I think that is a good change and definitely makes the card feel a little more solid without feeling "useless" in certain situations.
Also, on a second read through, it is interesting that the spell being targeted is the one dealing the damage. Is there a particular reason for that instead of just having Reflection deal the damage? Most of the time where it matters are more corner case, but I can see it being more fun to have Reflection deal the damage. For things like Firesong and Sunspeaker or Pestilent Spirit for example. I don't think these would put it over the top at all. But I don't think it is bad the way it is either so this isn't really a power level or balance tweak and the card works fine as it is.
I did not miss that.
I was intentionally suggesting that you break-away from the rest with just that single design.
The very first sentence in this thread is:
I was trying to figure out for he sake of silliness how many different spell modes could be crammed onto a single card
Your arrogance, your ineptitude, your overall general disregard for anyone other than yourself led you to a point where you decided to comment on a thread whose *entire purpose* was silliness and fitting into a very specific goal with: "I see what you want to do: here is a redesign that does none of it".
At least if you were honest in that you didn't understand the intent of the card (the entire goal of this thread) your other responses could be understood and the discussion could get back on track about what this card is meant to be. Instead you doubled down and just refused to participate in what rowanalpha wanted for this card. Taking away any part of the card takes away from the entire premise.
To the topic at hand:
I don't see anything inherently wrong with the card. Everything seems pretty balanced actually, even considering that they all exist on one card. I could legitimately see any number of these on singular cards and they wouldn't feel out of place but none feel overcosted either. I could maybe see the combined cost of Reflection//Rejection being a smidge too high, and maybe Reflection can go down to {1R}.
The main reason I say this is because it does allow for the card to be a 5 mana counter (a little overcosted but fine for what it does) while the Reflection side dealing 3 damage to the player and the creature (on a 6 mana spell) feeling right. Because the opponent gets the choice of the creature, and because it doesn't do as well as lower Mana Values anyway, I could see dropping that down to give that side a little more efficacy in more situations. At 3 mana, I think it might be too high to really do enough.
There is still the idea of not wanting to go too low on a card that has so much going on, especially when it can always get shuffled back into the library, but that is the only real tweak I could see making with the card.
Speaking of shuffling it into the library: I love that effect. It seems fairly innocuous, but just the fact that any "spell" on the card can use it actually makes it into a pretty elegant design I think.
I think my biggest issue with this card ends up being the ultimate. Since no one plays anything with Vanishing or Time Counters in general, the ability is just "at the beginning of each players upkeep, they sac all nonland permanents they control".
I don't mind the effort but I think adding a second counter to ensure they at least get one more turn with their stuff would make it more sensible. Otherwise, just make them sac everything rather than trying to go the route of adding counters and Vanishing.
The "cast" ability seems odd too. You can only return something with power 1 or less and then the loyalty counters are twice that. So, either 2 or 0? Why not just have her enter with 2 counters?
I think maybe having her enter with 1 counter by default at 2 mana is reasonable. Perhaps that is too cheap but I think it is alright considering her ability. And then changing the first ability to something like "As an additional cost, sacrifice a creature. ~ enters with X additional loyalty counters where X is equal to half the power of the sacrificed creature rounded up." I would think half makes sense because it is too easy to ultimate otherwise. It might still be too powerful but, really, you are effectively just sacrificing a high power creature to turn her into a wrath which seems alright.
It does seem like whatever you do, she should be white instead of red.
It is important to note that none of Reap's Deus Ex Machina abilities actually work within the rules and should just be ignored. I don't want to discount any suggestions he has for your card based on the card itself, but he never feels like cards by other people are good enough which is why both of his suggestions included significant additions that you didn't ask for.
I like where the card sits as it is. Might still be a little higher on the power scale in Standard, but I do think it is reasonable for most formats including Commander. Probably not Legacy playable but that is a massive hurdle either way. I still think the mana cost is likely a tricky thing to get for something like this but I do believe 3 mana makes it playable without being broken. It might be annoying at times, and it seems pretty much at home in a draw-go type deck (which I am always in favor of) and the 3 mana becomes a real decision that the blue player needs to make as that can be a critical turn to go shields down. At least, it is more of a decision to make than 2 mana.
The nice thing about it is that it counts itself so casting another spell after it can get you a token right away. Which, again, ties into a significant decision tree as to when to try to get use out of it.
There might still be an argument for putting it back to 2 mana but only ever creating a single token as I think that is still reasonable but I think the current version is playable and is in a good spot for the effect you want.
I do agree with Reap on it being too good on your opponent's turn. I would just leave it as "whenever you cast your second spell each turn, create a token". That seems like the right spot to be, especially for a color that can far more easily do that compared to other colors. There might be an argument for it being slightly undercosted just because of the color but Clarion Spirit exists and isn't exactly tearing up the tournament scene.
I like the card and think it has potential in a few different formats. Even keeping it at two tokens for the opponents' turns likely doesn't break it in Commander or Legacy but could be a big problem in Standard or maybe Limited just for gumming up the board too much. It is kind of a tricky card to be honest which is why I might lean towards going with the cleaner template. I think if you want the two tokens on an opponent's turn, I would think increasing the cost is prudent.
Also, if you go that route, a better template might be:
"Whenever you cast your second spell each turn, create a 1/1 blue Faerie creature token with flying. If it is an opponent's turn, create an additional one of those tokens".
The last ability is worded as both a trigger and a replacement effect. I would keep it as a trigger to allow for some interactivity from the opponents, which would then mean the "instead of your graveyard" isn't needed.
I like the effects overall and they tie very well together. 4 mana seems a little low but I am not always the best judge of the effects like this.
To preface this, I did read more into it than it really says so that is a fair point. The card reads weird overall and on a re-read it seems that I could be reading more into it than what Reap intended. We would need him to clarify that.
I initially read it as choosing a land or artifact and then setting up a rule for the turn that allows it to be activated without paying its costs. It would seem though that your interpretation, especially with the actual words Reap used, means you make the choice of a land or artifact on resolution and activate it while the ability is still resolving (like casting a spell through Shelldock Isle for example). And the effect doesn't say "this turn" so it ends when the ability is off the stack.
However, the ability doesn't limit itself though. We certainly have things like Shelldock Isle that only work to cast the spell once because the card changes zones, that isn't the case here. It could be interpreted as the card granting a permission that exists only while the ability is resolving but you can just keep doing it since that permission exists until you are done activating the ability as many times as you want (since activated abilities don't normally have a limit). That is, there isn't a built-in "stopping mechanism" that exists for other things that allow for special permission during an ability resolving such as a card changing zones.
I could certainly see the argument being made that since you have permission to activate the ability while this card's ability is resolving, you no longer need priority but you also aren't limited to just once because activated abilities aren't normally limited to just once. So then you can still activate it as many times as you want as long as you can pay the costs (of which there are none).
The closest real example I can think of to this though is activating something like Ashnod's Altar while resolving Flash. You get to activate that a whole bunch of times since Flash asks for a mana payment and the rules offer a permission like this card does. And you are not limited to only producing two mana in that case. I could see this being interpreted the same.
In the end, I think you are right, but the effect being what it is suggests it could be a little murkier than what it seems on the surface.
The cards above that were mentioned make your land still broken in certain formats. While your land can certainly be inst-banned in those formats, that is a terrible look for any designer/developer.
As for the other, your card seems to ignore things like the following:
Mishra’s Groundbreaker - You no longer need to sac it so it just makes all your lands into Artifact lands. Other cards do the same, but this is repeatable and controllable unlike most effects that turn a large swathe of lands into creatures.
The Blackstaff of Waterdeep - Same thing here. Since it doesn't need to tap anymore, it can change every artifact into a creature on the turn it enters. Which means that once tapped, it has no real downside, and your effect doesn't stop it from tapping at least once. It remains tapped but it still gets to be used.
And, of course, every Vehicle in the game. There are probably only a few that are truly broken, Colossal Plow might ironically be one of the worst to deal with. A turn 2 6/3 that ramps by 3 mana? That is insane. But there are others that I am sure become overpowered.
The responsibility on broken combos lies with both parties: the one who makes the first card and the one who makes the second. And you are playing in exceptionally dangerous space since costs are the way things are balanced. If someone printed a land that could turn itself into a 12/12 for 12 mana and sacrificing 3 creatures seems balanced enough on the surface (and might even make sense in some sets). But your card breaks it. So, you have effectively prohibited future design because of your inane arrogance and lack of awareness. No one is going to go out of their way to break this: they are going to go out of their way to balance a cool card and your card then breaks theirs. Yours is the problem.
Also, on a final note, this is a turn 2 win with Raging Ravine. So, not only do you hinder future development, you just broke an already existing card. And yes, the granted triggered abilities stack (I realize you don't play Magic so you don't know the rules) so activating it 1 million times gives it 1 million triggers. If someone doesn't have removal right then and there, they die. With things like Sylvan Scrying this could be far too consistent (though that ends up being turn 3 at best).
At least, that is a potential depending on your intent. I will admit that "becomes" generally refers to something that is not something and then is that something ("becomes tapped" doesn't trigger if tapping something already tapped). But this is a fairly nebulous concept due to the fact that the ability still attempts to turn it into a land which adds another continuous effect. There could be an argument to be made that it wouldn't actually work but it sure seems like it would since that is exactly what the ability does: turns Ravine into a land.
Activated abilities, in general, are not sorcery "speed". Equip is the exception here as most can be activated whenever you have priority.
Even if the activated ability they used could only be activated as a Sorcery, you cannot respond to it with another Sorcery or another Activated Ability that also has the "Activate as a Sorcery" restriction. You cannot use the Equip ability unless the stack is empty and it is your main phase. Since the stack is not empty, you cannot equip Greaves in response. The Greaves will stay where it is (since you can't activate it) and they will steal your God.
Your question seems a little all over the place but if you are wondering why Headless Rider triggers for itself and this doesn't, it is because this says "other". If you are wondering why this doesn't "see" anything that dies along with it....well, it does so I am not sure why you think it doesn't. It just can't trigger for itself dying.
???????????????????
What are we supposed to do with this response? Are you asking a question in your first post or not? Did you have a follow up question to my response or not? There are a lot of people here that are willing to help you understand but you need to communicate where your confusion lies if you want help.
I am guessing peter's more in depth response gave you the answer you needed. If not, just tell us where you are still confused.
Your question seems a little all over the place but if you are wondering why Headless Rider triggers for itself and this doesn't, it is because this says "other". If you are wondering why this doesn't "see" anything that dies along with it....well, it does so I am not sure why you think it doesn't. It just can't trigger for itself dying.
Because Palm only prevents the "next time" damage would be dealt, it will only prevent the First Strike damage in this case. The normal damage is dealt as it normally would.
You always need to use the Oracle Text for cards. It is not a Sorcery since, as you said, that wouldn't work. It received errata to function as an Instant. The reason it was printed as a Sorcery was because it was printed in a set without Instants and the text telling you when to cast it was meant to provide the exact window to cast it which allowed it to function as a limited Instant.
Her ability does not say you get additional Main Phases so you don't. The extra Combat Phase happens immediately after the current Combat Phase is done.
There are a few issues with these but the main one I want to point out is that the "You can always activate abilities of artifacts you control" doesn't do anything. It seems like this is meant to be a countermeasure to things like Null Rod but in Magic, "can't" always beats "can" so these effects saying you can do something are just going to get overridden by Null Rod as normal. I am not sure there is a good way to word what you want to do. Maybe "Ignore effects that say you can't activate abilities of artifacts you control"?
Also, on a second read through, it is interesting that the spell being targeted is the one dealing the damage. Is there a particular reason for that instead of just having Reflection deal the damage? Most of the time where it matters are more corner case, but I can see it being more fun to have Reflection deal the damage. For things like Firesong and Sunspeaker or Pestilent Spirit for example. I don't think these would put it over the top at all. But I don't think it is bad the way it is either so this isn't really a power level or balance tweak and the card works fine as it is.
The very first sentence in this thread is:
Your arrogance, your ineptitude, your overall general disregard for anyone other than yourself led you to a point where you decided to comment on a thread whose *entire purpose* was silliness and fitting into a very specific goal with: "I see what you want to do: here is a redesign that does none of it".
At least if you were honest in that you didn't understand the intent of the card (the entire goal of this thread) your other responses could be understood and the discussion could get back on track about what this card is meant to be. Instead you doubled down and just refused to participate in what rowanalpha wanted for this card. Taking away any part of the card takes away from the entire premise.
To the topic at hand:
I don't see anything inherently wrong with the card. Everything seems pretty balanced actually, even considering that they all exist on one card. I could legitimately see any number of these on singular cards and they wouldn't feel out of place but none feel overcosted either. I could maybe see the combined cost of Reflection//Rejection being a smidge too high, and maybe Reflection can go down to {1R}.
The main reason I say this is because it does allow for the card to be a 5 mana counter (a little overcosted but fine for what it does) while the Reflection side dealing 3 damage to the player and the creature (on a 6 mana spell) feeling right. Because the opponent gets the choice of the creature, and because it doesn't do as well as lower Mana Values anyway, I could see dropping that down to give that side a little more efficacy in more situations. At 3 mana, I think it might be too high to really do enough.
There is still the idea of not wanting to go too low on a card that has so much going on, especially when it can always get shuffled back into the library, but that is the only real tweak I could see making with the card.
Speaking of shuffling it into the library: I love that effect. It seems fairly innocuous, but just the fact that any "spell" on the card can use it actually makes it into a pretty elegant design I think.
I don't mind the effort but I think adding a second counter to ensure they at least get one more turn with their stuff would make it more sensible. Otherwise, just make them sac everything rather than trying to go the route of adding counters and Vanishing.
The "cast" ability seems odd too. You can only return something with power 1 or less and then the loyalty counters are twice that. So, either 2 or 0? Why not just have her enter with 2 counters?
I think maybe having her enter with 1 counter by default at 2 mana is reasonable. Perhaps that is too cheap but I think it is alright considering her ability. And then changing the first ability to something like "As an additional cost, sacrifice a creature. ~ enters with X additional loyalty counters where X is equal to half the power of the sacrificed creature rounded up." I would think half makes sense because it is too easy to ultimate otherwise. It might still be too powerful but, really, you are effectively just sacrificing a high power creature to turn her into a wrath which seems alright.
It does seem like whatever you do, she should be white instead of red.
I like where the card sits as it is. Might still be a little higher on the power scale in Standard, but I do think it is reasonable for most formats including Commander. Probably not Legacy playable but that is a massive hurdle either way. I still think the mana cost is likely a tricky thing to get for something like this but I do believe 3 mana makes it playable without being broken. It might be annoying at times, and it seems pretty much at home in a draw-go type deck (which I am always in favor of) and the 3 mana becomes a real decision that the blue player needs to make as that can be a critical turn to go shields down. At least, it is more of a decision to make than 2 mana.
The nice thing about it is that it counts itself so casting another spell after it can get you a token right away. Which, again, ties into a significant decision tree as to when to try to get use out of it.
There might still be an argument for putting it back to 2 mana but only ever creating a single token as I think that is still reasonable but I think the current version is playable and is in a good spot for the effect you want.
I like the card and think it has potential in a few different formats. Even keeping it at two tokens for the opponents' turns likely doesn't break it in Commander or Legacy but could be a big problem in Standard or maybe Limited just for gumming up the board too much. It is kind of a tricky card to be honest which is why I might lean towards going with the cleaner template. I think if you want the two tokens on an opponent's turn, I would think increasing the cost is prudent.
Also, if you go that route, a better template might be:
"Whenever you cast your second spell each turn, create a 1/1 blue Faerie creature token with flying. If it is an opponent's turn, create an additional one of those tokens".
I like the effects overall and they tie very well together. 4 mana seems a little low but I am not always the best judge of the effects like this.
I initially read it as choosing a land or artifact and then setting up a rule for the turn that allows it to be activated without paying its costs. It would seem though that your interpretation, especially with the actual words Reap used, means you make the choice of a land or artifact on resolution and activate it while the ability is still resolving (like casting a spell through Shelldock Isle for example). And the effect doesn't say "this turn" so it ends when the ability is off the stack.
However, the ability doesn't limit itself though. We certainly have things like Shelldock Isle that only work to cast the spell once because the card changes zones, that isn't the case here. It could be interpreted as the card granting a permission that exists only while the ability is resolving but you can just keep doing it since that permission exists until you are done activating the ability as many times as you want (since activated abilities don't normally have a limit). That is, there isn't a built-in "stopping mechanism" that exists for other things that allow for special permission during an ability resolving such as a card changing zones.
I could certainly see the argument being made that since you have permission to activate the ability while this card's ability is resolving, you no longer need priority but you also aren't limited to just once because activated abilities aren't normally limited to just once. So then you can still activate it as many times as you want as long as you can pay the costs (of which there are none).
The closest real example I can think of to this though is activating something like Ashnod's Altar while resolving Flash. You get to activate that a whole bunch of times since Flash asks for a mana payment and the rules offer a permission like this card does. And you are not limited to only producing two mana in that case. I could see this being interpreted the same.
In the end, I think you are right, but the effect being what it is suggests it could be a little murkier than what it seems on the surface.
As for the other, your card seems to ignore things like the following:
Mishra’s Groundbreaker - You no longer need to sac it so it just makes all your lands into Artifact lands. Other cards do the same, but this is repeatable and controllable unlike most effects that turn a large swathe of lands into creatures.
The Blackstaff of Waterdeep - Same thing here. Since it doesn't need to tap anymore, it can change every artifact into a creature on the turn it enters. Which means that once tapped, it has no real downside, and your effect doesn't stop it from tapping at least once. It remains tapped but it still gets to be used.
Toymaker - Same thing here.
And, of course, every Vehicle in the game. There are probably only a few that are truly broken, Colossal Plow might ironically be one of the worst to deal with. A turn 2 6/3 that ramps by 3 mana? That is insane. But there are others that I am sure become overpowered.
The responsibility on broken combos lies with both parties: the one who makes the first card and the one who makes the second. And you are playing in exceptionally dangerous space since costs are the way things are balanced. If someone printed a land that could turn itself into a 12/12 for 12 mana and sacrificing 3 creatures seems balanced enough on the surface (and might even make sense in some sets). But your card breaks it. So, you have effectively prohibited future design because of your inane arrogance and lack of awareness. No one is going to go out of their way to break this: they are going to go out of their way to balance a cool card and your card then breaks theirs. Yours is the problem.
Also, on a final note, this is a turn 2 win with Raging Ravine. So, not only do you hinder future development, you just broke an already existing card. And yes, the granted triggered abilities stack (I realize you don't play Magic so you don't know the rules) so activating it 1 million times gives it 1 million triggers. If someone doesn't have removal right then and there, they die. With things like Sylvan Scrying this could be far too consistent (though that ends up being turn 3 at best).
At least, that is a potential depending on your intent. I will admit that "becomes" generally refers to something that is not something and then is that something ("becomes tapped" doesn't trigger if tapping something already tapped). But this is a fairly nebulous concept due to the fact that the ability still attempts to turn it into a land which adds another continuous effect. There could be an argument to be made that it wouldn't actually work but it sure seems like it would since that is exactly what the ability does: turns Ravine into a land.
Even if the activated ability they used could only be activated as a Sorcery, you cannot respond to it with another Sorcery or another Activated Ability that also has the "Activate as a Sorcery" restriction. You cannot use the Equip ability unless the stack is empty and it is your main phase. Since the stack is not empty, you cannot equip Greaves in response. The Greaves will stay where it is (since you can't activate it) and they will steal your God.
I am guessing peter's more in depth response gave you the answer you needed. If not, just tell us where you are still confused.