MTG Salvation

WOTC just needs to leave Commander alone

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Quote from Werewolf_Rawr »

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Quote from Werewolf_Rawr »

So they just slapped Demon on each card type and put some horns in the art. Nothing about the cards has anything demonic mechanically. Zero downside. Zero additional costs to cast like life or resources. Oh how far magic flavor has fallen.

Demons haven't been required to have downsides or additional costs for a while now and I don't see any reason they should.

That’s the whole point. They used to have some mechanically unique qualities that identified them as demons. Now they’re just angels with black mana and that’s boring.

At the very least, some recent demons require you to pay life or sacrifice a creature to get their abilities.

These have no demonic identity. You could remove that word entirely and the card wouldn’t be any different - you’d never be able to differentiate it from anything by else.

Calm Down. I absolutely love wild demons with crazy drawbacks, but that's not the only correct way to design a demon. Plenty of people want to play demons without committing to an often unpleasant gimmick, just like dragons and angels. Your favorite kind of demon is not the only correct kind, because you're not the only Magic fan in the world.
Seriously, that's like insisting that every hydra has to be a 0/0 with counters and every rebel has to be able to search for a rebel with +1 mana value. Mechanical gimmicks are fun and all, but they're just gimmicks, and R&D shouldn't be ruled by them. We'll see plenty of drawback demons in the future, so just be patient and let other people have fun, too.

Nobody needs to calm down because this is just a discussion. Ya know, one of those things where differing opinions are shared?

I’m also not blocking anyone’s fun by saying the card designs are uninspired and out of flavor with the identity that Magic had built for a creature type. What a ridiculous sentiment.

MTG had an identity in the color pie and creatures and spells used to reflect that. Of course that’s faded into ambiguity within modern design but that doesn’t mean it’s good. I’d argue that making MTG more generic might make it more accessible and simple but that’s not a great thing.

These creatures just happen to be the most recent and blatant examples of how little identity and uniqueness cards have today. It was much cooler when playing a demon meant making sacrifices of some sort to do. It’s much better for the role playing aspect of it and that’s more valuable to me. Of course that’s my opinion - but there’s no reason for me not to share that opinion.

Also, I don’t know if you said it or someone else did - but yes, hydras should have that 0/0 mechanic. It’s what MTG did as a foundation to give a hydra a unique play style and identity. Without that, a hydra is just another green creature and that’s not as much fun. Same concept for demons. If you like demons, then you should enjoy the risk in summoning them. Again, role play - that’s what used to set this game apart.

now, the only identity magic has are the rules governing turns, “mana”, and supposed balance. No wonder there’s such a spotlight on MTG’s identity through it’s power level and balance now. Because everything else that made it unique have been pushed aside.

Quote from DJK3654 »

Quote from Werewolf_Rawr »

So they just slapped Demon on each card type and put some horns in the art. Nothing about the cards has anything demonic mechanically. Zero downside. Zero additional costs to cast like life or resources. Oh how far magic flavor has fallen.

Demons haven't been required to have downsides or additional costs for a while now and I don't see any reason they should.

That’s the whole point. They used to have some mechanically unique qualities that identified them as demons. Now they’re just angels with black mana and that’s boring.

At the very least, some recent demons require you to pay life or sacrifice a creature to get their abilities.

These have no demonic identity. You could remove that word entirely and the card wouldn’t be any different - you’d never be able to differentiate it from anything by else.

So they just slapped Demon on each card type and put some horns in the art. Nothing about the cards has anything demonic mechanically. Zero downside. Zero additional costs to cast like life or resources. Oh how far magic flavor has fallen.

I despise that shrine commander. Not for the card itself or it’s abilities, but for the fact that it highlights what I hate about the recent WOTC design with regards to commander.

I love this - stakes raised. I'm excited to see where this goes. I would love the Phyrexians to eat up Kaladesh. I hated that set.

I despise this more than any other to date. WTF is this even.

Everything about this card is amazing! They've printed so many strong wolf cards since Nightpack Ambusher that I really feel I can have a cohesive wolf deck. This is incredible.

And that art! OMG...

Quote from soramaro »

Quote from 5colors »

Quote from soramaro »

Quote from 5colors »

Quote from soramaro »

Why are all of the werewolves so boring mechanically ... there's one thing on the front, and the back half does a powered-up version of it. Not exactly what I'd call exciting from a Mel perspective...

What would you do with werewolves then? As a werewolf player I enjoy these designs since you still use the human half in decks for the same reason as I count on the back.

I like it when the two sides of a DFC play into each other. For example, if the front gets a buff from you casting spells, the back half could exile spells from your graveyard for direct damage or something. Just having a stronger version of the front-face effect is something you can throw in to mix up the design a bit, but to me it feels like way too many werewolves do this.

I think a factor in that is they need ~ 3 lines of text for the transform clause limits them to how much they can fit into one text and make even common werewolves more complex then most other creatures. Not sure if your example could fit prowess/prowess 2 and have you exile spells from graveyard for damage and nightbound and still be considered an uncommon.

Do you play werewolves or this more of a design thought? Cause there are more DFC than werewolves that already do want you want.

Well, in my example the back half simply wouldn't have Pseudo-Prowess but the direct damage effect instead. You could adjust the power to make up for the "lost" Prowess effect.

I'm talking about this from a pure design perspective on the single card level. I've never played a werewolf deck - never even considered it because play-wise, I don't like how a core part of their mechanical identity is always being out of your control to a degree. I recognize that they need simpler cards for Limited and such, but then again I'm of the opinion that way too much interesting design space is wasted in favour of making Limited work.

I play the werewolves as well. It's been my pet deck since 2011. I see where you're both coming from. Where Soramaro seems to be seeking more Huntmaster of the Fells variants.

Huntmaster works so well because both sides' effects are very strong and they're effects that you'll essentially always want for 4 mana. And while that card is amazing, one thing you find as you play the tribe a lot is that often times you don't want the front and backsides of the same to do a lot of different things. That makes it increasingly difficult to manage the effect you're actually trying to aim for in the current situation.

With the Midnight Hunt werewolf design, I ensure that I get the effect that I wanted when playing the card. I just get that effect in varying intensities.

I don't see this as boring - I see it as removing one additional limitation that hamstringed the original werewolf design (of which it already inherently has plenty already). The tribe already has a limitation by requiring me to manage my spell casting carefully, it has a limited number of the tribe to utilize being contained within one plane, and for the most part, it's been limited to just two colors. All of those limitations or restrictions already create a unique and dynamic deck building and gameplay experience. I really don't think werewolves need an additional variance such as two different effects on each side in order to be fun...or to avoid being boring.

Moreover, in the pursuit of creating more cards with powerful but unique effects on both sides, the designers would inherently be walking the fine line of making numerous overpowered cards. This isn't to say Huntmaster is overpowered, but, it has the benefit of being an outlier. If Huntmaster were the model for werewolves, I think that overpowered line would likely be crossed multiple times.

Quote from Flamebuster »

Cool card, but they're hitting it out of the battlefield with the art this set.

Holy moly Batman

'buster

Completely agree. My zada commander deck likes this card as a finisher.

I'm trying to work up the effort to voice my displeasure on these but it doesn't even seem worth doing so. Welcome to Magic the Apathy.

I have never watched Doctor Who, but when they first announced this product a few months back I watched a few clips on YT and read a few wiki pages. And you know what? It looked kind of fun! I could see why there's such a big fandom for it, and I even felt like I could've become a fan myself in a parallel universe where I grew up with it.

So it's not like I hate Doctor Who (or Warhammer, or LoTR, or any other franchises that have gotten UB cards) ... but I just can't bring myself to like the MtG crossover stuff. Yes, I know, Magic is very heterogenous. But searching on Scryfall and seeing that an interesting commander in the color combo I'm looking for is only available in the form of cross-promotion material for an outside IP, idk ... it just instantly kills all my interest in playing the game.

Quote from Evil Never Dies »

Quote from Simto »

Stuff like this should be limited to some Secret Lair variant. Modern and scifi stuff looks so wrong on Magic cards it's crazy. Can't tell you how much I dislike Dr. Who.

You just made cry Mirrodin/New Phyrexia
And Kaladesh
And Neo Kamigawa
And New Capenna
And old Thran Technology
And old Phyrexian Technology
And Brother's War Technology (that has same cyberpunk aesthetic of Warhammer 40k cards)
etc.

A large part of Magic is already and always been modern and scify, among traditional and fantasy stuff. Thats the whole point of having a multiverse and people exploring planes, literally everything is possibile somewhere. Seems you confused your personal preference of traditional fantasy as the only canon setting Magic could have (which, as just proved, is just doesn't hold water with facts)

We already went over this with kamigawa and the gangster plane I forget the name of. Magic is fantasy, not scifi/modern/futuristic.
The planes and tech you mention are still rooted in fantasy. The highest tech they reached before that was Kaladesh, which I thought was the limit because it was again still rooted in fantasy.
Brothers war tech does not look like 40k. I also thought it was really dumb to use 40k instead of Warhammer Fantasy or the ugly Age of Sigmar.
Magic is Fantasy.

Where are the numbers and county jail sign and what are they being booked for?

I find this artistic theme dull and gross. Just one persons opinion.

AND IT GOT A ****ING 9!

THAT'S HILARIOUS!!!

A fitting end would be for the person to take the card (safely) to the edge of an active volcanic feature, rip it up and toss it in and it burns. (Live Stream it for posterities sake.)

Will never happen but it would be so fitting and worthy of Frodo's deed. (ie Tolkien's genius)

I doubt I could even do that, but I would insure it, auction it off to the highest bidder requesting a matching amount of that winning bid to be donated to a worthy charity (in my case St. Jude's)

Quote from seilaoque »

Quote from jshrwd »

Sharkey will do some work in EDH

how? because I just don't see it.... haha

It's a really underpowered body for 4 mana and depends entirely on your opponents so it does something at all.

even then, I just don't remember that many lands with activated abilities that would be good in a 4 mana permanent.

unfortunately you can't run Ashaya alongside it in commander.... if you could you'd be able to donate Ashaya to your opponents and shut down activated abilities for their creatures.... hahah

I'll say it a different way: It hits 61 of the top 100 utility lands on EDHREC

Maybe that matters. Maybe it doesn't.

Eh, it's very subjective I guess. I think if you're that bent on playing Sultai Faeries with those four ancient janky faerie cards + Maraleaf Pixie, you could just choose a generic goodstuff commander like Muldrotha, Damia, Yarok or Zimone and Dina and be done with it.

Quote from Evil Never Dies »

Quote from soramaro »

Oh, there's a UB "Fae Dominion" commander precon. I still think of Eldraine as a discount Lorwyn of sorts, but more Dimir faeries are always a good thing

Still no Sultai Faerie tribal in a set that literally have also UG faeries with stuff like Maraleaf Pixie? Boo

Aside from Maraleaf Pixie and Ivy, Gleeful Spellthief, there's maybe one other green Faerie you'd want to include in a commander deck (Scryb Ranger). Why are people so bent on expanding a tribe's colors, especially when there's so little material to work with? Faerie tribal is fine as Dimir.

Oh, there's a UB "Fae Dominion" commander precon. I still think of Eldraine as a discount Lorwyn of sorts, but more Dimir faeries are always a good thing