Whisper to Tourach B
Sorcery
Target player discards one card at random.
I think I would... That random discard can really f over an opponent.
This is pretty terrible. It wouldn't be playable in any format I know of. You get no information except for the card discarded at random. Why does that help? Other discard cards that are worse than IoK or Thoughtseize, at least allow you to see their hand or parts of it.
This is pretty terrible. It wouldn't be playable in any format I know of. You get no information except for the card discarded at random. Why does that help? Other discard cards that are worse than IoK or Thoughtseize, at least allow you to see their hand or parts of it.
It's funny that Magic works this way. The Whisper to Tourach design is technically half as bad as Hymn, but in practice is way worse than that. It's like how Shock isn't 2/3 as good as Lightning Bolt; it's magnitudes worse by almost every measure.
I do like the idea of trying to fix Hymn for Modern. Augur of Skulls was a very lame attempt (if even it referred to Hymn). Stupor is too expensive and too weak. Fall is better than both, but still too inconsistent. Wrench Mind is actually pretty good in the format, but has some big blank matchups (Affinity and Tron, which is like 15-20% of a metagame right there), and doesn't screw over hands enough. So what can we do to fix it?
HtT can't go up on its mana cost or it misses that critical window when its relevant. You really need the spell to hit on turn 1 or 2 to make an impact.
Tourach's CacophonyBB Sorcery
As an additional cost to cast Tourach's Cacophony, discard a card at random.
Target player discards two cards at random.
Not really sure how balanced this is. Discarding two cards at random as the cost is definitely unplayable. But one? Unclear. Love the flavor though; the player hears a little bit of Tourach's song and the other player gets the full blast.
I still don't understand why people love to discuss endless convoluted variants on classic spells like Hymn and Counterspell when in all actuality those cards are perfectly fair themselves. Just because a card is better than other cards doesn't mean it's broken, it's just the correct choice. Thoughtseize is better than IoK but IoK still gets played, Bolt is better than Galvanic Blast/Shrapnel Blast/Electrostatic Bolt/Flame Slash but those have seen play as well. For a card to be "broken" it needs to go above and beyond just being "the best card for a particular effect" and start actively pushing other strategies out of existence. Goyf is the best beater and blocker in modern, by far. But that doesn't mean that aggro suddenly doesn't exist or for some reason can't compete, you know?
Oh, I thought he was talking about playing a spell that is countering a spell with counters on it as it comes into play, but I see you guys were just discussing whether he was flashing a creature with flash in order to flash a flashback or just flashing a creature with flash but not needing flash in order to flashback a spell without flash.
I still don't understand why people love to discuss endless convoluted variants on classic spells like Hymn and Counterspell when in all actuality those cards are perfectly fair themselves. Just because a card is better than other cards doesn't mean it's broken, it's just the correct choice. Thoughtseize is better than IoK but IoK still gets played, Bolt is better than Galvanic Blast/Shrapnel Blast/Electrostatic Bolt/Flame Slash but those have seen play as well. For a card to be "broken" it needs to go above and beyond just being "the best card for a particular effect" and start actively pushing other strategies out of existence. Goyf is the best beater and blocker in modern, by far. But that doesn't mean that aggro suddenly doesn't exist or for some reason can't compete, you know?
Because those spells, while iconic, do not fit in with Modern's power level. Some of us would enjoy throwbacks to these cards. Others feel that certain parts of modern are lacking (countermagic) but feel that reprints of the Legacy staples would ruin the format (FoW). So they suggest alternatives.
Additionally, many of those cards you listed are different enough that they are not strictly better/worse. IoK is much better in a deck that cannot afford the life cost of Thoughtsieze and/or only cares about early threats. Galvanic/Shrapnel Blast are better than Bolt in an artifact deck (i.e. affinity). Goyf is only the best beater if you're playing green. U/W midrange has things like Geist, so it is fine without goyf.
Add B to your mana pool. // Add R to your mana pool.
:symtap:, Sacrifice Blight Pit//Thundermaw: Destroy target land. Its controller may search his or her library for a Swamp//Mountain land card, put it onto the battlefield, then shuffle his or her library.
----------------------------------------
These are two different Land cards. Both are just coloured Ghost Quarters.
Add b to your mana pool. // Add r to your mana pool.
:symtap:, Sacrifice Blight Pit//Thundermaw: Destroy target land. Its controller may search his or her library for a basic land card, put it onto the battlefield, then shuffle his or her library.
I don't think a strictly better Ghost Quarter is exactly good card design
Sacrifice X creatures, target player sacrifice's X creatures.
----------------------------
A flexible and cheap way to get rid of opposing creatures but with build-in card disadvantage.
I think changing the rules text to something like "Sacrifice X creatures. Target player sacrifices Y creatures, where Y is the number of creatures you sacrificed this way." is more balanced.
what i really want is an aggressive one drop for tribal fae you can actually play on the first turn. something on par with a goblin guide: flash is better than haste here, but it has a smaller butt (dies to unbuffed tokens or half of an electrolyze). i imagine it with an even worse drawback because it has mandatory flavor evasion.
U
Creature - Faerie
Flash, flying
Whenever ~ deals combat damage to a player, that player may draw a card.
2/1
what i really want is an aggressive one drop for tribal fae you can actually play on the first turn. something on par with a goblin guide: flash is better than haste here, but it has a smaller butt (dies to unbuffed tokens or half of an electrolyze). i imagine it with an even worse drawback because it has mandatory flavor evasion.
U
Creature - Faerie
Flash, flying
Whenever ~ deals combat damage to a player, that player may draw a card.
2/1
I could see it as 2/2, and instead of straight draw, it does a guide-check for instant and/or sorcery spells instead of lands.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Thanks to Rivenor for the signature and XenoNinja for the Avi!
I could see it as 2/2, and instead of straight draw, it does a guide-check for instant and/or sorcery spells instead of lands.
the reveal-check drawback seems reasonable for a 2/2 on the ground, but since this one flies right over bobs and goyfs and legendary spirit clerics i feel like it almost has to give PURE card advantage to keep it on even power level with the guide.
that said, i'd wouldn't complain with it being a 2/2, if only because i hate spirit tokens. haha.
the reveal-check drawback seems reasonable for a 2/2 on the ground, but since this one flies right over bobs and goyfs and legendary spirit clerics i feel like it almost has to give PURE card advantage to keep it on even power level with the guide.
that said, i'd wouldn't complain with it being a 2/2, if only because i hate spirit tokens. haha.
Guide has haste which is immeasurably more powerful than Flash. Hand with three guides, on the play, has them at 12 before the opponent's second turn. And maybe they drew a land, but goblin guide decks don't care about cards in the opponent's hand.
Hand with three of these, they're at 18, and possibly have drawn a relevant spell, potentially off of this trigger and killed it before damage.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Thanks to Rivenor for the signature and XenoNinja for the Avi!
maybe i'm making the comparison to goblin guide too linear, because while this design does have a lot in common with GG, in my mind the two cards actually do very different things.
if we're talking explosive damage potentially, i suppose haste is immeasurably more powerful than flash, but in the archetype i'm thinking of, i'm not so sure it's really better... since flash allows you to hold onto spell snare or spell pierce mana... or allow +1 before a spellstutter sprite on turn 3... and the flying really is pretty important, especially if you only have one of them on the board--attacking with three 2/2s on turn 2 is frightening, yes. but only one of them can get clogged up, real fast, while this guy just keeps swinging.
but hey, i don't know. maybe that drawback is too much, since, as you say, with multiples, it is exponentially worse than GG. when i'm fantasizing about imaginary cards, i tend to try to err on the side of jank than broken pet cards. heh.
I think this card would help make that deck possible.
B
Greed's Whisper
Artifact Creature - Horror
When Greed’s Whisper enters the battlefield, target player reveals his or her hand. You choose a nonland card from it. That player puts that card into his or her library third from the top.
Cards you cast that your don’t own cost 1 less to cast.
1/1
U
Creature - Faerie
Flash, flying
Whenever ~ deals combat damage to a player, that player may draw a card.
2/1
I agree that UR Fae needs a cheap faerie like this but I think the cmc is too low for something like this. I know that it would be lumped in with Snapcaster Mage, but I think having another 2 cmc blue creature that gave great value but from a different angle would be awesome.
I'd really like to see some lands that are worth sacrificing your turn to have them enter tapped for.
The only ones in modern right now are probably the Raving Ravine, Celestial Colonnade, Stirring Wildwood, and Treetop Village - all manlands.
How about a powerful effect tacked onto a land?
Frozen Fortress
Land
Frozen Fortress enters the battlefield tapped. When it does, creatures target player controls cannot attack on that players next turn. T: Add U or W to your mana pool.
I'd really like to see some lands that are worth sacrificing your turn to have them enter tapped for.
The only ones in modern right now are probably the Raving Ravine, Celestial Colonnade, Stirring Wildwood, and Treetop Village - all manlands.
How about Halimar Depths? I agree with you though there should be more utility lands in the card pool. The question is though, what effects are powerful enough to essentially set you back a turn?
Goblin DemolitionistR
Creature - Goblin
Goblin Demolitionist enters the battlefield, it does 1 damage to target creature or player.
Sacrifice Goblin Demolitionist: If a source named Goblin Demolitionist would deal damage this turn, it deals that much plus 1.
1/1
I think the versatility here goes a long way in helping sligh-style decks, not to mention the Goblins deck could really use a 1-drop of this power level.
Goblin DemolitionistR
Creature - Goblin
Goblin Demolitionist enters the battlefield, it does 1 damage to target creature or player.
Sacrifice Goblin Demolitionist: If a source named Goblin Demolitionist would deal damage this turn, it deals that much plus 1.
1/1
I think the versatility here goes a long way in helping sligh-style decks, not to mention the Goblins deck could really use a 1-drop of this power level.
Thats a cool design, but it might be confusing for new players to grasp that you can sacrifice it to pump its own damage output.
How about Halimar Depths? I agree with you though there should be more utility lands in the card pool. The question is though, what effects are powerful enough to essentially set you back a turn?
Depths is almost worth it, I'd say, but when you dabble in spell lands what you're really doing is asking yourself "should I run Knight of the Reliquary?"
Does anyone see anything wrong with re-printing innocent blood?
I'd object to it, even as a person who plays UB.
It's stupid good, and the card's text is a total load anyway because we all know it's going to be abused as one-sidedly as possible.
Which I guess is the point, but seriously it's a stupid card and something about it feels really below the belt.
I'd object to it, even as a person who plays UB.
It's stupid good, and the card's text is a total load anyway because we all know it's going to be abused as one-sidedly as possible.
Which I guess is the point, but seriously it's a stupid card and something about it feels really below the belt.
I agree, I just wish black also had a vote for 'best removal in modern'--not path and bolt.
I would really like to see red get something along the lines of:
"Exile all spells from the stack, then return them in reverse order"
Not certain what the implications would be, just thought it would be neat.
Also, for white, something along the lines of:
"At your upkeep, if your hand is empty, draw a card"
Just something to make top deck mode more bearable without giving white really good card draw.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Things WotC cares about:
-making certain Standard cards can be played in Modern, therefore increasing their value and increasing WotC's profit margin
Things WotC does not care about:
-keeping the ban list as short as possible
-taking chances with an entire format for the benefit of a single card
-catering to play styles that newer players generally don't like and will lose them more players than it will gain
-keeping the meta balanced between archetypes/colors/whatever
-keeping cards on the secondary market cheap (available yes, but not cheap)
-keeping the meta diverse (as long as a single deck doesn't threaten the popularity of the format)
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This is pretty terrible. It wouldn't be playable in any format I know of. You get no information except for the card discarded at random. Why does that help? Other discard cards that are worse than IoK or Thoughtseize, at least allow you to see their hand or parts of it.
Sexy Sig by mchief111 @ Rising Studios
EDH
G Isao
It's funny that Magic works this way. The Whisper to Tourach design is technically half as bad as Hymn, but in practice is way worse than that. It's like how Shock isn't 2/3 as good as Lightning Bolt; it's magnitudes worse by almost every measure.
I do like the idea of trying to fix Hymn for Modern. Augur of Skulls was a very lame attempt (if even it referred to Hymn). Stupor is too expensive and too weak. Fall is better than both, but still too inconsistent. Wrench Mind is actually pretty good in the format, but has some big blank matchups (Affinity and Tron, which is like 15-20% of a metagame right there), and doesn't screw over hands enough. So what can we do to fix it?
HtT can't go up on its mana cost or it misses that critical window when its relevant. You really need the spell to hit on turn 1 or 2 to make an impact.
Tourach's Cacophony BB
Sorcery
As an additional cost to cast Tourach's Cacophony, discard a card at random.
Target player discards two cards at random.
Not really sure how balanced this is. Discarding two cards at random as the cost is definitely unplayable. But one? Unclear. Love the flavor though; the player hears a little bit of Tourach's song and the other player gets the full blast.
Well it's nice to know someone knew where I was going with that.
-regarding Snapcaster Mage.
Because those spells, while iconic, do not fit in with Modern's power level. Some of us would enjoy throwbacks to these cards. Others feel that certain parts of modern are lacking (countermagic) but feel that reprints of the Legacy staples would ruin the format (FoW). So they suggest alternatives.
Additionally, many of those cards you listed are different enough that they are not strictly better/worse. IoK is much better in a deck that cannot afford the life cost of Thoughtsieze and/or only cares about early threats. Galvanic/Shrapnel Blast are better than Bolt in an artifact deck (i.e. affinity). Goyf is only the best beater if you're playing green. U/W midrange has things like Geist, so it is fine without goyf.
Yeah, lets reprint Strip Mine.
I don't think a strictly better Ghost Quarter is exactly good card design
Ooh, nearly strictly better Barter in Blood...*drools*
I think changing the rules text to something like "Sacrifice X creatures. Target player sacrifices Y creatures, where Y is the number of creatures you sacrificed this way." is more balanced.
U
Creature - Faerie
Flash, flying
Whenever ~ deals combat damage to a player, that player may draw a card.
2/1
I could see it as 2/2, and instead of straight draw, it does a guide-check for instant and/or sorcery spells instead of lands.
Thanks to Rivenor for the signature and XenoNinja for the Avi!
Quotes:
That would be pretty neat. 1 toughness makes sense in fae because they are pretty fragile creatures.
the reveal-check drawback seems reasonable for a 2/2 on the ground, but since this one flies right over bobs and goyfs and legendary spirit clerics i feel like it almost has to give PURE card advantage to keep it on even power level with the guide.
that said, i'd wouldn't complain with it being a 2/2, if only because i hate spirit tokens. haha.
Guide has haste which is immeasurably more powerful than Flash. Hand with three guides, on the play, has them at 12 before the opponent's second turn. And maybe they drew a land, but goblin guide decks don't care about cards in the opponent's hand.
Hand with three of these, they're at 18, and possibly have drawn a relevant spell, potentially off of this trigger and killed it before damage.
Thanks to Rivenor for the signature and XenoNinja for the Avi!
Quotes:
if we're talking explosive damage potentially, i suppose haste is immeasurably more powerful than flash, but in the archetype i'm thinking of, i'm not so sure it's really better... since flash allows you to hold onto spell snare or spell pierce mana... or allow +1 before a spellstutter sprite on turn 3... and the flying really is pretty important, especially if you only have one of them on the board--attacking with three 2/2s on turn 2 is frightening, yes. but only one of them can get clogged up, real fast, while this guy just keeps swinging.
but hey, i don't know. maybe that drawback is too much, since, as you say, with multiples, it is exponentially worse than GG. when i'm fantasizing about imaginary cards, i tend to try to err on the side of jank than broken pet cards. heh.
I think this card would help make that deck possible.
B
Greed's Whisper
Artifact Creature - Horror
When Greed’s Whisper enters the battlefield, target player reveals his or her hand. You choose a nonland card from it. That player puts that card into his or her library third from the top.
Cards you cast that your don’t own cost 1 less to cast.
1/1
I agree that UR Fae needs a cheap faerie like this but I think the cmc is too low for something like this. I know that it would be lumped in with Snapcaster Mage, but I think having another 2 cmc blue creature that gave great value but from a different angle would be awesome.
Artifact
2: Scry 2.
Thanks to Rivenor for the signature and XenoNinja for the Avi!
Quotes:
The only ones in modern right now are probably the Raving Ravine, Celestial Colonnade, Stirring Wildwood, and Treetop Village - all manlands.
How about a powerful effect tacked onto a land?
Frozen Fortress
Land
Frozen Fortress enters the battlefield tapped. When it does, creatures target player controls cannot attack on that players next turn.
T: Add U or W to your mana pool.
I always thought Crystal ball was just a bit too weak. This seems just right for a fixed Top.
How about Halimar Depths? I agree with you though there should be more utility lands in the card pool. The question is though, what effects are powerful enough to essentially set you back a turn?
Creature - Goblin
Goblin Demolitionist enters the battlefield, it does 1 damage to target creature or player.
Sacrifice Goblin Demolitionist: If a source named Goblin Demolitionist would deal damage this turn, it deals that much plus 1.
1/1
I think the versatility here goes a long way in helping sligh-style decks, not to mention the Goblins deck could really use a 1-drop of this power level.
Thats a cool design, but it might be confusing for new players to grasp that you can sacrifice it to pump its own damage output.
Depths is almost worth it, I'd say, but when you dabble in spell lands what you're really doing is asking yourself "should I run Knight of the Reliquary?"
I'd object to it, even as a person who plays UB.
It's stupid good, and the card's text is a total load anyway because we all know it's going to be abused as one-sidedly as possible.
Which I guess is the point, but seriously it's a stupid card and something about it feels really below the belt.
I agree, I just wish black also had a vote for 'best removal in modern'--not path and bolt.
"Exile all spells from the stack, then return them in reverse order"
Not certain what the implications would be, just thought it would be neat.
Also, for white, something along the lines of:
"At your upkeep, if your hand is empty, draw a card"
Just something to make top deck mode more bearable without giving white really good card draw.
-making certain Standard cards can be played in Modern, therefore increasing their value and increasing WotC's profit margin
Things WotC does not care about:
-keeping the ban list as short as possible
-taking chances with an entire format for the benefit of a single card
-catering to play styles that newer players generally don't like and will lose them more players than it will gain
-keeping the meta balanced between archetypes/colors/whatever
-keeping cards on the secondary market cheap (available yes, but not cheap)
-keeping the meta diverse (as long as a single deck doesn't threaten the popularity of the format)