Wanted to make a different sort of Mardu card for multiplayer.
Dire Straits
Enchantment
All creatures get +2/+0.
All creatures you don’t control gain menace.
Whenever an opponent attacks you and/or one or more planeswalkers you control, draw a card
Not that powerful but a weird design. If it would be safe to trigger per creature that attacks, let me know.
Now that you've made Dire Straits, I look forward to seeing your designs for Walk of Life and Sultans of Swing.
You might need to tweak the amount it buffs the creatures, because this might just prompt an opponent to swing in and kill you with their newly buffed-and-evasive team and then the card draw doesn't matter.
The wording does need to be tweaked. The question is, do you want it to draw one card per creature, or one card for the whole attack?
It will either be:
"Whenever a creature attacks you or a planeswalker you control, draw a card."
or
"Whenever one or more creatures attack you and/or planeswalkers you control, draw a card."
It probably needs to be the latter, as the former is toon many cards for non-blue to draw in this way.
The wording used on this type of effect was actually updated a bit with Strixhaven (though it was one of the more subtle changes next to things like "Mana Value" or plain old "Shuffle"). See cunning rhetoric for an example (though I do need to say "one or more planeswalkers", so will edit that).
Good catch, I'd missed that update. It does save one the "one or more creatures" part of the text to say just "opponent"
If its only drawing you one card per attack, this fits as a white draw ability so no need for blue.
The only thing I don't like is that it doesn't do anything for you on board. I'd suggest giving all creatures +2/+0 and only giving menace to your opponents, or vice versa. Then its not as dead a draw when you're head to head with someone.
Good catch, I'd missed that update. It does save one the "one or more creatures" part of the text to say just "opponent"
If its only drawing you one card per attack, this fits as a white draw ability so no need for blue.
The only thing I don't like is that it doesn't do anything for you on board. I'd suggest giving all creatures +2/+0 and only giving menace to your opponents, or vice versa. Then its not as dead a draw when you're head to head with someone.
Not that powerful but a weird design. If it would be safe to trigger per creature that attacks, let me know.
Maybe. The massive buff to your own creatures might be enough though. Perhaps, "For each two creatures attacking you, create a 0/1 Thrull token." But maybe that's too much. This is already a very powerful multiplayer card that encourages combat.
Not that powerful but a weird design. If it would be safe to trigger per creature that attacks, let me know.
Per creature would create A LOT of potential draws for a three mana card. As it is, its a slight penalty for attacking you, but it isn't so big that it completely discourages it. Every creature would basically hand you the win if the other player couldn't kill you outright, and so the game would grind to a halt until someone could deliver a haymaker.
Wanted to make a different sort of Mardu card for multiplayer.
Menace is already so polarizing. It's not healthy as abundant as it's seen either. It would have been nice if Nuisance had caught on, it's a much more graceful alternative to menace.
Why not something that nerfs menace instead? And open up interactivity so it's as versatile as it really wants to be.
Dire StraitsRWB Enchantment
All creatures get +2/+0.
Creatures with menace enter the battlefield with a -1/-1 counter on them.
Whenever a creature is blocked by more than one creature, the defending player may draw a card.
I think the card looks pretty good as it is now. One card per attack is fine (Mangara requires 2 creatures to be attacking so this is better in that regard) and I like the idea of buffing all creatures to "suggest" that attacks be made. Being in white means the +2/+0 makes sense for your team and while the Menace granting ability is somewhat weird, it is not without precedent. There is Alms Beast that gives opposing creatures lifelink.
I wonder if it might be better to only affect creatures attacking you? Not "better" in the sense that the card is better, but better in terms of flavor since it really moves opponents to attacking you over the other players putting you in Dire Straits over everyone else along with you. Unless that was the intent of course.
Dire Straits
Enchantment
All creatures get +2/+0.
All creatures you don’t control gain menace.
Whenever an opponent attacks you and/or one or more planeswalkers you control, draw a card
Not that powerful but a weird design. If it would be safe to trigger per creature that attacks, let me know.
You might need to tweak the amount it buffs the creatures, because this might just prompt an opponent to swing in and kill you with their newly buffed-and-evasive team and then the card draw doesn't matter.
The wording does need to be tweaked. The question is, do you want it to draw one card per creature, or one card for the whole attack?
It will either be:
"Whenever a creature attacks you or a planeswalker you control, draw a card."
or
"Whenever one or more creatures attack you and/or planeswalkers you control, draw a card."
It probably needs to be the latter, as the former is toon many cards for non-blue to draw in this way.
If its only drawing you one card per attack, this fits as a white draw ability so no need for blue.
The only thing I don't like is that it doesn't do anything for you on board. I'd suggest giving all creatures +2/+0 and only giving menace to your opponents, or vice versa. Then its not as dead a draw when you're head to head with someone.
Anyways, this would be a filler uncommon. It's not worth building around. It just wants to look pretty and important in clad silver.
That sounds like a nifty change. Done!
Maybe. The massive buff to your own creatures might be enough though. Perhaps, "For each two creatures attacking you, create a 0/1 Thrull token." But maybe that's too much. This is already a very powerful multiplayer card that encourages combat.
Per creature would create A LOT of potential draws for a three mana card. As it is, its a slight penalty for attacking you, but it isn't so big that it completely discourages it. Every creature would basically hand you the win if the other player couldn't kill you outright, and so the game would grind to a halt until someone could deliver a haymaker.
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Menace is already so polarizing. It's not healthy as abundant as it's seen either. It would have been nice if Nuisance had caught on, it's a much more graceful alternative to menace.
Why not something that nerfs menace instead? And open up interactivity so it's as versatile as it really wants to be.
Dire Straits RWB
Enchantment
All creatures get +2/+0.
Creatures with menace enter the battlefield with a -1/-1 counter on them.
Whenever a creature is blocked by more than one creature, the defending player may draw a card.
I wonder if it might be better to only affect creatures attacking you? Not "better" in the sense that the card is better, but better in terms of flavor since it really moves opponents to attacking you over the other players putting you in Dire Straits over everyone else along with you. Unless that was the intent of course.