I'm sure I'm not the only one who finds Gerrard Capashen's card rather underwhelming. Being one of the Coalition's heroes and all, you'd expect his card to be more impressive. Well, lo and behold! I present a new, improved, multicolor-friendly Gerrard Capashen!
Gerrard, Coalition Hero4W
Legendary Creature - Human Soldier Domain - Whenever ~ attacks, you may pay WUBRG. If you do, reveal the top X cards of your library, where X is the number of basic land types among lands you control plus the number of colors among permanents you control. You may cast a nonland card with converted mana cost X or less from among them without paying its mana cost. Then put the rest on the bottom of your library in a random order.
4/4
This Gerrard is another General Tazri-style legend, a monocolor creature with a WUBRG ability, making them WUBRG legends as far as Commander's color identity rules are concerned. This allows you to play the full Weatherlight crew in a single deck, and play into Invasion's Domain and five color mechanical themes. And considering this Gerrard can potentially allow you to cast a nonland card with a cmc as high as 10 every time he attacks and you pay the mana cost, he makes for quite the payoff in a WUBRG deck.
Of course, if that design seems a bit clunky or over-the-top, we can try something a little closer to the inspiration:
Gerrard, Coalition Hero4W
Legendary Creature - Human Soldier Domain - Whenever ~ attacks, create X 1/1 white Soldier creature tokens that are tapped and attacking, where X is the number of basic land types among lands you control. WUBRG: Creatures you control get +X/+X until end of turn, where X is the number of colors among permanents you control.
4/4
This way, the Domain and WUBRG abilities are separated and the design looks less messy. If creating up to five tokens per attack is a bit much, perhaps it can be restricted to ETB instead.
Gerrard, Coalition Hero4W
Legendary Creature - Human Soldier Domain - When ~ enters the battlefield, create X 1/1 white Soldier creature tokens, where X is the number of basic land types among lands you control. WUBRG: Creatures you control get +X/+X until end of turn, where X is the number of colors among permanents you control.
4/4
This design allows Gerrard and his five tokens to deal 39 damage to a single player (9 + {6 x 5 = 30} = 39), enough to take a player down to 1 life in Commander with a single hit. That's provided of course that you control lands of all five basic land types as well as permanents of all five colors.
MTGS Wikia Article about "New World Order"
Every time I read a comment about "Well if this card had card draw/trample/haste/indestructible/hexproof/life gain...", I think "You're missing the point." They're armchair developer comments that fail to take into account the card's role in the greater Limited and Standard environment. No, it may not be as good as whatever card you're comparing it to. There's a reason for that. Not every burn spell is Lightning Bolt, nor does it need to be or should be.
PSA to everyone who keeps forgetting about the Reserved List:
You're on a website dedicated to talking about MtG. You're only a few keystrokes away from finding out what cards are on the Reserved List. You're also only a few keystrokes away from finding out why some cards on the Reserved List got foil printings in FtV, as Judge promos, or whatnot, as well as why that won't happen again. Stop doing this.
I like the second and third options better, not because of the clutter or power level, but because they do something when you don't have WUBRG available. I actually like the Genesis Hydra ability from the first version best as a domain effect. If you kept that, but pulled the WUBRG payment and permanent color tracking out as it is in the latter versions, I think that would be a very fine card. So like this.
Gerrard, Coalition Hero4W
Legendary Creature - Human Soldier Domain - Whenever ~ attacks, reveal the top X cards of your library, where X is the number of land types among lands you control. You may cast any number of nonland cards with converted mana cost X or less from among them without paying their mana costs. Then put the rest on the bottom of your library in a random order. WUBRG: Creatures you control get +X/+X until end of turn, where X is the number of colors among permanents you control.
4/4
I juiced it up a little too, since X would max out at 5 rather than at 10 as it did in your original version.
saneatali's version and version 1 in the OP are IMO too verbose. (For reference: Genesis Hydra has less lines including designed by-line; and that card is at the limit for what you can put on a card.)
OP's version 2 and 3 are better on word count, but both emulate General Tazri. While the idea to give Gerrard a five-color identity as well is alright, I don't see why it has to be almost the same or - as far as I can tell - generally better version of the Ally commander.
Gerrard Capashen e. g. while not a good card has a clear flavor of fighting to win even if you are an underdog (your opponent has more resources? you get ready to outlast them! your enemy has the larger threats? you outmaneuver them!). While you don't have to go for the same thematic interpretation of the character, at least try to choose an interpretation that isn't "almost the same as that card released recently".
BTW: I'm pretty certain Gerrard Capashen doesn't even remotely try to play the "redruit creatures" angle of a leadership character, because that role is already covered in the Weatherlight crew by Captain Sisay.
That said I like the token creation ability that triggers on attacking in general. Though if you think about it more critically you notice that General Tazri's abilities are synergizing with each other in a different nmore subtle way and provide more depth than "you did a thing, here have some dudes" for assembling domain.
I think the big restriction you put upon yourself that forces your hand is to use domain on a card that could use it but doesn't need to. Domain encourages/rewards multicolor play, but you know what else does? A five-color activation cost. By forcing both onto the card you clutter it up. Since the color identity is important to this one, I'd drop domain.
A variant:
Gerrard, Coalition Hero
Legendary Creature - Human Soldier (R)
Whenever you cast a spell that targets ~, creatures you control get +1/+2 until end of turn.
: Exile the top five cards of your library. You may play one of them without paying its mana cost if that spell targets ~. Put the remaining cards on the bottom of your library.
3/3
Somewhere between a team player and a solo fighter which is accomplished by a heroic ability. Considering Gerrard is an unwilling leader some personal heroics seem appropriate.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Planar Chaos was not a mistake neither was it random. You might want to look at it again.
[thread=239793][Game] Level Up - Creature[/thread]
The original design I came up with called back to the original card by tying the lifegain to Domain (the more types of land you control, the more resources your army has) and having the WUBRG ability tap up to five artifacts and/or creatures (adding artifacts to better represent fighting the Phyrexians). I just felt both were a little underwhelming for who was supposed to be the military leader of the Coalition. Yes, the pump ability is reminiscent of Tazri, but it's based on the fact Gerrard can rally his troops to fight harder, and in his case there seemed to be no need for a tribal restriction.
I liked the idea of using Domain as it was Invasion block's marquee mechanic and closely tied to the Coalition. Lifegain however doesn't feel Soldiery, though I do realize the irony in allowing Gerrard to play better with Phyrexian cards, Phyrexian Arena in particular.
Another option could be if Gerrard's Domain ability provided a constant anthem effect and the WUBRG ability granted five keywords to your creatures:
Gerrard, Coalition Hero4W
Legendary Creature - Human Soldier Domain - Each other creature you control gets +1/+1 for each basic land type among lands you control. WUBRG: Until end of turn, each creature you control gains first strike, vigilance, lifelink, and "Whenever this creature becomes the target of a spell or ability, you may return this creature to its owner's hand."
3/4
The chosen keywords are deliberate overlaps with white that Gerrard would seem capable of granting. I wanted to stay away from outright damage prevention, indestructibility, hexproof, or other such protection effects as those would be the domain of mages and healers like Orim. The self-bounce effect is flavored as evasive maneuvers or tactical retreats, as if to say "Incoming! Get down, get down!" I would use flickering, but I figure the self-bounce works better with Kicker.
MTGS Wikia Article about "New World Order"
Every time I read a comment about "Well if this card had card draw/trample/haste/indestructible/hexproof/life gain...", I think "You're missing the point." They're armchair developer comments that fail to take into account the card's role in the greater Limited and Standard environment. No, it may not be as good as whatever card you're comparing it to. There's a reason for that. Not every burn spell is Lightning Bolt, nor does it need to be or should be.
PSA to everyone who keeps forgetting about the Reserved List:
You're on a website dedicated to talking about MtG. You're only a few keystrokes away from finding out what cards are on the Reserved List. You're also only a few keystrokes away from finding out why some cards on the Reserved List got foil printings in FtV, as Judge promos, or whatnot, as well as why that won't happen again. Stop doing this.
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Gerrard, Coalition Hero 4W
Legendary Creature - Human Soldier
Domain - Whenever ~ attacks, you may pay WUBRG. If you do, reveal the top X cards of your library, where X is the number of basic land types among lands you control plus the number of colors among permanents you control. You may cast a nonland card with converted mana cost X or less from among them without paying its mana cost. Then put the rest on the bottom of your library in a random order.
4/4
This Gerrard is another General Tazri-style legend, a monocolor creature with a WUBRG ability, making them WUBRG legends as far as Commander's color identity rules are concerned. This allows you to play the full Weatherlight crew in a single deck, and play into Invasion's Domain and five color mechanical themes. And considering this Gerrard can potentially allow you to cast a nonland card with a cmc as high as 10 every time he attacks and you pay the mana cost, he makes for quite the payoff in a WUBRG deck.
Of course, if that design seems a bit clunky or over-the-top, we can try something a little closer to the inspiration:
Gerrard, Coalition Hero 4W
Legendary Creature - Human Soldier
Domain - Whenever ~ attacks, create X 1/1 white Soldier creature tokens that are tapped and attacking, where X is the number of basic land types among lands you control.
WUBRG: Creatures you control get +X/+X until end of turn, where X is the number of colors among permanents you control.
4/4
This way, the Domain and WUBRG abilities are separated and the design looks less messy. If creating up to five tokens per attack is a bit much, perhaps it can be restricted to ETB instead.
Gerrard, Coalition Hero 4W
Legendary Creature - Human Soldier
Domain - When ~ enters the battlefield, create X 1/1 white Soldier creature tokens, where X is the number of basic land types among lands you control.
WUBRG: Creatures you control get +X/+X until end of turn, where X is the number of colors among permanents you control.
4/4
This design allows Gerrard and his five tokens to deal 39 damage to a single player (9 + {6 x 5 = 30} = 39), enough to take a player down to 1 life in Commander with a single hit. That's provided of course that you control lands of all five basic land types as well as permanents of all five colors.
Every time I read a comment about "Well if this card had card draw/trample/haste/indestructible/hexproof/life gain...", I think "You're missing the point." They're armchair developer comments that fail to take into account the card's role in the greater Limited and Standard environment. No, it may not be as good as whatever card you're comparing it to. There's a reason for that. Not every burn spell is Lightning Bolt, nor does it need to be or should be.
Gerrard, Coalition Hero 4W
Legendary Creature - Human Soldier
Domain - Whenever ~ attacks, reveal the top X cards of your library, where X is the number of land types among lands you control. You may cast any number of nonland cards with converted mana cost X or less from among them without paying their mana costs. Then put the rest on the bottom of your library in a random order.
WUBRG: Creatures you control get +X/+X until end of turn, where X is the number of colors among permanents you control.
4/4
I juiced it up a little too, since X would max out at 5 rather than at 10 as it did in your original version.
OP's version 2 and 3 are better on word count, but both emulate General Tazri. While the idea to give Gerrard a five-color identity as well is alright, I don't see why it has to be almost the same or - as far as I can tell - generally better version of the Ally commander.
Gerrard Capashen e. g. while not a good card has a clear flavor of fighting to win even if you are an underdog (your opponent has more resources? you get ready to outlast them! your enemy has the larger threats? you outmaneuver them!). While you don't have to go for the same thematic interpretation of the character, at least try to choose an interpretation that isn't "almost the same as that card released recently".
BTW: I'm pretty certain Gerrard Capashen doesn't even remotely try to play the "redruit creatures" angle of a leadership character, because that role is already covered in the Weatherlight crew by Captain Sisay.
That said I like the token creation ability that triggers on attacking in general. Though if you think about it more critically you notice that General Tazri's abilities are synergizing with each other in a different nmore subtle way and provide more depth than "you did a thing, here have some dudes" for assembling domain.
I think the big restriction you put upon yourself that forces your hand is to use domain on a card that could use it but doesn't need to. Domain encourages/rewards multicolor play, but you know what else does? A five-color activation cost. By forcing both onto the card you clutter it up. Since the color identity is important to this one, I'd drop domain.
A variant:
Gerrard, Coalition Hero
Legendary Creature - Human Soldier (R)
Whenever you cast a spell that targets ~, creatures you control get +1/+2 until end of turn.
: Exile the top five cards of your library. You may play one of them without paying its mana cost if that spell targets ~. Put the remaining cards on the bottom of your library.
3/3
Somewhere between a team player and a solo fighter which is accomplished by a heroic ability. Considering Gerrard is an unwilling leader some personal heroics seem appropriate.
Finally a good white villain quote: "So, do I ever re-evaluate my life choices? Never, because I know what I'm doing is a righteous cause."
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Remnants: Valheim
Legendary Journey: Heroes & Planeswalkers
Saga: Shards of Rabiah
Legends: The Elder Dragons
Read up on Red Flags & NWO
I liked the idea of using Domain as it was Invasion block's marquee mechanic and closely tied to the Coalition. Lifegain however doesn't feel Soldiery, though I do realize the irony in allowing Gerrard to play better with Phyrexian cards, Phyrexian Arena in particular.
Another option could be if Gerrard's Domain ability provided a constant anthem effect and the WUBRG ability granted five keywords to your creatures:
Gerrard, Coalition Hero 4W
Legendary Creature - Human Soldier
Domain - Each other creature you control gets +1/+1 for each basic land type among lands you control.
WUBRG: Until end of turn, each creature you control gains first strike, vigilance, lifelink, and "Whenever this creature becomes the target of a spell or ability, you may return this creature to its owner's hand."
3/4
The chosen keywords are deliberate overlaps with white that Gerrard would seem capable of granting. I wanted to stay away from outright damage prevention, indestructibility, hexproof, or other such protection effects as those would be the domain of mages and healers like Orim. The self-bounce effect is flavored as evasive maneuvers or tactical retreats, as if to say "Incoming! Get down, get down!" I would use flickering, but I figure the self-bounce works better with Kicker.
Every time I read a comment about "Well if this card had card draw/trample/haste/indestructible/hexproof/life gain...", I think "You're missing the point." They're armchair developer comments that fail to take into account the card's role in the greater Limited and Standard environment. No, it may not be as good as whatever card you're comparing it to. There's a reason for that. Not every burn spell is Lightning Bolt, nor does it need to be or should be.