Ballista Troop (Common) 2R
Creature - Human Soldier
4/1
Reach
Conflicting Orders (Common) 2R
Enchantment — Aura
Enchant creature
As long as you control enchanted creature, it gets +2/+2. Otherwise, it it can’t block.
Critical Hit (Common) 2R
Instant
Choose one —
• Destroy target artifact.
• Target creature gets +1/+0 and gains first strike until end of turn.
Flamehorn Minotaur (Common) 1R
Creature — Minotaur Shaman
1/3 2R: Flamehorn Minotaur gets +2/+0 until end of turn.
From Hell (Common) 5R
Sorcery
Choose one —
• Create a 7/1 red Elemental creature token with trample and haste.
• Create two 3/1 red Elemental creature tokens with trample and haste.
Trucebreaker (Common) R
Creature — Goblin Advisor
1/2
Haste Spectra — When Trucebreaker enters the battlefield, it gets +X/+0 until end of turn, where X is the number of colors among cards in your graveyard.
Spectral Flames (Common) 3R
Instant Spectra — Spectral Flames deals X damage to any target, where X is the number of colors among cards in your graveyard.
Man-at-Arms (Common) 1(R/W)
Creature — Human Soldier
3/1
*vanilla*
Orcish Ruffian (Common) 3R
Creature — Orc Warrior
3/3
Trample
When Orcish Ruffian enters the battlefield, you may attach target Equipment you control to it.
Overpower (Common) 2(R/G)
Instant
Target creature gets +2/+2 and gains trample until end of turn.
Pyre Elemental (Common) 2R
Creature - Elemental
2/3
If a creature dealt damage by Pyre Elemental would die this turn, exile it instead.
Sacrifice Pyre Elemental: Effect.
Impulsive Research (Common) R
Sorcery
Exile the top card of your library. You may play it this turn.
Draw a card.
Ruby Monocle (Common) 3
Artifact t: Add R. t, Sacrifice Ruby Monocle: Draw a card.
Scorch (Common) 1R
Instant
Scorch deals 2 damage to any target. If a creature dealt damage this way would die this turn, exile it instead.
Shield Golem (Common) 3
Artifact Creature — Golem
2/0
Armed 1 (This creature enters the battlefield equipped with a colorless artifact Equipment token. It has “Equip 1” and “Equipped creature gets +1/+1.”)
For convenience I will review not in alphabetic order but in curve (and first creatures and then non-creatures). I like this format because it gives you a clear picture of how limited goes.
Goblin Gangleader: I'm not sold right now, mostly because your multicolored creatures are vanilla hybrids for the most part and in about half the cases they are among your weakest creatures. If you don't plan to change the vanilla commons you could grant +1/+0 on top of Haste in order to make this whole package a little bit more exciting.
Flamehorn Minotaur: Cousin of Sun-Collared Raptor, who was highly playable in a much more powered-up set. I really like how this plays very well with blue instants (because that deck wants to leave mana open anyway) and green ramp, but it's not a auto-pick for everyone.
Halo Hater: Cool ability. For some reason the name and the ability itself sounds more black then red to me, but maybe it's just me. Unfortunately such cool ability is "wasted" in a bear. People will hardly ever want to waste pacifism variants in this. And even when they do, it's probably because they are being pounded by 2-3 early drops - in that case they can use removal in any other target for pretty much the same effect.
Man-at-Arms: 3/1 vanillas have proven to be fairly playable given enough aggression and combat tricks. This one also enables Prisma, so it's probably a solid filler.
Pyre-Elemental: Another card that seem to play into Prisma theme, this time against it, which is pretty cool. This is a bit on the underwhelming side. Ex: It doesn't block favorably against 2 out of 3 2-drops in red. The 2/3 body however blocks and attacks very well when bumped by equipment.
Ballista Troop: My favorite one. Very organic design - really like how the low power in practice mimics a Ballista with a single ammo. This is highly playable as a defensive card too as 3 red drop that trades as far as air elemental.
Orcish Ruffian: Looks perfect as well. The floor is not impressive but good enough given the stats of most of your 3 drops. Given a heavy equipment cmc 3, this can be a monstrous tempo swing.
Two-Headed Serpent: I also love this design. 4/2 Menace body looks as dangerous as the serpent with two freaking heads it represents.
Volcano Giant: Not my favorite Prisma ability. I want to hit the threshold to see my cards getting awesome, not to save then from suicide.
From Hell: First mod is virtually useless. All it takes is one 2/2 and 2/3 to trade well against this. God forbid if the opponent has a combat trick. The second mod might be playable from the SB if you notice a lack of 4 toughness creatures on the other side AND 6-drop is desirable.
Megapede: Trading your 6 drop for a 2 drop (or for low cost removal) is not where you want to be in any limited environment. Demands too much synergy/support to be interesting.
Rain of Fire: I really like the player/pw pinging. Solid anti-token tech out of the SB that will eventually decide games.
Critical Blow:Abrade this is not. Still, your red creatures so desperately needs first strike that this might be playable regardless.
Scorch: How about removing indestructible to give red at least one answer against the common black skeleton ? All in all, playable burn.
Conflicting Orders:Maniacal Rage is more interesting in every aspect.
Overpower: Combat tricks gets more predictable and generate less tempo the more they cost. This costs more then Critical Blow and +1 toughness saves less lives then first strike, specially when such a large part of your roster have high power. I understand hybrid instant/sorcery cards are the best way to enable Prisma but the other hybrid spell doesn't seem so under powered.
Warcry: Tried and tested card. This is always playable for as long as you are aggressive enough, wide enough and/or evasive enough. Looks like a much better way to enable Prima then Overpower.
Incendiary Flare: Extra 3 damage is juicy but the kind of reward only the very aggressive decks will really chase. And keywords like Prisma seems to favor less aggressive decks. Something to think about.
Monocle:2 are doable for as long as green can ramp G for just G and can ramp + fix colors for 1G. But even then, I feel like this is unfair - you never see card draw or burn in artifacts to be even close to blue and red spells. I like old magic as much as anyone else from the the 90's but green having no identity is not something I miss.
Shield Thing: I don't know why the shield thing is a 5/1 creature. In any case, I'm happy with trading 4 against anything and keeping a short sword.
All in all I really like this old school set. I think the creature curve may need some work - cmc 2 and cmc 4 packs a punch, 3 is filler and 5+ is nearly unplayable. The fire minotaur and the orc wants to see red playing a longer game, blocking and forging equipment but the higher drops to complement that game play disappoints.
The red/green theme of playing a 8/2 and granting it haste and trample is a cool theme, honestly, but it's wonky right now. You want to play Gangleader + Megapede and Megapede + Overpower but each of those cards are semi-useless without the other and they don't even work together if you have all 3 of then !
The non-creature curve have all three cards at cmc 3 pumping, which is inconvenient.
Finally, for some reason I really expected something kin to Atog or Shrapnel Blast given the artifact token theme.
Halo Hater exchanged from the 2/2 to the 6/4 (formerly known as Volcano Giant with Prisma). Now the 2/2 has Prisma = first strike.
From Hell now creates decent tokens. (Note that this is part of a cycle that only creates tokens that already exist in Magic.)
Conflicting Orders is part of a cycle (that I happen to like ).
The cmc of the Monocle cycle has been increased from 2 to 3. Removed the etb tapped clause. Added scry 1 to the sac ability.
The hybrid creatures and the colorless creatures will be better developed once all 101 commons have been designed (currently at 91/101). I’ll also refine the curve once all of the common cards have been compiled into one file.
blue
black
green
golems
rocks
Ballista Troop (Common)
2R
Creature - Human Soldier
4/1
Reach
Conflicting Orders (Common)
2R
Enchantment — Aura
Enchant creature
As long as you control enchanted creature, it gets +2/+2. Otherwise, it it can’t block.
Critical Hit (Common)
2R
Instant
Choose one —
• Destroy target artifact.
• Target creature gets +1/+0 and gains first strike until end of turn.
Flamehorn Minotaur (Common)
1R
Creature — Minotaur Shaman
1/3
2R: Flamehorn Minotaur gets +2/+0 until end of turn.
From Hell (Common)
5R
Sorcery
Choose one —
• Create a 7/1 red Elemental creature token with trample and haste.
• Create two 3/1 red Elemental creature tokens with trample and haste.
Goblin Tactician (Common)
1R
Creature — Goblin
2/1
Sacrifice Goblin Tactician: Target creature can’t block this turn.
Trucebreaker (Common)
R
Creature — Goblin Advisor
1/2
Haste
Spectra — When Trucebreaker enters the battlefield, it gets +X/+0 until end of turn, where X is the number of colors among cards in your graveyard.
Spectral Flames (Common)
3R
Instant
Spectra — Spectral Flames deals X damage to any target, where X is the number of colors among cards in your graveyard.
Man-at-Arms (Common)
1(R/W)
Creature — Human Soldier
3/1
*vanilla*
Megapede (Common)
4(R/G)
Creature - Treefolk
5/3
*vanilla*
Orcish Ruffian (Common)
3R
Creature — Orc Warrior
3/3
Trample
When Orcish Ruffian enters the battlefield, you may attach target Equipment you control to it.
Overpower (Common)
2(R/G)
Instant
Target creature gets +2/+2 and gains trample until end of turn.
Pyre Elemental (Common)
2R
Creature - Elemental
2/3
If a creature dealt damage by Pyre Elemental would die this turn, exile it instead.
Sacrifice Pyre Elemental: Effect.
Impulsive Research (Common)
R
Sorcery
Exile the top card of your library. You may play it this turn.
Draw a card.
Ruby Monocle (Common)
3
Artifact
t: Add R.
t, Sacrifice Ruby Monocle: Draw a card.
Scorch (Common)
1R
Instant
Scorch deals 2 damage to any target. If a creature dealt damage this way would die this turn, exile it instead.
Shield Golem (Common)
3
Artifact Creature — Golem
2/0
Armed 1 (This creature enters the battlefield equipped with a colorless artifact Equipment token. It has “Equip 1” and “Equipped creature gets +1/+1.”)
Two-Headed Serpent (Common)
3R
Creature — Serpent
4/2
Menace
Halo Hater (Common)
4R
Creature — Devil
6/4
Hexproof from Auras
Warcry (Common)
(R/W)
Instant
Attacking creatures get +1/+0 until end of turn.
Goblin Gangleader: I'm not sold right now, mostly because your multicolored creatures are vanilla hybrids for the most part and in about half the cases they are among your weakest creatures. If you don't plan to change the vanilla commons you could grant +1/+0 on top of Haste in order to make this whole package a little bit more exciting.
Flamehorn Minotaur: Cousin of Sun-Collared Raptor, who was highly playable in a much more powered-up set. I really like how this plays very well with blue instants (because that deck wants to leave mana open anyway) and green ramp, but it's not a auto-pick for everyone.
Halo Hater: Cool ability. For some reason the name and the ability itself sounds more black then red to me, but maybe it's just me. Unfortunately such cool ability is "wasted" in a bear. People will hardly ever want to waste pacifism variants in this. And even when they do, it's probably because they are being pounded by 2-3 early drops - in that case they can use removal in any other target for pretty much the same effect.
Man-at-Arms: 3/1 vanillas have proven to be fairly playable given enough aggression and combat tricks. This one also enables Prisma, so it's probably a solid filler.
Pyre-Elemental: Another card that seem to play into Prisma theme, this time against it, which is pretty cool. This is a bit on the underwhelming side. Ex: It doesn't block favorably against 2 out of 3 2-drops in red. The 2/3 body however blocks and attacks very well when bumped by equipment.
Ballista Troop: My favorite one. Very organic design - really like how the low power in practice mimics a Ballista with a single ammo. This is highly playable as a defensive card too as 3 red drop that trades as far as air elemental.
Orcish Ruffian: Looks perfect as well. The floor is not impressive but good enough given the stats of most of your 3 drops. Given a heavy equipment cmc 3, this can be a monstrous tempo swing.
Two-Headed Serpent: I also love this design. 4/2 Menace body looks as dangerous as the serpent with two freaking heads it represents.
Volcano Giant: Not my favorite Prisma ability. I want to hit the threshold to see my cards getting awesome, not to save then from suicide.
From Hell: First mod is virtually useless. All it takes is one 2/2 and 2/3 to trade well against this. God forbid if the opponent has a combat trick. The second mod might be playable from the SB if you notice a lack of 4 toughness creatures on the other side AND 6-drop is desirable.
Megapede: Trading your 6 drop for a 2 drop (or for low cost removal) is not where you want to be in any limited environment. Demands too much synergy/support to be interesting.
Rain of Fire: I really like the player/pw pinging. Solid anti-token tech out of the SB that will eventually decide games.
Critical Blow: Abrade this is not. Still, your red creatures so desperately needs first strike that this might be playable regardless.
Scorch: How about removing indestructible to give red at least one answer against the common black skeleton ? All in all, playable burn.
Conflicting Orders: Maniacal Rage is more interesting in every aspect.
Overpower: Combat tricks gets more predictable and generate less tempo the more they cost. This costs more then Critical Blow and +1 toughness saves less lives then first strike, specially when such a large part of your roster have high power. I understand hybrid instant/sorcery cards are the best way to enable Prisma but the other hybrid spell doesn't seem so under powered.
Warcry: Tried and tested card. This is always playable for as long as you are aggressive enough, wide enough and/or evasive enough. Looks like a much better way to enable Prima then Overpower.
Incendiary Flare: Extra 3 damage is juicy but the kind of reward only the very aggressive decks will really chase. And keywords like Prisma seems to favor less aggressive decks. Something to think about.
Monocle: 2 are doable for as long as green can ramp G for just G and can ramp + fix colors for 1G. But even then, I feel like this is unfair - you never see card draw or burn in artifacts to be even close to blue and red spells. I like old magic as much as anyone else from the the 90's but green having no identity is not something I miss.
Shield Thing: I don't know why the shield thing is a 5/1 creature. In any case, I'm happy with trading 4 against anything and keeping a short sword.
All in all I really like this old school set. I think the creature curve may need some work - cmc 2 and cmc 4 packs a punch, 3 is filler and 5+ is nearly unplayable. The fire minotaur and the orc wants to see red playing a longer game, blocking and forging equipment but the higher drops to complement that game play disappoints.
The red/green theme of playing a 8/2 and granting it haste and trample is a cool theme, honestly, but it's wonky right now. You want to play Gangleader + Megapede and Megapede + Overpower but each of those cards are semi-useless without the other and they don't even work together if you have all 3 of then !
The non-creature curve have all three cards at cmc 3 pumping, which is inconvenient.
Finally, for some reason I really expected something kin to Atog or Shrapnel Blast given the artifact token theme.
BGU Control
R Aggro
Standard - For Fun
BG Auras
Thanks for all that!
I’ve already started making changes:
Gangleader now has haste itself.
Halo Hater exchanged from the 2/2 to the 6/4 (formerly known as Volcano Giant with Prisma). Now the 2/2 has Prisma = first strike.
From Hell now creates decent tokens. (Note that this is part of a cycle that only creates tokens that already exist in Magic.)
Conflicting Orders is part of a cycle (that I happen to like ).
The cmc of the Monocle cycle has been increased from 2 to 3. Removed the etb tapped clause. Added scry 1 to the sac ability.
The hybrid creatures and the colorless creatures will be better developed once all 101 commons have been designed (currently at 91/101). I’ll also refine the curve once all of the common cards have been compiled into one file.
Thanks again!