This is one of the first card I ever made, and I personally think is one of the best. Like a lot of my early cards-no references used at all, not even inspiration. This the wording is solid and the flavor slaps. But what do you guys think. Rip me apart idc.
On the Soul Shard, remember, all aura cards specify the type of permanent they enchant, so you'd want to start with saying "Enchant Creature". The ability itself, is super cool. I think it's a great design. The Mimeoplasm decks would be able to put something like that to use for sure.
As far as Death of Life's Energy, tapping a land for mana IS an ability. I'm hoping you didn't design this with that in mind. Right now, it basically says (with very few exceptions) "Your opponents don't get to play Magic anymore". You may want to change it to "If a spell or ability of a non-land permanent your opponent controls would add mana, that ability adds no mana instead." That way they can still play the game but mana rocks/dorks and ritual effects are turned off. I'm assuming that's what you were going for. It may be a better effect if it's not one sided, either. Make it turn of your spells and dorks and such, too. That way it can't just be run, haphazardly. You'd only want to play it if you aren't abusing those mana sources in your own strategy. It would be a more interesting card, and less likely to be just a given to slot into a lot of sideboards in formats where fast mana is abundant.
I've got an Abzan Life Gain Matters commander deck, and there's not a really good commander for those colors that fits the theme. I thought I'd try to make one. Here's what I came up with.
Spell Clash looks good. You lose 2 cards and the opponent one, but its a card you would mostly use it to counter a deadly combo. So its a 1 mana card that prevents you losing the game, which is good.
And it can be even better if you have cards in your deck that trigger something when you discard them. As a normal counterspell to counter non-deadly enemy spells, it isnt that good.
@TheKeefMan I don't know if anyone has told you this, but there are expectations for this thread that each person posting a card gives feedback on at least the most recently shared card, that way everyone gets feedback. When you posted a card without giving feedback on my most recent post, it left me without any responses, and I've noticed that you've done that before. We have a great group of people that try to go above and beyond to make sure everyone gets great feedback, so I'm not really worried, but please do your best to provide a fair opportunity for all of us to be seen.
@LvB Correct wording wise, Phyrexian Cathedral would say "each player sacrifices a creature and a land" (which is a massive hit to the board for free while also getting a land that can conceivably tap for crazy amounts of mana and can serve as removal) I think it may be one of the strongest lands in the game, if not the strongest land. If it just said {t}: add {b} for each creature that died this turn, without any ETB or it would still be one of the best lands in the game. It is way too good and probably could never be printed for real, unless your choice of adding phyrexian mana is to imply it's adding black mana with the condition that it can only be used to pay phyrexian mana costs. There's probably plenty of ways to still break this, but decks typically don't have phyrexian mana costs as anywhere close to the majority of their costs, so it might have a slightly less utility, but it still seems pretty busted.
The Corrosive Mist, however, is a really cool idea. It may be a little under costed, as there are a lot of ways this can be used and abused, but it's a neat design and seems very flavorful. I can see it being a huge blowout at some point in most games, while a dead card in plenty of games as well, which makes it a very interesting card to play with.
i tried to negate the undercost of the corrosive mist by making it 3-colored, so players wont always be able to play it on turn 3.
Since its an instant players will most likely play it on the enemy turn which means you cant spend all mana during your own turn. Thats a huge drawback.
Now what do you think of this, eh ... nice ... little fellow.
Oblivion's Touch - wubrg for either one of the effects is over costed and if you have access to all those colours there are just better ways to get that effect. It should be "choose one or both" and then you can justify the difficult costing cost. One thing to note is that it exiles a spell and not counter so it gets around uncounterables which is very rare and makes it interesting, perhaps to go inline with getting around uncounterables it should be 'choose a permanent, exile then that permanent.' so it also gets around hexproof and protection. Now, pay wubrg and get the ultimate "No".
Dredge the Forgotten - The way I see it is in order for you get the most out of it is if you get at least 4 mana's worth of a card out of it. So given no set up and you blind cast it in a commander game (to get the best chances of something good) can one expect to see a +4 CMC card? I think most of the time no and if you do it won't be part of your strategy. Additionally what if some removal is revealed among the cards? Do you pick the creature only for another player to cast the removal? Blind casting, I think the risk of it back firing or being a dud greater than it's worth. Now of course that is if you are blind casting, if you've scryed or some way fixed the bottom card then you can get in with a large pay off but compare that to cheating creatures out via reviving from the graveyard, milling and discard is much more common than scrying and you don't need to maintain a specific order, or casting for free from the top of your library is probably easier than setting up the bottom. And on top of that, an opponent might get lucky and reveal a counter to the thing you tried to cheat out, so that can be a big oof after all that work. The last bit where if players don't cast a spell they lose 5 life prevents some shenanigans like forcing someone to cast a Pact or one of Red's Final Fortune like spells, it does narrow down the different ways to use the card. With all that said I think it should have some red in the cost given the random nature. I think most "cast the next <card type> on top of your library for free" cards are typically minimum 4CMC but given that everyone gets to do it and it's from the bottom I can see this being 3CMC. It certainly can be a fun card and when it works it can be satisfying, but when it backfires it can really be bad.
Fleshwarp - This card reminds me of Agony Warp but a better variant. So running through some cases, if you have a lot of cards in hand you can't really play the +X/-X lest you want to kill some of your creatures even at 2 cards so really the choice is -X/+X which is just typically a fog effect. If you have 1 card and most of your creatures are not gonna die, casting the +X/-X you might up trade in combat but everyone is probably gonna be dying on combat then. Now if the opponent has a lot of card then it's a simple one sided wrath and you can even have spells that make everyone draw cards to build up their hand before you hit them with it so that's pretty cool. If you build it around a deck where everyone draws cards I can see this card being fun to play.
Astral Border Post - It really plays out like Terramorphic Expanse if you think about it. Only difference is you don't get to shuffle your library, you do get to trigger 2 landfalls, but it one won't be instant, but you get artifact synergy. I like it for the amount of interesting interaction you get out of the card.
Sudden Overgrowth - I don't see why you would play this over Prismatic Omen, am I missing something? It cost more, effects less land types, and changes less land types.
Soul Shard - An oblivion ring that steals the power of another creature, I like mechanic and it's executed nicely. Colourwise though I don't think it is black, Oblivion rings type effects are white and ability stealing is blue (more or less a clone effect), I would put this to {2}{w}{u} and the name and flavour would still work even with those colours.
Death of Life's Energy - Let's assume it doesn't effect lands because that would be broken. A mana dork/rock and ritual hoser, is interesting but it doesn't effect land ramp which flavourwise where I think the 'life' comes from. Colourwise I think this should have white, it's the colour of playing fair and shutting down abilities is in it tool box along with effecting artifacts.
Spell Clash - It's a very finicky counter spell even at 1 CMC and you go down in card advantage. You are unlikely to counter their big spells with it which is what you want to be doing with a counter spell. It's probably best in a graveyard deck to toss cards into the graveyard but can be too unreliable as a normal counter.
Gyniva - I like the first ability and that you put a check on it so you can't gain too much, 5 is plenty a turn if you can trigger it on each of your turn, and quite good on other people's turn. I can see a commander deck just sit there and pop off each of their 'gain 1 life' abilities on each opponent's turn and gain tons of life. With that said I think the black ability is a bit underwhelming, if you already have a deck to gain a ton of life wouldn't be better to have an ability to use all that life? I'd like it if it had like a "pay 10 life do something." like the invoker creatures.
Phyrexian Cathedral - In a sacrifice deck this land is nuts. It's enter the battlefield is already a Tremble and Innocent Blood in one card and 0 cost so right there it already good. For the most part it's almost like a Phyrexian Altar
if you have a sac outlet, like... an actual Phyrexian Altar and if you're able to untap it well, there is your broken combo, double dipping is insane. On top
of that you can repeatedly lock an opponent's best creatures and kill them?
Also it says main phase, you get two per turn so it's even faster.
Let's just say each one of these abilities would already make for a good
to broken land card.
Corrosive Mist - It's Aether Snap
but harder to cast and does a bit more. The end all end of turn effect
is interesting, it's mainly shutting down combat tricks. I think if this
didn't kill all tokens and wasn't legendary it would be a cool 'anti
buff' spell as it wipes everything clean. Remove the black and I can see
it as a nice white/blue spell.
Phyrexian Amputater - Putting
-2/-1 counters are clunky and ugly so avoid that. It's a 2CMC 1/2 that can handle 3/3
more or less and straight up kill X/1 before combat damage. It's pretty
powerful in combat, so if it attacks I'm not blocking and taking 1
damage. If it's on defense I'll treat it like deathtouch. The fact that
it gives them -2/-1 before combat damage is a killer, let alone it's
going to be getting +1/+1 it needs cost more if you want to balance it.
Course you also need to fix the wordings
Some opinions on this please
Time themed, she's no Teferi but she can certainly create an interesting game state floating spells and creatures above people's head waiting for opportune times to drop them.
I think Kronii is good. It looks weak at first, cause you put suspend counters on your own cards, but as long as a creature is in play, that doesnt matter cause you will just use her ability to put stun counters on creatures and cast the spell. Since Kronii is a creature you can put all the stun counters you want on her.
Even if the enemy has no creatures, lets say you play 3 spells, they get suspend 1, then you put 3 stun counters on Kronii and remove the suspend counters and the spells are cast.
The phasing out is a perfect self protection and the returning of instant/sorceries is strong if you can play some spells during the enemy turn.
In a deck with a lot of cheap spells, for example a blue/red storm deck, this could be super powerful.
Maybe rework it, that you can use each of Kroniis ability only once per turn or that Kronii cant put stun counters on herself. Or that Kronii can put stun counters only on creatures who dont have stun counters.
@LvB In regards to your flesh golem, I think that the idea of the card is really solid. However the other abilities can use somes re-hashing. The first ability should be re-worded as "Whenever Demonblood Skinflayer enters the battlefield, you may pay up to 3 life." and the second ability should specify who or what it's regenerating. If it is regenerating another creature then it's fine, but if it regenerates itself, then the ability wouldn't work since +1/+1 counters don't go into the graveyard. Maybe consider just making the regen ability cost more like {1}{p/b}{p/b}, you can make it remove two +1/+1 counters from another creatute instead of this one then keep the cost, or an ability that would work better with its second ability would be you can keep the cost and make it sacrifice a creature instead which would triger it's second ability.
I would like review on cards from my main account which didn't get as much attention
Demonblood Skinflayer - The wording should be following magic's templates and phrasing to avoid ruling confusion. It would probably be like this:
When Demonblood Skinflayer enters the battlefield, you may pay up to 3 life, if you do, put a +1/+1 counter on it for each life paid this way.
Whenever a creature dies, if Demonblood Skinflayer dealt damage to it this turn, it gains all that creature's abilities.
{p/b}, remove two +1/+1 counters from Demonblood Skinflayer: Regenerate Demonblood Skinflayer.
Now, this should work, though I'm a bit iffy on the ability copying, I don't think it's convention to simply just say 'It has all the abilities' full stop, without some kind of tracking. A more flavourful way might be to give it mutate, putting the creature that died on top of the card, hence "wearing it's skin" would be a cool way to represent that and still be copying abilities. In terms of it's stat line, you can get a 4/4 on turn two but at the cost of 7 life, with no evasion. Interestingly it might get them to force chump blocks in the early game so it's second ability can kick in, with regenerate it can get some work in if that choose not to block, it's actually a pretty neat set of abilities. Fix the wording and it's a nice card to drop down early and then see if it can take any skin.
Drovar Firebrood - 5 CMC 5/4 haste is a pretty normal stat line, however the upgrading ability is kinda clunky, I had to read it a few times since things seem to be offset by one. Even then let's do some math, to see the cost to get him to full power. To give him trample it costs a total of 0+1+2=3 {r} over 3 combat phases (including your opponent's), then 3+4=7 (10 total) to give it death touch, and a whooping 5+6+7=18 (28 total) red mana to get him indestructible paying that normally is insane and I don't think he is surviving minimal 8 combat phases. Now I get it, you can proliferate but that just makes the normal cost obsolete and designed to never be used. A better way is to just use what we already have, those upgrades looks like the level up mechanic. Or you can mix up other ways to upgrade him, maybe give it renown and monstrosity only when renown.
Karth Frostbrood - 5 CMC 4/2 first strike trample, nothing weird about that maybe even underpowered these days. Now what is interesting is first strike + trample and the trigger on dealing damage to a player. You might be able to catch a bad block by your opponent if you manage to do first strike trample damage to the opponent getting the trigger to add +1/+1 on him before normal combat catching them off guard. Like if they block with a 3/3 and 2/2, you assign 3 damage to the 3/3 1 trample damage goes to opponent and you add a +1/+1 which let's him survive the 2/2 during normal combat.
However it can be a bit difficult to get that exact scenario where he survives it all given he only has 2 toughness. For the most part though he a creature that punishes chump blocking by getting bigger.
I'd like some opinions on these two, what sort of build arounds would you do?
Also I'd like a second opinion on my previous card, what kind of plays can you see being enabled by the ability to float spells and creatures.
@BT9154 I like bringing back the haunt mechanic with Reimu, and I never considered haunting your opponent's creatures, I just always haunted my own, so I had more control over getting the triggers. That being said, I think it's a really cool build around and mostly, I'm loving that you're diving into an old mechanic that certainly could see some more design space. You'd probably have to design some more haunt payoffs before it's really an interesting deck, though. There's a reason that haunt wasn't the most popular mechanic. Nothing with that ability was really that great.
Pomu, on the other hand, just seems really broken with any token strategy. I've often made 10 of the same creature in a token deck, some times much more than 10. That's basically an anthem for tokens that can scale ridiculously well. If nothing else, that's a cool card to combo with Spy Kit. I'd probably run it in the 99 of my Cadira, Caller of the Small deck, just to make all my bunnies absolute tanks.
I feel like Kronii is a really difficult commander to build around. It seems to just be a sort of good control option, but by suspending everything, you either lose the timing you need for a control deck, or you cast cards that you can wait on, but then you really don't want to cast them unless there's some benefit from Kronii. It just seems unlikely that you'll ever really accomplish much with her ability. You might want to exile the cards with time counters, but don't give them suspend, so they don't automatically have to lose a counter at the beginning of the turn (like Alaundo the Seer), so you can, for instance, float a counter spell and save it for when you really need it.
Here's my most recent card that I feel like may be easy to break, but I want to hear your opinions. Is this too good with looting or rummaging? Does this make 8 Rack too good? Let me know.
Having a pseudo-Leyline of Anticipation that can both protect itself and also effectively provides two forms of removal, all for the low price of revealing your spells in advance (and not being able to use X spells I suppose) is pretty nuts.
If you suspend a board wipe with Kronii, since the table can see it, they'll either force you to use it (which isn't a problem thanks to Kronii's first mode) or avoid playing things into it. If it gets back to you and you don't want to cast it though, you can use her second mode to bounce your board wipe for later. (Assuming you have a spare instant or suspend at least one creature as well, you can achieve the most favorable outcome regardless of what your opponents do.)
(The above assumes you have no other cards that deal with time counters; you can get into even more shenanigans with effects like Clockspinning.)
You can also do some silly things with abilities like Buyback and Replicate, since Kronii changes when those costs need to be paid. (Buyback becomes more like Echo, and you get two chances to pay Replicate costs.) On the other hand, any spells with negative additional costs (e.g. Thrill of Possibility) will need to have those costs paid twice.
Kronii's second mode seems especially noteworthy as it lets you go infinite in a variety of ways (e.g. infinite treasures with Storm-Kiln Artist and two instants with total cost three mana or less). Even without going infinite, it lets you get a large number of cast triggers off of just a couple spells.
@StuffnSuch ;I have little experience with modern, but after looking up some decklists I don't know if 8 Rack really wants Terminus Machine (it's slow, doesn't necessarily work depending on which discard spell you cast, and is probably a win-more in most circumstances). I'd be more concerned if this appears alongside Queza or Sheoldred, the Apocalypse, or in something like a wheels deck like Nekusar & friends. Perhaps such decks already have enough options though, so Terminus Machine likely isn't much of an issue anywhere. It would make Sire of Insanity pretty nuts though, so maybe there's potential for a spin on hellbent decks here.
@cadstar369 Ambition's edge seems like an upgrade or 'Read the Bones', with that replicate being a suitable power up for black. I feel like it's pretty balanced to that regard.
Purifex's charm is too similar to the other jeskai charms to be honest. I feel it needs a little more to set it apart from it. What exactly? I don't know. But still pretty solid as a playable card. Good job
Ambitions Edge can be very powerful in the right deck. Big Creatures + cheap token creatures to sacrifice and then some reanimation. Will flood the board fast.
Purifex Charm seems a bit weak for its 3 diffrent colored mana cost.
i'd change it to:
Choose one.
- Counter target spell
- 2 damage to target creature. That damage cant be prevented or redirected. Creature cant regenerate.
@121092 I fail to comprehend the source of your assertion. Speaking broadly, Jeskai Charm is best at supporting a board of creatures, whereas Purifex charm is more suited to a control shell; I don't see how these could be more different without the red effect being something like rummaging or impulse draw (which would detract from the exile theme across the three abilities).
@LvB in general, charms have three relatively overcosted abilities in exchange for the flexibility. Given existing charms that counter spells, the only unrestricted ones are Archmage Charm for UUU (for which 'counter target spell' is overcosted) and Dromar's Charm (for which the other two effects are very bad; likely to compensate). Given Obscura Charm's second mode, Purifex Charm is restricted to a single type since exiling spells is stronger. (Similar arguments lead from various charms to the other two abilities.) Additionally, I'm curious as to why you suggest shifting the red effect to a weaker variant (none of the effects it prevents are particularly common), while leaving the white ability unchanged; this looks like a similar situation to Dromar's Charm, which doesn't seem particularly playable or interesting.
Overall, I fail to understand the thought process behind both of your assertions & suggestions regarding Purifex Charm, and would appreciate it if you elaborated.
@LvB I wanted to follow up on Phyrexian Cathedral. Others have already pointed out how busted some of the abilities on it are, but no one hit the most abusable part, which is absolutely what it would be played for: land recursion decks.
All you need with this card is a card that lets you play lands out of your graveyard and multiple lands per turn. This is already a common landfall type build, usually in B/G. There are many cards for both of these effects, but for the sake of example, let's use Exploration and Crucible of Worlds. With this, you can freely play two lands a turn: both of them will be Phyrexian Cathedral, which will choose to sacrifice itself as it comes in each time. This will cause each player to sac a creature (if they have one), and each opponent will need to sac a land. You're now destroying two lands for each opponent, each turn, at no cost to you and very likely clearing their board as well. Start stacking more "extra lands per turn" effects and you're hard-locking them out of the game.
@StuffnSuch - Terminus Machine is deadly lethal with wheel effects. Jace's Archivist and Windfall for example. Wheel effects are already pretty busted, so worst case it's just piling on, but that's the deck it's going to find a home in, rather than discard theme.
@Creid233 That's a good point. No one ever seems to think much about wheels when designing discard or draw payoffs, so they always seem pretty busted with them. Guess I'm guilty of that now, too. I'm really curious how that would play out with a wheel deck, now. If you can make someone discard a full hand, that's 14 life. Yikes!
@StuffnSuch given Nekusar & friends, along with the fact that most wheels make you draw at least as much as you discard, I don’t think Terminus Machine is more of a threat than existing cards unless you specifically chain multiple Windfall effects (to take advantage of the increasing number of cards in hand). If you’re wheeling though, you also have to also figure out how to not kill yourself in the process, unlike with existing cards.
I think you've got a strong hit with both Ambition's Edge and Purifex Charm. Love both of 'em. AE is going to find quite a few homes, slotting in at about the same strength as Sign in Blood; especially in aristocrats decks. To be perfectly honest, the only criticism I would levy against the card is I don't think the name quite fits the effect. "Price of Ambition"? Or something close? It's a minor nitpick; rules wise, this is excellent.
Purifex Charm is 95% of the way there, everything in it is on color point and overall is pretty balanced. I do think it's slightly on the weaker side of the existing 3 color charms, so I'd up one function a small bit. The second seems to be the best case - perhaps either up the damage to 3, or leave at 2 and target anything? Even when you just balance that against Shock, it's very overcosted for that effect, so that would remain the lowest-use case.
@cadstar369 It seems the closest comparison to Purifex Charm is Bant Charm as there's a destroy artifact-exile enchantment parallel and a counter instant-exile sorcery parallel. This leaves the comparison of tucking a creature to Magma Spraying a creature, which comes out heavily in favour of Bant Charm because it can remove any creature it can target, no questions asked. Given that three colour charms tend to do things in threes, I'd suggest upping the damage to three. I wouldn't worry about lowering the damage to weaken the red effect just because exiling makes the other two effects slightly better than if they were straight counter and destroy. Yes, it would make the damage from Purifex Charm slightly better than the damage from Naya Charm, but it would still be worse than the damage from Darigaaz's Charm.
Ambition's Edge seems reasonable as it simply gives each creature you control the potential to become what I imagine a black Sleight of Hand would look like. The key to the balance was making it a sorcery. I think you'd almost always pay the life to get the card in hand, even if it's just a land, given that you have to give up a creature to get the effect, but I suppose the option to save some life and/or bin both cards would be the most relevant for black. The first copy of the spell does seem overcosted as it also requires a creature sacrifice. I see the symmetry in having a starter of paying {b} and making every copy of Ambition's Edge cost a creature, but I think that will relegate the spell to only being cast for its maximum Replicate value to do mass digging/card drawing. It's not a spell that has any value in redeeming a questionable opening hand, if that's of any concern.
@Creid223@Jadefire thank you both for the feedback; will up the damage on Purifex Charm later today & consider dropping the sacrifice cost for the initial cast of Ambition's Edge.
While I wasn't thinking about it at the time, the value of cheap cards in sketchy opening hands is something I should consider more going forward. Recently I’ve started to find myself annoyed by a number of the recent 1-drop charms/cantrips that tutor for lands and/or dig through lots of cards (perhaps that stems more from my not being a fan of green, as these effects tend to be green).
@LvB I think the discussion around some past cards, though interesting, has left your equipment, The Plowshare, just hanging there, waiting to get some feedback. I have a few things to say about it. First, the obvious connection is with the card Swords to Plowshares, but what you may not realize about that card is it, from a flavor perspective, represents a creature choosing to give up a life of violence and battle and instead decides to become a farmer. Essentially, the original spell is causing the creature to just be overcome with a desire to do good in the world, and the plowshare represents the gaining of life that happens as part of the effect. Therefore, flavorfully, if you had an equipment called The Plowshare, it should keep the equipped creature out of combat and allow it to help it's controller gain life or something. To sum up, this equipment feels more like a sword than a plowshare.
Flavor aside, however, I really like the design of this card. It reminds me of Godsend, but not so busted. The formatting can be fixed by getting rid of the italics (which makes me think it's reminder text or flavor text and I should ignore it for gameplay purposes) and keeping the ability part of the same paragraph. The quotes are enough to distinguish it and what the ability does. You also just say "equipped creature" not "the equipped creature". Finally, you could lower the cost of the Swords to Plowshares effect down to just one W. It would match with the actual spell and not make it too busted. Your opponent can see it coming and just not give you a chance to use the ability unless they're okay with it and the creature could easily die in combat before the ability even matters. It won't be broken.
Here's another of mine:
I thought I'd try to make a card that is as likely to kill you as to win you the game. What do you think? Is this more likely to be an easy win-con or will it tend to blow up in your face? Can you build around it to break it?
@StuffnSuch it's fairly easy to win with Face Death. White has access to plenty of spells in a variety of flavors to keep Face Death from killing you (e.g. Teferi's Protection, Angel's Grace, Riot Control), and WB has access to tons of great removal and board wipes, so there should be little to no issue stalling through the suspend cast. It would be a little more difficult to use if you lost life equal to the total power of all creatures, but even then I don't think it'd be particularly dangerous. (Honestly, I can't think of any matchup where Face Death is likely to blow up in your face.)
Edit 2/17: In light of the comments below, I'd like to suggest another direction to consider taking this, since we already have a plethora of wincon/losecon enchantments that count up/down. (Name changed below because it seemed a touch more fitting.)
Overcome Death {w}{b}
Enchantment
Shroud
You can't gain life.
At the beginning of each upkeep, if you have 0 or less life, you win the game.
(This way, rather than just stalling out a timer, you have to actively figure out what to do with this effect to win the game, particularly in a fashion where white spells don't make this trivially simple.)
@StuffnSuch - Echoing what cadstar said: so long as those sources are doing damage to you, you can look to many white and some black effects to negate the downside completely. Holy Day and Darkness are the same card in different colors. Worship - which requires you to control a creature - prevents your life from dropping below 1. Inside of a limited card pool like Standard, this may be more lethal; in an unlimited card pool, it's really no downside at all. You could even use Comeuppance to redirect the damage from your opponent(s) creatures back at them. White and Black are also the strongest board-wipe colors by far, so you stand a good chance of just nuking every creature off the board the turn before this casts.
Changing it to life loss will help with some of that. However, I think there's a larger issue with this card design.
Personal opinion, but cards that are alternate win cons should be something you can interact with fairly easily. This one is going to sit in exile for 5 turns and then probably win the game and the only real chance to stop it is a counterspell. If I were looking to create a card like this, I would make it an enchantment that has 5 counters on it as it enters play, removing one each upkeep. When all are gone, sac it and do the effect. (There's still some issues with this, such as Hex Parasite, but it's overall a more interactable design space.) Making it a permanent also lets you put on other abilities that could make it fun. For example with this, I might add "2: Put a 5/1 black and white Wraith creature token with Defender into play under their control. Any player may play this ability."
@StuffnSuch I agreed with Creid233 and cadstar369. However, I usually don't like the idea of effect that immediately ends the game within five turns. I would prefer Face Death to be Enchantment with 5 counters like Creid233 said. However, I would like it better, if:
When Face Death enters the battlefield, each creature you control deals damage to you equal to its power.
Players can only cast noncreature spells unless there is a or more time counter on Face Death.
On your upkeep, remove a time counter from Face Death.
That way will give opponents a chance to enter survival mode when time runs out. They can try to destroy the enchantment or fight its controller to death. I would say that's fair, because you "paid" your life to make that happen just to have creatures as your shield against opponents entering survival mode. Like cadstar369 says, White is well known for controlling the creatures and Black is well known for "Blood for Power". Now for opinion about this; Creator, Multiverse Maker by FireOfGolden | MTG Cardsmith
Creator, Multiverse Maker is obviously a commander card. In normal games it would be just bad. You could use its -5 one or 2 times and thats it.
In Commander however where every enemy can have 2-3 colorless creatures on the board without the game being won by then, it could get counters fast. You might even be able to use its -20 if the enemies have enough creatures.
But there is maybe one thing you might wanna change and that is, give it Partner. Since its a Planeswalker you cant win the Game via Commander-Damage, so giving it Partner might be a good idea to have a creature-commander too.
@LvB ; Plowshare - Flash + free attachment is too much of an effect for the cost on the card. Plus it feels cluttered. I think the rest of the design is fine, but I'd probably remove Flash. Also, the Equip cost on the card should be significantly higher; probably 4. (+1/+1 with a minor ability equips for 2 as a standard. Things that attach for free, such as Living Weapons, have increased equip costs for when you need to reuse them.)
Burn the Infidels - Gonna examine this card from two perspectives. The first is the card design itself: this effect is grossly undercosted and also the wrong color. For existing references for this kind of ability, let's look to Call to the Grave and Archfiend of Depravity. White generally does not do sac effects unless balanced across all players, except when splashing black. And this mechanic is potentially one-sided, even if it rotates players. As such, I'd recommend using hybrid mana for this and give it the white or black option. The cost for this should be about a CMC of 5-6 total. You can lower it by removing the ETB effect. For reference, "each player sacs a creature" at sorcery speed is worth 1 CMC: Innocent Blood. However, as a permanent card, that effect is worth more, because you can potentially flicker it to get repeats, so just the ETB by itself is worth 2 CMC. Finally, the phrasing on the 2nd ability can be cleaned up a bit to match existing cards by changing it to "At the beginning of each player's end step, that player chooses a creature. Each player then sacrifices a creature that does not share a creature type with the chosen creature."
Second criticism: This card would never get printed as it is, thematically. As a custom card being discussed on a forum like this, this isn't really a problem (at least in my opinion), but it's worth saying this: in 2020, WotC banned in all formats seven old cards that are not considered suitable by today's standards, because their names, artwork, rules, etc. invoked racial and religious intolerance. (If you want to see the kind of themes that were considered unacceptable by current standards, the cards were: Invoke Prejudice, Cleanse, Stone-throwing Devils, Pradesh Gypsies, Crusade, Jihad, and Imprison.) The name selected for this and the artwork for the card is reminiscent of these.
Mechalichdom - I can see the lich-style mechanic you're going for here; I think you're over-thinking it a bit. The CMC for this is approximately right; it should be a 5-6 CMC effect. Making it WUBRG does warrant it being 5, although I would argue this doesn't need to be all colors. Maybe B/G/W? Either way, it's fine in that regard, you can cost this effect however you like. IMO, you can remove the life-loss mechanics from this card and it'll still be fine. Firstly, it's highly difficult to use this in a normal 20 life game of magic as it's written: you'd need to gain significant life to offset the life loss plus the damage your opponent is doing to you. Even in commander, getting to 20 poison before losing due to life loss would be troublesome. Usually "Lich" effects say you don't lose the game for having 0 life. Since this one isn't doing that, there's no need to punish the player for trying to get poison counters; they'll still just loose if the opponent beats the life out of them. So, I would shorten this to "You do not lose the game for having 10 or more poison counters. If you have 20 or more poison counters, you win the game." Putting poison counters onto yourself is already at least somewhat difficult. Once one is on there, proliferate is your best option. Your opponents aren't going to keep giving you poison counters if this is in play. So this is already a tough alternate win. Plus, it's a very risky one too - once you're over halfway to your goal, any enchantment removal causes you to lose immediately. The downsides are built into the win-con, you don't need to lay into it harder. (Also, there's really no reason for this effect to be Legendary.)
Hmm, ok, the "enter the battlefield" sacrifice effect of Burn the infidels could be abused, thats right. Without it it would still be a good card. The name might be questionable, but right now Elesh Norn has this zealot thing going on, so i dont know. Since white is quite fanatical its kinda fitting to burn everyone who isnt part of a certain group. The Artwork is taken from a historical engraving. Might not be pleasant for everyone but witch burning is part of our history.
Ah, well, anyway, next one. (im a bit worried that this might be totally overpowered)
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On the Soul Shard, remember, all aura cards specify the type of permanent they enchant, so you'd want to start with saying "Enchant Creature". The ability itself, is super cool. I think it's a great design. The Mimeoplasm decks would be able to put something like that to use for sure.
As far as Death of Life's Energy, tapping a land for mana IS an ability. I'm hoping you didn't design this with that in mind. Right now, it basically says (with very few exceptions) "Your opponents don't get to play Magic anymore". You may want to change it to "If a spell or ability of a non-land permanent your opponent controls would add mana, that ability adds no mana instead." That way they can still play the game but mana rocks/dorks and ritual effects are turned off. I'm assuming that's what you were going for. It may be a better effect if it's not one sided, either. Make it turn of your spells and dorks and such, too. That way it can't just be run, haphazardly. You'd only want to play it if you aren't abusing those mana sources in your own strategy. It would be a more interesting card, and less likely to be just a given to slot into a lot of sideboards in formats where fast mana is abundant.
I've got an Abzan Life Gain Matters commander deck, and there's not a really good commander for those colors that fits the theme. I thought I'd try to make one. Here's what I came up with.
Just a card I forgot I made awhile ago
@LvB Correct wording wise, Phyrexian Cathedral would say "each player sacrifices a creature and a land" (which is a massive hit to the board for free while also getting a land that can conceivably tap for crazy amounts of mana and can serve as removal) I think it may be one of the strongest lands in the game, if not the strongest land. If it just said {t}: add {b} for each creature that died this turn, without any ETB or it would still be one of the best lands in the game. It is way too good and probably could never be printed for real, unless your choice of adding phyrexian mana is to imply it's adding black mana with the condition that it can only be used to pay phyrexian mana costs. There's probably plenty of ways to still break this, but decks typically don't have phyrexian mana costs as anywhere close to the majority of their costs, so it might have a slightly less utility, but it still seems pretty busted.
The Corrosive Mist, however, is a really cool idea. It may be a little under costed, as there are a lot of ways this can be used and abused, but it's a neat design and seems very flavorful. I can see it being a huge blowout at some point in most games, while a dead card in plenty of games as well, which makes it a very interesting card to play with.
@LvB In regards to your flesh golem, I think that the idea of the card is really solid. However the other abilities can use somes re-hashing. The first ability should be re-worded as "Whenever Demonblood Skinflayer enters the battlefield, you may pay up to 3 life." and the second ability should specify who or what it's regenerating. If it is regenerating another creature then it's fine, but if it regenerates itself, then the ability wouldn't work since +1/+1 counters don't go into the graveyard. Maybe consider just making the regen ability cost more like {1}{p/b}{p/b}, you can make it remove two +1/+1 counters from another creatute instead of this one then keep the cost, or an ability that would work better with its second ability would be you can keep the cost and make it sacrifice a creature instead which would triger it's second ability.
I would like review on cards from my main account which didn't get as much attention
Drovar Firebrood
Karth Frostbrood
Pomu, on the other hand, just seems really broken with any token strategy. I've often made 10 of the same creature in a token deck, some times much more than 10. That's basically an anthem for tokens that can scale ridiculously well. If nothing else, that's a cool card to combo with Spy Kit. I'd probably run it in the 99 of my Cadira, Caller of the Small deck, just to make all my bunnies absolute tanks.
I feel like Kronii is a really difficult commander to build around. It seems to just be a sort of good control option, but by suspending everything, you either lose the timing you need for a control deck, or you cast cards that you can wait on, but then you really don't want to cast them unless there's some benefit from Kronii. It just seems unlikely that you'll ever really accomplish much with her ability. You might want to exile the cards with time counters, but don't give them suspend, so they don't automatically have to lose a counter at the beginning of the turn (like Alaundo the Seer), so you can, for instance, float a counter spell and save it for when you really need it.
Here's my most recent card that I feel like may be easy to break, but I want to hear your opinions. Is this too good with looting or rummaging? Does this make 8 Rack too good? Let me know.
@StuffnSuch ;I have little experience with modern, but after looking up some decklists I don't know if 8 Rack really wants Terminus Machine (it's slow, doesn't necessarily work depending on which discard spell you cast, and is probably a win-more in most circumstances). I'd be more concerned if this appears alongside Queza or Sheoldred, the Apocalypse, or in something like a wheels deck like Nekusar & friends. Perhaps such decks already have enough options though, so Terminus Machine likely isn't much of an issue anywhere. It would make Sire of Insanity pretty nuts though, so maybe there's potential for a spin on hellbent decks here.
I'd appreciate feedback on these cards:
Ambition's edge seems like an upgrade or 'Read the Bones', with that replicate being a suitable power up for black. I feel like it's pretty balanced to that regard.
Purifex's charm is too similar to the other jeskai charms to be honest. I feel it needs a little more to set it apart from it. What exactly? I don't know. But still pretty solid as a playable card. Good job
@LvB in general, charms have three relatively overcosted abilities in exchange for the flexibility. Given existing charms that counter spells, the only unrestricted ones are Archmage Charm for UUU (for which 'counter target spell' is overcosted) and Dromar's Charm (for which the other two effects are very bad; likely to compensate). Given Obscura Charm's second mode, Purifex Charm is restricted to a single type since exiling spells is stronger. (Similar arguments lead from various charms to the other two abilities.) Additionally, I'm curious as to why you suggest shifting the red effect to a weaker variant (none of the effects it prevents are particularly common), while leaving the white ability unchanged; this looks like a similar situation to Dromar's Charm, which doesn't seem particularly playable or interesting.
Overall, I fail to understand the thought process behind both of your assertions & suggestions regarding Purifex Charm, and would appreciate it if you elaborated.
I think you've got a strong hit with both Ambition's Edge and Purifex Charm. Love both of 'em. AE is going to find quite a few homes, slotting in at about the same strength as Sign in Blood; especially in aristocrats decks. To be perfectly honest, the only criticism I would levy against the card is I don't think the name quite fits the effect. "Price of Ambition"? Or something close? It's a minor nitpick; rules wise, this is excellent.
Purifex Charm is 95% of the way there, everything in it is on color point and overall is pretty balanced. I do think it's slightly on the weaker side of the existing 3 color charms, so I'd up one function a small bit. The second seems to be the best case - perhaps either up the damage to 3, or leave at 2 and target anything? Even when you just balance that against Shock, it's very overcosted for that effect, so that would remain the lowest-use case.
It seems the closest comparison to Purifex Charm is Bant Charm as there's a destroy artifact-exile enchantment parallel and a counter instant-exile sorcery parallel. This leaves the comparison of tucking a creature to Magma Spraying a creature, which comes out heavily in favour of Bant Charm because it can remove any creature it can target, no questions asked. Given that three colour charms tend to do things in threes, I'd suggest upping the damage to three. I wouldn't worry about lowering the damage to weaken the red effect just because exiling makes the other two effects slightly better than if they were straight counter and destroy. Yes, it would make the damage from Purifex Charm slightly better than the damage from Naya Charm, but it would still be worse than the damage from Darigaaz's Charm.
Ambition's Edge seems reasonable as it simply gives each creature you control the potential to become what I imagine a black Sleight of Hand would look like. The key to the balance was making it a sorcery. I think you'd almost always pay the life to get the card in hand, even if it's just a land, given that you have to give up a creature to get the effect, but I suppose the option to save some life and/or bin both cards would be the most relevant for black. The first copy of the spell does seem overcosted as it also requires a creature sacrifice. I see the symmetry in having a starter of paying {b} and making every copy of Ambition's Edge cost a creature, but I think that will relegate the spell to only being cast for its maximum Replicate value to do mass digging/card drawing. It's not a spell that has any value in redeeming a questionable opening hand, if that's of any concern.
@Creid223 @Jadefire thank you both for the feedback; will up the damage on Purifex Charm later today & consider dropping the sacrifice cost for the initial cast of Ambition's Edge.
While I wasn't thinking about it at the time, the value of cheap cards in sketchy opening hands is something I should consider more going forward. Recently I’ve started to find myself annoyed by a number of the recent 1-drop charms/cantrips that tutor for lands and/or dig through lots of cards (perhaps that stems more from my not being a fan of green, as these effects tend to be green).
Flavor aside, however, I really like the design of this card. It reminds me of Godsend, but not so busted. The formatting can be fixed by getting rid of the italics (which makes me think it's reminder text or flavor text and I should ignore it for gameplay purposes) and keeping the ability part of the same paragraph. The quotes are enough to distinguish it and what the ability does. You also just say "equipped creature" not "the equipped creature". Finally, you could lower the cost of the Swords to Plowshares effect down to just one W. It would match with the actual spell and not make it too busted. Your opponent can see it coming and just not give you a chance to use the ability unless they're okay with it and the creature could easily die in combat before the ability even matters. It won't be broken.
Here's another of mine:
I thought I'd try to make a card that is as likely to kill you as to win you the game. What do you think? Is this more likely to be an easy win-con or will it tend to blow up in your face? Can you build around it to break it?
Edit 2/17: In light of the comments below, I'd like to suggest another direction to consider taking this, since we already have a plethora of wincon/losecon enchantments that count up/down. (Name changed below because it seemed a touch more fitting.)
Overcome Death {w}{b}
Enchantment
Shroud
You can't gain life.
At the beginning of each upkeep, if you have 0 or less life, you win the game.
Changing it to life loss will help with some of that. However, I think there's a larger issue with this card design.
Personal opinion, but cards that are alternate win cons should be something you can interact with fairly easily. This one is going to sit in exile for 5 turns and then probably win the game and the only real chance to stop it is a counterspell. If I were looking to create a card like this, I would make it an enchantment that has 5 counters on it as it enters play, removing one each upkeep. When all are gone, sac it and do the effect. (There's still some issues with this, such as Hex Parasite, but it's overall a more interactable design space.) Making it a permanent also lets you put on other abilities that could make it fun. For example with this, I might add "2: Put a 5/1 black and white Wraith creature token with Defender into play under their control. Any player may play this ability."
When Face Death enters the battlefield, each creature you control deals damage to you equal to its power.
Players can only cast noncreature spells unless there is a or more time counter on Face Death.
On your upkeep, remove a time counter from Face Death.
That way will give opponents a chance to enter survival mode when time runs out. They can try to destroy the enchantment or fight its controller to death. I would say that's fair, because you "paid" your life to make that happen just to have creatures as your shield against opponents entering survival mode. Like cadstar369 says, White is well known for controlling the creatures and Black is well known for "Blood for Power".
Now for opinion about this;
Creator, Multiverse Maker by FireOfGolden | MTG Cardsmith
Plowshare - Flash + free attachment is too much of an effect for the cost on the card. Plus it feels cluttered. I think the rest of the design is fine, but I'd probably remove Flash. Also, the Equip cost on the card should be significantly higher; probably 4. (+1/+1 with a minor ability equips for 2 as a standard. Things that attach for free, such as Living Weapons, have increased equip costs for when you need to reuse them.)
Burn the Infidels - Gonna examine this card from two perspectives. The first is the card design itself: this effect is grossly undercosted and also the wrong color. For existing references for this kind of ability, let's look to Call to the Grave and Archfiend of Depravity. White generally does not do sac effects unless balanced across all players, except when splashing black. And this mechanic is potentially one-sided, even if it rotates players. As such, I'd recommend using hybrid mana for this and give it the white or black option. The cost for this should be about a CMC of 5-6 total. You can lower it by removing the ETB effect. For reference, "each player sacs a creature" at sorcery speed is worth 1 CMC: Innocent Blood. However, as a permanent card, that effect is worth more, because you can potentially flicker it to get repeats, so just the ETB by itself is worth 2 CMC. Finally, the phrasing on the 2nd ability can be cleaned up a bit to match existing cards by changing it to "At the beginning of each player's end step, that player chooses a creature. Each player then sacrifices a creature that does not share a creature type with the chosen creature."
Second criticism: This card would never get printed as it is, thematically. As a custom card being discussed on a forum like this, this isn't really a problem (at least in my opinion), but it's worth saying this: in 2020, WotC banned in all formats seven old cards that are not considered suitable by today's standards, because their names, artwork, rules, etc. invoked racial and religious intolerance. (If you want to see the kind of themes that were considered unacceptable by current standards, the cards were: Invoke Prejudice, Cleanse, Stone-throwing Devils, Pradesh Gypsies, Crusade, Jihad, and Imprison.) The name selected for this and the artwork for the card is reminiscent of these.
Mechalichdom - I can see the lich-style mechanic you're going for here; I think you're over-thinking it a bit. The CMC for this is approximately right; it should be a 5-6 CMC effect. Making it WUBRG does warrant it being 5, although I would argue this doesn't need to be all colors. Maybe B/G/W? Either way, it's fine in that regard, you can cost this effect however you like.
IMO, you can remove the life-loss mechanics from this card and it'll still be fine. Firstly, it's highly difficult to use this in a normal 20 life game of magic as it's written: you'd need to gain significant life to offset the life loss plus the damage your opponent is doing to you. Even in commander, getting to 20 poison before losing due to life loss would be troublesome. Usually "Lich" effects say you don't lose the game for having 0 life. Since this one isn't doing that, there's no need to punish the player for trying to get poison counters; they'll still just loose if the opponent beats the life out of them.
So, I would shorten this to "You do not lose the game for having 10 or more poison counters. If you have 20 or more poison counters, you win the game."
Putting poison counters onto yourself is already at least somewhat difficult. Once one is on there, proliferate is your best option. Your opponents aren't going to keep giving you poison counters if this is in play. So this is already a tough alternate win. Plus, it's a very risky one too - once you're over halfway to your goal, any enchantment removal causes you to lose immediately. The downsides are built into the win-con, you don't need to lay into it harder. (Also, there's really no reason for this effect to be Legendary.)
Hope this helps!