New Mechanic: Dilute
Custom Cards forum
Posted on Aug. 19, 2016, 3:10 p.m. by ABadMagicPlayer100
I thought this mechanic would be a neat idea - basically you can make your deck weaker to get a powerful effect at a lower cost than usual.
Dilute X (As an additional cost to cast CARDNAME, put X basic lands you own from outside the game into your library, then shuffle your library.)
As you can see, your deck becomes "diluted" with basic lands, making each individual card harder to draw naturally.
I understand this would be hard to push for competitive play without making cards insanely overpowered given that the lands would have to take up sideboard space, but it could be fun in draft or in casual play where outside the game doesn't have to mean sideboard only.
I believe this is flavored as a blue or black mechanic, blue because they are willing to experiment with things, and black because they will trade anything for power. However, it could also be extended into other colors, especially green (lands matter).
Some sample cards:
Ruthless Tutor 
Sorcery
Dilute 5
Search your library for a card and put it into your hand, then shuffle your library.
Mind Bend 
Instant
Dilute X
Counter target spell with a converted mana cost 2 greater than X.
Ruthless Tutor is a Demonic Tutor, which is inherently powerful, but adding 5 basics to your deck makes the probability of drawing any given non-basic card significantly lower, especially late in the game. It therefore makes it harder to draw multiples of the tutor, making it difficult to set up a combo, but it can find your bomb rare in a draft.
Mind Bend is a counterspell variant. Usually, counterspells are printed at 3 mana or at 1 mana with severe restrictions. The restriction on this card makes it able to counter larger spells at a significant, but non-mana, cost.
I think this is a cool mechanic, and I hope you all do too! Is it broken? Is it weak? Is it just right? Is there some card that already exists that would love this mechanic? Leave your thoughts below.
It's an interesting concept but I think in practice it would just serve to make games less fun as it increases the role of random chance in determining the outcome. Losing because you flood out is a miserable experience and facing an opponent who gets to play cards as powerful as Demonic Tutor and then luckily manages to dodge drawing any of the added lands would also be very frustrating.
August 19, 2016 3:32 p.m.
It's a fun mechanic indeed. However, in real life it's way too complicated. First, it doesn't work in tournaments (as you mentioned yourself). Then, what happens if you play with sleeves? Then you got to sleeve up a lot of lands so you can put them in your deck? What if your run out of sleeved lands? And between matches, you got to take all those lands out again... Seems complicated.
It would be a lot easier if you instead exiled your own card from your library. Like, "Dilute 5: Exile 5 non-land card's from your library". This way, you would indirectly put more lands in the deck.
August 19, 2016 4:46 p.m. Edited.
I agree it would be better to remove cards from the deck rather than add them in, but that might not be as harsh of a set back as it sounds. example: I have a 60 card deck with 24 lands in it. the remaining 36 cards would be 16 early game cards 12 mid game cards and 4 late game finisher. after i cast my dilute/dismiss/keyword card, i can eliminate any cards that are too small to impact the game. if im casting the counterspell T4 i will make sure to take out any cards that wont help me. its almost like sideboarding. i see youre playing hatebears. let me take out my Negates etc. so keep that in mind when determining what limitations there are to the keyword and how many cards would be involved.
August 19, 2016 7:24 p.m.
i think the shuffle would be unnecessary. just exiling top X would work. yeah some people could scry things to the bottom before hand or otherwise influence the top of the deck, but thats not really the big of a deal since they would have to find a way to make a card X+1 from the top of their deck for it to be of any relevance. which is pretty difficult past X=2
August 19, 2016 7:55 p.m.
hmm interesting idea.
How about Dilute tokens. Something like:
Dilute Token
Remove this card from your deck before playing.
(this card does nothing)
Dilute Counter
Counter target spell. Shuffle 5 Dilute Tokens into your library.
That way they are easier to spot when you want to take them out, and harder to abuse.
August 20, 2016 8:49 a.m.
Other cards can have stuff like Discard 3 Dilute Tokens, do something cool..
August 20, 2016 8:51 a.m.
Think Again
Instant
Draw a card
Dilute 3 (shuffle 3 Dilute Tokens into your library)
Flashback: discard 2 Dilute Tokens
Diluted Strenght 
Instant
Target creature gets +2/+2 until end of turn
Dilute 1 (shuffle 1 Dilute Token into your library)
As you cast Diluted Strenght you may discard a Dilute Token from your hand. If you do, target creature gets +5/+5 instead.
Diluted Fiction
Sorcery
As an additional cost to cast Diluted Fiction discard X Dilute Tokens. Reveal the top 2 + X cards of your library. An opponent separates them into 2 piles. Put one into your hand and the other into your graveyard.
Dilute 3 (shuffle 3 Dilute Tokens into your library)
Diluted Flood
Instant
Dilute X (shuffle X Dilute Tokens into your library)
Tap X target creatures
Dilutseize
sorcery
Dilute X (shuffle X Dilute Tokens into your library)
Target player reveals his or her hand. Choose a nonland card with converted mana cost X. That player discards that card.
Diluted Cheese 
Sorcery
Diluted Victory cant be countered.
Reveal 5 Dilute Tokens from your hand. If you do you win the game.
Fiery Dilute 
Instant
Fiery Dilute deals 3 damage to target creature.
As you cast Fiery Dilute you may discard a Dilute Token from your hand. If you do, Fiery Dilute deals 5 damage to target creature or player instead.
Diluted Haven
Land
add one mana of any color to your mana pool.
Dilute 1 (shuffle 1 Dilute Token into your library)
Diluter
Artifact Put a Dilute Token into your library second from top.
August 20, 2016 9:26 a.m. Edited.
Maybe some more powerful Dilute cards:
Diluted Vision
Sorcery
As an additional cost to cast Diluted Vision discard a Dilute Token.
Draw 3 cards.
Dilute 3
Diluted Mox 
Artifact reveal X Dilute Tokens from your hand: add X to your mana pool.
Dilute 2. (shuffle 1 Dilute Token into your library)
Diluted Order
Sorcery
As an additional cost to cast Diluted Order discard a Dilute Token
Search your library for a green creature card and put it into play tapped
Dilute Twister
Sorcery
As an additional cost to cast Dilute Twister discard a Dilute Token.
Each player shuffles his hand and graveyard into his or her library then draws 7 cards. Dilute 10.
Dilute attack
Enchantment, discard a Dilute Token: Put a creature from your hand into play. That creature has haste. Exile it at the beginning of your next upkeep.
August 20, 2016 9:51 a.m.
Postmortal_Pop says... #15
I actually really like smackjacks idea for it, the tokens wouldn't cut into your sideboard but are also inherently worse than drawing a land because the land can be played. I would be totally game for this idea you could even use it as a weapon,
Diluted Cognizance 
Sorcery
Target player dilutes X.
August 28, 2016 4:47 p.m.
There's still one major issue I see with this. anyone with a sleeved deck would need plenty of extra sleeves with them in case they need to put dilute tokens in. You'd also need a lot of dilute tokens. Generally speaking you don't need other tokens. You can use dice or slips of paper to represent them. But these tokens would need to be on hand in card form. Also I don't know if "token" would be the right term in the phrase "put X dilute tokens into your library" because tokens would cease to exist in the library. I believe it would need to be "cards named diluted ~" where "diluted ~" is the new name.
jparker-sartori21 says... #2
Maybe have dilute cards like this:1 red and 1 colorless manadilute 3-put 3 creature cards cmc 7 or greaterdilute 3-put 3 basic land cardsput 3 3/3 goblins with haste
August 19, 2016 3:23 p.m.