Silly Message Board GamesA forum for any kind of quote games, continuing story games, "What would you do if?" games, or whatever anyone comes up with. Old threads will now expire after one month.
My insistence on properly templating all of my entries finally pays off! A round of applause for everybody else who entered, all of the submissions were certainly unique.
Actually, properly templating would have both abilities directly above one another, not with a line in between...
Faith 4WWWWWW
Creature - Angel Incarnation M
Flying, Lifelink, Protection from Nonwhite
If you have no cards in your hand other than cards named Plains or Faith, you may reveal your hand. If you do, you may exile your hand and all permanents you control rather than pay Faith's mana cost. Those who truly believe have the greatest strength.
7/7
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It's tgva8889. If you can't spell it correctly, just copypasta it, please.
Pokemon White Friend Code: 3353 3706 1386
Thanks to araveugnitsuga for my current Poke-atar.
I'm gonna be against the flow here and say outlined.
What? Everyone else are against the flow too, okay?
Quote:
Originally Posted by The Glyphstone
In the grim statistics of the far future, there is only math.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Kneenibble
Most Hilarious Murderer in the Playground. Both his episodes of hysterically ending my life left me chuckling even hours later when I thought about them.
Lord of the Ossuary 8GWB
Legendary Creature- Plant Zombie
Affinity for Creatures
Convoke
Trample
At the beginning of each upkeep, put a 1/1 Green Saproling token onto the battlefield.
Whenever a creature you control dies, put a +1/+1 counter on Lord of the Ossuary.
When Lord of the Ossuary dies, put a 1/1 Green Saproling token onto the battlefield for each +1/+1 counter on Lord of the Ossuary.
3/3
Spoiler
Yes, this can easily be summoned turn 3. Turn 1: Land, Green one drop. Turn 2: Land, Gather the Townsfolk. Turn 3: Land, Gather the Townsfolk, Lord of the Ossuary with the one untapped black mana you have. Made easier with Dark Ritual. And much, much easier on turn 4.
__________________ Xykon avatar by Elagune. Innistrad, coming soon to a D&D 3.5 game near you!
Last edited by DMofDarkness : 06-26-2012 at 10:33 PM.
Very quirky. The coinflip feels very red, and the effect is very red as well; the triple color commitment doesn't feel out of place. Forecast is an interesting choice for a mechanic, seeing as it was printed only on Azorious cards, but it works well enough. It does restrict your instant to actually being a sorcery, though. Reducing the cost of the card by 7 lucky mana is cute, too.
AgentPaper
Spoiler
Oof. This card is a powerhouse. Still, it's about what you'd expect from a ten mana creature. A flying beatstick that gives you a bunch of dudes each turn is about on par for ten mana. Untapping with this in play is essentially lethal on board. I'm not so sold on the alternate cost, though-three mana a turn to pump all of your creatures by two and give them lifelink seems really, really strong, and kind of undercosted. I'd run this card even if I never planned on actually casting it, solely because the Entreat ability is so strong.
Erik Vale
Spoiler
I'll be honest; this one made me want to gouge my eyeballs out with my thumbs. The templating is a mess, the wording is incorrect, you've invented two new keywords, half the card is far too specific or doesn't do what you intend it to do.
As a piece of advice, I'd browse the gatherer for a little while to try to understand the formatting and basic power levels of cards before you go off designing your dream card.
Tgva8889
Spoiler
I like the intended effect-believing in your deck when it's giving you a poor hand and being rewarded for it, and placing all of your faith in one card as you go all-in. However, it's ludicrously strong-with a land-heavy deck, I could see this coming down turn one; unless your opponent has a turn three O-ring or an early edict effect, it's an autowin. You do get brownie points for flavor text though.
On Templating: Oh you.
Ninjaman
Spoiler
Ouch. Well, it's certainly a very black card. Paying fourteen life for a dude seems kind of steep though, even for suicide black. For that kind of pain I could Channel/cast Emrakul. Still, very flavorful; and it's a fine addition to black's history of huge flying demons that can come down early. One of my only worries is that you're mixing regular colored mana and phyrexian mana, although that's a minor nitpick.
DMofDarkness
Spoiler
I really enjoy this card's flavor; it's very in-character for the WBG wedge, and I like how it rewards you for playing to the wedge's strengths. I'm a little concerned about casting it turn three, however; You have to have a perfect opening hand and have to jump through all sorts of hoops to make it work. I do like the use of Affinity, though; I think there's design space there that could be explored if Wizaards wasn't so afraid of having another Ravager fiasco.
Runner-up:
Spoiler
Tgva8889. I really like the flavor of the card, but it's just a wee bit too strong; slamming it turn one (easy with the right deck) is almost a guaranteed win unless your opponent has a way to get rid of it ASAP or is playing a legacy deck. Very close, though. It's still a good card.
And the winner IIIIIIS.....
Spoiler
BINKS! Your submission met the criteria I set and was, I felt, the most balanced of the submissions. Not as flashy as some of the others, but it just goes to show; bigger isn't always better. I look forward to seeing the challenge you set for us this time!
You would have to design a deck such that your hand consists of entirely cards named Faith or Plains to play it on turn 1...not very easy in any format BUT Legacy. There are quite a few White ways to deal with this guy (Pacifism, Condemn, Path, Swords, Wing Shards all come to mind, in addition to Vindicate, Mortify, Unmake...) If you play it on any later turns, they have access to 4 mana which greatly widens the options. And if they do answer it, you pretty much lose since you have no cards. I think the strength is very high, but not quite ludicrous. Gotta take some risks to advance the game, though!
That said, yeah, I like Bink's card a lot. Definitely a good, fun design. The use of Forecast was definitely interesting. Congrats to the winner!
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Cool. I honestly hadn't even noticed I was reducing it by lucky number 7, I just wanted it to be RRR when you cast it for cheap and 10 mana CMC. Worked out better than I could have planned.
This week's contest - In honor of the M13 pre-release this weekend (woohoo!) make a mono-color legendary creature.
Good Luck!
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Awesome avatar by kaptainkrutch.
Ralia, Persistent Guardian 1WW
Legendary Creature - Human Soldier R
If a source would deal damage to Ralia, Persistent Guardian or a creature you control and it is the first such source that turn, prevent that damage. (If multiple sources deal damage simultaneously, choose only one to prevent.) "Stand behind my shield."
2/3
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Pokemon White Friend Code: 3353 3706 1386
Thanks to araveugnitsuga for my current Poke-atar.
Brava, the Conquerer 2RR
Legendary Creature - Human Warrior R
Haste
Whenever Brava, the Conquerer attacks, defending player divides their creatures into two piles. All creatures in a pile of your choice can’t block this turn. Divide and...well you get the idea.
4/3
Mundural the Strange 3UU
Legendary Creature-Human Wizard
If a player would draw a card, instead that player puts the bottom card of their library into their hand.
UUU, T: Put target creature on top of its owner's library.
1/3
So, seeing as this forum is much more geared towards being social and having fun than the one this contest came from, I'm thinking maybe we can relax the rules on commenting on cards before the contest is over. My only request is that the judge not take part in these discussions, and that we come up with some way to distinguish the entries themselves. Put them in bold perhaps? Or we could put the conversations in spoilers? This might make people feel better about posting entries when they're not confident in their skills, since others are more likely to offer help.
The contest has been going well, so I don't want to shake things up too much, but it seems like a good time to try this out.
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Excellent avatar by Elder Tsofu.
Last edited by AgentPaper : 07-05-2012 at 10:13 PM.
We could discuss the cards after the contest is over for a little while, too. That way the new judge has time to come up with a contest if they need it. Spoilers probably seem like the best idea in any case, though.
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Oslo, the King's Shadow 2BB
Legendary Creature - Human Assassin (R)
Vigilance
Oslo, the King's Shadow is unblockable.
Whenever Oslo, the King's Shadow attacks and isn't blocked, you may tap target creature that player controls have it get -2/-2 until end of turn. If you do, prevent all combat damage Oslo, the King's Shadow would deal this turn.
{1}{B}{B}{Tap}: Destroy target tapped creature.
2/2
Spoiler
I've always felt that Assassins have been underutilized as a tribe, so I decided to make one. I'm abusing the color pie for the sake of flavor here, but I like to think the card still feels very black, what with the killing and all.
Also, if we're discussing entries from previous weeks:
Quote:
Originally Posted by AgentPaper
Basking Rootwall
This should win all the contests by default. Heck, we should have just had the thread locked once it was posted. There's no topping that.
(But seriously, I found this entry much too amusing for my own good.)
Edit: Deciding to give up on this guy for now. I've come to see that what I have in mind here just isn't going to work out. Keeping this post for context, though. I'll have a new entry up soon, hopefully.
Edit 2: Alright, here it is.
Yoltan the Vain - 1UU
Legendary Creature - Human Wizard
The "legend rule" doesn't apply to Yoltan the Vain
{T}: Target creature you control becomes a copy of Yoltan the Vain. (This effect lasts indefinitely.)
Tap three untapped creatures you control named Yoltan the Vain: Target creature becomes a copy of Yoltan the Vain. (This effect lasts indefinitely.)
"You are a wretched, ugly creature; but I am nothing if not generous to those less fortunate than I. Now come- I will make you perfect."
1/2
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G-Man by the wonderful Ceika
Spoiler
Hextech Singed by the amazingly talented (and handsome) Thormag Steam Profile
Last edited by Frankelshtein : 07-12-2012 at 03:05 AM.
Frankelstein, your cards tend to have too many words in their text box to fit into normal cards. You just have cards that do too much. It's highly unwieldy and it makes your designs look weaker, as if you're trying to jam as many abilities onto the card at once rather than letting your cards speak for themselves. The best cards aren't the cards with piles of abilities, the best cards are the ones that do one particularly awesome thing, or maybe two things that work in conjunction.
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Frankelstein, your cards tend to have too many words in their text box to fit into normal cards. You just have cards that do too much. It's highly unwieldy and it makes your designs look weaker, as if you're trying to jam as many abilities onto the card at once rather than letting your cards speak for themselves. The best cards aren't the cards with piles of abilities, the best cards are the ones that do one particularly awesome thing, or maybe two things that work in conjunction.
Spoiler
I suppose I can see where you're coming from here, but I'm of the opinion that text-heavy cards can work if their effects make sense. Take Oslo here as an example. He's basically a harder-workig Royal Assassin. Flavor-wise, he wants to avoid direct combat and has the stealth skills to do so, hence unblockability. Once he's attacked, he can kill or cripple an opponent's creature. Once that's done with, you have the actual assassination ability to finish the job if necessary. The key here is versatility; his abilities can work synergistically together or they can be used separately as you see fit. Oslo is meant to give the player options, to be more than a simple beat stick. Sure, there's a chance that a player might not be able to grasp the intricacies of what's happening on the card at first glance, but that doesn't mean that the card is just a mess of abilities I slapped on there. I put some thought into it, and made a card that I feel is well balanced, somewhat nuanced, and ultimately fun to play with.
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G-Man by the wonderful Ceika
Spoiler
Hextech Singed by the amazingly talented (and handsome) Thormag Steam Profile
The issue isn't that the abilities may or may not work together. It's that the card looks like a mess. So many different things are happening on the same card. At least one of them is completely off-color (Black doesn't get Vigilance). He has four separate lines of abilities that all together take up 8 lines on the card, which is only 1 below the maximum number of lines you can fit into a readable textbox. Making a card do more things at the same time doesn't necessarily make the card design better. It isn't a problem on all cards, but MOST of your designs have this much text.
If the player doesn't get what you're doing, you're doing it wrong. Whether the designer understands it or not, if a basic player can't understand what you're trying to do you're doing too much.
It's also especially problematic that your Legendary Creature doesn't have space for flavor text. How is a new player going to know why your card is important?
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Pokemon White Friend Code: 3353 3706 1386
Thanks to araveugnitsuga for my current Poke-atar.
The issue isn't that the abilities may or may not work together. It's that the card looks like a mess. So many different things are happening on the same card. At least one of them is completely off-color (Black doesn't get Vigilance). He has four separate lines of abilities that all together take up 8 lines on the card, which is only 1 below the maximum number of lines you can fit into a readable textbox. Making a card do more things at the same time doesn't necessarily make the card design better. It isn't a problem on all cards, but MOST of your designs have this much text.
If the player doesn't get what you're doing, you're doing it wrong. Whether the designer understands it or not, if a basic player can't understand what you're trying to do you're doing too much.
It's also especially problematic that your Legendary Creature doesn't have space for flavor text. How is a new player going to know why your card is important?
Spoiler
Now that you mention it, there are some changes I could make to address some of the issues you're seeing. Vigilance I have in there to avoid having to shoehorn in some untap ability to achieve the desired effect. It is a gross violation of the color pie though, I agree with you there. Though I'm not sure I see most players having trouble understanding what the card is meant to do. I mean, when broken down into its component pieces it seems fairly straightforward. Two abilities that can be used in conjunction or seperately. Plenty of cards like this exist within the game already. Teysa, Orzhov Scion is one that springs to mind. While Oslo may have more text, he still has the same two basic abilities that make him what he is. He may not be the most friendly card to someone who is just beginning the game, but then again, most relatively complex cards aren't. Still, doubt the majority of players would have a hard time understanding what the card can do.
As for flavor text, I'm planning on writing that in later. It was late at night when I did this, and I wasn't feeling very inspired.
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G-Man by the wonderful Ceika
Spoiler
Hextech Singed by the amazingly talented (and handsome) Thormag Steam Profile
Now that you mention it, there are some changes I could make to address some of the issues you're seeing. Vigilance I have in there to avoid having to shoehorn in some untap ability to achieve the desired effect. It is a gross violation of the color pie though, I agree with you there. Though I'm not sure I see most players having trouble understanding what the card is meant to do. I mean, when broken down into its component pieces it seems fairly straightforward. Two abilities that can be used in conjunction or seperately. Plenty of cards like this exist within the game already. Teysa, Orzhov Scion is one that springs to mind. While Oslo may have more text, he still has the same two basic abilities that make him what he is. He may not be the most friendly card to someone who is just beginning the game, but then again, most relatively complex cards aren't. Still, doubt the majority of players would have a hard time understanding what the card can do.
As for flavor text, I'm planning on writing that in later. It was late at night when I did this, and I wasn't feeling very inspired.
Spoiler
Good design isn't about what you can add, it's about what can you take away. You seem to have a good idea of what your card is supposed to do. Now, take away everything you possibly can without taking away the core concept. If you can take away most of the text on the card, you've got a good core concept. If you can't, then most likely there's something wrong with your core concept.
For example, a core concept shouldn't be "An assassin who can attack to tap something and then tap to kill that thing". Instead, it should be "An assassin who sneaks behind enemy lines to kill things", or even just "an assassin".
As an aside, I think a good rule of thumb for the comments could be, try to give general advice, rather than make specific suggestions. Instead of saying "Your entry should have haste and reduce it's power by 2", instead discuss the underlying concepts, and let them decide for themselves exactly how to change their card in light of that advice. This way, it's still their card, rather than a collaboration, and they'll learn more if they decide for themselves. The card might not be as good as it could be, but the point isn't to make the card design better, but to make the card designer better.
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Excellent avatar by Elder Tsofu.
Last edited by AgentPaper : 07-06-2012 at 12:24 PM.
I try, but specific examples get across a point better.
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Pokemon White Friend Code: 3353 3706 1386
Thanks to araveugnitsuga for my current Poke-atar.
I'm gonna be against the flow here and say outlined.
What? Everyone else are against the flow too, okay?
Quote:
Originally Posted by The Glyphstone
In the grim statistics of the far future, there is only math.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Kneenibble
Most Hilarious Murderer in the Playground. Both his episodes of hysterically ending my life left me chuckling even hours later when I thought about them.
First Impression - Guardian with something like absorb. Interesting.
Flavor - 4.5/5, Pretty good flavor, certainly feels like a guardian. That said 3 toughness and 2 power seems a little off to me.
Power - 4/5, Good power. I'm a little worried that this might be too powerful against decks that don't have destroy spot removal (IE red and green), but it looks good overall.
Fun - 5/5, That's just a plain cool effect. I can't really say anymore, I love the effect.
Fit - 5/5, Definitely feels legendary and white
Brava, the Conquerer - Agent Paper
Spoiler
First Impression - Interesting. I like the divide and conquer idea, and the power of such an effect is interesting.
Flavor - 4/5, A very aggressive ability and stats to match. 1 point docked for a big flavor mismatch if your opponent has only 1 creature. How are you dividing and conquering a single enemy? And how does that basically make them unable to block? Kind of strange flavor there.
Power - 5/5, Very very powerful against decks have have only a few blockers, far weaker against decks with multiple good blockers or lots of tokens.
Fun - 5/5, Chaotic, rule breaking, and attack encouraging. This is a fun effect.
Fit - 5/5, He feels like a legendary conqueror and his effect is extremely red.
Mundural the Strange - Duos
Spoiler
First Impression - Certainly strange.
Flavor - 3/5, The strangeness reverses your draw location. What I don't get is that UUU T ability, doesn't seem to fit the rest of the design. While it's very intriguing how the card's abilities work together there's no real flavor there that I can see.
Power - 4/5, He's certainly powerful, but his 5 cost and need to untap with him in play to do much of anything weaken him significantly. That said, his tap ability is card advantage, and great card advantage at that generally, so any cheaper and he might be broken.
Fun - 4/5, I can sort of see how breaking this rule could be fun, and he plays amusingly well with scry, but overall he feels kind of bland. Unless someone is messing with the library his top ability is a blank, and his bottom isn't exactly fun. This is blue, however, kind of library manipulation, so you get some points back there.
Fit - 5/5, He feels legendary, if only because he's so weird there can't possibly be more than 1 of him. He also feels very blue, so a perfect fit.
Grand Poobah Burkek - Lady Tialait
Spoiler
First Impression - An Orc leader who's sort of a scaled down version of the Pit Fighter guy. Interesting.
Flavor - 4/5, He's an Orc leader who can single out another creature for combat sort of. Interesting. Personally I think a fight variant would have worked better for his tap but it works wells as is.
Power - 5/5, He's strong but not broken. He buffs a pretty weak tribe, and his tap ability helps clear enemies but has no growth potential, it's always going to be 3 to a creature.
Fun - 4/5, He's not as wacky as some of the other entries but I would certainly enjoy playing him. In some ways his straightforwardness is his strength, while others ask you to change your game completely to accommodate them he's just here to smash faces.
Fit - 5/5, Not only does he feel like a red legend, he feels like an orc too. If I could give bonus points here I would.
Yoltan the Vain - Frankelshtein
Spoiler
First Impression - I always like cards with 'the legend rule doesn't apply' written on them :P. An interesting ability that reminds me a lot of one of the sides of Endless Space.
Flavor - 4.5/5, He makes other people like him. Why does it take 3 of him to effect any enemy creature is my only question
Power - 4/5, He's a bit weak to be making your entire army copies of him, would probably be better as a more expensive but more powerful creature. I understand that's part of the point but it makes the card read as so much less powerful than if he cost more but had better stats.
Fun - 4/5, Major points for a fun ability, points docked for his ability basically stalling the entire gameboard as everything becomes 1/2s and can't attack for fear of double blocking
Fit - 5/5, Definitely feels like a mad blue wizard. Doesn't feel quite as unique as the other legends, but that's clearly on purpose.
Athernix, Lord of the Æther - Ninjaman
Spoiler
First Impression - Bounce guy with a built in untap? Interesting.
Flavor - 4/5, Why does being lord of the aether make him able to untap? The bounce aspect makes perfect sense but I'm not 100% seeing this.
Power - 5/5, Expensive to bounce enemy creatures, but that's how it should be. Pay 6 and nothing else -> Return a creature to your opponents hand is pretty reasonable, and Pay 3/don't do it again this turn -> Bounce is alright.
Fun - 4/5, He almost has too much going on, do you use him to save your creatures or bounce your opponents? He's fantastic in a draw-go or ninjitsu deck but not too much fun outside of those two.
Fit - 5/5, Definitely feels like a mad blue wizard and a master of the aether.
Man...you people like your blue wizards it seems :P. And you made it very hard on me with how great all of the cards were. The difference between first and second is extremely tiny, it really could have gone either way...
The winner is Agent Paper with Brava, the Conquerer but a special thanks to everyone for such awesome and fun cards.
__________________
Awesome avatar by kaptainkrutch.
On flavor: I wasn't really worrying about it that much, but it does make some sense: You're dividing the creature and it's owner, to conquer it's owner.
Regardless, thank you for the win. I'll have a challenge up sometime today, as soon as I figure out a good one.
This week's challenge: Drawing from one of the more popular games on the site I drew this one from, you will take a common card from the latest set (M13), and create a Mythic Rare version of that card. The cards you can choose from are:
Ajani's Sunstriker Archaeomancer Bloodhunter Bat Goblin Battle Jester Spiked Baloth
You don't necessarily need to keep any of the details from the original, you can change the name, cost, stats, effects, even the card type! It should still have ties to it's common version, but exactly how is up to you.
Your cards will be rated on design, development, and flavor. You'll also be docked points if you mess up wording or formatting.
Unstoppable Baloth 3G
Creature-Beast (MR)
Trample
Whenever Unstoppable Baloth attacks, put a +1/+1 counter on it.
Whenever Unstoppable Baloth deals combat damage to an opponent, you may draw cards equal to the number of +1/+1 counters on it.
4/2
Did I actually lose points for a white 2/3 for 3 being unflavorful?
Also, man I forget how much better creatures are these days. All those cards are common now. Wow.
Master Archaeomancer 3UU
Creature - Human Wizard M
When Master Archaeomancer enters the battlefield, you may cast target instant or sorcery card in your graveyard without paying its mana cost.
2/2
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Pokemon White Friend Code: 3353 3706 1386
Thanks to araveugnitsuga for my current Poke-atar.
Bloodhunter Vampire - 3BB
creature - Vampire shaman - M
Flying
When Bloodhunter vampire or another vampire or a bat you control enters the battlefield target player lose 2 life and you gain 2 life
Lifelink The bats return eager to share the feast of blood and gore with him.
2/3
I'm gonna be against the flow here and say outlined.
What? Everyone else are against the flow too, okay?
Quote:
Originally Posted by The Glyphstone
In the grim statistics of the far future, there is only math.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Kneenibble
Most Hilarious Murderer in the Playground. Both his episodes of hysterically ending my life left me chuckling even hours later when I thought about them.
Master Jester - 2RR
Creature - Goblin - M
Whenever you cast a spell, target creature can't block this turn
Whenever an opponent casts a spell, target creature attacks this turn if able Is that goblin dancing? - Last words of Commander Fargold
2/2
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Re: Magic the Gathering - You Make the Card!
