MTG Salvation

R/W Prowess Archetype Showcase

I'm also rebuilding a lot of the uncommon premonition cards.

Ok changes to RW prowess, white commons, uncommon cycles and quasi premonition wording changes are now complete.
I've got more playtesting planned for the end of the month so my focus for the next week or two is revamping names, flavor an art into something a little more cohesive.
I've uploaded a new visual spoiler, as always I'm happy to get feedback.

Full changelog:

• Added the Mandate Cycle. Modular Flashback cards at uncommon.
• Removed loose Foretold cycle at uncommon. Changed to individual premonition designs
• Removed common discard flashback cycle.
• Righteous Ancestor renamed to Aven Harrier.
• Righteous Ancestor changed from color shifted Daggerdrone Imp to 1/2 flying prowess. This helps the RW prowess deck and the 1 point lifegain wasn't doing enough for the BW archetype.
• Blessed Aspirant tap trigger changed from 1/1 lifelink token creation -> gain 3 life. This places it more solidly in BW and it can now combo with Hope familiar.
• Blessed Aspirant PT: 2/4 -> 3/3 as white needed a little more power at uncommon.
• Nimbus Guide changed to Champion of Altor. Aura fetching ETB changed to prowess tempo creature for the new RW archetype.
• Dawn Crusader 2W 3/2 dreamwalker -> 1W 2/1 dreamwalker due to curve reasons and a glut of 3 drop dreamwalk creatures across all colors.
• Dayblade Scout 1W 3/1 vanilla -> 2W 2/3 vanilla. This should help reduce white's early aggression.
• Dayblade Scout changed name to Dayblade Sentry as a 2/3 scout feels fat.
• Decree of Light changed to a flashback card, then changed to Avenging Arrow stlye removal. Finally changed back to original design just with new dot point template.
• Equinox Preacher Human -> Giant so that the 4/6 stats make sense.
• Removed Battle Vigor due to new lack of RW auras.
• Frontline Purifier changed from ETB Sun Titan trigger to supercharged Crusader of Odric due to Heroic Return being added.
• Foretold Heroics changed to Heroic Return. Team pump -> Small creature revive.
• Aural Renewal renamed Opulent Renewal
• Opulent Renewal added equipment and changed from rare to mythic.
• Scapehuning moved to 6cmc due to curve reasons and now exiles cards from library to counter flashback.
• Scapehuning removed flashback
• Torpor Visitant: added new flavor text.
• Vitality Unending changed to smaller lifegaining flashback spell.
• Vitality Unending changed from mythic to rare.
• Aleen’s Mandate replaces Illusionary Summons
• Enter the Dreamscape: minor template and spelling fixes
• Possibility Agent: Trying new wording for Quasi premonition cards to reduce confusion. Will need to rewrite some of the comprehensive rules for premonition.
• Winter’s Whisper: removed discard clause.
• Yank to the Past: Changed to quasi griptide to allow for curve considerations
• Foretold Pact replaces Foretold Despair due to sacrifice clause on the black Mandate.
• Ghoulish Nightwalker fixed wording to target
• Inner Darkness replaces Nihil Demon to add variety to the rare flying bombs and add distinction between Nihil Demon and Greed Unbound
• Parasitic Nightwalker changed from boring regenerator design to aggressive old style nightmare creature
• Blinding Finesse now gives power bonus on prowess trigger. No longer has a white off color activated ability.
• Channeled Fury: 2R -> 1RR, sorcery -> Instant increased flashback from 6R -> 6RR
• Frenzied Onslaught replaces Wrap in Flames variant due to the Red Mandate.
• Hysteria Aspect replacing Cobblebrute vanilla due to curve changes
• Mori’s Chosen: Enchantment matters -> prowess and dreamwalk
• Undying Rage removed to make room for the Red Mandate. Not needed due to the lack of RW auras.
• Cultist Channeler renamed to Rabid Sparkweaver
• Rabid Sparkweaver: aura matters -> prowess haste card.
• Raving Spree 2R -> 3R to increase clunkyness and reduce chance of two for 1's
• Recurrent Betrayal: added to replace Foretold Betrayal. Is a repeating Act of Treason in the style of Festering March
• Scapesmasher: dreamwalk removed
• Scapesmasher: changed to Scapesmash Giant and given white activated ability instead of firebreathing.
• Sting of the Past: Added double targets similar to Pinnacle of Rage
• Midnight Howling: 4G -> 5G flashback
• Unravel the Delusion: 5G -> 4G flashback
• Herald of Carnage: 3/3 -> 4/3
• Wildtouched Dreamer redesigned to have two activated abilties rather than a single passive
• Augury Storm: minor wording changes
• Seeker of Wonders: replaces Battle Nimbus for RW gold card
• Seeker of Wonders: 3/2 -> 4/2
• Mindi’s Caretaker: minor wording changes

Done another update to the visual spoiler. I have mainly been working on flavor stuff and tweaking several cards that have come up in online playtesting.
I'll have a full changelog in the future.

Just finished another Dreamscape paper playtest. It was lots of fun and I'm looking forward to doing plenty more in the near future.
We ended up doing 6 player sealed which allowed me to get more data on color balance. Here are the preliminary results:

• Red and Blue was the most played deck colors which surprised me a little. The event was a small sample size so I'll be keeping this on the watchlist for future sealed events to see if this trend continues..
• Green and Black are now the least played colors. I'm keeping an eye on black as I think it may be a touch underpowered but I want to do more playtests first.
• I finally think the format has slowed down from triple Zendikar style speeds. This has taken a long time to get right with Dreamwalk and Trance pushing you to increased agression.
• I potentially think some of reds commons and uncommons are too powerful. I'm not making any changes yet but keeping an eye on it.
• People not noticing dreamwalk came up a lot more often this playtest, I really need a new frame thats more distinctive. However the reason this increased from previous playtests is due to the new flavor text on some cards making the font smaller. So I'm shortening or removing flavor text from most of my dreamwalk commons and also placing it before evergreen keywords so it is the first thing you read in the textbox.
• Green has too many low powered rares/uncommons, I think this rather than the commons is what made it less played.
• Cards that need balance nerfing: Ral Zarek, Dreamblessed Scout, Dreamfire Dragon.
• Cards that need buffing: Recurrent Betrayal, Memories of the Earth.

Most fun card of the night: Aleen, Prophet Unbound. I won a game with exactly 1 card left in my library. Went deep on milling but the extra turns where worth it.

Full Changelog:

• Added Mandate cycle
• Added Recurrent cards in Red and Blue to replace low performing premonition cards.
• Added minor premonition wording changes
• Added Parasitic Nightwalker
• Increased the size and cost of Lumbering Ancient
• Added Heroic Return
• Removed freeze effect of Dream Frontier to make it more appealing.
• Enigmatic Sphinx can now premonition any of your permanents rather than just itself.
• Added Opulent Renewal
• Whispering Bashe 7/6 -> 6/7 as part of making green a little less agressive
• Sunbloom Elf 2/1 -> 1/2
• Added new dot point wording to Protect the Dreamer
• Reworded Lethargy to not use the confusing "enchant tapped creature" wording. Card is still mechanically nearly identical.
• A few art changes
• Changed the names of a few commons to add more variant to the vocabulary
• Removed a number of uncommons
• Added new flavor text to dozens of cards

A small update after a recent draft paper playtest:
Recurrent Betrayal was buffed a little too much, making it to unfun. I changed it to a 3 turn cycle which makes it more appealing but didn't adjust the costs enough.

RG really needs a more coherent archetype plan. Cards like Memories of the Earth are both fighting against themselves and not properly defining the archetype.

The new rares and uncommon tweaks seem to be working fairly well for the most part.

The red removal suites I think needs a shakeup but I'm gonna wait until I finish a few other redesigns first as it could be a fairly major shakeup of the commons.

Quote from Doombringer »

RG really needs a more coherent archetype plan. Cards like Memories of the Earth are both fighting against themselves and not properly defining the archetype.

Is the archetype currently ramp/elementals/flashback?

Quote from IcariiFA »

Quote from Doombringer »

RG really needs a more coherent archetype plan. Cards like Memories of the Earth are both fighting against themselves and not properly defining the archetype.

Is the archetype currently ramp/elementals/flashback?

Yes, but it only has a single dedicated support card for Elemental tribal in Wildtouched Dreamer. While Memories of the Earth actually usually hinders future high cost flashback cards and negates the work you have used to ramp.

EDIT: after talking on the IRC channel one possible solution is using Awaken tech to make the land not be sacrifices, make the flashback more interesting and prevent memory issues.
Awakened Earth 4R
Sorcery (C)
Put four +1/+1 counters on target land you control and it becomes a 0/0 Elemental creature with haste. It’s still a land.
Flashback 4G

That does fit much nicer, especially since last I checked +1/+1 counters have support in your set. That said, is having a card that animates lands like this important? What's your thought process behind your version versus:

Memories of Earth 4R
Sorcery (C)
Put a 4/4 red Elemental creature token onto the battlefield.
Flashback 6G

I feel like I have too many vanilla token making flashback cards which are playing far better.
Also the awaken version allows you to:

• Stack counter to make an 8/8
• Have the land creature ETB tapped to block Dreamwalkers
• Be more splashy to encourage players to think about being RG.

Good points, particularly about the tapped option hidden in there.

I don't know if this is the right place for this, but why isn't Ashiok on Noctus? She makes nightmares, so this seems like something right up her alley.

New article with both a Dreamscape Crack-a-Pack as well as card design stories.
http://thegraymerchants.com/?p=501

I'd love to hear what you think and if you would of chosen the same pick.

Good call on the use of star borders to denote dreamwalkers.

I'd pick the Guardian.

I picked bloodwing myself before reading your answer. Your life gain archetype looked decently easy to enable from what I remember, and triggering its ability once recoups its slighlty below par stats immediately. And I mean very slightly since 3 power flying for 4 is general good in limited. The one toughness being the downfall, I don't remember if you have many pingers or cheap removal that takes advantage of that.

A lot of my playtesters have been busy with exams, work and other activities and so playtestings has slowed down a bit but I'm hoping to get more playtests underway in a few more weeks.

However I've been using the time to shuffle around a bunch of reds common removal as well as some of the underpowered or overpowered uncommons.

Quote from IcariiFA »

I don't remember if you have many pingers or cheap removal that takes advantage of that.

I have a card similar to Giestflame at common but other than that not too much 1 toughness hate.

Ok I'm about to do another paper playtest, the first I've done for a few weeks.
Most of the changes this time are to uncommons that needed tweaking after the last round of playtests.
Red got a large array of tweaks to its commons to flatten the power level a bit and make it's removal suite a more interesting.
Finally I've been writing plenty of new flavor text to expand the worldbuilding and flesh out the characters.

I look forward to reporting on how the playtest goes.

Full Changelog:

• Altor Oathbound: Changed from 5R 5/3 that gains first strike to a smaller body that can pump the team. Was swapped with Memories of the Earth when it came to the CMC.
• Alwen, Reality Steward: Changed to a legendary creature, is now and elf and no longer has the ugly "non-dryad" clause to prevent infinite loops.
• Blinding Finess: Swapped +2/+0 and first strike bonuses to make it more playable and be a more interesting bluffing game.
• Blurred Horizons: Removed lifeloss to make it more appealing.
• Dancing Blaze: Replaces Channeled fury (a flashback Soul's Fire) This better allows UR to deal with 1 or 2 toughness creatures as I wanted to change its common ping spell to not be as swingy.
• Deepmind Mori: Increased premonition cost by 1 after being too strong in previous playtests.
• Deny the Fantasy: Changed from a global anti-dreamwalk card to an uncommon for the BG loner deck.
• Doused Fate: Changed from a flashback bounce spell that was conflicting with the blue Mandate and appeared underwhelming. This now reads as weak but is actually still very powerful.
• Dreamfire Dragon: PT 5/4 -> 4/4 as it just ended the game a little too fast.
• Flash of Inspiration: Changed to hit creatures only and had its costs adjusted accordingly as part of red's removal makeover. Also new flavor text.
• Foretold Pact Increased premonition cost as was too efficient compared to the other already very powerful premonition card draw spells.
• Harmonic Dreamer: PT 2/1 -> 3/1 to make it a bit more appealing.
• Memories of the Earth: Changed from a token maker that you had to sac lands -> awaken flashback spell. This makes for far better playing. Adjusted costs accordingly so that you can awaken two lands in a row.
• Memory Guide: Removed +1/+1 bonus as it was too quick.
• Primordial Wanderer: Change to an elemental so it can target itself, also changed name and added flavor text.
• Raving Spree: Can now hit players but only now causes the sacrifice of an artifact if you do. Part of reds removal makeover.
• Recurrent Betrayal: Increased both premonition and casting cost to make this less abuse-able.
• Savage Cultblade: changed from a 5R 3/3 to a 2RR 2/2 to help out red's uncommon curve.
• Sting of the Past: Changed from a 1 damage Pinnacle of Rage to a combination of Giestflame and Lunge.
• Twisted Land Cycle (eg: Twisted Expanse): Can now tap or untap enemy targets to make it more constructed and limited playable.
• Unravel the Delusion: Flashback 4G -> 1G and added wicked new flavor text.
• Changed the names of several minor cards
• Added dozen of new flavor text pieces.

Any reason that Sting of the Past isn't a mostly functionally identical flashback First Volley? I get that different instant-speed spells can prevent sting and volley because of the template difference, but you don't actually have such effects (i.e. instant-speed hexproof or protection) in the set! And if the opponent only controls a hexproof creature, then you can't cast either spell anyway...

This one is a bit of a stretch, but maybe consider that calling blue-black land "Twisted Tundra" leaves to be desired when Tundra is a white-blue dual? (possible replacement: "Twisted Grotto")

I agree the the new Unravel the Delusion flavor is wicked.

Hi
Harmonic Dreamer's flavor is confusing me. It clearly looks like a peaceful monk, yet he is 3/1 and druid. May I suggest change him into 1/3 and Monk?

Also, I would like to playtest this set on cocktrice with you guys. Just tell me if you are interested.

After mylatestdraft went really well I have updated the visual spoiler with 5 new uncommons and moving the Mandate cycle up to rare.
I'll have a full list of changes in the next week or so after another round of playtesting.

Quote from Circeus »

Any reason that Sting of the Past isn't a mostly functionally identical flashback First Volley? I get that different instant-speed spells can prevent sting and volley because of the template difference, but you don't actually have such effects (i.e. instant-speed hexproof or protection) in the set! And if the opponent only controls a hexproof creature, then you can't cast either spell anyway...

It is supposed to be templated like Chandra, Pyromancer but I forgot the "up to" text. It is supposed to be that you can ping a player even if they have no valid creature targets.

Quote from netn10 »

Also, I would like to playtest this set on cocktrice with you guys. Just tell me if you are interested.

I am constantly on the custommagic IRC channel and am happy to have more people help playtest over cockatrice. It just tends to be difficult to organize both people and time zones.

Well I finally did it and moved over to the new card frames.
I'll have a massive new changelog sometime next week.

Can't wait to see the updated cards. Will you post a link to PDF? It makes it pleasant to view.

Quote from Legend »

Will you post a link to PDF? It makes it pleasant to view.

Sure. I'll start including PDFs as well as the webpage versions. Mine won't have the fancy intros etc that Apoquallyp has but a simply card-dump is easy enough.

Plus I can print it out of I want to

Quote from Doombringer »

Quote from Legend »

Will you post a link to PDF? It makes it pleasant to view.

Sure. I'll start including PDFs as well as the webpage versions. Mine won't have the fancy intros etc that Apoquallyp has but a simply card-dump is easy enough.

I expect a Planeswalker's Guide to Noctus with background lore to the characters and places. Twenty pages min!

Despite the lack of updates here recently I've been slowly working on this. New art, card frames, templating and much more has underway.
Special thanks to Apoquallyp for all his recent feedback
The visual spoiler has been updated and below is the massive changelog:
General Changes:

• M15 for all cards
• M15 god frames for all Dreamwalkers
• Wording changes and grammer fixes for dozens of cards.

White
White has had a large number of it's uncommons changed and some of its mediocre noncreature spells have been improved to improve their playability in limited.

• Champion of Altor: PT: 2/2 -> 2/3
• Dayblade Sentry: PT: 2/3 -> 3/2. Had too much overlap with Equinox Sage and wasn't very playable.
• Evis’ Mandate: Changed from uncommon to rare.
• Heroic Return: Can now be cast without a valid target to prevent confusion with Premonition
• Knight of the New Age: Changed from a static first strike bonus to creatures with a +1/+1 counter to a 5W ability that wants mass +1/+1 counters.
• Lingering Glow: Fixed wording, reduced cost by 1. Changed from variable lifegain to fixed for simplicity. Was too close in function to Life’s Grandeur.
• Lost in the Moment: Increased cost by 1. Reduced flashback cost. Swapped with Lingering Glow in the curve.
• Nurturing Mori: Removed lifelink and reduced cost by 1
• Strive for Justice: added to replace the white mandate

Blue
Blue has remained reasonably unchanged except for wording fixes and a few higher rarity cards being tweaked

• Aleen’s Mandate: Moved from uncommon to rare. Aligned the dot point text.
• Counting Sheep: Added to replace Aleen’s Mandate at uncommon.
• Dreamglider Mori: Now gives dreamwalk creatures a power boost rather than a cost reduction.
• Enigmatic Sphinx: Minor wording changes as it used an old version of the premonition text
• Flux Aspirant: Reduced cost and now swaps P/T on tap rather than shrinking an enemy.
• Jorallen Hypnotist: "you don’t control" -> "an opponent controls"
• Twisted Representation: changed name and added flavor text

Black
Black got very few changes. Mainly fixing wording mistakes.

• Cruel Memories: Changed from sorcery to instant
• Ikelious’ Mandate: Changed from uncommon to rare
• Inner Darkness: Added flying to the token like intended
• Ominous Shade: Fixed creature type
• Plague with Distress: Added to replace the black mandate
• Withering Dreamstrider: added "until end of turn" as intended.

Red
Red has had a reasonable number of commons and uncommons undergo developmental changes or redesign

• Blinding Finesse: Swapped the prowess and static bonuses to make it more appealing.
• Charred Visionary: Added first strike
• Dancing Blaze: you don’t control -> your opponents control
• Destiny Crusher: PT: 3/3 -> 3/2 due to being a little too premium
• Dreamfire Dragon: Added an additional R to its abilitycost
• Dreamheart Seal: Changed from destroy to sacrifice.
• Dreamspark: Instant -> Sorcery
• Mori’s Mandate: changed rom uncommon to rare
• Nightfire Brute: changed from a +X/+0 attack trigger to a */2 based on tapped creatures you control. This allows it to be more flexible and less pure agression.
• Panic Figment: Changed from Impulsive Draw to a boardstall breaker
• Summons of Desire: Added to replace the red Mandate

Green
Green got the most extensive changes to its commons. The low cost creatures where really not working correctly, making the whole color very inconsistent.

• Abundant Growth: Added to replace Sunbloom Chorus at common
• Æther Predator: Changed from 3/2 for 2G to 3/4 for 3G
• Gardener of Wisdom: Reworded to simplify the trigger
• Knight of the Old Ways: Changed from a static regen for +1/+1 counter creatures to a adding additional counters.
• Nature’s Precept: Added to replace green mandate.
• Reality Aspirant: Fixed creature type
• Shimmerhide Rhino: Added to give a reward to a green heavy deck. Also replaces the vanilla slot of Viridescent Kirin
• Sunbloom Chorus: Moved from common to uncommon. Cost reduced by 1.
• Travel Preparations: Added flavor text
• Viridescent Kirin: Added flash. Is no longer the green vanilla
• Yemma’s Mandate: Moved from uncommon to rare and increased the flashback cost by 1

Gold and Artifact
Gold and artifacthas had a few cards completely redesigned as I strive to make them appealing signposts for different color combos or as general purpose cards.

• Crusade of the Daumas: Completely redesigned
• Earthflare: Changed from instant to sorcery due to being absurd.
• Jorallen Dualminds: Changed from a spell trigger to a Sentinal of the Eternal Watch trigger.
• Dreamsteel Servitor: changed name from dreamsteel golem and changed creature type
• Fixed frame of all gold lands
• Added new art to basic lands