Just had a fun idea for a Planeswalker and thought I would share.
Moengroth, Fungusaur Ascendant 1GG
Planeswalker - Moengroth
If combat damage would be dealt to Moengroth on your turn, prevent that damage and put that many loyalty counters on it.
[0]: This turn, creatures you control can attack Moengroth as though an opponent controls it.
[-X]: Put X 1/1 green Saproling creature tokens onto the battlefield.
[2]
So, there might be some rules issues with attacking your own Planeswalkers (especially if you block your own creatures), but I thought it's at least a cool idea. The Fungusaur flavor more or less requires that you beat him up in order for him to grow, and it has synergy with his -X ability. I think actual attacking is necessary for the flavor to work, since "Tap an untapped creature you control" just wouldn't make it clear that he works like a normal Fungusaur. Also, this doesn't require a mountain of text, so I think it's elegant, provided that the rules could be made to accomodate it.
Sabotage Specialist1B
Creature - Human Rogue
Whenever ~ deals combat damage to a player, you may sacrifice it. If you do, that player discards two cards.
2/1
Do you guys really doubt that a deck could be built around Fractured Crypt? If I were to reanimate, say, Iona, Shield of Emeria, Platinum Emperion, and Decree of Silence, what would be the likelihood of my losing that game?
How about Warstorm Surge and two giant creatures with combined power over 20? Do you really think it would be hard to set this up consistently by turn 4? Does no one remember Replenish?
Wanderer's Woods
Land
:symtap:: Add one mana to your mana pool of any type that a basic land you control could produce. Spend some time wandering in these woods, and you'll see yourself more clearly than any reflection.
Scepter of Divinity
Artifact - Equipment
Equipped creature has ":1mana:, :symtap:: You gain 5 life" and doesn't untap during its controller's untap step.
Equip
Tarnished Powerstone4
Artifact
As long as ~ is untapped, the first artifact spell cast each turn costs less to cast.
As long as ~ is tapped, the first non-artifact spell cast each turn costs an additional to cast.
:2mana:: Tap ~.
Phoenix Egg2R
Creature - Egg
When ~ dies, put a 2/2 red Phoenix creature token with flying and haste onto the battlefield.
Whenever a Phoenix you control dies, you may return ~ from your graveyard to your hand.
0/2
This new system isn't perfect, and I'm not sure I like the emphasis on farming. Nonetheless, it does fix the biggest problem with the old ratings system, so I feel that it's a step in the right direction. Overall, I support it.
There are literally no GPs or PTQs in the country I live in. Before that was okay, I can improve my rating at FNMs and local tourneys and travel to bigger venues when I have the time. The odds are bad, but in theory a person can push their rating up this way. Under the new system it's impossible; players in small countries are enormously disadvantaged by this policy.
That sucks, but if your country has a Nationals (69 countries do), then you can use that to qualify for Worlds.
Otherwise, it seems that you are disadvantaged by this system, as is anyone who can't afford to travel for Grand Prix.
On the other hand, if you are unable to travel to any really competitive events, then a high rating alone might not be a good indication that you are a strong player anyway. Beating up on a weak local metagame isn't necessarily the best way to qualify for anything.
Maybe some kind of compromise could be had...like, if Nationals tournaments allowed players from small surrounding countries to compete. Hopefully you can make it to at least one.
This card could have been red and it would've been fine. It would've added a new element to red decks in eternal formats, giving red an actually decent mechanic instead of increasing the already excessive number of playable blue cards.
It wouldn't even have been anything particularly new. Red occasionally gets similar cards, like Recoup and Surreal Memoir.
Seriously, all I ever see are good blue cards. It's ridiculous that blue is considered to be "thought-provoking, wise, and strategic." This is a STRATEGY game, for heaven's sake. If the point of the game is to win, you can't make "win" the flavor of a color. It's ridiculous. Red, on the other hand, has underpowered random effects, which is the exact opposite of anything anyone wants to do in any strategy game.
I agree about this and also about Flash. Furthermore, I think they should move the "extra turn" mechanic out of blue entirely, and make it primarily red and green. The flavor of "I'm gonna move faster than you" would be a good fit for red, and "I influence the seasons and rhythms of nature" would work for green.
are you serious bro? Blue is the teachers pet since 1993. The power 9 are 6 artifacts and THREE blue spells.
Indeed. At least the problem isn't as bad as it used to be.
that prejudge always bothered me to hell. Aggro is no easier to play than control, I can resume control to "not play good cards now, leave mana open for counterspell" liek you did with burn and it'll be childish.
Theres autopilot for every archtype.
Aggro decks can be difficult to play, but they are far more forgiving. In other words, if you were to take an aggro deck and a control deck which are equally matched in the hands of great players, the control deck will perform worse in the hands of a less experienced pilot. Not always, of course, but it's generally true.
Anyways, I'm off to bed and don't have time for 16 more pages of this thread.
You couldn't be more wrong. Many board game designers HAVE to consider color blind folks because it's far more common than you think. It's honestly one of the #1 reasons a game becomes unplayable to someone. While I think that this isn't as big of an issue here, as for the most part the cards stay the same color... it's still going to show up being an issue for the cards that switch color. Might not be as big of a whoops in tournament play since folks really do memorize cards on that scene, but on the casual tables and your local FNM drafts it most certainly will be (esp if there are "color matters" cards that appear.
You have utterly misunderstood the point of what I was saying, which is pretty much exactly the opposite of what you seem to have thought you were reading. I agree that game designers should consider the colorblind, and was ranting about the fact that many people here seem to think they shouldn't bother.
Aside: a pet peeve of mine is the use of lines like "more common than you think." You do not know what I think about the prevalence of colorblindness, and I made no claim about it that would inform your speculation on the subject in any meaningful way. Please do not just assume that your audience is ignorant when you have no clue about what they do or don't know. In particular, it would behoove you to avoid doing so while demonstrating a lack of reading comprehension.
Sorry if that sounded nasty. I know we all have our airhead moments.
in addition - the planar chaos card frames were easily distinguishable from each other even in black and white, because of their textures.... the new card frames are not. so i would also ask them what they were thinking when they scrapped them.
(example; mana tithe vs essence warden... look at that difference! it's striking!)
I'm glad you mentioned this. It is my opinion that the Planar Chaos frames (and the Future Sight ones for that matter) are better than the ones they use regularly now, for this reason and also aesthetically. I wish WotC would revisit those.
I have two problems with the colorblindness argument coming from a family full of color blindness.
1) all of the backgrounds on the different colored cards are different. A red card has a different background then a red card. If you don't have color to rely on to identify a card or, say, a token (zomg, colorblind people dont't know what color tokens are!!1!) you will pick up on these other subtlties and be just fine.
They are different enough for experienced players who have spent some time looking at them. It's a disadvantage in learning the game for others.
2) a colorblind person can very easily turn to a friend and say "what color is this?" problem solved. It's not like he has no memory. He's just colorblind, he'll cope. This argument is a bad thing to get up in arms about.
At a tournament, you can't. You could call a judge, but you shouldn't have to. It's a waste of your time and could have been easily avoided. It also might reveal something about your thought process to your opponent.
And for all those saying "you can't do that without the text becoming microtext"... maybe that's a sign that the transformers, should not have came to be in the first place.
I'm ok with DFC's and the transform mechanic, but I partially agree with you in the sense that they shouldn't design cards that they can't template properly.
I can't believe anyone is actually defending the color indicators with regard to accommodation of the colorblind. It's like you're going out of your way to be insensitive.
Yeah, the whole thing isn't a big deal. We get that and I bet even the colorblind among us would agree. However, it seems like the only real points on one side of the argument are saying that the whole thing isn't important and that anyone who thinks this is an issue at all should just get over it. It seems that many people are failing to make the distinction between "this is not an issue of utterly critical importance" and "this is an issue which deserves no consideration at all."
Really...I know a lot of you don't care and some of you even seem to be annoyed at the idea that Wizards should cater to colorblind people at all, but can anyone make a convincing argument that the presentation of these cards is actually better than it would be if there were an additional indicator (like, say, a watermark, or having the night symbol be shaped like a mana symbol)? Not just an argument that the way they did it is fine and we shouldn't worry about it, but an argument that this is actually better than a clearer visual cue that everyone can understand.
I'm also not moved by the argument that Garruk doesn't have room in his text box. First of all, we've had a planeswalker with four abilities before, so there obviously is room for some extra text. Secondly, a watermark or an alteration to the night symbol wouldn't need to take up any space at all. And finally, if they really can't find a better way to convey his color identity than what they did, then they should have designed the card differently. He could either become mono-black or remain mono-green in his transformed state. The multicolored identity really isn't necessary to convey the flavor information, especially in a setting where lots of green cards are going to be cursed and creepy anyways.
The last straw for me is that these dots have a fairly simple job to do and aren't even doing it well. There is no indication on the card itself what it's supposed to mean. Indeed, when we first saw these spoiled without the rules, it wasn't obvious even to the large and experienced community on this site. The fact that players have to be apprised of the rules regarding these indicators is a good indication that they are making the cards more, not less, difficult to understand. If you have to look up what the indicators mean, then it's an utter failure to communicate clearly. Seriously, this is about as clear and efficient as if we had to look up the color of each card on a rules insert. Saikuba said it quite well:
If they want people to see it, why not make it a bit clearer what the purpose of the dot is?
The first time I saw a "color indicator" on a double faced card, I got confused and had to go to the rules. I certainly didn't think "well, this card is green but now it flipped and so this dot means that it is still green."
Most players are going to get the color information from the frame and not the dot. The dot serves a somewhat arcane purpose that will only confuse the average player. The one group of people who can't easily get the color from the frame, that is to say color blind people, can't get the color from the indicator dot either. So I'm not sure who "needs" to see the dot.
All that the dot needs to do is to be somewhere on the card to serve its hack job function. If they wanted the dot to clearly remind the players of the color, they just should have wrote "CARDNAME is COLOR" which is as clear as it possibly could be and works just fine for the colorblind.
Scarbane Dragon4RR
Creature - Dragon (R)
Flying, wither, protection from creatures with -1/-1 counters on them 3R: ~ deals 1 damage to target creature.
5/5
I would actually rather see that protection and ping combo of abilities on a guy without flying, so that you can use the protection to get him past blockers. Even so, that's a pretty awesome card.
Predatory InstinctBG
Whenever a creature dies, put a +1/+1 counter on each creature you control that dealt damage to it this turn.
:2mana::symr:: Target creature gains first strike and provoke until end of turn.
Moengroth, Fungusaur Ascendant 1GG
Planeswalker - Moengroth
If combat damage would be dealt to Moengroth on your turn, prevent that damage and put that many loyalty counters on it.
[0]: This turn, creatures you control can attack Moengroth as though an opponent controls it.
[-X]: Put X 1/1 green Saproling creature tokens onto the battlefield.
[2]
So, there might be some rules issues with attacking your own Planeswalkers (especially if you block your own creatures), but I thought it's at least a cool idea. The Fungusaur flavor more or less requires that you beat him up in order for him to grow, and it has synergy with his -X ability. I think actual attacking is necessary for the flavor to work, since "Tap an untapped creature you control" just wouldn't make it clear that he works like a normal Fungusaur. Also, this doesn't require a mountain of text, so I think it's elegant, provided that the rules could be made to accomodate it.
Maybe there's a better way to do this? Discuss.
Creature - Human Rogue
Whenever ~ deals combat damage to a player, you may sacrifice it. If you do, that player discards two cards.
2/1
How about Warstorm Surge and two giant creatures with combined power over 20? Do you really think it would be hard to set this up consistently by turn 4? Does no one remember Replenish?
Land
:symtap:: Add one mana to your mana pool of any type that a basic land you control could produce.
Spend some time wandering in these woods, and you'll see yourself more clearly than any reflection.
Next: Wild Wish
Enchantment
Permanents you control have protection from multicolored.
Artifact - Equipment
Equipped creature has ":1mana:, :symtap:: You gain 5 life" and doesn't untap during its controller's untap step.
Equip
Sorcery
Destroy all creatures with less than 5 power.
Next: Sunspear Shikari in Portal 3K
Artifact
As long as ~ is untapped, the first artifact spell cast each turn costs
As long as ~ is tapped, the first non-artifact spell cast each turn costs an additional
:2mana:: Tap ~.
Phoenix Egg 2R
Creature - Egg
When ~ dies, put a 2/2 red Phoenix creature token with flying and haste onto the battlefield.
Whenever a Phoenix you control dies, you may return ~ from your graveyard to your hand.
0/2
*shrug*
To each his/her own.
That sucks, but if your country has a Nationals (69 countries do), then you can use that to qualify for Worlds.
Otherwise, it seems that you are disadvantaged by this system, as is anyone who can't afford to travel for Grand Prix.
On the other hand, if you are unable to travel to any really competitive events, then a high rating alone might not be a good indication that you are a strong player anyway. Beating up on a weak local metagame isn't necessarily the best way to qualify for anything.
Maybe some kind of compromise could be had...like, if Nationals tournaments allowed players from small surrounding countries to compete. Hopefully you can make it to at least one.
It wouldn't even have been anything particularly new. Red occasionally gets similar cards, like Recoup and Surreal Memoir.
I agree about this and also about Flash. Furthermore, I think they should move the "extra turn" mechanic out of blue entirely, and make it primarily red and green. The flavor of "I'm gonna move faster than you" would be a good fit for red, and "I influence the seasons and rhythms of nature" would work for green.
An ironic comment if ever there were one. Blue cards get banned so often precisely because they are overpowered.
This is exactly the problem. When one color has a near-monopoly on "smart," you end up with the other 80% of the game being dumbed down.
Indeed. At least the problem isn't as bad as it used to be.
Aggro decks can be difficult to play, but they are far more forgiving. In other words, if you were to take an aggro deck and a control deck which are equally matched in the hands of great players, the control deck will perform worse in the hands of a less experienced pilot. Not always, of course, but it's generally true.
Anyways, I'm off to bed and don't have time for 16 more pages of this thread.
You have utterly misunderstood the point of what I was saying, which is pretty much exactly the opposite of what you seem to have thought you were reading. I agree that game designers should consider the colorblind, and was ranting about the fact that many people here seem to think they shouldn't bother.
Aside: a pet peeve of mine is the use of lines like "more common than you think." You do not know what I think about the prevalence of colorblindness, and I made no claim about it that would inform your speculation on the subject in any meaningful way. Please do not just assume that your audience is ignorant when you have no clue about what they do or don't know. In particular, it would behoove you to avoid doing so while demonstrating a lack of reading comprehension.
Sorry if that sounded nasty. I know we all have our airhead moments.
I'm glad you mentioned this. It is my opinion that the Planar Chaos frames (and the Future Sight ones for that matter) are better than the ones they use regularly now, for this reason and also aesthetically. I wish WotC would revisit those.
They are different enough for experienced players who have spent some time looking at them. It's a disadvantage in learning the game for others.
At a tournament, you can't. You could call a judge, but you shouldn't have to. It's a waste of your time and could have been easily avoided. It also might reveal something about your thought process to your opponent.
I'm ok with DFC's and the transform mechanic, but I partially agree with you in the sense that they shouldn't design cards that they can't template properly.
Yeah, the whole thing isn't a big deal. We get that and I bet even the colorblind among us would agree. However, it seems like the only real points on one side of the argument are saying that the whole thing isn't important and that anyone who thinks this is an issue at all should just get over it. It seems that many people are failing to make the distinction between "this is not an issue of utterly critical importance" and "this is an issue which deserves no consideration at all."
Really...I know a lot of you don't care and some of you even seem to be annoyed at the idea that Wizards should cater to colorblind people at all, but can anyone make a convincing argument that the presentation of these cards is actually better than it would be if there were an additional indicator (like, say, a watermark, or having the night symbol be shaped like a mana symbol)? Not just an argument that the way they did it is fine and we shouldn't worry about it, but an argument that this is actually better than a clearer visual cue that everyone can understand.
I'm also not moved by the argument that Garruk doesn't have room in his text box. First of all, we've had a planeswalker with four abilities before, so there obviously is room for some extra text. Secondly, a watermark or an alteration to the night symbol wouldn't need to take up any space at all. And finally, if they really can't find a better way to convey his color identity than what they did, then they should have designed the card differently. He could either become mono-black or remain mono-green in his transformed state. The multicolored identity really isn't necessary to convey the flavor information, especially in a setting where lots of green cards are going to be cursed and creepy anyways.
The last straw for me is that these dots have a fairly simple job to do and aren't even doing it well. There is no indication on the card itself what it's supposed to mean. Indeed, when we first saw these spoiled without the rules, it wasn't obvious even to the large and experienced community on this site. The fact that players have to be apprised of the rules regarding these indicators is a good indication that they are making the cards more, not less, difficult to understand. If you have to look up what the indicators mean, then it's an utter failure to communicate clearly. Seriously, this is about as clear and efficient as if we had to look up the color of each card on a rules insert. Saikuba said it quite well:
I would actually rather see that protection and ping combo of abilities on a guy without flying, so that you can use the protection to get him past blockers. Even so, that's a pretty awesome card.
Predatory Instinct BG
Whenever a creature dies, put a +1/+1 counter on each creature you control that dealt damage to it this turn.
:2mana::symr:: Target creature gains first strike and provoke until end of turn.