Beacon of Creation Episode 6 notes

Hey everyone.

I haven't posted in a while, I know, but I've got something exciting going forward.  I've teamed up with Bradley Rose to make a podcast about Magic design. If you haven't listened yet, do so! (And give us a good rating!) I will be posting these every week as a supplement to the podcast so you, the listeners, can look at what happened while you are listening (or after.)

This week, we had Jay Treat on, of goblinartisans.com. He is a smart dude, and he had a lot of cool stuff to say about magic design. 

This week's challenges (send your submissions to beaconcreation@gmail.com):

Host/Augment: A vertical cycle that must use only one or two lines of rules text. A vertical cycle, if you don't know, is three (or four if you go mythic) cards of different rarites that do something similar. The bloodfire cycle is an example.

Worldbuilding challenge: Design a story spotlight card that features two of the created planeswalkers from last week.  Use one old, and one new.  You can mix and match any way that you like.

Here are some mockups of those planeswalkers, if you missed them before. Just a warning I edited some of their abilites from the original versions to clean them up and make them work a little better.

Card of the Day - Wasteland Temple

Card of the Day - Tunneling Badger

This mechanic is not mine.  I found it on a reddit post where u/socialscalie had a rough version on the card for his Wurm tribe.  I cleaned it up a bit and here it is.  I think it's a really cool form of evasion that green and red could share.  This thing gets in one hit and then it can do normal creature things.  I'm sure there's a red creature with Burrow and Haste that is going to be awesome.

If anyone has more concise wording for the ability, let me know.  I might use this in a future set.

Card of the Day - Hateful Fiend

I think it's about time that I get back into designing.  I know I promised all of ya'll that I would be doing a card every day, and I've obviously not done that.  New promise: sometimes I will make cards, and sometimes they will be good.   That is all.

Card of the Day - Tersh, the Walled City

I like legendary land walls.

Card of the Day - The Unfalling Wall

I like legendary commander walls.

Card of the Day - Great Wall of Bant

I like legendary walls.

Card of the Day - Wall of Thought

I like tricky walls.

Card of the Day - Garden Wall

I like walls.

Card of the Day - Squirrel Blast

The art from this is when Squirrel Girl defeats Dr. Doom in the Marvel comic.  I wanted to make this monogreen, but I wanted it to hit players as well, so I changed it to green red. I think this could be a green effect as long as it only hits creatures, since the damage is based on how many creatures you control.

Card of the Day - Squirrel Call

I originally called this Call the Squirrelwatch, but that was too silly.

Card of the Day - Sgt. Squirrel

Mythic Squirrel! This guy could probably be legendary, but he's cooler in multiples.

Card of the Day - Secret Squirrel

This was the first card I thought of when designing Squirrels.  The real Secret Squirrel is a Hanna-Barbera property, but I'm doing it anyway.  This art was from a comic book version I think?

Card of the Day - Squirrel Matron

The cards this week all have real art!  I have always liked Squirrel cards, and even though they are little too silly for regular Magic, I made some anyway.

Card of the Day - Unity Charm

This one is my favorite of the four color charm cycle.  The last mode makes a token copy of any creature, and it can even give you a double of your favorite legendary creature, without all the legendary baggage.

Card of the Day - Compleation Charm

Atraxa really enjoys this. We all know she really likes working with planeswalkers and their counters.  Blinking three of your planeswalkers with the third mode on Compleation Charm should finish the game for you, if it hasn't been compleated already. /awesomepun

Card of the Day - Maelstrom Charm

Yidris would find this pleasing. Works well with a few different strategies. The second mode seems like the best one, but either of the others could win the game for you.

Card of the Day - Artifice Charm

This one would have been in the Breya deck, which deals in artifice.  The second ability is a version of Soulquake for artifacts.

Card of the Day - Swarm Charm

This week's theme is Charms.  I really wanted there to be four colored charms in the last commander set, but I suppose we will have to settle for these.

Card of the Day - Glass Shark

Sharks are artifacts because sometimes people make them. This is a reference to a MBMBAM joke that you can find here.

Card of the Day - Hammerhead Hatchling

Sharks are red because of the loss of control that happens when they sense blood in the water. Shark frenzy is like berserker rage.  Dig it.

Card of the Day - Megalodon

Sharks are green because they are natural beings that survive on their instincts. Megalodons are an extinct species of giant shark that can be up to three times bigger than the biggest shark alive today. #sharkfacts

Card of the Day - Brutal Mako

Sharks are black because they are selfish and do whatever they can to get on top (of the food chain.) This card is a nearly functional reprint of Sengir Vampire, with menace substituted for flying.  I think menace gives it a more interactive feel in combat than flying does.

Card of the Day - Cunning Predator

SHARK WEEK!  Sharks are blue because they live underwater and they are fish.

Card of the Day - Gilt-Leaf Witch

Lorwyn elves have antlers! That is all.

Card of the Day - Misshapen Meditator

Imagine the future of magic. Emrakul escapes from the moon over Innistrad, and goes somewhere where elves live.  This is one of them.

Card of the Day - Patron of Renewal

A little love for my favorite guild. (Sorry Simic, you're second place.) This could be a mono-green card, but I think it fits in nicely with the flavor of the guild. Don't you?

Card of the Day - Artoan Crasher

Today's Elf is quite a bit different from yesterday's. He is still a 2/2, but he has the Boost keyword.  Boost has a number after it, and that's how much this creature's power and toughness increase when it attacks.  If you can figure out a way to attack more than once per turn, the boosts stack. Yowza.

Card of the Day - Argothian Apologist

I designed this card with Commander in mind.  There are a lot of incidental Sol Rings and signets that this fella can use to his advantage.  Worst case, he's a 2/2 for 2.

Card of the Day - Sands of Uncertainty

Everyone loves modal spells!  This card is usable at any mana cost.  For 3, you can just kill a creature that's been bugging you, and for 8, you get 5 1/1s. 

Card of the Day - Stoic Krumar

Sometimes a vanilla creature with reasonable stats does good work. Abzan players would not scoff at this guy.

Card of the Day - Wailing Arynx

Simple uncommon.  Good for blocking, good for attacking.

Card of the Day - Calculated Tragedy

I really like the idea of this. It might be better as a 4color card, but I think Abzan colors fit it well.

Card of the Day - Terrus Fen, the Anointed

Welcome to Abzan week. This week I will be featuring cards from my favorite wedge. Today's card is a two mana legendary creature.

The nice thing about creatures with off-color activation costs is that you can cast them and use them as a regular creature even if you don't have the mana to use the off-color ability.  Sure, the card gets better if you have it, but it's not necessary.

The Future of Mad Olaf's Magic Cards

Hello all,

If you've seen my blog before, you know that I usually just post a picture of a card that I designed and maybe a small explanation of it.

Not today.

When I first started this blog, sometime in 2012 (has it really been 5 years?), I promised to post a new card every day.  I did that faithfully for the first two and a half years, but I've been slacking. Since I've moved to Seattle, I'm that much closer to actually achieving my dream of working for Wizards of the Coast and I think it's time to review the vision for the blog.

Originally, I posted a card every day at midnight, central time.  To reach a bigger audience, I will be posting each weekday at 6am, pacific time.  You can expect a post every day, Monday through Friday.

That is all for now, and if you haven't been keeping an eye on my blog, now might be a good time to catch up.

Thank you all,

Adam

Card of the Day - Alcazar, Dread Captain

 I've been thinking about the Commander 2017 set, which has decks based around creature types. The Dragon deck has been partially spoiled, but I think what we really need is a Grixis colored Pirate deck.  A good captain knows that his crew is what keeps the ship moving.

Card of the Day - Slime Spawner/Expelling Jelly/Gelatinous Cube

I was inspired to make these cards after playing someone's mono-green Ooze deck. Although the deck was super fun, it could really use a couple of cards like this.

Card of the Day - Turn into Newt

I noticed today that blue and green share the ability to change power and toughness on creatures.  This is a mix of Lignify and Illusory Wrappings. I think it's okay. 

Card of the Day - Gix, Yawgmoth Praetor

If you're not familiar with Gix, he was one of the original Phyrexian baddies. You can learn a bit more about him here.

Card of the Day - Tull, Desert City

If you don't know by now, I'm very excited for the Dark Tower movie to show up at my local theater in July.  Tull is the first inhabited place visited by the Gunslinger in the first book of the Dark Tower series.

Card of the Day - Exchange Favors

So Hollee said to me tonight, "Are there any bargain cards? Like a card that can let you trade a card in your hand with a card in an opponent's hand?" 

I thought for a minute and couldn't think of one, so I made it.

I had to rejigger the wording to make it mutual exile instead of just trading cards in hands, but if it makes you feel better, you can put that card in your hand if you like.  I give you my permission.

Card of the Day - Strength of Solidarity

This is a play on all those white team pump enchantments.  White really wants to have a bunch of dudes to swing with, and Strength of Solidarity plays into that.

This card has a lot of knobs to turn to make it correct, developmentally speaking. The mana cost, the number of creatures required, the size of the buff, and any keyword abilities can all be changed to make this card correct for the format it belongs in.

I plugged it in the uncommon slot because it has a tiny bit of build-aroundness attached.  Not every white deck will want it, but most will. It gives incentive to get smaller white creatures, of which most sets have many.

In retrospect, I think +1/+2 and vigilance is too big of a boost for uncommon, especially for all creatures at once, but I made the card that way, and I'm sticking to it.