General Custom Cards: The Lab

K

Karshtakavaar

Let me make my opinion very clear.

I would play this card in my cube - its why I threw it out there as the first idea that came to mind when Mown pointed out that Retrace could go on permanents. I do not have a very powerful cube. It would be a slight upgrade to Gravecrawler in that specific context.

I do not think Wizards would print this card - though not for the reasons you list. I doubt they would print it because they shy away from cards that make games enter into repetitive states at low to no cost, particularly if they are to be printed into sets rather than supplemental products due to limited. Franky, I doubt they'd print Gravecrawler today - but not for power level reasons.

I do not, however, think it is broken. Ragavan is broken. Fury and Solitude and Oko and TNN and Time Walk and Ancestral Recall are broken. Wizards prints broken crap all the time, even more often now than they used to- hell, they've printed two cards this year that literally did not work as written.

Please do not attempt to use my shorthand opinion to support your upsettingly aggressive argument about wizard squares - with which I happen to disagree. For the record, the matter of my disagreement with you is perfectly acceptable to me - I have no need to convince you of my opinion, nor do I particularly want you to convince me. I do however, generally wish to understand the opinions of others (Especially when I do not agree with them), so I thank you for the second response to the card made in this thread. It is, after all, why I continued to engage with the perfectly comfy conversation in the other thread. I cannot speak for Zee, but I for one would have been satisfied with that single post without addendum.
 
N0oh

N0oh

I would say it is indeed strong, because it seems more easy to get back than others one drop (dominaria skeleton, amonkhet zombie, bloodsoaked champion, gravecrawler).

But i'm not sold on "broken", it's hard to abuse due to the "tapped" and the fact that retrace doesn't change the speed of the spell.
I think the closest to "retrace on creature" we ever had are bloodghast and skyclave shade. And this looks closer to the second than the first, the second being a good but rather fair card I guess ?

Edit : if we're talking infinite loops/combo, then retrace is better than landfall obviously, because you can repeat it.
Still, abusing this doesn't seem easier than gravecrawler with another zombie/alter/bombardment/whatever.
 
Onderzeeboot

Onderzeeboot

Ecstatic Orb
Velrun said:
You are not important
The world owes you nothing
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Thanks for pointing this out, because I really needed to be put in my place here. After all, I took the time to explain my reasoning for why I think it isn't broken, and you refused to do so unless someone continued the discussion in this thread. Which I did. To which you replied: "Broken :p". Obviously it's really weird for me to answer to this reply asking for more than that. Except, I didn't even demand a better explanation like you owed me one, I simply said that repeating the "trust me, it's broken" argument still wasn't going to convince me. You know, I created this post in this thread at your suggestion that you were willing to discuss this card in this thread, because I was curious for your reasoning. Frankly, you didn't have to be a dick about it.

That said, thanks for the eventual actual reply. I think your answer sidesteps the question of whether the custom design is broken, and changes it to: "would WotC print this card?" There are lots of non-broken cards WotC wouldn't print, like a {9}{R} sorcery-speed Shock. Broken? No. Would WotC print it? No. So that question is, in my mind, fundamentally different from "is this card broken?" Still, if I may I want to go over your arguments.

Velrun said:
It’s a 2/1 that can be played in two different colors.
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So are Dryad Militant (all upside) and Tattermunge Maniac (with a significant downside), and those are uncommons. Anyway, the point is this isn't unheard of. There's also Rakdos Cackler, which effectively is a 2/2 for one mana that can be played in two different colors. Also an uncommon. All of these uncommons saw play in some for, so it's a strong effect, but not unprintable.
Velrun said:
It has an upside that far outweighs its downside.
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This is very subjective, but the same could be said for Gravecrawler. When making or judging a custom card, I like to compare the card to existing designs that operate in a similar space, and existing designs don't suggest this effect is out of line. That's my opinion though.
Velrun said:
It is a recurring threat. For a single mana with no deck building requirements. Unseen before (correct me if I am wrong)
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Correct, this is unseen before. However, as previously stated, it does have a considerable cost of activation. Discarding a land is not free, and while Gravecrawler does have a deck building requirement, the actual cost of activation is light years lower (as in, the difference between having an additional cost and having an activation requirement. WotC prints cards with unseen before mechanics (whether keyworded or not) all the time, so I don't think this alone is a strong enough argument to not print the card.
Velrun said:
It is a discard outlet.
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Generally, retrace is a weak discard outlet, because you can only discard lands. On a creature in particular, it is even worse of a discard outlet, because it only works as a discard outlet when it's dead.
Velrun said:
It uses a keyword that they haven’t before used for a creature.
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While unprecedented for retrace, it's a keyword that explicitly works on all (playable) card types. Adding it to a creature (or other permanent card type) is the logical next step if they ever revisit the mechanic.
Velrun said:
It’s even a Zombie for the tribal decks.
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I agree with you that it might be a mistake to make this a zombie, considering in particular the synergy with Gravecrawler. Creature typing is very flexible though, and you'll notice that I made it a scarecrow in my render.
Velrun said:
All of these things point towards Wizards not wanting to print this card in 2022. I think it would wreak havoc in Legacy and anything below. It’s deceptively strong because it’s just an aggro card. Of course they printed Ragavan so maybe anything is possible but they also had to admit that the monkey was a mistake and ban it.
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Despite all your points, and while agreeing this would be one of the strongest recursive one drops in existence, I remain unconvinced that it is better in practice than Gravecrawler. It does increase the critical mass of recursive one drops, but Gravecrawler isn't currently played competitively alongside the likes of Bloodsoaked Champion or Cult Conscript in any non-singleton constructed format. I absolutely expect Murderous Scarecrow to make it into some form of black- or green-based aggro deck in Standard (if printed in a Standard legal set), and maybe even Pioneer or Modern. The baseline could be good enough to make it into Legacy even. In none of those formats I expect a recurring 2/1 to be broken though, because historically no recurring 2/1 has ever been broken. Designs like this give aggro a way to regrow a threat, they're cogs in a greater wheel. Print too many of them relative to other tools in a single format, and aggro might get oppressive, but that still doesn't make this insular design broken. For that moniker, I'ld expect a design to universally go beyond what is healthy for the game, and we've seen too many similar designs in Magic's past to suggest Murderous Scarecrow be deserving of that label.

Kind regards, despite our difference in opinion, Onderzeeboot.
 
Suicufnoc

Suicufnoc

I'm joining team not-broken. I will cube the card, because it's cool, but I wouldn't if I thought it was broken.

Come to think of it, why would somebody saying they'd play the card suggest that they think its broken? This isn't MTGS, its riptide. If anything, riptiders liking the card probably suggests they DON'T think its broken...
 
shamizy

shamizy

Onderzeeboot said:
View attachment 7576
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I'm on Team Not Broken for this as well.

The gold standard for recursive 1 drop to me is Gravecrawler and I think this is definitely worse. Enters tapped, still has timing restrictions at sorcery speed, less relevant creature type, and its more restrictive to recur with the retrace. Unless you've got something like Wrenn and Six or Life from the Loam going, lands in hand are going to be a finite resource. Even then, I'm not too interested in a slightly bigger Reassembling Skeleton impression unless I can get some sort of loop going. I'm just trying to think of ways to break this card and I can't really see it. Going Gravecrawler + Other Zombie + Phyrexian Altar is an infinite ETB loop, if you generate infinite mana you can get infinite ETBs off Skeleton + sac outlet, but I can't think of anything off the top of my head for this card. I guess if you've got Reaper King going and build your own Vindicate? But even then you're still limited by # of lands in hand.

It can be strong in the right shell, but I think it's right in that Cult Conscript/Dread Wanderer tier of recursive body and behind Gravecrawler or Bloodsoaked Champion to me.
 
inscho

inscho

shamizy said:
It can be strong in the right shell, but I think it's right in that Cult Conscript/Dread Wanderer tier of recursive body and behind Gravecrawler or Bloodsoaked Champion to me.
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Feels firmly better than Conscript and Wanderer, better than Bloodsoaked Champion, and worse than Gravecrawler due it being less abusable imo.
 
shamizy

shamizy

inscho said:
Feels firmly better than Conscript and Wanderer, better than Bloodsoaked Champion, and worse than Gravecrawler due it being less abusable imo.
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Is it better than Bloodsoaked? A relevant creature type and an easier trigger for aggressive decks to pull off makes it more appealing for me. I've done the machine gun drain ala Blood Artist + Sac Outlet + multiple Raid recursions before to close out games if they stalled out. Suicidal attacks into blocks just to drain that 1 life is a real play when you've got excess mana to work with. I think having to discard a land does become a real cost without dedicated recursion.

If this was a Zombie (to open up Gravecrawler lines) or just a 3/2 for 1{B/G} instead (which would make it closer to a Tenacious Underdog) I would change my mind, but as is I think it's strong but not quite cream of the crop. For Aggro I guess any land after the 4th is whatever so it's kind "free" to pitch for recursion, but I'm not so sure about it in bigger decks until you get to 6+ lands unless you can abuse it. It just feels like Reassembling Skeleton with more restrictions to me for non-Aggro decks.
 
TrainmasterGT

TrainmasterGT

Velrun said:
I'm not joining your circus again. I invoke Karshtakavaar. Please do not attempt to use my shorthand opinion to support your upsettingly aggressive argument.
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Gee Vel I was only curious. I don’t really care one way or another about the card, I was just genuinely interested in knowing why you thought Onder was being aggressive.
 
Velrun

Velrun

TrainmasterGT said:
Gee Vel I was only curious. I don’t really care one way or another about the card, I was just genuinely interested in knowing why you thought Onder was being aggressive.
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Haha nope :) It doesn’t take much to figure that out yourself. I’m not joining your conversations if they are in these manners.
 
Onderzeeboot

Onderzeeboot

Ecstatic Orb
shamizy said:
Is it better than Bloodsoaked? A relevant creature type and an easier trigger for aggressive decks to pull off makes it more appealing for me. I've done the machine gun drain ala Blood Artist + Sac Outlet + multiple Raid recursions before to close out games if they stalled out. Suicidal attacks into blocks just to drain that 1 life is a real play when you've got excess mana to work with. I think having to discard a land does become a real cost without dedicated recursion.

If this was a Zombie (to open up Gravecrawler lines) or just a 3/2 for 1{B/G} instead (which would make it closer to a Tenacious Underdog) I would change my mind, but as is I think it's strong but not quite cream of the crop. For Aggro I guess any land after the 4th is whatever so it's kind "free" to pitch for recursion, but I'm not so sure about it in bigger decks until you get to 6+ lands unless you can abuse it. It just feels like Reassembling Skeleton with more restrictions to me for non-Aggro decks.
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I think this is pretty much where I would put it; Gravecrawler > Bloodsoaked Champion >= Murderous Scarecrow. There's not much between Champion and Scarecrow. Having played with the Champion a lot, I think it just edges out the Scarecrow because it's relatively easy to recur in aggro decks, just about easier than discarding a pile of lands, I would say. Making it a zombie would elevate Murderous Scarecrow a lot though, so I think Velrun correctly focused on the creature type of the original design. I don't think Gravecrawler and Murderous Zombie would be a healthy combination of recursive 2/1's, as it becomes a little bit too easy to self-enable the whole package with a single land in hand (and a bunch of self mill). All in all I really like Karshtakavaar's design!
 
Jason Waddell

Jason Waddell

Administrator
Staff member
Vel, take a big chill pill please. I have too much stomach flu in me at the moment to deal with this properly. Since the last exodus, all the conflict here happens via one person, please self evaluate and change perspective.
 
Rusje

Rusje

Jason Waddell said:
Vel, take a big chill pill please. I have too much stomach flu in me at the moment to deal with this properly. Since the last exodus, all the conflict here happens via one person, please self evaluate and change perspective.
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Get well soon! Ah, the joy of children and the diseases they bring home.
 
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