MTG Salvation

From what I can tell, R&D's perspective is that = 1 color mana, so :symu::symu: should about equal :2mana::symu:

Quote from Circeus

Contemplate is draw 2 cards for :symu::symu:... is that really such a good idea?

Yes or no, depending. Although, it definitely shouldn't be an instant.

As for sorcery speed, UU for draw two is clearly very strong, what we need to determine is whether or not it's too strong to print.

An alternative is to have the draw a card be the default and add a different effect for the kicker.

EDIT: How about this:

Contemplate (2/U)
Instant (C)
Draw a card. For each U spent to cast ~, draw an additional card, then discard a card.

Perhaps there is a better way to word this, but it should work out like this:

2: Draw
U: Draw 2, discard 1
UU: Draw 3, discard 2

I think that's a pretty reasonable card.

I still prefer it as a Divination but i agree it should be a sorcery.

Just a suggestion, but you could try playtesting a UU Divination to see if that's too strong or not. Either in this set or some quickie 40 card decks of core set cards. You're probably not going to be able to tell for certain if it is too strong or not without testing.

Also, this version of the cycle is definitely less complex. I still worry that the cycle as a whole feels a bit too complex since I'm not certain new players will get that you can pay CC for the colorless cost. I like the cycle, so I'm willing to let it rest and see what results playtesting might yield.

The reason I don't like the UU divination is that it also does other things, which I think makes it a bit too good IMO.

I think the looting version is a lot better, and it also means it can be an instant like the rest of the cycle.

I would like to PSA to any lurkers to please go on our multiverse site and tell us your favorite and least favorite cards and what might be poorly worded or broken. It doesn't matter who you are or even if you have a salvation account. Your opinion will only improve the set.

Some artifact creature support rares for modular!
Cogstormer 3
A bat like construct dances inside a vortex of spinning dirt and cogs.
Artifact Creature- Spirit
Flying, Modular 3
At the beginning of your upkeep, sacrifice another artifact creature you control.
Whenever an artifact creature dies, put a +1/+1 counter on Cogstormer.

Cogquistador 1
Artifact Creature- Soldier
Modular 1
At the beginning of your upkeep, if Cogquistador is on the battlefield, each player returns all cards named Cogquistador from his or her graveyard to the battlefield.

Also:
Assembly Line 2.0 6
Artifact
Steam powered: When Assembly Line enters the battlefield, if only colorless mana was used to cast Assembly Line, put 3 2/2 colorless assembly-worker artifact tokens onto the battlefield.
Tap 3 assembly-workers you control: put a token onto the battlefield that is a copy of target noncreature artifact other than assembly line.

Hey guys, we've been doing some good work over at the multiverse, so keep up all your contributions.

I thought I'd come by to drop some of my thoughts on the set as a whole. I'm really proud of where we've gotten with this project, but taking a step back to view the set as a whole there are definitely some issues, so I thought I'd air some of my major concerns with the set as we continue to work.

To be honest folks, I think this set is a mess. Don't get me wrong, I think what we've done is awesome. We've got some awesome mechanics, an awesome world built from the ground up, and a whole lot of awesome cards. What we're missing though is a sense of cohesion. The set still feels like a bunch of individual cards created under some set parameters, which is fair because that's how we designed the set. However, cohesion is one of the most important things to me personally as a designer, and there are a lot of areas in which we can improve.

Complexity: I think this is the area that most of us can agree is pretty apparent. Our set has a pretty significant level of complexity. Components are probably the simplest of our mechanics, especially since they work similarly to something else players understand, but what about the rest. Spellslingers have complex activated abilities that involve managing your hand and mana. While modular is a good step up from clockwork, it also adds to on-board complexity with the death trigger. Mono-hybrid in general complicates how players have to think about casting their spells. All of this plus the multiple sub-themes like land-death or donation, and the fact we're in dire need of vanilla creatures at common, and you can see what I mean when I say the set kind of looks like a mess. I think part of the problem is that Steampunk is a genre that basks in intricacy and ornateness, which pushes the set in a more complex direction, but every time I look at a spellslinger I have to ask myself if I can in good conscience put that effect on a common under NWO.

Color combinations: One of the strategies that WotC have been using more and more when designing for limited is the idea that each color pair should have it's own strategy. They've used this technique in Innistrad, Modern Masters, and Theros design, and it seems to have been pretty successful (at least as far as we can tell.) Note that this doesn't mean flavor factions; Innistrad didn't have enemy colored flavor factions and Theros has almost no factions at all, it has more to do with how the colors work in limited. Some of these we have a pretty clear sense of; RB Spellslingers and GW Modular for instance, but we haven't given nearly enough time to some of the others; what the heck does a GU deck look like in Archester? I think we should reevaluate what we want these color combinations to do, then reform the set around those mechanical themes. Defining what cards are important to what combinations will also tell us what cards can be simplified or replaced to reduce complexity.

I hope I'm not being too debby-downer here. I am incredibly proud of how far we've come since this project started, and I thank you all for your dedication (and especially your patience) in working together on this. However, WotC tries and discards giant portions of a set multiple times over the course of set design, and unfortunately I don't think we're immune to the all the pitfalls they fall into as well. Sometimes, we do need to step back and ask if what we're doing makes sense anymore. Only then can we work towards an even better set.

Well,
WR- small cheap creatures, artifact destruction, and blink? We got us aggro, with shatterstick gremlin and our blink giving the deck reach.
RU- I look at Promising Youth and Stream Release and I feel like there's something cool to brew.
UG- There are a lot of good solid efficient creatures like Bookkeeper's Messenger or Lifewinder, removal cards like Steam Geyser and Veteran Trail Guide- this is straight midrange.
GB- Scrapyard Surveyor and all the artifact killing cards in green seems like a solid path.
BW- all the life gain, fat butts, and just straight creature removal says control lives here. There's even the dream of pulling multiple demonic dividends for the blowout deck.

That's just looking at what's going on with the existing cards. There are going to be some sweet decks. We just need to polish them a bit.

Go go gadget over analysis!

WU: The theme here is supposed to be components. Right now it feels a little counter intuitive because we have a lot of support for components, but components themselves don't actually win the game. For instance, Master of Contraptions is awesome at helping your components, but that doesn't mean anything if you're just attaching do-nothing components to do-nothing artifacts.

I think we have a couple of options here. One is to simply pump more power into this deck, such as making Eldaveth's Guard cost W and things of that nature. I'd kinda feel ok with this because Components are hard to set up properly, so we could give a little bit more of a reward for committing to them.

Another would be to lessen the component emphasis and instead make it an "artifact matters" deck. Less interesting perhaps, but it then opens up options for the deck to not have to focus so much on contraptions. By emphasis artifacts, contraptions will become a natural part of the deck since this'll be where they can do the most work. (Also it just occurred to me, why didn't we call them Gadgets?)

UB: There doesn't seem to be a whole lot of synergy between these two colors. Black has a lot of synergy, what with the caring about lands in graveyards and having loads of ways to get them there, but blue seems kind of left out.

I feel like something we could add to blue is a few more cards that care about artifacts being in graveyards. It seems like it would really strengthen it's connection to basically all colors. Other things we could potentially add to blue are milling (to help with the land thing) or a higher emphasis on steampowered, since many blue and black cards give colorless mana.

BR: These two colors seem matched up pretty well, though I will say most of the support cards for this archetype are red not black. Perhaps Spellslinger's Creed can be changed to trigger on artifacts entering your graveyard from anywhere, allowing it to assist Spell slingers, Sacr-o-facts, and this theoretical UR Mill-o-facts deck.

RG: The synergy here seems sketchy at best. I suppose you could blow up your own modular creatures to spread the counter love, but in general these two colors don't seem to be on the same page, and I'm not sure we should be pushing the whole donate situation.

GW: This deck is pretty well defined, in fact it's probably the most well defined of all the decks. This mostly has to do with how modular creatures work incredibly well together. I'm also afraid that "GW take every modular thing I see" is going to be too strong, especially since they also have a lot of good support cards. At the very least, I don't think we need to add or change much about this archetype.

WB: This I think is a combo that could use a lot of help. It's full of solid cards but no clear interactions. I think a reanimator type deck could fit here, but doesn't because of how we've nerfed certain cards like Casket Constructor and Frontier Recycler. I think if we can move things around a bit we might be able to bring that back to at least give the deck a little more definition.

UR: I think "artifacts in your graveyard" is a cool idea for this deck, but blue nees a bit more support than just Promising Youth to make it happen.

BG: I think it might be an interesting idea to give green a couple more land-search cards, just to allow more play with black here.

RW: Another faction I think could be helped by giving white more of a bringing-back-artifacts vibe.

GU: I like some of the interactions here, like Complacent Crew with Taurox Emptyhand, but feel like it could benefit with another dose of identity.

Which strategies need the most help?

I think the color combos that need the biggest help are the enemy colored ones. They allied colored combos currently have a huge leg up over them becuase the allied ones have been incorpated into the set from the beginning, where as the concept of enemy colored combos are a very recent addition to Archester.

If we make False Friends uncommon (which, while a repeatable effect is a rare, is actually about as hard to understand as blink and therefore should have no trouble as an uncommon, then just throw a few more etb triggers and ltb triggers in white and red, we have a sweet little Boros blink deck. Also, it more solidly justifies our current blink suite, which is cool but wasn't as in tune as it was with clockwork.

EDIT: also, we need a common blink spell and a few more ETB triggers.

say, can I join in?

Sure you can join. Most of the discussions are taking place here. Also, I should let you know that the OP is wildly out of date. Clockwork has become modular and there has been numerous individual card updates. Just a heads up.

thx

I just noticed that if Archester ever make it out, the steam-powered will be easily achieved in Commander with a little bit of trickery. Say you run Tecksa as your commander and want steam-power? Pump blue out of your "Any color mana" lands and voila! you got salsa- eh I mean colorless.

Also, kudos to everybody who helped making this set. I'll be printing myself a RB deck with Tecksa and test it out with my friends and we'll see what we can get from it.

As from a Johnny point-of-view, I can see quite a lot to be done inside this set and oh boy! the combos I can make up with other sets. (ie: Richard Ferron + Memnarch = Opness)

Quote from deritof

I just noticed that if Archester ever make it out, the steam-powered will be easily achieved in Commander with a little bit of trickery. Say you run Tecksa as your commander and want steam-power? Pump blue out of your "Any color mana" lands and voila! you got salsa- eh I mean colorless.

Also, kudos to everybody who helped making this set. I'll be printing myself a RB deck with Tecksa and test it out with my friends and we'll see what we can get from it.

As from a Johnny point-of-view, I can see quite a lot to be done inside this set and oh boy! the combos I can make up with other sets. (ie: Richard Ferron + Memnarch = Opness)

Thanks for the feedback! If you could post your Tecksa deck here I would love to see it!

Here you go. My Tecksa deck, just for you guys.

Now, why those particular cards? what makes them likable?

I'm going to find artwork for all the cards. Currently I have 835 Steampunk photos saved to my computer, so now comes the hard task of matching each photo to cards already designed.

Here's a teaser for an example for a finished card from the set skeleton:



And since I'm the type of designer who usually uses artwork to inspire card design rather than trying to hunt and find artwork to fit a card already designed, I'll be coming up with a lot of new card designs as well based on the huge number of artwork I've found. Here's another teaser that's hopefully very on theme:



Many more to come. Stay tuned!

Thanks for the submissions. If a lot of your work is art related, you could take it to the Archester Creative thread here.

Here are some card design submissions:


I also noticed there are lots of cards with flying or grant flying in the set (17 in total), but very few creatures with reach (Only 1.) That probably needs to get fixed.