This is like five posts in one. Sorry about that.
Alright, awesome, some great ideas so far.
Cad: Your cycle of "dragons" is badass, and none really need to be fixed. The only thing that needs to be fixed is, as you said, the flavor; they don't make a drop of sense as dragons, and the only comparison I can think of so far is Dragon Whelp. Find or create a fitting fantasy race maybe?
Keru_Shiri:
Bigasiodon is a very fitting card design, considering that every non-green color already has a choice-forcing (aka "skill") mechanic, and I was looking for one to fit green; I like it a lot. I'd even argue that you could seriously push that power level, as, in a limited format, that drawback is actually very significant with aggressive strategies running around. I have yet to playtest with it, but I'd say you could have a vertical cycle of similar creatures, all with pushed power levels and increasing complexity, and all would fit in the set.
I somewhat disagree with Cad on Super Intense Heat; I'd say that, in a fantasy set, it fits squarely in Red's slice of the color pie to be able to exile permanents; just, non-enchantment permanents. You can't exactly burn Mirari's Wake to death.
Super Intense Heat (Uncommon)
3RR
Sorcery
Exile target non-enchantment permanent
I propose this as a fix; it doesn't do anything red couldn't explicitly do before, it's got a nifty effect, and the flavor makes sense. It can be red's "Beast Within" of the set, just.... not as powerful.
Another thing I didn't bring up before:
I can't proxy "transform" cards without spending close to a dollar per card, so I'd like to immediately exclude them from development, as much fun as they can be. Sorry!
Musings on remembrance:
It doesn't work. Sorceries can't be on the battlefield, and initial testing showed that the rules concerns presented far outweigh the elegant templating/space saving of the card.
Token creation doesn't quite cover the purpose of the card, as abilities such as Lifelink will not transfer to the creature created. I'll keep working at it to see if there's an elegant solution, but the mechanic is likely to be scrapped.
Also, there's no unifying set theme at all right now, just a few mechanics that suggest nothing but skill-intensive cards that force choices for opponents (which I personally LOVE as a Johnny/Spike fed up with the oversimplification of Magic in recent years.) Cad suggested Enchantments as a unifying theme, and I feel it could work. Opinions?
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Prizes.
Alright, so, my buddies are really fucking good at making proxies. I kind of suck at it, but I can still occasionally make a presentable card:
This is a fairly expensive, time-consuming process, and are of no real value except for bragging rights for the "winners" of the competitions (or those who wish to playtest with their created cards), but I feel like proxies would make fantastic prizes.
I figure when the design is over, my buddies and I will make about 50-100 of these (of the cards created in the set - NOT actual Magic cards) and ship them to our favorite designers and artists from the design competition, as well as the winner(s) of the tournament(s) to take place after the set is designed. Does this sound acceptable to everyone?
My initial idea was to ship out around ~500 Magic rares of varied quality, but shipping costs would likely exceed what the prizes are worth, considering I'd mostly be sending out silly bulk rares like Tyrant of Discord.
I guess it'd be easier to distribute promos with little weekly sub-contests, like designing set protagonists and building backstory.
So... do that.
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THIS WEEK'S CONTEST:
The best legendary creature designs complete with backstory will be selected at the end of the week (June 2nd, let's say) and their creators will be shipped two promos of the card they designed; one foil, one nonfoil.
An example of backstory:
http://www.wizards.com/Magic/TCG/Article.aspx?x=magic/bok/inkeyes
You do not need to submit a card if you do not want to; just have a character story with a physical description of your character, and if you're inspired, a card to go along with it.
If you also submitted the art for that card, you'll get two foils and two nonfoils instead.
There's a damn good chance every good submission will receieve the prize, but
Rules:
Winners will be chosen based on thread feedback and the opinions of the lead designers/testers, of equal weight.
If an international GAF member wins, it'd be really nice if they'd help out on shipping (if they want the prize). I don't really have the money to send out individual cards across the globe.
The purpose of the contest is to have a cool backstory; NOT a cool card design. When you rate someone's submission, realize the contest is weighted ~90% towards the character's story.
Prizes will be sent out when the set is complete, to ensure that the winners recieve the finalized version of the card, complete with art; the set is obviously going to change a TON once testing goes "public".
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Some of you are likely wondering why everything's so unstructured right now; frankly, we don't need to begin the process of eliminating mechanics and designing cards of specific types in order to finish the set until we've got 150+ suitable cards already in the OP. At that point, we will turn our pile of cards into a set, restructuring for flavor/power and making cute when necissary. This is also when a "partial spoiler" will hit the OP, making it clear to designers which colors need more/less cards.
Also, if anyone was wondering, Pentanesia will be a standard 230 card "large" set (not including basic lands) with each color having an equal number of cards. At the rate cards are being submitted and designed by the leads (and literally every card submitted is on my sheet of considerations,) we'll have double if not triple that amount by the time two weekly contests end. This is good; it leaves us plenty of design space to cut mechanics unfitting of what Pentanesia is to become, and also gives us the ability to allow overflow to spill into a neoGAF "core set" to make our fictional Standard format more interesting. It's food for thought.
Basically, I just want you all to continue designing cards right now, even if they have literally no place on the current plane. Everything that is interesting to you is of valid consideration for the set, and if it doesn't make it, it will remain filed for future expansions. I'll continue making comments when I see particularly interesting mechanics (or color pie/rulings concerns, or cards I know would be amazingly fun with a lower mana cost), but I'm not going to stifle anyone's creativity. That's for phase II of development when my "How Wizards R&D Designs Cards" tutorial gets posted.
tl;dr keep making cards and mechanics, keep 'em as awesome as possible. The set has to be balanced as a whole.
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Here's some more card designs from the other designer and I some of which have exceedingly "pushed" power levels in the hopes of creating fun themes to build around. Nothing can be judged in a vacuum, so any immediate constructed power level concerns will be noted... But there's really nothing that can be done to "prove" a card is busted or terrible until the set is printed.
http://i.imgur.com/rJFG1.jpg - One of my more elegant Remembrance designs, inspired by the proliferate kill spell from New Phyrexia. For a hefty 4B investment, you get unconditional creature destruction as well as a 1/1 with deathtouch.
http://i.imgur.com/oaGbg.jpg - Part of a 5-card cycle of "fixed" moxen, something I have wanted WoTC to print for years. "Luxury" was an early artifact subtype which was referenced in multiple Blue and Red cards, primarily in swapping mechanics (IE, a creature which you can tap in order to exchange control of a luxury you control for an artifact an opponent controls.) In terms of flavor, they're supposed to be opulant moxen to the point of absurdity, all crafted on the Red island as a flamboyant display of wealth.
http://i.imgur.com/nEUDM.jpg - I really don't know how to feel about this mechanic. It's very weak outside of limited if you don't abuse it; I intended it as an "epic" variant to show the rapid scientific progress (yet disregard for spellcasting) on the blue island, but I can't see it being fun to play with. We'll see in testing, I suppose.
Finally, here's the stupid-powerful Muraganda Petroglyphs variant I was talking about in the IRC:
Bone-Scratched Petroglyphs - 1GG
Enchantment
Nontoken creatures with no abilities get +1/+1.
If a creature you control with no abilities would be dealt lethal damage, regenerate it.
Basically, all of your creatures with no abilities are indestructible and slightly fatter. It's a Knight Exemplar for all of your 'lil vanilla bears.
The mechanic is much weaker than it seems, but I already threw one into a deck with 32 grizzly bears and it was pretty damn good for casual play, if a little bit stupid.
Speaking of stupid:
Banal Bears
Basic Creature - Bear
(You may have as many copies of a card with the basic supertype in your deck as you want.)
2/2
I realize this mechanic isn't exactly... well, fun.... but it does leave some interesting design space open concerning player favorites like Relentless Rats.
The main reason my co-designer suggested it is, if there's going to be a "no abilities matter" mechanic, there will need to be a ton of vanilla creatures, which will lead to a boring limited format. Basic Creatures fix that.
