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Custom-Start: An experimental challenge
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lightning Speed+#37
https://mtgcardsmith.com/view/mind-depletion
https://mtgcardsmith.com/view/eldrazi-corruption-3
https://mtgcardsmith.com/view/eldrazi-ambusher-2
Edit: I hope that I can actually do that, because rn I'm in a hurry and am just commenting on the most recent packs I see.
Hey! Good job on meeting the requirements, but there must have been a misunderstanding on the common rules of the challenge, you need to design a common, an uncommon, a rare and a mythic, and those are three rares >.<
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@Potato13
Rainbow #33 is all yours!
It's going to be multicolored cards in the theme of Angels and/or Demons in white, black and red. Obviously, the card with the five-coloured identity is allowed to break the Mardu colour identity, but just this card! Hope you do well!
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@Faiths_Guide
Welcome to the challenge! First you need to choose one design pack and one flavor pack from those six (these are all yours, nobody else can claim them):
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The next person who wants to participate can claim a design pack and a flavor pack from those six (fair warning, the contest closes on Sunday!):
My submission for my jump-start! I hope you do this event more than once; these are really fun to build around. Kinda sad that I can't get a second round of pack, because these are really, really fun!
https://mtgcardsmith.com/view/archangel-selyena (I know I forgot the legendary border, apologies.)
https://mtgcardsmith.com/view/butcher-of-the-guildless
https://mtgcardsmith.com/view/cackling-angel
https://mtgcardsmith.com/view/smog-demon
Smiles and Poisons and flavor pack #30 please
Perfect, you entry satisfies all the restrictions, congrats!
And yeah, I underestimated a bit how many people would be interested in the challenge, unfortunately. When there are some overly complex challenges like this one, you usually get around five people participating but I think the visual aspect of it draw more people into it than normal ^^" So I can't let people have another round right now because I don't have enough packs and also that's like three times the number of entries I thought I was going to judge already xD
@fire12
Works for me! Your entry is valid, congrats ^^
@Faiths_Guide
Here you go, Smiles and Poisons #30 incoming! (You like a challenge, don't you ? ;p)
Smiles and Poisons is kind of a group hug pack, the spirit is that there must always be a part of the card that could benefit an opponent. And to go with it:
Kaladesh, of course! The cards must be in white/blue/red at most, a pretty good combination of colours for group hug if you ask me ^^ Good luck!
Thanks, I'd better get to work!
I realized after coming up with this concept that you specifically said exchange control of two permanents.
Oh well, maybe this will be my fourth card:
https://mtgcardsmith.com/view/process-mandate
Anyone have thoughts on these possible changes for balance?
- Up the cost {2}{u} or more
- Make a CMC restriction
- Make a type restriction (noncreature, etc.)
Edit:Cost is now {2}{u} and it can only target artifact, enchantment, instant, or sorcery spells.
Ah yeah, to be fair I forgot that was a possibility, I put two "permanents" on the design pack but the spirit is to make an exchange spell. I'll overrule it, let's pretend it says two "objects" as I really just wanted an exchange card, I don't actually care if they are permanents, so you don't need to make another exchange cards if you don't want to ^^
I'm not going to give too many hints on balance as I'm also in charge of choosing the best entry in the end, but yeah based on Sudden Substitution I agree it's probably a bit generous right now ^^
Wonderful, all restrictions have been met, congrats! ^^
Hey, I'm looking at all the entries and I just realised that yours is missing one card and has one too many rares
Am I too late?
Hey! No it's technically not too late but you would need to submit your entry before the end of tomorrow so it's going to be complicated >.< If you still want to try, you can choose a design pack and a flavour pack from the packs above (Call an Ambulance / Brawn & Might / Proactive / 11 / 16 / 38). Here's a link to the comment: LINK
Sorry, I know I said I already checked your entry but I just now realised that you went mythic > rare > uncommon >... rare instead of common xD I honestly thought it was your common, is that just a typo in the card? I'm going to consider Smog Demon as a common because it looks like it was designed to be one, but if it's not can you please update it to a common? ^^
@Arceus8523
@LordTachanka123
@HeroKP
@IzItTru
@KorandAngels
@Aggroman15
@Dizzydude
@Faiths_Guide
REMINDER: DEADLINE TOMORROW!
sorry again.
The plane of Kaldheim is one of Magic's lesser-known cannon planes, and is one that hasn't had a lot of expansion on it. All we know of the plane is one location: Skybreen, a blizard-wracked mountain range home to a native race of toughened barbarians. While we don't know for sure this is MTG's "viking" plane, a lot of signs point to it, thus I decided to set my entries there, and worldbuild upon it a little bit.
The common, satisfying category 1
I envision Kaldheim featuring multiple warring clans/tribes/"factions"/etc. vying to expand their territories and control, and this entry focuses on the brutal combat that can break out between warring factions.
Mechanically, I wanted to emphasize the idea that coin flipping doesn't inherently have to make a card bad, and that both results of a coin flip can result in good outcomes for the card. This card, firstly, incentivizes an aggressive strategy in the hypothetical limited environment and/or JumpStart pack it would exist in, as its effect only triggers when it becomes blocked and makes profitably blocking no matter how the coin comes up. I don't envision this seeing any sort of constructed play, but it seems relevant enough for limited.
The uncommon, satisfying category 2
Rain of Arrows flavorfully references two worldbuilding concepts I had in mind, the Northern Ravagers, one of the "factions" consisting of archers skilled at ranged warfare, and, more importantly, the Blustergales. These are winds that ravage the snowy peaks of Kaldheim, and create unpredictable whether patterns, resulting in blizzards one day and clear skies the next. Many factions have learned to adapt to the Blustergales and find ways to use them to their advantage, and the Northern Ravagers are no exception.
Mechanically, I wanted a card that had the potential to be way better on rate than the typical 3-mana kill spell, but also the chance to be way worse on rate than Bone Splinters, since Timmies of the game like these big swing moments like this. This card originally started out at just "destroy two target creatures chosen at random," but it was pointed out to me that this could be used to devastating effect in a control deck that doesn't reply on creatures, hence the provision that it can only be cast while you control a creature.
The rare, satisfying category 2
Blustergale Reader shows how some "factions" on Kaldheim are taking advantage of the harsh winds that blow throughout the mountainous terrain of the north. Even despite Kaldheim residents being more primitive than a lot of other planes, they are still humans and humans are great at pattern recognition. Blustergale Readers are shamans that can predict how these seemingly-chaotic winds will blow, and are often seen assisting in planning out battle strategies, settlements, and seasonal preparations.
Mechanically, this card is a "pressure valve" on all the random effects that would be flying around in this hypothetical pack by making them no longer random. It's a strong card that can warp the way a deck would play, and might help Spikes warm up to the idea of running random effects given how ell this card can take advantage of them.
The mythic, satisfying categories 2 and 3
Ramaz is a little-known cannon MTG planeswalker who played a subtle-yet-important role in the story leading up to Rise of the Eldrazi. A pawn of the elder dragon planeswalker Nicol Bolas, Ramaz tricked Chandra Nalaar into stealing an artifact on Zendikar known as the Dragon Scroll, which set in motion the events that set the Eldrazi free from their imprisoment, letting them loose on the world and culminating in the events of Battle for Zendikar block (the aftermath of which will be seen in the upcoming set Zendikar Rising). Essentially, without Ramaz's actions as a pawn of Bolas, the events of MTG lore that we see today, such as the formation of the gatewatch and the battle against the Eldrazi, wouldn't have happened.
This card depicts Ramaz some time after the events of Rise of the Eldrazi. In revenge for what he tricked Chandra into doing, the pyromancer planeswalker began to tack and chase Ramaz across various planes with the hopes of confronting and killing him for his deeds. This ultimately culminated in a skirmish on Kaldheim. Ramaz escaped, revealing only that he had been a pawn in the grater scheme of Bolas.
Now, Ramaz sees a bit of a color shift from his previous identity, where he was Temur (green/blue/red), this was in part due to the color restrictions of my pack, but also in part due to the fact that he was working under Bolas, a Grixis (blue/black/red) planeswalker. I envision that as Ramaz remained working under Bolas, he became more and more power-hungry and succumbed more and more to Bolas and submitting to him, hoping that he would come out on top alongside Bolas once the elder dragon had achieved his goals.
The effects go pretty straightforward, the plus sets up the ultimate, so that the ultimate doesn't remain truly random, and his 0 functions both as creature removal and as a way to dump cards into the graveyard for his plus. Individually, I knew I wanted one of his abilities to discard cards randomly for in-pack synergy with Blustergale Reader, which became his 0, and I knew I wanted at least one effect to not be random and help set up for the freecasting ability, which became his +1.
This is the card that took me the longest to design and is one of the reasons this entry came so late. I struggled to make a planeswalker based around randomness that wasn't as bad as Tibalt, but also wasn't downright insane in turn. It's taken a lot of fine tuning, and I'm still not sure he's quite balanced. The biggest concern I have is his +1 being too strong as repeatable recursion, but I also don't have a lot of time before the deadline to playtest.
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Now then, all that being said, I enjoyed this. Is it too late to take another challenge?
https://mtgcardsmith.com/view/amiable-smith
https://mtgcardsmith.com/view/exhilarated-thief
https://mtgcardsmith.com/view/process-mandate
https://mtgcardsmith.com/view/infiltrating-saboteur
Thanks for the contest, @ningyounk!
The rules of the challenge are actually in the introduction! Everyone gets three little challenges but you can distribute them across all four cards any way you want, you don't need to make one card for each restriction ^^
@SNAPcreator7
That's going to be difficult yeah, the deadline is today (it's 2 a.m. where I live right now) so by the time I wake up and open the packs you choose, you get like a few hours to design the cards, that's probably not going to lead to anything fun ^^"
I am so close to being done... would it be ok if I submit in around 3 or 4 hours? Or is that much too late?
am very sorry.
No problem, I usually close my contests when the day of the deadline is officially over everywhere in the world ^^ Right now it's about 3 a.m. in the samoan islands so you still got time xD
Yeah sorry, there won't be enough time to choose packs, open them, and design all the cards I'm afraid >.<