Is anyone else reminded of China Mieville's TheScar? Both have fish people, pirates and vampires fighting over an object of mysterious power, both have strong ties to the pulp genre/retro Weird fiction, and both even have floating pirate islands made of ships. In addition, Vraska seems rather similar to Bellis Coldwine (at least mid-book Bellis), and Bolas is doing a darn good SPOILERSilas Finnec impression especially in his relationship to Bellis/Vraska. Going out on a further limb, the Tishana-Kumena feud resembles the Lovers/Brucolac conflict.
I love the GDS as a source of entertainment, but I hate it as a way of selecting interns. It seems both impractical and a tad unethical to choose employees based on an online pseudo-gameshow. This seems especially evident now, as they are transparently using it to build hype first and foremost. I wish that they would just make a tournament with a small cash prize, disentangling it from hiring and allowing it to occur more regularly.
Phyrexian Torture RB
Instant U
Phyrexian Torture deals 2 damage to target creature.
Put a -1/-1 counter on each creature your opponents control that was dealt damage this turn. In the hellish agonies of phyresis, Gerula's spark ignited. She escaped her plane, but would forever carry its horrors within herself.
Mirrodin71:clunky removal without flavor text seems neither interesting nor synergistic.
Picnic_bomber: Clever expansion of the ninjistu mechanic, although Sklulk seems a liitle weird here.
Raikourider: the mechanics are a tad wordy, but I love the flavor of this. Shalin, interplanar cowgirl. We direly need a new beastmaster walker since Garruk became Edgelord McAxemurder.
IcariiFA: return from exile is a bad mechanic. I woud be willing to perhaps overlook it if the walker used exile, but it doesn't.
Void_nothing: a solid anthem affect that both works with Temidon's buffing abilities and showcases his status as a protector of his people.
Hemlock: This just seems broken in enchantments,especially because Marille can be a commander, making the second clause far easier.
Gerula, the Incompleat 1BR
Legendary Planeswalker-Gerula MR
+1: Until your next turn, whenever you or Gerula are dealt damage, you may draw a card. If you do, discard a card.
-X: Put a creature card from your hand with converted mana cost X or less onto the battlefield. That creature gains haste. Sacrifice the creature at the beginning of the next end step.
-4: You get an emblem with "Creatures you control have haste. You may cast creature cards from your graveyard. At the beginning of your end step, sacrifice all creatures you control."
[3]
Gerula's Curse XB
Sorcery R
You may remove X loyalty counters from a Gerula planeswalker you countrol rather than pay Gerula's Curse's mana cost.
Target creature gets -X/-X until end of turn. Its control loses X life. "The oil infecting her realizes her fevered nightmares. Willingly or not, Gerula may have doomed this plane,"
-Ajani
Sheoldred: ...This is a two-card combo with any card that allows you to pay life 1 at a time. This is probably fine for big formats, but would be heavily restrict what could be printed in smaller constructed formats.
Just FYI, as I checked for combos before making this card, there are only three combo cards(which I see as cards that allow you to repeatably pay 1 life without also paying mana) for this in modern: Kuro, Pitlord, carrion howler and Wall of Blood. Given that I don't exactly see players falling over themselves to play any of those in modern, I think that the risks of degeneracy are fairly low. Given that the most recent of those three was printed in Ravnica, I feel that this card's existence would not impinge too much on design space in whatever hypothetical standard it shows up in.
EDIT: Forgot to add Carrion Howler.
So your ninjas become so fast that they leave afterimages when they move. Man I love that flavor! Mechanically, it builds on ninjitsu in an interesting way, however that is a Future Sight level of text for an uncommon.
So, the true companion, the brother in arms of Temidon, a centaur from myth-filled Theros who is known as the "Renewer of Valour",
is... a sheep? Cool and synergistic abilities, but I saw this challenge as centered on flavor, and this card just leaves me scratching my head. No flavor text,not even a clue that this sheep is sapient. Just... Sheep. Ok.
I love how this can punish both go-wide and go-tall. Unfortunately, the that tap-down effect does not work in black, thus the card does not work as a hybrid.
Great design! Synergizes with the walker in both flavor and mechanics, and stands alone as a strong uncommon. Enchantment etherium sculptor
A clever and unique design that captures its flavor very well. However, it fails both additional clauses of the challenge: exact color match and (un)common.
Cool design that harkens back to the Lorwynn fairies. That said, just being the walker's second ability on a stick is not terribly interesting.
I just went from a thread where someone was complaining about contrapiton "forcing you to run another library" to this, lol. Also, if you get multiples, do you get 16 decks?
1 Hemlock
2 Raikou
3 picnic
Instant U
Phyrexian Torture deals 2 damage to target creature.
Put a -1/-1 counter on each creature your opponents control that was dealt damage this turn.
In the hellish agonies of phyresis, Gerula's spark ignited. She escaped her plane, but would forever carry its horrors within herself.
Picnic_bomber: Clever expansion of the ninjistu mechanic, although Sklulk seems a liitle weird here.
Raikourider: the mechanics are a tad wordy, but I love the flavor of this. Shalin, interplanar cowgirl. We direly need a new beastmaster walker since Garruk became Edgelord McAxemurder.
IcariiFA: return from exile is a bad mechanic. I woud be willing to perhaps overlook it if the walker used exile, but it doesn't.
Void_nothing: a solid anthem affect that both works with Temidon's buffing abilities and showcases his status as a protector of his people.
Hemlock: This just seems broken in enchantments,especially because Marille can be a commander, making the second clause far easier.
Top 3
1 Raikourider
2 voidnothing
3 picnic_bomber
Legendary Planeswalker-Gerula MR
+1: Until your next turn, whenever you or Gerula are dealt damage, you may draw a card. If you do, discard a card.
-X: Put a creature card from your hand with converted mana cost X or less onto the battlefield. That creature gains haste. Sacrifice the creature at the beginning of the next end step.
-4: You get an emblem with "Creatures you control have haste. You may cast creature cards from your graveyard. At the beginning of your end step, sacrifice all creatures you control."
[3]
Gerula's Curse XB
Sorcery R
You may remove X loyalty counters from a Gerula planeswalker you countrol rather than pay Gerula's Curse's mana cost.
Target creature gets -X/-X until end of turn. Its control loses X life.
"The oil infecting her realizes her fevered nightmares. Willingly or not, Gerula may have doomed this plane,"
-Ajani
I don't see how Hydradoodle's art could be used on anything *not* silly. Also, love the poodleboy reference.
Just FYI, as I checked for combos before making this card, there are only three combo cards(which I see as cards that allow you to repeatably pay 1 life without also paying mana) for this in modern: Kuro, Pitlord, carrion howler and Wall of Blood. Given that I don't exactly see players falling over themselves to play any of those in modern, I think that the risks of degeneracy are fairly low. Given that the most recent of those three was printed in Ravnica, I feel that this card's existence would not impinge too much on design space in whatever hypothetical standard it shows up in.
EDIT: Forgot to add Carrion Howler.
is... a sheep? Cool and synergistic abilities, but I saw this challenge as centered on flavor, and this card just leaves me scratching my head. No flavor text,not even a clue that this sheep is sapient. Just... Sheep. Ok.
2 Picnic_bomber
1 Hemlock