The Dueling Guns0 Artifact
When The Dueling Guns enters the battlefield, if it's not a token, each other player puts a copy of it onto the battlefield under their control.
Sacrifice The Dueling Guns: Scry 2 or fateseal 1. "Reach for the sky or fly."
—Barrel Inscription
For this design, I had contemplated the keywording of a point-based recycle mechanic—in the spirit of Gaea's Blessing—that I thought to maybe tag on the end of this ability chain. Something as a lovely final signature. I think in that sense the cascade would go 3-2-1. Otherwise, I think maybe even it could be 2 and 2 here. It's just that fateseal 2 (although it makes the card seem so much more interesting) isn't to be taken lightly or just thrown around. The original concept was that I wanted to create a mini-game between players that gives them the opportunity to try and do the other in by some means. This was originally the functionality concept for Epstini Coin, and later was re-branded so that Epstini Coin could take a similar, but more suiting form (in functionality).
Epstini Coin0 Artifact
When Epstini Coin enters the battlefield, if it's not a token, each other player puts a copy of it onto the battlefield under their control.
, Pay 1 life: Add C to your mana pool. Bearers of the coin are among the wealthiest—and lush in spiritual debts.
Alt. Flavor Text
If you bare the coin, your cup certainly runs over; but at what cost?
Traditional wording is "if it's not a token" and has the opponent create the tokens not you. There are important rules reasons for this but since you don't know or care about those I'm posting for anyone who reads this and doesn't know.
When BLANK enters the battlefield, if it's not a token, each opponent creates a token that's a copy of it.
Dueling gun. It's not worth it to run this card. It's not horrible as there are innumerable possible synergies. There are just better options at 0 in every nonstandard format.
Epstini Coin, broken as most free mana is. Even if your opponent gets the free mana as well. Having built your deck with this card in mind you should win the game before it matters.
Both are a miss as printable cards and there aren't any available knobs to turn to try and balance them. Any changes might as well be a complete redesign.
One of the problems with The Dueling Guns is that when it becomes: Scry 2 or Fateseal 2; there's not as much artistic element involved in using them back-to-back against each other. Otherwise, if they put 2 cards back on the top, there's the suspense of trying to guess the stack order and what they did with it that they would use their gun to fateseal 1 their top card, or wait for the next possibly. If they put 1 on the top, and try to optimize their draw by putting the other on the bottom, it's easy to finish them off with the fateseal 1. Or if they bluff in some way—the suspense furthers. With fateseal 2, that extra domain influence pushes guesswork out of the way to become at a loss for suspense.
An explanation of the flavor could lie in the strategy of attempting to shoot first or shoot second (as in the style of a feint or dodge for advantage).
I'd love to see a little more elaboration. For example, there are already far better 0 mana options; Mox Diamond / Chrome Mox.
You card requires no additional cards to generate mana for you. Both chrome mox and mox diamond require a specific type of card in hand to be able to utilize their fast mana, while paying 1 life for a free mana is a negligible cost. Giving your opponent access to the same mana generation is also a negligible risk, as your deck will be focused on maximizing the fast mana to combo and win while their deck likley cannot capitalize in the same way should you fail to kill them on the turn you play the Coin.
Further, the idea of "tricking your opponent into spending life" is, frankly, utterly divorced from reality or common sense. If you are - for some dumb reason - playing this in a deck that cannot win the turn it is played, your opponent will use the mana as it benefits them like at were a pain land. No one is "tricked" when they put Battlefield Forge or City of Brass in a deck, they just spend on resource to get another when it is beneficial and the same is true here.
You are basing you designs on how you want people to make gameplay decisions, not how they actually play Magic. In you imaginary world I'm sure they are just peachy cards, but they wouldn't be used that way in actual reality where all the people actually playing the game are.
It doesn't necessarily have to cost you another card. Does need to require an additional resource so that it's not entirely free, and life is a resource. Giving your opponent a copy of the card is significant, and creates liability, especially facing counter and removal. Very ideal to say one can win the game on this, but no more than a player could off Lotus Petal already—to even greater extents—with full color capability.
So, I'm not seeing the argument here. It's obviously incredibly flawed, and fallacy at worst.
It doesn't necessarily have to cost you another card.
You have fundamentally failed to understand what was stated. The two cards your brought up always cost you another card to produce mana.
Does need to require an additional resource so that it's not entirely free, and life is a resource.
Life is a valid resource when properly weighted. One life to one mana is not properly weighted. Two life to one mana as seen on phyrexian mana has proven to not be properly weighted as all of those cards are above curve.
Giving your opponent a copy of the card is significant, and creates liability, especially facing counter and removal.
Your delusions are mystifying. Bringing up counters and removal when talking about this card shows how utterly divorced from reality you are.
Very ideal to say one can win the game on this, but no more than a player could off Lotus Petal already—to even greater extents—with full color capability.
"My card is only as good as this card that's used to win games, is restricted in vintage, and would never be printed in modern-day magic" Is not the defense you think it is.
So, I'm not seeing the argument here. It's obviously incredibly flawed, and fallacy at worst.
Yes, if you were talking about your argument all of those words would make sense. We can't see it as you haven't actually provided a defense beyond the above terrible one. It's obviously incredibly flawed as I pointed out. While calling it a fallacy at worst isn't fair since it's a fallacy at its base.
If only 1 life weren't significant truly. Oohh, and someone listed painlands before? Which are like in the last category of selection now among lands for duals—because they cost you a life each time to use.
And maybe nevermind that a player has something like Doom Blade or Negate—if you insist it poses no risk (in the face of removal) to give your opponent an available mana.
And this is why the words struggle to make sense to me. It's just that all these scenarios exist, and they are among the most common and imminent.
If only 1 life weren't significant truly. Oohh, and someone listed painlands before? Which are like in the last category of selection now among lands for duals—because they cost you a life each time to use.
This is actual data, made from people actively competing against each other to make the best possible decks. If you were correct and there is some secret deck out there that "exploits" people using painlands without (without offsetting it with lifegain) for easy victories, someone would have figured it out by now and the entire meta of the game would have adjusted to represent this fact.
One life for one mana, even one colorless mana is not a fair rate, especially for a non-legendary nonland card that you can potentially have more than one copy of in your opening hand.
Artifact
When The Dueling Guns enters the battlefield, if it's not a token, each other player puts a copy of it onto the battlefield under their control.
Sacrifice The Dueling Guns: Scry 2 or fateseal 1.
"Reach for the sky or fly."
—Barrel Inscription
For this design, I had contemplated the keywording of a point-based recycle mechanic—in the spirit of Gaea's Blessing—that I thought to maybe tag on the end of this ability chain. Something as a lovely final signature. I think in that sense the cascade would go 3-2-1. Otherwise, I think maybe even it could be 2 and 2 here. It's just that fateseal 2 (although it makes the card seem so much more interesting) isn't to be taken lightly or just thrown around. The original concept was that I wanted to create a mini-game between players that gives them the opportunity to try and do the other in by some means. This was originally the functionality concept for Epstini Coin, and later was re-branded so that Epstini Coin could take a similar, but more suiting form (in functionality).
Epstini Coin 0
Artifact
When Epstini Coin enters the battlefield, if it's not a token, each other player puts a copy of it onto the battlefield under their control.
, Pay 1 life: Add C to your mana pool.
Bearers of the coin are among the wealthiest—and lush in spiritual debts.
Alt. Flavor Text
If you bare the coin, your cup certainly runs over; but at what cost?
When BLANK enters the battlefield, if it's not a token, each opponent creates a token that's a copy of it.
Dueling gun. It's not worth it to run this card. It's not horrible as there are innumerable possible synergies. There are just better options at 0 in every nonstandard format.
Epstini Coin, broken as most free mana is. Even if your opponent gets the free mana as well. Having built your deck with this card in mind you should win the game before it matters.
Both are a miss as printable cards and there aren't any available knobs to turn to try and balance them. Any changes might as well be a complete redesign.
The flavor of “Dueling Guns”, though, makes zero sense. Why does sacrificing a gun cause you to Scry?
I had envisioned one of the key strategies behind Epistini Coin is to trick your opponent into paying life for mana. They take it and try to run with it. When they could just be patient, and savor every precious life they can. While certain decks, such as ones utilizing lots of lifelink; Vampire of the Dire Moon - Nighthawk Scavenger - Gifted Aetherborn; can afford to offset the life loss. Then can do something like; Life of Toshiro Umezawa - Blood Funnel - Profane Command - Torment of Hailfire - Exsanguinate; to accentuate upon this.
One of the problems with The Dueling Guns is that when it becomes: Scry 2 or Fateseal 2; there's not as much artistic element involved in using them back-to-back against each other. Otherwise, if they put 2 cards back on the top, there's the suspense of trying to guess the stack order and what they did with it that they would use their gun to fateseal 1 their top card, or wait for the next possibly. If they put 1 on the top, and try to optimize their draw by putting the other on the bottom, it's easy to finish them off with the fateseal 1. Or if they bluff in some way—the suspense furthers. With fateseal 2, that extra domain influence pushes guesswork out of the way to become at a loss for suspense.
An explanation of the flavor could lie in the strategy of attempting to shoot first or shoot second (as in the style of a feint or dodge for advantage).
You card requires no additional cards to generate mana for you. Both chrome mox and mox diamond require a specific type of card in hand to be able to utilize their fast mana, while paying 1 life for a free mana is a negligible cost. Giving your opponent access to the same mana generation is also a negligible risk, as your deck will be focused on maximizing the fast mana to combo and win while their deck likley cannot capitalize in the same way should you fail to kill them on the turn you play the Coin.
Further, the idea of "tricking your opponent into spending life" is, frankly, utterly divorced from reality or common sense. If you are - for some dumb reason - playing this in a deck that cannot win the turn it is played, your opponent will use the mana as it benefits them like at were a pain land. No one is "tricked" when they put Battlefield Forge or City of Brass in a deck, they just spend on resource to get another when it is beneficial and the same is true here.
You are basing you designs on how you want people to make gameplay decisions, not how they actually play Magic. In you imaginary world I'm sure they are just peachy cards, but they wouldn't be used that way in actual reality where all the people actually playing the game are.
So, I'm not seeing the argument here. It's obviously incredibly flawed, and fallacy at worst.
Yes, if you were talking about your argument all of those words would make sense. We can't see it as you haven't actually provided a defense beyond the above terrible one. It's obviously incredibly flawed as I pointed out. While calling it a fallacy at worst isn't fair since it's a fallacy at its base.
If only 1 life weren't significant truly. Oohh, and someone listed painlands before? Which are like in the last category of selection now among lands for duals—because they cost you a life each time to use.
And maybe nevermind that a player has something like Doom Blade or Negate—if you insist it poses no risk (in the face of removal) to give your opponent an available mana.
And this is why the words struggle to make sense to me. It's just that all these scenarios exist, and they are among the most common and imminent.
Here is a standard deck that willingly uses 7 pain lands even though alternatives are available. You may notice that it only came in 11th place but the first place winner was using 8. In fact, Here is a page filled with standard decks people actually use. Go ahead and see how many multicolor decks you find that choose not to use painlands.
This is actual data, made from people actively competing against each other to make the best possible decks. If you were correct and there is some secret deck out there that "exploits" people using painlands without (without offsetting it with lifegain) for easy victories, someone would have figured it out by now and the entire meta of the game would have adjusted to represent this fact.
One life for one mana, even one colorless mana is not a fair rate, especially for a non-legendary nonland card that you can potentially have more than one copy of in your opening hand.