Note also that "undoable" is something you interpret into the text. They didn't deem Day/Night undoable
I take it you don't read the articles you recommend, SecretInfiltrator:
The team spent many hours trying every possible way to trigger the game state. And nothing worked. Each version would bring its own problems. Either the game was too swingy, not allowing us to create the kind of transformations we wanted, or the game state was so tenuous that it made the player bend over backwards to play Day/Night. After weeks of playtesting, the team deemed the mechanic undoable.
At this point it becomes apparent that you are unaware that this very mechanic, and this very fix to it, has been considered before for canonical Magic. The mechanic was in consideration for Kamigawa-block IIRC turning into flip cards. You could do a google search on the topic of Maigc's Day/Night mechanic and find more than one article concerning the design and problems of the mechanic - maybe that can help you to skip another one or two steps since you are already grasping for the same unpleasent patchwork solutions the WotC designers were going for.
Are you talking about this one? Reading it only reminds me how their design teams are full of bull***** sometimes.
The design team was easily able to design cards that changed with the transition from Day to Night. The real problem was figuring out how the toggle from Day to Night, and back to Day, would happen. At first, the team considered just having the state naturally go back and forth, one turn Day, one turn Night, etc. . The team was reminded of the homarid mechanic from Fallen Empires where the game state kept rotating based on the “state of the tides”. After playing a little, they agreed that following a set pattern was often confusing to track and was just too predictable.
Oh no, the transition between day and night is predictable, who would've thought that? It's also a mystery to me how following a set pattern as predictable as the movement of the sun could possibly be confusing to track, but whatever.
MaRo's design was interesting though, shame he didn't show it to anyone:
A quick side note, during Unglued 2 design, I created a card called Heads Up/Tailspin. It was an enchantment with two sides. Each upkeep, the card's controller flipped a coin and then flipped up the relevant side. Heads Up was a positive enchantment while Tailspin was negative. I don't believe this card had any influence on this mechanic though as I never had an opportunity to show it to anyone because the set got put on hiatus.
After that they go on to test God knows what with a random experimental group and simply decide that Day/Night is undoable without explaining why. I trust these people with coming up with good designs as much as I trust them with the task of not keep printing new AncestralRecalls.
I think Hangarback Walker for half the mana cost might be too easy to break in a deck like Affinity. Also, the static ability has the old wording ("count as"). Nowadays it'd read "Servos you control are Hydras in addition to their other types," without the may clause.
Rat FloodBBB
Creature — Rat (R)
Rat Flood costs B less to cast for each Rat you control.
Rat Flood's power and toughness are each equal to the number of Rats on the battlefield.
Whenever another nontoken Rat enters the battlefield under your control, create a token that's a copy of Rat Flood.
*/*
What if the coin only entered the game when someone casts the first day/night spell? Then that player would flip it at the beginning of each of his turns until the end of the game. It wouldn't be that much different from putting counters on permanents. The wording could be something like this:
Timekeeping (When you cast this spell, if no player has a timekeeper, create a timekeeper face up or face down. Flip the timekeeper at the beginning of each of your turns.)
Example:
Twilight GuardianWB
Creature — Human Soldier
Timekeeping (When you cast this spell, if no player has a timekeeper, create a timekeeper face up or face down. Flip the timekeeper at the beginning of each of your turns.) Crepuscular — Whenever the timekeeper is flipped, put a +1/+1 counter on Twilight Guardian.
1/1
But the concept of things triggering with the twilight can be translated into cards just the same as if it was about the time of the day that the coin is flipping into, so I think it would work better if it was just Diurnal and Nocturnal.
My bad, I forgot to add the crew restriction because the other vehicles don't have that.
Pirate Fleet3
Artifact — Vehicle (U)
Pirate Fleet can only be crewed by Pirates and can't attack unless defending player controls an Island.
When Pirate Fleet enters the battlefield, you may search your library for up to three cards named Pirate Fleet, reveal them, and put them into your hand. If you do, shuffle your library. T: Pirate Fleet deals 1 damage to target creature or player. Activate this ability only if Pirate Fleet is a creature.
Crew 1
3/3
What about it now? I can't remove the fetching ability because, well, it won't be a fleet if I do.
The Great Web 2G
Legendary Enchantment
Prevent all damage that would be dealt to Spider creatures you control by creatures with flying. 2G: Create a 1/2 green Spider creature token with reach.
"It doesn't fill the WHOLE sky; look, if I turn back the way we came I can't even see it."
More support for Spider tribal is always welcome and that one has a lot of flavor, although it looks like it's a weaker Arachnogenesis most of the time. Maybe you could give it Flash, kinda like a Howlpack Resurgence, and make the spiders deal damage to flying creatures that are attacking you.
On a side note, the thought of a Kuldotha Phoenix getting caught in a giant web without burning it and the whole forest is hilarious.
Nocturnal Vampire Nocturnus of the Night1BBB
Creature — Vampire Nocturnal — During the night, Vampire Nocturnus and other Vampire creatures you control get +2/+1 and have flying.
3/3
Then some cards that flip the coin:
Darkness FallsBB
Instant
Cast Darkness Falls only if it's day.
Flip the (Time?) Coin.
I'm not sure where the parallel between Atraxa and a god-ish/messenger/liaison/whathaveyou with wings on a plane that has not been shown to have angels is. We already know that angels existed on Mirrodin, and Atraxa is a compleated Mirran angel.
It shows that angels are what they are by virtue of their function as messengers, no matter who they're "delivering messages" for. If Karn were to drop by Theros and leave some angels there, would they suddenly disappear because they aren't supposed to be Greek or would they start working for the gods? Most likely, everybody would just get compleated because it's Karn we're talking about after all, so we will never know for sure.
But MTG angels in general are simply white mana constructs. They aren't tied to any one particular god or religion, it's just another creature type. And as we were saying, Theros isn't exactly 100% faithful to Greek mythology. What's stopping it from having this creature type then? Nothing but the fixed idea that angels can't be reinterpreted outside of an Abrahamic religious context and are therefore incompatible with Greek myths, which isn't necessarily true, for the reasons already stated.
Vanity's MessengerWBG
Creature — Angel
Flying, first strike, vigilance
When Vanity's Messenger enters the battlefield, choose an opponent at random. That player gains control of Vanity's Messenger.
At the beginning of your upkeep, target opponent discards a card. If a creature card is discarded this way, that player gains control of Vanity's Messenger.
3/4
Result of the discussion about angels on Theros and me trying to find a way to cheat Wilt-Leaf Liege and Loxodon Smiter into play without resorting to Chain of Smog and mind control techniques.
That comparison is more apt when you think about the fact the entire idea for angels as people think of them is a pretty modern concept, not a (relatively) old one. You said yourself that the term Angel comes from the Greek word for messenger (ángelos), which is true. But it's important to emphasize back then it ONLY meant messenger. Attaching supernatural qualities to the word came much, much later.
That's why I feel having Angels as a type for something greeco-roman doesn't make much sense. The idea of Angel as we think of it today didn't even exist then. Including an angelic type in Theros would too heavily lean things to a modern judo/christian way of looking at the beliefs the set was based on. Beliefs that did not match greeco-roman culture.
That'd only matter if Theros was supposed to be a direct parallel to Greek mythology, when it's actually the pop culture, Clash of Titans version of it.
And even then, the point about the eudaemons still stands. They were angels in everything but name. It's no wonder unholy spirits would later be known as demons in contrast with angels. You say Christianity had influence on Greek culture but forget that the opposite happened to a much greater degree and how the religion turned out to be more Greek than Jewish.
I practically minored in greeco/roman art and architecture and have been to greece several times along with turkey, including to some of the sites in your pictures.
Maybe you should've finished that minor then. You'd find out that those gods aren't depicted as winged people because of Christianity.
Or go with the casual google searches, that'd do too:
Quote from Aristophanes (c. 400 BC) »
At the beginning there was only Chaos, Night (Nyx), Darkness (Erebus), and the Abyss (Tartarus). Earth, the Air and Heaven had no existence. Firstly, blackwinged Night laid a germless egg in the bosom of the infinite deeps of Darkness, and from this, after the revolution of long ages, sprang the graceful Love (Eros) with his glittering golden wings, swift as the whirlwinds of the tempest. He mated in the deep Abyss with dark Chaos, winged like himself, and thus hatched forth our race, which was the first to see the light.
But that's beside the point. You said "angelic" and not "a literal Christian angel." I'm not arguing that Eros and the other gods are angels. Iris isn't one either, we know that. But they're all depicted as angelic beings and people recognize them as such, whether it's because of Christianity or not. So I don't see any problem in Theros having characters that are based on gods but have the creature type Angel. They'd just have to be reinterpreted as lesser beings in the celestial hierarchy. Spirit and Avatar are also possible, but I think they're more vague types, while Angel directly communicates the idea of a winged messenger, as Manite explained.
Greeco/Roman Myths almost never mentioned anything angelic. It doesn't matter if technically they may have been briefly mentioned, they aren't party of the iconography people associate with it.
That depends on how you define "angelic."
But "supernatural winged people" have been a part of Greek iconography for thousands of years now.
Ordolatram, Who Hears Summons8
Legendary Creature - Eldrazi (M)
Trample, haste
Reveal Ordolatram, Who Hears Summons from your hand: Create a colorless 1/1 Eldrazi Cleric token. It has "1, sacrifice another creature: Create a token that is a copy of this creature" and "Sacrifice eight Eldrazi Clerics: Search your library, hand or graveyard for a creature card named Ordolatram, Who Hears Summons and put it onto the battlefield, then shuffle your library". Then shuffle Ordolatram into your library. Activate this ability only once per turn.
8/8
I like the Eldrazi-themed Forecast. The eight Eldrazi Clerics cost feels like it's a lot, but in a deck full of tokens this could go off faster than you'd think. Seems balanced enough though.
Next:
Pirate Fleet3
Artifact — Vehicle (U)
Pirate Fleet can only be crewed by Pirates and can't attack unless defending player controls an Island.
When Pirate Fleet enters the battlefield, you may search your library for up to three cards named Pirate Fleet, reveal them, and put them into your hand. If you do, shuffle your library. T: Pirate Fleet deals 2 damage to target creature or player.
Crew 1
3/3
Almost every ancient culture had a concept of angels as supernatural winged messengers, including the Greeks. But they usually referred to those beings as eudaemons.
Theros' angels would of course be different from the traditional MTG Angels inspired by Abrahamic religions, even if they looked similar.
Did they ever explain why there were no angels in Theros? It's actually weird that there wasn't any, because Theros could totally have its own angels, the word Angel itself being Greek for messenger.
I take it you don't read the articles you recommend, SecretInfiltrator:
Are you talking about this one? Reading it only reminds me how their design teams are full of bull***** sometimes.
Oh no, the transition between day and night is predictable, who would've thought that? It's also a mystery to me how following a set pattern as predictable as the movement of the sun could possibly be confusing to track, but whatever.
MaRo's design was interesting though, shame he didn't show it to anyone:
After that they go on to test God knows what with a random experimental group and simply decide that Day/Night is undoable without explaining why. I trust these people with coming up with good designs as much as I trust them with the task of not keep printing new Ancestral Recalls.
Rat Flood BBB
Creature — Rat (R)
Rat Flood costs B less to cast for each Rat you control.
Rat Flood's power and toughness are each equal to the number of Rats on the battlefield.
Whenever another nontoken Rat enters the battlefield under your control, create a token that's a copy of Rat Flood.
*/*
Too many rats?
Timekeeping (When you cast this spell, if no player has a timekeeper, create a timekeeper face up or face down. Flip the timekeeper at the beginning of each of your turns.)
Example:
Twilight Guardian WB
Creature — Human Soldier
Timekeeping (When you cast this spell, if no player has a timekeeper, create a timekeeper face up or face down. Flip the timekeeper at the beginning of each of your turns.)
Crepuscular — Whenever the timekeeper is flipped, put a +1/+1 counter on Twilight Guardian.
1/1
But the concept of things triggering with the twilight can be translated into cards just the same as if it was about the time of the day that the coin is flipping into, so I think it would work better if it was just Diurnal and Nocturnal.
Pirate Fleet 3
Artifact — Vehicle (U)
Pirate Fleet can only be crewed by Pirates and can't attack unless defending player controls an Island.
When Pirate Fleet enters the battlefield, you may search your library for up to three cards named Pirate Fleet, reveal them, and put them into your hand. If you do, shuffle your library.
T: Pirate Fleet deals 1 damage to target creature or player. Activate this ability only if Pirate Fleet is a creature.
Crew 1
3/3
What about it now? I can't remove the fetching ability because, well, it won't be a fleet if I do.
More support for Spider tribal is always welcome and that one has a lot of flavor, although it looks like it's a weaker Arachnogenesis most of the time. Maybe you could give it Flash, kinda like a Howlpack Resurgence, and make the spiders deal damage to flying creatures that are attacking you.
On a side note, the thought of a Kuldotha Phoenix getting caught in a giant web without burning it and the whole forest is hilarious.
And Vampire Nocturnus would've been much cooler to read:
Nocturnal Vampire Nocturnus of the Night 1BBB
Creature — Vampire
Nocturnal — During the night, Vampire Nocturnus and other Vampire creatures you control get +2/+1 and have flying.
3/3
Then some cards that flip the coin:
Darkness Falls BB
Instant
Cast Darkness Falls only if it's day.
Flip the (Time?) Coin.
It shows that angels are what they are by virtue of their function as messengers, no matter who they're "delivering messages" for. If Karn were to drop by Theros and leave some angels there, would they suddenly disappear because they aren't supposed to be Greek or would they start working for the gods? Most likely, everybody would just get compleated because it's Karn we're talking about after all, so we will never know for sure.
But MTG angels in general are simply white mana constructs. They aren't tied to any one particular god or religion, it's just another creature type. And as we were saying, Theros isn't exactly 100% faithful to Greek mythology. What's stopping it from having this creature type then? Nothing but the fixed idea that angels can't be reinterpreted outside of an Abrahamic religious context and are therefore incompatible with Greek myths, which isn't necessarily true, for the reasons already stated.
Creature — Angel
Flying, first strike, vigilance
When Vanity's Messenger enters the battlefield, choose an opponent at random. That player gains control of Vanity's Messenger.
At the beginning of your upkeep, target opponent discards a card. If a creature card is discarded this way, that player gains control of Vanity's Messenger.
3/4
Result of the discussion about angels on Theros and me trying to find a way to cheat Wilt-Leaf Liege and Loxodon Smiter into play without resorting to Chain of Smog and mind control techniques.
That'd only matter if Theros was supposed to be a direct parallel to Greek mythology, when it's actually the pop culture, Clash of Titans version of it.
And even then, the point about the eudaemons still stands. They were angels in everything but name. It's no wonder unholy spirits would later be known as demons in contrast with angels. You say Christianity had influence on Greek culture but forget that the opposite happened to a much greater degree and how the religion turned out to be more Greek than Jewish.
Now, don't get me wrong, I wouldn't go as far as making every single winged character in a Greek mythology setting an angel. But if it's humanoid, supernatural, winged, and works as a messenger for gods or some sort of religious organization, then yeah, that's an angel alright.
Maybe you should've finished that minor then. You'd find out that those gods aren't depicted as winged people because of Christianity.
Or go with the casual google searches, that'd do too:
But that's beside the point. You said "angelic" and not "a literal Christian angel." I'm not arguing that Eros and the other gods are angels. Iris isn't one either, we know that. But they're all depicted as angelic beings and people recognize them as such, whether it's because of Christianity or not. So I don't see any problem in Theros having characters that are based on gods but have the creature type Angel. They'd just have to be reinterpreted as lesser beings in the celestial hierarchy. Spirit and Avatar are also possible, but I think they're more vague types, while Angel directly communicates the idea of a winged messenger, as Manite explained.
Also,
That'd be a weird thing to do, considering Sirens look more like "human-headed chickens" than winged people.
That depends on how you define "angelic."
But "supernatural winged people" have been a part of Greek iconography for thousands of years now.
I like the Eldrazi-themed Forecast. The eight Eldrazi Clerics cost feels like it's a lot, but in a deck full of tokens this could go off faster than you'd think. Seems balanced enough though.
Next:
Pirate Fleet 3
Artifact — Vehicle (U)
Pirate Fleet can only be crewed by Pirates and can't attack unless defending player controls an Island.
When Pirate Fleet enters the battlefield, you may search your library for up to three cards named Pirate Fleet, reveal them, and put them into your hand. If you do, shuffle your library.
T: Pirate Fleet deals 2 damage to target creature or player.
Crew 1
3/3
Theros' angels would of course be different from the traditional MTG Angels inspired by Abrahamic religions, even if they looked similar.
Valkyrie should be a creature type though.
Why does Creeping Pits of Tar become a Faerie and not an Elemental?