Premise:
Named after the magic card Abundance, the goals of this format are:
1) To decrease dead draws
2) Eliminate Mana Flood
3) Eliminate Mana Screw
4) Make it easier to draw out of color screw
5) Make it easier to curve out.
6) Keep the game play as similar to standard magic as possible with the above.
Abundance Magic Rules
In simple terms:
1) You have a land and non-land deck
2) When you draw a card, you may draw from either deck
Basically Every draw is like having Abundance in play without the reveal
Rules (Update 7-31-14)
Mandatory New Rules
------------------
Rule 0: For 40 Card Deck format players have a 17 card land deck and a 23-card non-land deck. For a 60 Card Deck format: Players have a 24 card land deck and a 36-card non-land deck.
Justification: Allows for the rest of the rule changes.
Rule 1: Whenever a player would draw card(s), that play player chooses card(s) one at a time from either library.
Justification: Elimination of mana-screw and mana-flood.
Compulsive Research:
i) Card Draw: Draw two non-land cards and 1 land card, discard the land card
ii) Card Search/Cards to Graveyard: Draw three non-land cards and discard two cards
Rule 2: Whenever a player would look/reveal the top z cards of a library, he/she may look/reveal the top x cards from the land library and the top z cards from the non-land library where x + y = z. This is done one at a time.
Justification: Adjusting look/reveal for the presence of two libraries.
Mystic Speculation
i) Land Fixing: Player looks at the top card of the land library until they see the land card they want or have looked at three cards. Puts the other looked at land cards on the bottom of the library. Uses the rest over scry on the non-land library.
ii) Card Searching: Scry as normal when top three cards are non-land.
2a) If an effect instructs to look/reveal from a library until a condition is met, the player must choose such that the condition is met as quickly as possible.
Justification: Prevents easy ways for this system to be broken.
Mind Funeral
Only mills four land cards. The alternative would be milling any number of non-land cards from his/her opponents library. Countryside Crusher
Never gets a +1/+1 Counter. The alternative would be getting any number of +1/+1 counters on crusher upto remaining land library count.
Rule 3: Whenever an effect would require a player to put card(s) from the top of his/her library into his/her graveyard, that player chooses cards one at a time from either library.
Justification: Adjusting milling for the presence of two libraries
Returned Centaur
1) Do not have reanimation effects: Player puts the top four land cards into the graveyard
2) Player has reanimation effects: Player puts non-land cards into the graveyard one at a time till gets a reanimation target or reaches four non-land cards put into the grave
Highly Suggested New Rules
-------------------
Rule 4: Whenever a land would come into play tapped, that lands controler may pay two life to have it come into play untapped instead.
a) This ability cannot be countered.
b) No effect may prevent this loss of life.
Justification: In this system where a player can always hit lands drop and play on the curve, lands coming into play tapped is a much large draw-back then it is traditionally.
Vivid Creek
You may pay two life as Vivid Creek comes into play to have it come into play untapped.
Rule 5: A player may pay three and exile a card in their hand face down to draw a card. This ability can be used only anytime that player could use a sorcery.
a) This ability cannot be countered.
b) Cards exiled this way cannot be removed from exile.
Justification: A primary purpose of this format is to eliminate dead draws. Now that drawing excess land when you do not need them and drawing non-lands when you need lands have been eliminated, the only source of "dead draws" is drawing cards late game that are useless late game. This rule lets you cycle away "dead" card for a "live" one. It is worded in such a way to avoid abuse.
Cultivate
1) Early game, play normally.
2) when you have an empty hand, plenty of mana, and no land fall creatures, pay 2 to exchange this "dead" draw for another one.
Technical Details of the above.
1) Each player has two decks. A 17 card land deck and a 23 card non-land deck where the total number of cards is 40. Land cards can be in the non-land deck if you have a lack of playable cards but not the other way around.
Justification: Land/Non-land ratio most commonly seen in draft decks
2) Whenever a player would draw (or look at or mill) cards from a library, they must draw as equally as possible from the two libraries.
Examples:
i) Draw 1 means draw a card from either the land or non-land library
ii) Mill 2 means mill 1 card from the land deck and 1 card from the non-land deck.
iii) Look at the top five cards means Look at three cards from the land deck and two cards from the non-land deck or look at two cards from the land deck and three cards from the non-land deck.
Justification: Draws are "balanced" between the libraries to keep draw (or look or mill) effects from becoming too strong (Imagine Glimpse the Unthinkable to someones land library, or Mulch drawing 4 lands or binning 4 creatures)
3) If a card is put back into/onto a library, it must be put back into its appropriate library.
Justification: Just a common sense rule.
4) If one library is empty, all draws come from the other library.
a) You lose the game from card drawing only when you have to draw and both your libraries are empty.
Justification: Just to keep the game running as it should
NEW - After more play testing
Suggested Rules regarding Starting Hands and Mulligans
Opening Hand:
0) Normal Hand Size
1) You can draw cards one a time from either library
Justification: This allows a person to draw land in response to starting non-land cards or draw land cards to ensure mana variety depending on deck. Example: If you see that you have drawn an early game card with a strict mana requirement Counterspell you might switch to drawing land until you have two islands.
2) Your final hand can have no less then 2 land and 2 non-land cards
Justification: Standard keep land criteria in draft.
Mulligan Rules:
1) No free mulligans
Justifcation: Since you should not need them
2) You must reveal your hand to mulligan
Justification: To ensure 3)
3) You can only mulligan when none of the mana in your hand matches the cards in you hand or if you don't have enough symbols to cast them.
Examples:
2 Islands, 5 Red Cards - Mulligan
1 Swamp, 1 Mountain, 5 BB cards - Mulligan
1 Swamp, 1 Mountain, 3 BB cards and 2 RR cards - Can Mulligan, however might not want to.
Justification: Helps ensure Mulligans are used only to get rid of unplayable starting hands not dig for god hands, since there already is open hand sculpting, more is not needed.
NEW
Other Suggested Rule(s) (Currently only 1)
1) When a land would come into play tapped, you may pay 2 life to have it come into play untapped instead
Justification: After play-testing lands coming into play tapped is a much larger downside when you can reliably always play on the curve and never mana flood.
Previous Explored Rules - No longer suggested - Kept for reference
i) The Land deck is played face up, but only turned face up when game begins. Also turned face up only after shuffling/cutting is down.
Justification: To more easily tell the decks apart. Also to enforce only lands are in the land deck.
ii) Starting Hands consist of 5 Non-Lands Cards and 2 Land cards
Justification: Helps enable the option of drawing lands right away if in a color screw situation or drawing gas right away if not.
iia) When drawing your opening gambit choose a land non-land ratio and draw those face down.
iii) No mulligens
Justification: As you can draw your way out of about any situation, they are no longer needed. Also enables games to start immediately.
iiib) Mulligen only if have 5 of the same basic land or 5 cards that cannot be played using your lands
iv) All effects where cards are put into/onto library with hidden information as to the card types are banned. Example: Brainstorm
Justification: Same as 6a)
Land Rules:
These rules are in place to sensitize non-basic lands. Since a player can always hit their land drops and will never draw too many lands, lands that come into play tapped and lands that are useful when mana flooded (colorless lands with extra abilities) will almost never be chosen over basic lands.
v) Whenever a non-basic land would come into play tapped you may pay 2 Life to have it come into play untapped instead. No effect may prevent this loss of life.
Justification: When you can always be on curve with your lands, coming into play tapped is a very harsh draw-back. I found I would rather play basics then any land that must come into play tapped.
vi) Whenever a non-basic land would come into play untapped unconditionally you may gain 2 Life. No effect may be triggered from this life gain.
Example: I play Rakdos Guildgate. I can pay 2 Life to have it come into play untapped.
Justification: As non-basics that come into play unconditionally generally are for use when you have too much mana, alot of the reason to play them is removed.
vii) Whenever a non-basic land would come into play untapped conditionally you may gain 1 life. No effect may be triggered from this life gain.
Example: I play Blood Crypt. I pay 2 Life to have it come into play untapped, then gain 1 life when it does, for a net life loss of 1 life.
Justification: This allows non-basic lands to stay different. Notice how the guildgate cost 2 life and the shockland cost 1 life to come into play untapped.
Cards whose evaluations have been changed
Ramp (only) cards: Any card that just adds mana to your mana pool or put more land into play becomes worse. Since you can always depend on reaching the correct number of mana, a ramp card on top of your non-land library when you've reached this point is a dead card and undesirable. Since your possible number of dead draws has been reduced you do not want to add to them. This hits green the most.
Land Draw effects on bodies: These cards become very strong cards early game. They read choose your next land drop and your next draw can be non-land without missing your landdrop. This effect hits green the most.
Draw 2 effects: Before you reach your land threshold, draw 2 means draw a non-land card this turn (replace itself with another action card) and have your land drop next turn while still drawing a non-land card. After you hit your land threshold, draw 2 acts just like draw 1 in providing 1 non-land card.
Mana Sink effects: As you'll never have a mana flood, mana sinks to address that issue become worse. As a trade-off curving out becomes much easier.
Cards that cost more then 7 on the draw and cards that cost more then 6 on the play: If you play 1 non-land card and 1 land card a turn you will run out of cards, you'll have to spend a turn just increasing your land in play.
Landfall and Retrace Effects: Since you can always draw a land and will never draw an extra land, these cards need to be evaluated individually. Ones where you'd always want to draw a land should probably be banned. Ones where you still would never want to draw a land if you do not have to should probably not be used.
Force Spike Effects: If people do not know you have the effect, since this is format where it is easy to curve out, there will be more opportunities to use this effect. However it is very easy to play around. Mana Leak however might as well be an unconditional counter spell.
Bounce Lands (if have 2 Life untapped Rule): These lands improve as they can be used as ramp. Also decrease the number of lands you need to draw.
Example: Tap a land. Play Gruul Turf. Bounce tapped land. Pay 2 life. Gruul Turff comes into play untapped and can be tapped for for 2 mana which means up 1 mana for the turn for the price of life. Also you can draw a non-land card next turn and still hit your land drop.
I've tested a few drafts using 2-decks, and played a shared 5-deck variant for about 7 years. (Google search for Commie Box MTG. It won't let me post a link.)
1. I love the shared deck version.
2. Draft works fine. It's major shortfall: It feels like a normal draft without mana screw. In other words, once you get used to having 2 decks, it feels invisible compared to most variant play.
Regarding your rules:
1. I wouldn't mess with extra rules trying to balance things. It will only confuse players, or make them not want to play from the get-go. Most cards balance no problem, including Retrace and Landfall. A couple cards like Trepenation Blade are not balanced, so I don't use them.
2. You can still get mana-screwed, even with a 17-card land deck. We play with 12-card land decks, and still get squeezed on colors.
3. I probably wouldn't go with lands face up for the initial tests. Make sure the basic rules work to your satisfaction before putting additional weirdness in front of your testers. They will be dubious of your tweaks, so the fewer the better. There's also the "sliding card" peek and "wrong land" despair that will irk your testers.
4. I don't think you need to ban Brainstorm.
5. Try this with draft first. You will have less testers trying to break the format right off the bat. Do it "keep what you draft" to maximize the feel-good of the experience. Moreover, using a draft testers don't have to invest time in constructing.
Most of my rules are more personal guidelines to keep the play as similar as possible to normal magic. For example: I noticed that I started refusing to use any land that came into play tapped when I could just draw my way out of early game color screw and still be able to always play on a curve. If I was playing a green red deck and my starting hand contained 2 mountains, I draw land cards every opportunity till I draw a forest, then draw non-land cards until I need another land, if I do not need to draw lands to fix colors, top decking a non-basic that comes into play tapped, really feels like a let down.
On the issue of Retrace and Landfall. It is not that I think they need to be banned, but the ability to always draw a land makes a few of the top cards far more powerful. It just a made a few of my collection's cards (note I have a small collection) no longer fun. For Rampaging Baloths and Call the Skybreaker they tended to always win the game on their own and make it so drawing and playing a land were always the optimum decision. Compare this to landfall cards like Grazing Gladehart, which is never enough reason to draw and play a land just for the effect.
The land pile face up was to help draw from the correct pile more then anything else. When I started play-testing this format I had both piles face down and I often drew from the land when I wanted a non-land and visa versa. I found the easiest way to always draw the correct card was just to have them "look different".
The banning of brainstorm is not for power reasons but because of how it allows the nonland cards to be put into the land deck and visa versa. For instance I am perfectly fine with ponder (which is in my cube) and my only objection to not including Ancestral Recall (besides not owning it and feeling scared using a card that expensive) would be because I do not like including cards that are unequivocally better then any other card with that type of effect. For similar reason I refuse to use Swords to Plowshares.
After reading comments from stickered above (thanks again) and from the Magic 2.0 thread additional play-testing has occurred.
The first entry has been cleaned up:
First the essential rules are addressed (far less then before)
1) Land and Non-Land Decks
2) How card drawing has changed
Then suggested methods for dealing with Starting Hands and Mulligans are addressed
These are highly modified from before and allow more variability
Then other suggested rules are given - only one left here
All other information before is kept, but in its own section, and I admit not really essential.
Specific Comments about play-testing:
1) Mana Flood and Screw are completely eliminated. Cheers!
2) Color Screw, while reduced, still exists. The suggested mulligan rules are to help further reduce color screw while providing as little additional benefit in non color screwed situations.
3) I had originally thought that a player would always follow this pattern: Draw Non-Land cards when you have land cards in hand, draw land cards when you do not have land cards in hand, then draw non-land cards when you have reached 6-7 lands. I was pleasantly surprised that this is not the case.
There were plenty of times I drew land with land in hand to help me get the specific mana combination I wanted for the next turn
There were a multiple of times when I played out my hand by turn 4/5 and drew non-land cards to increase my actions
There were also plenty of times where I kept drawing lands even when I reached my "maximum" to keep up combat tricks, for counter-spells, card abilities, etc.
4) Most importantly, even with these rule changes, the game play still feels like traditional magic, just with a little less luck involved.
If there is any interest in the cube that I am using I will add it.
I personally thought the color screw was a non-issue (I never have had that problem), but I have a friend that managed just that 6 times in a row yesterday. The revised mulligan rules are to help avoid this specifically.
As I tend to do 2-person limited formats (namely Winchester or Sealed), there is not the equivalent of picking a 10th pick land for your deck as in standard 4/8 person draft. That being the case, the lands that end up in our decks tend to be the ones we lucked out to get.
My cube is made up of a very casual magic collection. Think of it as the opposite of a power cube, the main goal was to keep the colors as balanced as possible.
1) the proportion of creature to non-creature is a fixed proportion across each color (slightly less for colorless working on this)
2) the colors and colorless have the same number of cards at each CMC (except some variation with 6+)
For each color and colorless
10 Cards at CMC 1
14 Cards at CMC 2
10 Cards at CMC 3
8 Cards at CMC 4
6 Cards at CMC 5
4 Cards at CMC 6+
3) Before drafting I assemble "semi-random" 15 card packs. I choose my card proportions based on this. I do this to keep the colors "even" each draft.
For each color and colorless 1 card with CMC 1 or 2 (6 cards)
For each color and colorless 1 card with CMC 3 or 4 or 5 (6 cards)
1 card with CMC 6+ (1 Card)
2 Non-basic Lands (2 Cards)
1) Rules now work in all formats.
2) Less and Simpler rules.
Below are the revised rules.
Abundance Magic Base Rules
------------------
Rule 0: For 40 Card Deck format players have a 17 card land deck and a 23-card non-land deck. For a 60 Card Deck format: Players have a 24 card land deck and a 36-card non-land deck.
Rule 1: Whenever a player would draw card(s), that play player chooses card(s) one at a time from either library.
Rule 2: Whenever a player would look/reveal the top z cards of a library, he/she may look/reveal the top x cards from the land library and the top z cards from the non-land library where x + y = z. This is done one at a time.
2a) If an effect instructs to look/reveal from a library until a condition is met, the player must choose such that the condition is met as quickly as possible.
Rule 3: Whenever an effect would require a player to put card(s) from the top of his/her library into his/her graveyard, that player chooses cards one at a time from either library.
Abundance Magic Suggested Rules
-------------------
Rule 4: Whenever a land would come into play tapped, that lands controller may pay two life to have it come into play untapped instead.
a) This ability cannot be countered.
b) No effect may prevent this loss of life.
Rule 5: A player may pay three and exile a card in thier hand face down to draw a card. This ability can be used only anytime that player could use a sorcery.
a) This ability cannot be countered.
b) Cards exiled this way cannot be removed from exile.
Named after the magic card Abundance, the goals of this format are:
1) To decrease dead draws
2) Eliminate Mana Flood
3) Eliminate Mana Screw
4) Make it easier to draw out of color screw
5) Make it easier to curve out.
6) Keep the game play as similar to standard magic as possible with the above.
Abundance Magic Rules
In simple terms:
1) You have a land and non-land deck
2) When you draw a card, you may draw from either deck
Basically Every draw is like having Abundance in play without the reveal
Rules (Update 7-31-14)
Mandatory New Rules
------------------
Rule 0: For 40 Card Deck format players have a 17 card land deck and a 23-card non-land deck. For a 60 Card Deck format: Players have a 24 card land deck and a 36-card non-land deck.
Justification: Allows for the rest of the rule changes.
Rule 1: Whenever a player would draw card(s), that play player chooses card(s) one at a time from either library.
Justification: Elimination of mana-screw and mana-flood.
Compulsive Research:
i) Card Draw: Draw two non-land cards and 1 land card, discard the land card
ii) Card Search/Cards to Graveyard: Draw three non-land cards and discard two cards
Justification: Adjusting look/reveal for the presence of two libraries.
Mystic Speculation
i) Land Fixing: Player looks at the top card of the land library until they see the land card they want or have looked at three cards. Puts the other looked at land cards on the bottom of the library. Uses the rest over scry on the non-land library.
ii) Card Searching: Scry as normal when top three cards are non-land.
Justification: Prevents easy ways for this system to be broken.
Mind Funeral
Only mills four land cards. The alternative would be milling any number of non-land cards from his/her opponents library.
Countryside Crusher
Never gets a +1/+1 Counter. The alternative would be getting any number of +1/+1 counters on crusher upto remaining land library count.
Justification: Adjusting milling for the presence of two libraries
Returned Centaur
1) Do not have reanimation effects: Player puts the top four land cards into the graveyard
2) Player has reanimation effects: Player puts non-land cards into the graveyard one at a time till gets a reanimation target or reaches four non-land cards put into the grave
-------------------
Rule 4: Whenever a land would come into play tapped, that lands controler may pay two life to have it come into play untapped instead.
a) This ability cannot be countered.
b) No effect may prevent this loss of life.
Justification: In this system where a player can always hit lands drop and play on the curve, lands coming into play tapped is a much large draw-back then it is traditionally.
Vivid Creek
You may pay two life as Vivid Creek comes into play to have it come into play untapped.
a) This ability cannot be countered.
b) Cards exiled this way cannot be removed from exile.
Justification: A primary purpose of this format is to eliminate dead draws. Now that drawing excess land when you do not need them and drawing non-lands when you need lands have been eliminated, the only source of "dead draws" is drawing cards late game that are useless late game. This rule lets you cycle away "dead" card for a "live" one. It is worded in such a way to avoid abuse.
Cultivate
1) Early game, play normally.
2) when you have an empty hand, plenty of mana, and no land fall creatures, pay 2 to exchange this "dead" draw for another one.
Technical Details of the above.
1) Each player has two decks. A 17 card land deck and a 23 card non-land deck where the total number of cards is 40. Land cards can be in the non-land deck if you have a lack of playable cards but not the other way around.
Justification: Land/Non-land ratio most commonly seen in draft decks
2) Whenever a player would draw (or look at or mill) cards from a library, they must draw as equally as possible from the two libraries.
Examples:
i) Draw 1 means draw a card from either the land or non-land library
ii) Mill 2 means mill 1 card from the land deck and 1 card from the non-land deck.
iii) Look at the top five cards means Look at three cards from the land deck and two cards from the non-land deck or look at two cards from the land deck and three cards from the non-land deck.
Justification: Draws are "balanced" between the libraries to keep draw (or look or mill) effects from becoming too strong (Imagine Glimpse the Unthinkable to someones land library, or Mulch drawing 4 lands or binning 4 creatures)
3) If a card is put back into/onto a library, it must be put back into its appropriate library.
Justification: Just a common sense rule.
4) If one library is empty, all draws come from the other library.
a) You lose the game from card drawing only when you have to draw and both your libraries are empty.
Justification: Just to keep the game running as it should
NEW - After more play testing
Suggested Rules regarding Starting Hands and Mulligans
Opening Hand:
0) Normal Hand Size
1) You can draw cards one a time from either library
Justification: This allows a person to draw land in response to starting non-land cards or draw land cards to ensure mana variety depending on deck. Example: If you see that you have drawn an early game card with a strict mana requirement Counterspell you might switch to drawing land until you have two islands.
2) Your final hand can have no less then 2 land and 2 non-land cards
Justification: Standard keep land criteria in draft.
Mulligan Rules:
1) No free mulligans
Justifcation: Since you should not need them
2) You must reveal your hand to mulligan
Justification: To ensure 3)
3) You can only mulligan when none of the mana in your hand matches the cards in you hand or if you don't have enough symbols to cast them.
Examples:
2 Islands, 5 Red Cards - Mulligan
1 Swamp, 1 Mountain, 5 BB cards - Mulligan
1 Swamp, 1 Mountain, 3 BB cards and 2 RR cards - Can Mulligan, however might not want to.
Justification: Helps ensure Mulligans are used only to get rid of unplayable starting hands not dig for god hands, since there already is open hand sculpting, more is not needed.
NEW
Other Suggested Rule(s) (Currently only 1)
1) When a land would come into play tapped, you may pay 2 life to have it come into play untapped instead
Justification: After play-testing lands coming into play tapped is a much larger downside when you can reliably always play on the curve and never mana flood.
Previous Explored Rules - No longer suggested - Kept for reference
i) The Land deck is played face up, but only turned face up when game begins. Also turned face up only after shuffling/cutting is down.
Justification: To more easily tell the decks apart. Also to enforce only lands are in the land deck.
ii) Starting Hands consist of 5 Non-Lands Cards and 2 Land cards
Justification: Helps enable the option of drawing lands right away if in a color screw situation or drawing gas right away if not.
iia) When drawing your opening gambit choose a land non-land ratio and draw those face down.
iii) No mulligens
Justification: As you can draw your way out of about any situation, they are no longer needed. Also enables games to start immediately.
iiib) Mulligen only if have 5 of the same basic land or 5 cards that cannot be played using your lands
iv) All effects where cards are put into/onto library with hidden information as to the card types are banned. Example: Brainstorm
Justification: Same as 6a)
Land Rules:
These rules are in place to sensitize non-basic lands. Since a player can always hit their land drops and will never draw too many lands, lands that come into play tapped and lands that are useful when mana flooded (colorless lands with extra abilities) will almost never be chosen over basic lands.
v) Whenever a non-basic land would come into play tapped you may pay 2 Life to have it come into play untapped instead. No effect may prevent this loss of life.
Justification: When you can always be on curve with your lands, coming into play tapped is a very harsh draw-back. I found I would rather play basics then any land that must come into play tapped.
vi) Whenever a non-basic land would come into play untapped unconditionally you may gain 2 Life. No effect may be triggered from this life gain.
Example: I play Rakdos Guildgate. I can pay 2 Life to have it come into play untapped.
Justification: As non-basics that come into play unconditionally generally are for use when you have too much mana, alot of the reason to play them is removed.
vii) Whenever a non-basic land would come into play untapped conditionally you may gain 1 life. No effect may be triggered from this life gain.
Example: I play Blood Crypt. I pay 2 Life to have it come into play untapped, then gain 1 life when it does, for a net life loss of 1 life.
Justification: This allows non-basic lands to stay different. Notice how the guildgate cost 2 life and the shockland cost 1 life to come into play untapped.
Cards whose evaluations have been changed
Ramp (only) cards: Any card that just adds mana to your mana pool or put more land into play becomes worse. Since you can always depend on reaching the correct number of mana, a ramp card on top of your non-land library when you've reached this point is a dead card and undesirable. Since your possible number of dead draws has been reduced you do not want to add to them. This hits green the most.
Land Draw effects on bodies: These cards become very strong cards early game. They read choose your next land drop and your next draw can be non-land without missing your landdrop. This effect hits green the most.
Draw 2 effects: Before you reach your land threshold, draw 2 means draw a non-land card this turn (replace itself with another action card) and have your land drop next turn while still drawing a non-land card. After you hit your land threshold, draw 2 acts just like draw 1 in providing 1 non-land card.
Mana Sink effects: As you'll never have a mana flood, mana sinks to address that issue become worse. As a trade-off curving out becomes much easier.
Cards that cost more then 7 on the draw and cards that cost more then 6 on the play: If you play 1 non-land card and 1 land card a turn you will run out of cards, you'll have to spend a turn just increasing your land in play.
Landfall and Retrace Effects: Since you can always draw a land and will never draw an extra land, these cards need to be evaluated individually. Ones where you'd always want to draw a land should probably be banned. Ones where you still would never want to draw a land if you do not have to should probably not be used.
Force Spike Effects: If people do not know you have the effect, since this is format where it is easy to curve out, there will be more opportunities to use this effect. However it is very easy to play around. Mana Leak however might as well be an unconditional counter spell.
Bounce Lands (if have 2 Life untapped Rule): These lands improve as they can be used as ramp. Also decrease the number of lands you need to draw.
Example: Tap a land. Play Gruul Turf. Bounce tapped land. Pay 2 life. Gruul Turff comes into play untapped and can be tapped for for 2 mana which means up 1 mana for the turn for the price of life. Also you can draw a non-land card next turn and still hit your land drop.
1. I love the shared deck version.
2. Draft works fine. It's major shortfall: It feels like a normal draft without mana screw. In other words, once you get used to having 2 decks, it feels invisible compared to most variant play.
Regarding your rules:
1. I wouldn't mess with extra rules trying to balance things. It will only confuse players, or make them not want to play from the get-go. Most cards balance no problem, including Retrace and Landfall. A couple cards like Trepenation Blade are not balanced, so I don't use them.
2. You can still get mana-screwed, even with a 17-card land deck. We play with 12-card land decks, and still get squeezed on colors.
3. I probably wouldn't go with lands face up for the initial tests. Make sure the basic rules work to your satisfaction before putting additional weirdness in front of your testers. They will be dubious of your tweaks, so the fewer the better. There's also the "sliding card" peek and "wrong land" despair that will irk your testers.
4. I don't think you need to ban Brainstorm.
5. Try this with draft first. You will have less testers trying to break the format right off the bat. Do it "keep what you draft" to maximize the feel-good of the experience. Moreover, using a draft testers don't have to invest time in constructing.
I had never heard of Commie Box MTG before. Think I might experiment with it.
I do most of my playing with just one other person in Winchester Draft (see link) (alternative to Winston Draft) format. I never considered that it needs to be simple to sell it to others. Thank you.
http://archive.wizards.com/Magic/magazine/article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/ld/143
Most of my rules are more personal guidelines to keep the play as similar as possible to normal magic. For example: I noticed that I started refusing to use any land that came into play tapped when I could just draw my way out of early game color screw and still be able to always play on a curve. If I was playing a green red deck and my starting hand contained 2 mountains, I draw land cards every opportunity till I draw a forest, then draw non-land cards until I need another land, if I do not need to draw lands to fix colors, top decking a non-basic that comes into play tapped, really feels like a let down.
On the issue of Retrace and Landfall. It is not that I think they need to be banned, but the ability to always draw a land makes a few of the top cards far more powerful. It just a made a few of my collection's cards (note I have a small collection) no longer fun. For Rampaging Baloths and Call the Skybreaker they tended to always win the game on their own and make it so drawing and playing a land were always the optimum decision. Compare this to landfall cards like Grazing Gladehart, which is never enough reason to draw and play a land just for the effect.
The land pile face up was to help draw from the correct pile more then anything else. When I started play-testing this format I had both piles face down and I often drew from the land when I wanted a non-land and visa versa. I found the easiest way to always draw the correct card was just to have them "look different".
The banning of brainstorm is not for power reasons but because of how it allows the nonland cards to be put into the land deck and visa versa. For instance I am perfectly fine with ponder (which is in my cube) and my only objection to not including Ancestral Recall (besides not owning it and feeling scared using a card that expensive) would be because I do not like including cards that are unequivocally better then any other card with that type of effect. For similar reason I refuse to use Swords to Plowshares.
The first entry has been cleaned up:
First the essential rules are addressed (far less then before)
1) Land and Non-Land Decks
2) How card drawing has changed
Then suggested methods for dealing with Starting Hands and Mulligans are addressed
These are highly modified from before and allow more variability
Then other suggested rules are given - only one left here
All other information before is kept, but in its own section, and I admit not really essential.
Specific Comments about play-testing:
1) Mana Flood and Screw are completely eliminated. Cheers!
2) Color Screw, while reduced, still exists. The suggested mulligan rules are to help further reduce color screw while providing as little additional benefit in non color screwed situations.
3) I had originally thought that a player would always follow this pattern: Draw Non-Land cards when you have land cards in hand, draw land cards when you do not have land cards in hand, then draw non-land cards when you have reached 6-7 lands. I was pleasantly surprised that this is not the case.
There were plenty of times I drew land with land in hand to help me get the specific mana combination I wanted for the next turn
There were a multiple of times when I played out my hand by turn 4/5 and drew non-land cards to increase my actions
There were also plenty of times where I kept drawing lands even when I reached my "maximum" to keep up combat tricks, for counter-spells, card abilities, etc.
4) Most importantly, even with these rule changes, the game play still feels like traditional magic, just with a little less luck involved.
If there is any interest in the cube that I am using I will add it.
I would be curious to know the general vibe of the cube. Is it a power cube or more level?
As I tend to do 2-person limited formats (namely Winchester or Sealed), there is not the equivalent of picking a 10th pick land for your deck as in standard 4/8 person draft. That being the case, the lands that end up in our decks tend to be the ones we lucked out to get.
My cube is made up of a very casual magic collection. Think of it as the opposite of a power cube, the main goal was to keep the colors as balanced as possible.
Cube Details (not card specific):
0) 360 Cards (for 4 2-person drafts or 2 6 pack sealeds)
1) the proportion of creature to non-creature is a fixed proportion across each color (slightly less for colorless working on this)
2) the colors and colorless have the same number of cards at each CMC (except some variation with 6+)
For each color and colorless
10 Cards at CMC 1
14 Cards at CMC 2
10 Cards at CMC 3
8 Cards at CMC 4
6 Cards at CMC 5
4 Cards at CMC 6+
3) Before drafting I assemble "semi-random" 15 card packs. I choose my card proportions based on this. I do this to keep the colors "even" each draft.
For each color and colorless 1 card with CMC 1 or 2 (6 cards)
For each color and colorless 1 card with CMC 3 or 4 or 5 (6 cards)
1 card with CMC 6+ (1 Card)
2 Non-basic Lands (2 Cards)
1) Rules now work in all formats.
2) Less and Simpler rules.
Below are the revised rules.
Abundance Magic Base Rules
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Rule 0: For 40 Card Deck format players have a 17 card land deck and a 23-card non-land deck. For a 60 Card Deck format: Players have a 24 card land deck and a 36-card non-land deck.
Rule 1: Whenever a player would draw card(s), that play player chooses card(s) one at a time from either library.
Rule 2: Whenever a player would look/reveal the top z cards of a library, he/she may look/reveal the top x cards from the land library and the top z cards from the non-land library where x + y = z. This is done one at a time.
2a) If an effect instructs to look/reveal from a library until a condition is met, the player must choose such that the condition is met as quickly as possible.
Rule 3: Whenever an effect would require a player to put card(s) from the top of his/her library into his/her graveyard, that player chooses cards one at a time from either library.
Abundance Magic Suggested Rules
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Rule 4: Whenever a land would come into play tapped, that lands controller may pay two life to have it come into play untapped instead.
a) This ability cannot be countered.
b) No effect may prevent this loss of life.
Rule 5: A player may pay three and exile a card in thier hand face down to draw a card. This ability can be used only anytime that player could use a sorcery.
a) This ability cannot be countered.
b) Cards exiled this way cannot be removed from exile.