You're in denial and just anti-new sliver, you'll deny any point given to you.
Head crest, facial shape/design. Not to mention, if you knew anything of the alien franchise, they act in almost the EXACT same way.
Yes, who can forget the Skittering Spider Sliver's tendency to face-rape its human victims, implanting a tiny Sliver in their bellies which later bursts out and runs across tables.
Granted, Slivers and Aliens are cut from the same cloth in a similar way Humans and Faeries are. They're both eyeless, serpentine predators with a queen + hive structure. Whether or not original Slivers were influenced by Aliens (and they most certainly were) isn't really what the discussion is about though. The common complaint seems to be that they took a beloved, Magic-unique race and radically changed their appearance to one meant to be more appealing to the masses. Combine that with the fact that the new Slivers look strikingly like races we've seen commonly or recently, and it's not hard to see why people are so passionate about this issue.
Thundermaw Hellkite is likely to return. Wizards has said they like to keep the big staply cards in the set for two years, to give players more time to get + play with them before they leave. This was the case with Baneslayer Angel and the Titans.
Yet another "Sliver" with no Sliverlike features. This is a disappointing return for Slivers, to say the least.
It's weird that small Slivers are referred to in the flavor text as "thrums", especially considering that Slivers' card names always include "Sliver". I guess potential Sliver flavor text has been mined dry, so they need new things to talk about.
How about 'Memento' as a name instead of Remember?
Remember's wording needs a change to prevent sacrifice tricks. As-is, if you had a sac outlet like Viscera Seer, you could sacrifice your Remember creature with its exile trigger on the stack, putting it back in the graveyard so you can Remember it over and over. If that's something you don't want the ability to do, I'd change it to "If you do, exile it when it enters the battlefield or if it would die".
Great mechanic DarkCronos, the cards you posted are good proofs of concept. Your formatting makes them hard to read though, the spacing breaks up the flow of reading the abilities. In the future I suggest using something akin to this:
Card Name
Card type - Subtype (Rarity)
Keyword Ability
Other text and such
*/*
These decks are good jumping off points and look like fun to play, but they may be too inconsistent and unfocused.
The WG deck needs more white sources, a few Plains and possibly some Selesnya Guildgate. With more white sources you won't need Chromatic Lantern or Abundant Growth, so those slots can go to killing your opponent with more Rancor or Unflinching Courage. Druid's Deliverance and Heroes Reunion are nice, but those slots would be better used on more Selesnya Charm and Oblivion Ring, which can proactively remove what's trying to kill you rather than stalling for time. Tormod's Crypt may be handy, but it's a sideboard card at best. If you find yourself getting rolled by graveyard decks, keep Rest in Peace in the sideboard, it shuts them down a bit better than Tormod's. Your base creatures in Arbor Elf and Avacyn's Pilgrim are good; you should add more strong 3-drops to follow them up with. Try getting some Loxodon Smiter, he's a terror to see on turn 2. Another Centaur Healer or two might be good, since he can help you catch up to the really fast aggro decks. Lastly, you should condense your higher-cost creatures a bit. Try adding more Vorapede and Armada Wurm, and see if you can get your hands on 4 Advent of the Wurm. Other good cards to include are Strangleroot Geist, Call of the Conclave, and Fiend Hunter. Strangleroot can get real scary with a Rancor or two!
so this is my explanation for both the new mechanic and look of the new slivers. as mentioned in this thread the original slivers were brought to rath from another plain, perhaps if slivers are anything like other hive minded animals they only have to obey their own hive queen. and if the slivers from rath were taken from only one hive of slivers then it makes sense that they benefit all other slivers on rath because they are all hive siblings. and for the look, original slivers dont look dissimilar for the sort of boneless organism that spawned animal life on earth(which were basically a tube of flesh and a central nervous system.) so basically they could look like anything as they continue to evolve.
My issue is that we shouldn't need explanations as to why these Slivers look so drastically different. There should be enough design similarities between the look of new and old Slivers to make them clearly connected. I should be able to look at the new Slivers vs the old Slivers and SEE the similarities. The odd Sliver claw tossed on to a pair of distinctly non-Sliver creatures isn't enough.
I have no problem with the idea of switching up the base look of Slivers, but I don't like the way they were executed here. These "Slivers" are so visually divorced from the original Slivers that I have a hard time accepting them as being the same creature.
The change in function from "all" to "you control" is a bit of a flavor hit for Slivers, but I see why that change needed to happen for gameplay.
It really does seem like if they had to change Slivers so drastically to fit what they wanted, they just shouldn't have brought back Slivers at all.
However, without that knowledge, these really don't feel like spellbombs. A lot of the effects are just too big to feel right on a spellbomb, like Bloodscent and Essence Drain.
Is he going to be playing FNM or just casual games with friends? That distinction calls for two very different types of deck. Should it be more of a learning + fun games deck, or an efficient one that can do slightly better than 2-2 at FNM?
I gurantee that if we had posted
"What do you like most about slivers?"
Before this, very, very few people would have said "That they affect every player's slivers".
You all just hate change and love to complain.
And how many people do you think would have replied with "I like the way they look"?
It works that it adds the effect to the spell. But it doesn't work as intended because the effect would be added to the end of the spell. You could reword it similar to Fatal Blow though:
Destroy target creature if it was dealt damage this turn.
or:
Destroy all creatures that were dealt damage this turn.
That should probably cost a bit more though, both because it is almost Shriveling Rot and because the second time it is a free flashback. It could probably use a cost from the graveyard to help balance it, but then why isn't it just flashback?
It started off as a mechanic that exiled itself on resolution and added the spell's effects to each instant/sorcery you cast after, but I was afraid that'd be too powerful and unfun to play against. After the change, the "mix and match spell effects" was all it really had over flashback, so I wanted to make sure it worked.
I've thought about adding a cost to the ability, particularly a single C cost on all of them. I like your Fatal Blow fix a lot, I'll try to rework my other meld designs similarly. Thanks.
You mean the clear Ultra-Pro binder pages? I regularly stuff 4-8 cards per pocket with little wear. 1-2 per is ideal though, especially if you don't want to stretch out the pockets.
Before you binder up those foils I advise you get some of those exact fit clear sleeves for them. The foils will move around in the pockets if you transport the binder often, which will eventually cause them to cloud up. With exact fit sleeves it'll be the sleeves moving around in the binder pocket, not the card, stopping the foiled side from clouding. In my experience the shifting around has little to no impact on nonfoil cards, but it can't hurt to exact sleeve those too.
Shrivel :symb::symb:
Sorcery
Whenever a creature is dealt damage this turn, destroy it.
Meld (As you cast an instant or sorcery spell while this is in your graveyard, you may exile this card. If you do, add this card's effects to that spell.)
My goal here is that when you cast a Shock and meld this spell onto it, the Shocked creature will die due to Shock + Shrivel's combined effect. Is that the way it works?
The main thing Dimir seemed to be missing was a solid evasive guy with that Dimir Rogue flavor. Considering that the guild mechanic is focused on having your creatures go unblocked, an attractive small evasive guy seems like a no-brainer to include. I wasn't satisfied with the ones they did give us; Woodlot Crawler is a glorified Zombie Outlander, while Death Cult Rogue is neat but not powerful. I'll try a few:
Soul Drinker :symu::symb:
Creature - Vampire Rogue (R)
Flying, lifelink
Whenever Soul Drinker deals combat damage to an opponent, you may search that player's library for a card and exile it. Then that player shuffles his or her library.
2/1
Phantom Stalker :1mana::symu::symb:
Creature - Illusion Rogue (U)
Phantom Stalker is unblockable.
When Phantom Stalker enters the battlefield, target player reveals cards from the top of his or her library until a land card is revealed, then puts those cards into his or her graveyard.
2/2
Strongarm Spy :symu::symb:
Creature - Human Rogue (U)
Intimidate
Whenever Strongarm Spy deals combat damage to an opponent, that player exiles a card from his or her hand. Return that card to that player's hand at the beginning of his or her next end step.
2/1
Also, it would have been nice to have a repeatable grind effect (like Trostani) or a card that bridges Dimir's mill and non-mill strategies. This is both:
Sadistic Necrosage :1mana::symu::symb:
Creature - Human Wizard (R)
Whenever a creature card or token is put into an opponent's graveyard from anywhere, you may draw a card.
:1mana::symu::symb:, :symtap:: Target player reveals cards from the top of his or her library until a land card is revealed, then puts those cards into his or her graveyard.
1/3
Yes, who can forget the Skittering Spider Sliver's tendency to face-rape its human victims, implanting a tiny Sliver in their bellies which later bursts out and runs across tables.
Granted, Slivers and Aliens are cut from the same cloth in a similar way Humans and Faeries are. They're both eyeless, serpentine predators with a queen + hive structure. Whether or not original Slivers were influenced by Aliens (and they most certainly were) isn't really what the discussion is about though. The common complaint seems to be that they took a beloved, Magic-unique race and radically changed their appearance to one meant to be more appealing to the masses. Combine that with the fact that the new Slivers look strikingly like races we've seen commonly or recently, and it's not hard to see why people are so passionate about this issue.
It's weird that small Slivers are referred to in the flavor text as "thrums", especially considering that Slivers' card names always include "Sliver". I guess potential Sliver flavor text has been mined dry, so they need new things to talk about.
There is! It's the yellow thumbs up at the bottom left of the post, under the username/avatar/etc.
Remember's wording needs a change to prevent sacrifice tricks. As-is, if you had a sac outlet like Viscera Seer, you could sacrifice your Remember creature with its exile trigger on the stack, putting it back in the graveyard so you can Remember it over and over. If that's something you don't want the ability to do, I'd change it to "If you do, exile it when it enters the battlefield or if it would die".
Great mechanic DarkCronos, the cards you posted are good proofs of concept. Your formatting makes them hard to read though, the spacing breaks up the flow of reading the abilities. In the future I suggest using something akin to this:
Card Name
Card type - Subtype (Rarity)
Keyword Ability
Other text and such
*/*
The WG deck needs more white sources, a few Plains and possibly some Selesnya Guildgate. With more white sources you won't need Chromatic Lantern or Abundant Growth, so those slots can go to killing your opponent with more Rancor or Unflinching Courage. Druid's Deliverance and Heroes Reunion are nice, but those slots would be better used on more Selesnya Charm and Oblivion Ring, which can proactively remove what's trying to kill you rather than stalling for time. Tormod's Crypt may be handy, but it's a sideboard card at best. If you find yourself getting rolled by graveyard decks, keep Rest in Peace in the sideboard, it shuts them down a bit better than Tormod's. Your base creatures in Arbor Elf and Avacyn's Pilgrim are good; you should add more strong 3-drops to follow them up with. Try getting some Loxodon Smiter, he's a terror to see on turn 2. Another Centaur Healer or two might be good, since he can help you catch up to the really fast aggro decks. Lastly, you should condense your higher-cost creatures a bit. Try adding more Vorapede and Armada Wurm, and see if you can get your hands on 4 Advent of the Wurm. Other good cards to include are Strangleroot Geist, Call of the Conclave, and Fiend Hunter. Strangleroot can get real scary with a Rancor or two!
The UW deck is a bit less dtraightforward. You've got several really powerful cards, like Snapcaster Mage and Angel of Serenity, but I don't know if this is the best deck to use them in. If you're going for more Human tribal I suggest upping the number of Champion of the Parish to 4, getting Boros Elite and generally playing more strong aggressive cards. 4 Gather the Townsfolk,
If you're going more WU control I suggest you take out a lot of your smaller guys in favor of more long-game card advantage, tempo and removal cards. Try getting Augur of Bolas, Azorius Charm, Oblivion Ring, Detention Sphere, Syncopate, Dissipate, Supreme Verdict, and Geist of Saint Traft as a finisher. Sphinx's Revelation does wonders for this type of deck. You lands could use at least a couple Azorius Guildgates, if not Hallowed Fountains.
The BR is pretty straightforward aggro, I like it. Grimoire of the Dead and Tablet of Guilds aren't great here. The deck could definitely use more small creatures like Stromkirk Noble, Rakdos Cackler, Spike Jester, and Stonewright. Pyreheart Wolf can make blocking your creatures difficult, while Ash Zealot is efficient, quick, and goes well with Stonewright. Some faster creatures like Falkenrath Aristocrat, Hellrider, or Exava, Rakdos Bloodwitch will help you end games before they go late. Bloodfray Giant is another, if slower, alternative.
My issue is that we shouldn't need explanations as to why these Slivers look so drastically different. There should be enough design similarities between the look of new and old Slivers to make them clearly connected. I should be able to look at the new Slivers vs the old Slivers and SEE the similarities. The odd Sliver claw tossed on to a pair of distinctly non-Sliver creatures isn't enough.
The change in function from "all" to "you control" is a bit of a flavor hit for Slivers, but I see why that change needed to happen for gameplay.
It really does seem like if they had to change Slivers so drastically to fit what they wanted, they just shouldn't have brought back Slivers at all.
Battlegrowth
Shatter
Seething Song
Terror
Essence Drain
Early Frost
Thirst for Knowledge
Awe Strike
Raise the Alarm
Bloodscent
However, without that knowledge, these really don't feel like spellbombs. A lot of the effects are just too big to feel right on a spellbomb, like Bloodscent and Essence Drain.
Given the new look of Slivers I think Chandra would be pulling a Schwarzenegger, not a Ripley.
And how many people do you think would have replied with "I like the way they look"?
It started off as a mechanic that exiled itself on resolution and added the spell's effects to each instant/sorcery you cast after, but I was afraid that'd be too powerful and unfun to play against. After the change, the "mix and match spell effects" was all it really had over flashback, so I wanted to make sure it worked.
I've thought about adding a cost to the ability, particularly a single C cost on all of them. I like your Fatal Blow fix a lot, I'll try to rework my other meld designs similarly. Thanks.
Before you binder up those foils I advise you get some of those exact fit clear sleeves for them. The foils will move around in the pockets if you transport the binder often, which will eventually cause them to cloud up. With exact fit sleeves it'll be the sleeves moving around in the binder pocket, not the card, stopping the foiled side from clouding. In my experience the shifting around has little to no impact on nonfoil cards, but it can't hurt to exact sleeve those too.
Sorcery
Whenever a creature is dealt damage this turn, destroy it.
Meld (As you cast an instant or sorcery spell while this is in your graveyard, you may exile this card. If you do, add this card's effects to that spell.)
My goal here is that when you cast a Shock and meld this spell onto it, the Shocked creature will die due to Shock + Shrivel's combined effect. Is that the way it works?
Soul Drinker :symu::symb:
Creature - Vampire Rogue (R)
Flying, lifelink
Whenever Soul Drinker deals combat damage to an opponent, you may search that player's library for a card and exile it. Then that player shuffles his or her library.
2/1
Phantom Stalker :1mana::symu::symb:
Creature - Illusion Rogue (U)
Phantom Stalker is unblockable.
When Phantom Stalker enters the battlefield, target player reveals cards from the top of his or her library until a land card is revealed, then puts those cards into his or her graveyard.
2/2
Strongarm Spy :symu::symb:
Creature - Human Rogue (U)
Intimidate
Whenever Strongarm Spy deals combat damage to an opponent, that player exiles a card from his or her hand. Return that card to that player's hand at the beginning of his or her next end step.
2/1
Also, it would have been nice to have a repeatable grind effect (like Trostani) or a card that bridges Dimir's mill and non-mill strategies. This is both:
Sadistic Necrosage :1mana::symu::symb:
Creature - Human Wizard (R)
Whenever a creature card or token is put into an opponent's graveyard from anywhere, you may draw a card.
:1mana::symu::symb:, :symtap:: Target player reveals cards from the top of his or her library until a land card is revealed, then puts those cards into his or her graveyard.
1/3