MTG Salvation

Here is my decklist from 1999 (I know it was 13 years ago, and we don't have Gaea's Cradle anymore, but it gives you an idea what a Stompy (or ALL-IN-GREEN) deck should look like.



Breaking it down -
Albino Troll - No clear replacement but it was cheap, despite echo, and it regenerated with a large body

Elvish Lyrist - Enchantment Hate on a 1/1 body, needed in that format, mana dork (Pilgrim) probably fits better here in the current format.

Llanowar Elves - Arbor Elf is the closest replacement

Pouncing Jaguar - Another efficient 1 drop, Geist might be the best replacement here

River Boa - We have a few options in this slot that are pretty close to functional reprints, the REGENERATE is VERY important here.

Uktabi Orangutan - Maindeck hate with a body again, no real replacement, might need to be maindeck hate for your worst matchup that is still decent in others.

Wild Dogs - A win more card really but it applied pressure early, I'd almost opt for Young Wolf here, almost

Cursed Scroll - Removal and Stall card, obviously no replacement, but a pressure card that is not a creature needs to be here

Rancor - We have this one available

Giant Growth - We have this one too

Forests/Cradle/Treetops - I ran 22 lands, not for curve, but for consistency, even with cradle and my super low mana costs. It tested as the right number (note that 2 Cradles always got sided out in the control matchup to increase speed while sacrificing consistency on the draw ONLY)

The sideboard was meta'd for Regionals that year (I ended up 7th at Columbus Regionals) I'm pretty sure this exact same decklist, or very close to it, got played to a top 8 at worlds that year also.

The Fogs (constant mists) were extremely important against the RDW decks. They are faster than you and will blow you out when you are on the draw game 2 or 3. We have Fog now, and I'd suggest it.

Hurricane was for the fliers and got dropped down considerably because flying wasn't "in" then. It is now and I'd suggest Plummet or something to deal with the guys you can't block.

Overrun was the whooping stick for the mirror and creature matchups. Saddly we don't have it, but we have Revenge of the Hunted. It should be sideboard and not main.

Thran Foundry was metaspecific and doesn't correlate well to today's meta, this should probably be Predator Ooze.

two more orangutans for arti hate - could be prey upon here or naturalize

Weatherseed Treefolk is almost a direct swap for Vorapede, but if you like Silverheart better, I could get behind using him in this slot but this slot is more for resiliency against removal and burn.


All in all it's not a cut and paste and plug and play decklist, it just gives you an idea. Through months of testing I continued to sacrifice a little bit of flat out speed for overall consistency and found myself winning a heck of a lot more with a still really fun to play deck. Take what you will from this, or disregard it all together, doesn't matter to me, figured I'd try and lend a hand since green stompy is my favorite archetype ever.

Quote from zeke_the_plumber

How 'bout each country has a seperate theme and different set of colors.

There's way too many countries to do that. On the allied side alone you have France, US, Soviets, Canada, Austrailia, Britian, and about 13 others that predominantly fought for the allied side.

Quote from doinitwrong

Another thing you could do is to add a supertype of either Allied, Axis, or Neutral to each card so they'd read "Allied Creature-...", then have each weapon have "Equip Allied" or such, so they can only be attached to a certain side's cards.

- doing this, thanks

Quote from doinitwrong

This seems really interesting. I've considered doing something like this in the past, but never got around to it. I've been playing Magic for almost my entire life, so I'm pretty knowledgeable as to how cards are worded etc. If you need any help with wording or converting history to a card, I'd be willing to help.

I agree with Anthony that a lot of cards would be artifacts. I personally die a little inside whenever I see a colored artifact, but those could be used to keep certain weapons with certain sides. I also see combat pinging like Crossbow Infantry being used here.

Yeah, I realize the set will be heavy artifact and/or equipment unless I create a new "subtype" in the realm of enchantment (but obviously NOT enchantment) that can color the "equipment" without them being artifacts.

Thanks for the input. I like the idea of the bigger stuff like tanks being creatures. Maybe instead of calling them creatures, subtype them as Constructs or some other word different from "creature" to symbolize their uniqueness, that act like artifact creatures in everyway, but aren't named creature.

I still want to use the Planeswalker "type" layout for the important men from the war, but obviously need another key word instead of Planeswalker as well, that describes them.

Next I need to decide which colors are Axis, Allies, and Neutral. I'm guessing Red and Black or Red and White for Axis (from the swaztika and uniforms) and Blue and Green for Allies and makle whichever (probably white to symbolize pacifism) for the nuetrals. Any suggestions on that?

I'll try and add a master list of equipment, important battles, and important figures to base cards off of as a starter. I'm guessing it would be best to try and split the war into 3 phases and make it a small block set. I'm thinking instead of having multitudes of endless creature-human cards we can also use wildlife that played a roll. I'm not really sure how to take a very real thing and transform it into a magical game.

Looking for assitance or direction on creating a World War II based set. Specifically how to go about incorporating weapons, machinery etc into the magic realm. I think it can be done but I'm not sure how to do the wording. Has anyone else tried this? I've tried multiple times to create sets on here and get very little assistance and whind up just doing them on my own elsewhere. But I'd really like to have a community built set around this theme. I have some ideas, and I'm a military history buff so I have the knowledge, just need someone more magic technical oriented to help me word everything correctly and narrow the scope to a workable set. Any takers?

Below I'm going to list equipment, people, weapons, battles, etc (with their country of use of tie in) for a master list to create cards from. Not all of them need to be made into cards. It is just a comprehensive list of the cool named and important things from the war itself.

Aircraft
Generic Card ideas to show formatting. Open for suggestions.

Clear Illusions - I'm ok with this at common, Demnystify does this for one less mana, exiles it, and it's an uncommon.

Prayer - I like this, but not at common, Serra Angel is 5 mana at uncommon and used to be a rare, I'd make this an uncommon and add an ability to the card.

Healer's Charm - Feels like an uncommon to me since it counts all white permanents and not just creatures.

Shielder of the Pack - Nice.

Angel War Caller - Nice.

Gold Fur Wolf - Needs to be uncommon unless the only creatue to get pumped is the Wolf.

Arc of Light - Nice.

Probation Order - Haha, nice.

Angel's Cleric - The second ability could get stupid good, really fast. Might want to revisit that.

Angels Interference - In blue, this costs 5 mana, make it at least 4.

Life Light - Ok.

Wolf High Priestess - Ok. A little low on the curve, but agressive.

Life's Knowledge - Busted. busted in half with Healer's Charm. Reword to say something like if you gained life this turn, you may draw a card at the beginning of the end step.

Angelic Banishment - Besides the spelling errors, it's ok.

Battle-Death Hero - White doesn't get 3/3 for 3 CMC with an ability often, especially not at uncommon with such a good ability. Make it either a 1/4, a 2/3, or a 3/1.

White Alpha - While I don't like the name, I do like the card.

Protector of the Golden Fields - A possible 6/6 flyer for 5 mana is above grade for white. Casting cost should increase to 6 minimum even though it's a rare.

Church Alpha - fine card, don't like the name.

Angels Healing - fix the spelling error, otherwise ok.

Lul the Chosen - Busted, make the token a 1/1 AT BEST.

Immortality of the Noble - Seems really good, but ok.

Bianca - the indestuctibility ability is costed way too low.

Angel's Fury - Magic has backed away from cards like this, although I like it alot, other people might not.

Giver of Blessings - good ability, but too high power and toughness for a card with such a good ability.

I'm pretty sure Dark Ritual didn't break any formats (and still doesn't) without tons of help. I've already stated why I included Dark Ritual in earlier posts and see no need to revisit it. Demonic Tutor is not busted if it doesn't have busted cards to go get, which this set isn't loaded with. I also addressed it previously. Sinkhole, once again, addressed previously.

I am not making a brand new core set for the masses. I am making a BLOCK SET, it would rotate, like any other block. I am just using previously printed cards because most of them give the colors their identity and there is no point in trying to improve that. This set is going to be printed up (4 copies of each common, 3 copies of each uncommon, 2 copies of each rare, and 1 copy of each mythic rare) and made into psuedo packs for my playgroup to draft and build sealed decks with. It is not a standard format, nor a CORE set in our design.

Alpha Redux initial set is complete (initial design is done, in the process of critiquing, making sure cards are worded properly and in good flavor, renaming where needed) Open to critiques and suggestions for changes at this point before I playtest the set to see where the power gaps are and what is missing essentially. Then I'll add the artwork and move on to Beta. If you want to give it a look, feel free to comment and make suggestions on things I need to change. Thanks!

Quote from SecretInfiltrator

I'm not sure what your guideline for the first set of black cards up there is... You think Dark Ritual, Perish, Sinkhole and Demonic Tutor are good cards to include? I also spy Animate Dead...
I understand that you are okay with printing "power", but you ignore lessons of the previous ten+ years on the topic of color identity (i. e. today's or even "yesterday's" color pie), appropriate costs for a healthy and fun game in the long term as well as how to design fair hosers and complexity.

Also while I appreciate a healthy Metallica reference here and there I just don't see the general appeal of the mechanics you put forth in your new cards; in an unfortunate consistency your designs are showing the same weaknesses as some of your chosen reprints.

On a plus side I'm all for Gravedigger.

---

Another thing I don't understand is how you want the "block" to turn out. Are you trying to make what today basically equals three core sets in succession? That's what I get so far.

It would be nice to have some things cleared up...

I'll try and address each of your comments to the best of my ability.

1) Reprinting Dark Ritual - It is a personal all time favorite of mine (and many of those in my play group) simply for its efficiency. Red continuously gets the mana boosts nowadays, but it shows up sparingly in black still. Remember that I am recreating Alpha first and foremost, a card which Dark Ritual was a part of and a staple in almost everything pre 6th Edition. I do not feel it is overpowered (against the other cards in the set) and is a nice nastalgic inclusion.

2) Perish is up for debate (I personally do not like color hosers) but it was a suggestion from some of those in my play group to include them (a few per color) as old school magic relied on them quite a bit (see the Elemental Blasts, Persecute, Chill, etc also included). This is for them, not for me, and is definitely something I am willing to change when I am closer to compiling everything.

3) Sinkhole - One of my favorite LD spells of all time, simple, efficient and an old school staple as well. While black does not get alot of LD spells anymore, I still felt like giving them this one (but there are no others that directly only destroy lands included).

4) Demonic Tutor - I have always thought Demonic was fair, some people highly disagree, but then again I haven't filled the set with NUTS cards to abuse it. Most people never played with Demonic when it was just a base card with nothing bonkers to do with it. It was quite good, but not broken, and that is my aim here, to have it be quite good, spark nostalgia, and have it not be busted.

5) Animate Dead - Simply there because one of my friends wanted me to put in Worldgorger Dragon (which I have decided to not put in for obvious reasons). I'm on the fence about it's inclusion now, but left it because no one had voiced their opinion, as you can see, for or against it.

As far as the power level of the cards, I stated quite early on that I needed tons of help balancing the set based on the fact that I was going to include the power reprints. I don't want a degenerate block, but then again my strongest assets are not balancing overall power of sets.

As far as the color pie goes, there are a lot of leeching abilities I have noticed and some of that is my fault for not removing the card. I want the colors to define themselves but for the players to also be able to see what else the color is "sometimes" capable of doing without devoting several cards to it (ie Sinkhole and Psionic Blast).

As far as the new cards go, I used Metallica references in the names because I am generally horrible at naming new cards (because I have used so many of my good names on previous builds). They are all subject to change and I felt like using those references might help me create cards in the vein of their title, but they appear somewhat sloppy and misfocused to which I would love opinions on how to improve upon what is currently there, moreso to help fill the gaps in the set for things it needs.

As far as how the "block" is supposed to be, imagine ABU as the first three set block in magic, there is no M94 Edition for base cards, while you see reprints in the above block, they are not technically reprints in this case because I am building the block as if no other cards existed yet in the MTG world. I don't want ABU to be three editions of the same cards like previous. It will be a base block for the beginning of magic that my friends and I want to draft, have block constructed games, etc with.

Lastly, yeah, gravedigger had to get the nod.

Alpha Redux Black has been updated and moved to the OP. It is complete with card listings, rarities, and the proposed new cards. If you have a moment please give it a look and drop a few suggestions. Moving on to Alpha Blue in the meantime. Thanks

The division of the sets has been completed, slots for new cards indicated, i'll compile them into drop down spoilers and put them into the OP as soon as i get a chance. Would really love some feedback on what I have overlooked so far, what cards don't belong, what cards should be here that aren't, and how to go about making the new cards to fill the gaps.

next up is artifacts and lands (reserved for cards)

Alpha Redux Artifacts moved to OP

Beta Redux Artifacts

Unlimited Redux Artifacts

Alpha Redux Lands moved to OP

Beta Redux Lands

Unlimited Redux Lands

next up is white (reserved for cards)

Alpha Redux White moved to OP

Beta Redux White

Unlimited Redux White

next up is red (reserved for cards)

Alpha Redux Red has been move to OP

Beta Redux Red

Unlimited Redux Red