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Magic: the Gathering |OT9| Kaladesh - Cruisin' Down the Street in my 6/4

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2/5, enchantment creature, RWW.

Make it a 4/4

with vigilance

And this flavor text

"I advise you not to touch the fine goods. They can be most unappreciative."

a compromise, I wanted the W to be more prominent in the costs as well but this should in theory come down after a couple enchantments having been played and not see itself as one

EtPtzL8.png
 
I liked the Experience counter thing so I took a stab at it.

2RW
Legendary Creature - Giant, Advisor
Vigilance
Whenever you cast an enchantment spell, you get an experience counter.
At the beginning of your end step, you may pay RW, TAP. If you do, play enchantment card with converted mana cost less than or equal to the number of experience counters you have without paying its mana cost.
3, TAP Remove X experience counters from CARDNAME: Gain X Life.
2/4

2RW
Legendary Creature - Giant, Advisor
Vigilance
Whenever you cast an enchantment spell, you get an experience counter.
If an enchantment you control is targeted by an opponent, you may deal X damage to him or her where X is the number of experience counters you have.
2/4
 

pigeon

Banned
There's no way to make this guy feel good if he's a two-color, two power creature with two abilities that do literally nothing unless you have other cards in play. If you want him to have an ability that counts enchantments, he needs to be an enchantment. I would rather make this guy a non-creature enchantment than a non-enchantment creature.
 

DashReindeer

Lead Community Manager, Outpost Games
a compromise, I wanted the W to be more prominent in the costs as well but this should in theory come down after a couple enchantments having been played and not see itself as one

EtPtzL8.png

I believe the templating is off. The first ability should be:

"Whenever an enchantment you control becomes the target of a spell or ability an opponent controls, Barumn deals X damage to that player where X is the number of enchantments you control."

I'd take off the "you may have" just for brevity's sake. Right now there's quite a lot of text on the card.

Technically, I also think the second ability has to read:

"At the beginning of your end step, you gain X life, where X is the number of enchantments you control."
 
I believe the templating is off. The first ability should be:

"Whenever an enchantment you control becomes the target of a spell or ability an opponent controls, Barumn deals X damage to that player where X is the number of enchantments you control."

I'd take off the "you may have" just for brevity's sake. Right now there's quite a lot of text on the card.

Technically, I also think the second ability has to read:

"At the beginning of your end step, you gain X life, where X is the number of enchantments you control."

You're right, at first I even templated it as "at the end of your turn".

There's no way to make this guy feel good if he's a two-color, two power creature with two abilities that do literally nothing unless you have other cards in play. If you want him to have an ability that counts enchantments, he needs to be an enchantment. I would rather make this guy a non-creature enchantment than a non-enchantment creature.

that's not unusual for commanders. He's supposed to synergise with what your deck does not already by itself
 
Changed it
2RW
Legendary Creature - Giant, Advisor
Vigilance
Whenever you cast an enchantment spell, you get an experience counter.
At the beginning of your end step, you may pay RW, TAP. If you do, play enchantment card with converted mana cost less than or equal to the number of experience counters you have without paying its mana cost.
3, TAP Remove X experience counters from CARDNAME: Gain X Life.
2/4

2RW
Legendary Creature - Giant, Advisor
Vigilance
Whenever you cast an enchantment spell, you get an experience counter.
If an enchantment you control is targeted by an opponent, you may deal X damage to him or her where X is the number of experience counters you have.
3, TAP Remove X experience counters from CARDNAME: Gain X Life.
2/4
 
It is unusual for commanders to feel bad to play because they do nothing useful.

I could mock up a deck that would get quite some use out of him there's a lot of good cheap white enchantments combined with some of the enchantment creatures and you got a commander that protects your board from spot removal and keeps you healthy.
 

Yeef

Member
Cube people I have a question for you: How many archetypes can a cube support? Does this number change with the size of my cube?

My current plan for a low-power "cards I either have lying around or are below 1€" cube has 10 archetypes (one for each colorpair) but some of them will work decent together so you could pick cards from a similar archetype or go ahead and build a 3-color deck (example: WR would be tokens and BR a value-sacrifice deck so if you want to sac some goblin tokens or even play full out Mardu, go ahead!). Can this work in a 360 cube? If yes, can I possibly cram in an all-color morph and/or all-color energy theme (as some of the morph and newly spoiled energy cards go quite well in various archetypes but I feel these mechanics are too big to just be there as a two-of or something) as well?
When building archetypes, be sure to choose archetypes that work well together. Try to load up on cards that fit into multiple archetypes. If you have too many cards that are only good in their archetype decks, it'll make the drafts feel like they're on rails. Likewise, you don't want too many cards that are just generically good and don't fit into any archetype. You want some, of course, but if there's too many the archetypes won't matter at all.

Another thing to keep in mind is that every limited format has what I like to call a magic number. It's the amount of toughness a creature needs to avoid most removal and survive most combats. After you do a first pass on your cube, it's a good idea to keep it in mind as you make edits. Sometimes you need to cut back on the power of removal if your creature base isn't as flexible. If all of the best creatures for your archetypes have 3 or less toughness, you don't want to fill your cube with too much cheap burn that deals 3 or more damage, for example.

One other thing is, when working with archetypes, make sure you understand what sort of deck the archetype wants to be. Let's take UR spells, as an example, since it's a pretty popular archetype. There's multiple ways to build it into your cube. You can go the combo route and lean towards storm (or something like it) where you're trying to get a critical mass of spells on a single turn. You can build it as a more tempo/aggro base where you have lots of prowess creatures and ways to get them in. You can build a more controlling version that uses early defenders and incremental advantages from cards like Prescient Chimera or Docent of Perfection to take over the board.

Keep in mind what sorts of decks your archetypes want to be and how they play against the other archetypes.
 

ajf009

Member
I think it would be really cool if instead of wasting cardboard Wizards would print relavent (to the story) flavour text on lands. Maybe even specific to the land pictured
 

Yeef

Member
Cr4WAytVYAAM8db.png


rough translation: ~ 2BB enchantment

~ enters the battlefield with 7 time counters.

At the beginning of your draw step, you draw an additional card and remove two time counters from ~.

Your maximum hand size is equal to the number of time counters on ~.

Whenever you discard a card, you lose 1 life.
 
If the actual translation shows that you only draw an extra card if you removed any time counters, this could be good with Harmless Offering. Otherwise, getting a maximum hand size of 0 seems like a worthwhile downside for an extra card every turn.
 
That seems unbelievably awful if that translation is right.

It basically boils down to "Draw two cards during your draw step, discard your hand at the end of your turn". It's powerful in the right deck but decks that plan on emptying their hand every turn usually don't devote slots to 4 mana enchantments.

Avaricious Dragon did the same thing and was on a 4/4 flying body. I can't imagine this goes anywhere.
 
It basically boils down to "Draw two cards during your draw step, discard your hand at the end of your turn". It's powerful in the right deck but decks that plan on emptying their hand every turn usually don't devote slots to 4 mana enchantments.

You get a max hand size of 5, then 3, then 1, before you go down to 0. There's leeway if you can't empty your hand right away.
 

Ashodin

Member
Huh?

That card says

Turn 1: Hand size 7
Turn 2: Draw a card, Hand size 5
Turn 3: Draw a card, Hand size 3
Turn 4: Draw a card, Hand size 1
Turn 5: Draw a card, Hand size 0

In the right deck, it could be powerful. Madness decks, in fact. You'd have Harmless Offering as a backup. More targets to give away for the Cat Pact deck seems pretty cool.
 
You get a max hand size of 5, then 3, then 1, before you go down to 0. There's leeway if you can't empty your hand right away.

Yes but control and midrange decks aren't ever going to want their hand size at 0. Maybe you try to close a match out with this but there are much better cards at doing that and they don't carry a serious downside. And aggro decks don't want to spend turn 4 casting enchantments that don't effect the board.
 

Yeef

Member
For casual play, it's a decent card is you have a spellbook effect (though I think you'd still generally prefer Phyrexian Arena).
 

Yeef

Member
If two things are dictating your maximum hand size, which do you go with?
It goes in timestamp order. The most recent will be the one that applies.

In this case, though, it only applies to things that increase or decrease your hand size by a certain amount (like Minamo Scrollkeeper) or set it to a certain amount (Recycle). Things that say you have no maximum hand size essentially override any other modifications.
 

Yeef

Member
Cr4fTk0VMAQz0DA.jpg


2W
Instant
Exile target creature you control, then return that card to the battlefield under its owner's control.
Draw a card.
 

ajf009

Member
a compromise, I wanted the W to be more prominent in the costs as well but this should in theory come down after a couple enchantments having been played and not see itself as one

EtPtzL8.png


I love this if you make it 1UWW instead. But that's just me. I guess that doesn't fit the colour pie to a T, but damn it works in my UW enchantment deck
 
A lot of people have been addressing the fact that Kaladesh, despite giving the appearance of at least partially being an Indian set, has absolutely no Indian mythology or culture at all, most notably in this blog post. The issues are:
* Very few Western properties choose to depict anything based on Indian mythology, and Kaladesh made people hope that Magic would do it in a respectful way.
* Instead, Kaladesh's Indianness is used just for window dressing. Nothing about the world or culture is particularly Indian. It's clear they did this to avoid controversy, but being colorblind isn't good either.
* It's very unlikely that after making Kaladesh a "20% Indian world", they'd make another world that's actually based on Indian mythology.

MaRo has said that people at Wizards have read that post and have been discussing it a lot, and he asks for more responses here.

My opinion of the blog post is that the intercutting with stories of his life growing up was laying it on a bit thick, but he makes a really good point. In particular, I had previously assumed that Kaladesh was too positive to have demons and that's why we had no rakshasas, but nope, we have a plain old demon. And the gremlins could have very easily been swapped out for monkeys that go around destroying artifacts.

I think the most likely outcome is that with Return to Kaladesh, things will suddenly get a lot more Indian. There's an easy out for Wizards, in that this set is focusing mainly on Ghirapur and city life. We could easily have rakshasas, monkeys, nagas, and yes, bear people, if the return block chooses to leave the cities, or they decide to move in. After all, they did find a way for Return to Ravnica to suddenly have merfolk.
 

twobear

sputum-flecked apoplexy
It stuck out to me a bit that the planeswalker from the Indian subcontinent themed plane, Chandra, is Caucasian as heck.
 

kirblar

Member
A lot of people have been addressing the fact that Kaladesh, despite giving the appearance of at least partially being an Indian set, has absolutely no Indian mythology or culture at all, most notably in this blog post. The issues are:
* Very few Western properties choose to depict anything based on Indian mythology, and Kaladesh made people hope that Magic would do it in a respectful way.
* Instead, Kaladesh's Indianness is used just for window dressing. Nothing about the world or culture is particularly Indian. It's clear they did this to avoid controversy, but being colorblind isn't good either.
* It's very unlikely that after making Kaladesh a "20% Indian world", they'd make another world that's actually based on Indian mythology.

MaRo has said that people at Wizards have read that post and have been discussing it a lot, and he asks for more responses here.

My opinion of the blog post is that the intercutting with stories of his life growing up was laying it on a bit thick, but he makes a really good point. In particular, I had previously assumed that Kaladesh was too positive to have demons and that's why we had no rakshasas, but nope, we have a plain old demon. And the gremlins could have very easily been swapped out for monkeys that go around destroying artifacts.

I think the most likely outcome is that with Return to Kaladesh, things will suddenly get a lot more Indian. There's an easy out for Wizards, in that this set is focusing mainly on Ghirapur and city life. We could easily have rakshasas, monkeys, nagas, and yes, bear people, if the return block chooses to leave the cities, or they decide to move in. After all, they did find a way for Return to Ravnica to suddenly have merfolk.
The problem they have is that it's very easy to use a dead religion or culture.

It's very difficult to use a real one. (And no, Shinto doesn't count.) Look at Josie in Tekken 7 or "Kiora Atua" - it's so easy to accidentally fuck something up due to a lack of cultural nuance that the safe route is not attempting it.
 
The problem they have is that it's very easy to use a dead religion or culture.

It's very difficult to use a real one. (And no, Shinto doesn't count.) Look at Josie in Tekken 7 or "Kiora Atua" - it's so easy to accidentally fuck something up due to a lack of cultural nuance that the safe route is not attempting it.

But that hasn't stopped them from using angels and demons and djinn and plenty of other religion and/or cultural based creature types, for starters. Let's be honest, the reason for it missing in Kaladesh is almost certainly more because "no one would get it" than anything else. As the blog post points out, we haven't even seen normal animals that would be associated with India. Maybe those exist in the full set but not having seen any so far isn't exactly a good sign.
 

Crocodile

Member
A lot of people have been addressing the fact that Kaladesh, despite giving the appearance of at least partially being an Indian set, has absolutely no Indian mythology or culture at all, most notably in this blog post. The issues are:
* Very few Western properties choose to depict anything based on Indian mythology, and Kaladesh made people hope that Magic would do it in a respectful way.
* Instead, Kaladesh's Indianness is used just for window dressing. Nothing about the world or culture is particularly Indian. It's clear they did this to avoid controversy, but being colorblind isn't good either.
* It's very unlikely that after making Kaladesh a "20% Indian world", they'd make another world that's actually based on Indian mythology.

MaRo has said that people at Wizards have read that post and have been discussing it a lot, and he asks for more responses here.

My opinion of the blog post is that the intercutting with stories of his life growing up was laying it on a bit thick, but he makes a really good point. In particular, I had previously assumed that Kaladesh was too positive to have demons and that's why we had no rakshasas, but nope, we have a plain old demon. And the gremlins could have very easily been swapped out for monkeys that go around destroying artifacts.

I think the most likely outcome is that with Return to Kaladesh, things will suddenly get a lot more Indian. There's an easy out for Wizards, in that this set is focusing mainly on Ghirapur and city life. We could easily have rakshasas, monkeys, nagas, and yes, bear people, if the return block chooses to leave the cities, or they decide to move in. After all, they did find a way for Return to Ravnica to suddenly have merfolk.

I guess they found themselves in a damned if you do damned if you don't situation - in trying to be as inoffensive as possible, they failed to meet the expectations of even those most likely and most justified in potentially being offended. Not the first time in media this has happened and not the last. You hire cultural advisors for this exact reason, and they did, but they clearly played it extra safe (as they are oft to do in every scenario that isn't specifically Magic design) and got bit. As you say though its not the end of the world - listen to feedback and improve for a hypothetical "Return to Kaladesh".
 

ultron87

Member
So you hit a Flickerwisp and an Emrakul. If they pick Emrakul, you just flicker it and get it back under your control at end of turn. If they pick Flickerwisp, you have an Emrakul.
 

duxstar

Member
Its a green card so let me try to defend it ....

Well what if you cast emrakul and this in the same turn then YOU get to ... wait no, play an eldrazi displacer then this and then ...

Nope cant do it card is bad. I'm sure Seth better known as Saffron Olive will have fun with this card though
 
I1ZLju2.png


What everyone's been waiting for, a CoCo variant. But like also probably bad, outside some weird combo w/ flickering.

My first thought is that this is a really bad card. That being said, the effect is powerful and quirky enough that it certainly seems like it could be possible to do some really silly things with it. The fact that it's a sorcery holds it back some, of course. People will try to find a way to break this card and it's an open question as to whether or not they'll succeed.
 

Angry Grimace

Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
"Probably bad" is an understatement.

I think the idea is that this is a total build-around, but its mostly just superbad Collected Company. Like how do you build around your opponent getting the better of two creatures?

The fact that they put that the card is "dubious" in the title is funny though.
 

kirblar

Member
But that hasn't stopped them from using angels and demons and djinn and plenty of other religion and/or cultural based creature types, for starters. Let's be honest, the reason for it missing in Kaladesh is almost certainly more because "no one would get it" than anything else. As the blog post points out, we haven't even seen normal animals that would be associated with India. Maybe those exist in the full set but not having seen any so far isn't exactly a good sign.
But no one is going to make noise about Angels or Djinn.

You put a 4-armed Vedalken in and people probably lose their minds. It's easy to use dead cultures. It's hard to use living ones.
 

ultron87

Member
Woooooo basically Mulldrifter. Evoking it has always been giving up anyway.

And Blue/White possibly having a flicker subtheme excites me. Because that's my favorite mechanic.
 
I guess they found themselves in a damned if you do damned if you don't situation - in trying to be as inoffensive as possible, they failed to meet the expectations of even those most likely and most justified in potentially being offended. Not the first time in media this has happened and not the last. You hire cultural advisors for this exact reason, and they did, but they clearly played it extra safe (as they are oft to do in every scenario that isn't specifically Magic design) and got bit. As you say though its not the end of the world - listen to feedback and improve for a hypothetical "Return to Kaladesh".

Honestly, I see this as marketing's problem and not design's problem. Magic has been a fairly diverse game since its inception. There's always been experts brought on for world design, and there's always been a fairly diverse representation of races and orientations on cards. The only difference now is that marketing is seeing that they can slap buzzwords on it and get all kinds of attention for it. I shudder to think how hard they'd lean into Volrath if his storyline showed up today (check out the art for unmask for the short and sweet on that). I also noticed that Kaladesh wasn't actually particularly Indian, which means it probably shouldn't have been marketed heavily as that, but the political climate gives them huge incentive to do it anyways.
 

darkside31337

Tomodachi wa Mahou
en_ZtsvorutNk.png


Potential standard staple!

en_7imxJLicMd.png

Both of these cards will see lots of standard play. Copter is really slick. Crew cost is just easy to turn on with pretty much all the relevant planeswalkers. Starting to think there might be enough vehicles to make a Depala deck work.
 
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