I feel the idea is to take an existing rule of the game and turn it on it's head, like Doran, the Siege Tower making a creature's power nearly irrelevant. What I would do in this case is play through a sample turn in your head and think of what the most basic rules of the game are. Maralen of the Mornsong throws off the idea of "Untap, upkeep, draw" so you might want to explore similar ideas. Ultimately though this is a bullbuster of a challenge, one that if I were in your shoes I would have turned back on FuriouslySleepingIdea.
I'm trying to find a planeswalker that would be 5 color, but I don't find one...
Would you consider taking an iconic, near-divine, planeswalking-capable character, even if it wasn't originally a walker, as valid for the bonus point?! (to be more clear, I'm thinking about Karona, she was able to planeswalk even though she wasn't an actual planeswalker...)
You could try the List of planeswalkers. Without pointing to it directly I'll say that there is one in the Traditional planeswalkers list that I'd jump on if it were me. You can use anyone on that page except for the Not planeswalkers list, obviously. You can even use one of the unconfirmed. Jeska is listed as a planeswalker, so yes Karona is an option. She is dead though, so you might want to have an answer to the inevitable question as to how she's back. Worst case, you can forget about it and be out one bonus point, which out of 25 is quite negligable.
Seratonin, rodrigolich challenged you to make a merfolk creature that draws his power from forest. One bonus point is awarded for being the River King to Aynara, River Queen and another bonus point is for having more than one triggered ability. Rodrigolich, Seratonin challenged you to make a five color planeswalker. You get one bonus point if if it's an existing planeswalker (give a Wiki link if it's a prerevisionist walker) and an other bonus point if the cost has CMC 10.
Dd2k, FuriouslySleepingIdea challenged you to make a card that breaks one of the basic rules of magic. (ex. Doran, Maralen) You get one bonus point if it effects each player equally and another if it is monocolored or colorless. FuriouslySleepingIdea, dd2k challenged you to make a card that has two of out three of the following word combinations in its rules text: "any number", "that many", "target creatures". You get one bonus point for using the word combinations in different abilities and an other if it is niether an instant nor sorcery.
Bonus: 2/2
Balance: 8/10 I'm not sure how useful the land reveal ability is. I mean, if you hit a legendary land it's like you Armageddon yourself. If playing in two colors it can hose you out of one of your two, unless you luck out and get Simic Growth Chamber, though I don't see this as being a big extended trick. Really, the land clause is more likely to hurt you and I can't see any real help from it. Untapping a land every turn is nice, makes it easier to play counters.
Flavor: 5/5 I find it a little odd that he untaps his wife, but crude attempt at humor aside everything is good. Nice synergy with Aynara, River Queen.
Creativity: 2/4
Quality: 4/4 A-OK.
Total: 21/25
Bonus: 2/2
Balance: 5/10 I'm hesitant to call a planeswalker too good because they all have such powerful effects, but I need see nothing more than the second ability to call this. WUBRG for a creature factory that makes three 2/2's a turn is too much, and it's creature damage / Insurrection abilities go on top. Things would be very much different if the +2 were -2.
Flavor: 4/5 I like how the first ability is reminiscent of Jeska, Warrior Adept and the last ability is reminiscent of Karona, Flase God. Overall the flavor is okay, it doesn't answer the Jeska question of why or how she's back, which you might have been able to do in the title but it's not really a big deal.
Creativity: 3/4
Quality: 4/4
Total: 18/25
Bonus: 1/2 I'm hesitant to say this meets the round requirements, but I won't make a big deal of it. I read your spoiler box, and I agree with you 100%.
Balance: 6/10 Too abusable in combo, especially with protection and other abilities like that. If you have out one creature like Beloved Chaplain, the Conflux spoiled Progenitus, or anything like that then you can't be attacked. There are so many creatures that you can combo this with it's impossible to defend against everything, you'd have to Final Judgment to be sure, and to add insult to injury that would cost 2 more to play.
Flavor: 4/5 A little odd, but it works alright.
Creativity: 4/4 I have to take into consideration the essentially impossible challenge here.
Quality: 3/4 The second line should be reworded. Normally youd give keywords first, then activated abilities, then other abilities in that order just like on a creature. Also it would be better to put the attack restriction down on players rather than on the creatures, i.e. "Players can't attack players who control creatures."
17/25
Bonus: 1/2
Balance: 9/10 Highly usable, not on the power level some expect from legends but this would be an infinite chain in multiples so it's quite necessary. There are some infinity combos I can think of, Seeker of Skybreak in particular, but I can also think of easier infinity combos in standard. Let me go with Devoted Druid and Quillspike.
Flavor: 3/5 A little generic, but perfectly reasonable. It could have used flavor text considering how much space there is left on the card.
Creativity: 2/4 Untapping has been done before, but this brings something new to the table. It also does it out of the normal color which would be green, but blue untaps too.
Quality: 4/4 No mistakes
Total: 19/25
Winners: Seratonin and FuriouslySleepingIdea.
Since this is the second to last round I'll give two days for people to voice their issues with my scores. Keep everything on this thread, but if this thread drifts so far down on the page you can PM me so I'll be sure to see it. Once things are finalized both players can post their challenges. I'm aiming to finalize challenges Tuesday and finish the contest by this time next week.
Wait... I'm actually in the finals? Cool... (spare something goes horribly wrong.)
Challenge: Show me the cardboard incarnate of Jodah, Archmage Eternal
With the potential bonus points
-Converted mana cost between 4-6
-Monocolored with an off color activated abilitiy
-Multicolored with multiple triggered abilities
-Some form of regeneration
-Some form of blinking
-Some form of removal
-Some form of training a character
-Based off the Ice Age Jodah
-Based off the Planar Chaos/Future Sight Jodah
-Based off a post continuity Jodah, where he was taken Jhoira as his apprentice
-No existing keywords
I'm not used to people giving up bonus points. I mean, I'm only using bonus points to adhere to the FCC point breakdown and nobody ever gives those up... but I digress. I appreciate your honest and I'll fix that now.
My idea was the following. One fundament of magic is that you get your resources then do stuff, also the rules don't get more basic than turn structure.
Twisted Hourglass :3mana::symu::symu: Artifact [mr]
Each player has their beginning phase after their second main phase rather than at the start of their turn (The beginning phase contains the untap, upkeep and draw steps.)
Wait... I'm actually in the finals? Cool... (spare something goes horribly wrong.)
Challenge: Show me the cardboard incarnate of Jodah, Archmage Eternal
With the potential bonus points
-Converted mana cost between 4-6
-Monocolored with an off color activated abilitiy
-Multicolored with multiple triggered abilities
-Some form of regeneration
-Some form of blinking
-Some form of removal
-Some form of training a character
-Based off the Ice Age Jodah
-Based off the Planar Chaos/Future Sight Jodah
-Based off a post continuity Jodah, where he was taken Jhoira as his apprentice
-No existing keywords
That'll work, make Jodah. I'll pick bonus points once FSI has his challenge up.
Challenge:Make a card with an activated ability everyone can use.
Possible Bonuses
Only one non-modal activated ability.
Not a creature.
The ability does not change control.
The ability can be paid for with any type of mana.
FuriouslySleepingIdea, seratonin challenges you to make Jodah, Archmage Eternal, into a card. I give one bonus point if he uses a mechanic from Ice Age block and another if he uses a mechanic from Time Spiral block. For this purpose, a "mechanic" includes keywords and unofficial block mechanics, such as "snowtrips".
Seratonin, FurioulsySleepingIdea challenges you to make a card with an activated ability everyone can use. I give one bonus point if it's not a creature and another point if the card has no other abilities.
Since we're near the end I'm not going to be a bear on deadlines. You have until Friday at midnight to refuse the challenge (When Fri becomes Sat EST) and the deadline to have the card up is next Tuesday at midnight (when Tuesday the 27th becomes Wednesday the 28th, EST) but I suspect you two will be done before then.
I'm just going to say this now and say I accept that challenge and that I have a few ideas that I'm going to be tinkering with until next week.
Best of luck FSI.
I forgo a bonus point in favor of what I believe to be balance and flavor issues... Vainglorious VeracityWBR
Enchantment {R}
Players can't play noncreature spells. 3: Target attacking or blocking creature deals damage to its controller equal to its power. Any player may play this ability. "Face the facts. In a war like this, the incentive to deliever the final blow overwhelms all allegience. It's time to ask yourself if you can trust your own soldiers." -Nazra the Deserted, to Rafiq of the Many
Jodah, Archmage Eternal :3mana::symu::symw:
Legendary Creature - Wizard
Cumulative Upkeep: Gain one life.
:symtap:: Scry X, where X is the number of age counters on Joda, Archmage Eternal. The wisdom of the ages, and the lifespan to use it.
2/4
Seratonin, Vainglorious Veracity
Bonus: 1/2 The addition of "Players can't play noncreature spells" means you lose one of the bonuses.
Balance: 7/10 This card is a mystery to me, it seems combo-tastic but I'm not completely sure how the deck works. The creative use of protection creatures like Stillmoon Cavalier, Mistmeadow Skulk, Cairn Wanderer maybe? Since the creature does the damage instead of the enchantment you could use lifelink to be immune to the activated effect while still punishing anyone foolish enough to attack your or block. It combos with Doran, the Siege Tower because he has zero power but that seems difficult to pull off reliably.
This kind of card teeters on a dangerous line, one new card could break it in half but there's not quite enough evidence that it's really broken. At the very least the bit about playing noncreature spells could be problematic, as most enchantment removal would be effected. You would also be free from counterspells, so really it's probably worth trying in a deck with only a small number of protection or lifelink creatures to give WBR agrro some serious control.
Flavor: 3/5 I suppose this is the right color set if you think of the static effect as white and the activated ability black/red, but the net effect is just black in my mind. You can only play creatures, and your more powerful creatures will betray you (sometimes doing more damage to you than your opponent) so the whiteness gets lost somewhere. To me this feeling like it's two unrelated cards in one, like the result of a good two card combo.
Creativity: 3/4
Quality: 4/4 No mistakes. I mean, you shouldn't have hit enter in the flavor text. You have to keep hitting space to get MSE to do it right for some reason, but I'm not going to be that petty here.
Total: 17/25
FuriouslySleepingIdea
Bonus: 2/2
Balance: 6/10 While no doubt he can get you a lot of life and a card that sits in play to scry has it's uses (Counterbalance for instance, and eventually you can just tap to order your whole deck.) he's slow to get moving. If you play him on turn five he won't have done enough to justify his cost for somewhere near three turns and a lot of games don't go that long. Or rather, the games that do go that long involve removal spells so he won't be helpful. The catch 22 here is that if there were a good way to get him out quickly and keep him around then your balance score wouldn't improve much because then there would be danger of him being too good.
Flavor: 1/5 It really doesn't feel like Jodah. The impression I got from the Wiki was that he would be a red or blue mage. I feel that Cumulative Upkeep is being misused here, as all of the beneficial CU's from coldsnap were self terminating. Lastly, why is he not a human?
Creativity: 2/4 I liked using cumulative upkeep with an effect based on age counters, but I feel that this would be better served with an upkeep cost rather than a benefit.
Quality: 4/4 I didn't notice any mistakes. That is, except that he should be a human, but there's no need for me to take off twice for one mistake.
15/25
So that makes Seratonin our big winner. And to the winner goes the spoils, you can now start up the next Single Elimination Challenge: Double Dare Edition! And please, feel free to tweak the rules as you see fit.
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I'm trying to find a planeswalker that would be 5 color, but I don't find one...
Would you consider taking an iconic, near-divine, planeswalking-capable character, even if it wasn't originally a walker, as valid for the bonus point?! (to be more clear, I'm thinking about Karona, she was able to planeswalk even though she wasn't an actual planeswalker...)
Seratonin, rodrigolich challenged you to make a merfolk creature that draws his power from forest. One bonus point is awarded for being the River King to Aynara, River Queen and another bonus point is for having more than one triggered ability.
Rodrigolich, Seratonin challenged you to make a five color planeswalker. You get one bonus point if if it's an existing planeswalker (give a Wiki link if it's a prerevisionist walker) and an other bonus point if the cost has CMC 10.
Dd2k, FuriouslySleepingIdea challenged you to make a card that breaks one of the basic rules of magic. (ex. Doran, Maralen) You get one bonus point if it effects each player equally and another if it is monocolored or colorless.
FuriouslySleepingIdea, dd2k challenged you to make a card that has two of out three of the following word combinations in its rules text: "any number", "that many", "target creatures". You get one bonus point for using the word combinations in different abilities and an other if it is niether an instant nor sorcery.
Balance: 8/10 I'm not sure how useful the land reveal ability is. I mean, if you hit a legendary land it's like you Armageddon yourself. If playing in two colors it can hose you out of one of your two, unless you luck out and get Simic Growth Chamber, though I don't see this as being a big extended trick. Really, the land clause is more likely to hurt you and I can't see any real help from it. Untapping a land every turn is nice, makes it easier to play counters.
Flavor: 5/5 I find it a little odd that he untaps his wife, but crude attempt at humor aside everything is good. Nice synergy with Aynara, River Queen.
Creativity: 2/4
Quality: 4/4 A-OK.
Total: 21/25
Balance: 5/10 I'm hesitant to call a planeswalker too good because they all have such powerful effects, but I need see nothing more than the second ability to call this. WUBRG for a creature factory that makes three 2/2's a turn is too much, and it's creature damage / Insurrection abilities go on top. Things would be very much different if the +2 were -2.
Flavor: 4/5 I like how the first ability is reminiscent of Jeska, Warrior Adept and the last ability is reminiscent of Karona, Flase God. Overall the flavor is okay, it doesn't answer the Jeska question of why or how she's back, which you might have been able to do in the title but it's not really a big deal.
Creativity: 3/4
Quality: 4/4
Total: 18/25
Balance: 6/10 Too abusable in combo, especially with protection and other abilities like that. If you have out one creature like Beloved Chaplain, the Conflux spoiled Progenitus, or anything like that then you can't be attacked. There are so many creatures that you can combo this with it's impossible to defend against everything, you'd have to Final Judgment to be sure, and to add insult to injury that would cost 2 more to play.
Flavor: 4/5 A little odd, but it works alright.
Creativity: 4/4 I have to take into consideration the essentially impossible challenge here.
Quality: 3/4 The second line should be reworded. Normally youd give keywords first, then activated abilities, then other abilities in that order just like on a creature. Also it would be better to put the attack restriction down on players rather than on the creatures, i.e. "Players can't attack players who control creatures."
17/25
Balance: 9/10 Highly usable, not on the power level some expect from legends but this would be an infinite chain in multiples so it's quite necessary. There are some infinity combos I can think of, Seeker of Skybreak in particular, but I can also think of easier infinity combos in standard. Let me go with Devoted Druid and Quillspike.
Flavor: 3/5 A little generic, but perfectly reasonable. It could have used flavor text considering how much space there is left on the card.
Creativity: 2/4 Untapping has been done before, but this brings something new to the table. It also does it out of the normal color which would be green, but blue untaps too.
Quality: 4/4 No mistakes
Total: 19/25
Winners: Seratonin and FuriouslySleepingIdea.
Since this is the second to last round I'll give two days for people to voice their issues with my scores. Keep everything on this thread, but if this thread drifts so far down on the page you can PM me so I'll be sure to see it. Once things are finalized both players can post their challenges. I'm aiming to finalize challenges Tuesday and finish the contest by this time next week.
Challenge: Show me the cardboard incarnate of Jodah, Archmage Eternal
With the potential bonus points
-Converted mana cost between 4-6
-Monocolored with an off color activated abilitiy
-Multicolored with multiple triggered abilities
-Some form of regeneration
-Some form of blinking
-Some form of removal
-Some form of training a character
-Based off the Ice Age Jodah
-Based off the Planar Chaos/Future Sight Jodah
-Based off a post continuity Jodah, where he was taken Jhoira as his apprentice
-No existing keywords
Winner of the First and Fourth Double Dare Single Elimination Contests
2009 July CCL: COMING THIS JULY
2008 December CCL: The Mechinations of Fate
Double Dare to Design: The 5th Single Elimination Contest
Double Dare That Designer: The 2nd Single Elimination Contest
Twisted Hourglass :3mana::symu::symu:
Artifact [mr]
Each player has their beginning phase after their second main phase rather than at the start of their turn (The beginning phase contains the untap, upkeep and draw steps.)
Challenge to come later.
That'll work, make Jodah. I'll pick bonus points once FSI has his challenge up.
Don't wait too long. Deadlines aren't as important near the end, but the sooner this gets wrapped up the sooner it can start again.
Possible Bonuses
Only one non-modal activated ability.
Not a creature.
The ability does not change control.
The ability can be paid for with any type of mana.
FuriouslySleepingIdea, seratonin challenges you to make Jodah, Archmage Eternal, into a card. I give one bonus point if he uses a mechanic from Ice Age block and another if he uses a mechanic from Time Spiral block. For this purpose, a "mechanic" includes keywords and unofficial block mechanics, such as "snowtrips".
Seratonin, FurioulsySleepingIdea challenges you to make a card with an activated ability everyone can use. I give one bonus point if it's not a creature and another point if the card has no other abilities.
Since we're near the end I'm not going to be a bear on deadlines. You have until Friday at midnight to refuse the challenge (When Fri becomes Sat EST) and the deadline to have the card up is next Tuesday at midnight (when Tuesday the 27th becomes Wednesday the 28th, EST) but I suspect you two will be done before then.
Best of luck FSI.
I forgo a bonus point in favor of what I believe to be balance and flavor issues...
Vainglorious Veracity WBR
Enchantment {R}
Players can't play noncreature spells.
3: Target attacking or blocking creature deals damage to its controller equal to its power. Any player may play this ability.
"Face the facts. In a war like this, the incentive to deliever the final blow overwhelms all allegience. It's time to ask yourself if you can trust your own soldiers."
-Nazra the Deserted, to Rafiq of the Many
Winner of the First and Fourth Double Dare Single Elimination Contests
2009 July CCL: COMING THIS JULY
2008 December CCL: The Mechinations of Fate
Double Dare to Design: The 5th Single Elimination Contest
Double Dare That Designer: The 2nd Single Elimination Contest
Legendary Creature - Wizard
Cumulative Upkeep: Gain one life.
:symtap:: Scry X, where X is the number of age counters on Joda, Archmage Eternal.
The wisdom of the ages, and the lifespan to use it.
2/4
Winner of the First and Fourth Double Dare Single Elimination Contests
2009 July CCL: COMING THIS JULY
2008 December CCL: The Mechinations of Fate
Double Dare to Design: The 5th Single Elimination Contest
Double Dare That Designer: The 2nd Single Elimination Contest
Bonus: 1/2 The addition of "Players can't play noncreature spells" means you lose one of the bonuses.
Balance: 7/10 This card is a mystery to me, it seems combo-tastic but I'm not completely sure how the deck works. The creative use of protection creatures like Stillmoon Cavalier, Mistmeadow Skulk, Cairn Wanderer maybe? Since the creature does the damage instead of the enchantment you could use lifelink to be immune to the activated effect while still punishing anyone foolish enough to attack your or block. It combos with Doran, the Siege Tower because he has zero power but that seems difficult to pull off reliably.
This kind of card teeters on a dangerous line, one new card could break it in half but there's not quite enough evidence that it's really broken. At the very least the bit about playing noncreature spells could be problematic, as most enchantment removal would be effected. You would also be free from counterspells, so really it's probably worth trying in a deck with only a small number of protection or lifelink creatures to give WBR agrro some serious control.
Flavor: 3/5 I suppose this is the right color set if you think of the static effect as white and the activated ability black/red, but the net effect is just black in my mind. You can only play creatures, and your more powerful creatures will betray you (sometimes doing more damage to you than your opponent) so the whiteness gets lost somewhere. To me this feeling like it's two unrelated cards in one, like the result of a good two card combo.
Creativity: 3/4
Quality: 4/4 No mistakes. I mean, you shouldn't have hit enter in the flavor text. You have to keep hitting space to get MSE to do it right for some reason, but I'm not going to be that petty here.
Total: 17/25
FuriouslySleepingIdea
Bonus: 2/2
Balance: 6/10 While no doubt he can get you a lot of life and a card that sits in play to scry has it's uses (Counterbalance for instance, and eventually you can just tap to order your whole deck.) he's slow to get moving. If you play him on turn five he won't have done enough to justify his cost for somewhere near three turns and a lot of games don't go that long. Or rather, the games that do go that long involve removal spells so he won't be helpful. The catch 22 here is that if there were a good way to get him out quickly and keep him around then your balance score wouldn't improve much because then there would be danger of him being too good.
Flavor: 1/5 It really doesn't feel like Jodah. The impression I got from the Wiki was that he would be a red or blue mage. I feel that Cumulative Upkeep is being misused here, as all of the beneficial CU's from coldsnap were self terminating. Lastly, why is he not a human?
Creativity: 2/4 I liked using cumulative upkeep with an effect based on age counters, but I feel that this would be better served with an upkeep cost rather than a benefit.
Quality: 4/4 I didn't notice any mistakes. That is, except that he should be a human, but there's no need for me to take off twice for one mistake.
15/25
So that makes Seratonin our big winner. And to the winner goes the spoils, you can now start up the next Single Elimination Challenge: Double Dare Edition! And please, feel free to tweak the rules as you see fit.