There is absolutely no reason why the game should ever get instant speed wrath, unless it has some very significant additional cost to cast. A huge cost is not the way to go. Big mana spells should help the game end, not drag it further.
I think instant speed wrath is by itself a huge design challenge. It seems your intention is less about tackling this challenge and more about creating a sacrificial board wipe. To start, make this thing sorcery speed. At sorcery speed and 4BB cost I think it's on the right spot, balance wise. And a great card.
Its too late to stop instant speed wraths from being in the game. Nearly 20 years late. Rout and Fated Retribution are both things, neither of which were over powered so a 7cmc on instant wrath has proven safe. Add on a cost reduction and you have to to increase the cost, by how much is debatable.
Hahaha way to make a fool of myself. Totally forgot about Rout (and I used to play that). Fated Retribution is so unremarkable I forgot it existed.
In any case, my argument was not that instant speed wraths would be too powerful. The argument is that if balance-costed, they end up being cards that makes the game boring.
There is absolutely no reason why the game should ever get instant speed wrath, unless it has some very significant additional cost to cast. A huge cost is not the way to go. Big mana spells should help the game end, not drag it further.
I think instant speed wrath is by itself a huge design challenge. It seems your intention is less about tackling this challenge and more about creating a sacrificial board wipe. To start, make this thing sorcery speed. At sorcery speed and 4BB cost I think it's on the right spot, balance wise. And a great card.
maybe i am alone with the oppinion, but i think people complain to easy instead of thinking about solutions how to play vs hard decks. to me this is kind of the thrill that comes with magic... "how do i beat this deck"
The problem is "how do I beat deck X" is not really why people enjoy the game. Adapting your list to how the meta is developing is one thing. Totally changing archetype just to counter something because majority of decks simply don't have the tools to fight is another.
The second is sign of unhealth meta for sure and the kind of thing that hurts the game, specially if you are starting.
Party Mechanic: Tribal playing with four creature types sounds nice but I just hate the execution. Giving a bonus for counting heads is very overdone. While this is just how tribal is done, most of the time the tribe get some other mechanical distinction, like elf ramping and zombies using the graveyard and so on. The party is split across all colors so a mechanical distinction was impossible. This is why counting heads was a bad idea for the party. Slivers and Allies are both much better because they are more mechanically distinct.
Class Tribal: What a terrible idea to have class tribal and party on the same set. The class tribal just dilutes the theme of adventure like acid. A bunch of clerics doing clericy things does not speak adventure to me, neither does equipment warrior deck. I get that part of the design is letting you "choose your class" by letting you build toward class tribes. But creatures caring about creatures is 100% the wrong way to do it. The only tribal theme at common/uncommon should have been party (all four creatures types working together) and "choose your class" should have been a theme you draft if you get the rare legends, who would all be flavored as leaders of their respective class guilds.
Class Depictions are Inconsistent: This is suppose to be about fantasy adventures. Clerics should heal, wizards should cast spells, rogues should outmaneuver and trick the opponent and warriors should protect you and bash face. Sounds simple, right ? Instead we get clerics flying on kite sail (and mosquitos), bashing face just like warriors do and summoning cats. Other classes depictions are not as flawed as cleric's but still very lacking. There is way too many wizards that just fly and bash face. No wizard that counter spells, destroy enchantments, paralyzes creatures, create illusions, summon stuff. No warriors that are dedicated blockers, that protect your other creatures, that fights opponent creatures. Rogue is the only tribe that is reasonably executed imo.
Non-Human-like Class Creatures: Another huge mistake. It would be much better if adventurers and NPCs stayed separated. Having a bunch of angel and demon clerics flying around works against the trope. Angels, Demons and Sphinx are too over powered to be adventurers, having then filling your party ranks is silly. Adventurer decks should be about a bunch of small creatures winning the game through synergy of their abilities, not angel warriors fightning along side demon clerics.
I think you would be right except that land-type is starting to matter more, even in standard. Eldraine utility lands, Nissa, Field of Ruin, the M20 black Shade. I think the point is that basic land types are inherently more valuable from now on and this is the reason why we are past this design rule.
I think power creep on common / uncommon is not a issue at all, it always bothered me that in common creatures could never compete with common removal in limited, not even bad removal. I think having common 'B' grade creatures is a really great move.
The power creep that I don't like is how secondary color effects are getting absurdly good. Like card draw, removal and hasty creatures in green (mono-green in standard right now has more and better removal then any of the mono-colored aggro decks... questing beast is the best haste creature... the top 3 CA engines are all green).
Other example is tokens and big creatures in red. Red have tons of super efficient 3 drops that generates a bunch of tokens left and right. I thought white was the "go wide" color ? Why is that red is allowed to get a 4/3 + TWO very good upsides ? While Knight of Autumn is vanilla when played as a 4/3.
Extinction Event is on par with the best white sweeper in standard. Only wiping even or odd is not exactly a downside as it may preserve your creatures as well. That card should have been mono white or WB but never mono black.
This trend of secondary color effects getting better and better is diluting the color pie. Standard right now is unrecognizable, that is not MtG.
My guess is that Eldrazi will be a smaller theme this time. More like one or two limited arch-types, rather then half the set. Lands as overarching theme and allies should make a return. I hope quests make a return as well. Quests are free in terms of space in the set: they can always make quests supporting the other themes and have just a single "quest-matters" card in the set.
There is relatively small space for innovation. With D&D coming back, they should capitalize on the adventure theme. So I hope they finally do dungeons in MTG.
Good Riddance:D Now it's just going to be who can drop the most busted green planeswalker earlier than the opponent.
Gotta say I fear the same. Feels like Food decks are free to reign over the format, but WotC obviously did some tests. Golos decks were probably decimating a bunch of stuff that could threaten food, but I don't know.. I feel like most decks are not equipped to deal with turn 3 control magic. And 6 loyalty is just over the top, even for a cmc 5+ PW. I don't know wtf they were thinking.
Presence of the Wise Man is a lot worse than Phyrexian Arena. 1 is not worth 1 life per turn. But I would love to see this at UUU.
Traumatic Amnesia is bound to happen one day. Wrench Mind is not really that great and it's downside is relatively small. They are progressively improving discard spells with all the Mind Rot+ limited fodder, it's just a matter of time until they create this.
Reflecting Stone I like WotC decision to keep cheap ramp spells in green. The design space of CMC 1 ramp cards is very small. More emphasis on CMC 2 ramp spells is needed for diversity's sake, which means colorless ramp must be mostly 3 mana. 2 with a downside is not unreasonable but the downside here is a bit too small.
Nguvu, Ape Lord pretty cool. The two disjointed abilities feel old school (the all upside 5/5 for 5 does not). I guess the point is to have old school creatures with modern power level.
Gullom, the Sedge Beast. Avalanche Riders nemesis ? Hard to evaluate but feels safe.
Dimur, the Mind Stealer. My favorite of the bunch. I'm a Ravenous Rats lover (I try them in standard whenever they show up) and this feels like the upgrade rats really needs.
Hama, Leader of War. I'm an exception and feel like Band can be salvaged. I have a couple of custom mechanics that are band-like and people apparently enjoy then. The feeling of your creatures fighting as one is awesome and what the game needs to keep token/wide decks more interesting instead of relying on crazy ass speed. Nothing wrong with that, it's just that it's a bit limited in scope.
New cards devaluing old cards does not mean WotC loses money. The new cards hold value and drive sales after all.
Unless you are talking about printing these in lower rarity (more supply of mana base). In that case this is not news. WotC keeps the best lands at rare to bump how much money people needs to spend in the game.
Pride Lands
Land
As Pride Lands enters the battlefield, you may reveal an Cat card from your hand. If you don't, Pride Lands enters the battlefield tapped. T: Add G or W.
Not a very common tribe but the most distinct GW tribe as far as I can tell. For RG there are many options but I think it has to be Dinosaurs. Elementals are too spread among all colors, Beasts and Kavu are outdated, Warriors and Shamans never got any tribal support.
Lost Valley
Land
As Lost Valley enters the battlefield, you may reveal an Dinosaur card from your hand. If you don't, Lost Valley enters the battlefield tapped. T: Add R or G.
Merfolks are very solidly in green now. It's not only a Ixalan thing, Return to Ravnica had establish the connection between green and merfolks in simic. Notice the first merfolk to be playable in mono-green (Merfolk of the Depths) is from that block.
Coral Acropolis
Land
As Coral Acropolis enters the battlefield, you may reveal an Merfolk card from your hand. If you don't, Coral Acropolis enters the battlefield tapped. T: Add G or U.
Now we need a new WU one. It should be either Spirits or Birds. Spirits is by far the most supported one but I'm a bird guy, what can I say ?
Hovering Aery
Land
As Hovering Aery enters the battlefield, you may reveal a Bird card from your hand. If you don't, Hovering Aery enters the battlefield tapped. T: Add W or U.
Imo it's unfair some strategies in the colors gets a better landbase them others. It's needless constraint.
I agree with this. Most land cycles are symmetrical in their constraints. If they aren't then it has a weird side effect of telling players what colors or strategies they're allowed to play right from the manabase, rather than as a result of what other cards are in the format's pool.
Every advantage has a cost, this is how game balance is maintained. If you want great flexibility in what Mardu spells you play, your cost is the land coming into play tapped (Khans tri-lands). If you want access to the mana faster, you get restricted to colored spells of a certain type (Knights in this instance). The point of Tournament grounds isn't to enable-three colored strategies, since the Throne format is built mostly around mono-colored strategies and too much triple color support with the Ravnica stuff in standard would create 5-color good stuff soup, its to enable people who want to build Knight tribal to have an easier time doing it.
In essence, you're arguing that it doesn't do the thing you want when its purpose wasn't to do that anyway.
I don't know why Knight tribal should get the extra help but not the people trying to play Mardu Aristocrats or Mardu Angels, aside from the already mentioned reason that Knights are suppose to be aggro deck and thus they are disproportionately hurt by scry lands and Fabled Passage.
I understand it's not possible to give equal support to every single strategy. It's just that the land base is a really bad place to give support for some archetypes in detriment of others imo.
Usually when WotC do this it's just to make casual archetypes more accessible. A cycle like this in rare and involving very competitive strategies in standard would be a disaster.
Imo it's unfair some strategies in the colors gets a better landbase them others. It's needless constraint.
Tournament Grounds only improvement over taplands is that knight decks wants to play 1 drops and thus "ETB tapped" does not work there. But I would rather have another drawback there then simply exclude the others 3 color decks.
I don't like them because they restrict which kind of strategy are supported by the colors. Sort of like how Tournament Grounds does not support standard Kaalia decks. The game gains nothing with this sort of restrictions.
Hahaha way to make a fool of myself. Totally forgot about Rout (and I used to play that). Fated Retribution is so unremarkable I forgot it existed.
In any case, my argument was not that instant speed wraths would be too powerful. The argument is that if balance-costed, they end up being cards that makes the game boring.
I think instant speed wrath is by itself a huge design challenge. It seems your intention is less about tackling this challenge and more about creating a sacrificial board wipe. To start, make this thing sorcery speed. At sorcery speed and 4BB cost I think it's on the right spot, balance wise. And a great card.
The problem is "how do I beat deck X" is not really why people enjoy the game. Adapting your list to how the meta is developing is one thing. Totally changing archetype just to counter something because majority of decks simply don't have the tools to fight is another.
The second is sign of unhealth meta for sure and the kind of thing that hurts the game, specially if you are starting.
Unfortunately necromancers are not accepted in mtg parties :'(
I think power creep on common / uncommon is not a issue at all, it always bothered me that in common creatures could never compete with common removal in limited, not even bad removal. I think having common 'B' grade creatures is a really great move.
The power creep that I don't like is how secondary color effects are getting absurdly good. Like card draw, removal and hasty creatures in green (mono-green in standard right now has more and better removal then any of the mono-colored aggro decks... questing beast is the best haste creature... the top 3 CA engines are all green).
Other example is tokens and big creatures in red. Red have tons of super efficient 3 drops that generates a bunch of tokens left and right. I thought white was the "go wide" color ? Why is that red is allowed to get a 4/3 + TWO very good upsides ? While Knight of Autumn is vanilla when played as a 4/3.
Extinction Event is on par with the best white sweeper in standard. Only wiping even or odd is not exactly a downside as it may preserve your creatures as well. That card should have been mono white or WB but never mono black.
This trend of secondary color effects getting better and better is diluting the color pie. Standard right now is unrecognizable, that is not MtG.
There is relatively small space for innovation. With D&D coming back, they should capitalize on the adventure theme. So I hope they finally do dungeons in MTG.
Gotta say I fear the same. Feels like Food decks are free to reign over the format, but WotC obviously did some tests. Golos decks were probably decimating a bunch of stuff that could threaten food, but I don't know.. I feel like most decks are not equipped to deal with turn 3 control magic. And 6 loyalty is just over the top, even for a cmc 5+ PW. I don't know wtf they were thinking.
Traumatic Amnesia is bound to happen one day. Wrench Mind is not really that great and it's downside is relatively small. They are progressively improving discard spells with all the Mind Rot+ limited fodder, it's just a matter of time until they create this.
Reflecting Stone I like WotC decision to keep cheap ramp spells in green. The design space of CMC 1 ramp cards is very small. More emphasis on CMC 2 ramp spells is needed for diversity's sake, which means colorless ramp must be mostly 3 mana. 2 with a downside is not unreasonable but the downside here is a bit too small.
Nguvu, Ape Lord pretty cool. The two disjointed abilities feel old school (the all upside 5/5 for 5 does not). I guess the point is to have old school creatures with modern power level.
Gullom, the Sedge Beast. Avalanche Riders nemesis ? Hard to evaluate but feels safe.
Dimur, the Mind Stealer. My favorite of the bunch. I'm a Ravenous Rats lover (I try them in standard whenever they show up) and this feels like the upgrade rats really needs.
Serra Reborn. Nice, simple finisher. Gotta agree, the missing Vigilance feels wrong, wrong.
Hama, Leader of War. I'm an exception and feel like Band can be salvaged. I have a couple of custom mechanics that are band-like and people apparently enjoy then. The feeling of your creatures fighting as one is awesome and what the game needs to keep token/wide decks more interesting instead of relying on crazy ass speed. Nothing wrong with that, it's just that it's a bit limited in scope.
Favorites are: Morning Faery, Electrolizer Mage, Word of Banishment, Death's Deception, Singular Orb.
Unless you are talking about printing these in lower rarity (more supply of mana base). In that case this is not news. WotC keeps the best lands at rare to bump how much money people needs to spend in the game.
Land
As Pride Lands enters the battlefield, you may reveal an Cat card from your hand. If you don't, Pride Lands enters the battlefield tapped.
T: Add G or W.
Not a very common tribe but the most distinct GW tribe as far as I can tell. For RG there are many options but I think it has to be Dinosaurs. Elementals are too spread among all colors, Beasts and Kavu are outdated, Warriors and Shamans never got any tribal support.
Lost Valley
Land
As Lost Valley enters the battlefield, you may reveal an Dinosaur card from your hand. If you don't, Lost Valley enters the battlefield tapped.
T: Add R or G.
Merfolks are very solidly in green now. It's not only a Ixalan thing, Return to Ravnica had establish the connection between green and merfolks in simic. Notice the first merfolk to be playable in mono-green (Merfolk of the Depths) is from that block.
Coral Acropolis
Land
As Coral Acropolis enters the battlefield, you may reveal an Merfolk card from your hand. If you don't, Coral Acropolis enters the battlefield tapped.
T: Add G or U.
Now we need a new WU one. It should be either Spirits or Birds. Spirits is by far the most supported one but I'm a bird guy, what can I say ?
Hovering Aery
Land
As Hovering Aery enters the battlefield, you may reveal a Bird card from your hand. If you don't, Hovering Aery enters the battlefield tapped.
T: Add W or U.
I don't know why Knight tribal should get the extra help but not the people trying to play Mardu Aristocrats or Mardu Angels, aside from the already mentioned reason that Knights are suppose to be aggro deck and thus they are disproportionately hurt by scry lands and Fabled Passage.
I understand it's not possible to give equal support to every single strategy. It's just that the land base is a really bad place to give support for some archetypes in detriment of others imo.
Usually when WotC do this it's just to make casual archetypes more accessible. A cycle like this in rare and involving very competitive strategies in standard would be a disaster.
Tournament Grounds only improvement over taplands is that knight decks wants to play 1 drops and thus "ETB tapped" does not work there. But I would rather have another drawback there then simply exclude the others 3 color decks.