Proposed Keyword: Violate N(Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until N land cards are put into the graveyard in this way.)
* Numerous instances of Violate are cumulative. If a creature with Violate N gains Violate O, it has Violate N+O. If it looses Violate, it loses all instances of Violate.
* Violate 1 reads as Violate, while any instance of violate N, where N>1 reads as Violate N.
(Proposal: Errata Flanking, Bushido, and Prowess to work in the same way.)
Rationale: UB has very little color pie overlap. Lorwyn block pushed Black's ability to Mill, and given black likes interacting with the graveyard, this fits well in his or her color pie.
2 Key Gameplay Roles:
1) Facilitate the alternate win condition of having your opponent lose the game because he or she cannot draw a card. (IE, "milling out the opponent."
2) Put cards into opponent's graveyards to use as a resource for your spells, and/or to prevent your opponent from playing them.
Problems associated with keywording Mill on creatures.
* If the mill total is tied to combat damage to a player, and tied to the P of the creature, the player will die before milled. Mill is redundant.
* If the mill total is tied to combat damage to a player, and not tied to the P of the creature (hypotethical 1/1 with Mill 5), then there is a flavor problem.
* If the mill total is tied to combat damage other than to a player - to creatures players control, to itself, etc. (A) Mill is often redundant in constructed formats, and (B) there are flavor issues.
How Violate solves this:
* Violate mills "until you hit N lands", where N will usually be 1. Players tend to run roughly 1/3rd lands. If we assume a 1/1 violate will mill 3 cards, then 20 damage mills 60. However, if we assume players draw 15 cards normally (7 and then 8 turns?), this means that the violator will only need to mill 45 cards, or do 15 damage. This means Violate is not redundant in constructed.
* Violate, like any mill, is strong in limited. However, because Violate requires your creature to be unblocked (like poisonous, Infect, etc.), combat is still relevant. Cards like Belltower Sphinx make the game play far differently; while Violate doesn't.
Perks of Violate:
* Each time violate activates, it is kind of a mini-game - What cards will you mill this time? This will create memorable game experiences, as there'll be times your violator hits 12 cards in one go, and times it just top decks a land.
* Although mill-effects that don't lead to decking don't necessarily affect gameplay, it does create psychological tension that is interesting. If you've milled all 4 of your opponent's shock, they'll be worried they can't stop your saheeli rai combo. Yeah, they just as easily might not have drawn those cards normally - but now they know they can't! Similarly, your opponent might choose to block because they can't "risk" you milling away a combo piece.
* Violate also lets you see more of your opponent's deck than you otherwise would. This is hard to quantify, but it has substantive implications for sideboarding in general.
* UB care about things being in the graveyard. Black reanimates, blue might expand it's spell-reanimation (or flashback) part of the color pie as well. UR cares about artifacts in the 'yard, this can be explored in new ways.
* In some blocks (like a new core set, when WOTC decides to release those again), Violate can be doled out to creatures to create a limited environment where mill decks are a legitimate option. In constructed, a few quality rare and mythic mill cards - whether the classic Millstone or some high N violator demon or whatnot - can make mill a viable archetype if desired.
* In other blocks, Violate might be confused as a means to fuel reanimator effects.
* In still others, Violate might be a drawback, as it gives your opponent Threshold and helps activate delve easier. I genuinely like Green having the ability to play lands from the 'yard, but with stone rain effects largely gone, these have become largely unnecessary (except to abuse fetchlands). This gives green (the enemy of UB) a flavorful slice of the color pie that they can use to take advantage of its enemy colors. Similarly, this will facilitate more library-recycling-effects being printed in green.
Potential causes for concern:
* Limited/Constructed balance of mill strategy.
* Because Violate mills until it hits a land, it might increase land-screw.
* Casual and limited players might not like his or her bombs being milled.
Costing - I think that Violate should cost less than Flying or Deathtouch on small creatures. On large creatures, Violate N should be somewhat tied to his or her power, but not necessarily 1:1 or 3:1, and should be costed roughly 1. The exception is self-violators (black creatures that deal damage to you at the beginning of your upkeep/etc.); here violate may be free or even cost-reducting.
Sample French Vanilla Violators:
Violating RodentB
Creature - Rat (C)
Deathtouch
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
1/1
Violating Reseacher1U
Creature - Human Wizard (C)
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
1/3
Violator Serpent Warrior2B
Creature - Snake Warrior (C)
When ~ enters the battlefield, it deals 3 damage to you.
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
3/3
Violator Imp1B
Creature - Imp Wizard (U)
Flying
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
2/1
Violating Visage1U
Creature - Illusion (U)
~ is unblockable.
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
1/1
Violator Sphinx3UU
Creature - Sphinx (U)
Flying
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
4/4
Violus and Violante of Sardia1UU
Legendary Creature - Human Wizard (R)
Violate 2 (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until 2 land cards are put into the graveyard in this way.)
2/3
Violator Demon2BB
Creature - Demon (R)
At the beginning of each player's upkeep, ~ deals 1 damage to you.
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
5/5
Fancy Violators: Card Draw Violator2U
Creature - Human Wizard (U)
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
Whenever a land is put into an opponent's graveyard from anywhere, you may draw a card.
1/3
Violating Scavenger1B
Creature - Human Rogue (C)
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
Whenever an artifact is put into an opponent's graveyard from anywhere, put a +1/+1 counter on ~.
2/1
Violating Necromancer1B
Creature - Human Cleric (R)
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
Whenever a creature card is out into an opponent's graveyard from his or her library, you may exile it. If you do, create a 2/2 black zombie creature token.
2/1
Land Desecrater2B
Creature - Spirit (R)
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
Whenever a land is out into an opponent's graveyard from anywhere, if ~ is in your graveyard you may return it to the battlefield under your control.
2/2
Foreland ChannelerB
Creature - Goblin Cleric (R)
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.) T: Add one mana of any color a land in an opponent's graveyard could produce to your mana pool.
1/1
Forestill Channeler1U
Creature - Human Wizard (R)
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
~ has all activated abilities of all artifact cards in all opponent's graveyards.
2/2
Violating Ooze2BB
Creature - Ooze (R)
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
~ has all activated abilities of all creature cards in all opponent's graveyards.
3/3
Violation Ambassador4BB
Creature - Vampire Cleric (R)
Flying
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
Whenever ~ or another creature enters the battlefield under your control, it deals 1 damage to each opponent and you gain 1 life.
4/4
I think, like, this is pretty good but it needs a new name.
Thanks! I'm open to a new name, but I was thinking "Violate" sounded close enough to "Intimidate" to work.
I was thinking of calling it Traumatize, but violate captures the same flavor idea - you're psychologically scarring your opponent. The unblocked creature might only deal 1 damage to you, but you're also psychologically scarred and this varies over time...
This seems like it has a lot of the same problems as poisonous. You're stapling two game plans together, and they don't really meaningfully work towards each other. It's also substantially stronger in limited than constructed. If a player averages seven land draws in a limited game, violate is just the same as poisonous 1, which is to say it only matters on creatures with power 1. In 60-card it gets even less attractive. Add into that that it plays poorly with pump, one of the most common kinds of combat trick, and it really doesn't seem like it has what's needed for even a block keyword.
Private Mod Note
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Call me Fortuna, please. Ms. Imperatrix Mundi is the empress of the world.
I'm sympathetic to your "plays poorly with pump" argument... what about:
* Victimize V2 (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until X land cards are put into the graveyard in this way, where X equals the damage dealt by ~.)
I like the original better, but this is exactly why WOTC went for something like Infect over Poisonous N.
As for the unevenness of the keyword in C/L, I agree but this is true for other keywords - First Strike for example, is best in limited. Many cards are simply better in limited because it's a different environment.
That said, I do think that this has other benefits than just stapling life loss and damage dealt. It fuels Mortivore and similar cards - and that feels very black and blue. As it so happens, there are many mill effects in UB that you benefit from for reasons other than decking your opponent. The fact you'd target yourself for mill with Thought Scour is perfectly fine; but the fact you'd target your opponent to stop them from drawing what they Imperial Sealed is also pretty great. Lots of people think Mill isn't a very diverse mechanic, but there is evidence to the contrary. Printing a new cycle of Seals at rare or mythic as sorceries (or as CITP effects on creatures) would make Violate pretty useful.
I'm basically just going to repeat myself from another thread.
There are a small group of players who do enjoy mill but mill is a mechanic that isn't generally enjoyed by the magic community. This fact alone just kills the mechanic. You can't make a mechanic evergreen when most of the player base doesn't even enjoy the mechanic.
In addition, Mill isn't something designers actually want in every set and doesn't play well in every environment. In general, unless mill effects are very common then mill won't work as an alternative win con, and you will need a bunch of other cards around that care about the graveyard to actually make the incidental mill matter. This just acts to put more constraints on set design by effectively forcing a minor graveyard theme into every set.
Private Mod Note
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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.
- Manite
Re: Some players don't enjoy mill - Many players hate Hexproof, Shroud, Indestructible, and yes - even Deathtouch. No players like Reach/Web, but they enjoy not needing to have the text spelled out on each card.
If this fact alone "kills the mechanic", then MTG will have far, far fewer evergreen mechanics. Landwalk, Protection, and Intimidate were retired because it punished players randomly for playing a deck of a certain type. Defender is rare to see nowadays because if you're going to do a 0/4, it doesn't really need the drawback usually, and Players don't like drawback keywords - this includes echo, phasing, and the like. Don't confuse "people don't universally love x" with "x is not a good evergreen keyword."
Re: Designers don't want in every set; I've addressed this issue above. In some sets, Violate is for the mill win condition; in some it helps you, in others it helps your opponent.
Let's be clear here - You don't like mill effects. Fine. But are you telling me you can't design 3 violate cards to put in a set like Kaladesh that doesn't (A) warp limited without (B) being useless? What's wrong with Forestill Channeler or Violating Scavenger being put into Kaladesh at those rarities? And that's 2 out of a dozen or so cards not designed with Kaladesh in mind. Are you saying you wouldn't like to run those in limited or constructed? (I suppose if you only think of mill as a win condition, sure - these suck. But I don't mind a 2/1 that grows when my opponent's servos die, and that has a small chance of slithing himself.)
What's wrong with Forestill Channeler or Violating Scavenger being put into Kaladesh at those rarities?
The designs themselves are fine. Of course, they only play well because they both have a second ability. The mechanic in general is doing what I'm saying it is, forcing a graveyard matters sub theme into the set for no other reason than that Violate doesn't function unless it is present in very large numbers (supporting a mill archetype) or there is a group of cards that care about the graveyard.
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.
- Manite
Yes, but violate is one way of triggering their 2nd ability.
In sets where mill is a goal, violate is easy to print.
In sets where graveyard stuff is a goal, violate is easy to print.
In sets where combo is a thing, violate disrupts.
In instances where your creature wants stuff in the 'yard, violate is a way to enable it. It's not unlike how flying enables certain effects like curiosity.
Is violate the most elegant damage-> mill keyword ability? WOTC tried Poisonous and Wither before they got to Infect; so I don't know. But I think the math makes it particularly interesting.
In fact, one of the best things about the mechanic is that it's kind of fun. Not blocking risks you losing your combo piece, bomb, etc. THAT is relevant across all formats, and tacked onto an efficient body - it would be an incentive to run that creature - no more or less than vigilance or Bushido or Flex V4.
Yes, but violate is one way of triggering their 2nd ability.
The fact that they need secondary abilities in order for the designs to work should be a cause for concern. Putting flying on a creature is interesting by itself. Creatures with flying (or trample, hexproof, lifelink, first strike, etc) don't need secondary abilities because the keyword itself is interesting and works. As opposed to Violate which is "do nothing" unless present in very large numbers or something specifically interacts with violate. (i.e. graveyard matters abilities)
In sets where mill is a goal, violate is easy to print.
Agreed. But supporting mill isn't a typical design concern.
In sets where graveyard stuff is a goal, violate is easy to print.
Except for the fact that its usually a drawback in those sets. In most graveyard matters blocks/sets, its bad to mill your opponent.
In sets where combo is a thing, violate disrupts.
It doesn't. Mill doesn't impact combo in any way. Mill, by itself, doesn't do anything.
In instances where your creature wants stuff in the 'yard, violate is a way to enable it. It's not unlike how flying enables certain effects like curiosity.
If all flying did was enable curiosity type effects, I would be against using flying as a keyword. Unfortunately, all Violate really does is pigeon whole developers into making graveyard matters cards or forcing a mill archetype into their limited environments.
In fact, one of the best things about the mechanic is that it's kind of fun. Not blocking risks you losing your combo piece, bomb, etc. THAT is relevant across all formats, and tacked onto an efficient body - it would be an incentive to run that creature - no more or less than vigilance or Bushido or Flex V4.
You aren't correctly evaluating the impact of mill. When cards are put into a graveyard from a randomly ordered deck, they have no net impact on the game. Statistically, you are just as likely to improve the opponents deck quality as you are to reduce it. Fundamentally, there is no difference between milling from the top vs bottom of someones deck.
EDIT: For anyone who wants to dig into mill evaluation, check out this article posted on the mother ship.
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.
- Manite
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Violate N (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until N land cards are put into the graveyard in this way.)
* Numerous instances of Violate are cumulative. If a creature with Violate N gains Violate O, it has Violate N+O. If it looses Violate, it loses all instances of Violate.
* Violate 1 reads as Violate, while any instance of violate N, where N>1 reads as Violate N.
(Proposal: Errata Flanking, Bushido, and Prowess to work in the same way.)
Rationale:
UB has very little color pie overlap. Lorwyn block pushed Black's ability to Mill, and given black likes interacting with the graveyard, this fits well in his or her color pie.
2 Key Gameplay Roles:
1) Facilitate the alternate win condition of having your opponent lose the game because he or she cannot draw a card. (IE, "milling out the opponent."
2) Put cards into opponent's graveyards to use as a resource for your spells, and/or to prevent your opponent from playing them.
Problems associated with keywording Mill on creatures.
* If the mill total is tied to combat damage to a player, and tied to the P of the creature, the player will die before milled. Mill is redundant.
* If the mill total is tied to combat damage to a player, and not tied to the P of the creature (hypotethical 1/1 with Mill 5), then there is a flavor problem.
* If the mill total is tied to combat damage other than to a player - to creatures players control, to itself, etc. (A) Mill is often redundant in constructed formats, and (B) there are flavor issues.
How Violate solves this:
* Violate mills "until you hit N lands", where N will usually be 1. Players tend to run roughly 1/3rd lands. If we assume a 1/1 violate will mill 3 cards, then 20 damage mills 60. However, if we assume players draw 15 cards normally (7 and then 8 turns?), this means that the violator will only need to mill 45 cards, or do 15 damage. This means Violate is not redundant in constructed.
* Violate, like any mill, is strong in limited. However, because Violate requires your creature to be unblocked (like poisonous, Infect, etc.), combat is still relevant. Cards like Belltower Sphinx make the game play far differently; while Violate doesn't.
Perks of Violate:
* Each time violate activates, it is kind of a mini-game - What cards will you mill this time? This will create memorable game experiences, as there'll be times your violator hits 12 cards in one go, and times it just top decks a land.
* Although mill-effects that don't lead to decking don't necessarily affect gameplay, it does create psychological tension that is interesting. If you've milled all 4 of your opponent's shock, they'll be worried they can't stop your saheeli rai combo. Yeah, they just as easily might not have drawn those cards normally - but now they know they can't! Similarly, your opponent might choose to block because they can't "risk" you milling away a combo piece.
* Violate also lets you see more of your opponent's deck than you otherwise would. This is hard to quantify, but it has substantive implications for sideboarding in general.
* UB care about things being in the graveyard. Black reanimates, blue might expand it's spell-reanimation (or flashback) part of the color pie as well. UR cares about artifacts in the 'yard, this can be explored in new ways.
* In some blocks (like a new core set, when WOTC decides to release those again), Violate can be doled out to creatures to create a limited environment where mill decks are a legitimate option. In constructed, a few quality rare and mythic mill cards - whether the classic Millstone or some high N violator demon or whatnot - can make mill a viable archetype if desired.
* In other blocks, Violate might be confused as a means to fuel reanimator effects.
* In still others, Violate might be a drawback, as it gives your opponent Threshold and helps activate delve easier. I genuinely like Green having the ability to play lands from the 'yard, but with stone rain effects largely gone, these have become largely unnecessary (except to abuse fetchlands). This gives green (the enemy of UB) a flavorful slice of the color pie that they can use to take advantage of its enemy colors. Similarly, this will facilitate more library-recycling-effects being printed in green.
Potential causes for concern:
* Limited/Constructed balance of mill strategy.
* Because Violate mills until it hits a land, it might increase land-screw.
* Casual and limited players might not like his or her bombs being milled.
Costing - I think that Violate should cost less than Flying or Deathtouch on small creatures. On large creatures, Violate N should be somewhat tied to his or her power, but not necessarily 1:1 or 3:1, and should be costed roughly 1. The exception is self-violators (black creatures that deal damage to you at the beginning of your upkeep/etc.); here violate may be free or even cost-reducting.
Sample French Vanilla Violators:
Violating Rodent B
Creature - Rat (C)
Deathtouch
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
1/1
Violating Reseacher 1U
Creature - Human Wizard (C)
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
1/3
Violator Serpent Warrior2B
Creature - Snake Warrior (C)
When ~ enters the battlefield, it deals 3 damage to you.
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
3/3
Violator Imp 1B
Creature - Imp Wizard (U)
Flying
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
2/1
Violating Visage 1U
Creature - Illusion (U)
~ is unblockable.
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
1/1
Violator Sphinx 3UU
Creature - Sphinx (U)
Flying
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
4/4
Violus and Violante of Sardia 1UU
Legendary Creature - Human Wizard (R)
Violate 2 (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until 2 land cards are put into the graveyard in this way.)
2/3
Violator Demon 2BB
Creature - Demon (R)
At the beginning of each player's upkeep, ~ deals 1 damage to you.
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
5/5
Fancy Violators:
Card Draw Violator 2U
Creature - Human Wizard (U)
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
Whenever a land is put into an opponent's graveyard from anywhere, you may draw a card.
1/3
Violating Scavenger 1B
Creature - Human Rogue (C)
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
Whenever an artifact is put into an opponent's graveyard from anywhere, put a +1/+1 counter on ~.
2/1
Violating Necromancer 1B
Creature - Human Cleric (R)
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
Whenever a creature card is out into an opponent's graveyard from his or her library, you may exile it. If you do, create a 2/2 black zombie creature token.
2/1
Land Desecrater 2B
Creature - Spirit (R)
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
Whenever a land is out into an opponent's graveyard from anywhere, if ~ is in your graveyard you may return it to the battlefield under your control.
2/2
Foreland Channeler B
Creature - Goblin Cleric (R)
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
T: Add one mana of any color a land in an opponent's graveyard could produce to your mana pool.
1/1
Forestill Channeler 1U
Creature - Human Wizard (R)
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
~ has all activated abilities of all artifact cards in all opponent's graveyards.
2/2
Violating Ooze 2BB
Creature - Ooze (R)
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
~ has all activated abilities of all creature cards in all opponent's graveyards.
3/3
Violation Ambassador 4BB
Creature - Vampire Cleric (R)
Flying
Violate (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until a land card is put into the graveyard in this way.)
Whenever ~ or another creature enters the battlefield under your control, it deals 1 damage to each opponent and you gain 1 life.
4/4
Thanks! I'm open to a new name, but I was thinking "Violate" sounded close enough to "Intimidate" to work.
I was thinking of calling it Traumatize, but violate captures the same flavor idea - you're psychologically scarring your opponent. The unblocked creature might only deal 1 damage to you, but you're also psychologically scarred and this varies over time...
* Victimize V2 (Whenever ~ deals damage to a player, put the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard until X land cards are put into the graveyard in this way, where X equals the damage dealt by ~.)
I like the original better, but this is exactly why WOTC went for something like Infect over Poisonous N.
As for the unevenness of the keyword in C/L, I agree but this is true for other keywords - First Strike for example, is best in limited. Many cards are simply better in limited because it's a different environment.
That said, I do think that this has other benefits than just stapling life loss and damage dealt. It fuels Mortivore and similar cards - and that feels very black and blue. As it so happens, there are many mill effects in UB that you benefit from for reasons other than decking your opponent. The fact you'd target yourself for mill with Thought Scour is perfectly fine; but the fact you'd target your opponent to stop them from drawing what they Imperial Sealed is also pretty great. Lots of people think Mill isn't a very diverse mechanic, but there is evidence to the contrary. Printing a new cycle of Seals at rare or mythic as sorceries (or as CITP effects on creatures) would make Violate pretty useful.
There are a small group of players who do enjoy mill but mill is a mechanic that isn't generally enjoyed by the magic community. This fact alone just kills the mechanic. You can't make a mechanic evergreen when most of the player base doesn't even enjoy the mechanic.
In addition, Mill isn't something designers actually want in every set and doesn't play well in every environment. In general, unless mill effects are very common then mill won't work as an alternative win con, and you will need a bunch of other cards around that care about the graveyard to actually make the incidental mill matter. This just acts to put more constraints on set design by effectively forcing a minor graveyard theme into every set.
- Manite
If this fact alone "kills the mechanic", then MTG will have far, far fewer evergreen mechanics. Landwalk, Protection, and Intimidate were retired because it punished players randomly for playing a deck of a certain type. Defender is rare to see nowadays because if you're going to do a 0/4, it doesn't really need the drawback usually, and Players don't like drawback keywords - this includes echo, phasing, and the like. Don't confuse "people don't universally love x" with "x is not a good evergreen keyword."
Re: Designers don't want in every set; I've addressed this issue above. In some sets, Violate is for the mill win condition; in some it helps you, in others it helps your opponent.
Let's be clear here - You don't like mill effects. Fine. But are you telling me you can't design 3 violate cards to put in a set like Kaladesh that doesn't (A) warp limited without (B) being useless? What's wrong with Forestill Channeler or Violating Scavenger being put into Kaladesh at those rarities? And that's 2 out of a dozen or so cards not designed with Kaladesh in mind. Are you saying you wouldn't like to run those in limited or constructed? (I suppose if you only think of mill as a win condition, sure - these suck. But I don't mind a 2/1 that grows when my opponent's servos die, and that has a small chance of slithing himself.)
The designs themselves are fine. Of course, they only play well because they both have a second ability. The mechanic in general is doing what I'm saying it is, forcing a graveyard matters sub theme into the set for no other reason than that Violate doesn't function unless it is present in very large numbers (supporting a mill archetype) or there is a group of cards that care about the graveyard.
- Manite
In sets where mill is a goal, violate is easy to print.
In sets where graveyard stuff is a goal, violate is easy to print.
In sets where combo is a thing, violate disrupts.
In instances where your creature wants stuff in the 'yard, violate is a way to enable it. It's not unlike how flying enables certain effects like curiosity.
Is violate the most elegant damage-> mill keyword ability? WOTC tried Poisonous and Wither before they got to Infect; so I don't know. But I think the math makes it particularly interesting.
In fact, one of the best things about the mechanic is that it's kind of fun. Not blocking risks you losing your combo piece, bomb, etc. THAT is relevant across all formats, and tacked onto an efficient body - it would be an incentive to run that creature - no more or less than vigilance or Bushido or Flex V4.
The fact that they need secondary abilities in order for the designs to work should be a cause for concern. Putting flying on a creature is interesting by itself. Creatures with flying (or trample, hexproof, lifelink, first strike, etc) don't need secondary abilities because the keyword itself is interesting and works. As opposed to Violate which is "do nothing" unless present in very large numbers or something specifically interacts with violate. (i.e. graveyard matters abilities)
Agreed. But supporting mill isn't a typical design concern.
Except for the fact that its usually a drawback in those sets. In most graveyard matters blocks/sets, its bad to mill your opponent.
It doesn't. Mill doesn't impact combo in any way. Mill, by itself, doesn't do anything.
If all flying did was enable curiosity type effects, I would be against using flying as a keyword. Unfortunately, all Violate really does is pigeon whole developers into making graveyard matters cards or forcing a mill archetype into their limited environments.
You aren't correctly evaluating the impact of mill. When cards are put into a graveyard from a randomly ordered deck, they have no net impact on the game. Statistically, you are just as likely to improve the opponents deck quality as you are to reduce it. Fundamentally, there is no difference between milling from the top vs bottom of someones deck.
EDIT: For anyone who wants to dig into mill evaluation, check out this article posted on the mother ship.
- Manite