So the convention center versions of the Mystery Booster packs will contain some Playtest Cards. Some of these look quite fun. They will not be legal, ever, but as sort of wish fulfillment I made some cards playing around with some of the "new" mechanics contained in them:
~ WRG
Creature - Elf Druid R
Vigilance, Haste
Aggressive (During your turn there is an additional combat phase after the first, and only creatures with aggressive may attack during it) T: Add two mana of any color to your mana pool
2/2
~ 1UB
Creature - Zombie Wizard R
Flash
Scrycast - 2 life (If you see this card while scrying, you may reveal it and cast it by paying 2 life)
When ~ enters the battlefield return a creature with power equal to or less than the amount of life you lost this turn to your hand.
2/2
~ 1WW
Creature - Human Knight
Spark (Activate spark abilities by spending or giving yourself spark counter. Activate only one spark activity per turn and only as a sorcery.)
+2: Put a +1/+1 token on ~
-3: ~ Gains doublestrike until end of turn.
2/2
~ 3B
Enchantment
At the beginning of each player's upkeep, that player ransoms an artifact, creature, or land (Exile that card. It's owner may pay 3 at any time to return it to their hand).
~ 1R
Creature - Goblin Shaman R
[Red] spells cost 2 more to cast.
If ~ deals combat damage, until the beginning of your next upkeep ignore the bracketed text.
2/2
~ 1R
Sorcery
Deal 5 damage to target [white or blue] creature. If a white or blue creature was dealt damage this turn, ignore the bracketed text as you cast ~.
There is some interesting stuff here as well as significant breaks from the color pie.
Ransom is devestating as it is at minimum bouncing a permanent each turn. This one hitting lands is probably unacceptable.
Red taxing is weird. Why is red taxing? Hurting yourself to also hurt the opponent is more a black effect yet taxing isn't black either. The ability is neat but unlikely fun.
The Ransom card is a riff on Braids so might be okay?
If nothing else is going on Braids eventually kills herself. As an enchantment, this never happens. It could be fixed by adding enchantment, but then it's not as black. Though it could be fine as an artifact. Though you should mirror the mana cost as Braids is already really good, while having the 'drawback' of color intensity, being a creature(the most common type so the type with the most common answers) and legendary while this has none of that.
~ 2WB
Enchantment
At the beginning of each player's upkeep, that player ransoms an artifact, creature, or enchantment (Exile that card. It's owner may pay 3 at any time to return it to their hand).
Yeah adding white to that probably makes it kosher.
See: World Queller for white sacrifice effects. Or, even more appropriately, Doom Foretold.
My only gripe is with the ransom mechanic itself. I feel like it should somehow benefit the person who ransomed the permanent, like a real-life ransom.
Maybe a card to fix that...
Ransom CollectorWB
Creature - Thrull
Whenever a ransom is paid, create a treasure token.
2/2
Thrull seems to fit because the whole mechanic feels very Orzhov to me. Ransom is also a really cool sort of Whitemane Lion effect for your own creatures.
Virtuous Lender1W
Creature - Human Noble
Flash
When ~ enters the battlefield, ransom another creature you own.
1/3
Indebted Angel2WBB
Creature - Angel
Flying, vigilance
If ~ would die, ransom it instead. No making ends meet, no means to an end.
4/4
There's a lot of other fun stuff you can do with ransom...
Grave Cost1B
Sorcery
Ransom any number of target creature cards from your graveyard (Those cards are exiled. You may pay 3 at any time to return one to your hand). Open coffers open coffins.
Ransom is definitely the mechanic that I can see printed. I personally really like Spark. It's like energy but way better.
~ 1G
Creature - Elf Druid C
Spark (Activate spark abilities by spending or giving yourself spark counter. Activate only one spark activity per turn and only as a sorcery.)
+1: Add G to your mana pool
-4: Put five +1/+1 counters on target creature you control
1/1
~ 2U
Creature - Human Wizard U
Spark (Activate spark abilities by spending or giving yourself spark counter. Activate only one spark activity per turn and only as a sorcery.)
+1: Target creature gains flying until end of turn
-2: Return target instant or sorcery card from your graveyard to your hand.
2/3
~ 3BB
Creature - Demon R
Spark (Activate spark abilities by spending or giving yourself spark counter. Activate only one spark activity per turn and only as a sorcery.)
Flying, Trample
+2: Lose 2 life.
-2: Search your library for a card and put it into your hand. Shuffle your library.
4/4
I have mixed feelings about spark. Only being able to activate one ability per turn gives it bad synergy with itself, which means that rather than creating a single deck archetype it will instead come to define whatever format it's in. The high value of running just a few so that they don't need to compete with each other means that every competitive deck will want to run a few of them. Though, the minus abilities do help with this somewhat by creating payoffs for playing a higher number of the cards.
Also energy counters ran into issues due to not being interactive enough. Spark has a similar feel to it.
But despite any concerns, it is a really cool mechanic. You can make a lot of neat designs with it and I particularly like how it captures the fantasy of wizards, clerics, shamans, and other stereotypical 'squishy caster' archetypes in that they get both smaller cantrips and bigger but more expensive options.
Fire Flinger 2R
Creature - Goblin Wizard
Spark
+1: Target creature gains menace until end of turn.
-2: ~ deals 2 damage to any target.
2/3
Vessel of Divinity 3W
Artifact - Equipment
Spark
+1: Equip ~ to target creature you control.
+1: Put a +1/+1 counter on equipped creature.
-3: Equipped creature gets +3/+3 and gains flying, vigilance, and lifelink until end of turn.
Tidal Mastery 2U
Enchantment
Spark
-1: Tap target creature. It doesn't untap during its controller's next untap step.
+2: Return up to one target tapped creature to its owner's hand and sacrifice ~.
Some other mechanics from the playtest cards that may be fun are:
~ 2G
Creature - Wolf
Four-Faced (Whenever this becomes tapped move it to the next stage, or stage 1 if its at stage 4).
Stage 1 - 1/1
Stage 2 - 3/3
Stage 3 - 3/3 Hexproof
Stage 4 - 3/3 Hexproof, Vigilance T: Put two +1/+1 counters on ~
~ 2
Artifact
Reflect - 1(when ~ enters the battlefield, each opponent may pay 1. If they do, they create a token copy of this card except that it lacks this ability.)
When ~ enters the battlefield draw a card. 1, T: Add one mana of any color to your mana pool.
2GW
Enchantment
Landship — At the beginning of your upkeep, you may look at the top card of your library. If it s a land card, you may reveal it. If you do, until end of turn whenever you tap a land for mana add 1 to your mana pool.
~ R
Sorcery
Deal 2 damage to any target
Underdog - If you lost a game this match, deal 4 damage to any target instead.
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~ WRG
Creature - Elf Druid R
Vigilance, Haste
Aggressive (During your turn there is an additional combat phase after the first, and only creatures with aggressive may attack during it)
T: Add two mana of any color to your mana pool
2/2
~ 1UB
Creature - Zombie Wizard R
Flash
Scrycast - 2 life (If you see this card while scrying, you may reveal it and cast it by paying 2 life)
When ~ enters the battlefield return a creature with power equal to or less than the amount of life you lost this turn to your hand.
2/2
~ 1WW
Creature - Human Knight
Spark (Activate spark abilities by spending or giving yourself spark counter. Activate only one spark activity per turn and only as a sorcery.)
+2: Put a +1/+1 token on ~
-3: ~ Gains doublestrike until end of turn.
2/2
~ 3B
Enchantment
At the beginning of each player's upkeep, that player ransoms an artifact, creature, or land (Exile that card. It's owner may pay 3 at any time to return it to their hand).
~ 1RCreature - Goblin Shaman R
[Red] spells cost 2 more to cast.
If ~ deals combat damage, until the beginning of your next upkeep ignore the bracketed text.
2/2
~ 1R
Sorcery
Deal 5 damage to target [white or blue] creature. If a white or blue creature was dealt damage this turn, ignore the bracketed text as you cast ~.
Ransom is devestating as it is at minimum bouncing a permanent each turn. This one hitting lands is probably unacceptable.
Red taxing is weird. Why is red taxing? Hurting yourself to also hurt the opponent is more a black effect yet taxing isn't black either. The ability is neat but unlikely fun.
~ 2WB
Enchantment
At the beginning of each player's upkeep, that player ransoms an artifact, creature, or enchantment (Exile that card. It's owner may pay 3 at any time to return it to their hand).
See: World Queller for white sacrifice effects. Or, even more appropriately, Doom Foretold.
My only gripe is with the ransom mechanic itself. I feel like it should somehow benefit the person who ransomed the permanent, like a real-life ransom.
Maybe a card to fix that...
Ransom Collector WB
Creature - Thrull
Whenever a ransom is paid, create a treasure token.
2/2
Thrull seems to fit because the whole mechanic feels very Orzhov to me. Ransom is also a really cool sort of Whitemane Lion effect for your own creatures.
Virtuous Lender 1W
Creature - Human Noble
Flash
When ~ enters the battlefield, ransom another creature you own.
1/3
Indebted Angel 2WBB
Creature - Angel
Flying, vigilance
If ~ would die, ransom it instead.
No making ends meet, no means to an end.
4/4
There's a lot of other fun stuff you can do with ransom...
Grave Cost 1B
Sorcery
Ransom any number of target creature cards from your graveyard (Those cards are exiled. You may pay 3 at any time to return one to your hand).
Open coffers open coffins.
Definitely my favorite mechanic of the bunch.
- Rabid Wombat
~ 1G
Creature - Elf Druid C
Spark (Activate spark abilities by spending or giving yourself spark counter. Activate only one spark activity per turn and only as a sorcery.)
+1: Add G to your mana pool
-4: Put five +1/+1 counters on target creature you control
1/1
~ 2U
Creature - Human Wizard U
Spark (Activate spark abilities by spending or giving yourself spark counter. Activate only one spark activity per turn and only as a sorcery.)
+1: Target creature gains flying until end of turn
-2: Return target instant or sorcery card from your graveyard to your hand.
2/3
~ 3BB
Creature - Demon R
Spark (Activate spark abilities by spending or giving yourself spark counter. Activate only one spark activity per turn and only as a sorcery.)
Flying, Trample
+2: Lose 2 life.
-2: Search your library for a card and put it into your hand. Shuffle your library.
4/4
Also energy counters ran into issues due to not being interactive enough. Spark has a similar feel to it.
But despite any concerns, it is a really cool mechanic. You can make a lot of neat designs with it and I particularly like how it captures the fantasy of wizards, clerics, shamans, and other stereotypical 'squishy caster' archetypes in that they get both smaller cantrips and bigger but more expensive options.
Fire Flinger 2R
Creature - Goblin Wizard
Spark
+1: Target creature gains menace until end of turn.
-2: ~ deals 2 damage to any target.
2/3
Vessel of Divinity 3W
Artifact - Equipment
Spark
+1: Equip ~ to target creature you control.
+1: Put a +1/+1 counter on equipped creature.
-3: Equipped creature gets +3/+3 and gains flying, vigilance, and lifelink until end of turn.
Tidal Mastery 2U
Enchantment
Spark
-1: Tap target creature. It doesn't untap during its controller's next untap step.
+2: Return up to one target tapped creature to its owner's hand and sacrifice ~.
- Rabid Wombat
~ 2G
Creature - Wolf
Four-Faced (Whenever this becomes tapped move it to the next stage, or stage 1 if its at stage 4).
Stage 1 - 1/1
Stage 2 - 3/3
Stage 3 - 3/3 Hexproof
Stage 4 - 3/3 Hexproof, Vigilance T: Put two +1/+1 counters on ~
~ 2
Artifact
Reflect - 1 (when ~ enters the battlefield, each opponent may pay 1. If they do, they create a token copy of this card except that it lacks this ability.)
When ~ enters the battlefield draw a card.
1, T: Add one mana of any color to your mana pool.
2GW
Enchantment
Landship — At the beginning of your upkeep, you may look at the top card of your library. If it s a land card, you may reveal it. If you do, until end of turn whenever you tap a land for mana add 1 to your mana pool.
~ R
Sorcery
Deal 2 damage to any target
Underdog - If you lost a game this match, deal 4 damage to any target instead.