for their religion (we could even make a god card) and the people are resisting them.
May 17, 2019 9:03 a.m.
I like the idea of corrupted faeries in , but that may draw comparisons to Lorwyn. On where the angels are from, id say they were at one point separate, living secluded in a mountaintop city where they controlled things in a more political way, but upon the crowning of a new queen, (Or whoever rules them), they suddenly organized a military and decided to take control directly.
May 20, 2019 10:30 a.m.
I think it would be interesting to potentially focus exclusively on angels of different colors fighting or competing with each other, and each color of angel could represent a set of emotions or ideals. White could be the usual purity and righteousness, blue could be curiosity and knowledge, black can be death, and an ending of life (more of a focus on grim reaper sort of thing, not inherently evil), green could be nature and the natural way, and red could be fury, and vengeance. I honestly think that this would work better for an entire set if angels are the focus as far as color balancing goes, and I think could be an interesting theme
May 22, 2019 4:27 p.m.
Another thought, using the god idea, each of the types of angels could have been created by a god or other deity. These gods could then have been created in turn by a planeswalker to create inhabitants for an artificial plane perhaps. This could create our environment, as the planeswalker could have left, promising to return after creating the plane and it's gods, but have gone missing (perhaps killed in war of the spark?) and each of the gods and their angels are trying inhabit this new plane peacefully, and create order. Just a thought.
May 22, 2019 5:19 p.m.
I really like Smart_TJ's idea. Though we will probably need to give each color of angel a different creature type as a sort of underling or follower, similar to how DTK had dragons in all 5 colors but each of those dragon groups had different mechanics and creatures associated with them.
May 23, 2019 10:41 a.m.
Ok, i think we have the setting and base of the set figured out. I'll summarize what has been said so far so we can move on.
The setting is a once peaceful plane that was ruled by benevolent angels from a mountain top city. Until on day (the fire nation attacked) the angles decided they wished to expand their reach to the entire plane through force. This lead to disagreement between the angels on how this should be done and a civil war broke out between the different groups (Represented by ally colored pairs). The war expanded as did the influence of the angels over each groups respective followers. The civil war grew despite the non-angels not knowing what the war was for, or their fate. This war continues with no clear winner until a yet-to-be decided/created planeswalker arrives on the plane with a goal of either ending the war or bending the results in their favor depending on how we want to go.
Mechanically, this will be a tribal/creature heavy set similar to DTK by having one 5-color tribe but instead of the different "underling" colors being focused on different mechanics, they are focused on another tribe, leading to 6 tribes in total. Each tribe will have a unique mechanic/keyword/theme. I will attempt to keep the tribes different enough from the respective Ravnica guild, but there is only so much i can do if i want to stay in the color pie.
: Devils (I know Rakdos is pretty devil heavy, but i think the tribe is very underdeveloped and we can take them in a new direction)
: Kithkin
: Skeletons
: Faeries (More organized, militant, and lawful than the ones we saw on Lorwyn, hence the color change.)
: Beasts
The angels in each color pair will take aspects of the tribe they correspond to, with the angels being chaotic and violent (i know this sounds very rakdos but this color pair has always been pretty narrow) being fundamentalist, wanting to conquer with brute strength rather than tactics (possibly a "no abilities" sub-theme?) being cunning and magically gifted (possible want to win with the casting of one massive spell?) functioning like a traditional military with angel commanders and kithkin foot soldiers, and is a forgotten faction of fallen angels that were banished a long time ago but have used the chaos the return (the more i go on the more dimir this sounds but i think its salvageable).
May 29, 2019 10:13 a.m.
This sounds like a nice plane I like the tribe-subtribe vibe in this setting and it sounds interesting. I am mainly commenting to subscibe to this, but will lend a hand with a couple of ideas on mechanics.
The above post sounds like a 10 mechanic deal - 2 per color pair. One for the angel leaders, and one for the underling tribe. Both mechanics in each pair should be synergystic with each other.
For example, the BR color pair could be -
1/ For the BR angels - Contort - After blockers are declared, choose up to one target blocking or attacking creature. Switch its power and toughness until end of turn.
2/ Devils - Morbid - a returning keyword action that means "if a creature died this turn, do X"
May 29, 2019 10:37 a.m.
10 mechanics may be a bit to many, just because we won't want to barrage players with too many new keywords. We can assume this is put in a slot for a more complex standard set similar to WAR so it will be fine to have around 5 but no more. I've given some prior thought to mechanics, but here is a more comprehensive list.
: Renown is a great mechanic that i think provides a lot more depth to combat and hasn't been used to its full potential.
: I'm thinking either a new mechanic or a "No-Abilities" theme, like on Muraganda Petroglyphs
: I like morbid, but a new mechanic may help to separate this group from the rest of the tribes we've seen
: I'm thinking a mechanic that either makes instants/sorceries more powerful in some way or a pillow fort style prison control theme.
: Either delve, or the unamed zombie mechanic from Shadows block that reanimates things cheaply but makes you discard. I really like this form of "fixed delve" and think that it makes for some interesting games and stratigies.
June 4, 2019 9:46 a.m.
I like this, but for green-red I think it shouldn't necessarily be no abilities, because then you have 2 problems.
-
The idea becomes boring after a few cards, because having cards with no abilities means that they aren't very unique, and makes gameplay feel boring I feel
-
If the ability incentivises not having abilitys, then that means that the mechanic is literally broken
Therefore I propose an ability that wants things to only have keyword abilities, or something along the same lines
June 4, 2019 4:26 p.m.
Yeah, thats probably better, i was thinking the same thing, but hadn't thought of a fix yet and just wanted to get the idea out there. The main idea is i want a flavorful way to show that the main feature of the card is the brute strength, not any special magic or ability. possibly just "trample matters" cards and leave it at that.
June 7, 2019 8:54 p.m.
I know I'm late to this particular party, but what proportion of creatures will be Angels? If I'm understanding the above summary right, every ally color pair is represented by a tribe and an Angel faction.
For a ability, I had a thought a while ago about "precasting" spells that might work here. You can either cast them normally, or pay a higher price to exile them from your hand, then cast them from exile for free. Would this work?
June 7, 2019 9:29 p.m.
I like the precasting, but I think it would fit better in since they are our spell colors. As for propertions. Probably 1/3 or 1/4 of the creatures in the set will be angels.
June 8, 2019 7:27 a.m.
So if I understand you correctly, it would work something like this
-card name-
Sorcery
Precast - (Exile this card from your hand and pay its precast cost, you may cast it from Exile at any time as if it had flash without paying its mana cost)
June 8, 2019 7:30 a.m.
Diddle Pretty close to what I was thinking. It doesn't inherently give it flash, but I guess there's no reason it couldn't. I was also playing with the idea that you reveal it, exile it face down, then look at it and cast it (under normal timing restrictions) for free, but I'm still up in the air about that. Exiling face down, as long as you reveal it to show you're not cheating, is more of the subtle preparation approach, but just exiling face up is simpler and less wordy.
Diddle says... #2
We should start with setting, a few ideas I've had are a British-Steampunk inspired plane, a humanless plane controlled by corrupt angels, and a plane populated entirely by planeswalkers seeking a normal life.
May 14, 2019 10:47 a.m.