Big Hit - ...if a creature (previously possibly this creature) dealt 4 (previously 5) or more combat damage to a player this turn...
Brutality Elemental1RGG
Creature - Elemental (r)
Haste, Trample Big Hit - At the beginning of your end step, sacrifice Brutality Elemental unless a creature dealt 4 or more combat damage to a player this turn.
6/3 (previously 7/1)
Raging Primalist2G
Creature - Human Shaman (c) Big Hit - At the end of combat on your turn, if a creature dealt 4 or more combat damage to a player this turn, destroy target artifact or enchantment.
3/2
Gruul VanguardRG
Creature - Goblin Berserker (u)
Whenever Gruul Vanguard attacks and is not blocked, target blocked creature you control gets +2/+0 and trample until the end of the turn. Big Hit - At the end of combat on your turn, if a creature dealt 4 or more combat damage to a player this turn, put a +1/+1 counter on it.
2/2
Cataclysmic ImpactR
Instant (r)
Target creature gets +2/+2 until the end of the turn. If that creature is blocked, it gets an additional +2/+2 and trample until the end of the turn. Big Hit - At the end of combat on your turn, if a creature dealt 4 or more combat damage to a player this turn,you may pay 2G. If you do, return Cataclysmic Impact from your graveyard to your hand.
Borborygmos, Unstoppable2RRRGGG
Legendary Creature - Cyclops (m)
Trample
Whenever Borborygmos, Unstoppable becomes blocked, creatures you control get +X/+X and trample until the end of the turn, where X is the number of blocked creature you control. Big Hit - At the end of combat on your turn, if a creature dealt 4 or more damage to a player this turn, Borborgymos, Unstoppable deals 3 damage to each opposing player and each creature those players control.
7/7
Big Hit - ...if a creature/this creature dealt 5 or more combat damage to a player this turn...
Brutality Elemental1RGG
Creature - Elemental (r)
Haste, Trample Big Hit - At the beginning of your end step, sacrifice Brutality Elemental unless it dealt 5 or more combat damage to a player this turn.
7/1
Raging Primalist2G
Creature - Human Shaman (c) Big Hit - At the end of combat on your turn, if a creature dealt 5 or more combat damage to a player this turn, destroy target artifact or enchantment.
3/2
1. Ability words should group the same condition - either all of them care about "a creature" or all about them care about "this creature". It's so weeird, if you have creature A deal 5 damage and it satisfies cthe condition of creature B's Big Hit, but not creature C's Big Hit - that's exactly the kind of thing uniformity across an ability word should exploit - you don't want e. g. half the landfall creatures to trigger on playing a land rather than it entering the battlefield - same principle.
I can see making an argument for the instant/sorcery card with the mechanic due to their impermanent nature, but on creatures you have to make a call.
2. The color red. Gruul have the burn color in their guil. A single burn spell doesn't even usually do 5 damage, but why not allow one of the colors to do its thing, when it comes to dealing damage? A "big hit" with a fireball to the face is still a big hit, right?
3. Win-more. 5 damage in Standard and Limited is 25% of the life total. It also has to come from a single source, so maybe other sources have dealt 1 or 2 combat damage that turn - plus the fact that the 5 damage swing probably wasn't the first attack that connected, so you have - what? - an opponent at half life? We expect to get only one effective Big Hit?
4. Half of the creatures cannot achieve a "big hit" if left to their own devices. That's a horrible showcase.
So, I have seen an ability word that means "At the beginning of your/each end step, if an opponent has lost 3 or more life this turn, you get a cookie." That mechanic does a lot better - it chooses a lower threshold that you can reach multiple times; it allows smaller creatures to combine their damage output to reach the threshold, so the mechanic is less size-dependent and makes sense on e. g. a bear; it allows burn to contribute and is more friendly to e. g. red; it doesn't care about the cause of the life loss and hence stays consistent about not caring.
You should weigh those differences and address them going forward. You don't have to settle on a mechanic that does everything e. g. you have some thematic reason to choose a high threshold, but then again: Caring about a high threshold doesn't mean, this needs to be e. g. "win more".
How about "Big Hit - [...] a source you control deals 5 or more damage [...]"? Now running big attackers into chump blockers still helps your mechanic - or your 7-power trampler suddenly assigns only 2 damagge to the player when blocked by a 3-toughness creature, because assigning 5 damage to 3 toughness is suddenly a valid tactical decision, and that burn spell that deals 5 damage to a creature is suddenly an enabler - and since this consistently doesn't care about the source of the damage being the creature itself, you can put it on a 3/2 without ability to pump itself and it's far less weird.
As an aside: Brutality Elemental dies to being blocked by a 1/1 - usually creatures that get sacrificed at end of turn don't care about toughness, but you specifically design this with trample and a power greater than 5 so this can be blocked and prevent itself from being sacrificed. But if you leave the toughness at 1 you are just tricking the player into thinking the creature can survive being blocked that way - in reality any blocker with power at all blocking this makes the whole ability irrelevant. You don't want to set up your player to be disappointed by your design, put some toughness on there - tell yourself that's what green contributes to your Ball Lighntning.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Planar Chaos was not a mistake neither was it random. You might want to look at it again.
[thread=239793][Game] Level Up - Creature[/thread]
1. Ability words should group the same condition - either all of them care about "a creature" or all about them care about "this creature". It's so weeird, if you have creature A deal 5 damage and it satisfies cthe condition of creature B's Big Hit, but not creature C's Big Hit - that's exactly the kind of thing uniformity across an ability word should exploit - you don't want e. g. half the landfall creatures to trigger on playing a land rather than it entering the battlefield - same principle.
I can see making an argument for the instant/sorcery card with the mechanic due to their impermanent nature, but on creatures you have to make a call.
Yeah, I kinda waffled between the two. I think "a creature" works better, given the difficulty of the condition. That also gives me the liberty to split the design into creatures that care about punching through and creatures that cheer on their clanmates.
2. The color red. Gruul have the burn color in their guil. A single burn spell doesn't even usually do 5 damage, but why not allow one of the colors to do its thing, when it comes to dealing damage? A "big hit" with a fireball to the face is still a big hit, right?
Red is also the secondary color for trample, and it gets lots of offensive pump spells, too. Burn is essentially red, but it isn't the only thing the color gets to do. Take this idea, for example: Savage Tactic3RG
Instant (c)
Savage Tactic deals 2 damage to any target.
Up to one target creature gets +2/+2 and trample until the end of the turn.
It represents both colors by burning and pumping, but it also offers a choice between a 2-for-1 and maximizing damage for big hit by pumping a blocked creature and damaging the blocker. That is the design I'm aiming for here.
3. Win-more. 5 damage in Standard and Limited is 25% of the life total. It also has to come from a single source, so maybe other sources have dealt 1 or 2 combat damage that turn - plus the fact that the 5 damage swing probably wasn't the first attack that connected, so you have - what? - an opponent at half life? We expect to get only one effective Big Hit?
Ideally, it's a mechanic designed to work well with bloodrush. Ideally, you devote lots of cards to achieving your big hit(s), and then your creatures' abilities carry you the rest of the way. I like Legend's suggestion to lower the threshold to 4, though.
4. Half of the creatures cannot achieve a "big hit" if left to their own devices. That's a horrible showcase.
Ergo, the aforementioned switch to "a creature" across the board, so I have designated cheerleaders and hitters. The ability to get a big hit from a cheerleader with a well-timed pump spell will be a bonus.
So, I have seen an ability word that means "At the beginning of your/each end step, if an opponent has lost 3 or more life this turn, you get a cookie." That mechanic does a lot better - it chooses a lower threshold that you can reach multiple times; it allows smaller creatures to combine their damage output to reach the threshold, so the mechanic is less size-dependent and makes sense on e. g. a bear; it allows burn to contribute and is more friendly to e. g. red; it doesn't care about the cause of the life loss and hence stays consistent about not caring.
You should weigh those differences and address them going forward. You don't have to settle on a mechanic that does everything e. g. you have some thematic reason to choose a high threshold, but then again: Caring about a high threshold doesn't mean, this needs to be e. g. "win more".
How about "Big Hit - [...] a source you control deals 5 or more damage [...]"? Now running big attackers into chump blockers still helps your mechanic - or your 7-power trampler suddenly assigns only 2 damagge to the player when blocked by a 3-toughness creature, because assigning 5 damage to 3 toughness is suddenly a valid tactical decision, and that burn spell that deals 5 damage to a creature is suddenly an enabler - and since this consistently doesn't care about the source of the damage being the creature itself, you can put it on a 3/2 without ability to pump itself and it's far less weird.
As an aside: Brutality Elemental dies to being blocked by a 1/1 - usually creatures that get sacrificed at end of turn don't care about toughness, but you specifically design this with trample and a power greater than 5 so this can be blocked and prevent itself from being sacrificed. But if you leave the toughness at 1 you are just tricking the player into thinking the creature can survive being blocked that way - in reality any blocker with power at all blocking this makes the whole ability irrelevant. You don't want to set up your player to be disappointed by your design, put some toughness on there - tell yourself that's what green contributes to your Ball Lighntning.
Big Hit is specifically designed to be a high-risk, high-reward mechanic that rewards you for throwing everything that you have at your opponent. The life-loss-based mechanic you mentioned is a great Rakdos mechanic and an inferior Gruul mechanic (imo). I should have stated this in my opening post, but my goal for the mechanic is to encourage a dynamic, interactive form of combat. Some guilds are just fine tossing a Lightning Bolt and calling it a day, but the Gruul really want to get right up in the enemy's face. I want a mechanic that incentivizes otherwise weak tactics such as using Giant Growth as if it were Lava Spike. You're talking an awful lot about the conditions for achieving the mechanic, but it's so much more than that.
And, yes, the elemental deserves a couple extra points of toughness. It's a break from Ball Lightning, but it at least encourages the opponent to lose something more substantial.
Big hit is a very big flavor hit! (Could also work for Naya.)
My suggestion is reduce the "hit" to 4 damage (that's still very big), make it damage to anything, and unify the trigger (as S_I suggested).
Question: How many cards to you plan for this mechanic at each rarity?
Those are good suggestions. I'm more concerned about the mechanic and the structure around it than some of the set design-based numbers, since I really don't have the free time right now to design an entire set.
Brutality Elemental 1RGG
Creature - Elemental (r)
Haste, Trample
Big Hit - At the beginning of your end step, sacrifice Brutality Elemental unless a creature dealt 4 or more combat damage to a player this turn.
6/3 (previously 7/1)
Raging Primalist 2G
Creature - Human Shaman (c)
Big Hit - At the end of combat on your turn, if a creature dealt 4 or more combat damage to a player this turn, destroy target artifact or enchantment.
3/2
Gruul Vanguard RG
Creature - Goblin Berserker (u)
Whenever Gruul Vanguard attacks and is not blocked, target blocked creature you control gets +2/+0 and trample until the end of the turn.
Big Hit - At the end of combat on your turn, if a creature dealt 4 or more combat damage to a player this turn, put a +1/+1 counter on it.
2/2
Cataclysmic Impact R
Instant (r)
Target creature gets +2/+2 until the end of the turn. If that creature is blocked, it gets an additional +2/+2 and trample until the end of the turn.
Big Hit - At the end of combat on your turn, if a creature dealt 4 or more combat damage to a player this turn,you may pay 2G. If you do, return Cataclysmic Impact from your graveyard to your hand.
Borborygmos, Unstoppable 2RRRGGG
Legendary Creature - Cyclops (m)
Trample
Whenever Borborygmos, Unstoppable becomes blocked, creatures you control get +X/+X and trample until the end of the turn, where X is the number of blocked creature you control.
Big Hit - At the end of combat on your turn, if a creature dealt 4 or more damage to a player this turn, Borborgymos, Unstoppable deals 3 damage to each opposing player and each creature those players control.
7/7
1. Ability words should group the same condition - either all of them care about "a creature" or all about them care about "this creature". It's so weeird, if you have creature A deal 5 damage and it satisfies cthe condition of creature B's Big Hit, but not creature C's Big Hit - that's exactly the kind of thing uniformity across an ability word should exploit - you don't want e. g. half the landfall creatures to trigger on playing a land rather than it entering the battlefield - same principle.
I can see making an argument for the instant/sorcery card with the mechanic due to their impermanent nature, but on creatures you have to make a call.
2. The color red. Gruul have the burn color in their guil. A single burn spell doesn't even usually do 5 damage, but why not allow one of the colors to do its thing, when it comes to dealing damage? A "big hit" with a fireball to the face is still a big hit, right?
3. Win-more. 5 damage in Standard and Limited is 25% of the life total. It also has to come from a single source, so maybe other sources have dealt 1 or 2 combat damage that turn - plus the fact that the 5 damage swing probably wasn't the first attack that connected, so you have - what? - an opponent at half life? We expect to get only one effective Big Hit?
4. Half of the creatures cannot achieve a "big hit" if left to their own devices. That's a horrible showcase.
So, I have seen an ability word that means "At the beginning of your/each end step, if an opponent has lost 3 or more life this turn, you get a cookie." That mechanic does a lot better - it chooses a lower threshold that you can reach multiple times; it allows smaller creatures to combine their damage output to reach the threshold, so the mechanic is less size-dependent and makes sense on e. g. a bear; it allows burn to contribute and is more friendly to e. g. red; it doesn't care about the cause of the life loss and hence stays consistent about not caring.
You should weigh those differences and address them going forward. You don't have to settle on a mechanic that does everything e. g. you have some thematic reason to choose a high threshold, but then again: Caring about a high threshold doesn't mean, this needs to be e. g. "win more".
How about "Big Hit - [...] a source you control deals 5 or more damage [...]"? Now running big attackers into chump blockers still helps your mechanic - or your 7-power trampler suddenly assigns only 2 damagge to the player when blocked by a 3-toughness creature, because assigning 5 damage to 3 toughness is suddenly a valid tactical decision, and that burn spell that deals 5 damage to a creature is suddenly an enabler - and since this consistently doesn't care about the source of the damage being the creature itself, you can put it on a 3/2 without ability to pump itself and it's far less weird.
As an aside: Brutality Elemental dies to being blocked by a 1/1 - usually creatures that get sacrificed at end of turn don't care about toughness, but you specifically design this with trample and a power greater than 5 so this can be blocked and prevent itself from being sacrificed. But if you leave the toughness at 1 you are just tricking the player into thinking the creature can survive being blocked that way - in reality any blocker with power at all blocking this makes the whole ability irrelevant. You don't want to set up your player to be disappointed by your design, put some toughness on there - tell yourself that's what green contributes to your Ball Lighntning.
Finally a good white villain quote: "So, do I ever re-evaluate my life choices? Never, because I know what I'm doing is a righteous cause."
Factions: Sleeping
Remnants: Valheim
Legendary Journey: Heroes & Planeswalkers
Saga: Shards of Rabiah
Legends: The Elder Dragons
Read up on Red Flags & NWO
My suggestion is reduce the "hit" to 4 damage (that's still very big), make it damage to anything, and unify the trigger (as S_I suggested).
Question: How many cards to you plan for this mechanic at each rarity?
Yeah, I kinda waffled between the two. I think "a creature" works better, given the difficulty of the condition. That also gives me the liberty to split the design into creatures that care about punching through and creatures that cheer on their clanmates.
Red is also the secondary color for trample, and it gets lots of offensive pump spells, too. Burn is essentially red, but it isn't the only thing the color gets to do. Take this idea, for example:
Savage Tactic 3RG
Instant (c)
Savage Tactic deals 2 damage to any target.
Up to one target creature gets +2/+2 and trample until the end of the turn.
It represents both colors by burning and pumping, but it also offers a choice between a 2-for-1 and maximizing damage for big hit by pumping a blocked creature and damaging the blocker. That is the design I'm aiming for here.
Ideally, it's a mechanic designed to work well with bloodrush. Ideally, you devote lots of cards to achieving your big hit(s), and then your creatures' abilities carry you the rest of the way. I like Legend's suggestion to lower the threshold to 4, though.
Ergo, the aforementioned switch to "a creature" across the board, so I have designated cheerleaders and hitters. The ability to get a big hit from a cheerleader with a well-timed pump spell will be a bonus.
Big Hit is specifically designed to be a high-risk, high-reward mechanic that rewards you for throwing everything that you have at your opponent. The life-loss-based mechanic you mentioned is a great Rakdos mechanic and an inferior Gruul mechanic (imo). I should have stated this in my opening post, but my goal for the mechanic is to encourage a dynamic, interactive form of combat. Some guilds are just fine tossing a Lightning Bolt and calling it a day, but the Gruul really want to get right up in the enemy's face. I want a mechanic that incentivizes otherwise weak tactics such as using Giant Growth as if it were Lava Spike. You're talking an awful lot about the conditions for achieving the mechanic, but it's so much more than that.
And, yes, the elemental deserves a couple extra points of toughness. It's a break from Ball Lightning, but it at least encourages the opponent to lose something more substantial.
Those are good suggestions. I'm more concerned about the mechanic and the structure around it than some of the set design-based numbers, since I really don't have the free time right now to design an entire set.