I'll abstain from voting if Razor will. Or we can both vote for ourselves, that works too.

personally I prefer the vote-for-ourselves option so I can see the poll without having to click "show results" every time. (for the record I did that so you should as well.)

Tough criteria for sure.

I think Blessings have more design space than Shackles but they're also not that much different than equipment. This particular card I also don't think needs to be red, and it seems quite weak that you have to wait a turn for the trigger, then put your creature out of commission for a turn, just to get the buff the turn after. If you play this on curve, your buffed two-drop gets to attack on turn five. Your opponent has probably drawn a kill spell or played a bigger creature by then, so I would think the benefit needs to be larger. Compare to Feather of Flight. I wonder if triggering at end of turn might work better? It still requires you not attack for a turn (barring vigilance), but removes the extra turn of delay after playing the blessing.

Shackles have sort of a specific flavor, and if they're mostly removal or removal-adjacent, it might be a little unfun to have too many in one format: normally you have to weigh the immediate benefits of playing out removal against the risk of your opponent playing something better, but here you get to have your cake and eat it too. Your opponent might end up in a state where they know nothing they draw matters because any relevant creature will get shackled immediately. That said, I think there's probably enough possible designs like this one that shackles could show up occasionally in small doses and be interesting.

yeah, I think I balanced it for the initial version that didn't have a tap cost and then didn't make the adjustment once I did. that said, I'd compare it not to Feather but to aeronaut's wings: there's a significant difference in limited between giving one thing flying and giving every creature flying one at a time. Echoes could probably have cost a little less but with no mana cost attached to the equip, and with the extra upside of vigilance, I did want to be a little careful. still, either or +1/+1 would probably be a fair change. but I do really like the eot suggestion, if I were redoing the design I would definitely take that approach.

Cato gives us an artifact that works like an aura.
Razorborne gives us an enchantment that works like an equipment.
I like the Blessing type more than the shackles type. It's flavorfully more open-ended and mechanically more distinct.
As an individual design though, I like the ability of Shadow Tether more than Echoes of Aurelia. The latter feels very proof-of-concept; it's printable but it doesn't really get me excited for the debut of blessings.
Shadow Tether seems a little on the strong side. Echoes of Aurelia looks good in limited, bad in constructed. Also, blessings probably look weaker than they are.

Going with Razor on this one.

I withhold my vote in case a tiebreaker is needed, but I'll want to give comments on this round when it's resolved because i find it fascinating.

damn, this one is really coming down to the wire.

tell me about it. every time I open the thread, the lead's changed again.

And with an ended poll, we are tied. This means it's time for me to come in (anyone with the authority can confirm I did not vote) to break the tie.

Both of these cards are reasonably flawed, as makes sense for such a tough criteria. I actually think they're pretty interesting, and show a sort of contrast.

Shadow Tether is a very solid card. It's a nasty way to soft-remove creatures, and is very cheap for a jumping Pacifism equivalent which makes sense when you can grin and bear it, making it better when its controller is ahead. The card is a solid workhorse at what it does without being really over the bar. However, I feel that the prompt got more lost here. Is there any reason why this couldn't be an Equipment with the Bind keyword? Equip innately cares about who controls the creature... but Equipment, as a type, does not. Hence why we can get Bloodthirsty Blade as a design. Keywording the "equip to an enemy" ability as "Bind" would be pretty cool and have design space, but I think it would just stay equipment, since there's no inherent difference.

On the other hand, a Blessing is at least different from an Equipment or Aura... but dang Echo is slow. It takes two turns from casting this thing to being able to use it no matter what phase of the game you're in, since you have to wait to upkeep and *then* tap a creature to pick up the blessing, meaning you then have to untap with the blessed creature to get any use out of it. And should you need to rebless, it forces a downtime turn again. I feel like this could have cost and still been weak (but not unplayable) because of how absolutely glacial it is. Yes, 2 to cast/2 to equip is pretty standard for Flying and a positive rider on equipment but that can still go live the turn after you play it on curve or same-turn later in the game, and can go live again on your very next turn after your creature gets shot down rather than having a null turn every time. But I feel like the idea of the blessing type has potential. Some of the details might need to be adjusted to give it design space that isn't very sad. Like perhaps it should bless unblessed creatures rather than attaching when unattached (changing the dynamic so each creature can hold one and one can be held by any number) or be as-is but bless as a sorcery rather than on upkeep to shave a turn off the initial start-up. But can I judge the card on its potential if it were workshopped? No, but the fact is still true that Blessing is a new (sub)type in a way that Shackle fundamentally isn't. This card better respected and executed the criteria even if I think the card is absolute pack-filler.

And I think this is part of why this contest has been so tough. Not only do you have the choice between a solid workhorse and a janky but conceptually exciting card, but you have to decide between having the better-executed card and having the better evocation of the prompt.

In the end... I think I have to give the nod here to Razor. I love what Tether is doing as a card, and will be dropping it into CotW as something of a consolation, but its prompt treatment is like typing "creature with flash" to "summon" -- the Rubric these cards are being graded on is skewed so hard in favor of Blessing that it ultimately does tip the scale.

WINNER: RAZORBORNE

I really do think y'all are underestimating how powerful repeated flying attachments are in limited, but yeah I do agree it could've been pushed. I think if I'd given it more thought, I probably would've gone with this:

Echoes of Aurelia-
Enchantment-Blessing
Creature Boon At the beginning of your end step, if this Blessing is unattached, you may tap an untapped, unblessed creature you control to attach this to it. A creature can only have one Blessing.)
Blessed creature gets +1/+1 and gains flying and vigilance.
With her last breath, she gave the Legion their final command: Win the Guildwar, at any cost.

but I actually wouldn't be surprised if that was a pretty high pick in its limited format. still, strictly better than the card I submitted in, like, three different ways, so I do take the point that it wasn't balanced right. again I think that's 'cause I spent most of the design process with it just attaching for free on upkeep and when I realized that wasn't really good for play patterns, I added the cost without giving enough thought to how it impacted the overall power.

anyway, thanks for running the contest, Tevish! this was fun, and I did really like this criteria. Blessing might be a mechanic I play around with more in the future.

damn, that was a really tight finish. Congratulations to razor!

thanks, and congrats to you too! I don't think we've ever had a tie in a PT finals before, and honestly I was expecting you to win for most of it.



PS: wait just looked it up and last PT was also a tie. weirdly with half the voters this one had, though. maybe a good sign of forum health?

All things considered I do think YMTC is busier now than it was a year and change ago. We haven't seen a surge of new blood, per say, but our interest is solid.

That said, and understanding it may be a bit premature, I think it's worth doing a bit of a postmortem and talking a little about what PTYMTC XI might look like.

If somebody else who's got the spirit wants to step up and run it, I'm more than willing to step back to the position of celebrity judge or, if unneeded, a common contestant. I'm frustrated with myself for how long I let X drag out, between waiting on this that and the other thing or just letting life get in the way and distract me from doing what, honestly, wasn't that hard to do when I tended to get down to it. But if nobody else has a bright idea and a passion for it, I'm going to keep this thing running. I think I would likely want to reset to the new year, though. 2024 is more over than not, so starting the next iteration Jan '25 would stand to reason.

I think the shortened format and generous wildcard is more realistic for the current state of the forums. The judging component, however, is a bit of a sticking point. It's been a bother I think pretty much every PTYMTC (not just in my era), but one of the big draws is the multi-judge format; we do community votes and single judges all the time, so PTYMTC would feel less if it just became a fully voted affair or the Tevish Grades You Show. As such, that december feelers out (presuming I'm still taking the reins) is going to be largely interested in making sure there are a couple of devoted judges so we get three of us sounding off every round. I really do want to thank everyone who has judged, whether or not they've been all rounds all the time, because I know this is a lot of pressure. The judging crew is what makes PTYMTC work the way it does.

I could probably step back in as a judge if need be. I think this is my third(?) PT win, so I should probably take some time off.

First off, congratulations razor!

Secondly, I would also be willing to help judge, but for some reason I always feel woefully inadequate. Mostly because I checked out of retail magic a long time ago, so I don't really know any of the current cards, decks, metas, etc.

just do what I do: pretend Magic is the same as it was a decade ago but every creature gets +1/+1.

Thanks for hosting, Tevish! I regret missing all the qualifiers but I had a good time watching the finals and voting.

Also, congrats razorborne!