"Broken Plane" block
Custom Cards forum
Posted on Aug. 17, 2016, 9:09 p.m. by Guardian_Xain
I had an idea for a MTG block a little while back, and was wondering what people thought, and if anyone wanted to help me come up with ideas for cards. The block has two parts: "Broken Plane" and "Apocalypse" (names pending). The theme of Broken Plane is "Control is an illusion," and has a heavy focus on Colorless mana. Apocalypse continues the colorless mana focus, but also features a bunch of double sided cards, and effects that mass flip these double sided cards. I'd like to focus on Broken Plane for now, but if this thread does well, I might make one for Apocalypse. That's enough for an intro, I'll make a few posts below this describing the story, mechanics and sample cards. Please note that since this is all about making up cards and balancing them, the first post about a card isn't necessarily the most up to date version.
Guardian_Xain says... #3
Mechanics
Just a few ideas to start the set off.
Madness and Devoid would make a return in this set.
Unbound
A card with Unbound is not controlled by any player. Instead, it kinda sits in the middle of the field, doing things between the end step of its owner and the upkeep of the next player. Most cards with Unbound start off as normal cards, but the transform into an unbound state when something happens. Non-creature unbound cards will usually say what triggers when it is "their" turn, and unbound creatures simply attack a random player (unless stated otherwise).
Tame
Tame is quite simple. Usually an ETB effect, Taming allows you to take control of an Unbound card and remove it's Unbound status for as long as the Tamer (the card that triggered the Tame effect) is on the field. If the card that tamed an unbound card leaves the field, the card becomes Unbound once again.
Unpredictable
This ability triggers when a card enters the battlefield, and usually involves rolling a 6 sided dice or flipping a coin. The card then gains extra effects based on the result.
August 17, 2016 9:27 p.m.
Guardian_Xain says... #4
Sample Cards
New land cycles!
This set would have two new land cycles, one common or uncommon and one rare. The common cycle would feature a set of "Barren" basic lands. These lands would have some sort of ETB drawback (enter tapped, take damage, or something), and would tap for 1 colorless mana and one of the color from the normal basic land. For example, the Barren Mountain would produce 1 colorless and 1 red. These would also be Duel lands, with the Waste and whatever type the other color is from.
The Rare cycle is a set of Unbound lands. They enter normally, and tap for 1 of the 6 types of mana depending on which one. They also each have a special trigger.
The Red land reads "Whenever a source would deal non-combat damage, it deals twice that much damage. Put half that many charge counters on this card." and "Tap this land: this land deals 1 damage to target creature or player."
Green: "Whenever a creature enters the battlefield, it's controller loses 1 life. Then put a charge counter on this card." (Not sure about this one. Needs to be more advantageous to the player using it)
Blue: "Whenever a player casts an instant or sorcery, that player loses one life. Then put a charge counter on this card." (same problem as the green one)
White: "Whenever a player gains life, that player loses twice that much life. Put half that many charge counters on this card." and "Tap this land: Target player gains 1 life."
Black: "Whenever a player sacrifices a creature, that player loses 1 life. Then put a charge counter on this card." and "Tap this land: Target player puts a 1/1 colorless Void token into play. They immediately sacrifice it."
Colorless: "Whenever a player taps a land for mana, they lose 1 life. Then put a charge counter on this card."
Each land also has "Any player can pay (5) to destroy this land" and "If this card would be destroyed, Transform it instead."
Got all that? Now for the flip side. Each land transforms into a X/X Avatar of the lands color. Each one has "This card's base Power and Toughness is each equal to the number of Charge counters on this card when it transformed" and Unbound. They also each have a combat ability related to their color: Trample for Green, First Strike for Red, Flying for White, Deathtouch for Black, Hexproof for Blue, and Myriad for Colorless. The colorless card also has "If a token generated by this creature would die, sacrifice all copies of this card"
August 17, 2016 9:48 p.m.
Guardian_Xain says... #5
More Cards!
Since the lands took up so much room, I decided to split the cards into multiple posts.
Elven Fiddler
Cost: (4), 1 green
Creature: Elf
2/2
When this card enters the battlefield, Tame target Unbound card as long as Elven Fiddle is on the battlefield.
Even in a dead world, there's always a bad musician
Temporal Anomaly
Cost: (8), 2 Blue
Legendary Enchantment
All of your cards have Flash.
Whenever you cast a spell, untap lands equal to it's converted mana cost.
During your upkeep, draw seven cards.
Jace could sense the anomly. He didn't know what had caused it or what it could do, but it seemed to be following him...
August 17, 2016 9:54 p.m.
mechanics seems fine depending on exactly what the unbound cards do.
holy shizbizzle your lands or broken. they are amazing. they don't ETB tapped, they tap for colorless along with there regular color at no cost. Each of their effects stack in multiples. oh my gosh I want like 40 each and more if possible. you could win games with just these lands. whats the draw back? my opponent can pay 5 mana and use a kill spell to remove them? ok thats at least 6 mana and a card my opponent had to waste.
fiddler seems fine depending on the strength of unbound cards.
Temporal anomoly is a 10 mana win the game on your next turn card which seems about right.
August 17, 2016 10:36 p.m.
I'm getting, "A plane that's not really a plane" vibes here.
August 17, 2016 10:40 p.m.
NotSquishedYet says... #8
The mechanics are a unique idea, but the cards are far too powerful.
Those lands need to be limited, for one. Something like "Pay 5 mana or sacrifice when playing them, and they don't untap for 3 turns after you do." They would also not be basics, and land at mythic rare.
Temporal Anomaly would be strictly better than a $12 card by orders of magnitude, which means: Not balanced.
August 17, 2016 11:15 p.m.
Guardian_Xain says... #9
aholder7: That's a very good point. Maybe if I make the cycle of Unbound lands Legendary? Then you can't have multiples of them. Also, I think the fact that the creature side is unbound, and therefore can turn against you at least helps balance them a little. Thanks for the input!
NotSquishedYet: Hmmm.... Maybe if I remove the draw clause from the Anomaly? That way, while you can play cards for basically free (like Tamiyo, Field Researcher's ultimate), your in danger of running out of cards if you play to many.
August 18, 2016 11:49 a.m.
NotSquishedYet says... #10
That would make it just a slightly worse version of Omniscience without too much different about it. Perhaps it should be a different sort of card altogether.
August 18, 2016 2:10 p.m.
Guardian_Xain says... #11
NotSquishedYet Yeah, maybe. I didn't even know there was a card like Omniscience, haha. I wouldn't want them to be to similar. Hmmm..... Maybe "Flash", "Unpredictable: Roll a d6. -1: Return all other non-land permanents to their owner's hands. -2: Exile all creatures. -3: Players may not cast spells this turn. -4: Creatures may not attack this turn. -5: Creatures may not block this turn. -6: Put all permanents from all graveyards, hands and exiles into play under their owner's control." and "During each player's upkeep, exile this card, then return it to the field under it's owner's control." Or somethign else entirely, if you have any ideas.
August 18, 2016 2:44 p.m.
NotSquishedYet says... #12
It would take a bunch of balancing, but that's actually a pretty neat idea.
August 18, 2016 2:47 p.m.
Guardian_Xain says... #13
And how about another card? Just a basic common that shows some Unbound and Tamed interactions.
Untamed Stallion
Cost: 1 generic, 1 white.
2/2 Creature: Horse
Untamed
When you cast this card or Tame it, gain 2 life.
August 18, 2016 2:47 p.m.
The horse seems fine as a common assuming tammers are common.
I have a question though about unbound creatures. You mentioned that they would attack people at random during their (controls) turn? There is a problem with this. Creatures cannot attack their controllers. You can circumvent this by making them deal damage directly through an ability. Something like "during your upkeep flip a coin. If you won the flip target opponent loses 2 life (or this creTure deals 2 damage to them, whichever you prefer). If you didn't then you lose 2 life." Or something like that.
August 18, 2016 2:57 p.m.
Guardian_Xain says... #17
aholder7. The thing about Unbound creatures is that they are not controlled by anyone. There is no controller, hence the name of the ability. And it's not actually on their owner's turn, it's between their owner's turn and the next person's turn. So between the end step of the owner and the upkeep of the next person, there is a mini phase where the owner's unbound cards do stuff. Does that clear it up?
August 18, 2016 3:05 p.m.
there isn't a zone where those cards can exist and interact that way. you'd have to fundamentally rework the rules of magic.
August 18, 2016 7:34 p.m.
Guardian_Xain says... #19
aholder7 I'd like to point out, that as this is an imaginary block that will never actually see the light of day, we can probably get away with an imaginary zone. However, that is a very valid point. We could always reword the Unbound ability. Like, Unbound card's triggered abilities can't be triggered, creatures can't attack, and they all do something (like dealing damage equal to it's power to a random player) during the end step. Then Tame would just change control of that permanent.
August 18, 2016 7:42 p.m.
That would probably make them fit better. i have another idea that would simplify the word count on the cards and be more flavorful IMO.
example card (may or may not be balanced):
Name: Half-sane villagercost 1R
When ~ enters the battlefield, you may discard a card. If you do, you may draw a card.
Whenever a creature spell is cast, exile ~ and transform it.
Name: Half-Mad villager (flip side of above)
Unbound: during each player's upkeep that player discards a card at random, then draws a card.
2/2
(unbound simply being a key word meaning this cards effects still apply even though it's in exile or however that would be worded).
things to note about this card. i gave it an etb loot because i figured that it would enter and leave a few times because of tamers, and this would give people a reason to want to tame it along with getting rid of its somewhat negative unbound effect. i gave it a power and toughness on the backside because i figured it would be unflavorful to have it transform into a non creature, otherwise that side has no effect. however you could have tamers simply bring the cards under your control and not transform them back which would basically mean tamers would mostly be giving you free bodies since the effect would still persist. i think it would be better to keep tamers as they are with wording something like (Tame: when this card enters the battlefield put target exiled card with unbound onto the battlefield under your control untransformed. The tamed card cannot become unbound so long as this creature remains on the battlefield. if this card leaves the battlefield, return to exile transformed the tamed card. or whatever)
August 18, 2016 9:35 p.m.
Guardian_Xain says... #21
aholder7: That's a wonderful idea. Thanks for all the help. We could add that unbound creatures deal damage equal to their power to a random player at the end of their owner's endstep. I guess the next step would be to include cards beside Tamers that interact with unbound cards. Maybe something like a new keyword that translates to "put target card in exile into it's owners graveyard." It would basically be a Destroy effect for Unbound cards.
August 18, 2016 9:44 p.m.
I think having cards that interact with them would be fine. i don't know that you need a key word to remove them from exile. if you really want one id go for something like "Anchor" as it sounds like these unbound cards are sort of floating through time-space outside of reality (or at least not fully there)
August 18, 2016 10:04 p.m.
Guardian_Xain says... #23
aholder7: Hmmm.... That sounds pretty good, but I think something that sounds more like "Bringing back to sanity" more than "bringing back to this world" would sound better. If we use a keyword, haha. But depending on how many of these types of cards we make, it might be a bit annoying to have them all read "Put target exiled card in it's owner's graveyard." That's just a lot of text. For now, Anchor works pretty well though.
August 18, 2016 10:15 p.m.
i just wanted to make it short. almost all keywords are single words. there are a select few that are 2 words (9 total, 1 of them is a unique card from future site, and another is from conspiracy. so basically 7).
August 18, 2016 10:30 p.m.
Guardian_Xain says... #25
aholder7: Yeah, that makes sense. I meant the bringing back thing as a description of what the keywords suggest, not as the actual keywords, lol. Anchor sounds like "bringing back to this world" like you said, but I feel the keyword for Unbound should suggest "bringing back from insanity" or "bringing back to sanity" or something like that. Oh, duh. Bind. That should work. Doesn't suggest what I was talking about, but poses a nice counter to the Unbound keyword. And it's harsher than Tame, since it's going to the grave. So like, "Bind target Unbound card" or something.
August 18, 2016 10:39 p.m.
Guardian_Xain says... #27
aholder7: I actually meant Bind to replace Anchor, but replacing Tame does indeed sound better. Unbound, Bind and Anchor, huh? Sounds good!
Guardian_Xain says... #2
Story
The story starts with Jace receiving a mysterious telepathic message form a seemingly empty part of the Blind Eternities. Taking a chance, Jace Planeswalks to the area of the message, and stumbles across a strange plane that cannot be sensed from the outside.
The entire plane seems dead, its landscapes wasted away to almost nothing. The few living things he encounters are raving mad. He also discovers that the mana of the plane is twisted and corrupted with mana similar to that produced by Kozilek, and this strange twisting of mana affects spells and living things alike in strange ways.
He discovers a semi-sane village hidden away deep in the mountains, full of half alive, half sane humans, elves and the like. They rave about a Great Light that twisted the entire plane, letting loose "The Great Nothing."
Heading deeper into the mountains, Jace finds what used to be a cabin, and deep below, protected by ancient and powerful magic is some sort of lab. The lab is in ruins, with notes strewn about everywhere, and ominous scrawls on the walls.
In the center of the room is a strange crystal. Jace can feel massive amounts of twisted mana inside the crystal, some even seeping out, further corrupting the plane.
Deep in the lab, he finds a strange slate of metal that glows whne he infuses mana into it. On the slate is a recording of the plane's history. Jace begins to read, not sensing the strange presence that has been following him the entire time, and is getting closer....
Apocalypse deals with both the past of the plane, and Jace's further studies of the plane.
August 17, 2016 9:19 p.m.