Overly Ambitious Exercise: Creating a Commander Set
Custom Cards forum
Posted on Sept. 29, 2018, 8:08 a.m. by PIayswithFlRE
This is something that's just been bouncing around in my head for a while, so I thought I should actually start writing things down.
Decided
- five decks
- Ally color pairs
- desk is werewolf/wolf related
- each deck has two mono-colored Partner Legendary creatures, possibly with "your other commander must share a color or creature type with ~"
- Based on one idea I had for an Arlin Kord, all commanders are two-abilities planeswalkers with Eminence that transform into creatures
Current cards/decks
|
Neheb, Deathseeker by TypicalTimmmy
Legendary Planeswalker - Neheb +2 Create a 2/3 red and black Minotaur Zombie creature token with menace. It enters the battlefield tapped. -X Exile up to X spells from your graveyard each with converted mana cost X or less. You lose X life. Until end of turn, you may cast each of these spells. If you cast 3 or more exiled spells in this way, exile Neheb, Deathseeker and return it to the battlefield transformed. Neheb, Deathseeker can be your commander. Eminence - At the start of combat on your turn, if Neheb, Deathseeker is in the command zone or on the battlefield, target creature gains haste. 3 |
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Neheb, Forsaken by the Gods
Legendary Creature - Minotaur Zombie Warrior Deathtouch, Haste, Menace Whenever Neheb, Forsaken by the Gods attacks you may exert him. If you do, you may put a creature from your hand onto the battlefield tapped and attacking that shares a subtype with him. At the end of combat, return it to your hand. If that creature would be destroyed this turn, exile it instead. As long as Neheb, Forsaken by the Gods is exerted, creature spells you control gain Bloodthirst 2 and sorcery spells you control have deathtouch. 4/4 |
|
Arlinn, Changing
Legendary Planeswalker - Arlinn +1 Create a 2/2 green wolf creature token. You may pay . If you do, create a 3/2 red werewolf creature token with haste instead. -X Transform Arlinn, Changing and up to X target creatures with converted mana cost X or less Arlinn, Changing can be your commander Eminence - While Arlinn, Changing is in the command zone or on the battlefield, non-Human werewolves you control can't tranform 4 |
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Arlinn, Changed for Good
Legendary Creature - Werewolf Double strike, menace Other wolves and non-Human Werewolves you control can't transform and have undying (When a creature with undying dies, if it had no +1/+1 counters on it, return it to the battlefield under its owner's control with a +/+1 counter on it) You may cast Wolf an Werewolf spells as if they had flash 3/4 |
|
Huatli, Inspiring
Legendary Planeswalker - Huatli +1 Until end of turn, up to one target creature gains your choice of lifelink, trample, or vigilance. -X Create X 1/1 green white Soldier Ally creature tokens with exalted. You may transform Huatli, Inspiring Huatli, Inspiring can be your commander Eminence - At the start your turn, if Huatli, Inspiring is in the command zone or on the battlefield, target creature gains hexproof until another creature attacks 3 |
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Huatli, People's Champion
Legendary Creature - Warrior Poet Ally Vigilance, trample Huatli, People's Champion's power and toughness are equal to the number of untapped creatures you control. : Huatli, People's Champion gains hexproof until end of turn -/- |
|
Narset 2 by MindAblaze
Legendary Planeswalker - Narset +2 Counter the next spell cast that targets you or a permanent or spell you control until your next turn. -X The next instant or sorcery spell you cast with CMC X or less gains rebound. The next time you cast a spell from exile, exile Narset, and return her to the battlefield transformed. Narset can be your commander Eminence - Whenever a creature enters the battlefield from exile, if Narset is in the command zone or on the battlefield, you may cast target instant or sorcery spell in your graveyard. If you do exile it. 2 |
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Narset Awakened
Legendary Creature - Human Monk Prowess (Whenever you cast a noncreature spell, this creature gets +1/+1 until end of turn.) When Narset Awakened enters the battlefield, exile another target creature you control. Return it to the battlefield at end of turn. Creatures you control gain prowess. 3/2 |
+1 Exile a card at random from target opponents hand. You may cast that card using mana of any color this turn. If you do not, place that card in the graveyard.
-4 Ashiok, Dream Eater becomes a X/X Nightmare where X is the number of cards in all players hands and has "When ~ deals combat damage to a player that player discards half their hand rounded up and you draw that many cards. Prevent all combat damage dealt to ~ this turn.
Ashiok, Dream Eater can be your commander
Eminence: The first time you discard or cycle a card each turn, if Ashiok, Dream Eater is in the command zone or on the battlefield, each opponent discards a card.
4
PIayswithFlRE says... #3
Thanks for the suggestions.
Yeah, the idea with the walkers would be that there really is no ultimate that has to be managed. But I know that temporarily turning walkers into creatures is convoluted, so I'm thinking that they have
+1/2: Create an on-theme token
-X: Do something, then exile the walker and return them to play transformed. Then they stay creatures forever
~ Can be your commander
Eminence - while ~ is in play or in the command zone, "something that's similar to what the emblems do, but less so, since you don't have to ultimate to get it
So (not necessarily final forms), let's say something like:
| Planeswalker | Flip side creature |
| Arlin, Touched by Darkness Legendary Planeswalker - Arlin +1: Create a 2/2 green wolf creature token -X: Exile Arlin, Touched by Darkness and any number of other creatures you control with total converted mana cost X or less, then return them to play transformed. Arlin, Touched by Darkness can be your commander Eminence - While Arlin, Touched by Darkness is on the battlefield or in the command zone, non-Human Werewolves you control can't transform Loyalty: 4 |
Arlin, Forever in Moonlight Legendary Creature - Werewolf Haste Other Wolves and Non-Human Werewolves you control get +1/+1 and can't transform You may cast Wolf and Werewolf cards as if they have flash 4/4 |
| TBD, Caller of the Host Legendary Planeswalker, TBD +1: Create a 1/1 green and white Soldier Ally creature token with exalted -X: Target creature gets +X/+X and trample until end of turn. Exile TBD, Caller of the Host an return it to play transformed TBD, Caller of the Host can be your Commander Eminence - At the start of combat on your turn, if TBD, caller of the host is on the battlefield or in the command zone, target creature you control gains hexproof until end of turn unless another creature you control attacks |
Angelic Host Creature - Angel Ally Exalted, Myriad Angelic Host's power and toughness are equal to half the number of permanents you control with exalted, rounded down. -/- |
Or is that just ridiculous?
September 29, 2018 9:39 a.m.
JANKYARD_DOG says... #4
To me, transforming into a creature permanently would mean that Walker is essentially losing it's spark.
You could however have the -X abilities be more like -3/-4 to become a creature. For instance; working off your examples Arlinn could be a -3: ~ becomes a 4/4 Werewolf with Attacking Were/Wolves you control gain +1/+1 & First strike. Prevent all combat damage done to ~ this turn. (Prevents loss of loyalty). Her eminence ability can handle the transform prevention.
The "Caller of Hosts" could be: -4: ~ becomes X/X Angel Ally with flying (assuming because angel) and trample where X is the Number of Creatures/Allys? you control. Prevent all combat damage done to ~ this turn. Adding Exalted and/or Myriad I think would be too much, esp with the trample. Same eminence ability is fine I think.
Maybe your U/B cycle/discard could bring back Ashiok as you PW/commander. Possibly along the lines of:
Ashiok, Dream Eater
+1: Exile a card at random from target opponents hand. You may cast that card using mana of any color this turn. If you do not, place that card in the graveyard.
-4: ~ Becomes a X/X Nightmare where X is the number of cards in all players hands and has "When ~ deals combat damage to a player that player discards half their hand rounded up and you draw that many cards. Prevent all combat damage dealt to ~ this turn.
Eminence: Once each turn, whenever you cycle/discard a card, each opponent discards a card.
Just a thought.
September 29, 2018 1:35 p.m.
PIayswithFlRE says... #5
I guess I was thinking that, since they come right back to the command zone after they die and, at a minimum, using their eminence, if not being recast this turn or next turn, they weren't losing their spark as much as wading directly into battle rather than influencing things from afar.
But, I could get behind something like -N/N-1 where their starting loyalty is N or close to it. I guess, instead of transforming them, it could also just create a legendary token creature (except maybe for Arlinn). It just always seemed like a lot of hoop jumping to make them indestructible creatures that can't take damage so that we don't also have to track the loyalty counters.
On G/W, I'm going back and forth between focusing on exalted or just focusing on Ally. Either way, mix in a little bit of myriad to either benefit from extra attackers or extra rally effects.
Ashiok was who I was considering but hadn't fleshed out the abilities. Yours looks good.
Going to spend some time thinking about it and hopefully post initial passes at most, if not all of the planeswalkers* somewhere tomorrow
*Currently
Angrath (or a new minotuar from his plane)
Arlin Kord
Starting to feel like Elspeth shifted slightly into green
Maybe Narset, focusing on instants and sorceries in some way
Ashiok
September 29, 2018 5:42 p.m.
MindAblaze says... #6
Narset
+2: until your next turn, whenever a player would cast a spell targetting you, a permanent or a spell you control, counter that spell.
-X : The next instant or sorcery spell you cast with CMC X or less gains rebound. The next time you cast a spell from exile, exile Narset, and return her to the battlefield transformed.
Eminence - Whenever a creature enters the battlefield from exile, if Narset is in the command zone or on the battlefield, target instant or sorcery spell in your graveyard gains flashback until end of turn.
Loyalty : 2
Narset Awakened
Legendary Creature - Human Monk
Prowess
When Narset Awakened enters the battlefield, exile another target creature you control. Return it to the battlefield at end of turn.
Creatures you control gain prowess.
3/2
September 29, 2018 6:15 p.m. Edited.
PIayswithFlRE says... #7
OK, I absolutely intend to reply to the last round of comments, but I'm just really frustrated with the site right now. I created images for my current versions of Arlinn, Angrath, and Elspeth (still using my reverse-flipwalker model for the moment) and I tried to put them back in my original post. They show up when I preview, but not when I post. Anyone know what's up with that? Tried it both inside and outside the accordion block.
And/or do other people see them?
September 30, 2018 9:29 a.m.
PIayswithFlRE says... #8
Couldn't get the images to work, so text versions included below along with a bunch of other text. Thanks again to everyone reading and contributing to this
Definitely like having her give your creatures prowess. Made me start thinking of another way to recur sorceries an instants:
Whenever you cast an instant or sorcery, you may manifest it instead of putting it into the graveyard.
: Return target attacking or blocking creature with converted mana cost X to its owner's hand. You gain life equal to the number of cards in that players hand
So, you can use the second ability as a normal blue/white combat trick or, pay just to get your manifested spell back and gain some life since the Morph has 0 CMC. And, with Narset giving the Morphs prowess, they can be halfway decent blockers.
I do like all the ETB exploitation of your version, though.
Having the transformation only go from planeswalker to creature also means I just don't have to care about the loyalty counters once it happens. I realize I can get around that by doing "Exile ~ and return it to play transformed" instead, though.
On your Angrath, I like the artifact focus for an Angrath origin story because of, as you mention, his prior career as a blacksmith and the abilities you gave it accomplish that really well.
Mechanically, though, before I picked the commander, I knew I wanted to go in a Hellbent / Neheb, the Worthy type of deck an thought it would be interesting to support that with Suspend so you could have fewer cards in hand without having too many fewer options. So, what I'm imagining is an Angrath after he escaped Ixalan an becoming an obsessive planner/time-manipulator to avoid accidentally walking into another situation like that again.
I should probably just invent a different Minotaur planeswalker, though, either from Angrath's plane or Amonkhet, since it's more likely that Angrath would spend his time reconnecting with family and just enjoying being home, rather than what I've outlined; he was just the only minotaur planeswalker
| Angrath, Waiting | Arlinn, Changing | Elspeth, Recruiting |
| Legendary Planeswalker - Angrath | Legendary Planeswalker - Arlinn | Legendary Planeswalker - Elspeth |
| +1: Create a 2/3 red black Spirit Minotaur creature token with Vanishing 2. You may move a time counter from a suspended card to it. |
+1: Create a 2/2 green wolf creature token. You may pay . If you do, create a 3/2 red werewolf creature token with haste instead. |
+1: Until end of turn, up to one target creature gains your choice of lifelink, trample, or vigilance. |
| -X: X red or black spells with converted mana cost X or less gain suspend. Exile them with X time counters on them. You may transform Angrath, Waiting |
-X: Transform Arlinn, Changing and up to X target creatures with converted mana cost X or less |
-X: Create X 1/1 green white Soldier Ally creature tokens with exalted. You may transform Angrath, Waiting |
| Angrath, Waiting can be your commander Eminence - At the start of combat on your turn, if Angrath, Waiting is in the command zone or on the battlefield, target creature gains haste |
Arlinn, Changing can be your commander Eminence - While Arlinn, Changing is in the command zone or on the battlefield, non-Human werewolves you control can't tranform |
Elspeth, Recruiting can be your commander Eminence - At the start your turn, if Elspeth, Recruiting is in the command zone or on the battlefield, target creature gains hexproof until another creature attacks |
4 | 4 | 4 |
| Angrath, The Wait is Over Legendary Creature - Minotaur |
Arlinn, Changed for Good Legendary Creature - Werewolf |
Elspeth, Army of One Legendary Creature - Soldier Avatar |
| Menace, trample Angrath, The Wait is over gets +X/+X where X is the number of suspended cards or permanents you control with time counters. If you have one or fewer cards in hand, he gets an additional +X/+X : Exile target card from your hand or graveyard with X-1 time counters on it where X is its converted mana cost. It gains suspend. |
Double strike, menace Other wolves and non-Human Werewolves you control can't transform and have undying (When a creature with undying dies, if it had no +1/+1 counters on it, return it to the battlefield under its owner's control with a +/+1 counter on it) You may cast Wolf an Werewolf spells as if they had flash |
Vigilance, trample Elspeth, Army of One's power and toughness are equal to the number of untapped creatures you control. : Elspeth, Army of One gains hexproof until end of turn |
| 0/1 | 3/4 | -/- |
So, my current questions:
- Temporarily setting aside the oddness of how I have the planeswalkers flip, would you be interested in building decks around them?
- 1a. Any general thoughts on the current wordings of my reverse flipwalkers?
- Should I use a different planeswalker (either existing or invented) for the red black deck? If so, any suggestions?
- Half-on-purpose, I created the commanders with color-adjusted identical costs and loyalties. Variation would be better, wouldn't it?
September 30, 2018 5:29 p.m.
JANKYARD_DOG says... #9
Problem with wanting Elspeth as W/G... She's essentially dead... in the underworld in Theros. Were she to return she would most likely be W/B. However, you could possibly revert to when she is first starting out?. Other than that the only W/G PW we got is Ajani.
Nice idea with Neheb.
As for your Q3, I think having them near the same cost is a way to keep them balanced. Though as mentioned above, BR wants to go fast usually, so it makes sense to lower the cost there. Maybe the same idea with W/G. A reduced cost, but smaller stats as W/G is usually token based. BU could maybe even be upped one because of its level of control. The other 2 seem good where they are at 5cmc.
September 30, 2018 8:58 p.m.
MindAblaze says... #10
My thought was the counter applies to your spells just as much as their spells, so no instant speed flickering, putting pants on your things or other shenanigans like that. That being said it is probably too strong as is. You could say “the next time a spell targets you or a permanent you control counter that spell.” Then it only happens once. It works quite well in a tempo style build for UW I think.
September 30, 2018 11:32 p.m.
PIayswithFlRE says... #11
Neheb
I really like the Neheb, both the story and the card you came up with. I hadn't considered the possibility that he could still ignite after becoming an Eternal, but I like the idea of a zombie planeswalker. And I would definitely have fun building around the card you came up with, for all the reasons you listed.
Angrath and Temporal Manipulation are out (though I'm saving the idea of a suspend-based commander for another time) and Neheb is in.
Also, how do you get the planeswalker arrows and loyalty images to show up?
Elspeth
Yeah...I guess I was thinking of W/G angels, but that's not how Theros works. I think Ajani's got enough cards. There is Huatli in Huatli, Radiant Champion. This could maybe work as Huatli, People's Champion
Narset
Yeah, just countering the next one should work.
I'll get the latest versions of the walkers into the initial post when I have more time.
I'm taking kind of a top-down approach here, so the next step will probably be coming up with the mono-colored partner legendaries. I do think I still want them to have something like "Partner. Your two commanders must share a color or creature type"
Thanks again to everyone on the thread
October 1, 2018 5:34 p.m.
PIayswithFlRE says... #12
Got the first post updated.
I think I may have to abandon the "your two commanders must share a color or creature type." That or give up on, for example, both of the green commanders being able to partner with both of the red ones in the Red Green deck. You end up having to either give everything three creature types or every color has something like an Elder X and an X Ally.
If you want to keep building out Rakdos, go for it.
My current thinking for some of the others, mostly informed by the Command Zone Wish List episode:
Mind Over Matter
I'm liking the idea of building a pair that create and exploit manifest (and, probably, to a lesser extent, morph) creatures like in the alternate idea I posted for Narset.
Only One May Stand
I'm thinking some energy-based partners. Since Huatli ended up on Kaladesh, thematically, this would fit in the GW deck.
Mechanically, I think RG has more interesting energy options.
But, I think it can work in GW and then maybe create a Legendary Artifact Creature - Dinosaur to round out the GW commander options
Lycan or Not
Thinking a set of Shapeshifters, maybe a Wolf Shapeshifter and Werewolf Shapeshifter that probably don't transform, but have other ways of buffing your creatures, possibly in the style of Mirror Entity
No clear ideas for or , but hopefully I've have something more concrete on at least one set of these tomorrow.
October 3, 2018 12:32 a.m.
PIayswithFlRE says... #13
I like the Curse. I almost feel like it should also do some damage to someone other than you for that mana cost, but I guess it's essentially a double Arcane Adaptation and Zombie an Minotaur do both have a lot of tribal support, so it's worth it.
For images, I've been looking at mCardstock just because I saw the link here (like I said, had card images for the walkers but couldn't get them to show up) and I was just making the "X can be your commander" and Eminence ability the third ability with a 0 cost; not entirely accurate, but close enough. Once or twice; I just put the "can be your commander" at the end of the X ability due to relative wordiness.
As someone who enjoys Rakdos, what do you think about this card for Rakdos/mono red in Commander:
Flame Chains
Legendary Artifact - Equipment
Flame Chains costs less for each spent
If a non-creature source you control or equipped creature is red and would deal damage to a permanent or player, it deals that much damage plus 1 for each opponent with 1 or more life instead. Equip
Trying to make it boost burn in commander without impacting any other format any more than Pyromancer's Gauntlet or Sulfuric Vapors.
October 3, 2018 6:29 a.m.
PIayswithFlRE says... #14
Mostly just for fun. I haven't ruled out printing out one or more deck's new cards to test it out, just to see if the ideas are actually practical. But, mostly, like the title says, I just thought this would be a fun mental exercise.
As for the costs of the deck, I guess I'm trying to make this fit the molds of the yearly commander pre-cons (~5 mythics including the commander, ~25-30 rares and ~25-30 uncommons), which they sell for about 45 but which seem to end up being resold for/being worth about 100 once they're out of print due to both the new cards and reprintings of cards that had been creeping up in price, so I guess somewhere in that range.
The goal is definitely to create unique cards. I just wanted to go for something larger in scope than creating one-off cards and this seemed like a fun way to do it/hopefully collaborate with others given the scale.
October 3, 2018 5:13 p.m.
PIayswithFlRE says... #15
OK, let's see if these images work. Supposed to be the UW partner commanders
October 4, 2018 6:45 a.m.
PIayswithFlRE says... #16
OK, so I went back to the idea of the partner commanders saying "Your two commanders must share a color or creature type." Still not dead set on it, but I wanted to see what I could do with it. I did give up on the idea of, if you put all four cards that could potentially be in a deck into that deck, they could all partner with each other, but I'm working on making it so that three of the four possible combinations can work.
Basically, pick five creature types and have both commanders of that color have that type as well as one of the commanders that those colors partner with. That gets you half of them. For the others, I just decided to make the commander of each color that wasn't already double-typed an Elder something, so that the two Elders can partner (though probably not with as much synergy).
With that, I ended up with
Red Elder ? Shapeshifter
Green Shapeshifter Ally
Green Elder ? Ally
White Monk Ally
White Elder Monk
Blue Monk Nightmare
Blue Elder Nightmare
Black Nightmare Zombie
Black Elder Zombie
Red Zombie Shapeshifter
And then tried to come up with ways to fill in the gaps while trying to keep the creatures that shared a type mechanicially related.
So Far Show
Only three fifths done, but it's become a nice day out, so I'm going to go enjoy it. Hopefully, I can come up with something for the others and I may still tweak these a bit, but I'm pretty happy with them (while completely open to suggestions/criticisms).
October 7, 2018 12:55 p.m.
JANKYARD_DOG says... #17
2 things commonly found in R/G are Elementals and Hydras if that fits into your missing pairings.
October 7, 2018 1:15 p.m.
why are you restricting the choice of partners by the must share a colour or type clause?
You could just use partner. It is simpler and still only lets you max at three colour decks with the 2 colour commanders from the 4 colour decks.
I mean you can restrict it but i don't see what the reward for doing so is?
October 8, 2018 1:43 a.m.
PIayswithFlRE says... #19
Mj3913, I went with Shapeshifter and Ally for red and green, which aren't necessarily as common in those colors, but fit either mechanically or thematically for the commanders of the deck(s) they're in:
R/G werewolves get shapeshifter partners
G/W exalted that produces ally tokens and flips to an ally get Ally partners
Not sure yet what to do with the Zombie Shapeshifter in B/R, but there are possibilities
Bobbbyyy, yeah, I guess there isn't really a good reason to keep it there in the final forms of the cards. You're right that it won't accomplish much in terms of gameplay. I think I want it there now (at least in my head) as an additional constraint for me to think about when trying to come up with the cards just to help me focus on synergy and see if it sparks some clever ideas. I will probably drop that line when I finish with the cards.
Leaving the constraints in place for the moment, though, I think I'm going to use Wizard instead of Nightmare as the blue creature type. It's more of a blue archetype while still combining fine with monk and zombie (the nightmare monk I've already made is already a wizard anyway).
Also considering making the Elder creature type matter more mechanically, probably in the form of a positive cumulative upkeep. Not sure yet, but I kin of like the idea.
JANKYARD_DOG says... #2
3/5 seem creature based, so why not have W/U more spell focused? So maybe a mix of Stax, taxes, pillow fort, possibly a touch of group hug. If you want Walker creatures I would think you would have to do it like Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker or Gideon of the Trials, where one of the abilities turn them into a critter for a turn.
Eminence on walkers... could work in place of Ultimate Abilities I suppose. Wolves and Minotaurs could be an anthem or on combat thing, exalted could be "If a creature attacks alone it gains Doublestrike". The cycling/discard could be something like "whenever you discard, each opponent does as well (possibly limited to once/turn?). And the last, maybe a Norn's Annex effect.
September 29, 2018 8:56 a.m.