I think Snow is expected and coming back in a big way.
Model DFCs are a great way to have Snow card, one side is normal, the other is Snow.. Maybe even cast with Snow Mana.
Now for an extra tech... print Snow card.. but use MDFCs for a cycle of "<Place Name> Mire" Land -(Add B)// Shadowrime Mire Snow Land - Add C" make people choose what they play the land for and don't print snow-covered basics other than snow-covered wastes.
It would be interesting gameplay, making all snow mana in standard colorless (or at least tricky to get in colors), while allowing Snow Mana in Modern (and maybe historic) to use the snow basics.... creating different effects in different formats.
I think it will be castable from hand as a sorcery, hence the lack of reminder text.
Also in this card, it makes sense: You can choose, cast your 5/5 cheap beast if the conditions are right, or choose to make a token, should you need one.
The flavor is you send your hero or whoever on an adventure.
Mechanically: You may cast Welcome Home as a sorcery from the battlefield, as if the adventure was a card 'in hand'. The card (Flaxen intruder included) moves to the stack, and the spell resolves into the graveyard as such. Pretty similar in function to a sac ability, but it is actually casting a spell so that it interacts with cost reduction, cast triggers, storm, etc.
It makes sends with the format: "Welcome Home" is formatting like a mini-card. And it exists in the text box, so it's only active when Flaxen Intruder is in play
I think Goatnap could be a blast in limited: With both Slivers and multiple mini-tribal interactions abound, Changelings could be real crazy things in limited. Stealing and pumping one could result in some huge and funny swings.
I do wonder if Arena's 'no singles' policy has an effect on this. It's an uncommon wildcard, but I'm slowly coming to point where managing my uncommon wildcards or getting the uncommons that I want is encouraging me to play more drafts than the free crystals and gold allow. Oddly, since Arena works different, flooding us with chase uncommons would be a greater spur to online sales. I'd be interested in seeing the marketer's thinking here.
On a totally different note: Will Magistrate's Scepter become actually used? In a turbo-proliferate deck, 3 proliferates + an untapped scepter yield an extra turn. Already Karn's Bastion and Wilderness Reclamation give 2 per turn, without needing much modification from some existing decks. If a deck can reliably proliferate 3 times a turn.. we have a colorless turn engine. Even in you can only reliably proliferate 2/turn you could end up taking 2 turns to your opponent's 1. If this is the level of proliferate.. that 3/turn limit is not hard... and you're also proliferating counters and walkers in the meantime.
The sotry scenes on the mothership can be clicked to expand them into sets of 4 cards, including one that's been up for a while, but not on this spoiler.
Gleaming Overseer1UB
Creature - Zombie Wizard (U)
When Gleaming Overseer enters the battlefield, amass 1.
Zombie tokens you control have hexproof and menace.
1/4
Protecting your army seems really useful. I'd hate to be amassing an army under a pacifism, this could help.
I don't think you need a hugely dedicated deck. The Scepter is basically a free turn per 3 proliferates, once you get over the hurdle of Playing it, tapping for the first counter, and then untapping it. However, in the meantime: You're still proliferating your other planeswalkers, +1/+1 counters and more. If there's a strong proliferate suite, this just slots in.
With Karn's Bastion and Wilderness Reclamation, this gets out of hand. A wilderness reclamation deck plays as normal, except for trading a colored land for the Bastion. Do your normal thing.. until you get Scepter, Bastion, and 2 Reclamations.. and you've just stapled a potential infinite into an otherwise already functional deck. An Bastion isn't just a combo piece, as bastion/reclamation could proliferate the heck out of many other things.
Also, if proliferating is too easy, I could see this becoming a part of Mastermind's Acquisition toolboxes.
Oh poor Magistrate's Scepter, it never really got its moment.. except with proliferate it could get twisted.
With just the cards spoiled now, building up three counters per turn reliably is quite easy, without having go into junk cards, other than Scepter itself.
Karn's Bastion proliferates once per turn, Twice if you have Wilderness Reclamation. The new Kiora is a nice ramp/utility piece that can also grant a consistent untap. (And proliferate would put her counters back). So Bastion/Scepter could just be slipped into a Wilderness reclamation deck with little effort.. and bam you've got infinite turns.
Just with Bastion and Reclamation, you get 2 of the 3 counters per turn. Finding a third proliferate source doesn't seem difficult. I could see this leading to some too easy locks.
Perhaps Turbo-Scepter could become a deck of its own? Flux Channeler and Scepter means that ,after 1 counter is on, you can get an extra turn for every 3 spells you cast. You could try to make a deck that casts 3 spells per turn on average, (or less if you have other consistent proliferate effects). I know there is a hurdle to getting Scepter onto the field, adding the first counter, then untapping with it, but after that.. it's an repeatable extra turn engine.. which is worth a shot.
Why the talk of uncommon walkerss when 16 mythics and 20 rares is more likely? 36 planeswalkers is more than enough for this to be a walkers set, it's one more than the number of dinosaurs in Ixalan.
as MaRo stated many times you cannot have a "theme" if it's only present in higher rarity because in limited you can't really get it.
having a set with 16 mythic pw ( 1more mythic than a normal set) and 30 rare (more than half the normal numbers of rares) won't work.
for your example of the number of dinosaurs (and they were 1 of 4 factions) they were spread across all rarities, we still can consider common out of the equations but going down to UC like the legendary theme in Dominaria seems right to have a PW theme (obviously UC PW must be simple designs and not too powerful)
But, this could be dealt with by including a PW in every sealed kit. Combine this with PW masterpieces, and we get guaranteed planeswalkers, enough variety to make the kits not boring, and a way to be sure PW matters cards aren't junk in limited.
I think PW matter abilities would have to be tacked on to otherwise useful bodies, or made modal.. so they could be used pro/anti planeswalker. With a slightly high probability to make sure PW are ok in draft, and the right balance of masterpiece placement, it could work for limited without screwing up standard.
Another thought.. too many planeswalkers in a limited deck can be annoying.. I'd expect any rare planeswalkers to have difficult casting costs, perhaps even a rare cycle of XCCC PWs, which would allow PWs to be in higher density.. without encouraging everyone to go superfriends and snag every last one.
It should be noted that it's simply a stamped foil Planeswalker. It doesn't specify War of the Spark Planeswalker.
I think they might just do 5-7 planeswalker in War of the Spark. Then include Domri, Dovin, Ral, Kaya, Vraska and maybe even Bolas as possible War of the Spark stamped cards in the prerelease kits.
Exactly what masterpieces would accomplish: Non War of the Spark PWs
I can see this going down 2 routes:
1) getting Tibalt levels of disappointment from most of the planeswalkers, pretty much working as glorified sorcery spells (only loyalty spending abilities usable once or twice at most) or not making any decent impact on the game.
2) In a standard environment where Oath of Teferi is still legal, getting superfriends control in addition to monored (and variants) and Teferi control (and variants), making Standard an even more unplayable mess (at least for Arena).
Another issue solved by bringing back Masterpieces (which weren't standard legal)
This makes sense with the gameplay ramifications. In the end, this is what they would need to do to make a PW set work.
A PW-focused set runs into the problem that too many PWs can spread thin your ability to deal with them. And at a certain point, being able to deal with that many planeswalkers through creatures... turns into 'screw it, go for the dome' A flood of PWs in limited would make gameplay ridiculous. Having more than a few in a set could make limited hell.
But on the other hand: If they print PW-matter cards, (which people want)you need to be sure people have a PW to use it with, or it's a feel-bad situation.
So the gameplay issue is: How to be sure everyone has a chance to use PW-matters cards /without/ flooding the limited environment with more planeswalkers than can be reasonably dealt with? The answer, quite elegantly, is to do exactly this: Add 1 foil PW to each prerelease kit.
It's an easy and quite elegant solution to balancing the density of planeswalkers for limited play and the ability of PW matters cards to exist. However, I do expect
A) there to be a higher-than-normal planeswalker density in the set, perhaps even at rare
B) Planeswalker masterpieces are almost a must. If each back contained 1 out of 6 different PWs, it would be boring, especially if they we build-around quality. Even if it was 1 of 10, the variety would be meh. We need a bunch. But the only way to really have enough variety of PWs to make the packs different enough, without having enough PW density to warp limited, is to re introduce masterpieces.
Masterpieces would be the right tool for this job.
In an interview with Gavin on Tolaria Community College, he let slip that there was something in 'War of the Spark' I think regarding merfolk. That supports the name theory
1. An Archon with a B Belligerent Archon4RWB
Creature - Archon (R)
Flying, Vigilance
Creatures that are attacking you or a planeswalker you control get -1/-1
Creatures your opponents control must attack if able. He drove the men of Akros to a frenzy, and punished them for the selfsame act. But archons see no paradoxes, only a single truth: They are unerringly right.
5/5
2. Red Control Commander: Auntie Hullaga3RR
Legendary Creature - Goblin Shaman (M)
Whenever a goblin you control deals combat damage to a player, put a loot counter on target nonland permanent that player controls.
During your upkeep, gain control of all permanents with loot counters on them until end of turn. They gain haste.
3/3
3. Complaet the Card: Beckett, Brass Admiral5
Artifact Creature - Pirate (R)
Infect, Menace
When Beckett deals combat damage to a player, gain control of target nonland permanent that player controls with casting cost X or less, where X is the number of poison counters they have. She was upgraded for her useful acquisition skills... and the delicious irony
2/5
4. To fit with Lorthos from Zendikar Deepruin Savant3U
Creature - Merfolk Wizard (U)
T: Add CCCC. This mana may not be used to cast spells Overlooked by serious scholars as useless frivolity, the secrets of Ula's lost temple had applications beyond both imagination and sanity
1/4
5. A card named Metathran Tactitian Metathran Tactitian2WU
Creature - Metathran Knight (R)
Hexproof from spells with a converted mana cost of 4 or less.
Metathran Tactition can't be blocked by creatures with a converted mana cost of 4 or less. Lesser forms of reality are simply beneath him
3/3
Turning of Tarkir3UBR
Enchantment - Saga (M)
I: Destroy all dragons.
II: Each player shuffles their hand and graveyard into their library, then draws seven cards.
III: Reveal any number of dragon permanent cards from your hand and put them on the battlefield,
Rakdos: Spectacle X( When you draw this card, you may cast if for X)
Azorius: Deliberate X (Pay X and exile this card. At the beginning of your next upkeep, you may cast this without paying its mana cost. Deliberate only as a sorcery)
Orzhov: Linger(test name only on Inst/Sorc): When you cast a spell with a higher converted mana cost, you may cast this spell from your graveyard without paying its mana cost then exile it.
Simic: Monstrosity returns
Gruul: Bloodthirst Returns
Logic:
Rakdos: Starting with Spectacle and the spoiled card, "light the stage". This seems to be a card that you'd cast for like a miracle card: When you get it. In the disucssions of Miracle, it had been a 4 or 5 on the storm scale before being demoted. The big issue they mention is limited design space in the theme. If they replace the 'This suddenly saves the day" with "We are doing this NOW" theme, then the mechanics' huge hurdle is lifted. As well as the 'feel bad' of only getting miracle at very specific, sometimes hard to track times.
Fiery FLourish 2R
Instant (C)
Spectacle R (When you draw this card, you may cast it for R)
Deal 4 damage to any creature.
Azorious: Their mechanics kinda sucked. Detain was boring but functional. However, if we have the Rakdos, we can contrast them to the Rakdos by casting spells cheaply, but slowly. Suspend was a popular but problematic mechanic, with a lot of fiddly bits, time counter manipulations, intense attention to the exile zone etc. However, a 'suspend 1' mechanic captures the slow an deliberate feel of the Azorious perfectly.
Ledev Bureaumancer 4WW
Deliberate 2W (2W,Exile this card: At the beginning of your next upkeep, you may cast it without paying its mana cost. Deliberate only as a sorcery
When Ledev Bureaumancer enters the battlefield, target player skips their next untap step.
2/5
Orzhov: Haunt was a bust, and Extort has a few balance problems with 2HG, EDH, and the counterintuitive W mana on a black card but not really problem. So Orzhov likes opulence, Orzhov also likes the graveyard. So what about a mechanic that cares about High CMC spells. Orzhov is rich, they should be playing big things. So my idea is that if they cast a big spell, they can get a free smaller spell as a rider.
Shifty Loophole 2W
Instant Linger-When you cast a spell with a higher converted mana cost, you may cast shifty loophole from your graveyard without paying its mana cost then exile it.
Exile target nontoken creature. At the beginning of the next end step, return it to the battlefield under its owner's control.
As for the New Mechanics: Azorious and Rakdos allow you to cast High CMC spells earlier, which can help Orzhov or other CMC matters mechanic. SO the B and W mechanic interactions are there.
Now, by interesting Monstrosity in simic it gives U a mana sink to use its discounted mana on. Monstrosity is well in line with simic, its what they do.. make things bigger. Also, by adding a few +1/+1 counter using/respecting creatures in the mix, especially in green. We can interact with bloodthirst.
Lastly, Bloodthirst was popular, but it needed ways to get trigger more often. Enter the Rakdos as a companion guild. The rakdos style supports bloodthirst more than the mechanic does.
Model DFCs are a great way to have Snow card, one side is normal, the other is Snow.. Maybe even cast with Snow Mana.
Now for an extra tech... print Snow card.. but use MDFCs for a cycle of "<Place Name> Mire" Land -(Add B)// Shadowrime Mire Snow Land - Add C" make people choose what they play the land for and don't print snow-covered basics other than snow-covered wastes.
It would be interesting gameplay, making all snow mana in standard colorless (or at least tricky to get in colors), while allowing Snow Mana in Modern (and maybe historic) to use the snow basics.... creating different effects in different formats.
Also in this card, it makes sense: You can choose, cast your 5/5 cheap beast if the conditions are right, or choose to make a token, should you need one.
The flavor is you send your hero or whoever on an adventure.
Mechanically: You may cast Welcome Home as a sorcery from the battlefield, as if the adventure was a card 'in hand'. The card (Flaxen intruder included) moves to the stack, and the spell resolves into the graveyard as such. Pretty similar in function to a sac ability, but it is actually casting a spell so that it interacts with cost reduction, cast triggers, storm, etc.
It makes sends with the format: "Welcome Home" is formatting like a mini-card. And it exists in the text box, so it's only active when Flaxen Intruder is in play
On a totally different note: Will Magistrate's Scepter become actually used? In a turbo-proliferate deck, 3 proliferates + an untapped scepter yield an extra turn. Already Karn's Bastion and Wilderness Reclamation give 2 per turn, without needing much modification from some existing decks. If a deck can reliably proliferate 3 times a turn.. we have a colorless turn engine. Even in you can only reliably proliferate 2/turn you could end up taking 2 turns to your opponent's 1. If this is the level of proliferate.. that 3/turn limit is not hard... and you're also proliferating counters and walkers in the meantime.
Gleaming Overseer 1UB
Creature - Zombie Wizard (U)
When Gleaming Overseer enters the battlefield, amass 1.
Zombie tokens you control have hexproof and menace.
1/4
Protecting your army seems really useful. I'd hate to be amassing an army under a pacifism, this could help.
With Karn's Bastion and Wilderness Reclamation, this gets out of hand. A wilderness reclamation deck plays as normal, except for trading a colored land for the Bastion. Do your normal thing.. until you get Scepter, Bastion, and 2 Reclamations.. and you've just stapled a potential infinite into an otherwise already functional deck. An Bastion isn't just a combo piece, as bastion/reclamation could proliferate the heck out of many other things.
Also, if proliferating is too easy, I could see this becoming a part of Mastermind's Acquisition toolboxes.
With just the cards spoiled now, building up three counters per turn reliably is quite easy, without having go into junk cards, other than Scepter itself.
Karn's Bastion proliferates once per turn, Twice if you have Wilderness Reclamation. The new Kiora is a nice ramp/utility piece that can also grant a consistent untap. (And proliferate would put her counters back). So Bastion/Scepter could just be slipped into a Wilderness reclamation deck with little effort.. and bam you've got infinite turns.
Just with Bastion and Reclamation, you get 2 of the 3 counters per turn. Finding a third proliferate source doesn't seem difficult. I could see this leading to some too easy locks.
Perhaps Turbo-Scepter could become a deck of its own? Flux Channeler and Scepter means that ,after 1 counter is on, you can get an extra turn for every 3 spells you cast. You could try to make a deck that casts 3 spells per turn on average, (or less if you have other consistent proliferate effects). I know there is a hurdle to getting Scepter onto the field, adding the first counter, then untapping with it, but after that.. it's an repeatable extra turn engine.. which is worth a shot.
But, this could be dealt with by including a PW in every sealed kit. Combine this with PW masterpieces, and we get guaranteed planeswalkers, enough variety to make the kits not boring, and a way to be sure PW matters cards aren't junk in limited.
I think PW matter abilities would have to be tacked on to otherwise useful bodies, or made modal.. so they could be used pro/anti planeswalker. With a slightly high probability to make sure PW are ok in draft, and the right balance of masterpiece placement, it could work for limited without screwing up standard.
Another thought.. too many planeswalkers in a limited deck can be annoying.. I'd expect any rare planeswalkers to have difficult casting costs, perhaps even a rare cycle of XCCC PWs, which would allow PWs to be in higher density.. without encouraging everyone to go superfriends and snag every last one.
Exactly what masterpieces would accomplish: Non War of the Spark PWs
Another issue solved by bringing back Masterpieces (which weren't standard legal)
A PW-focused set runs into the problem that too many PWs can spread thin your ability to deal with them. And at a certain point, being able to deal with that many planeswalkers through creatures... turns into 'screw it, go for the dome' A flood of PWs in limited would make gameplay ridiculous. Having more than a few in a set could make limited hell.
But on the other hand: If they print PW-matter cards, (which people want)you need to be sure people have a PW to use it with, or it's a feel-bad situation.
So the gameplay issue is: How to be sure everyone has a chance to use PW-matters cards /without/ flooding the limited environment with more planeswalkers than can be reasonably dealt with? The answer, quite elegantly, is to do exactly this: Add 1 foil PW to each prerelease kit.
It's an easy and quite elegant solution to balancing the density of planeswalkers for limited play and the ability of PW matters cards to exist. However, I do expect
A) there to be a higher-than-normal planeswalker density in the set, perhaps even at rare
B) Planeswalker masterpieces are almost a must. If each back contained 1 out of 6 different PWs, it would be boring, especially if they we build-around quality. Even if it was 1 of 10, the variety would be meh. We need a bunch. But the only way to really have enough variety of PWs to make the packs different enough, without having enough PW density to warp limited, is to re introduce masterpieces.
Masterpieces would be the right tool for this job.
1. An Archon with a B
Belligerent Archon 4RWB
Creature - Archon (R)
Flying, Vigilance
Creatures that are attacking you or a planeswalker you control get -1/-1
Creatures your opponents control must attack if able.
He drove the men of Akros to a frenzy, and punished them for the selfsame act. But archons see no paradoxes, only a single truth: They are unerringly right.
5/5
2. Red Control Commander:
Auntie Hullaga 3RR
Legendary Creature - Goblin Shaman (M)
Whenever a goblin you control deals combat damage to a player, put a loot counter on target nonland permanent that player controls.
During your upkeep, gain control of all permanents with loot counters on them until end of turn. They gain haste.
3/3
3. Complaet the Card:
Beckett, Brass Admiral 5
Artifact Creature - Pirate (R)
Infect, Menace
When Beckett deals combat damage to a player, gain control of target nonland permanent that player controls with casting cost X or less, where X is the number of poison counters they have.
She was upgraded for her useful acquisition skills... and the delicious irony
2/5
4. To fit with Lorthos from Zendikar
Deepruin Savant 3U
Creature - Merfolk Wizard (U)
T: Add CCCC. This mana may not be used to cast spells
Overlooked by serious scholars as useless frivolity, the secrets of Ula's lost temple had applications beyond both imagination and sanity
1/4
5. A card named Metathran Tactitian
Metathran Tactitian 2WU
Creature - Metathran Knight (R)
Hexproof from spells with a converted mana cost of 4 or less.
Metathran Tactition can't be blocked by creatures with a converted mana cost of 4 or less.
Lesser forms of reality are simply beneath him
3/3
Enchantment - Saga (M)
I: Destroy all dragons.
II: Each player shuffles their hand and graveyard into their library, then draws seven cards.
III: Reveal any number of dragon permanent cards from your hand and put them on the battlefield,
Rakdos: Spectacle X( When you draw this card, you may cast if for X)
Azorius: Deliberate X (Pay X and exile this card. At the beginning of your next upkeep, you may cast this without paying its mana cost. Deliberate only as a sorcery)
Orzhov: Linger(test name only on Inst/Sorc): When you cast a spell with a higher converted mana cost, you may cast this spell from your graveyard without paying its mana cost then exile it.
Simic: Monstrosity returns
Gruul: Bloodthirst Returns
Logic:
Rakdos: Starting with Spectacle and the spoiled card, "light the stage". This seems to be a card that you'd cast for like a miracle card: When you get it. In the disucssions of Miracle, it had been a 4 or 5 on the storm scale before being demoted. The big issue they mention is limited design space in the theme. If they replace the 'This suddenly saves the day" with "We are doing this NOW" theme, then the mechanics' huge hurdle is lifted. As well as the 'feel bad' of only getting miracle at very specific, sometimes hard to track times.
Fiery FLourish 2R
Instant (C)
Spectacle R (When you draw this card, you may cast it for R)
Deal 4 damage to any creature.
Azorious: Their mechanics kinda sucked. Detain was boring but functional. However, if we have the Rakdos, we can contrast them to the Rakdos by casting spells cheaply, but slowly. Suspend was a popular but problematic mechanic, with a lot of fiddly bits, time counter manipulations, intense attention to the exile zone etc. However, a 'suspend 1' mechanic captures the slow an deliberate feel of the Azorious perfectly.
Ledev Bureaumancer 4WW
Deliberate 2W (2W,Exile this card: At the beginning of your next upkeep, you may cast it without paying its mana cost. Deliberate only as a sorcery
When Ledev Bureaumancer enters the battlefield, target player skips their next untap step.
2/5
Orzhov: Haunt was a bust, and Extort has a few balance problems with 2HG, EDH, and the counterintuitive W mana on a black card but not really problem. So Orzhov likes opulence, Orzhov also likes the graveyard. So what about a mechanic that cares about High CMC spells. Orzhov is rich, they should be playing big things. So my idea is that if they cast a big spell, they can get a free smaller spell as a rider.
Shifty Loophole 2W
Instant
Linger-When you cast a spell with a higher converted mana cost, you may cast shifty loophole from your graveyard without paying its mana cost then exile it.
Exile target nontoken creature. At the beginning of the next end step, return it to the battlefield under its owner's control.
As for the New Mechanics: Azorious and Rakdos allow you to cast High CMC spells earlier, which can help Orzhov or other CMC matters mechanic. SO the B and W mechanic interactions are there.
Now, by interesting Monstrosity in simic it gives U a mana sink to use its discounted mana on. Monstrosity is well in line with simic, its what they do.. make things bigger. Also, by adding a few +1/+1 counter using/respecting creatures in the mix, especially in green. We can interact with bloodthirst.
Lastly, Bloodthirst was popular, but it needed ways to get trigger more often. Enter the Rakdos as a companion guild. The rakdos style supports bloodthirst more than the mechanic does.
Just some ideas that may work coherently together