MTG Salvation

http://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/creativity/custom-card-creation/custom-card-contests-and-games/715550-june-mcc-round-3

Round 3 is up.

Quote from Moss_Elemental »

And now, something more important: We're going to need someone to run the MCC for July. I should also add that I will be starting a new job and the end of this month, but I have no idea what my schedule will be like, so chances are I won't have time to run the MCC or to judge. It will be up to others to step up.

As prowdawesome is going to host the CCL in July, I can do the MCC if needed. I have no plan for now, but of course I'd take inspiration from Eldritch Moon. If there are others though, I'm more than glad to let them do it and come back to simply judge.

It's early, but I do worry about the drop in support.

Quote from bravelion83 »

(0.5/3) Viability - There are no problems with color pie or rarity (reason why this is not a full zero), but this doesn't work as intended. The first mode doesn't specify that this permanent retains or "gains" this ability (see Artisan of Forms, Cemetery Puca, Cryptoplasm, Dimir Doppelganger and others for example), so it loses it when it becomes a creature for the first time. If it no longer has this ability, it can't revert back to an enchantment with the second mode as the intended functionality clearly was, because if it weren't than why is the second mode there at all?

I was thinking more along the lines of this: http://magiccards.info/us/en/22.html
Your examples are only for becoming a copy of a creature.

Quote from glurman »

I was thinking more along the lines of this: http://magiccards.info/us/en/22.html
Your examples are only for becoming a copy of a creature.

This has already been reported to me. I'm going to check the CR and rule on the basis of that. Of course, my judgments are suspended until further notice.

EDIT: My "investigation" is complete and it turns out you're right. Your judgment has been updated, with both an adjustment of scores and a lengthy explanation of my mistake and how things actually work. Thanks for letting me know.

I just received confirmation from proudawesome that he's doing July CCL, and no one else volunteered for the MCC, so I guess I can start taking care of the July MCC. I'll post the judge signup thread later tonight.

EDIT: And here it is!

EDIT (two days later): Now Round 1 is also up!

Quick question on the round 1 challenge.....Can the creature being sacrificed be a specific type of creature? For instance, could it be, "As an additional cost to cast ~, sacrifice an Oyster"?

Quote from Flatline »

Quick question on the round 1 challenge.....Can the creature being sacrificed be a specific type of creature? For instance, could it be, "As an additional cost to cast ~, sacrifice an Oyster"?

If you specify "sacrifice an Oyster creature" yes, if you just say "sacrifice an Oyster" no because it means an Oyster permanent in the rules, so we end up in the case of "sacrifice a permanent". Going to add this in the clarifications.

Good to know. I purposely left "creature" off of my wording assuming that would prompt you to give the further clarification you've given above. Bravelion never fails.

Is "~" supported shorthand I.E. will using it detract quality points? I've forgotten.

Quote from caliburdeath »

Is "~" supported shorthand I.E. will using it detract quality points? I've forgotten.

You do lose points for using ~ instead of typing in the full name.

Regarding July MCC round 1
does it have to be Eldrazi? or just Innistradishh? Horrorish?

Regarding July MCC round 1
does it have to be Eldrazi? or just Innistradishh? Horrorish?

Quote from Forestsguy »

Regarding July MCC round 1
does it have to be Eldrazi? or just Innistradishh? Horrorish?

No, that's not required. You can do anything you want, and of course you can still do an Eldrazi/Innistrad/Horror card if you want. For all this month's rounds, Eldritch Moon was just the inspiration, but the challenges will be broader.

Woo hoo! My second straight MCC victory. I think I might finally be getting the hang of this contest.

As always, thanks to the judges, especially Moss_Elemental for hosting the month. Also, congrats to Clockwork Gamer on an excellent month. You are a truly worthy adversary.

Edit: A quick thought on the judgments for my final round card....Although I readily admit that the basis for my card was obviously taken from Phyrexian Obliterator, I feel like the effect itself was quite original. As far as I know, no card has ever been printed with that rules text. Considering this, it seems like it should garner a higher score than 0.5 for originality. Probably not more than a 1.5, but still.

Sorry for the double post. I would've just PMed this to bravelion, but I feel conversations like this are good for the overall community, especially considering that it sounds like other people in the round made similar functionality errors.....

@bravelion...So I think I understand what you're saying about about the functionality of Flesh-Fueled Dragon, but I'm little confused as to why Voracious Dragon works then. I assume it has something to do with the fact that devour is worded "As this enters the battlefield...." instead of saccing a creature as part of the cost? I apologize for my confusion, I've never claimed to be a rules guru.

http://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/creativity/custom-card-creation/custom-card-contests-and-games/722344-july-mcc-round-1-changing-by-death?page=2#c29
I'm done. Some many Devourers.

"Might be a bit much text for flavortext, but to be honest with you, there's always room for a oneliner in the MCC."
:0 Is this true? I input the card on MSE and it was 8 lines, which is the limit, but I would've liked to add flavortext.

I guess it depends on the judge. I've lost points before, because my card got too crammed and I added a flavortext.
I wonder what the best way would be to judge this. Some people lose points because there's no flavortext and others just dodge that by making an extra long card.
Seems unfair. Not saying anyone is doing that on purpose, but it is a concern of mine.

I'd say this is still readable:
http://i.imgur.com/joDc5do.png

Thanks for the crits! My flavor was supposed to be that the guy died (sacrifice a creature) and came back even stronger as a protective spirit, sorry if that wasn't clear through the card.

Quote from Flatline »

Sorry for the double post. I would've just PMed this to bravelion, but I feel conversations like this are good for the overall community, especially considering that it sounds like other people in the round made similar functionality errors.....

@bravelion...So I think I understand what you're saying about about the functionality of Flesh-Fueled Dragon, but I'm little confused as to why Voracious Dragon works then. I assume it has something to do with the fact that devour is worded "As this enters the battlefield...." instead of saccing a creature as part of the cost? I apologize for my confusion, I've never claimed to be a rules guru.

It's the same reason monstrosity X works, basically the CR have the ability look back in time (emphasis mine):

Quote from CR (SOI Edition) »

702.81b Some objects have abilities that refer to the number of creatures the permanent devoured. “It devoured” means “sacrificed as a result of its devour ability as it entered the battlefield.”

The principle is that abilities of permanents can't be based on cost paid to cast the permanent, as they are two distinct event well apart in time: you pay the costs while casting the permanent, then the permanents enters the battlefield, and only after that triggered abilities are triggered or you can activate activated abilities. Also remember that those abilities are separate objects from the permanents that generated them with no link to those permanents. Note that all of this doesn't matter for instants and sorceries, are their effects happen during the resolution of the same spell you paid the costs for, so those work because there are not separate objects, but it's all part of a single object on the stack.

I realized I probably made a challenge that for many people was harder than I meant it to be, because many may not have a rules knowledge deep enough to understand such cases. I apologize and will try to do better in the future. If a challenge requires some particular rules knowledge I'll try to provide it beforehand.

Quote from caliburdeath »

"Might be a bit much text for flavortext, but to be honest with you, there's always room for a oneliner in the MCC."
:0 Is this true? I input the card on MSE and it was 8 lines, which is the limit, but I would've liked to add flavortext.

There's no hard written rule, but I personally consider 9 lines fine in the M15 frame, 10 lines borderline (it depends on the spacing between paragraph mostly), 11 lines or more is microtext. I will definitely deduct points for 11 lines or more, and may deduct points for 10 lines. If you have 9 lines or less, you're safe. If you have doubts, try copying and pasting your rules text and flavor text in MSE.

Quote from doomfish »

I guess it depends on the judge. I've lost points before, because my card got too crammed and I added a flavortext.

I don't know if I have been one of those judges (I might), but I can tell you that the M15 frame does allow for an extra line of text without microtext (I've tried in MSE). Those limits I just talked about were all one line less before M15, so you might need to consider that too.

I wonder what the best way would be to judge this. Some people lose points because there's no flavortext and others just dodge that by making an extra long card...

...that I'd penalize too as a judge. Anyway, in both cases there should be a deduction of points. I personally give 1-1.5 points less to a card without flavor text in general. If there is no flavor text but the rules text is so long that there is indeed no room for flavor text, I'll only deduct half a point usually. I still deduct points because I'm supposed to judge flavor text and I can't judge what is not there, but I deduct the minimum because you were right in not including flavor text in that case.

I'd say this is still readable:
http://i.imgur.com/joDc5do.png

I agree. 9 lines total, that would be fine to me. A tenth line probably would not fit though, because there are a lot of paragraph breaks that take room.

Quote from sperlman »

Thanks for the crits! My flavor was supposed to be that the guy died (sacrifice a creature) and came back even stronger as a protective spirit, sorry if that wasn't clear through the card.

I admit I thought about that. That's why I lamented the absence an explaining flavortext. Normally cards that convey this flavor exile a creature from the graveyard and don't actively kill them.

In other news, round 2 is up!

Quick question about round two. The first setence talks about Escalate, and yet there is actually nothing in the description of the requirements that says to use the mechanic Escalate. So I simply made a monocolored modal spell. Is it supposed to be implied that the card has to use Escalate?

Quote from BrainPo »

Quick question about round two. The first setence talks about Escalate, and yet there is actually nothing in the description of the requirements that says to use the mechanic Escalate. So I simply made a monocolored modal spell. Is it supposed to be implied that the card has to use Escalate?

This is already covered in the clarifications spoiler, but I'll repeat: escalate was just the inspiration for this challenge, but you only have to actually use it (or any other mechanic that allows you to choose multiple modes) for subchallenge 1. You can make a traditional modal spell just fine, only be aware that if there's no in-built way to choose more than one mode (and ANY way counts, not only escalate) it won't pass subchallenge 1.