Kheva, Bard of Shiv2BR
Legendary Creature — Human Rogue [M]
Haste
Whenever Kheva, Bard of Shiv attacks, gain control of target creature defending player controls until end of combat. Put that creature into combat tapped and attacking that player.
[2/2]
Jodah the Terisian1RGWU
Legendary Creature — Human Wizard [M]
Protection from black
Jodah the Terisian gets +2/+2 for each other creature you control named Jodah the Terisian. 1, T: Put a token that’s a copy of Jodah the Terisian onto the battlefield, except that token isn’t legendary.
[2/2]
Latros the Extractor1GWUB
Legendary Creature — Centaur Rogue [M]
Trample, protection from red
Whenever Latros the Extractor deals combat damage to a player, you may search that player’s library for a card and exile it face down. If you do, that player shuffles his or her library. You may look at and play that card for as long as it remains exiled.
[5/5]
Previous Kheva. Previous Jodah. Previous Latros. The plan is now to put one 4-color legend in Icefall and the remaining two in Nexus.
EDIT: Removed nonbasic landwalk from Kheva.
EDIT: Changed Latros's third clause from "same mana cost" to "same name", reduced it to hit only cards exiled with Latros instead of all exiled cards.
EDIT: Gave Latros trample, changed his ability from an ETB Detention Sphere variant to a damage-trigger Praetor's Grasp variant.
Latros: I don't see green in this. Just to be clear, from my understanding of the last line, your opponents can't cast spells with the same CMC as ANY exiled cards, not just the ones exiled with this creature.If that's the case, its easily too good and quite easily capable of locking out your opponent of playing any spells enitrely in simple combination with something like Tormod's Crypt or Bojuka Bog.
Dahammer4
Artifact - Equipment (R)
Choose one - Equipped creature gets +4/+0; or Double Strike; or "When this creature deals combat damage to a creature, exile that creature"; or t, unattach ~ from this creature: ~ deals 5 damage to target creature." t: Equipped creature gains flying until end of turn.
Equip 3
Much has been said lately of the box-checking school of design regarding ALA / KTK blocks. Let's just get it out of the way that I generally try not do Mantis Riders unless I think the play experience trumps the lack of creativity evident in those kinds of designs.
A lot of people have made a lot of very sound arguments against 4-color design on exactly those grounds. That is: you don't want to box-check, you want the card to feel organic, it's really hard to feel organic in four different colors at the same time, and (as opposed to 2- or 3-color alternatives) 4-color cards are just too tyrannical about their deckbuilding requirements to be worth doing.
Well, you still have a gaping hole in the 4-color design space no matter how sound your argument. So I think you have to approach the problem differently.
What I tried to do here was to define each 4-color pair more by the missing color than by anything else. I wanted Jodah to feel very un-black. I wanted Latros to feel very un-red. And I wanted each of the cards to be as elegant as they could be. Would Latros be more green if I gave him trample? Sure. It even makes flavor sense. It wouldn't push the card over any edges it hasn't already been pushed over. But its extraneous, so I didn't.
It's mana cost, not converted mana cost. The fact that your card in exile prevent them from playing things feels a little wrong to me though.
Are these the only 4 color cards in the block, or is there a mythic cycle for commander and a rare cycle of non-commanders?
Correct, it is very intentionally "mana cost" and not "converted mana cost."
The short version of what I was trying to do was a kind of combination Lobotomy + Oblivion Ring, but with less rules text. The "card in exile" clause was really just there as a power bump, and as an anti-red mechanic. But if it's a huge deal, I can change it to "cards exiled with Latros."
I am only planning on the five 4-color cards in the block. Do you feel that is sufficient or insufficient?
Much has been said lately of the box-checking school of design regarding ALA / KTK blocks. Let's just get it out of the way that I generally try not do Mantis Riders unless I think the play experience trumps the lack of creativity evident in those kinds of designs.
A lot of people have made a lot of very sound arguments against 4-color design on exactly those grounds. That is: you don't want to box-check, you want the card to feel organic, it's really hard to feel organic in four different colors at the same time, and (as opposed to 2- or 3-color alternatives) 4-color cards are just too tyrannical about their deckbuilding requirements to be worth doing.
Well, you still have a gaping hole in the 4-color design space no matter how sound your argument. So I think you have to approach the problem differently.
What I tried to do here was to define each 4-color pair more by the missing color than by anything else. I wanted Jodah to feel very un-black. I wanted Latros to feel very un-red. And I wanted each of the cards to be as elegant as they could be. Would Latros be more green if I gave him trample? Sure. It even makes flavor sense. It wouldn't push the card over any edges it hasn't already been pushed over. But its extraneous, so I didn't.
So, to be clear, you have no reason for these creatures to be 4 colors other than 'you wanted it to be 4 colors'? Why do you feel that having the seemingly arbitrary 4 color is so important? 3 colored cards can just as easily hate on 1 color as a 4 color card.
Dahammer4
Artifact - Equipment (R)
Choose one - Equipped creature gets +4/+0; or Double Strike; or "When this creature deals combat damage to a creature, exile that creature"; or t, unattach ~ from this creature: ~ deals 5 damage to target creature." t: Equipped creature gains flying until end of turn.
Equip 3
So, to be clear, you have no reason for these creatures to be 4 colors other than 'you wanted it to be 4 colors'? Why do you feel that having the seemingly arbitrary 4 color is so important? 3 colored cards can just as easily hate on 1 color as a 4 color card.
I have spectrum, and the "play more colors" mechanics of the block's Coalition faction in general as reasons.
I also don't think that there's any requirement to be perfectly parsimonious in assigning colors to a design. Rhox War Monk is a thing, although it's a thing I try not to emulate too much.
I meant I would word it "Your opponents can’t cast spells with the same mana cost as a card they own in exile."
4 color design doesn't have a lot of space, but since we probably wouldn't see it again for a decade I'd probably go for 10 between the three sets. I think there are some fun noncreature designs to be had, but I wouldn't want to deprive commander players of their cycle.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
I primarily play limited, so most of my spoiler season comments view cards through that lens.
Latros feels distinctly un-red to me; Red really hates being restricted. Red generally doesn't exile very much.
Jodah on the other hand feels a bit less "un-black", but it does marginally fit its four colors (Token generation and pumping=White and Green, copying creatures=Blue and Red).
Psychic Intrusion and Daxos of Meletis both have the "spend mana as though it were mana of any color to cast this" clause. Is that intentionally left off of Latros to prevent playing red spells?
Psychic Intrusion and Daxos of Meletis both have the "spend mana as though it were mana of any color to cast this" clause. Is that intentionally left off of Latros to prevent playing red spells?
Using the Praetor's Grasp template as opposed to the Psychic Intrusion template was intentional, but not because I want to keep you from playing red spells.
One of those reasons is elegance. I wanted players to be able to grab out a land with this, and the "cast" wording would feel clunky next to the "play" wording, I felt. Also, because you can grab out a land, you can actually set yourself up with the mana you need to cast the spell, if given multiple turns to do so.
More importantly, there are "snow-colored" spells in this environment, so the Psychic Intrusion wording is actually no guarantee that you'd be able to cast any given spell. Pair that with the fact that you already need to get to four colors to cast Latros, I felt like this design played a bit more straightforward if it asked you to dial in the right mana yourself, rather than giving you a pass. Since this block is ultimately a clash of dueling mana bases, I didn't feel like allowing you to sidestep that whole conflict felt like a good design choice.
I think your rejection of box checking is a step back in multicolor design. It's pretty cool to see two colors combine so well they feel like a new one but the vast majority of the appeal of multicolor cards is see the aspects of different colors mixed up in one card and that requires box checking at some level. Mantis Rider looks lazy because it's a copy of a older card and because it's just a mish mash of abilities from each color and they don't even work together well in a clever way (unlike Gelectrod who has an very clearly red and blue ability).
I think you have the right method for those cards. Just pick one very deep hybrid ability for each par that works well together. For me Jodah is almost there. I would just try a different bonus that feels more WR, basically because his cloning ability is already very UG.
Latros should get vigilance + big butt which is WG enough and some UB ability that somehow cares about attacking without tapping. Or maybe you cna keep the WU ability and try to come up with a BG one to complement that.
The issue I have with New Latros is that you've basically taken an existing blue-black card, made it even bluer and blacker, then tacked two additional colors onto it.
Also, the floor judge in me still hasn't forgiven Wizards for the Standard Season of Accidentally(?) Stolen Cards.
I dunno, everybody has an idea of what 4-color cards should look like, if WotC were ever to do them again. So many of those ideas hold 4-color designs up to such impossible standards that many people just say they shouldn't be designed.
I had (have) a pretty clear goal with the 4-color megacycle in this block, and that's to do a cycle of 5 legendary creatures across 3 sets, which are tied together by protection from the odd color out. Beyond that, I'm just trying to design cards that I think would be fun to play, rather than focusing on creating the "perfect" 4-color cycle. Does Latros epitomize the intersection of green, white, blue, and black? Not really, but not much would.
If I could find the perfect harmony of abilities that sings "everything but red", I would consider that. But that harmony is hard to find.
Set 1 of 3 in Dominaria block
Kheva, Bard of Shiv 2BR
Legendary Creature — Human Rogue [M]
Haste
Whenever Kheva, Bard of Shiv attacks, gain control of target creature defending player controls until end of combat. Put that creature into combat tapped and attacking that player.
[2/2]
Jodah the Terisian 1RGWU
Legendary Creature — Human Wizard [M]
Protection from black
Jodah the Terisian gets +2/+2 for each other creature you control named Jodah the Terisian.
1, T: Put a token that’s a copy of Jodah the Terisian onto the battlefield, except that token isn’t legendary.
[2/2]
Latros the Extractor 1GWUB
Legendary Creature — Centaur Rogue [M]
Trample, protection from red
Whenever Latros the Extractor deals combat damage to a player, you may search that player’s library for a card and exile it face down. If you do, that player shuffles his or her library. You may look at and play that card for as long as it remains exiled.
[5/5]
Previous Kheva. Previous Jodah. Previous Latros. The plan is now to put one 4-color legend in Icefall and the remaining two in Nexus.
EDIT: Removed nonbasic landwalk from Kheva.
EDIT: Changed Latros's third clause from "same mana cost" to "same name", reduced it to hit only cards exiled with Latros instead of all exiled cards.
EDIT: Gave Latros trample, changed his ability from an ETB Detention Sphere variant to a damage-trigger Praetor's Grasp variant.
Latros: I don't see green in this. Just to be clear, from my understanding of the last line, your opponents can't cast spells with the same CMC as ANY exiled cards, not just the ones exiled with this creature.If that's the case, its easily too good and quite easily capable of locking out your opponent of playing any spells enitrely in simple combination with something like Tormod's Crypt or Bojuka Bog.
Sigpic by Rivenor
Artifact - Equipment (R)
Choose one - Equipped creature gets +4/+0; or Double Strike; or "When this creature deals combat damage to a creature, exile that creature"; or t, unattach ~ from this creature: ~ deals 5 damage to target creature."
t: Equipped creature gains flying until end of turn.
Equip 3
Courtesy of Crepes
[OMC] Omerium's Collapse
Are these the only 4 color cards in the block, or is there a mythic cycle for commander and a rare cycle of non-commanders?
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).
A lot of people have made a lot of very sound arguments against 4-color design on exactly those grounds. That is: you don't want to box-check, you want the card to feel organic, it's really hard to feel organic in four different colors at the same time, and (as opposed to 2- or 3-color alternatives) 4-color cards are just too tyrannical about their deckbuilding requirements to be worth doing.
Well, you still have a gaping hole in the 4-color design space no matter how sound your argument. So I think you have to approach the problem differently.
What I tried to do here was to define each 4-color pair more by the missing color than by anything else. I wanted Jodah to feel very un-black. I wanted Latros to feel very un-red. And I wanted each of the cards to be as elegant as they could be. Would Latros be more green if I gave him trample? Sure. It even makes flavor sense. It wouldn't push the card over any edges it hasn't already been pushed over. But its extraneous, so I didn't.
Correct, it is very intentionally "mana cost" and not "converted mana cost."
The short version of what I was trying to do was a kind of combination Lobotomy + Oblivion Ring, but with less rules text. The "card in exile" clause was really just there as a power bump, and as an anti-red mechanic. But if it's a huge deal, I can change it to "cards exiled with Latros."
I am only planning on the five 4-color cards in the block. Do you feel that is sufficient or insufficient?
So, to be clear, you have no reason for these creatures to be 4 colors other than 'you wanted it to be 4 colors'? Why do you feel that having the seemingly arbitrary 4 color is so important? 3 colored cards can just as easily hate on 1 color as a 4 color card.
Sigpic by Rivenor
Artifact - Equipment (R)
Choose one - Equipped creature gets +4/+0; or Double Strike; or "When this creature deals combat damage to a creature, exile that creature"; or t, unattach ~ from this creature: ~ deals 5 damage to target creature."
t: Equipped creature gains flying until end of turn.
Equip 3
Courtesy of Crepes
[OMC] Omerium's Collapse
I also don't think that there's any requirement to be perfectly parsimonious in assigning colors to a design. Rhox War Monk is a thing, although it's a thing I try not to emulate too much.
4 color design doesn't have a lot of space, but since we probably wouldn't see it again for a decade I'd probably go for 10 between the three sets. I think there are some fun noncreature designs to be had, but I wouldn't want to deprive commander players of their cycle.
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).
Jodah on the other hand feels a bit less "un-black", but it does marginally fit its four colors (Token generation and pumping=White and Green, copying creatures=Blue and Red).
One of those reasons is elegance. I wanted players to be able to grab out a land with this, and the "cast" wording would feel clunky next to the "play" wording, I felt. Also, because you can grab out a land, you can actually set yourself up with the mana you need to cast the spell, if given multiple turns to do so.
More importantly, there are "snow-colored" spells in this environment, so the Psychic Intrusion wording is actually no guarantee that you'd be able to cast any given spell. Pair that with the fact that you already need to get to four colors to cast Latros, I felt like this design played a bit more straightforward if it asked you to dial in the right mana yourself, rather than giving you a pass. Since this block is ultimately a clash of dueling mana bases, I didn't feel like allowing you to sidestep that whole conflict felt like a good design choice.
I think you have the right method for those cards. Just pick one very deep hybrid ability for each par that works well together. For me Jodah is almost there. I would just try a different bonus that feels more WR, basically because his cloning ability is already very UG.
Latros should get vigilance + big butt which is WG enough and some UB ability that somehow cares about attacking without tapping. Or maybe you cna keep the WU ability and try to come up with a BG one to complement that.
BGU Control
R Aggro
Standard - For Fun
BG Auras
Also, the floor judge in me still hasn't forgiven Wizards for the Standard Season of Accidentally(?) Stolen Cards.
Avatar by Numotflame96 of Maelstrom Graphics
Sig banner thanks to DarkNightCavalier of Heroes of the Plane Studios!
I had (have) a pretty clear goal with the 4-color megacycle in this block, and that's to do a cycle of 5 legendary creatures across 3 sets, which are tied together by protection from the odd color out. Beyond that, I'm just trying to design cards that I think would be fun to play, rather than focusing on creating the "perfect" 4-color cycle. Does Latros epitomize the intersection of green, white, blue, and black? Not really, but not much would.
If I could find the perfect harmony of abilities that sings "everything but red", I would consider that. But that harmony is hard to find.