This idea is inspired by my recent Azor, Parun of the Senate topic, in which one of the abilities I suggested had him create legendary enchantment tokens named Azor's Law that basically functioned like Rule of Law + Spirit of the Labyrinth (I'm amazed that they haven't made a regular enchantment version of that yet) but only for your opponents. I was thinking of an ability that would allow Azorius to play with enchantments more, befitting its use of law magic, and here we are, with a new mechanic I call Legislate:
Traffic Monitor1W
Creature - Human Knight
Vigilance Legislate - When ~ enters the battlefield, create a white Law enchantment token with "Creatures enter the battlefield tapped."
1/3
Spellpeace Enforcer2UU
Creature - Human Wizard Legislate - When ~ enters the battlefield, create a blue Law enchantment token with "Whenever an opponent casts a spell during another player's turn, counter that spell."
2/2
Legislate is an ability word that entails creating Law enchantment tokens with various abilities. There's also potential for Azorius cards with Laws matter effects, ideally found on cards with Legislate abilities, to encourage playing multiple Legislate cards together, though I would focus Laws matter on WU cards since other guilds wouldn't likely support Laws much. Ideally booster pack logistics would ensure that each pack with a Legislate card in it also has the appropriate Law enchantment token, particularly in the case of seeded Azorius booster packs.
Resistance Queller1W
Creature - Human Soldier Legislate - When ~ enters the battlefield, create a white Law enchantment token with "Whenever one or more creatures you control attack, you may tap target creature defending player controls."
1/1
Lyev Disciplinarian2W
Creature - Human Wizard Legislate - When ~ enters the battlefield, create a white Law enchantment token with "Players can't cast more than one spell each turn."
1/1
Skyknight Monitor3U
Creature - Vedalken Knight
Flying Legislate - When ~ enters the battlefield, create a blue Law enchantment token with "Creatures with flying can block only creatures with flying."
Creatures have "2: This creature gains or loses flying until end of turn."
2/4
Aggression Inhibitor2WU
Creature - Human Wizard Legislate - When ~ enters the battlefield, create a white and blue Law enchantment token with "Creatures can't attack you or a planeswalker you control unless their controller pays X for each attacking creature they control, where X is the number of Laws you control."
2/4
Champion Hussar3WU
Creature - Human Knight
First strike, hexproof Legislate - When ~ enters the battlefield, create a white and blue Law enchantment token with "No more than one creature may attack each combat" and "No more than one creature may block each combat."
~ gets +1/+1 for each Law you control.
3/3
If the Law subtype were to be introduced, I wouldn't mind Azor's Law tokens also having the Law subtype.
MTGS Wikia Article about "New World Order"
Every time I read a comment about "Well if this card had card draw/trample/haste/indestructible/hexproof/life gain...", I think "You're missing the point." They're armchair developer comments that fail to take into account the card's role in the greater Limited and Standard environment. No, it may not be as good as whatever card you're comparing it to. There's a reason for that. Not every burn spell is Lightning Bolt, nor does it need to be or should be.
PSA to everyone who keeps forgetting about the Reserved List:
You're on a website dedicated to talking about MtG. You're only a few keystrokes away from finding out what cards are on the Reserved List. You're also only a few keystrokes away from finding out why some cards on the Reserved List got foil printings in FtV, as Judge promos, or whatnot, as well as why that won't happen again. Stop doing this.
I like this. It sounds like a fun gimmick. Generally I would.suggest each law only doing one thing, not 2.
I would ha e paired creatures though. Like a white that forces creature to enter tapped and a blue that only allows player to untap one creature a turn.
Oh, this would be a royal pain to play against...which is probably the point, so well done.
My biggest concern with this is the sheer amount of abilities everyone would need to remember. Maybe the Legislate ability shouldn't generate tokens, but should instead pull Laws from your library?
Legislate - When ~ enters the battlefield (or when it deals combat damage, or when you draw a card, or at the beginning of your upkeep, etc), search your library for a Law card with converted mana cost _ or less, reveal it, and add it to your hand. Then shuffle your library.
_ would be one less than the converted mans cost of whatever is Legislating. The old Rebel cards and the Soulshift mechanic were similar.
This is an interesting way of doing an enchantment theme without using enchantment cards. I suppose Amonkhet and Hour of Devastation prove that having a ton of unique tokens in a set is possible too, if a little cumbersome.
The biggest problem here is design space. How many different common effects can you make out of this? This mechanic leans toward rare effects too, which exacerbates the problem.
Being that you're making enchantment tokens, you'll want those tokens to do something for as long as they're around, which pulls away from etb effects. Recurring triggers will be problematic in numbers, especially at common. Static effects are few and far between, again, especially at common.
Your best bet might be to have common legislators make blank Laws and then do some one-time effect that cares about how many Laws you control, but making a Law that doesn't do anything constructive might be a little too realistic I mean it'll probably feel weird.
Seems like a flavorful mechanic for sure. It has potential, but it eats up a lot of a set's complexity and demands a lot to make it work.
I like this. It sounds like a fun gimmick. Generally I would.suggest each law only doing one thing, not 2.
I would ha e paired creatures though. Like a white that forces creature to enter tapped and a blue that only allows player to untap one creature a turn.
Yeah, probably better to conserve design space. I've got a different idea for a Law with the "can't untap more than one each turn" effect.
Detention Order3UU
Sorcery Legislate - Tap each creature your opponents control, then create a blue Law enchantment token with "Players can't untap more than one creature during their untap steps."
Oh, this would be a royal pain to play against...which is probably the point, so well done.
My biggest concern with this is the sheer amount of abilities everyone would need to remember. Maybe the Legislate ability shouldn't generate tokens, but should instead pull Laws from your library?
Legislate - When ~ enters the battlefield (or when it deals combat damage, or when you draw a card, or at the beginning of your upkeep, etc), search your library for a Law card with converted mana cost _ or less, reveal it, and add it to your hand. Then shuffle your library.
_ would be one less than the converted mans cost of whatever is Legislating. The old Rebel cards and the Soulshift mechanic were similar.
That's why there would be token cards for the different Laws, and ideally packs would be seeded such that a Law token always accompanies the card that creates it. Each Law token could list the name of the card that creates it, much like emblems do.
I like your way of thinking, but I don't think parasitic A/B tutoring is ideal for a Guild mechanic.
This is an interesting way of doing an enchantment theme without using enchantment cards. I suppose Amonkhet and Hour of Devastation prove that having a ton of unique tokens in a set is possible too, if a little cumbersome.
The biggest problem here is design space. How many different common effects can you make out of this? This mechanic leans toward rare effects too, which exacerbates the problem.
Being that you're making enchantment tokens, you'll want those tokens to do something for as long as they're around, which pulls away from etb effects. Recurring triggers will be problematic in numbers, especially at common. Static effects are few and far between, again, especially at common.
Your best bet might be to have common legislators make blank Laws and then do some one-time effect that cares about how many Laws you control, but making a Law that doesn't do anything constructive might be a little too realistic I mean it'll probably feel weird.
Seems like a flavorful mechanic for sure. It has potential, but it eats up a lot of a set's complexity and demands a lot to make it work.
Well, thankfully a guild mechanic only needs to go on a handful of commons. On average, a Guild mechanic goes on two commons in each of the appropriate colors and one common that's both colors; in other words, five. I do acknowledge that Legislate is a little more complicated than Detain, thus why I'm racking my brain thinking of what kinds of non-Aura enchantments regularly appear at common in white and blue.
...unless Legislate cards can produce Aura Law tokens, emulating cards like Arrest and Grasp of the Hieromancer. Nothing says Legislate can't produce Aura Law tokens, right? As long as the basic requirement of creating an enchantment token with the subtype Law is met?
This also gives me an idea for a similar mechanic involving Curses...
Hmm, perhaps Aura Law tokens for common Legislate cards would be worth a shot?
Lyev Arrester2WW
Creature - Human Soldier Legislate - When ~ enters the battlefield, you may create a white Aura Law enchantment token atttached to target creature you don't control. The token has enchant creature and "Enchanted creature can't attack or block and its activated abilities can't be activated."
2/2
MTGS Wikia Article about "New World Order"
Every time I read a comment about "Well if this card had card draw/trample/haste/indestructible/hexproof/life gain...", I think "You're missing the point." They're armchair developer comments that fail to take into account the card's role in the greater Limited and Standard environment. No, it may not be as good as whatever card you're comparing it to. There's a reason for that. Not every burn spell is Lightning Bolt, nor does it need to be or should be.
PSA to everyone who keeps forgetting about the Reserved List:
You're on a website dedicated to talking about MtG. You're only a few keystrokes away from finding out what cards are on the Reserved List. You're also only a few keystrokes away from finding out why some cards on the Reserved List got foil printings in FtV, as Judge promos, or whatnot, as well as why that won't happen again. Stop doing this.
Lyev Arrester2WW
Creature - Human Soldier Legislate - When ~ enters the battlefield, you may create a white Aura Law enchantment token atttached to target creature you don't control. The token has enchant creature and "Enchanted creature can't attack or block and its activated abilities can't be activated."
2/2
I've recently been experimenting with enchantment tokens (including those with custom subtype Law) and the greatest struggle is that you cannot have too many different ones - this is why I prefer indeed such that have no global effects e. g. I went for Oblivion Ring-style tokens myself.
You really should to ask yourself what the most versatile token is and run with it. You can maybe get away with two different tokens. Looking through the possibilities, a very good common token would be e. g. some kind of Aura with "Enchanted permanent doesn't untap during its controllers untap step." It can be useful by itself, but it also can be part of A/B synergies with various tappers and is not even nonsensical if you get the token first since it is still hampering the opponent's longterm options.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Planar Chaos was not a mistake neither was it random. You might want to look at it again.
[thread=239793][Game] Level Up - Creature[/thread]
I'm not sure I'd like this mechanic if the laws all stayed around forever. Enchantments are usually harder to get rid of than creatures, and so far, this mechanic basically is a better way of sticking an ability on a creature (now, your opponent needs an anti-enchantment to get rid of that effect, and you still get to keep the creature if he has one).
I think it'd be more interesting (and probably easier to design at common) if most of those laws had a limited duration. Perhaps they should have a triggered ability that'll end up sacrificing them (e.g. "Whenever a creature attacks, sacrifice this law. If you do, exile that creature.", or "Spells cost 1 more to cast. At the beginning of each end step, if no spells were cast this turn, sacrifice this law.", or simply sacrifice them at the beginning of your next upkeep). Maybe that could help a bit with having a lot of different tokens too (I mean, if most laws disappear after a while, you're less likely to have a lot of multiple different laws at the same time and you don't have to remember what they do for very long).
Lyev Arrester2WW
Creature - Human Soldier Legislate - When ~ enters the battlefield, you may create a white Aura Law enchantment token atttached to target creature you don't control. The token has enchant creature and "Enchanted creature can't attack or block and its activated abilities can't be activated."
2/2
I've recently been experimenting with enchantment tokens (including those with custom subtype Law) and the greatest struggle is that you cannot have too many different ones - this is why I prefer indeed such that have no global effects e. g. I went for Oblivion Ring-style tokens myself.
You really should to ask yourself what the most versatile token is and run with it. You can maybe get away with two different tokens. Looking through the possibilities, a very good common token would be e. g. some kind of Aura with "Enchanted permanent doesn't untap during its controllers untap step." It can be useful by itself, but it also can be part of A/B synergies with various tappers and is not even nonsensical if you get the token first since it is still hampering the opponent's longterm options.
Again, there would be physical tokens associated with each card, much like with Embalm. And seeded packs can ensure that any Legislate card is always accompanied by the proper token, at the cost of restricting the pack to one Legislate card each.
That said, since WU played around with Arrest-esque effects last time, I suppose if different Law enchantment tokens proved unfeasible, then we could settle for some kind of universal Aura token, but I would be highly dissatisfied with that approach.
I'm not sure I'd like this mechanic if the laws all stayed around forever. Enchantments are usually harder to get rid of than creatures, and so far, this mechanic basically is a better way of sticking an ability on a creature (now, your opponent needs an anti-enchantment to get rid of that effect, and you still get to keep the creature if he has one).
I think it'd be more interesting (and probably easier to design at common) if most of those laws had a limited duration. Perhaps they should have a triggered ability that'll end up sacrificing them (e.g. "Whenever a creature attacks, sacrifice this law. If you do, exile that creature.", or "Spells cost 1 more to cast. At the beginning of each end step, if no spells were cast this turn, sacrifice this law.", or simply sacrifice them at the beginning of your next upkeep). Maybe that could help a bit with having a lot of different tokens too (I mean, if most laws disappear after a while, you're less likely to have a lot of multiple different laws at the same time and you don't have to remember what they do for very long).
You also have to write out the sacrifice clause on top of whatever else the Law does, causing every Legislate card to have a huge amount of text (we may be talking about Azorius here, but let's not be too literal ). The best way to mitigate that is to incorporate workarounds to each Law, like with Skyknight Monitor. Note that most of the Laws do not outright prevent victory, they just make it harder to win. A Rakdos deck can still push against the Azorius and win without removing its Laws, though as we saw with Enchanter's Bane recently, there are ways for red, and theoretically black, to deal with enchantments. A colorless answer to tokens a la Ratchet Bomb could also work, though in this format it would likely be costed a little higher so as not to utterly neuter the Azorius deck.
MTGS Wikia Article about "New World Order"
Every time I read a comment about "Well if this card had card draw/trample/haste/indestructible/hexproof/life gain...", I think "You're missing the point." They're armchair developer comments that fail to take into account the card's role in the greater Limited and Standard environment. No, it may not be as good as whatever card you're comparing it to. There's a reason for that. Not every burn spell is Lightning Bolt, nor does it need to be or should be.
PSA to everyone who keeps forgetting about the Reserved List:
You're on a website dedicated to talking about MtG. You're only a few keystrokes away from finding out what cards are on the Reserved List. You're also only a few keystrokes away from finding out why some cards on the Reserved List got foil printings in FtV, as Judge promos, or whatnot, as well as why that won't happen again. Stop doing this.
Lyev Arrester2WW
Creature - Human Soldier Legislate - When ~ enters the battlefield, you may create a white Aura Law enchantment token atttached to target creature you don't control. The token has enchant creature and "Enchanted creature can't attack or block and its activated abilities can't be activated."
2/2
I've recently been experimenting with enchantment tokens (including those with custom subtype Law) and the greatest struggle is that you cannot have too many different ones - this is why I prefer indeed such that have no global effects e. g. I went for Oblivion Ring-style tokens myself.
You really should to ask yourself what the most versatile token is and run with it. You can maybe get away with two different tokens. Looking through the possibilities, a very good common token would be e. g. some kind of Aura with "Enchanted permanent doesn't untap during its controllers untap step." It can be useful by itself, but it also can be part of A/B synergies with various tappers and is not even nonsensical if you get the token first since it is still hampering the opponent's longterm options.
Again, there would be physical tokens associated with each card, much like with Embalm. And seeded packs can ensure that any Legislate card is always accompanied by the proper token, at the cost of restricting the pack to one Legislate card each.
I don't see how having seeded tokens would solve the issue of a proliferation of global static effects. Even with tokens around (and embalm needsthem far less than legislate) more than half the embalm cards are virtual french vanillas - global tokens means the global complexity goes up.
I also think that this would be an extreme strain on a Ravnica-based set if one guild hogs all the tokens - Selsnya's populate didn't push out other tokens from packs. How many packs will have to be seeded with a law? How many are free to feature different tokens?
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Planar Chaos was not a mistake neither was it random. You might want to look at it again.
[thread=239793][Game] Level Up - Creature[/thread]
In Amonkhet, there were six embalm cards that had static, non-keyword abilities. The remainder (11) had either one-time-use abilities, or generic keyword abilities (flying, vigilance, etc). Eternalize was even smaller, with only two cards with static, non-keyword abilities.
Enchantments aren't going to have keyword abilities. You could probably get away with one-time-use abilities, and have your creatures have static abilities based on the Law tokens you have out, sort of like the investigate mechanic. But if you're going to have a bunch of Laws with static, complicated abilities, I really think those need to be cards in the set, not tokens.
That's a really cool idea, but I'm not sure it fits Azorius...seems more Orzhov? Also, I don't think "Legislate" would be the appropriate word for that kind of ability (though, in fairness, I'm not sure what would be appropriate).
Personally, I could imagine the pseudo-undying being called "lawbringer" and seeming somewhat in flavor
The lawmage introduces a new law that outlives them. Maybe something like:
Azorius Obstructor 3WW
Creature- Human Soldier
Lawbringer
All creatures get -1/-0
4/4
It certainly takes up less space on the card than an ETB effect that creates a token. Plus, this allows for effects that stack (such as power reduction, a minor ghostly prison or caltrops effect, or a tax effect) without blink abuse. Finally, this approach allows colors without enchantment removal to exile the creature.
While Azorius isn't the colors of reanimation, the revival is mostly there to save card space and remove need for tokens.
Again, there would be physical tokens associated with each card, much like with Embalm. And seeded packs can ensure that any Legislate card is always accompanied by the proper token, at the cost of restricting the pack to one Legislate card each.
I don't see how having seeded tokens would solve the issue of a proliferation of global static effects. Even with tokens around (and embalm needsthem far less than legislate) more than half the embalm cards are virtual french vanillas - global tokens means the global complexity goes up.
I also think that this would be an extreme strain on a Ravnica-based set if one guild hogs all the tokens - Selsnya's populate didn't push out other tokens from packs. How many packs will have to be seeded with a law? How many are free to feature different tokens?
To be fair, most of the global effects are fairly easy to understand, like Rule of Law. Each Legislate card based on an existing enchantment appears at the same rarity as the original. Most of the common Legislate cards could be Auras that effect only a single permanent (you know, stuff like restraining orders 8D ). As you suggested earlier, a "jailing" enchantment like Oblivion Ring or, more currently, Banishing Light could also work.
Since we're talking seeded guild packs, which should always include at least one card with the guild's mechanic, the existence of Legislate cards wouldn't keep other guild packs from including other kinds of tokens. As for regular booster packs, provided there are any for this theoretical scenario, when a pack has a legislate card in it, it has the corresponding Law token, otherwise it can have regular tokens. And frankly, regular tokens don't require physical reminders as much as something like Laws. We're all familiar with the usual Soldiers, Zombies, Goblins, etc., by now.
Although, an alternative did just come to mind: What if Legislate Laws had a checklist token that worked a bit like the DFC stand-ins for Innistrad? Since most Laws would be single sentences, you just find the one that matches the Law you're creating and check the circle next to it or put some kind of marker on it to show you control a Law with that ability.
In Amonkhet, there were six embalm cards that had static, non-keyword abilities. The remainder (11) had either one-time-use abilities, or generic keyword abilities (flying, vigilance, etc). Eternalize was even smaller, with only two cards with static, non-keyword abilities.
Enchantments aren't going to have keyword abilities. You could probably get away with one-time-use abilities, and have your creatures have static abilities based on the Law tokens you have out, sort of like the investigate mechanic. But if you're going to have a bunch of Laws with static, complicated abilities, I really think those need to be cards in the set, not tokens.
Keep in mind you'll only have so many cards with Legislate in any one deck, especially in Limited. Even if you include multiple copies of a particular Legislator, most of the Laws have noncumulative effects, again using Rule of Law as the primary example. The "Laws matter" abilities are kept in WU multicolor to help the monocolor Legislators play better with other guilds.
Frankly, it's not far removed from how a pillowfort deck works.
Legislate (when this creature dies, return it to the battlefield as a noncreature enchantment.)
Kind of represents the lasting legacy that individuals can create through laws.
The creature actually has an ability in life and requires no token for its ability to work (plus we get interesting synergy with animation effects).
That sounds like a good ability for a Theros revisit, actually, especially if they also include a sacrifice ability to represent the monsters next time (hmm, Devour seems like a good option).
On a side note, I would make sure the art of each Legislate card includes some manner of scroll or other easily identifiable document with glowing blue text to serve as a visual key for the Law token art.
MTGS Wikia Article about "New World Order"
Every time I read a comment about "Well if this card had card draw/trample/haste/indestructible/hexproof/life gain...", I think "You're missing the point." They're armchair developer comments that fail to take into account the card's role in the greater Limited and Standard environment. No, it may not be as good as whatever card you're comparing it to. There's a reason for that. Not every burn spell is Lightning Bolt, nor does it need to be or should be.
PSA to everyone who keeps forgetting about the Reserved List:
You're on a website dedicated to talking about MtG. You're only a few keystrokes away from finding out what cards are on the Reserved List. You're also only a few keystrokes away from finding out why some cards on the Reserved List got foil printings in FtV, as Judge promos, or whatnot, as well as why that won't happen again. Stop doing this.
Since we're talking seeded guild packs, which should always include at least one card with the guild's mechanic, the existence of Legislate cards wouldn't keep other guild packs from including other kinds of tokens. As for regular booster packs, provided there are any for this theoretical scenario, when a pack has a legislate card in it, it has the corresponding Law token, otherwise it can have regular tokens. And frankly, regular tokens don't require physical reminders as much as something like Laws. We're all familiar with the usual Soldiers, Zombies, Goblins, etc., by now.
Well, in that case I'd be interested in the numbers for seeded guild packs as well as regular booster packs. Are seeded guild packs for sealed only? Are they only two colors and colorless?
See, by saying that each token appears only at the rarity of the original enchantment you just showcase that indeed the original showcase is full of uncommon plus cards - and creates a high density of noncreature enchantments ready to mess with the game - you actually obsolete at least one of the enchantments with the creature providing its body for free at the same cost the token has by itself as a spell.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Planar Chaos was not a mistake neither was it random. You might want to look at it again.
[thread=239793][Game] Level Up - Creature[/thread]
So I had an idea you might find interesting. Instead of creating enchantment tokens or returning from death as enchantments, why not just combine Law enchantments with legislator creatures.
Self-Enforcing Curfew1W
Enchantment Creature - Law Elemental (Common)
1/3
Whenever ~ attacks, tap target creature.
I've always thought that the idea of self-enforcing laws made a lot of sense for Ravnica's law magic, so why not go this rout? Of course, not all Laws would be creatures, but some of them could be as a way to fill out the theme.
Since we're talking seeded guild packs, which should always include at least one card with the guild's mechanic, the existence of Legislate cards wouldn't keep other guild packs from including other kinds of tokens. As for regular booster packs, provided there are any for this theoretical scenario, when a pack has a legislate card in it, it has the corresponding Law token, otherwise it can have regular tokens. And frankly, regular tokens don't require physical reminders as much as something like Laws. We're all familiar with the usual Soldiers, Zombies, Goblins, etc., by now.
Well, in that case I'd be interested in the numbers for seeded guild packs as well as regular booster packs. Are seeded guild packs for sealed only? Are they only two colors and colorless?
See, by saying that each token appears only at the rarity of the original enchantment you just showcase that indeed the original showcase is full of uncommon plus cards - and creates a high density of noncreature enchantments ready to mess with the game - you actually obsolete at least one of the enchantments with the creature providing its body for free at the same cost the token has by itself as a spell.
Obviously there would be seeded packs for sealed. Since most everyone has a particular Guild they want to play, a prerelease box that contains only cards playable in that guild would help ensure they get to play that guild and play with its mechanic. Of course guildless cards are mixed in with the watermarked cards, so each pack still has a wide pool of cards to draw from.
Now they could consider making seeded packs the norm for GRN and RNA; however, seeded packs are not as ideal for draft, where pack logistics should allow each player to pull cards of different colors to help push them towards different guilds. Thus, universal Law tokens would probably be a better option. They'd probably print 3 different types of Law tokens total, one for white, one for blue, and one for multicolor. Each Law is represented with its name, mana cost, rules text, and a small portion of the source card art for visual identification.
So I had an idea you might find interesting. Instead of creating enchantment tokens or returning from death as enchantments, why not just combine Law enchantments with legislator creatures.
Self-Enforcing Curfew1W
Enchantment Creature - Law Elemental (Common)
1/3
Whenever ~ attacks, tap target creature.
I've always thought that the idea of self-enforcing laws made a lot of sense for Ravnica's law magic, so why not go this rout? Of course, not all Laws would be creatures, but some of them could be as a way to fill out the theme.
Eh, that would reduce the number of normal Azorius creatures, stuff like Soldiers and Wizards, which isn't ideal as they're the face of the Guild. I could see a Law enchantment that can become a creature a la Myth Realized or the old Opal cycle. But more likely the set would include a card similar to Opalescence or Starfield of Nyx that can turn enchantments into creatures.
MTGS Wikia Article about "New World Order"
Every time I read a comment about "Well if this card had card draw/trample/haste/indestructible/hexproof/life gain...", I think "You're missing the point." They're armchair developer comments that fail to take into account the card's role in the greater Limited and Standard environment. No, it may not be as good as whatever card you're comparing it to. There's a reason for that. Not every burn spell is Lightning Bolt, nor does it need to be or should be.
PSA to everyone who keeps forgetting about the Reserved List:
You're on a website dedicated to talking about MtG. You're only a few keystrokes away from finding out what cards are on the Reserved List. You're also only a few keystrokes away from finding out why some cards on the Reserved List got foil printings in FtV, as Judge promos, or whatnot, as well as why that won't happen again. Stop doing this.
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Traffic Monitor 1W
Creature - Human Knight
Vigilance
Legislate - When ~ enters the battlefield, create a white Law enchantment token with "Creatures enter the battlefield tapped."
1/3
Spellpeace Enforcer 2UU
Creature - Human Wizard
Legislate - When ~ enters the battlefield, create a blue Law enchantment token with "Whenever an opponent casts a spell during another player's turn, counter that spell."
2/2
Legislate is an ability word that entails creating Law enchantment tokens with various abilities. There's also potential for Azorius cards with Laws matter effects, ideally found on cards with Legislate abilities, to encourage playing multiple Legislate cards together, though I would focus Laws matter on WU cards since other guilds wouldn't likely support Laws much. Ideally booster pack logistics would ensure that each pack with a Legislate card in it also has the appropriate Law enchantment token, particularly in the case of seeded Azorius booster packs.
Creature - Human Soldier
Legislate - When ~ enters the battlefield, create a white Law enchantment token with "Whenever one or more creatures you control attack, you may tap target creature defending player controls."
1/1
Lyev Disciplinarian 2W
Creature - Human Wizard
Legislate - When ~ enters the battlefield, create a white Law enchantment token with "Players can't cast more than one spell each turn."
1/1
Skyknight Monitor 3U
Creature - Vedalken Knight
Flying
Legislate - When ~ enters the battlefield, create a blue Law enchantment token with "Creatures with flying can block only creatures with flying."
Creatures have "2: This creature gains or loses flying until end of turn."
2/4
Aggression Inhibitor 2WU
Creature - Human Wizard
Legislate - When ~ enters the battlefield, create a white and blue Law enchantment token with "Creatures can't attack you or a planeswalker you control unless their controller pays X for each attacking creature they control, where X is the number of Laws you control."
2/4
Champion Hussar 3WU
Creature - Human Knight
First strike, hexproof
Legislate - When ~ enters the battlefield, create a white and blue Law enchantment token with "No more than one creature may attack each combat" and "No more than one creature may block each combat."
~ gets +1/+1 for each Law you control.
3/3
If the Law subtype were to be introduced, I wouldn't mind Azor's Law tokens also having the Law subtype.
Every time I read a comment about "Well if this card had card draw/trample/haste/indestructible/hexproof/life gain...", I think "You're missing the point." They're armchair developer comments that fail to take into account the card's role in the greater Limited and Standard environment. No, it may not be as good as whatever card you're comparing it to. There's a reason for that. Not every burn spell is Lightning Bolt, nor does it need to be or should be.
I would ha e paired creatures though. Like a white that forces creature to enter tapped and a blue that only allows player to untap one creature a turn.
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My biggest concern with this is the sheer amount of abilities everyone would need to remember. Maybe the Legislate ability shouldn't generate tokens, but should instead pull Laws from your library?
Legislate - When ~ enters the battlefield (or when it deals combat damage, or when you draw a card, or at the beginning of your upkeep, etc), search your library for a Law card with converted mana cost _ or less, reveal it, and add it to your hand. Then shuffle your library.
_ would be one less than the converted mans cost of whatever is Legislating. The old Rebel cards and the Soulshift mechanic were similar.
The biggest problem here is design space. How many different common effects can you make out of this? This mechanic leans toward rare effects too, which exacerbates the problem.
Being that you're making enchantment tokens, you'll want those tokens to do something for as long as they're around, which pulls away from etb effects. Recurring triggers will be problematic in numbers, especially at common. Static effects are few and far between, again, especially at common.
Your best bet might be to have common legislators make blank Laws and then do some one-time effect that cares about how many Laws you control, but making a Law that doesn't do anything constructive might be a little too realistic I mean it'll probably feel weird.
Seems like a flavorful mechanic for sure. It has potential, but it eats up a lot of a set's complexity and demands a lot to make it work.
Detention Order 3UU
Sorcery
Legislate - Tap each creature your opponents control, then create a blue Law enchantment token with "Players can't untap more than one creature during their untap steps."
I like your way of thinking, but I don't think parasitic A/B tutoring is ideal for a Guild mechanic.
...unless Legislate cards can produce Aura Law tokens, emulating cards like Arrest and Grasp of the Hieromancer. Nothing says Legislate can't produce Aura Law tokens, right? As long as the basic requirement of creating an enchantment token with the subtype Law is met?
This also gives me an idea for a similar mechanic involving Curses...
Hmm, perhaps Aura Law tokens for common Legislate cards would be worth a shot?
Lyev Arrester 2WW
Creature - Human Soldier
Legislate - When ~ enters the battlefield, you may create a white Aura Law enchantment token atttached to target creature you don't control. The token has enchant creature and "Enchanted creature can't attack or block and its activated abilities can't be activated."
2/2
Every time I read a comment about "Well if this card had card draw/trample/haste/indestructible/hexproof/life gain...", I think "You're missing the point." They're armchair developer comments that fail to take into account the card's role in the greater Limited and Standard environment. No, it may not be as good as whatever card you're comparing it to. There's a reason for that. Not every burn spell is Lightning Bolt, nor does it need to be or should be.
I've recently been experimenting with enchantment tokens (including those with custom subtype Law) and the greatest struggle is that you cannot have too many different ones - this is why I prefer indeed such that have no global effects e. g. I went for Oblivion Ring-style tokens myself.
You really should to ask yourself what the most versatile token is and run with it. You can maybe get away with two different tokens. Looking through the possibilities, a very good common token would be e. g. some kind of Aura with "Enchanted permanent doesn't untap during its controllers untap step." It can be useful by itself, but it also can be part of A/B synergies with various tappers and is not even nonsensical if you get the token first since it is still hampering the opponent's longterm options.
Finally a good white villain quote: "So, do I ever re-evaluate my life choices? Never, because I know what I'm doing is a righteous cause."
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I think it'd be more interesting (and probably easier to design at common) if most of those laws had a limited duration. Perhaps they should have a triggered ability that'll end up sacrificing them (e.g. "Whenever a creature attacks, sacrifice this law. If you do, exile that creature.", or "Spells cost 1 more to cast. At the beginning of each end step, if no spells were cast this turn, sacrifice this law.", or simply sacrifice them at the beginning of your next upkeep). Maybe that could help a bit with having a lot of different tokens too (I mean, if most laws disappear after a while, you're less likely to have a lot of multiple different laws at the same time and you don't have to remember what they do for very long).
Again, there would be physical tokens associated with each card, much like with Embalm. And seeded packs can ensure that any Legislate card is always accompanied by the proper token, at the cost of restricting the pack to one Legislate card each.
That said, since WU played around with Arrest-esque effects last time, I suppose if different Law enchantment tokens proved unfeasible, then we could settle for some kind of universal Aura token, but I would be highly dissatisfied with that approach.
You also have to write out the sacrifice clause on top of whatever else the Law does, causing every Legislate card to have a huge amount of text (we may be talking about Azorius here, but let's not be too literal ). The best way to mitigate that is to incorporate workarounds to each Law, like with Skyknight Monitor. Note that most of the Laws do not outright prevent victory, they just make it harder to win. A Rakdos deck can still push against the Azorius and win without removing its Laws, though as we saw with Enchanter's Bane recently, there are ways for red, and theoretically black, to deal with enchantments. A colorless answer to tokens a la Ratchet Bomb could also work, though in this format it would likely be costed a little higher so as not to utterly neuter the Azorius deck.
Every time I read a comment about "Well if this card had card draw/trample/haste/indestructible/hexproof/life gain...", I think "You're missing the point." They're armchair developer comments that fail to take into account the card's role in the greater Limited and Standard environment. No, it may not be as good as whatever card you're comparing it to. There's a reason for that. Not every burn spell is Lightning Bolt, nor does it need to be or should be.
I don't see how having seeded tokens would solve the issue of a proliferation of global static effects. Even with tokens around (and embalm needsthem far less than legislate) more than half the embalm cards are virtual french vanillas - global tokens means the global complexity goes up.
I also think that this would be an extreme strain on a Ravnica-based set if one guild hogs all the tokens - Selsnya's populate didn't push out other tokens from packs. How many packs will have to be seeded with a law? How many are free to feature different tokens?
Finally a good white villain quote: "So, do I ever re-evaluate my life choices? Never, because I know what I'm doing is a righteous cause."
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Enchantments aren't going to have keyword abilities. You could probably get away with one-time-use abilities, and have your creatures have static abilities based on the Law tokens you have out, sort of like the investigate mechanic. But if you're going to have a bunch of Laws with static, complicated abilities, I really think those need to be cards in the set, not tokens.
Legislate (when this creature dies, return it to the battlefield as a noncreature enchantment.)
Kind of represents the lasting legacy that individuals can create through laws.
The creature actually has an ability in life and requires no token for its ability to work (plus we get interesting synergy with animation effects).
The lawmage introduces a new law that outlives them. Maybe something like:
Azorius Obstructor 3WW
Creature- Human Soldier
Lawbringer
All creatures get -1/-0
4/4
It certainly takes up less space on the card than an ETB effect that creates a token. Plus, this allows for effects that stack (such as power reduction, a minor ghostly prison or caltrops effect, or a tax effect) without blink abuse. Finally, this approach allows colors without enchantment removal to exile the creature.
While Azorius isn't the colors of reanimation, the revival is mostly there to save card space and remove need for tokens.
Since we're talking seeded guild packs, which should always include at least one card with the guild's mechanic, the existence of Legislate cards wouldn't keep other guild packs from including other kinds of tokens. As for regular booster packs, provided there are any for this theoretical scenario, when a pack has a legislate card in it, it has the corresponding Law token, otherwise it can have regular tokens. And frankly, regular tokens don't require physical reminders as much as something like Laws. We're all familiar with the usual Soldiers, Zombies, Goblins, etc., by now.
Although, an alternative did just come to mind: What if Legislate Laws had a checklist token that worked a bit like the DFC stand-ins for Innistrad? Since most Laws would be single sentences, you just find the one that matches the Law you're creating and check the circle next to it or put some kind of marker on it to show you control a Law with that ability.
Keep in mind you'll only have so many cards with Legislate in any one deck, especially in Limited. Even if you include multiple copies of a particular Legislator, most of the Laws have noncumulative effects, again using Rule of Law as the primary example. The "Laws matter" abilities are kept in WU multicolor to help the monocolor Legislators play better with other guilds.
Frankly, it's not far removed from how a pillowfort deck works.
That sounds like a good ability for a Theros revisit, actually, especially if they also include a sacrifice ability to represent the monsters next time (hmm, Devour seems like a good option).
On a side note, I would make sure the art of each Legislate card includes some manner of scroll or other easily identifiable document with glowing blue text to serve as a visual key for the Law token art.
Every time I read a comment about "Well if this card had card draw/trample/haste/indestructible/hexproof/life gain...", I think "You're missing the point." They're armchair developer comments that fail to take into account the card's role in the greater Limited and Standard environment. No, it may not be as good as whatever card you're comparing it to. There's a reason for that. Not every burn spell is Lightning Bolt, nor does it need to be or should be.
Well, in that case I'd be interested in the numbers for seeded guild packs as well as regular booster packs. Are seeded guild packs for sealed only? Are they only two colors and colorless?
See, by saying that each token appears only at the rarity of the original enchantment you just showcase that indeed the original showcase is full of uncommon plus cards - and creates a high density of noncreature enchantments ready to mess with the game - you actually obsolete at least one of the enchantments with the creature providing its body for free at the same cost the token has by itself as a spell.
Finally a good white villain quote: "So, do I ever re-evaluate my life choices? Never, because I know what I'm doing is a righteous cause."
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Self-Enforcing Curfew 1W
Enchantment Creature - Law Elemental (Common)
1/3
Whenever ~ attacks, tap target creature.
I've always thought that the idea of self-enforcing laws made a lot of sense for Ravnica's law magic, so why not go this rout? Of course, not all Laws would be creatures, but some of them could be as a way to fill out the theme.
Obviously there would be seeded packs for sealed. Since most everyone has a particular Guild they want to play, a prerelease box that contains only cards playable in that guild would help ensure they get to play that guild and play with its mechanic. Of course guildless cards are mixed in with the watermarked cards, so each pack still has a wide pool of cards to draw from.
Now they could consider making seeded packs the norm for GRN and RNA; however, seeded packs are not as ideal for draft, where pack logistics should allow each player to pull cards of different colors to help push them towards different guilds. Thus, universal Law tokens would probably be a better option. They'd probably print 3 different types of Law tokens total, one for white, one for blue, and one for multicolor. Each Law is represented with its name, mana cost, rules text, and a small portion of the source card art for visual identification.
Eh, that would reduce the number of normal Azorius creatures, stuff like Soldiers and Wizards, which isn't ideal as they're the face of the Guild. I could see a Law enchantment that can become a creature a la Myth Realized or the old Opal cycle. But more likely the set would include a card similar to Opalescence or Starfield of Nyx that can turn enchantments into creatures.
Every time I read a comment about "Well if this card had card draw/trample/haste/indestructible/hexproof/life gain...", I think "You're missing the point." They're armchair developer comments that fail to take into account the card's role in the greater Limited and Standard environment. No, it may not be as good as whatever card you're comparing it to. There's a reason for that. Not every burn spell is Lightning Bolt, nor does it need to be or should be.