Modify the Scroll Sorcery (R)
Target player reveals their hand. You may choose a nonland card from that player's hand or graveyard. If you do, that player casts that spell if able and pays life equal to its mana value rather than paying its mana cost. If a spell wasn't cast this way, draw a card and return this spell to its owner's hand.
"They are all my pieces, Jace Beleren. They always were. I just no longer want to play."
-Emeria flavor's strong. card's... I dunno. I don't like the escape clause, it makes this basically a colorless sorcery-speed
whispers of the muse which is fine, being an instant was a huge part of that card's power but it feels unrelated to the point of this. I get that it's there in case your opponent doesn't have a good target, but like, how often are you gonna be using it on them? in a lot of matchups this is gonna do less damage than
lava axe, and it gives them a free spell. like, maybe you get lucky and your opponent is sitting on a situational card like, say, a piece of creature removal when you don't have any targets and you can get the 2-for-1, but it's pretty unlikely and hard to use. you're much more likely to use it on yourself to cheat something out, and in those cases you know if you have a target already. even that doesn't really seem that pointful, though: 5 mana isn't much of a discount for anything that's not super expensive, and the life loss makes that much harder. it's probably for the best that this is pretty expensive for that sort of use, but I'm just not convinced the card has a non-degenerate purpose and I don't think adding the rider helps.
2/5Birth of the New Regime
Sorcery
As an additional cost to cast Birth of the New Regime, sacrifice X creatures.
Each opponent sacrifices X creatures. Put X +1/+1 counters on up to one target creature you control.
Joseph Kastov betrayed his king, betrayed his ideals, betrayed his followers, and claimed everything for himself.dang, dude. that's really exciting, both mechanically and flavorfully. really clear story that runs through every bit of it, and also has some really interesting play implications. I like moving the sac to the cost so you can't do the
barter in blood thing of having no creatures and taking out a bunch of theirs.
5/5Negligence EnchantmentWhen ~ enters, exile target nonland permanent until ~ leaves the battlefield.
When ~ leaves, sacrifice a nonland permanent you control.
By sealing Nahiri away in the Helvault, Sorin had consigned both of their homes to ruin. oh, that's a very cute O-Ring variant. cheaper, but with an interesting drawback if they do break the seal. flavor's nice, too. I'm not super familiar with that era of the official story so I had to look it up but after reading some background I think it really elevates the card. well done.
5/5Day of Revelation -
Sorcery
Until end of turn, whenever a creature you control attacks, create a 1/1 white Soldier creature token tapped and attacking. If this spell was foretold, create a 4/4 red Dragon creature token tapped and attacking instead.
Foretell
bold to enter a flavor round with no flavor text, but I do think it works. I get the story here. interesting to make the big tokens dragons instead of angels. should they have flying? they don't technically have to, not all dragons do, but the vast majority of real dragons fly. (real as in not counting D&D-set
dragonborn.) I do still think some flavor text would've helped, to give me clear characters and narrative stakes, but the mechanics are doing some decent lifting on that, especially with the flavor of Foretell filling in some gaps.
3/5Oath of Pursuit Enchantment (R)
Creatures you control have Haste.
At the end of your turn, if no creatures you control attacked this turn, you lose the game.
Their Oath shall drive them, and yet betray them, and ever snatch away the very treasures that they have sworn to pursue.
- The Silmarillion, J. R. R. Tolkien I feel like this could stand to have a less severe drawback. it's a solid discount on
fervor but the possible upside of that effect isn't really enough to justify the risk, especially since it means you can't actually play this turn 1 in most cases. and it's not like
fervor was ever a tournament staple (although to be fair
fires of yavimaya was) so there's probably room to strictly-better it anyway without much of any drawback. also I'm still not a huge fan of real-world quotes in flavor texts, but I do think the particular round justifies it a little, and I think the card works well with that particular story. I'd just make the last ability deal 2 damage to you or something.
3/5Edgar Markov's Blasphemy Sorcery (R)
Destroy target creature. Create a 2/2 black Vampire creature token. If the destroyed creature was an Angel, put two +1/+1 counters on the token. If the destroyed creature was white, put a lifelink counter and a menace counter on the token.
minor quibble but I'd swap the two if clauses, it's much more likely to be white than an angel. still I like the design a lot. probably room for some italics, but the mechanics and the name combine quite well to tell a pretty clear story even without them. I suspect in practice this would probably be more like
ravenous chupacabra, with a base creature body and an etb trigger, to avoid the counters-on-tokens problem, and it also might be a little too pushed compared to chupacabra. depends on rarity I guess. lifelink's also a nice choice since it scales with power so it makes the angel condition even more impactful.
4/5For As Long As We Both Shall Live Enchantment - Aura (U)
Enchant two creatures
If one of these enchanted creatures leaves the battlefield, the other leaves in the same manner.
(Examples: If one is put into its owner's library, the other is put into its owner's library; if one is put into its owner's hand, the other is put into its owner's hand; etc.)
"With the powers vested in me by the authorities of Ulgrotha, I now pronounce you—"
—Hazduhr the Abbot, final words this feels like a rules nightmare in a bunch of different ways. you could probably make it work but it's tricky. good story card, though. I wonder if a removal enabler is really the best way to capture the idea of a wedding, since you'll likely be putting it on your opponent's creatures, but there's something cute here.
3/5I don't think I get it. the flavor makes sense but is a bit on the generic side, and the card itself... I dunno, why does it cost 12? that's the same cost as
enter the infinite, and that does more than just a souped-up
buried alive. there's a version of this that makes sense, and I do think it needs to be on the expensive side, but 12? that's way out of line with a card that doesn't actually directly help you win in any meaningful way. it's a combo enabler but this sort of combo has been pretty easy to enable for decades, and the whole point of cards that cost this much is that they're supposed to be really exciting to read but the actual use case for this is really subtle. maybe if it cost 7? and also for a flavor round I'd like if there were some names or something attached that made it clear what exactly was happening.
1/5Syndali Offers Her Blood —
Sorcery (R)
As an additional cost to cast Syndali Offers Her Blood, pay X life.
Draw X cards.
“What happens now?” Mocoth stared dispassionately into the bubbling cauldron.
“We wait.” Syndali's lips betrayed half a grin as she watched the elixir begin to brew. really beautiful card. the effect isn't super unique, they've done versions of it on
skeletal scrying and
cut of the profits but this is a simpler, cleaner version than either of those. almost a shame to put such an elegant, reprintable design on sunch an unreprintable card name, but it does a really good job telling the story and the flavor text is beautifully written. I'm torn here on whether to give this a 4 or 5 but I think the flavor's strong enough to override those other minor concerns in a flavor round.
5/5Double Agent Enchantment - Aura (R)
You may cast this spell without paying its mana cost if it targets a creature you own.
Enchant creature
You control enchanted creature.
"You made me blow my cover!" it's a cute card and the benefits over
persuasion are minor enough that I'm not worried that it's technically strictly better, but for a flavor round, and especially for this criteria, I was hoping for something a bit more specific and evocative. this feels very much like a mechanical design with some cute flavor tacked on, not a pivotal narrative moment in card form. so, like, I like it, just not for this round.
2/5Avacyn's Sacrifice Enchantment |
UWhen Avacyn's Sacrifice enters, starting with you, each player chooses a creature. Exile all creatures chosen this way until Avacyn's Sacrifice leaves the battlefield.
Evil bound at any cost. ooooh. that's lovely. my only note is "each player
may choose a creature", to avoid the obvious play of just not having any creatures of your own so your opponent has to choose one of theirs. which is probably what you'll do with it anyway, which might make it a little too powerful but ultimately it's just 1-for-1 removal (assuming you make that change) and that can get as efficient as it wants depending on format.
fatal push exists and this is more restricted in which decks it can work in.
4/5it's a shame you didn't get the chance to come back to the flavor, as is it's got the reference and not much else. it also doesn't really feel like a superhero squad assembling, since it's just one guy showing up. which to be fair does kinda fit with the first Avengers film where Hulk shows up part way through the fight, but still, something like
congregation at dawn or
collected company would probably carry that flavor a lot better. this also feels less fun to me than, say,
dramatic entrance, 'cause you probably don't even get to use the thing you played. you're much more likely to just dump a really big legend and swing for lethal. I dunno. I feel bad grading this 'cause you said it was incomplete but it is technically a valid entry so I wasn't sure what to do.
2/5Eat the Apple -
Instant |
UExile target creature, then return that card to the battlefield under its owner's control unless you sacrificed a Food this turn.
There's nothing more tempting than that which is forbidden. I really like this as a design. I wish the story was a bit more specific but I do get the reference so it does work. seems like a really interesting utility card, both a decent blink effect and good removal if you've got spare food. maybe deceptively hard to use but I think that's a good thing. in another round I could easily see giving this a 5 but the one place it falls a little short is in the strongly evoked narrative and sadly that's what I was looking for here. it's good flavor, though.
4/5Fertilize the Blood Wood
Sorcery
Destroy target creature. Search your library for a basic forest or swamp and put it onto the battlefield.
as I've said to a couple folks, definitely bold to submit to a flavor round, and specifically a narrative round, without flavor text. the name is evocative, but on its own it doesn't feel like a specific
event, y'know? I think that could've easily been fixed with good italics. the card is nice: I had honestly forgotten about
Deathsprout until Tekk pointed it out so I won't hold that against you, but it does indicate that you probably balanced it correctly.
3/5Pyre of Boghaven Enchantment (R)
At the beginning of your upkeep, put a blaze counter on Pyre of Boghaven. Then Pyre of Boghaven deals damage to you equal to the number of blaze counters on it. Exile that many cards from the top of your library. You may play those cards this turn.
"More kindling!" raved the mayor, maddened by the curse. "We will light up the darkness! We will cleanse this land forever!" nice! red version of
mind unbound that comes down a lot faster but hurts you and also doesn't let you save up. scary but in an exciting sort of way. fills maybe a
forge of urabrask role in aggro sideboards. and the flavor's good too. I feel like this is the sort of card that I'd really need to see art for 'cause there's definitely a part of the story missing with just the words (all sorts of interesting options for what, exactly, they're using as kindling) but such is the burden of YMtC and I'm happy to just imagine.
5/5lotta fun entries this round, but I think I'm gonna have to give the win to
Tevish! congrats, nominating now, go join the next round.