Card of the Day - Arbiter's Gavel

Each guild has to have an artifact, right?  This should be the only card with the line "You get one more vote."

Card of the Day - Wartime Assembly

This one can get out of hand really quickly.  You might even have your opponents voting Yea on this one.

Card of the Day - Bureaucratic Protocol

It's fun to not let your opponent do anything.  Except when you're playing with friends, unless your one friend has a bunch of baddies that everyone is scared of.  Then it's fun. But not for him.

Card of the Day - Filibuster

One of the things I really like about the vote mechanic is that you don't have to win every time.  Sometimes just getting a few votes makes casting a spell worthwhile.

Yea or Nay?

As you may know, the next big set for Magic:the Gathering is the Return to Ravnica.  For those of you who weren't around the first time, the plane of Ravnica is a big city, kind of like Coruscant, but less space-y.

The city is divided into ten guilds.  Each guild is made up of two colors and its philosophy is based on the interaction between those colors.  For example: the green/white guild, Selesnya, values community, life, and peace whereas the Cult of Rakdos (black/red) are generally cruel and disgusting.

The last time we went to Ravnica, each guild has its own mechanic or keyword.  Dredge, the Golgari's keyword, is still being used to take down tournaments in eternal formats. This time each guild is going to have a different keyword, and I've been trying to independently figure out a keyword of my own for each one.

Last week we looked at how the Orzhov Syndicate uses gold to get what it needs, and yesterday's  Card of the Day was my take on the Golgari ability word. This week's keyword is for the Azorius Senate.  If you're familiar with the guild, you'll know that the Blue/White Azorius Senate makes the laws for Ravnica and they are very liberal with their use of Law Magic.  Therefore, I propose Voting.

Let's go over a few of the pitfalls before I unveil the whole thing.

In a two player game, if each player gets one vote, most times the vote is going to fail.  The solution for this is to let other Planeswalkers vote, as well.  If you have Gideon on your side, you're probably going to win.

That was the initial design.  After some thought, I decided to let legendary creatures vote, as well, for a few reasons. One, it's just unfun if you're always losing votes because your opponent is playing with (generally) more expensive cards than you.  Most legendary creatures cost less (financially) than Planeswalkers. Two, I wanted people to have to count more votes. Voting seems bad if you don't get to interact with it. Three, Commander!  This seems like a perfect mechanic for commander decks to play with.  It feels at home in a multiplayer enviroment, and when you're playing commander, everyone has at least one legendary creature to play with.

OK, so here's the wording on all vote cards that are less than rare.

(Each player gets one vote plus one vote for each Planeswalker and Legendary Creature he or she controls. Each player may choose to vote Yea or Nay.)

And, without further ado, I present Azorius Justicar, in all his extended art glory:

Card of the Day - Nightshade Shambler

I've spent a good amount of this week thinking about the Guilds of Ravnica and decided I should create a mechanic for each one before they are actually released to the public.  I borrowed the Gold counters, but Harvest is all mine.

I like the idea of exiling it from your hand or graveyard.  It gives you a lot of good options.

Card of the Day - Assassin's Contract

Better Murder.   (It's better 'cause you get paid!)

Card of the Day - Mokari of the Obzedat

Here's a guild legend.  He uses gold counters as a win condition.

Card of the Day - Commissioned Plague

Damnation variant that makes gold counters good.

Card of the Day - Orzhov Coffers

A simple execution of gold counter production.  Perfect for an Orzhov land.

Card of the Day - Debtor's Respite

Here's an interesting way to use gold counters: as payment.

Card of the Day - Gold Counter

Sometimes great ideas need to be expanded upon.  This idea was used by Devon Rule in the GDS2, and then reexamined in HavelockV's challenge.  Since we're going back to Ravnica, I'd like to expand on Jay Treat's entry into the challenge.  This week's cards are all Orzhov cards based around the idea of gold counters. Enjoy!

Card of the Day - Path of the Knowledgable

I'm not sure if anyone noticed, but this weeks' cycle started on Wednesday and ended on Sunday.  Tomorrow I will start a new cycle, and it's going to be cool.

Card of the Day - Path of the Enraged

Haste and fighting is fun.  I love Ulvenwald Tracker, and I thought an enchantment version of him would be superawesome. Hence Path of the Enraged.

Card of the Day - Path of the Vile

I made these cards so the two abilities are synergistic.  The red ability on this one will kill any creature that it hits, because of the deathtouch.  I like how it can hurt players too.

Card of the Day - Path of the Wild

This card has the 2nd lowest mana cost, but the highest off color cost.  I like how the trample and lifegain are connected.

Card of the Day - Path of the Enlightened

I wanted to make a cycle of uncommon enchantments that had an off-color activation cost.  They should be useable in limited in a deck that didn't include the 2nd color, but would be powerful if both colors were used.

Also, TAPPING ENCHANTMENTS.  That is all.

Card of the Day - Skareth Bladewielder

There really should be a 2/2 Double strike for 1RW.  So I made it.

Card of the Day - Paranoia

Creepy eye!

Card of the Day - Walking Bomb

This guy is construct-ed worthy.  (See what I did there?)

Card of the Day - Skarren Warlord

This guy can get real mean.

Card of the Day - Mindmoss Overgrowth

I love this design.  It feels like blue and green had an awesome enchantment baby.

Card of the Day - Duergar Brute

Red/White guy.  Nothin' fancy.

Card of the Day - Fellowed Minstrel

I like this combination of abilities.  It gives you a better chance of killing what you want to.

Card of the Day - Relinquish

This is a different version of Blatant Thievery. It costs 2 mana less, but the opponents choose which cards to give up. 

Card of the Day - Thran Power Stone

The Thran were really cool and made a bunch of stuff way back when.  This card captures their flavor, while being almost Mishra's Workshop in artifact form.

Card of the Day - Storm Dragon

This guy is a color-shifted Shivan Dragon.  I just thought he was cool.  Also:  not too powerful for uncommon.

Card of the Day - Korrud's Phylactery

If you don;t know who Korrud is, you can find his card here.

Back in business!

Hey guys, thanks for commenting on my cards this month!  I'll be going back and commenting on your comments today, as I finally have internets in my new apartment. 

Card of the Day - Narcus the Infected

This guy is awesome in multiplayer games, as his first two abilities work better against multiple opponents. Plus, he's a werewolf.  That's cool.

Card of the Day - Anrha, Chaos Acolyte

I like the idea of planeswalkers making emblems that do small things.  This guy just makes your direct damage spells a tiny bit better.  Pretty sweet.

Card of the Day - Myrra Finn

I like making planeswalkers with static abilities, as it seems like a reasonable evolution of the card type.

Card of the Day - Olai Potae, Lady of Fungus

If you don't know, trample and deathtouch work really well together.  You only have to assign enough damage to a blocking creature to destroy it, and the rest carries over to the defending player. 

Card of the Day - Yari Mizell, the Living Brain

It's Planeswalker week!  This guy can't really protect himself, but he can draw you a boatload of cards!

Card of the Day - Death Incarnate

Rough cost, but crazy good ability.  First turn Dark Ritual + this = good game (unless they have a quick answer.)

Card of the Day - Enticing Aroma

Green's options for creature removal are always based on you having bigger creatures than the other guy.  Here's another entry into that field.  Put it on a big guy and watch all the tiny guys die.

Card of the Day - The Tick

Just for fun. :)

Card of the Day - Study

I feel like a lot of the time people will scry 0, but it's nice to have the option.

Card of the Day - Malignant Knowledge

A scaling Sign in Blood.  I think this just might be exactly what monoblack needs.


edit  3/12/15.  Wizards has actually made a card with the exact same rules text, Damnable Pact, which was spoiled today and will be included in the Dragons of Tarkir set.

Card of the Day - The TARDIS

Of course the TARDIS is indestructible.  And also it travels through time, so there you have it.

Card of the Day - The 10th Doctor

As may of you know, I'm a big Doctor Who fan, so naturally, I've made some cards based on the series. 

If you've seen the show, you know that the Doctor is totally a planeswalker.

His third ability summons the TARDIS.  If you have any guesses to what it does, this would be a good time to throw them out, as tomorrow's card is exactly that.

Card of the Day - Icy Excavation

Here's a powerful card draw spell.  It can hurt a lot if you don't use a lot of snow cards in your deck.

Card of the Day - Cold Denial

Here's a tack-on ice counter counter.

Card of the Day - Cover in Frost

Here's an enabler for ice counter strategies.

Card of the Day - Winter Bolt

Here's a simple tack-on job.  It's just a Lightning Bolt with a ice counter and a snow mana added on.  Still awesome and you get bonus ice counters.

Card of the Day - Super 4thstravaganza!

Boom.  Here's your fireworks.

Happy 4th of July, Americans.

Card of the Day - Cote of Doves

Fun fact:  a flock of doves is called a Cote!

Another fun fact:  Not all creatures in Frostmere are Snow creatures!

Card of the Day - Coldfire Whelp

A small icy dragon with superfreeze breath.  booyah.

Counter Production

One of the things I wanted in Frostmere was a counter theme.  A lot of blocks have used counters as a theme. A recent example is the Scars of Mirrodin block.

Since most of the plane is covered in ice, I thought Ice counters would be fun to play around with. They are a callback to a few rares from Coldsnap and one uncommon from Ice Age (which is being reprinted in Frostmere.)

We're going to be expanding on what Ice counters actually mean for the permanent that they are on.  Some cards love to be iced up.

For example:

The icier this guy gets, the more powerful he is.


Other cards punish other players for being Iced up.  This zombie turns all your ice counters into liabilities.

Here's a card that helps you if you're playing with ice counters, and can hinder the opponent if he or she is using them.

Using him in decks with other two preview cards makes him useful in different ways.  You can use him to pump up your Rime Wolf, or give counters to opposing creatures.  Best of all, he can be used to hold down an enemy for a long time.

This week's cards all deal with ice counters in some way.