Keeper of Balance doesn't specify to that turn which makes it horribly broken in my opinion. It means that your opponent is having every creature they play tapped for 2 turns making defense impossible and lands become use it immediately or lose it for two whole turns rather than just the following turn. If you're on the play your opponent has only 2 mana at best on turns 2 and 3, and 3 at best on turn 4. Of that one of it must be used as the land if played. In addition it's going to be a miserable card to play with. Slows the game down drastically and absolutely punishes decks interested in anything beyond putting cheap permanents onto the board. If it's just meant to be the first of that type and be a fetch land punisher then I can get behind the card but not as written now.
As for Soul Eruption I agree with user_938036 it is either useless in smaller formats or among the best rituals in larger ones. I think that's actually fine but I just want to make sure you realize how powerful it is.
Council's Judgement is great, but it's a sorcery, and costs 3. I feel like this plays a somewhat different role. In comparison to Winds of Abandon or Declaration in Stone this is great. Destroy vs exile is not that big a deal imo.
I already don't cube with those though. I guess for me the comparison is probably Unexpectedly Absent and missing more card types is a point against this even if it is more reliable.
It's good (I have been loving Baleful Mastery and this is very similar) but I don't run much pure removal in white and it's top tier spells are excellent. It probably pushes the last traditional O-Ring out of my list because it can hit walkers but it's in a precarious position.
Edit: I take it back because I had already planned to cut O-Ring when I pick up a Skyclave Apparition. Card is very good but unless it beats out Unexpectedly Absent it's not going to make it for me because I can't imagine cutting anything else for a removal spell at this point.
P.S. Sorry for going off topic and talking about my own list. Hard to evaluate cards without doing that because I have no experience designing above 360 and I don't like making proclamations about things being good for bigger sizes when I don't really know.
As someone that loves aristocrats, I'm really not fan. Aristocrats deck don't actually need 3-4 "Aristocrats". There are a lot of other cards that support go wide strategies that can function as well as an aristocrat.
I can only see this played in the all-in aristocrats variant and even there I don't think its very good.
I don't fully support aristocrats so I'm not too familiar with it as a cube archetype but I would have assumed being an enchantment rather than a creature was a significant upside over Zulaport Cutthroat or Blood Artist and the wrath mode was gravy. Which payoffs do you prefer?
I'm not sold on this one but I think the art might be biasing me. Not a fan.
Instant speed is great but I'm agreeing with Sliver Lord that destroy is a real downside. It beats O-ring variants but I prefer Council's Judgment to it.
Seems great. Not sure how to make space for it because I think I want two Looters like that so definitely not a swap for il kor.
The fact that you can flip it so easily in a tempo deck that want to leave mana up is quite nice. Back side is a pretty must answer threat. Pretty sweet for 2 mana.
It's been good for us but because it's an actual 1/1 it needs either support or a good match up to be relevant more than most creatures.
Edit: the fact that my cube is powered, small, and equipment heavy helps it a lot. Easier to end up in a white weenie deck with thalia, luminarch aspirant, or stoneforge in 360 than at a larger size.
The tokens not blocking is pretty massive. Part of what makes Young Pyro and Sedgemore so good is that each spell is increasing your defense while giving you value. This is much more a purely offensive card. Talrand is probably worse because 4 is a ton of mana. When you have two of these cards this one becomes good but I think it's much worse than MMentor, YP, or the witch without another token maker.
I know it's not the intent but it's kind of cool to have designed a creature that wants to have it's power shrunk. Agree with User_9 that it probably should be Gruul not mono green. At 1RG I think it's still quite a good limited card and I'm not sure it's a constructed card either way.
Edit: I know wotc does it but trolls that small just feels wrong to me from a flavor POV. Trolls should be like giants. At least a 3/3 or bigger imo. But Wotc disagrees and that's just my personal hobby horse.
I really like a lot of these particularly the two Vectiline cards. I was wondering though if Rumblehoof would be better served borrowing exalted as a mechanic? It really captures the idea of the team working together and getting behind one strong champion I think.
The miracle style trigger is a huge downside on this mechanic. Considering you haven't costed for such a significant draw back why no go with the simpler channel. Just discard with a cost to get the effect. I don't get the flavor you're going for so I can recommend something that is a better flavor fit.
Yeah I didn't really explain the flavor well. My apologies. It's inspired by a specific book series but I was also just trying to make a flavorful mechanic out of the idea of telepathy and the different ways you could design with the concept of telepathy in MTG beyond just mind control and threaten type cards.
Basically the magic of direct communication, misdirection, and mind control but try to make a whole mechanic around it rather than just a few cards. Which now that I explain it is probably a bad idea.
I chose the miracle style trigger because I was trying to capture that it was a fleeting and ethereal type of magic but you are correct that it is a massive drawback on the power level. I costed it very conservatively because modal cards are powerful even with limited modality and the telepathy ability as designed is completely non-interactive.
Discarding could work as well but I loved the cuteness of a planeswalker taking the idea of spell out of their library and using the essence of it rather than summoning it. But I guess that could work via discarding too. Would definitely mean that you couldn't make any flashier spell with it though and all the telepathy abilities would need to be kept pretty weak/fairly costed.
While designing these cards I kept trying to come up with a way to convey telepathy via a mechanic. Well mind control style magic in general without it being just a mindslaver or control magic ability. That sort of telepathy/mindscrew magic is in the book series I was inspired by but I couldn't figure out an effective mechanical representation.
In the end I don't think it's a necessary thing to give a mechanic to because it's so often covered by a mind control style card but I wanted to try and make one anyway. So goals: a flexible triggered ability that can provide multiple different in game effects. A trigger outside of normal checking the battlefield to represent that it's a type of mental magic. And last actually convey the flavor of communication/misleading.
In the end I've gone with a spin on miracle and adventure and came up with the following wording: Telepathy [cost]: you may reveal this card from your hand as you draw it. When you reveal this card this way, you may exile it by paying [cost] and and .
I just realized I should word this differently and make it a reminder word like landfall to work the way I want which is unfortunate because then it is way too wordy. But I think unavoidable.
It allows flexible abilites, isn't dependent on the battlefield directly to trigger, and to my mind is evocative of mental magic because it involves coming directly off the top of your library in a burst.
The biggest downside, and it is significant, is that in it's current form is uncounterable leading to being very a uninteractive mechanic. A workaround would be to make it a cast and have an alternative function if cast for that cost but it is incredibly unwieldly and I think would require them to be structured like adventure cards but with the timing restriction. As it is I aimed for low power cards that act as modal spells.
Example cards:
Telepathic Blinder 1W
Creature Human Wizard 1W, t: tap target creature
Telepathy - you may reveal ~ when you draw it, if you do exile ~ and pay W: tap target creature.
1/2
Skill Coetrie 2UU
Creature Human Wizard
Ward: 2
When ~ etb draw a card
Telepathy - you may reveal ~ when you draw it, if you do exile ~ and pay 2U: Draw 2 cards
Verity, King-In-Waiting 1WR
Legendary Creature - Human Wizard
Vigilance Rt: Target creature must attack this turn if able.
Telepathy - you may reveal ~ when you draw it, if you do exile ~ and pay 4UU: gain control of target creature.
1/1
Shoreline Stone 3
Artifact
~etb tapped t: add 1 to your mana pool
Telepathy - you may reveal ~ when you draw it, if you do exile ~ and pay 1U: Scry 2 and then draw a card.
Waypoint Stone 3
Artifact
~etb tapped t: add 1 to your mana pool
Telepathy - you may reveal ~ when you draw it, if you do exile ~ and pay 1W: gain 4 life
Ruins Stone 3
Artifact
~etb tapped t: add 1 to your mana pool
Telepathy - you may reveal ~ when you draw it, if you do exile ~ and pay 1B: return target creature card from your graveyard to your hand.
Quicksilver Stone 3
Artifact
~etb tapped t: add 1 to your mana pool
Telepathy - you may reveal ~ when you draw it, if you do exile ~ and pay 1R: destroy target artifact
Ancient Stone3
Artifact
~etb tapped t: add 1 to your mana pool
Telepathy - you may reveal ~ when you draw it, if you do exile ~ and pay 1G: You may exile up to 3 cards from target graveyard.
Battlefield Confusion 3R
Sorcery
Untap target creature and gain control of it until end of turn. That creature gains haste until end of turn.
Telepathy - you may reveal ~ when you draw it, if you do exile ~ and pay 1RR: Creatures without flying cannot block this turn.
I'm sorry to not really add anything as I don't particularly care for commander cards which it has pretty well been stated this was designed for. But I'm more curious about what the top 15 cards are in your opinion. If you don't mind.
Not counting contract from below which would be with Lotus and Ancestral I've say the list is roughly like this:
1/2 Lotus/Ancestral
3 Mana Crypt
4-9 Sol Ring/ABUR Moxen
10 Mishra's Workshop
11 Bazaar of Baghdad
12 Time Walk
13 Channel
14 Mana Vault
15 Gitaxian Probe
Other cards in the running for me are Survival of the Fittest, Yawgmoth's Will, Underworld Breach, Mental Misstep, Timetwister, Wheel of Fortune, Oath of Druids, Tinker, Tabernacle at Pendrel Vale, and Strip Mine.
I got annoyed/frustrated at certain points of this game, but overall I enjoyed the experience and it was nice to be town on my home site again (for the last time). Think taking a.. fairly extended break from seriously competing in mafia has leveled me up in a couple of ways.
- Only join games when you have the time for them
- Only play one game at a time, never multigame
- Give the game your all regardless of your alignment because it's more fun for you and the other players when you do
This is why I should probably take an extended break from mafia. Even setting aside my unfortunate timing in the final day not being able to play on weekends is a killer. It just destroys your ability to stay in the flow of the game and if a deadline falls on a weekend just destroys any chance of you being an important player.
As for Soul Eruption I agree with user_938036 it is either useless in smaller formats or among the best rituals in larger ones. I think that's actually fine but I just want to make sure you realize how powerful it is.
I already don't cube with those though. I guess for me the comparison is probably Unexpectedly Absent and missing more card types is a point against this even if it is more reliable.
It's good (I have been loving Baleful Mastery and this is very similar) but I don't run much pure removal in white and it's top tier spells are excellent.
It probably pushes the last traditional O-Ring out of my list because it can hit walkers but it's in a precarious position.Edit: I take it back because I had already planned to cut O-Ring when I pick up a Skyclave Apparition. Card is very good but unless it beats out Unexpectedly Absent it's not going to make it for me because I can't imagine cutting anything else for a removal spell at this point.
P.S. Sorry for going off topic and talking about my own list. Hard to evaluate cards without doing that because I have no experience designing above 360 and I don't like making proclamations about things being good for bigger sizes when I don't really know.
I don't fully support aristocrats so I'm not too familiar with it as a cube archetype but I would have assumed being an enchantment rather than a creature was a significant upside over Zulaport Cutthroat or Blood Artist and the wrath mode was gravy. Which payoffs do you prefer?
Instant speed is great but I'm agreeing with Sliver Lord that destroy is a real downside. It beats O-ring variants but I prefer Council's Judgment to it.
The fact that you can flip it so easily in a tempo deck that want to leave mana up is quite nice. Back side is a pretty must answer threat. Pretty sweet for 2 mana.
Edit: the fact that my cube is powered, small, and equipment heavy helps it a lot. Easier to end up in a white weenie deck with thalia, luminarch aspirant, or stoneforge in 360 than at a larger size.
Edit: I know wotc does it but trolls that small just feels wrong to me from a flavor POV. Trolls should be like giants. At least a 3/3 or bigger imo. But Wotc disagrees and that's just my personal hobby horse.
If you're playing some number of those cards and like stax games go smokestack otherwise mindslaver.
Yeah I didn't really explain the flavor well. My apologies. It's inspired by a specific book series but I was also just trying to make a flavorful mechanic out of the idea of telepathy and the different ways you could design with the concept of telepathy in MTG beyond just mind control and threaten type cards.
Basically the magic of direct communication, misdirection, and mind control but try to make a whole mechanic around it rather than just a few cards. Which now that I explain it is probably a bad idea.
I chose the miracle style trigger because I was trying to capture that it was a fleeting and ethereal type of magic but you are correct that it is a massive drawback on the power level. I costed it very conservatively because modal cards are powerful even with limited modality and the telepathy ability as designed is completely non-interactive.
Discarding could work as well but I loved the cuteness of a planeswalker taking the idea of spell out of their library and using the essence of it rather than summoning it. But I guess that could work via discarding too. Would definitely mean that you couldn't make any flashier spell with it though and all the telepathy abilities would need to be kept pretty weak/fairly costed.
In the end I don't think it's a necessary thing to give a mechanic to because it's so often covered by a mind control style card but I wanted to try and make one anyway. So goals: a flexible triggered ability that can provide multiple different in game effects. A trigger outside of normal checking the battlefield to represent that it's a type of mental magic. And last actually convey the flavor of communication/misleading.
In the end I've gone with a spin on miracle and adventure and came up with the following wording: Telepathy [cost]: you may reveal this card from your hand as you draw it. When you reveal this card this way, you may exile it by paying [cost] and and .I just realized I should word this differently and make it a reminder word like landfall to work the way I want which is unfortunate because then it is way too wordy. But I think unavoidable.
It allows flexible abilites, isn't dependent on the battlefield directly to trigger, and to my mind is evocative of mental magic because it involves coming directly off the top of your library in a burst.
The biggest downside, and it is significant, is that in it's current form is uncounterable leading to being very a uninteractive mechanic. A workaround would be to make it a cast and have an alternative function if cast for that cost but it is incredibly unwieldly and I think would require them to be structured like adventure cards but with the timing restriction. As it is I aimed for low power cards that act as modal spells.
Example cards:
Telepathic Blinder 1W
Creature Human Wizard
1W, t: tap target creature
Telepathy - you may reveal ~ when you draw it, if you do exile ~ and pay W: tap target creature.
1/2
Skill Coetrie 2UU
Creature Human Wizard
Ward: 2
When ~ etb draw a card
Telepathy - you may reveal ~ when you draw it, if you do exile ~ and pay 2U: Draw 2 cards
Verity, King-In-Waiting 1WR
Legendary Creature - Human Wizard
Vigilance
Rt: Target creature must attack this turn if able.
Telepathy - you may reveal ~ when you draw it, if you do exile ~ and pay 4UU: gain control of target creature.
1/1
Shoreline Stone 3
Artifact
~etb tapped
t: add 1 to your mana pool
Telepathy - you may reveal ~ when you draw it, if you do exile ~ and pay 1U: Scry 2 and then draw a card.
Waypoint Stone 3
Artifact
~etb tapped
t: add 1 to your mana pool
Telepathy - you may reveal ~ when you draw it, if you do exile ~ and pay 1W: gain 4 life
Ruins Stone 3
Artifact
~etb tapped
t: add 1 to your mana pool
Telepathy - you may reveal ~ when you draw it, if you do exile ~ and pay 1B: return target creature card from your graveyard to your hand.
Quicksilver Stone 3
Artifact
~etb tapped
t: add 1 to your mana pool
Telepathy - you may reveal ~ when you draw it, if you do exile ~ and pay 1R: destroy target artifact
Ancient Stone3
Artifact
~etb tapped
t: add 1 to your mana pool
Telepathy - you may reveal ~ when you draw it, if you do exile ~ and pay 1G: You may exile up to 3 cards from target graveyard.
Battlefield Confusion 3R
Sorcery
Untap target creature and gain control of it until end of turn. That creature gains haste until end of turn.
Telepathy - you may reveal ~ when you draw it, if you do exile ~ and pay 1RR: Creatures without flying cannot block this turn.
Not counting contract from below which would be with Lotus and Ancestral I've say the list is roughly like this:
1/2 Lotus/Ancestral
3 Mana Crypt
4-9 Sol Ring/ABUR Moxen
10 Mishra's Workshop
11 Bazaar of Baghdad
12 Time Walk
13 Channel
14 Mana Vault
15 Gitaxian Probe
Other cards in the running for me are Survival of the Fittest, Yawgmoth's Will, Underworld Breach, Mental Misstep, Timetwister, Wheel of Fortune, Oath of Druids, Tinker, Tabernacle at Pendrel Vale, and Strip Mine.
This is why I should probably take an extended break from mafia. Even setting aside my unfortunate timing in the final day not being able to play on weekends is a killer. It just destroys your ability to stay in the flow of the game and if a deadline falls on a weekend just destroys any chance of you being an important player.