This is a thing I want to do since long time ago, but I never found the correct balance of number of cards to be satisfied with and to try to do it really
General Custom Cards: The Lab
- Thread starter anotak
- Start date
I have tried several different variants and they honestly have all been a succes. Everyone loved to play the format. I also like how Ravnic is going to do it: Start with a small number and slowly let that number grow. Our latest version do it the opposite. We start big and then slowly gain fewer and fewer cards but also better and better cards. The idea is to keep the excitement up at all point in time. And even if someone gets better cards in the start, they can’t be sure to still have the best cards later.
My advice would be to simply try it out and see how the player base react.
There are downsides to this kind of tournament as well as upsides. It is a lot more difficult to get themes to work, your cube needs to be larger and you are losing out on the draft portion of the game, which is something I really like. You can always do a mix of both drafting and getting new cards between games.
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How do you all make the little mana symbols appear in a post?
Chris Taylor
Contributor
Smiles menu
Awesome. Thanks, y'all!
Chris Taylor
Contributor
Random idea:
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Maul does also give first strike, so maybe this deserves another keyword, but maybe not. Gut feeling is trample (the obvious choice) would be a bit over the top?
--> --> Maul does also give first strike, so maybe this deserves another keyword, but maybe not. Gut feeling is trample (the obvious choice) would be a bit over the top?
Maul gives first strike AND FLYING and is still a hard sell at high power due to the crazy equip cost after your first holder dies.Random idea:
Maul does also give first strike, so maybe this deserves another keyword, but maybe not. Gut feeling is trample (the obvious choice) would be a bit over the top?
Embercleave costs about the same amount of mana in practice and gives double strike and trample, and has the same problem as Maul…
Chris Taylor
Contributor
Honestly I've found maul to be fine and embercleave to be GRBS
Just want to give a heads up that if you like making custom cards and don't hate antiquated forum software, we are hosting our annual big design contest over at nogoblinsallowed. For some background, we're a community mostly made up of card designers and flavor nerd refugees from 2013 when WotC nuked their official forums, but we don't get a lot of new blood (unsurprisingly) and I'm dead tired of grading the designs of the dwindling pool of the same people who haven't managed to win the contest yet, so I'm desperate for some new blood.
I'm pretty sure it has to be a permanent.
I think the solution is to bastardize Enchantments rather than bastardizing Disturb.
Seal of Extortion B
Enchantment
Sacrifice Seal of Extortion: Blackmail. Activate only as a sorcery.
Disturb - Sac a creature
___
Cabal Racketeering
Enchantment
EDIT Exile Cabal Racketeering: Therapy. Activate only as a sorcery.
You could put a "When ~ enters the battlefield, you may sacrifice it. If you do, -effect-." if the ability to leave it sitting around seems problematic.
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Onderzeeboot
Ecstatic Orb
I really don't think it has to be. I mean, sure, the official rules specifically talk only about permanents transforming, but Startled Awake still exists. There also isn't any reason the rules couldn't be rewritten to allow for transforming instants/sorceries, so for a custom card I think this is fair game (despite the fact that I think aftermath is a better solution). Really, the question we should ask ourselves here is this; what does it mean for a transformed card to be an instant or sorcery? Up until Innistrad: Midnight Hunt, the answer was "nothing". Transformed cards could only live on the battlefield, not on the stack. MID changed that though! Disturb allows you to put transformed cards directly onto the stack, and thus a valid use case for cards transforming into a non-permanent spell was born.
Edit: Good on you for moving this discussion, by the way
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Onderzeeboot
Ecstatic Orb
No worries! We can keep this discussion going in two different threads to confuse potential new Riptiders!Can't you just make the "back half" a pay a cost and exile this effect? Not to take away the rules artistry going on with this custom already lol.
Like this:
Seems like it would take about the same rules text as the current front side (a tad more) once you take away the disturb reminder text. and single sided card >> double sided card.
Edit: Sorry Brad for dragging this back here. I saw this thread first...
A (small?) downside of doing it the Geistblast way is that you lose out on story through the art that no longer fits. I added the flavor text, but this makes the font rather small. Additionally, because there is no mana cost involved in the secondary cost, it isn't immediately obvious that it does something from the graveyard.
I tried turning it into an aftermath card as well, but that just doesn't look as clean because of the alternate casting cost that doesn't involve paying mana. Anyway, here's a bunch of examples. Judge for yourself! (I included the original disturb version as well, for reference.)
Onderzeeboot
Ecstatic Orb
Personally, I dislike the old border, but one upside it has is that you can use the tombstone icon to denote cards that have a use in the graveyard. So, for anyone interested, here's three versions of Confine to Madness in the old frame; version one has the old wording that was in use around Odyssey block (no room for flavor text there), the other two have the modern wording, one without, and one with (@Chris Taylor's) flavor text.
Chris Taylor
Contributor
I think that is the best way to go about this.
Shame it's not a spell cast on the "Flashback"
Also to just head off the feel bad at the pass, I figure I'll change the cabal therapy line to "Choose a nonland card name. Target player reveals their hand and discards A card with that name."
Just so you can't get 2 for 1'd by drawing your cards in the wrong order.
Edit: oh shit we need to make the "flashback" sorcery only as well
Shame it's not a spell cast on the "Flashback"
Also to just head off the feel bad at the pass, I figure I'll change the cabal therapy line to "Choose a nonland card name. Target player reveals their hand and discards A card with that name."
Just so you can't get 2 for 1'd by drawing your cards in the wrong order.
Edit: oh shit we need to make the "flashback" sorcery only as well
Onderzeeboot
Ecstatic Orb
Good catch. That does make this variant more unwieldy. Damn, the more I think about it, the cleaner the disturb variant looks, except that it uses two card faces
I gave the aftermath version a rework. It's a bit weird, but to me the back part of the spell looks better without the mana cost. I think Confine to Madness is a better name than Confine (to) Insanity, but Madness as a card name just doesn't feel right when there's a mechanic with the same name that has nothing to do with this card. The spacing in the card text of Confine to Madness is a bit weird, but that's MSE's doing :/
Chris Taylor
Contributor
Honestly lefty doesn't look that bad.
Man all this and Dom doesn't even run customs.
Hey I did say it was the worst solution
Man all this and Dom doesn't even run customs.
Chris Taylor
Contributor
I've been updating my customs most of tonight and damn, I just have to give another shoutout card conjurer
Like compare:
I (to this day) haven't been able to find an extended art template for MSE, and I love that somehow I missed the opportunity to show more of this art.
Now I just have to convert my set symbol into an image format...
Like compare:
I (to this day) haven't been able to find an extended art template for MSE, and I love that somehow I missed the opportunity to show more of this art.
Now I just have to convert my set symbol into an image format...
Chris Taylor
Contributor
Oh shoot good catch.
This happens when you hit enter after the card name.
Let me fix that
