MTG Salvation

The official winner for July is Jimmy Groove. Congratulations to them for being the winner of the last MCC on this site! Thanks to all the players, judges, and other hosts that have made possible not just this month, but all these years of MCC here.

A chapter ends, but a new one begins. The MCC isn't over. I'm hosting August myself on MTGNexus. Join us there!

As for your first point:

Quote from bravelion83 »

I'm not a fan of trying to stretch the boundaries of a challenge like this or like you did in round 1.

This is essentially the reason. What felt like having fun to you wasn't exactly fun to me as the creator of the challenges. To me, it felt like somebody was implicitly telling me "you didn't want me to do this, but look, I can do it and I'm doing it just to kid you" (I'm trying to find a way to phrase this in a way that doesn't sound aggressive or confrontational, I hope I've managed it but if I haven't please don't read this that way, it's just so hard to convey tone in writing). At first I let it go because I had only seen the "Rend" in the card name. In that first version of my judgment, you had the whole 2 points in the Subchallenge section. Then, as I was rereading my judgments multiple times to fix typos, as I always do, I realized the second instance ("Malenda"). You still had 2 points. Then I reread them again looking for more typos (you'd be amazed at how many I usually find and fix) and I saw the third one ("Glen Elendra"). At that point, in this order, it was clear to me that you were doing it on purpose, I felt like I have tried to describe at the beginning of this post, I remembered that you did the same in round 1 and your judge there had already pointed it out to you, I went to check their judgment of your card in the round 1 thread (because I don't trust my memory at all), saw that they had already deducted you half a point in round 1 just because of that, that feeling I had made me agree with them, so I finally decided to do the same. This is the quick story of that half a point deduction.

I'm not sure the other two points were addressed to me, also because I agree with almost everything you've written there and I've even mentioned some of that in my own judgments, like your card being technically different despite being very (too?) similar to Plummet, and in fact I didn't give you a full zero in Uniqueness. I also didn't even mention Wing Snare at all, even if on second thought I probably should have, but that wouldn't have changed my own scores anyway. And as for Jimmy Groove's card, I have even explicitly mentioned Murder. What I might agree with is that I should have mentioned it in Viability as well as Balance, but even a half a point deduction in Jimmy Groove's Viability score (which is what I would have done in that case) wouldn't have changed the results so it would be kind of pointless now, and we're also way past the deadline anyway.

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EDIT August 1st: I want to thank everybody here in the MCC as well. Declaring a winner for July as soon as Algernone25's judgments are in will be my final act here. Just so everybody knows, I'm hosting the August MCC on MTGNexus right now. Come join us there!

Quote from bravelion83 »

On a serious note, this has been an incredible run! Thank you all for some amazing years of custom card design, for making the contests what they are today, and just for having been there, all you wonderful people who share this passion for Magic as a game and custom cards specifically with me. I hope to see as many of you as possible on Nexus. I'm already there.

I just have to thank you. You've made me notice an unintended loophole in the challenge instead of just exploiting it to your benefit, and you did so in a very nice and civil way. This is the way anybody should behave in situations like this.

Quote from slimytrout »

For the record, my current submission should still work independent of the revision ("until the end of your next turn").

Yes, I confirm that your current submission passes the revised Main Challenge just fine.

Quote from slimytrout »

Just wanted to make sure, does it count if we just use the name in the rules text? So, would a card named "End of the BBQ" that just said "End of the BBQ deals 3 damage to target creature" qualify? It seems like it currently works within the challenge as written, but it also feels a little like cheating, so I thought I should check.

No, it was not supposed to count. And yes, that's been yet another mistake on my part. I just didn't think about the fact that you could just repeat the card's name in the rules text and get away with it. That's totally NOT what I wanted this challenge to be. You were supposed to have a very hard time trying to find a way to do it. Doing it like this feels not a little but a lot like cheating to me, even if it's not technically because it does meet the challenge as I've written it. My challenge idea was a whole other thing, and much more difficult than how both you and IcariiFA have made it with your submissions.
Honestly, I'm torn between two options now: either regretfully accepting your submissions because it's too late to adjust the challenge while it's already underway, or modify the challenge adding a sentence that explicitly forbids this. After all, you still have more than three days before the deadline, so you should have all the time to come up with something different if I choose the latter option. I need a little more time to think about what I want to do.
One thing is for certain: I didn't expect and didn't want the last month of MCC on this site to go like this...

EDIT - Ok, I think I've reached my decision. I'm rewording the challenge to explicitly forbid it but I will push the deadlines back one day in exchange to give you more time to come up with new submissions. I've modified the round thread OP, and I've also sent a pm to the three contestants to make sure they see this, so it's official now.

I am really sorry to everybody. This wasn't supposed to go like this... and you better not know what I'm telling myself right now.

So that's it. It's over.

That's a dramatic way to say that round 3 is up. The final round. Both of this month and of the MCC as a whole on this site.

Quote from Algernone25 »

DQ has been overturned at moderator's request

Well, thank you, but I'm not a moderator. I'm just the host for the month.

Quote from Mr. Rithaniel »

I'm surprised you guys actually googled it.

I always do as a judge if a card has something that my senses tell me must have a meaning or be there for a reason, yet I don't understand it. In this case, the "o with umlauts" made my judge senses tickle, and so I googled the name. I'm far from knowing everything, but Google kinda does! And anyway, my knowledge about languages stops at the three ones I know: Italian (my mother tongue), English (I'm half British and very proud of my English origins), and French. I know close to nothing about any other language on Earth, and I have a very high respect for all, but especially for the ones that I don't know and have a whole culture behind. I must and want to respect that unknown (to me) culture as best I can, because it is in no way superior to mine.

Though, yes, Möngke is a name meaning "eternal," very rarely given, as I understand it. "Enebish" is a more common name, roughly translating to "not this one," and is meant to confuse and dissuade evil spirits from messing with the bearer of the name. Mongolian naming conventions give people three names. Their given name, their father's name, and then their family name. For centuries, family names were not tracked (there was a big thing in the 90s about recovering them, actually) and so everyone had two names. The character in the flavor text of this card is effectively "Enebish, son of Möngke."

It's true that every day you learn something new. This is what I've learned today. Thank you, and again a lot of respect to the Mongolians in general, and to you personally if you are Mongolian or have Mongolian heritage.

I will not answer the rest as it wasn't directly addressed to me, and as I've already said I'm not a moderator, but as host for the month I would be very pleased if everybody kept a low tone. I'm sure you all understand, and I thank you for that.

Quote from Eventide Sojourner »

Just wanted to get in a note regarding Subchallenge 2 for my card, as neither Algernone nor void has posted a review of my card yet.

The word "endure" appears in my flavor text. The word "endure" is not derivative of "end". The etymology of endure goes back to Latin "indurare".

Yes, this is true. I've just looked at your card and I confirm as host (and thus creator of the challenges) that it passes subchallenge 2 without any problem, just like void_nothing has already told you.

Quote from void_nothing »

I've started on my judgments but not finished them; I will not have them done before the deadline and I am, at this point, exhausted. I am going to have to post the DCC round soon and then get sleep. I promise I will finish as early as possible tomorrow.

No problem as long as you can make it within tomorrow night. I had said that a 24-hour extension for judging could be granted, and that's exactly what I'm doing now. New judging deadline is Sunday, July 21st 23:59 EST (no further time extensions will be granted this round).

Quote from The_Hittite »

Wait, wasn't I eliminated last round?

Yes, my bad. I had copied Algernone25's scores from round 1 before they adjusted them to break the tie, so I still had you tied for third place in round 1 in my Excel file. I will judge the card you submitted after I'm done with my bracket. My apologies.

Maybe I should just have done a puzzle instead, showing you what your opponent has in every single one of their zones and saying "design a card that can solve this puzzle". I'm not perfect, and my judgments and challenges aren't either. I wish they were, and I was. I knew this challenge could cause confusion, but I did it anyway because I really liked it for its flavor: you have to end the Promised End herself. I guess I could have done things differently, I'm not denying it. But I'm also striving to make the best I can in answering clarification requests and such. Maybe I should have just given up on trying to make this work and come up with a different challenge? I don't know, probably I should have. I just know that I'm trying to do the best I can, and that it's too late to change the challenge now even if I wanted. I apologize.

Quote from Eventide Sojourner »

That's a new one. I have mana tags for my Round 2 submission around "GGUU", and it's displaying as UUGG. I'd prefer to not get docked points because the site is re-ordering my mana symbols.

Wow, I didn't expect this, but I checked the source code of your post (via quote) and it's true! Thank you for mentioning this, if you hadn't I wouldn't know about such errors and I would have certainly deducted something for the wrong order of mana symbols if you happened to be in my bracket. This probably means that we judges will have to check the source code of every single submission post. Not too much more work to me, as I practically already do when quoting the cards in my bracket, I just have to remember to focus on it. But judges who don't have the habit to quote the cards they're judging should probably pay attention to this and check the source code too.

tl;dr - Go directly to check the "in summary" box below.

I expected this to potentially require more clarifications, even though I've tried to word the challenge in the clearest way possible. Ok, let's go.

Quote from Cardz5000 »

Would an instant that gets rid of, but doesn’t target or deal damage to Emrakul automatically fail? You said that all instants fail in the clarifications, but as best I can tell, cyclonic rift should pass this challenge.

Cyclonic Rift can't even target Emrakul in the first place, so it definitely fails the challenge. Remember the DEBT acronym for protection: "protection from instants" means Emrakul can't be damaged by any instants (potentially relevant), enchanted/equipped/fortified or blocked by any instants (not relevant for instants), or targeted by any instants (very relevant). What's true is that if you design a non-targeted bounce effect, such as "Return all creatures to their owners' hands", even as an instant, that will pass the main challenge because protection doesn't kick in (that effect doesn't target or deal damage to her) and so when it resolves Emrakul will actually leave the battlefield despite her protection from instants. This is what you have to ask yourself: as the card I've designed resolves, will it cause Emrakul to leave the battlefield? Does my card avoid any built-in way for Emrakul to return? If the answer to both questions is yes, your card passes the main challenge.
But you probaly meant an overloaded Cyclonic Rift. It's true that using overload will cause the Rift to not target Emrakul anymore, so it would work, but the card needs to always work to get rid of Emrakul, not only under some given circumstances. Cyclonic Rift only works if you overload it, and not always, so it still wouldn't pass the main challenge. Other examples: Evacuation would pass the main challenge despite being an instant, as it doesn't target, so it will successfully return Emrakul to hand. Whelming Wave would also pass, it's a sorcery so it would work either way even if it targeted. Unsummon doesn't pass the main challenge because it can't target Emrakul, Silent Departure would pass because it can target Emrakul (it's a sorcery) and return her to hand.

Quote from slimytrout »

I'm a little confused by the parameters of "can make," since it seems like very many cards could in theory kill an Emrakul if the right situation arose.

This is why I expected more clarification to be needed.

For example, would Prey Upon work, or does it need to be able to do it on its own?

The wording of the main challenge doesn't forbid cards that need the help of other cards to work. It forbids cards that can't work and/or that have a built-in way for Emrakul to return. Prey Upon is a sorcery, so it has no problem with Emrakul's protection from instants, it can cause her to leave the battlefield if she dies in the fight, and has no built-in way for Emrakul to return. So Prey Upon would pass the main challenge.

Or how about a version of Prey Upon that could give +13/+13?

Even better, it makes the fight easier for your creature to kill Emrakul. Also notice that it doesn't matter whether your creature survives the fight or not.

Alternatively, does creature combat work, i.e., does Deadly Recluse count?

The main challenge doesn't specify anything about combat, so cards that would make her die in combat do pass the main challenge. Deadly Recluse would pass the main challenge, because by having deathtouch it will always make Emrakul die. If it didn't have deathtouch it wouldn't count, because yes, it would be able to block Emrakul, but that wouldn't cause Emrakul to die. Emrakul always dying, and thus leaving the battlefield, because of your card is what matters. A card that can only kill Emrakul some of the times doesn't pass the main challenge.

And does it need to be definitely work, or would Diabolic Edict be okay?

No, Diabolic Edict doesn't pass the main challenge. If Emrakul's controller has another creature, they can (and very probably will) just sacrifice the other creature. Nowhere in the wording of the challenge it's specified that Emrakul is the only creature that your opponent controls, so you can't count on that. And yes, the card needs to always work to pass the main challenge.

I could keep going with corner cases but I think you get the idea.

I do, and that's why I've written that last bolded sentence just above this quote.

Quote from IcariiFA »

any instant automatically fails the Main Challenge, and will be thus DQ'ed. You've been warned.

An instant that returned all creatures to their owners hands would get around it's protection and should be legal, no?

I've seen this only after writing all of the above, because it was in the round thread and not here. You're right, and in fact I've just slightly modified the wording of that clarification to reflect this. void_nothing gave you the correct answer:

Quote from void_nothing »

Quote from IcariiFA »

any instant automatically fails the Main Challenge, and will be thus DQ'ed. You've been warned.

An instant that returned all creatures to their owners hands would get around it's protection and should be legal, no?

Absolutely, if it doesn't DEBT then protection doesn't stop it.

Round 2 is up.

I'm back after my 2HG prerelease. Our record was 2-1. I and my friend got second place overall, our best result since we play 2HG together, so we're very happy!

Quote from Hemlock »

Standard-issue Blade

...
Equip white and red creature
...
Can't get the space to appear before hybrids...

You probably have to use mana tags and curly brackets for hybrid mana. For example:
gives:
with the space between the name and mana cost, while this:
gives:
again with the space between the ability and its mana cost. Hope this helps. (Noparse tags are a wonderful thing. I hope they stay on Nexus.)

A little more than 4 hours to the design deadline. Seeing that right after I originally wrote this post, the site suddenly went in read-only mode for exactly 4 hours, and also because of the low number of entries, I've decided to delay both deadlines by one day. So, as of this moment, there are actually a little less than 24 hours before the design deadline. Hoping the site doesn't go in read-only mode out of nowhere again.

With only 16 entries for now, I expect 3 judges to be enough, and Mr. Rithaniel should be able to play. We'll see if anything changes in these 4 24 hours.

Quote from Eventide Sojourner »

For Round 1 of the July MCC, do Artifact Creatures meet the requirement?

Yes, they do. A colored artifact creature passes the Main Challenge.

Based on the Clarifications, they don't seem to.

Why? There's nothing excluding other card types. Notice that I said subtypes in the clarifications:

Quote from Clarifications »

The card can be a normal artifact without any subtype, an Equipment, a Vehicle, a Fortification, or have any other subtypes somehow. All of these are fine.

They're both on the type line, but types, supertypes, and subtypes are different things.

Quote from void_nothing »

The letter of the challenge itself doesn't actually exclude artifact creatures at all. I don't think the clarification was meant to be exclusive: the cards "can be" any of those things (including "having any other subtypes somehow" by having another card type) but there's no "can't be" that prevents the cards from being other things.

This is all correct.

EDIT: And I'm confident that if the Lion had meant noncreature artifacts, he would have said so explicitly.

Indeed. I didn't specify, so artifact creatures are fine. If I didn't want them, I would have said it explicitly. Design all the artifact creatures that you want! I'm going to adjust that first point in the clarifications to better reflect this.

EDIT: I'm modified the clarification, so you might want to check it out. In short, as long as the card has the card type "artifact" and it's colored, it's fine.

As a side note, I will very probably not be available from right now until tomorrow (European) night. You know, as a Magic player, I have that little periodic obligation that is called "prerelease"... And I have to prepare and rest for it. So see you all tomorrow night! And good luck for your own prerelease! May everybody have a lot of fun!

Quote from Eventide Sojourner »

Your foil Alpha Volcanic Island is in the mail, and you should receive it no later than August 32nd.

Good that I do not play Legacy or Vintage and that I actually prefer non-foil cards then! (And I'm actually not joking about either of those.) Expecting it to arrive exactly on August 32nd!
On a serious note, thanks for the congratulations, and thanks to you as host and all the other judges and players. I almost wonder if hosting the last MCC here and winning the penultimate one makes me enter in the history of this site... No, no need to answer, I'm just dreaming. Thanks anyway to everybody. Updating my resume now.