MTG Salvation

This could turn into fastbond with haste cards. The only note worthing this plants spread quickly. Maybe increasing its mana cost by 1 would make this balance.

Idea Snatch UB
Instant
Each opponent reveals his or her hand.
You may search your library for a card with the same name as a card revealed this way, put that card into your hand, then shuffle your library.
Draw a card at the beginning of the next end step if you didnt search your library this turn.

Idea Snatch - Flavor wise it just barely misses. It's more of an Idea copy, snatch implies taking something.

My take on it
Idea Snatch 1UB
Sorcery
Each opponent reveals his or her hand.
For each player, choose an instant or sorcery card, that player discards that card, then you may search your library for a card with the same name, then if you searched your library shuffle it.


Dakkon The Immortal- 3BUUW
Legendary Planeswalker - Dakkon
Whenever a creature dies, Dakkon gains a loyalty.
As long as The Blackblade is attached to Dakkon the Immortal, he becomes a 5/5 Human Soldier creature with indistructable that’s still a planeswalker. Prevent all damage that would be dealt to him.
+2: Scry 2, draw 1.
-X: Until the begining of your next turn, destroy the next X power worth of target creatures that deal damage to you or a planeswalker your control. (you choose targets when you activate this ability.)
-7: Put a Legendary Artifact - Equipment onto the battlefield named "The Blackblade" with equipped creature gains Death touch, "Whenever a creature dies put a +1/+1 counter on equipped creature.", and equip 5 and attach it to Dakkon the Immortal.
<5>

Well that's definitely a riff on the ol alarm. I think if you played it fairly, its a big overcosted red enchantment that gives you win-moar, requiring advantageous board state and just amplifying threats already big enough to attack with, and being miserably slow since you need to cast it for 7 and then cast more creatures. That's nothing to write home about. However, since its based on ETB instead of cast triggers, it goes infinite quite easily. Any creature that makes a token when attacking, or two tokens, means you've suddenly got at a minimum a free extra combat step the same turn. If they don't have 2 blockers for Kari Zev, its an infinite combat step / token generator combo.
But for 7 mana? That's probably a fair win condition.

Gore Chucker BR
Creature - Zombie (U)
Deathtouch
Whenever a nontoken permanent is destroyed, Gore Chucker deals 2 damage to that permanent's controller. (Permanents are destroyed only by lethal damage or abilities that say 'destroy')
2/2

Hmm. Is it a bit too much at that cost? I think maybe, but it IS symmetrical. It's definitely value-packed, though!

Something about chill depths 2UB
Legendary Creature - Homarid Shaman (no, this stays, no changing this!!)
Whenever you tap an island or swamp for mana, you may pay 1 life. If you do, add an additional U or B. (Edited in clause per suggestion)
xUB, , Put another creature you control into its owner's library third from the top: Put target creature or Planeswalker with converted mana cost X into its owner's library third from the top.
1/4 (edit: now 2/5)

Downside-less ramp really feels like it's encroaching on green's territory. It may have precedent in the likes of Crypt Ghast, but honestly, I think that card was a mistake in terms of color identity, and definitely don't approve of more joining its ranks. Perhaps "Whenever you tap an island or swamp for mana, you may pay one life. If you do, add one mana of any type that land produced." And no, I wouldn't reduce the cost of the card for the addition of that downside. Even with the downside, this is extremely good ramp, especially for a blue black commander with an additional good stuff ability. Note that that good stuff ability is repeatable tucking in colors with easy access to mill.

One last note, is that X supposed to be there, or be some specific number, or what? Because as is it really doesn't make much sense, since it has no effect on the ability.

Suppression Edict 2UU
Enchantment
Flash

When ~ enters the battlefield, counter target spell.
Your opponents may not cast spells with the same name as spells countered by ~.

lol whoops. Fixed. The X is now relevant! Like it was intended to be! I like your suggestion and will implement it, but I'm keeping the latter clause as "add U or B" because I think it's more fun for Islands and Swamps to potentially generate UB - of course, with a life payment now. Also, now 2/5.

For your card - I like it but I'd probably make it 2WU since as is, it feels sort of like it's stepping on white's toes.

Okay here's another legendary creature, plus something extra.

???, Guide of Mystery 2U edit: now 1UU
Legendary Creature - ??? Wizard
Partner
Prowess
5U , : Exile ???, Guide of Mystery then return it to the battlefield transformed and attached to a Commander creature you own and control. This ability costs 1 less for each instant or sorcery card in your graveyard.
1/1 edit: now 2/2

Mystic Apotheosis (transformsd)
Legendary Enchantment - Aura
Enchant a Commander creature you own and control.
Enchanted creature has base power and toughness 5/5, gains Indestructible and Prowess, and is a blue god in addition to its other colors and creature types.

Edit: overhauled, and now I like the costs better AND got rid of wonky phrasing.

On ???, I have a few thoughts.

The first thing is that I don’t know why the front side has prowess. Yeah it makes it symmetric with the back, but the front side is So underwhelming that you are basically playing this for the flip, at which point why add a line of text to an already wordy card.

My issue with the back side is that giving a big power and toughness boost and granting indestructible doesn’t feel like a blue effect. Green, white or maybe even black, but definitely not blue. Blue does get to set power and toughness, but typically to smaller values. The only part of this that feels blue is granting prowess, and prowess is by far the least relevant ability on the back side.

Additionally, I’m big on what this card essentially does and am not sure who it is supposed to appeal to. It doesn’t seem like a good Timmy card, since nothing it does is really all that exciting, and it doesn’t feel like a Johnny card since there are better ways of granting indestructibility, and it feels weirdly positioned as a spike card, since there really isn’t any ‘outplayability’ in the card.

I think the concept of a commander that flips into an aura is interesting, but this isn’t a great execution.

Devastating Firestorm
XXR
Sorcery
Alignment (This spell costs 1 less for each spell cast before it this turn)
Devestating Firestorm deals X damage to up to X targets.

I really like Alignment, granted it gives you a bit of book keeping, but so does storm. Ugg.... I can see that as a finisher in a storm deck honestly, but overall the design is pretty good, it's simple and effective.


Heroic Hydra - XWG
Legendary Creature - Hydra
This enters the battlefield with X +1/+1 counters on it.
Whenever a counter is removed from this, put a 1/1 White warrior token onto the battlefield.
Remove a +1/+1 counter from this: Prevent the next 1 damage target creature, spell, or ability would deal this turn.
0/0

So, some thoughts. First, the thing about ??? Is that it makes the Commander a God. That's one meaning for "apotheosis", the ascent to Divinity. All Gods in MtG that I'm aware of have Indestructible regardless of color, which is why Mystic Apotheosis gives it. As for the body, I gave it such unimpressive stats because of the Partner keyword. That said, a quick check of Partner cards show that the stats don't need to be weak, so it's now a 2/2 possibly for 1UU. It has and grants Prowess because I thought it dull to go with Flying. As to the stuff about what sort of audience the card could possibly be for, I quite frankly do not care. I make cards because I find the concept interesting and my only concerns are if they're balanced for whatever cost they are, and if they're comprehensible.

Anyway, the new card. I don't think this works as a Hydra, flavorfully. It feels a bit too uh orderly? I like the idea of the token creation as a trigger, but hmm. Is it pushed more than is advisable? Eh, maybe? But I like it as it is! I hope somebody else can offer more insightful commentary.

This guy is a riff on Theros block's themes 1G
Enchantment Creature - Satyr Druid
When this guy etc enters the battlefield, put a Blessing counter on target creature you control.
Creatures you control with Blessing counters gain " : Add one mana of any color."
: Add one of any color.
1//2

The blessing counter design is neat, and likely balanced since if they remove the Satyr, both creatures loose the ability.

Maliana, the Vengeful
3RW
Legendary Creature - Human Knight
Vigilance
At the end of each turn, if you were dealt combat damage by a creature this turn, take an extra turn after this one. Skip all steps during that turn except for the combat step.
4/4

The trigger is placed on the end step opposed to he combat step to avoid multiple combat steps triggering multiple extra turns.

I was just thinking about a single land that could be used for mana fixing, but utilizing a land sacrifice upon ETB and not tapped.

Bountiful Harvest
Land (Rare)
When ~ enters the battlefield, sacrifice a land you control.
:Add two mana of any combination the sacrificed land could produce. (B produces BB. B or G produces BB, BG, or GG.)

This is the first card I ever conceived of in this forum, so apologies if this is similar to someone else. I like the sacrifice mechanic as it can enable certain strategies, and I think limiting the mana production to what is sacrificed lowers the likely hood of it being too overpowered. Any painland or rainbow land would make the most use of the land in multi-colored decks. [Think, sac a City of Brass on turn 2 to then create two of any color on turn 2. Yes you can produce 3 mana on turn 2.] In the Modern meta, I can see people playing a Fetch-to-Shockland; then turn 2 float 1 mana and sac when this is played, tap to add 2 more colored mana to play whatever 3CMC spell (4CMC if a mana dork is in play). They would only have the single land in play afterwards and taken 3 damage so far. I think there is enough land hate that this is not format warping. What do people think?

Bountiful harvest actually has a fairly good solution to the problem presented by lotus vale / scorched ruins. Those cards needed rather clumsy errata because lands have the problem that you can tap them for mana before their ETB abilities resolve and float that mana, then sacrifice them, making them effectively a ritual. That was the entire basis for the amulet bloom deck abusing the ravnica karoo lands that were supposed to be limited by entering tapped. But by producing mana used a linked ability, you've actually made a template where no weird replacement effect is necessary, because tapping the land for mana before any land is sacrificed would add no mana since there's no linked card. I think you've got a lot of potential in such a template.

But I think you need to make two important changes. For one, the mana acceleration from getting +1 mana by floating a land would be to strong for almost every format, but you can easily fix that by making it only sacrifice an untapped land. Same thing as lotus vale. But for tracking issues, you probably want this to exile the land instead of sacrificing it. There's currently no precedent for permanently tracking a sacrificed card like that afaik, but plenty of cards exile something and 'remember' it. Especially considering how easy it is to move a sacrificed land out of your graveyard. So I'd recommend something like "When ~ enters the battlefield, exile an untapped land you control". Then there's also still the balance issue of whether its too strong. Being able to go 4 mana on turn 2 ponza-style with just an arbor elf and your normal lands, no extra utopia sprawl required- that might be too much.

Dancing to Death BB
Enchantment (R)
If a creature entering the battlefield under your control causes a triggered ability of a permanent you control to trigger, if that creature is on the battlefield, sacrifice that creature and that ability triggers an additional time.
Whenever you activate an ability of a creature you control, if that creature is on the battlefield, sacrifice that creature and copy that ability. You may choose new targets for the copy.

Bountiful harvest actually has a fairly good solution to the problem presented by lotus vale / scorched ruins. Those cards needed rather clumsy errata because lands have the problem that you can tap them for mana before their ETB abilities resolve and float that mana, then sacrifice them, making them effectively a ritual. That was the entire basis for the amulet bloom deck abusing the ravnica karoo lands that were supposed to be limited by entering tapped. But by producing mana used a linked ability, you've actually made a template where no weird replacement effect is necessary, because tapping the land for mana before any land is sacrificed would add no mana since there's no linked card. I think you've got a lot of potential in such a template.

But I think you need to make two important changes. For one, the mana acceleration from getting +1 mana by floating a land would be to strong for almost every format, but you can easily fix that by making it only sacrifice an untapped land. Same thing as lotus vale. But for tracking issues, you probably want this to exile the land instead of sacrificing it. There's currently no precedent for permanently tracking a sacrificed card like that afaik, but plenty of cards exile something and 'remember' it. Especially considering how easy it is to move a sacrificed land out of your graveyard. So I'd recommend something like "When ~ enters the battlefield, exile an untapped land you control". Then there's also still the balance issue of whether its too strong. Being able to go 4 mana on turn 2 ponza-style with just an arbor elf and your normal lands, no extra utopia sprawl required- that might be too much.

Thanks for the input. I didn't even know of the lotus vale errata issue, good to know for the future and cool that this type of template could be useful. Your other two points, were the same two points I was debating when I was writing the post. I actually deleted untapped, and felt guilty of doing that. I knew you could use this with Crucible of Worlds to replay a land you just sacrificed the previous turn. It was later in the evening when I thought remembering what colors are produced would be hard. I 100% agree that exiling would be the preferred zone for that land.

My rationale for deleting untapped, was that for a typical green ramp deck your first 2 turns play out: 1)Play Forest, then mana dork/arbor elf 2)Second land, and then you can cast up to a 3CMC spell. If you used Utopia Sprawl/Arbor Elf then 4CMC (total 4 cards needed) with 2 lands remaining in play that create 3 mana total each turn thereafter. Any other non-ramp deck would have 2 available mana on turn 2 if you exclude other sources like Simian Spirit Guide. The idea was to recreate that ramp style in the other colors, which may be overpowered, but at the cost of losing a land in play putting you more at risk of being disrupted by an early Stone Rain or Field of Ruin on turn 3 or 4. Even though you get a temporary boost on turn 2, that extra land ramp is gone on turn 3. If you used Arbor Elf, you can not untap Bountiful Harvest on your turn 3 since it's not a Forest to create 4 mana with one land, that would be broken for sure.

I edited this section in to show the land mana curve with tapped and untapped land sacrifice.
Mana pool from lands only on turns 1-4: 1-2-3-4
Mana pool from lands with turn 2 Bountiful Harvest saccing tapped land: 1-3-3-4
Mana pool from lands with turn 2 Bountiful Harvest saccing untapped land: 1-2-3-4

Green ramp and probably mono Red aggro may see a benefit to sacrifice a tapped land. I agree that exiling the sacrificed land would be the minimum change I would do to this card to satisfy the mana tracking and stop any land coming back from graveyard with Crucible like cards. I will need to evaluate the sac untapped land some more, but you offer good points. Thanks!

On Dancing Death, I like the card as a weird Johnny card, but I think the card could be worded more elegantly. Also, this has fun value as a card that you Donate.

Inflicted Agony
BB
Instant - Uncommon
Target creature deals damage to itself equal it its toughness.
”Stop hitting yourself”

The intention is to make a card that appeals to both Spikes in that it is an efficient removal spell, and also Johnies since it has a weird effect that they can build around (creatures dealing large amounts of damage to itself). The card is black opposed to red, as even though red is primary in ‘deals damage to creatures’, the card is in my circumstances just ‘destroy target creature’, which isn’t a red effect.

Its similar to kiku's shadow and inner struggle/wrack with madness/repentance. But having such a kill spell work by dealing damage equal to toughness, well it 'works' in almost every case and has some minor interactions with being unable to kill creatures that absorb/reduce damage and works with lifelink, but eh, the problem with such a card is that it falls into the trap of being over-designed. That is, if a card is just 99% the same as saying "destroy target creature", then the overly convoluted means by which you accomplish that destroy doesn't really merit printing the novel mechanic. Its a wonky hoop to jump through just to accomplish the same effect in almost every scenario. But, it might make sense in a block with mechanics like enrage or stuffy doll effects

Scholar of the Druid Grove UG
Creature - Human Druid (U)
Mentor 2 (When this enters the battlefield, exile the top two cards of your library face-down. At the end of your draw step each turn, you may exchange any number of the exiled cards with that many cards from your hand.)
T, put a card exiled by this creature into its owner's graveyard: Add G
2/1

Mentor is a pretty cool design, but it makes me wonder whether you're able to look at the face down cards whilst they're in exile or not. It's also easier to reword it to 'At the beginning of your draw step' rather than at the end, because Wizards don't like keeping track of the end of phases because of priority issues, plus you'd have drawn your card already anyway. I don't know whether the card is strong of not, but I feel like with several Mentor cards on the field it might be difficult to keep track of which cards are exiled by which creatures. However I do like the Mentor mechanic, so maybe I'd suggest having the exiled cards have some sort of counter on them or a means to keep track of the face down exiled cards you can exchange from your hand or not.

Tajuru Restoration 2GG
Enchantment
Awaken 4 5GGG (If you cast this spell for 6GGG, also put four +1/+1 counters on target land you control and it becomes a 0/0 Elemental creature with haste. It's still a land.)
Whenever a land creature deals combat damage to a player, your may return a card from your graveyard to your hand.
2GG: Target land becomes a 4/4 Elemental creature with trample until end of turn.

Hmmm.... the Awaken cost feels rather expensive to me. 7 mana should be enough. Otherwise, nice card.


Next

Tenacity Of Expanses 3GW
Enchantment (R)
Domain - Creatures you control get +0/+1 for each basic land types among lands you control.

Comments?


EDIT:

Tenacity Of Expanses 2GW
Enchantment (R)
Domain - Creatures you control get +0/+1 for each basic land types among lands you control.

hmm... make it +1/1 and I think it would be fine.

Strength of the Earth - 3wG
Legendary Enchantment
Whenever a land enters the battlefield, creatures you control gain +1/+1 and your choice of: Trample, First Strike, or Vigilance

Nice. It needs Scapeshift or such to be truly broken, and otherwise, it may only sometimes mass buff, so I believe at 5cc this should be just right.


A variant from Abyssal Persecutor

Necrarchy Hellkite 2BR
Creature - Zombie Dragon (M)
Flying, Trample, Haste
If an opponent has 0 or less life, that player wins the game instead.
2: Necrarchy Hellkite gets +1/+0 until end of turn. Any player may activate this ability.
"The dead is a kingdom worth ruling."
7/5

Nastier than Persecutor since it has Haste and firebreathing, but if you screw up and kill someone when this is on board, you lose. Comments?



EDIT:

Necrarchy Hellkite 2BR
Creature - Zombie Dragon (M)
Flying, Trample
If an opponent has 0 or less life, that player wins the game instead.
2: Necrarchy Hellkite gets +1/+0 until end of turn. Any player may activate this ability.
"The dead is a kingdom worth ruling."
7/6

Necarchy Hellkite sure is nasty. The one thing I would change is that I would get rid of haste, however. I suspect that this would create problems by punishing any ‘shields down’ moments that your opponent has for too low a cost, and that getting rid of haste makes it a bit less punishing.

Elemental Reshaping
1UU
Enchantment - Aura
Enchant Land
As Elemental Reshaping enters the battlefield, choose a creature or land.
The enchanted land is a copy of the chosen creature or land, except that if is a land in addition to its other types and has all of its abilities.

Edit: just realized that this needed a ‘is still a land’ clause in order to prevent the enchantment falling off. At this point, I made it so the land still had its old abilities to avoid it being a land that can’t tap for mana.

Yeah it does have that problem with aura-falls-off that plagues a lot of animate dead style effects, because its changing the properties of the thing its enchanting. Would it be too strong if you solved it by removing the 'except' clause and then making it a "Enchant Creature or Land". That would offensively make it a creature removal spell like path to exile- for 3 mana at sorcery speed at least. But that versatility of being a pseudo-clone effect to turn your own creatures into lands, or even a janky 2-for-1 land removal, maybe would be too strong. Especially if it was in a rotation with something like walking ballista to make it into a 3 mana 1-for-1 land destruction in that case. Which it still does with just the 'enchant land' clause mind you, but not so oppressively. Its a fun bit of blues color pie though either way

Restless Spirit Guide 2B
Creature - Spirit (U)
Ethereal (Attacking creatures assign combat damage as if creatures with ethereal weren't blocked or blocking.)
Exile Restless Spirit Guide from your graveyard and discard a card: Add B
2/2

So essentially this guy cannot take combat damage by blocking? Well... neat, I guess, possibly a bit too powerful though even if you do eat face damage. Otherwise, no issue.


Just a random Un card.

Three-Foot Avenger 3W
Creature - Dwarf Soldier (U)
Double strike
Whenever a creature you control attacks a player taller than you, that creature gains Skulk until end of turn.
"The taller they are, the easier it is to get to their weak points!"
1/3

Yeah, I know the flavor text is cheap

It seems like an interesting variant on the pongify / rapid hybridization thing. Seeing as it was already a color pie bleed from black into blue its fine to have it in black, and neat to create green tokens. But I would think this is a bit underpowered, in being sorcery speed and giving an opponent better bodies, and in a being in a color that gets stronger kill spells than blue. The flavor is absolutely on point

Savage Pillager RR
Creature - Human Barbarian (U)
First Strike
Bloodlust (When attackers are declared, this creature gets +1/+0 until end of combat for each possible creature it could block or be blocked by this combat.)
2/1

I'm a bit torn on how to template/implement this idea. The intention is to make the creature scale with number of attackers or defenders that could engage it, ignoring those it can't block or be blocked by due to evasion. As a trigger when attackers are declared, it can get evasion afterwards to cheat that damage in, ie attack a board with 6 defending tokens and cast infiltrate and it hits for +6 damage. If it was a static state-buff based on the number of blocks possible, giving it evasion would remove the bonus power, which I'd prefer design-wise. But the problem there is first/double strike would have the nonobvious effect of shrinking it before it deals combat damage (ie it gets +2/+0 because of 2 lingering souls tokens that could have blocked it, but they die blocking knights with first strike, then this loses that power, then deals its power)

that static template would be "This creature gets +1/+0 during combat for each possible creature it could block or be blocked by this combat"