Inversion of FormXUR
Instant
Chose one or two—
- Target creature gets +X/+0 until end of turn.
- Target creature gets -X/-0 until end of turn.
- Switch target creature’s power and toughness until end of turn.
I've seen a lot about layering and switching power and toughness, and I'm honestly a bit hazy on some of it. I created this with the idea that if you NEED to, you can reduce a creature's power to 0, then switch, thus killing it. So, does it work the way I think it does?
He's a really strong card, in my opinion. A choice of two great effects (bonus points for getting around indestructibility), terrifying art, and a terrifying prospect of a creature type to back up that face that no mother could love. Not to say that he's an auto include, but in Karador, where his cmc and p/t are largely irrelevant, I'm never sad to see him.
Mercy Killing is a solid removal option, gets around indestructible (but not hexproof/shroud), and has the upside of being able to target your own creatures for a potential benefit.
See my problem with that version is scrying - say its not the card type you need to get the effect, but its a card that you need otherwise (like a removal spell or something), so want to keep the card but waste the effect. At least you get the choice here, I suppose.
Fair enough. Still kinda feels like more hoops to jump through for the same effect. It seems to make it unnecessarily complicated.
However, my friend and I did come up with another idea:
Explore (To explore, put an exploration counter on target land you control without an exploration counter on it.)
From there, cards can care about exploration counters, how many exploration counters you have, when you explore, ect. I am somewhat concerned about parasitism, but I think if I work it kinda how energy counters work, then I should be alright. Thoughts?
Explore (Whenever a land enters the battlefield under your control, you may reveal the top card of your library.)
Then Explore cards do various things based on what card you reveal while exploring a land.
Frontier Ranger1W
Creature - Human Soldier
Explore (Whenever a land enters the battlefield under your control, you may reveal the top card of your library.)
Whenever ~ explores a land, put a +1/+1 counter on ~ if you revealed a creature card.
1/1
At first glace, I liked it. But then I realized that this is basically just a not as good landfall. Because it's still based on a land entering the battlefield under your control. So really it could easily be written as:
Landfall - Whenever a land enters the battlefield under your control, you may reveal the top card of your library. If the revealed card was a creature, put a +1/+1 counter on ~.
I originally had a mechanic called "Landhold" that was basically Metalcraft, but instead of three artifacts, you needed three lands of a specific basic type (Plainshold, Islandhold, ect). I really liked the mechanic, but it was pointed out to me by a friend that it is much more uninteractive than metalcraft because there are plenty of ways to get rid of artifacts to "turn off" your opponent's metalcraft, but there are far less ways to deal with lands, and most of the ways to deal with lands are considered pretty "unfun". So this was an attempt at a different mechanic that cared about lands.
Perhaps something like landfall that cares more about the type of land entering the battlefield? Or is that generally pointless? For example:
Frontier Guide1W
Creature - Human Scout Plainsfall - Whenever a Plains enters the battlefield under your control ~ gets +2/+2 until end of turn.
1/1
I'm not sure if this could potentially allow a power level similar to the original landfall (perhaps even slightly more pushed, like in the example), or if land type is controllable enough in a limited environment that it makes no different anyways.
Okay, some context first. This ability will appear in my custom set, tentatively named Kingmaker (for those of you familiar with the Pathfinder Adventure Path series, this set is loosely based on the events of the Adventure Path of the same name, from my experience). The set has strong "lands matter" and "basic land types matter" themes. Now I didn't want to just go an use Landfall. I love Landfall, but I wanted to do my own thing. So... I came up with Explore, or rather with two different explores (again, name may change), and each of them works the same on the surface, but each poses different design challenges.
Explore as an Ability Word
Explore as an ability word would read as: Explore -- [trigger], reveal the top card of your library. If it's a land card, [effect].
Used in this manner explore is fairly simple. It ties together all of the cards in the set that have you reveal the top card of your library and give you a nice little boost if the revealed card is a land. Its simple and effective. I do have one problem with it - since ability words themselves don't have any actual rules attached, cards cannot directly reference them, as in "Whenever you explore [effect]" - which really does have a nice ring to it. Also, I feel as though ability words have far less design space, and can easily become stale, even within a single set. The upside is that this is the easy route.
Example Card: Expeditionary Knights2W Creature - Human Knight Scout
First Strike Explore -- When ~ enters the battlefield, reveal the top card of your library. If it's a land card, put a +1/+1 counter on ~.
2/2
Explore as a Keyword Action
Explore as a Keyword Action would read: (To explore, look at the top card of your library. If it’s a land card, you may reveal it.)
In this version explore is an action. Cards will tell you when to explore, and will once again give a benefit if you reveal a land card when exploring. This version allows for cards to reference when you explore as in "Whenever you explore, [effect]". Plus, I feel as though the flavor of exploration fits better when written as a verb in a sentence rather than a lonely word, all by itself. Using it as a verb is far more evocative. Now the difficulty I'm having with this version is that as an action word, I feel performing the action will probably naturally occur more often, and that leads to the issue of the land remaining on top of the library, allowing multiple successful explorations from a single land (or, if you don't have a land on top, you can't successfully explore at all). Therefore I feel as though the card should move somehow. Putting the card on the bottom seems counter-intuitive, especially if you reveal a land. After all, you just explored that land, now you can't use it? Drawing the card makes the exploring a stronger cantrip, wherever it appears, which could easily create balance issues. The other option would be only drawing the card if it's a land, which kinda makes them a bit "all or nothing". Great cards when you reveal a land, but incredibly underwhelming when you don't because of how over costed they'd have to be to balance it out.
Example Card (base version): Expeditionary Knights2W Creature - Human Knight Scout
First Strike
When ~ enters the battlefield, explore. If you reveal a land card this way, put a +1/+1 counter on ~. (To explore, look at the top card of your library. If it’s a land card, you may reveal it.)
2/2
Example Card (drawing the card): Expeditionary Knights2W Creature - Human Knight Scout
First Strike
When ~ enters the battlefield, explore. If you reveal a land card this way, put a +1/+1 counter on ~. (To explore, reveal the top card of your library, then put it into your hand.)
2/2
Example Card (drawing ONLY if you reveal a land): Expeditionary Knights2W Creature - Human Knight Scout
First Strike
When ~ enters the battlefield, explore. If you reveal a land card this way, put a +1/+1 counter on ~. (To explore, reveal the top card of your library. If it’s a land card, put it into your hand.)
2/2
So what do you guys think? Ability Word for its simplicity? Keyword Action for its design space? If you think Keyword Action is the way to go, what should happen with the card on top of the library? Is the whole thing just a bad idea (and if so, why)?
I thought so, but I figured I may as well get a second opinion.
Instant
Chose one or two—
- Target creature gets +X/+0 until end of turn.
- Target creature gets -X/-0 until end of turn.
- Switch target creature’s power and toughness until end of turn.
I've seen a lot about layering and switching power and toughness, and I'm honestly a bit hazy on some of it. I created this with the idea that if you NEED to, you can reduce a creature's power to 0, then switch, thus killing it. So, does it work the way I think it does?
However, my friend and I did come up with another idea:
Explore (To explore, put an exploration counter on target land you control without an exploration counter on it.)
From there, cards can care about exploration counters, how many exploration counters you have, when you explore, ect. I am somewhat concerned about parasitism, but I think if I work it kinda how energy counters work, then I should be alright. Thoughts?
At first glace, I liked it. But then I realized that this is basically just a not as good landfall. Because it's still based on a land entering the battlefield under your control. So really it could easily be written as:
Landfall - Whenever a land enters the battlefield under your control, you may reveal the top card of your library. If the revealed card was a creature, put a +1/+1 counter on ~.
I originally had a mechanic called "Landhold" that was basically Metalcraft, but instead of three artifacts, you needed three lands of a specific basic type (Plainshold, Islandhold, ect). I really liked the mechanic, but it was pointed out to me by a friend that it is much more uninteractive than metalcraft because there are plenty of ways to get rid of artifacts to "turn off" your opponent's metalcraft, but there are far less ways to deal with lands, and most of the ways to deal with lands are considered pretty "unfun". So this was an attempt at a different mechanic that cared about lands.
Perhaps something like landfall that cares more about the type of land entering the battlefield? Or is that generally pointless? For example:
Frontier Guide 1W
Creature - Human Scout
Plainsfall - Whenever a Plains enters the battlefield under your control ~ gets +2/+2 until end of turn.
1/1
I'm not sure if this could potentially allow a power level similar to the original landfall (perhaps even slightly more pushed, like in the example), or if land type is controllable enough in a limited environment that it makes no different anyways.
Explore as an Ability Word
Explore as an ability word would read as: Explore -- [trigger], reveal the top card of your library. If it's a land card, [effect].
Used in this manner explore is fairly simple. It ties together all of the cards in the set that have you reveal the top card of your library and give you a nice little boost if the revealed card is a land. Its simple and effective. I do have one problem with it - since ability words themselves don't have any actual rules attached, cards cannot directly reference them, as in "Whenever you explore [effect]" - which really does have a nice ring to it. Also, I feel as though ability words have far less design space, and can easily become stale, even within a single set. The upside is that this is the easy route.
Example Card:
Expeditionary Knights 2W
Creature - Human Knight Scout
First Strike
Explore -- When ~ enters the battlefield, reveal the top card of your library. If it's a land card, put a +1/+1 counter on ~.
2/2
Explore as a Keyword Action
Explore as a Keyword Action would read: (To explore, look at the top card of your library. If it’s a land card, you may reveal it.)
In this version explore is an action. Cards will tell you when to explore, and will once again give a benefit if you reveal a land card when exploring. This version allows for cards to reference when you explore as in "Whenever you explore, [effect]". Plus, I feel as though the flavor of exploration fits better when written as a verb in a sentence rather than a lonely word, all by itself. Using it as a verb is far more evocative. Now the difficulty I'm having with this version is that as an action word, I feel performing the action will probably naturally occur more often, and that leads to the issue of the land remaining on top of the library, allowing multiple successful explorations from a single land (or, if you don't have a land on top, you can't successfully explore at all). Therefore I feel as though the card should move somehow. Putting the card on the bottom seems counter-intuitive, especially if you reveal a land. After all, you just explored that land, now you can't use it? Drawing the card makes the exploring a stronger cantrip, wherever it appears, which could easily create balance issues. The other option would be only drawing the card if it's a land, which kinda makes them a bit "all or nothing". Great cards when you reveal a land, but incredibly underwhelming when you don't because of how over costed they'd have to be to balance it out.
Example Card (base version):
Expeditionary Knights 2W
Creature - Human Knight Scout
First Strike
When ~ enters the battlefield, explore. If you reveal a land card this way, put a +1/+1 counter on ~. (To explore, look at the top card of your library. If it’s a land card, you may reveal it.)
2/2
Example Card (drawing the card):
Expeditionary Knights 2W
Creature - Human Knight Scout
First Strike
When ~ enters the battlefield, explore. If you reveal a land card this way, put a +1/+1 counter on ~. (To explore, reveal the top card of your library, then put it into your hand.)
2/2
Example Card (drawing ONLY if you reveal a land):
Expeditionary Knights 2W
Creature - Human Knight Scout
First Strike
When ~ enters the battlefield, explore. If you reveal a land card this way, put a +1/+1 counter on ~. (To explore, reveal the top card of your library. If it’s a land card, put it into your hand.)
2/2
So what do you guys think? Ability Word for its simplicity? Keyword Action for its design space? If you think Keyword Action is the way to go, what should happen with the card on top of the library? Is the whole thing just a bad idea (and if so, why)?