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Invisible_Pink_Unicorn
#284395
1 year ago
Notes for new players:
1. When two effects trigger at the same time, you can choose the order in which they resolve. If you put the friendship trigger on the stack first, it will resolve last, meaning you can enchant the Foal token or the legendary Pony you fetched from your library with your free Friendship card.
2. The two effects trigger when you cast Friendship Is Magic, not when it resolves, meaning that you'll get your Foal token or tutored Pony and the extra Friendship Aura even if the uncommons or rare get countered. :)
3. Each Friendship Aura grants +1/+1 to ALL creatures you've added to your group of friends, meaning that the bonus per creature starts at +2/+2 and grows by whopping increments of two. If you are in a multiplayer match, you can enchant other players' creatures to give them all the benefits of your Friendship Auras as well.
Invisible_Pink_Unicorn
#284425
1 year ago
Ergh. Copypasta error. Here is a fix:
2. The effect(s) trigger when you cast a Friendship Aura, not when it resolves, meaning that you'll get your Foal token, tutored Pony and/or the extra Friendship Aura even if it gets countered.
Anonymous
#284636
1 year ago
Friendship is an interesting mechanic if a bit cumbersome.
derpy9000
#284766
1 year ago
If theyre exiled they shouldnt be going to the bottom of your deck FYI, exiled is exiled.
Invisible_Pink_Unicorn
#284789
1 year ago
@ derpy9000 Check out the reminder text for cascade. You can also do all kinds of other shenanigans with exiled cards...
Invisible_Pink_Unicorn
#284854
1 year ago
If I remember correctly, the MtG "removed from the game" rules of old used to work exactly as derpy9000 describes it.
Under the current rules, exile is a zone just like the rest. The only things that differentiate exile from your graveyard are that a) it's not your graveyard and b) there are a whole lot less (and I really mean a whole lot less) cards that interact with it.
In addition to being the "bye bye FOREVER!" zone it used to be, it's mostly used as a "parking lot" for cards like Turn to Mist nowadays, the suspend mechanic being the most prominent example.
OK, I feel like a nerdy professor now...
Anonymous
#285292
1 year ago
Well...

- The pony tribal seems like it's just tacked on. The issue is, friendship has its own tribal mechanic built in, so the pony tribal is either going to mean nothing, or it's going to be confusing and probably overpowered.
- Friendship is waaay too complicated to be putting it on commons.
- The names of mechanics aren't capitalized unless they describe the card they are on. For example, creatures have "Flying," but Hurricane hits "each creature with flying." So it should be "friendship aura" everywhere except on the typeline and when "Friendship" is appearing as a keyword ability.
- Permanently taking control of things is almost always blue. You put it on a black-red card. I can kind of see it belonging there, but it's usually a sign the card should have blue in it somewhere.
- You can put the Friendship-fetched aura onto an opponent's creature. Probably intentional, but it's a bit odd.
- Using the clear Eldrazi skin on a predominantly purple image doesn't make it immediately obvious that the card is colorless. The Eldrazi cards worked because they had an overall neutral color scheme, which made it clear that they were colorless at a glance. Here, it makes the card look purple. (As an aside, there was a time when the design team was going to add purple as an official color; there's a few articles about it on dailymtg.)
- There's already a Magic set with a horseshoe set icon - Unhinged. Yours is pointed the other way, but it's still confusing. (Then again, the Zendikar and Worldwake icons are even more similar, so it's probably not that big a deal. Also, I'm going to have to think real hard to call them "set icons" and not "cutie marks" now.)
- Creature token creation is primary in white and secondary in green. You seem to be using it in green a lot.
- You have a fixation on cycles. Not everything works as a cycle.
- Worst, and probably related to the above: I don't get the flavor of any of these cards. Literally, none of them. It seems you just took a bunch of mechanics and strung them together, throwing on names and pictures as an afterthought.

but umm, whatever you want to do, is fine...
Anonymous
#286391
1 year ago
if these were ever in a real set, monoblue control would be ruined for that entire block
Anonymous
#286611
1 year ago
@292: Friendship and Aura are subtypes. Subtypes are capitalized. It's a bit confusing since friendship is also a keyword here. That should probably be changed.

Invisible_Pink_Unicorn@854: I did a little research, and the removed-from-game zone was being used as temporary storage long before it was renamed. This article from 2002 lists the first few cards to use that mechanic. IIRC, the change to "exile" was done for two reasons: to make the mechanic more flavorful (like calling cards in play "on the battlefield"), and to emphasize the then-recent rule that cards removed from the game were no longer "outside the game" for the purpose of cards like the Wishes.

Of course, then they made cards like Pull from Eternity to interfere with the new zone, and things went straight to hell once more. At least cards exiled face down are still untouchable... so far. (On a related note, something like AWOL would work really well in the pony set, from a flavor standpoint at least. Banish the card, then throw it in a dungeon in the zone it was banished to.)
Invisible_Pink_Unicorn
#286936
1 year ago
@ #285292: Thanks for the detailed feedback! It confirmed a few concerns I had and had a few surprises to offer as well.

Here is my reasoning behind the issues:
- My current guideline for determining whether a card is tribal or not is that cards that produce Ponies or interact primarily with Ponies are tribal, while those that don't or just offer a conditional secondary benefit are not. This distinction is shaky and may very well change. In any case, I'd like to avoid assigning the Tribal supertype in a purely arbitrary fashion.
- The friendship mechanic puts me in a quandary: restricting it to uncommons would result in too few friendship cards in limited formats, as the mechanic is very parasitic. The best solution would probably be to overhaul it completely.
- #286611 already handled the capitalisation issue. I agree that it's confusing and should be changed.
- Black can steal things permanently (see the last entry in this article), but it does show up much less frequently than in blue. If the flavor of the entire package justifies it (a street urchin zipping by and stealing your apples/foalnapping/grabbing a dragon *cough*), I'll go down the less orthodox route (assuming the flavor didn't fail, like it apparently did).
- As for being able to buff other players' creatures: I try to keep multiplayer in mind; you probably won't be buffing your opponents' creatures, but it's very likely that you'll have teammates or political/temporary allies.
- Agreed on the purple card. I can't be too picky about the artwork, though, and I'm assuming players know that "purple" isn't a MtG color. There are also other non-artifact colorless cards in the set that should clarify this issue.
- In my opinion, the theme of the set should make the cutie m- the set icon a non-issue.
- You got me at the token creation. I was always under the impression that it's a Green/White thing, with Green having a slightly stronger token fetish. I'll do more research on this issue.
- The reason you see so many cycles here is that I primarily post the cycles here. Head over to my DA gallery for more non-cycle cards. There is also a second reason cycles crop up first: they are easier to design, as they provide structure and are basically variations of the same thing. In a similar vein, you're seeing a lot of rares first, as they are also easier to design, allowing more complexity and, in this case, providing a starting point (mainly characters in the show). The tough part still looms ahead: designing close to a hundred commons that must make the set work, yet remain in flavor with the show... That being said, I'm aware of the dangers of "cycle overload" and will keep your words in mind (there's another cycle coming though - oops).
- The last part was a bit of a shock. While I designed this cycle bottoms-up, focusing primarily on synergies and gameplay dynamics, I was under the impression that the connection to flavor was "OK" (friends helping each other, taking a student under your wing for the uncommons, Zecora protecting you from nasty curses, Gilda teaching you to be a bully, etc.)

All things considered, these cards/this mechanic will probably need a rework, and it's definitely back to the drawing board if more people point out similar issues.
Invisible_Pink_Unicorn
#286975
1 year ago
@ 286611: Thanks for the link - these are always a good read.

I'm really tempted to make an AWOL card... The cycle containing Banish from Equestria probably is superfluous by now (I probably even have too much removal in the making/too many cycles already), so shattering the "rainbow" cycle (keeping Taste the Rainbow and changing/discarding the rest) is definitely an option, freeing up BfE for a redesign.
Invisible_Pink_Unicorn
#286996
1 year ago
@ 286611: Yikes! They already started pulling things back from exile in Arabian Nights? This concept is more venerable than I thought.
Invisible_Pink_Unicorn
#287422
1 year ago
@ #285292: Quick update - looks like we were both mistaken. A Gatherer search revealed 91 mono-white and 124 total white cards with the word "token(s)" on them, while Green brings a whopping 169 mono-green and 215 total green token-related cards to the table. Even if several cards refer to "nontoken creatures" or similar and don't produce tokens, I think we can safely assume that a) the amounts are proportionally small, and b) the percentage is roughly equal across both colors.

Guess I can write a letter to Celestia, now...
Anonymous
#289824
1 year ago
the wording is SHIT
Invisible_Pink_Unicorn
#290259
1 year ago
@ #289824: Since it's as close to the official MtG "grammar" as it can be, you will have to direct your complaints to Wizards of the Coast.
Anonymous
#290856
1 year ago
As it turns out, Auras (or, more specifically, the "Enchant [thingy]" keyword) imply that, as a spell, it has a target. The triggered ability for the token still uses the stack, so you'll have chosen your targets 'long' before you get the little bugger.
As much as I like the concept, as well as the variation on the final card, I feel that you'd have to stretch it way past painfully wordy.
In other news, these cards are crazy awesome and I love them. Lunar teachings made me laugh my ass off.
Scray
#291183
1 year ago
To Anon #290856: I was asking my local judge what happens if you exile an Aura with Oblivion Ring. Apparently, if the Oblivion Ring is removed, the exiled aura doesn't use the stack and can even be placed on permanents with shroud.

As for these cards, the Friendship mechanic is certainly interesting and I like seeing more Tribal cards.
Invisible_Pink_Unicorn
#291827
1 year ago
Correct - your "bonus" Aura isn't cast, so it doesn't need a target. :)
(The original spell still requires one, though...)

I'll keep polishing the cards, aiming for less clunk and more flavor.

Thanks for the feedback, 290856 and Scray!