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Rezatta — VISION DESIGN PHASE
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That's a cute idea, but that's a very parasitic card because it demands you to play other set mechanics to be good.
The cycle probably needs some balance tweaks (and wording/ability adjustments), but all-in-all that is a very neat cycle!
We can try the concept in some dedicated Discover test deck to see how it feels ^^ A priori, my best guess is that you can't discover for an artifact in a non-artifact set because you won't have enough artifacts to put in your deck anyway. Some of them (lands and creatures) are clearly easier to achieve than the rest. This makes me think it's a good cycle to playtest different Discover conditions and select which ones work best, but I don't think it's possible to balance it to the point where it would find a place in the actual design file. Other interesting things to playtest, asides from card type, could be converted mana cost, colours, creature types, and specific names ^^
The way it's worded pushes one aspect that I'm not fond of in the current iteration of the mechanic (and this is partly why I think this mechanic may need to be unkeyworded): you discover something, then you check if you actually discovered that thing. It's semantically quite weird
@TheGamingBolasChannel @Lujikul
You don't need to be playing a psylian life deck to appreciate getting some, so I think it's fine as a draft reward for playing a Rebirth deck ^^ That said, it could be interesting to make it a little less directional? For instance:
"Whenever a creature enters the battlefield under your control, you gain 1 psylian life. If that creature is reborn, you gain 2 psylian life instead."
The role of the Rebirth mechanic in the set is to compensate the lack of resonaring tropes about Renaissance with bluntness. Basically, it's here to scream "IT'S A RENAISSANCE SET!!!" at your face since it literally means "Renaissance" xD
This means we don't actually need a recursion mechanic, we need a mechanic called Renaissance. So we would rather change the mechanic entirely than keep it with a name that doesn't scream Renaissance like "Inspiration" ^^
We discussed changing Reborn to another type, including Legendary and even Angel, but so far we've come back to Reborn because it has the biggest flavour space.
Using Rebirth from the graveyard causes a subtle issue. Each set asks the player to focus on one main thing they would not focus on before. Graveyard sets asks you to keep tab of your graveyard so it would be fine to have rebirth trigger from the graveyard. But as a life-matters set we already ask the player to constantly remember when they gained/lost life during the turn. As such, we can't have a mechanic that ask the players to also keep track of all graveyards, we need to choose where players need to spend their mental energy. That said, it could be fine as a death trigger, as long as you can forget about those cards once they actually hit the graveyard for good, if you're interested in finding an alternate version ^^ A priori that sounds a bit pessimistic for what we're trying to do flavourfully though.
The deck lists are HERE, you can find them with the tabs at the bottom.
A few notes on how and why they're made:
- I made them 60 cards singleton decks to test a maximum of possibilities. If you want to do the same with another theme/mechanic it's completely fine to make the deck only 40-cards, though I wouldn't recommand putting more than two copies of the same card in the playtest deck unless a specific card interacts with oher copies of itself.
- The cards in those decks aren't part of the design file as we don't have enough room for that many cards dedicated to a single mechanic. That's why it was interesting to start with playtest decks that aren't limited by the larger needs of a set.
- There are strong and weak cards altogether, the point is to help get a feel of what works or not with this mechanic. Don't hesitate to change and replace the cards on the fly as you test them.
- I sometimes use design slang to shorten cards, don't be surprised of you find rules text talking about "bouncing" or "freezing" x) Also, the cards currently have no names ^^"
- I'm playtesting them physically by writing on small square of papers I slide in a sleeve in front of random commons. I'll try to add them on either Untap.In or Cockatrice later on. In the files below, I kept chech on how the cards I got to playtest already felt and the changes I made.
DECK #1: UR Disruptive Aggro Compose
PLUS: Compose has an interesting play pattern of being a tribal deck where the creatures of that tribe keeps disappearing and reappearing. That part was quite fun so far. There's also a combo-y feel that makes you proud when you find the synergies.
MINUS: It's very fiddly, and feels quite parasitic. Also, it probably feels a bit too agressive for Blue.
I'd be interested in playtesting other versions of the Art-Comes-To-Life mechanic that feel less agressive, and maybe more original.
DECK #2: WB Life Swings and Psylian life
PLUS: Psylian life is an exciting mechanic that promotes new and interesting play pattern. It adds a lot of good tension to the game, and so far I was never able to break the game with the free mana I got from it. Elated (that's how I called the "if at least 3 life was gained and/or lost this turn") worked wonderfully with psylian life. It's reasonably challenging to trigger it every turn, and you can get quite creative to reach that 3 life threshold.
MINUS: Paying life while having psylian life was very frustrating. Based on this new playtest deck, I think the rules of psylian life should not be "You always lose psylian life first" but rather "Whenever a source makes you lose life, by damaging you for instance, its controller chooses what type of life you lose" if we can afford the extra complexity.
Compose N (Create a colorless N/N Art creature token with haste. Sacrifice it at the beginning of the next end step unless it dealt damage this turn.)
It was a lot of fun, giving a lot more consistency to the deck and creating some unusual interactions ^^ I think it also increases the emphasis on damage which highlights the synergy between Compose and "Elated" for the players. I really recommand trying it out
Don't you mean the following. Otherwise, damage would be dealt 95% of the time.
Compose N (Create a colorless N/N Art creature token with haste. Sacrifice it at the beginning of the next end step unless it dealt damage to a player this turn.)
For the psylian life rules change proposal:
Whenever a source makes you lose life, by damaging you for instance, its controller chooses what type of life you lose.
This means that if your opponent makes you lose life, they can choose to have you lose psylian life before regular life. On the other hand, if you're paying life for an effect, you can choose to pay nonpsylian life and keep your psylian life intact in the process.
E.g:
- My opponent's creature deals combat damage to me. The controller of the source that made me lose life is my opponent so they decide to make me lose psylian life first.
- My opponent casts Lightning Bolt targeting me. My opponent controls the bolt so they decide to make me lose psylian life first.
- I cast Lightning Bolt targeting myself. I control that Lightning Bolt, the source that made me lose life, so I decide to lose nonpsylian life first.
- I have Phyrexian Arena on the battlefield. At the beginning of my upkeep, I lose 1 life. Since I control the Phyrexian Arena that made me lose life, I can decide to lose nonpsylian life first.
Is it too complicated? The other option is to refrain from doing life payments which would be a little sad for a life-matters set >.<
Oh right, I did mean:
Compose N (Create a colorless N/N Art creature token with haste. Sacrifice it at the beginning of the next end step unless it dealt damage to a player this turn.)
My bad ^^
They're not really important, it just allows me to track which cards I've playtested or not. Once I got the feel of a card, I just give it a quick rating (green = played nice and clean, yellow = played good but could be improved, orange = did not play great but could be improved maybe, red = should probably forget about it.)
You're a bit of a genius, aren't you?
2B
Whenever you lose life for the first time each turn compose 1.
1/2
I see. It's a good idea.
Most of the time, this card is going to trigger after your opponent's combat step, giving you a token that will disappear immediatly without doing anything, so it's a bit awkward
Also, if you have a sacrifice outlet or a "Whenever a creature ETB under your control" trigger, it punishes your opponent for attacking which is something you want to avoid, otherwise you stall the board.
I think it would be cleaner if it only triggered during your turn, and if it had a way to trigger itself (psylian life would be a good way, since it would offer you a one-shot use then aks you to find other ways to pay life.)
_________________________
I'm a bit worried about Blue so far because it's the only colour that really doesn't care about life changes (white/green/black can gain life, black/red can pay life and deal damage). Now that I played more with the UR build of Compose, it feels like the hasty aspect pushes that mechanic away from Blue as well.
Even admitting that we keep a discovery-flavoured mechanic centered in blue, it still doesn't have much to do in the set, I'd really like Blue to have access to the Art-Coming-To-Life mechanic.
I've started to look for non-hasty mechanics for Compose, so Blue can have access to it. Feel free to propose yours as well!
Here's one:
There are two aspects, I'm experimenting here:
1) Visually, I played with different details that could be reproduced on MTGCardsmith: the inner border (I know we discussed this one already and found it felt too hearthstone-y, it's just an example), the golden colour, the sorcery with P/T, the centered text in inverted. The idea was that Art was represented by sorceries that looked visually flashy. We could dig in different art styles, just like Sagas on Dominaria. All those details can be considered individually of course (for instance, the inner border could exist in each colour so the card doesn't have to be gold, the Art creatures could all have centered names without the rest, etc.)
2) Mechanically, it's a variant of Evoke in that it represents a spell coming to life (this way Art is flavoured as sorceries and/or instants). It lets you choose to have the effect of the spell right away as a sorcery or later when the living spell dies. It's trying to solve the Evoke problem with the rules text change (Evoke started as a spell becoming a creature, but the rules didn't like it.) I believe Evoke doesn't feel like what it's supposed to represent (a spell becoming a creature) because of the change they made, so I thought that was an interesting puzzlte to try to solve ^^
Anyways, does anyone has an idea to make the "Art-Coming-To-Life" mechanic more compatible with Blue?
I'd prefer we approach it more from the "this card is better if you have art" perspective (essentially turning them into creatures, but without other messy rule/card pieces).
This was my approach way back when:
https://mtgcardsmith.com/view/towering-masterpiece
Something like that could be used a hundred different ways and "make art permanent" in the process. I know it involves more cards, but if there are abilities and alternate ways of "making art" in the first place, having cards in your hand that get better because of it could be really neat IMO.
I am not a fan of new types of cards or new borders, which I've said before, and I also don't really like the wording "...it starts with'...'"
Aviary Carapace (3)
Artifact Creature-Thopter
Flying
Whenever a creature with flying enters the battlefield, you gain quintessence until end of turn.
CARDNAME is not a creature while you do not have quintessence
2/3
Can we bring back enchantment creatures? Not bestow though.
CG01
G 0/3
When ~ dies, discover a land.
CU01
1U 1/1
When ~ etbs, discover an instant or sorcery card.
CG02
2G 1/1
When ~ etbs, discover a creature card.
UU01
2UU 1/2
When ~ etbs, choose one:
- Discover an instant or sorcery card.
- Return target instant or sorcery card from your graveyard to your hand.
UG01
3G 4/3
Trample
When ~ deals combat damage to a player, discover a nonland permanent card.
CG10
G Sorcery
Discover a land or creature card. You gain 3 life.
(Note: not recommend to change to psylian life.)
CU10
U Instant
Scry 1, then discover a nonland, noncreature card.
RM01
2GU Enchantment
When ~ etbs or at the beginning of your upkeep, choose a card type, then discover a card of the chosen card type.
RU01
XUU Sorcery
Repeat the following process X times.
Discover an instant or sorcery card. If an instant or sorcery card with CMC X or less would be put into your hand this way, you may cast it without paying its mana cost instead.
RL01 (flavor note: can be some library.)
Legendary Land
~ etb tapped.
T: add C.
4, T: choose a card type. Discover a card of the chosen type.
UU02
2U 2/3
Prowess
Whenever you discover a card, ~ gets +1/+1 until end of turn.
UM01
GU Enchantment
When you discover a card, spells with the same name cost 1 less to cast.
3GU: discover a nonland card.
(It's bascially "Captivating Lessons" but less powerful. The cost reduction seems too powerful at 2.)
RG01
2G 1/3
2G, T: Discover a nonland permanent card.
If you would put one or more cards on the bottom of your library in any order, you may instead put one into your hand and the rest on the bottom of your library in a random order.
(Note about RG01: since the remaining cards after discover are put in ANY order, the ability allows the player to get potentially 2 cards from the pile. Very powerful. Decrease rarity only after nerfing the power of the ability.)
UU03
2U 1/2
Flash, flying
When ~ etbs, discover an instant or sorcery card.
Whenever you discover a card, noncreature spells you cast cost 1 less until end of turn.
Reminder text for "discover an OBJECT card":
(Exile cards from the top of your library until you exile the fifth or an OBJECT card. Put it into your hand. Put the rest on the bottom of your library in any order.)
I'm actually kind of a fan of quintessence. The name is great; in addition to the contemporary meaning, during medieval times, quintessence was thought to be the "fifth element" that was latent in every living thing and was pretty much The Force. I also like the idea of trying to trigger it every turn. With a lot of cards that become creatures if you have quintessence, seeding the battlefield with inert art pieces that at some point will rise as an army to crush your foes sounds like it would be fun to play with, and it also captures the ephemeral-ness that we tried to touch on with Compose equally well, while also emphasizing that the art still exists, it just isn't alive.
TL;DR: Yay quintessence.
ON THE ROLE OF BLUE IN THE SET
I'm actually unsure what you meant? Did you suggest:
A) That the whole set gets Art creatures with no keyword mechanic to create them.
C) That Blue gets the Art-matters cards while other colours get the Art creatures.
Here's my take on each suggestion:
A) Using Art creatures without having any mechanic in the set to produce them could work as we'd treat them as any tribe then. I guess we'd have to define their mechanical identity and it'd be fine (it would actually be the 1st challenge of GDS3 xD) But if we do that we lose the focus brought by the keyword on that aspect of the world. Mechanics like Explore, Embalm, or Revolt aren't supporting the mechanical theme of the set, they're supporting its flavour. I think having an "Art-coming-to-life" mechanic falls into that category, and is really important to complement the life mechanics that aren't focused on the Renaissance flavour as much.
C) Having Art-matters cards in Blue without giving it access to the keyword producing Art creatures still creates the same problem as above (Blue is left out of the set mechanically). In addition, it's possible to have an object in one colour without cards caring about it in that same colour, but we can't have cards caring about an object in one colour without having that object accessible to that colour. That would be a deadly trap in draft, where your cards would do nothing if you don't know you *have* to draft a specific other colour to "activate" your cards, and it would be immensely difficult to design for. I'm pretty sure that's not what you meant though, but just in case xD
ON THE CONCEPT CARD FOR LIVING ART
I know you're not really into new card types and borders, but it's still a part of modern MTG design! Every set has a mechanic that's visually unique (double-faced cards, morph, devoid, vehicles, aftermath, sagas,etc). We don't have access to a lot of those tools on MTGCardsmith, but if we can manage to bring a little bit of novelty visually I think we should go for it, because it would make the set more intriguing and also more realistic ^^ It could be as simple as having the Art creatures be non-digital paintings for instance!
For the Living Art mechanic above, here's the reminder text in proper rules text:
Living Art {cost} (You may pay {cost} rather than pay this spell's mana cost as you cast this spell. If this spell's Living Art cost was paid, it's a creature spell instead of a sorcery spell. Add "When this creature dies," at the beginning of its rules text.)
= 45 words
I used this shortened version:
Living Art {cost} (If you cast this spell for {cost}, it's a creature spell that starts with "When this creature dies")
= 18 words
"If you cast this card for {cost}" is seen on cards with Awaken. Most alternative costs (Dash, Bestow, Overload, etc.) would say "for its living art cost" but that's three words longer. So I think this part is fine.
I removed the mention to the beginning of the rules text because it was obvious it wasn't going to be elsewhere like in the name, but it's true I pushed a little hard x) It could be:
Living Art {cost} (If you cast this for {cost}, it's a creature spell. Add "When this creature dies" at the beginning of its rules text.)
= 22 words
ON THE QUINTESSENCE MECHANIC
@brcien @MagicChess
This mechanic is interesting in the sense that it causes a problem we don't see very often x) It has "the kicker problem" ^^
Basically, one of the mistakes of kicker was that it was too broad. It was literally keywording all additional costs. Now, whenever they want to make an additional cost mechanic, they get the criticism that it's just a variant of Kicker, and MaRo stated multiple times that, if they had known better back then, they would have done a narrower mechanic so it you could re-use it with different flavours and names.
Quintessence is doing just that, it's stepping on the toes of all past and future mechanics that would care about any state of the game for a turn, because it's too broad. It's doing the job of bloodthirst, heroic, landfall, morbid, raid, and rally at the same time.
The solution would be to narrow down the trigger and/or the resulting effect to something that's more core to the the set we're looking at. Innistrad cared about death and had Morbid. Rezatta cares about life, so if we apply the same principle we get... Elated x) So Quintessence would basically be Elated, but instead of caring about life swings it would care about anything possible. Which is why I think it's not the solution to our problem ^^
ON NEW POSSIBLE DIRECTIONS FOR THE ART-COMING-TO-LIFE MECHANIC
@brcien
We could consider enchantment-creatures but they strongly point at an enchantment set, misleading the player's expectations. Also we don't have access to the enchantment-creature frame on MTGCardsmith. I don't think it would be worth it without the alternate frame.
You mention Bestow, and the way you used Quintessence is very reminiscent of Vehicles to me ^^ I think it would be a good idea to gather all the existing mechanics that could be flavoured as coming to life, just to have a base line! I'll start, tell me if I forget anything:
- Bestow (Enchantments coming to life)
- Vehicles (While technically flavoured as being piloted, in my opinion that mostly shows how "becomes a creature" is a strong way of suggesting coming to life.)
- Living Weapon (Equipments coming to life)
- Evoke (Spells coming to life, and here I actually think the fact that it's a creature from the start completely disconnects the flavour for me.Yes, it's cleaner, but I don't think it feels like what its primary goal is supposed to be.)
- Fabricate (It's creating living objects.)
- Persist/Undying/Unearth/Embalm/Eternalize (Corpses coming to life.)
Here's a try with a variant of Fabricate:
Compose (You may put a +1/+1 counter on target Art. If you don't, create a colorless 1/1 Art creature token.)
The cards would always say "Compose N times" because it's easier than to explain that in reminder text with "Compose N". It's not very original but it has more of a combo-y feel, in that you can customize the tokens you create.
What I am thinking is there has to be a dozen cool possible mechanics that don't use tokens to catch that feeling. Back on Theros, we have Inspired. I think it is interesting how much I go back to Theros with this one because of how influential Greeks were on the classical age.
Pygmalion Statue (3)
Artifact-art
(2)(Tap): add one mana of any color.
InspiredWhenever you untap CARDNAME, it becomes a 2/2 creature until end of turn.
Wily Landscape (1)(G)
Creature-art
(Tap): add (G)
CARDNAME cannot attack or block unless two player's life totals have changed this turn.
(0/4)
Ferocious Masterpiece (3)(r)
Creature-art
Whenever an opponent loses life, CARDNAME gets +5/+3 until end of turn.
(0/2)
I see your point on Quintessence, but we need something flexible to work with. We could have used a bunch of the fuel Kaladesh burnt! It could also be like Arcane with Splice onto Arcane, but instead of extra costs from hand, it would trigger from on board.
Quintessence (3)(w)
Enchantment
Whenever you cast an artist creature, target noncreature permanent becomes a 2/2 art creature in addition to its other types until end of turn.
I'm more cryptic than I thought!
For A, B, & C, I meant none of the above.
I was suggesting having cards that allow blue to capitalize on having Art creatures, often resulting in permanent Art creatures for future turns. This would be in addition to your already established cards/abilities/functionality for blue and other colors.