When Astral Spellbox enters the battlefield, search your library for a white or blue card, reveal it, and put it into your hand. Then shuffle your library.
:symtap:: Add or to your mana pool.
Phobic Spellbox4
Artifact [U]
When Phobic Spellbox enters the battlefield, search your library for a blue or black card, reveal it, and put it into your hand. Then shuffle your library.
:symtap:: Add or to your mana pool.
Wicked Spellbox4
Artifact [U]
When Wicked Spellbox enters the battlefield, search your library for a black or red card, reveal it, and put it into your hand. Then shuffle your library.
:symtap:: Add or to your mana pool.
Savage Spellbox4
Artifact [U]
When Savage Spellbox enters the battlefield, search your library for a red or green card, reveal it, and put it into your hand. Then shuffle your library.
:symtap:: Add or to your mana pool.
Mighty Spellbox4
Artifact [U]
When Mighty Spellbox enters the battlefield, search your library for a green or white card, reveal it, and put it into your hand. Then shuffle your library.
:symtap:: Add or to your mana pool.
I am also considering tri-color versions that cost :5mana:.
I think these are kind of grossly overpowered. Of course it depends on the format and environment you put them in, but I think Wizards considers tutors of any kind to be worth 4 mana minimum themselves now. Add a 2-ish-mana mana rock on to it and it's definitely under costed at 4, especially since it basically costs 3 since it taps for mana the turn you play it.
I think a better design would be to basically obsolete the terrible Cluestones and make them 3 or 4 colorless to play and CD, T, sac to tutor. That way you have to weigh the utility of the mana rock early versus the essentially 5 mana sorcery tutor later, and it creates interesting decisions when you forgo one resource for another.
Oh, I thought he was talking about playing a spell that is countering a spell with counters on it as it comes into play, but I see you guys were just discussing whether he was flashing a creature with flash in order to flash a flashback or just flashing a creature with flash but not needing flash in order to flashback a spell without flash.
Quite a bit too strong, I feel. They'd be just about right if they tutored to the top of the library. A mana rock is worth a card, and paying a little more for a tutor seems fine, but it shouldn't grant immediate card advantage.
I agree with the others these are too strong, not even accounting for multiple tutoring ala bouncing them back and forth or even goblin welder type things - diabolic tutor if it was colorless should be 6 colorless mana plus mana artifact which is around 3 mana for it to be untapped. That would make the appropriate cost for these around 8 or 9 at which point they are useless.
These just break the colour pie way too much. Far too efficient for what you're getting in any colour other than black.
I'd be more excited by these if they each did something different. BU still shouldn't tutor, but I'd be okay with Ponder. BR could give a Shock, RG could give a Predator's Strike, that sort of thing. Basically, the Zendikar ETB lands (Teetering Peaks), but on artifacts which allow you to bend the colour pie a little further and make them a little more powerful. Could make them even more powerful if you made it conditional on already controlling a card of that colour (or maybe even on having Spectrum (right?) already).
On that note, I like what HammerandSickled was saying about having to sac them for an effect. If you make the sac effect conditional on having Spectrum, these artifacts gives you both incentive to get there and helps you manage it too!
Obviously all my examples should cost 3, which is a more reasonable price for ramping anyway.
At these costs, I'd say that maybe you could reveal the top 2 cards of your library and put a spell of either color into your hand. 1 is probably safer, though.
diabolic tutor if it was colorless should be 6 colorless mana plus mana artifact which is around 3 mana for it to be untapped. That would make the appropriate cost for these around 8 or 9 at which point they are useless.
I don't think your costing formula reflects typical design or development practice.
DOM seems to have a lot of cycles. Does this need to be a cycle?
I think it appears to be that way because I tend to design the cycles first and everything else afterwards. I've also posted a LOT of proof-of-concept cycles that I've later booted from the set. There are probably twice as many cards that I've posted and discarded than there are cards currently "in" the set.
Quite a bit too strong, I feel. They'd be just about right if they tutored to the top of the library. A mana rock is worth a card, and paying a little more for a tutor seems fine, but it shouldn't grant immediate card advantage.
Fair enough! How about this alternative?
Phobic Spellbox v.2 4
Artifact [U]
Phobic Spellbox enters the battlefield tapped.
When Phobic Spellbox enters the battlefield, search your library for a blue or black card, reveal it, then shuffle your library and put that card on top of it.
:symtap:: Add or to your mana pool.
That's definitely a major power hit. Does that feel fair now, or just nerfed?
That's better. The card advantage was the main power issue. They probably don't even need to CIPT.
I maintain, though, that five of these in one set will most likely lead to repetitive gamestates. WotC tries to limit the number of tutors they print for this reason.
I don't think your costing formula reflects typical design or development practice.
Phobic Spellbox v.2 4
Artifact [U]
Phobic Spellbox enters the battlefield tapped.
When Phobic Spellbox enters the battlefield, search your library for a blue or black card, reveal it, then shuffle your library and put that card on top of it.
:symtap:: Add or to your mana pool.
That's definitely a major power hit. Does that feel fair now, or just nerfed?
Its a rough formula - and your new card actually fits it: Comes into play tapped mana artifact is around 2 and a tutor to top of library is around one colored or 2 mana. . . so together around 4 mana. Again just a rough formula to see if a card is around the right cost.
That's better. The card advantage was the main power issue. They probably don't even need to CIPT.
I maintain, though, that five of these in one set will most likely lead to repetitive gamestates. WotC tries to limit the number of tutors they print for this reason.
I think if you stick with the original theme, you could stand to only nerf by putting the card on top (they don't have to ETBT at :4mana:). However, I do like the idea posted earlier:
Phobic Spellbox
Artifact (U)
:symtap:: Add or to your mana pool.
:?mana::symu::symb:, :symtap:, Sacrifice Phobic Spellbox: Search your library for a blue or black card. Reveal it and put it into your hand, then shuffle your library.
Here's another go. Less repetitive, less searching, more potential power:
Phobic Spellbox v.3 4
Artifact [U]
When Phobic Spellbox enters the battlefield, look at the top four cards of your library. You may reveal a blue or black card from among them and put it into your hand. Put the rest on the bottom of your library in any order.
:symtap:: Add or to your mana pool.
It also feels more like a surprise birthday present.
Only potential problem I see with this is that it's much better in a two-colour deck. I know you're trying to push 5-colour (or maybe 4) as an option, and this is less attractive to that deck. Good fix though.
to go with the rest of the DOM cards we have seen why not make them cost 5 and be triple colored?
Phobic Spellbox v.3 5
Artifact [U]
When Phobic Spellbox enters the battlefield, look at the top five cards of your library. You may reveal a blue, black or Red card from among them and put it into your hand. Put the rest on the bottom of your library in any order. T: Add U, B orR to your mana pool.
If you're reaaaaaaally trying to get 5-color going...
Phobic Spellbox
Artifact (U)
When Phobic Spellbox enters the battlefield, look at the top four cards of your library. You may reveal a white, red, or green card from among them and put it into your hand. Put the rest of the cards on the bottom of your library in any order.
:symtap:: Add or to your mana pool.
And then here's just a rando cool thing that popped into my head looking at these. I'll cobble it onto my weird color suggestion:
Phobic Spellbox
Artifact (U)
can't be less than 3.
When Phobic Spellbox enters the battlefield, look at the top X cards of your library. You may reveal a white, red, or green card from among them and put it into your hand. Put the rest of the cards on the bottom of your library in any order.
:symtap:: Add or to your mana pool.
I know you're trying to push 5-colour (or maybe 4)
I am.
Let's go deeper!
Phrenic Spellvault5
Artifact [U]
When Phrenic Spellvault enters the battlefield, search your library for a green card, a blue card, and a black card. Reveal those cards. An opponent chooses two of them. Put the chosen cards into your graveyard and the other into your hand. Then shuffle your library.
:symtap:: Add :symg:, :symu:, or to your mana pool.
Or I can just capitulate to the gods of simplicity and do the following:
Wicked Spellbook4
Artifact [C]
When Wicked Spellbook enters the battlefield, draw a card.
I'd prefer tri-colored spellbooks, myself. The spellbooks have a colorless-feeling effect, are simple, and work better with the needs of tri-colored players. Decks with worse mana tend toward the controlling side, so I might draft this card in a WBR creature destruction deck, whereas I would never pick it in an aggressive straight R/B deck due to its 4cmc.
Tri-colored spellbooks at common leave room for a bicolored uncommon cycle, which I assume will be lands with counters on them that ETB untapped; putting this cycle at uncommon means 1) fewer land cards clogging packs and 2) reducing the number of games where this annoying bookkeeping is likely to come up.
The spellvaults give disproportionate advantage to B/G because those are the colors of recurring things from the graveyard, which doesn't seem fair for a manafixing cycle. Waiting until I have 5 lands in play to get my manafixing is rather sketchy to begin with.
When Phobic Spellbox enters the battlefield, look at the top four cards of your library. You may reveal a blue or black card from among them and put it into your hand. Put the rest on the bottom of your library in any order.
:symtap:: Add or to your mana pool.
The best yet.
While we're brainstorming:
Pentic Spellbox4
Artifact (U)
As Pentic Spellbox enters play, choose a color.
When Pentic Spellbox enters play, search your library for a card that isn't the chosen color, reveal it, then shuffle your library and put that card on top of it. T: Add one mana of the chosen color to your mana pool.
Pentic Spellbox4
Artifact (U)
As Pentic Spellbox enters play, choose a color.
When Pentic Spellbox enters play, search your library for a card that isn't the chosen color, reveal it, then shuffle your library and put that card on top of it. T: Add one mana of the chosen color to your mana pool.
Well now you've got quite literally a colorless any-tutor. With that in mind, shouldn't it cost more?
A spellbox of my own?
Pyrite Spellbox4
Artifact
When Pyrite Spellbox comes into play, search your library for three red cards with different names and reveal them. Exile one of them at random and shuffle the others into your library. When Pyrite Spellbox leaves play, put that card into your hand.
T: Add R to your mana pool.
Sacrifice Pyrite Spellbox: Add R to your mana pool.
I was thinking that a cycle of tutoring artifacts would tutor for things that the color would tutor for, and in red's case, it would be "Random cards." Green would grab Green Creature, White would grab White Enchantment, and so on.
When Phrenic Spellvault enters the battlefield, search your library for a green card, a blue card, and a black card. Reveal those cards. An opponent chooses two of them. Put the chosen cards into your graveyard and the other into your hand. Then shuffle your library.
:symtap:: Add :symg:, :symu:, or to your mana pool.
Or I can just capitulate to the gods of simplicity and do the following:
Wicked Spellbook4
Artifact [C]
When Wicked Spellbook enters the battlefield, draw a card.
:symtap:: Add or to your mana pool.
The first is cool, but clearly not uncommon. It also has an issue that 5cmc mana rocks don't really fulfill a ramp function anymore, and are worse at fixing, so the mana ability is much less enticing.
At 3 I think you could do dual, ETBT, ETB cantrip (powerful). 3cmc triad could be a pretty direct cluestone+obelisk hybrid, but the cluestones have kind of a negative connotation now.
4cmc duals could pretty reasonably tutor to the top of library, and 4 triads could cantrip.
I don't recommend 5cmc duals, but if you go with the triads (which I'd recommend, as mentioned in the mine thread) you could do 1,:symtap:: Add GUB to your mana pool. I kind of like this option , because it makes them feel pretty distinct from previous mana rocks. These could cantrip or top tutor at uncommon, or you could push them to rare and go with the gifts design (this feels pretty sweet to me, so I guess it's a question of how important rarity is).
Must they all do the same thing? Could you not, theoretically, have something akin to:
Wicked Spellbook3
Artifact — Uncommon
When ~ enters the battlefield, look at the top three cards of your library. You may put them back in any order. Then, target creature gets +2/+2 until end of turn. T: Add B or R to your mana pool.
Artifact [U]
When Astral Spellbox enters the battlefield, search your library for a white or blue card, reveal it, and put it into your hand. Then shuffle your library.
:symtap:: Add or to your mana pool.
Artifact [U]
When Phobic Spellbox enters the battlefield, search your library for a blue or black card, reveal it, and put it into your hand. Then shuffle your library.
:symtap:: Add or to your mana pool.
Artifact [U]
When Wicked Spellbox enters the battlefield, search your library for a black or red card, reveal it, and put it into your hand. Then shuffle your library.
:symtap:: Add or to your mana pool.
Artifact [U]
When Savage Spellbox enters the battlefield, search your library for a red or green card, reveal it, and put it into your hand. Then shuffle your library.
:symtap:: Add or to your mana pool.
Artifact [U]
When Mighty Spellbox enters the battlefield, search your library for a green or white card, reveal it, and put it into your hand. Then shuffle your library.
:symtap:: Add or to your mana pool.
I think a better design would be to basically obsolete the terrible Cluestones and make them 3 or 4 colorless to play and CD, T, sac to tutor. That way you have to weigh the utility of the mana rock early versus the essentially 5 mana sorcery tutor later, and it creates interesting decisions when you forgo one resource for another.
-regarding Snapcaster Mage.
I'd be more excited by these if they each did something different. BU still shouldn't tutor, but I'd be okay with Ponder. BR could give a Shock, RG could give a Predator's Strike, that sort of thing. Basically, the Zendikar ETB lands (Teetering Peaks), but on artifacts which allow you to bend the colour pie a little further and make them a little more powerful. Could make them even more powerful if you made it conditional on already controlling a card of that colour (or maybe even on having Spectrum (right?) already).
On that note, I like what HammerandSickled was saying about having to sac them for an effect. If you make the sac effect conditional on having Spectrum, these artifacts gives you both incentive to get there and helps you manage it too!
Obviously all my examples should cost 3, which is a more reasonable price for ramping anyway.
Restricted tutoring is definitely present in all colors. Even unrestricted tutoring isn't particularly black.
Yes.
I don't think your costing formula reflects typical design or development practice.
I think it appears to be that way because I tend to design the cycles first and everything else afterwards. I've also posted a LOT of proof-of-concept cycles that I've later booted from the set. There are probably twice as many cards that I've posted and discarded than there are cards currently "in" the set.
Fair enough! How about this alternative?
Artifact [U]
Phobic Spellbox enters the battlefield tapped.
When Phobic Spellbox enters the battlefield, search your library for a blue or black card, reveal it, then shuffle your library and put that card on top of it.
:symtap:: Add or to your mana pool.
I maintain, though, that five of these in one set will most likely lead to repetitive gamestates. WotC tries to limit the number of tutors they print for this reason.
Its a rough formula - and your new card actually fits it: Comes into play tapped mana artifact is around 2 and a tutor to top of library is around one colored or 2 mana. . . so together around 4 mana. Again just a rough formula to see if a card is around the right cost.
This is essentially my assessment.
I̟̥͍̠ͅn̩͉̣͍̬͚ͅ ̬̬͖t̯̹̞̺͖͓̯̤h̘͍̬e͙̯͈̖̼̮ ̭̬f̺̲̲̪i͙͉̟̩̰r̪̝͚͈̝̥͍̝̲s̼̻͇̘̳͔ͅt̲̺̳̗̜̪̙ ̳̺̥̻͚̗ͅm̜̜̟̰͈͓͎͇o̝̖̮̝͇m̯̻̞̼̫̗͓̤e̩̯̬̮̩n͎̱̪̲̹͖t͇̖s̰̮ͅ,̤̲͙̻̭̻̯̹̰ ̖t̫̙̺̯͖͚̯ͅh͙̯̦̳̗̰̟e͖̪͉̼̯ ̪͕g̞̣͔a̗̦t̬̬͓͙̫̖̭̻e̩̻̯ ̜̖̦̖̤̭͙̬t̞̹̥̪͎͉ͅo͕͚͍͇̲͇͓̺ ̭̬͙͈̣̻t͈͍͙͓̫̖͙̩h̪̬̖̙e̗͈ ̗̬̟̞̺̤͉̯ͅa̦̯͚̙̜̮f͉͙̲̣̞̼t̪̤̞̣͚e̲͉̳̥r͇̪̙͚͓l̥̞̞͎̹̯̹ͅi͓̬f̮̥̬̞͈ͅe͎ ̟̩̤̳̠̯̩̯o̮̘̲p̟͚̣̞͉͓e͍̩̣n͔̼͕͚̜e̬̱d̼̘͎̖̹͍̮̠,͖̺̭̱̮ ̣̲͖̬̪̭̥a̪͚n̟̲̝̤̤̞̗d̘̱̗͇̮͕̳͕͔ ͖̞͉͎t̹̙͎h̰̱͉̗e̪̞̱̝̹̩ͅ ̠̱̩̭̦p̯̙e͓o̳͚̰̯̺̱̰͔̘p̬͎̱̣̼̩͇l̗̟̖͚̠e̱͉͔̱̦̬̟̙ ̖͚̪͔̼̦w̺̖̤̱e͖̗̻̦͓̖̘̜r̭̥e͔̹̫̱͕̦̰͕ ̗͔̠p̠̗͍͍̱̳̠r̰͔͎̰o͉̥͓̰͚̥s̟͚̹̱͔̣t͉̙̳̖͖̪̮r̥̘̥͙̹a͉̟̫̟̳̠̟̭t͈̜̰͈͎e̞̣̭̲̬ ͚̗̯̟͙i͍͖̰̘̦͖͉ṇ̮̻̯̦̲̩͍ ̦̮͚̫̤t͉͖̫͕ͅͅh͙̮̻̘̣̮̼e͕̺ ͙l͕̠͎̰̥i̲͓͉̲g̫̳̟͈͇̖h̠̦̖t͓̯͎̗ ̳̪̘̟̙̩̦o̫̲f̙͔̰̙̠ ̹̪̗͇̯t͖̼̼͉͖̬h̹͇̩e͚̖̺̤͉̹͕̪ ͚͓̭̝̺G͎̗̯̩o̫̯̮̟̮̳̘d̜̲͙̠-̩̳̯̲̗̜P̹̘̥͉̝h͍͈̗̖̝ͅa͍̗̮̼̗r̜̖͇̙̺a̭̺͔̞̳͈o̪̣͓̯̬͙̯̰̗h̖̦͈̥̯͔.͇̣̙̝
Phobic Spellbox
Artifact (U)
:symtap:: Add or to your mana pool.
:?mana::symu::symb:, :symtap:, Sacrifice Phobic Spellbox: Search your library for a blue or black card. Reveal it and put it into your hand, then shuffle your library.
Artifact [U]
When Phobic Spellbox enters the battlefield, look at the top four cards of your library. You may reveal a blue or black card from among them and put it into your hand. Put the rest on the bottom of your library in any order.
:symtap:: Add or to your mana pool.
Only potential problem I see with this is that it's much better in a two-colour deck. I know you're trying to push 5-colour (or maybe 4) as an option, and this is less attractive to that deck. Good fix though.
Phobic Spellbox v.3 5
Artifact [U]
When Phobic Spellbox enters the battlefield, look at the top five cards of your library. You may reveal a blue, black or Red card from among them and put it into your hand. Put the rest on the bottom of your library in any order.
T: Add U, B orR to your mana pool.
If you're reaaaaaaally trying to get 5-color going...
Phobic Spellbox
Artifact (U)
When Phobic Spellbox enters the battlefield, look at the top four cards of your library. You may reveal a white, red, or green card from among them and put it into your hand. Put the rest of the cards on the bottom of your library in any order.
:symtap:: Add or to your mana pool.
And then here's just a rando cool thing that popped into my head looking at these. I'll cobble it onto my weird color suggestion:
Phobic Spellbox
Artifact (U)
can't be less than 3.
When Phobic Spellbox enters the battlefield, look at the top X cards of your library. You may reveal a white, red, or green card from among them and put it into your hand. Put the rest of the cards on the bottom of your library in any order.
:symtap:: Add or to your mana pool.
I am.
Let's go deeper!
Artifact [U]
When Phrenic Spellvault enters the battlefield, search your library for a green card, a blue card, and a black card. Reveal those cards. An opponent chooses two of them. Put the chosen cards into your graveyard and the other into your hand. Then shuffle your library.
:symtap:: Add :symg:, :symu:, or to your mana pool.
Artifact [C]
When Wicked Spellbook enters the battlefield, draw a card.
:symtap:: Add or to your mana pool.
Tri-colored spellbooks at common leave room for a bicolored uncommon cycle, which I assume will be lands with counters on them that ETB untapped; putting this cycle at uncommon means 1) fewer land cards clogging packs and 2) reducing the number of games where this annoying bookkeeping is likely to come up.
The spellvaults give disproportionate advantage to B/G because those are the colors of recurring things from the graveyard, which doesn't seem fair for a manafixing cycle. Waiting until I have 5 lands in play to get my manafixing is rather sketchy to begin with.
Avatar by Numotflame96 of Maelstrom Graphics
Sig banner thanks to DarkNightCavalier of Heroes of the Plane Studios!
The best yet.
While we're brainstorming:
Pentic Spellbox 4
Artifact (U)
As Pentic Spellbox enters play, choose a color.
When Pentic Spellbox enters play, search your library for a card that isn't the chosen color, reveal it, then shuffle your library and put that card on top of it.
T: Add one mana of the chosen color to your mana pool.
Well now you've got quite literally a colorless any-tutor. With that in mind, shouldn't it cost more?
A spellbox of my own?
Pyrite Spellbox 4
Artifact
When Pyrite Spellbox comes into play, search your library for three red cards with different names and reveal them. Exile one of them at random and shuffle the others into your library. When Pyrite Spellbox leaves play, put that card into your hand.
T: Add R to your mana pool.
Sacrifice Pyrite Spellbox: Add R to your mana pool.
I was thinking that a cycle of tutoring artifacts would tutor for things that the color would tutor for, and in red's case, it would be "Random cards." Green would grab Green Creature, White would grab White Enchantment, and so on.
The first is cool, but clearly not uncommon. It also has an issue that 5cmc mana rocks don't really fulfill a ramp function anymore, and are worse at fixing, so the mana ability is much less enticing.
At 3 I think you could do dual, ETBT, ETB cantrip (powerful). 3cmc triad could be a pretty direct cluestone+obelisk hybrid, but the cluestones have kind of a negative connotation now.
4cmc duals could pretty reasonably tutor to the top of library, and 4 triads could cantrip.
I don't recommend 5cmc duals, but if you go with the triads (which I'd recommend, as mentioned in the mine thread) you could do 1,:symtap:: Add GUB to your mana pool. I kind of like this option , because it makes them feel pretty distinct from previous mana rocks. These could cantrip or top tutor at uncommon, or you could push them to rare and go with the gifts design (this feels pretty sweet to me, so I guess it's a question of how important rarity is).
Interested in Custom Card Creation.
My Cube:Cardinal Custom Cube
A custom version of a third modern masters: MM2019
(filter->rarity to see in set rarity).
So...
Artifact [C]
Phrenic Spellbook enters the battlefield tapped.
When Phrenix Spellbook enters the battlefield, draw a card.
:symtap:: Add or to your mana pool.
In that sense you could have them feel like they are part of other colors (via the abilities) which improves the five color theme (the examples here are supposed to have subdued, since its an artifact, blue and green effects). The abilities here are pulled from the //gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Search/Default.aspx?text=+[This">+[card's]+[converted]+[mana]+[cost]+[is]+[6]"]2/color Shadowmoor cards.