They thought Jitte was not good enough so they added the -1/-1 ability.
That's not true. They thought it wasn't good enough, so they had it add 2 counters rather than 1. The story on the whole thing and how it ended up as good as it did here:
Sometime in the middle of Betrayers development, there was an innocuous card in the file that looked like this:
Umezawa's Jitte 2
Legendary Artifact - Equipment
Whenever equipped creature deals combat damage, put a charge counter on Umezawa's Jitte.
Remove a charge counter from Umezawa's Jitte: Choose one - Equipped creature gets +2/+2 until end of turn; or add BB to your mana pool; or you gain 2 life.
Equip 2
We had been told that Toshiro Umezawa and his Jitte were both central to the story, and there was some amount of pressure to make both of them respectable cards. The problem was, the above card sucked. It was practically unplayable. You had to play it, equip it, then get into combat, and after all of that you either got one shot of a Vulshok Morningstar's permanent bonus, or a refund on the equip cost, or a couple of life. It was truly terrible.
So, during some meeting when we were lamenting about the sad state of the card, I uttered these simple words: "Why not just make it give two counters?" Everyone quickly agreed, we playtested it for awhile, and we liked what we saw. Now you were threatening some serious mana acceleration when you managed to connect, your creatures grew fearsome, and the lifegain was meaningful. It was strong in Limited formats but far from broken, and still seemed mostly outclassed in Constructed. Perfect for our purposes.
Fast forward to very late in the development process. The set was essentially out of our hands at this point, but editing had realized that a certain card didn't work within the rules. It turned out that you couldn't have a modal ability where the different choices operate at different speeds. By that I mean, two of the three abilities would go on the stack at instant speed as normal, but the mana ability didn't use the stack at all, and the rules couldn't support that. We had an emergency meeting to come up with a replacement ability. It couldn't provide mana, and ideally it needed to be black-aligned. We tossed around a few ideas that no one liked, and then someone (I honestly can't remember who) suggested that it could give -1/-1 to opposing creatures. I remember considering this, and my (flawed) reasoning went something like "Well, a lot of constructed decks don't even play creatures, and the ones that do usually play sturdy ones, so that seems like it would be fair." Awkward...
Now you might be thinking, "Given that you knew upfront that there was no opportunity to playtest it, wouldn't you want to pick some terrible ability that's guaranteed to be safe?" Yes, you're absolutely right. I like to think that if the designer that I am today were in that meeting, then I would've said something exactly along those lines. But here's the thing: the card had been unplayable in Constructed for months at this point. Once you mentally write off a card, it can be surprisingly difficult to see it as a contender again. The same exact thing happened to the Darksteel developers with Skullclamp one year earlier.
In our defense, Adrian Sullivan in his post pre-release article wrote "When I put Umezawa's Jitte into my sealed deck, I thought it might be neat. Once I'd finished playing it, I couldn't believe how well it had performed. As I drove home, I began to think that this card was so good that I wanted to try it for constructed." We were still at the "it might be neat" stage. Because we knew going in to that meeting that it was a final change, and we all had other obligations and tasks anyway, we just didn't playtest it to make the leap to the further stages.
And that's how I contributed to the creation of one of the more broken cards in recent memory.
If I remember correctly, Order of Leitbur was an attempt to sneak Order of Light Beer past the editors. It worked and I played the card in old Type I White Weenie.
Hahahaha. That's awesome. I wonder if they just left it in because it's funny, or if they missed it totally til it hit print. That had to have seen it I'd think.
Because conservative bias is a far, far worse thing. Liberal bias doesn't, statistically speaking, make people stupid. Conservative bias (or at least Fox's version of it) does.
Goblin Sharpshooter was originally a goblin, but with no goblins in Odyssey it was going to be a dwarf and only cost 1R, but they liked it better as a goblin and thought it was too cheap, so it finally got printed in Onslaught. Richard also designed the card.
About any "subpar" mechanics or cards: Context is king.
If I make a templating or grammar error, let me know.
The franchise MtG most resembles is Battlestar Galactica. Why? Its players exist in, at most, a dozen different models at any given point in time, with perhaps up to 3% variation, 5% if you're lucky.
Islands were put onto the rare sheets during Alpha in an attempt to disguise rarities back then. Players eventually wised up though and realized what was going on. Fun times opening a rare Island back then
It has now quadrupled in effectiveness, now affecting four creatures including Zodiac Rooster, Graceful Antelope and Boggart Arsonists also. Also worth mentioning: Aysen Highway
Juju Alters - Altered MTG Cards
That's not true. They thought it wasn't good enough, so they had it add 2 counters rather than 1. The story on the whole thing and how it ended up as good as it did here:
You can read the article it was from here.
—Kaysa, Elder Druid of the Juniper Order
Jamie and Wendy respectively. Somebody's daughters I believe, although I don't remember who.
Erebos B | Ghost Council WB | Grimgrin UB | Jhoira UR
Jor Kadeen RW | Melek UR | Mimeoplasm GUB | Rasputin WU
Savra BG | Sisay GW | Teneb BGW | Thada Adel U | Wort BR
I draft and play EDH. If a Standard player can't understand who a card is for, it's probably for me.
I also write things about good films.
echoes Hokusai's The Great Wave
Also, I've heard that Tarmogoyf was supposed to cost 1GG, but some sort of mixup lowered the cost. Doubtful, but that's what they say.
Hahahaha. That's awesome. I wonder if they just left it in because it's funny, or if they missed it totally til it hit print. That had to have seen it I'd think.
On that subject, don't forget that at one point they were actually going to give each set its own unique card back.
About any "subpar" mechanics or cards: Context is king.
If I make a templating or grammar error, let me know.
The franchise MtG most resembles is Battlestar Galactica. Why? Its players exist in, at most, a dozen different models at any given point in time, with perhaps up to 3% variation, 5% if you're lucky.
Yes I believe it was Arabian Nights that was supposed to have purple backs, as seen on the booster pack packaging.
Also while Brady says it's purely coincedence Liliana Vess is still an anagram for A Villianess.
Trade Thread
There's also a dude surfing, he's to the left of the skull.
Erebos B | Ghost Council WB | Grimgrin UB | Jhoira UR
Jor Kadeen RW | Melek UR | Mimeoplasm GUB | Rasputin WU
Savra BG | Sisay GW | Teneb BGW | Thada Adel U | Wort BR
I draft and play EDH. If a Standard player can't understand who a card is for, it's probably for me.
I also write things about good films.
-For the math geeks: Bosium Strip = Mobius Strip; Elkin Bottle = Klein Bottle.
-ESPN2 used to air the World Championship.
-Aladdin's Lamp replaced Black Lotus in Revised.
edit: The word on Aladdin's Lamp says "Danger" in Arabic.
There's a couple matches on Youtube.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DQuXalg4PKs
Finkel has a baby face.
Man, I used to have these on a VHS tape, and would watch these over and over back in the day!
I wish i still had those VHSs....
Edit: I wish I could find a video of the Ruben/Seldon match in the finals that year. I would like to watch that over again.