Community Set Uncommon Land Voting
Community Set
squire1
30 September 2011
1838 views
30 September 2011
1838 views
Hey there everyone. Great submissions this time. Pretty much all of them were viable as cards, so voting really came to power level, creativity and playability. And even then we had to narrow to our favorites. From here it is your turns to vote for the cards and decide who we will work with on the rest of the cycle. As indicated in the last article, the uncommon votings will now include a submission from each of the design team members. If a design team member wins the voting (we do not get to vote), then we will meet as usual and complete the cycle. So here are the finalists:
| Tharin'l Commons by Joshwarudd | |
 |
Creator's Description: Somewhat based on the Karoo lands from Ravinica these lands force you to go back a land drop to fix your mana. Once again if the card needs to get nerfed it can be changed to cost 1T: instead of just T: Design Team Comments: The design team felt that this was an overall good and fairly powered mana fixer. It should play well in limited and see play in constructed as is. |
| Shifting Landscape by IronHead | |
 |
Creator's Description: Each Land taps for the primary color and can be sacked for one of the two enemy colors. Design Team Comments: We were a bit unsure of power level here. Some suggested that it should enter the battlefield untapped, but that may make it closer to a rare. |
| Searing Volcano by Lectrys | |
 |
Creator's Description: This cycle is somewhere between the Alara cycle lands and Rupture Spire--they all fix all the shard's colours, but must be sacrificed upon entering the battlefield unless you pay 1 colourless mana. Design Team Comments: Overall we like this. Rupture Spire was a common, but this comes into play untapped which adds a bit to it while detracting its usability to only the right shard, a nice uncommon slot. |
| Oscillating Landscape by dude1818 | |
 |
Creator's Description: No description given. Design Team Comments: Pretty basic here, but sometimes basic is best. These types of lands saw play in alara, no reason to think it won't here. |
| Morglen Manor by spartanwolfej | |
 |
Creator's Description: Pretty basic. Each land will tap for one of the three colors of its shard, but won't untap during your untap step. Use the focus of the shard to untap the land, but no more than once per turn, to avoid making it abusable. Design Team Comments: We liked this as is. It is fairly basic and not overpowered. Actually it forces you to work within a shard paradigm or it becomes underpowered. That is a good thing. |
| Irindu Manafield by zandl | |
 |
Creator's Description: No description provided. Design Team Comments: A nice cycle idea, again really enforcing the use of each shard paradigm. It originally had a life gain piece to it that the design team was not a fan of, as it we like it. |
| Hidden Valley by dude1818 | |
 |
Creator's Description: Tri-lands that require you to do something negative, otherwise you sac it. However, the thing is less negative if you're playing towards that shard. Design Team Comments: Generally liked it. Good in limited and constructed, some thought it was a bit lame in Commander. |
| $ªmHεiπ's design | |
 |
Creator's Description: Note : these are also forest, plaines, swamps etc so they tap for a colored anyway - fixing comes from a resource other than battlefiled, appropriate to shard |
| Xander574's design | |
 |
Creator's Description: Flavor wise the idea is that each place is somewhere where going through fastly will cost you some damage. i also think that this is uncommon not rare. so it cant be two crazy. |
| squire1 's design | |
 |
Creator's Description: This set is designed as a non-slow land set. I was somewhat inspired by Mpz5's resource article. Each of our shards really specialize in augmenting a resource in one way or another. In the case of my example, flow increases hand size and is very plotting and methodical. So being able to use a tri-color land when you have utilized this aspect of a shard could be very beneficial. Each land in the cycle will be similar, relating to the hording of a resource that the shard features greatly. |
Voting
- Vote for your favorite cycle. Try to focus more on the cycle concept rather than the sample card alone. Each user may vote for one cycle idea only.
- Give us ideas and feedback on what might need to change about that cycle to make it even better or suggestions for othe cards in the cycle.
- You are also welcome to give feedback on all of the cycles, just be clear which you vote for.
- After votes are tallied, we will contact the winner of this contest and schedule a meeting with them to collaborate on the design of all the cards in the cycle. Then we will present the ful cycle to the community.
Other handy hints and things to remember
In this set there is no hybrid mana.
You can use other set mechanics from previous articles. Below is a list of articles explaining each of the five shards designed by the community so far and includes many of the previous winners.
Irindu
http://tappedout.net/mtg-articles/2011/sep/5/community-set-irindu-summary/
Ulgris
http://tappedout.net/mtg-articles/2011/sep/5/community-set-ulgris-summary/
Sorok
http://tappedout.net/mtg-articles/2011/sep/1/community-set-sorok-summary/
Chavest
http://tappedout.net/mtg-articles/2011/sep/5/community-set-chavest-summary/
Morglen
http://tappedout.net/mtg-articles/2011/sep/1/community-set-morglen-summary/
All voting is due by Wednesday, October 5th, 2011
Joshwarudd says... #2
These are some great submissions... this may be a bit difficult.
I really like my own cycle, but I hate being That Guy, so I'm not gonna vote for it. IronHead, spartanwolfej, zandl, dude1818's Hidden Vally, and the design team all had great ideas in design but I just didn't care too much for them. That leaves us with Lectrys and dude1818's Oscillating Cycle.
I really like Oscillating Landscape. It's simple and it looks like it would have great application in a real world environment, and that is what this design challenge is looking for.
I also really like the Searing Volcano cycle. It seems really powerful, yet controlled at the same time. Paying the mana means you cannot get that really fast advantage of mana, but means you will be ready on turn two.
Both lands would function almost exactly the same in a real world test environment. The only real difference is which land is untapped, the one that fixes your mana, or a basic land. But I believe that in most situations you would rather have a Searing Volcano... so my vote goes to Lectrys and his cycle of lands.
September 30, 2011 4:19 p.m.
I vote for Lectrys searing volcano set of lands. I just really like its effective mana fixing without taking away from the early game. I would want to see a searing volcano as my second land in a starting hand.
September 30, 2011 5:02 p.m.
Jarrod_0067 says... #4
Vote for #2. Rupture Spire was a common. The card is too weak as it is but it would be better if it had another additional condition instead, like "**card enters the battlefield tapped unless you control (the shard's main color basic land)"
September 30, 2011 8:33 p.m.
ilikeoldcardsbetter says... #7
Shifting Landscape.
I think it could enter Untapped. even then, you can only get one colour right away, just like a basic land.
September 30, 2011 9:30 p.m.
spartanwolfej says... #8
I vote for squire1 's land. It's pretty original, and is good at mana fixing without quite reaching rare quality.
September 30, 2011 10:42 p.m.
SwiftDeath says... #10
I am tied between Joshwarudd's tharinl's commons and Lectrys's searing volcano
tharinl's commons is like a take on the ravnica lands without being to overpowered by coming into play tapped and by the next turn you have the same mana base.
searing volcano on the other hand is like you said a take on Rupture Spire and has a nice shard effect and makes it more balanced because it comes into play untaped effectively trading off the colorless mana on turn two.
at the moment both lands appear to be balanced equaly and dont need any changes.
October 1, 2011 2:06 a.m.
Good question dude1818. I forgot to add that in the article. Due date for votes is midnight Wednesday
October 1, 2011 8:33 a.m.
My vote goes to $ªmHεiπ's design. I feel like it is the most balanced/well rounded.
October 2, 2011 7:51 a.m.
nightscape says... #14
I have to vote for Oscillating Landscape. All of these cards are interesting, but I believe the intention of mana fixing is to be reliable. If it gets too crazy, you have a good chance of mana screwing yourself instead. Simple is beautiful in this case.
October 2, 2011 12:19 p.m.
I was going to vote for $mHi's design, until I read that line that said it was a basic land...and the rest of the rules text that didn't say it wasn't strictly better than a basic land (except for being hit by Wasteland ). Bad idea. I decided not to vote for it because it's strictly better than a basic land and verges on the Alpha/Beta/Revised dual lands' power.
I'm also not a fan of Xander574's design because it's strictly better than the negashard equivalent of the Alara lands. You'd be surprised how much life Spikes will pay for mana.
Also, I thought the point of the lands was to provide mana-fixing, and squire1 's design doesn't seem to do that until it's too late.
(Sorry if it seems like I'm bashing the design team's designs, but they all seem a bit sub-par to me.)
In the end, I'm voting for Irindu Manafield because it's the most interesting of the remaining lands and it doesn't seem too overpowered (it's a worse City of Brass until you put permanents down).
October 2, 2011 2:56 p.m.
I am fine with all you said, but saying mine is only applicable to late game is a bit off I think. For all of my cards you have to think in combos, I am a Johnny and design for combos in many cases.
Turn one: Dryad Arbor
Turn two: drop my land and Birds of Paradise . My land is now active for use 90% of the time.
The point of the shard is swarm, if you can't swarm then it's useless, so yeah, if you build it correctly it could work fine, if not ou don't lose tempo since it makes colorless.
Let me say though that I do not think it is the best design up there. I also don't think it's my best design. My favorite lands that I designed for this would never have gotten votes.
October 2, 2011 3:30 p.m.
I have to go with Hidden Valley by dude1818 It's very similar to my second design and I thought I would have been a good set. The only difference is that in my design instead of de-buffing yourself, you were buffing your opponent which seemed more calculating. Running Resolve makes Hidden valley really good.
If I had a second vote it would go to squire1 because I love the interaction to the shard but I think that Hidden Valley and similar cards will be more obviously shard defining where as squire1 's is more under the surface.
October 2, 2011 11:26 p.m.
DeckBuilder345 says... #19
I like Tharin'l Commons. My only though does it have to be a plains, mountain, or forest that is returned? We could probably achieve a similar result and have far less words by just saying a land.
If i had a second vote it would be for Searing Volcano.
October 3, 2011 6:58 p.m.
I always felt that the duals were the best lands printed anyway. Considering the challenge : Mana fixing, uncommon lands you really don't have that many options persay. I mean produce mana of 3 colors, filter mana, or provide some subset of mana. Then since it is supposed to be uncommon provide some form of drawback or limit, be it come into play tapped, costs extra mana to activate, pay life, etc etc.
I suppose i could have left off the land types, but with the power creep in MTG lately, I didnt think the cards would see any sort of play on their own, I mean they are supposed to be better than basics, aren't they ?
October 3, 2011 7:23 p.m.
Better than basic lands, yes. Strictly better than basic lands, no. That card would instantly replace 4 Swamps in whatever deck I build. If it entered the battlefield tapped, made me lose life, made my opponents gain life, made me pay mana, made me sacrifice permanents, were legendary, or anything else, I'd vote for it, but not if it were a Swamp with no drawbacks.
October 4, 2011 12:09 a.m.
I have no problem being That Guy: I vote for Oscillating Landscape. It's simple, elegant, and gets the job done.
October 4, 2011 10:29 a.m.
New challenge up here http://tappedout.net/mtg-articles/2011/oct/7/community-card-uncommon-artifact-cycle/
idmantelli says... #1
I think I would have to vote for Shifting Landscape because it really exemplifies an uncommon land with its good abilities that come with slight consequences.
September 30, 2011 4:05 p.m.