Probably just upping the cost to 2 life should be fine. Its something that would require further testing, but there is probably some happy medium between mana cost and life payment.

Also, OrcishLibrarian, I went ahead and nominated Rain of Hammers for YMtc Card of the Week.

Would 3 life for 2 mana work out a little better?
Mostly because you end up exiling all your lands when you cast it, so anything that cost 5 mana after that point would end up hurting you HORRIBLY.
I mean, that was one of the big reasons I put in the lifelink is to mitigate some of the effects of playing larger spells, but you end up in the negatives for actual spells. It really makes you want to get some creatures in play.

And in case nobody else worked it out yet, it's supposed to be Vasilias's throne.

In other news, I've been working on some other mana fixing artifacts and am sort of wondering what people would feel about this:

Zhiran's Sapphire
Artifact
Zhiran's Sapphire enters the battlefield tapped.
, : Add to your mana pool.

I mean, it's somewhere between the power level of the signets and the diamonds, which are both, apparently, considered a bit on the strong side these days, but I like it.

... why the heck am I the one suggesting most of the solutions for mana fixing? Ruwin's design was absolutely spiff, though I still provided the prompt for it, which he filled wonderfully.

Diamonds aren't strong. Coldsteel Heart is strictly better.

MaRo mentioned in one of his articles that the marble diamond cycle was apparently a bit stronger mana fixing than they wanted in standard anymore. He said the same about the signets back during RtR block, so that's why we got the Cluestones and Keyrunes instead.

Uh oh, now I'm getting my hopes up.

I mean, I really want to take home the trophy for Best Use of Hardware as Precipitation, but all the nominees are really strong. Hailing Stud-Finders, in particular, did some pretty edgy work in an R-rated role. The voters usually eat that stuff up. And C-Clamp Cyclone is a threat to win every single year.

True, but last year's winner, DIY Dyson, who did such excellent work with that Levels Sea Level, dropped the ball this year with that horribly predictable Sander Sandstorm. The fact that they even allowed it to be a nomination this year is a testament to his former genius...

So the voting should be wide open this year.

I don't like to speak ill of the competition, but that guy has been coasting for years. Did you see Flathead Freezing Rain? It was basically a carbon copy of Philips-Head Drizzle. All he did was gender-swap the lead screwdrivers and move the story to Jakkard.

Seriously, that's just lazy storytelling. Real shoddy work.

Yeah, but you have to give him credit. "The Rain in the Plane Falls Mainly as a Plane" was fantastically, even ingeniously lyrical.

A Favor for a Favor [cost]
Sorcery

Put a loyalty counter on target planeswalker. Until end of turn, you may activate its abilities as though you controlled it.


Not sure what color, not sure how expensive.


Blood Contract
Enchantment - Aura

Enchant creature
When ~ enters the battlefield, if enchanted creature wasn't dealt damage this turn, sacrifice it.
You control enchanted creature.

“Just now, when you realized I can kill you, sell you, or save you on a whim? Well, you sold me your spirit, too. I’ve got you on lock, Cosette Desandro. You belong to me, mind, body and spirit.”
- Fisco Vane

Yes, I'm breaking the pie for this. No, I'm not ashamed.

Fisco really does know how to woo a lady. What a romantic!

Hehe.

Purple!!!!

But seriously, when in doubt, blue.

Hey all, I thought you would be interested to know that the first pass of NGA Masters is finished. I had to cut a few M:EM cards to get the balance to work, and the Souls ended up being mostly YMtC planes, but the legendary creatures, planeswalkers and such are all represented. I think it's pretty cool. Why don't you check it out here?

I see 2 equipments in the whole thing, one of which is the unplayable 2-shields.

I will re-iterate that Jinsen probably shouldn't have a equipment-related ability.

I decided to give Jinsen an Equipment-related ability because that was the focus of his original card. If you're worried about the usability of his -1, remember that NGA Masters will be part of an entire format that contains sets and blocks from throughout YMtC history. Rest assured that Jinsen will have no shortage of Equipment to tutor.

CKY, this turned out super-cool. Thanks a ton for roping the M:EM in!

I see. Well, if you had no intention of it being drafted as a self-contained set, as I had assumed it would since it was named after Modern/Vintage Masters, it's not as big a problem.
Still, if there's a draft involving the NGA masters, if none of the other packs involved has decent equipments, then it becomes... nowhere as good as it probably could have been.
Though I suppose this being NGA "constructed", draft probably wasn't in consideration.

I still think two shields shouldn't be included at all.

Two Shields is a very polarizing card. I decided that since you don't have to play it if you don't want to and you will never ever see it in a Constructed deck, including it to make the Two Shields fans happy was better than excluding it.

I wonder how many fans it has if you subtract out all of Pablo's dummy accounts. >_>