Spirit of the Uktabi
Custom Cards forum
Posted on Jan. 19, 2025, 2:45 p.m. by Squee_Spirit_Guide
Hello, friend! Thanks for checking out my custom card! I enjoy a lot of the creations others have come up with so I wanted to take a crack at it as well. I've done a couple of un-style cards before, but this is my first attempt at a real card.
I really like Spirit of the Night and I wanted to make a green creature inspired by it, that could fit into the Mirage expansion. I also wanted to make a creature with landhome that could be useful (if not actually good).
I also wanted to capture some of the feel of older Magic, which is why I went with the Mirage expansion symbol and regenerate stuck around. I couldn't figure out how to get an old border for the card, so if anyone knows how to do that on mtg.design please let me know!
I feel like the casting cost is a little low for 1996 Magic and it would definitely have been rare back in the day, but probably would be uncommon (or even common) now.
Foresthome and Forestwalk
The initial inspiration for this card was the landhome drawback. I always thought it was an incredibly flavourful keyword to put on a card, but I understand why they stopped. I also always thought landhome and landwalk of the same type were very synergistic. If a creature can't survive outside of a certain landscape, it makes sense that it thrives in that landscape.
For this card, I like how the two work together so that the third ability doesn't just remove a drawback, but creates a benefit as well. Once in play, the third ability will basically mean : deal 7 damage to target player.
Regenerate
My first iteration of the card was a Kudzu like plant that would spread quickly and suffocate creatures in its path. It made sense for a plant like that to be able to regenrate. Once I changed it to a "Spirit" of the jungle I kept regenerate because I like how it looks in the text box and I like how it protects your investment, although it's much less flavourful now.
Truning lands into forests
The one thing I dislike about landhome is the variance. On its own it's either a worse version of defender or pointless text on the card, depending on the lands your opponent has in play. I wanted to smooth that out by allowing you, for a cost, to make the landhome irrelevant. If your opponent happens to already have forests, great! If not, this isn't a dead card.
I found the art online and I really liked the feel of it. It has a very ethereal style similar to Spirit of the Night that fit well with what I wanted to do.
Here is a link to the original page.
Squee_Spirit_Guide says... #3
Hey, legendofa, thanks for the comment! Initially I wanted the other land to just gain the Forest subtype and not lose any other types or abilities. I didn't want the card to be used to mana screw someone. But the more I thought about it, I actually liked that it had the additional utility to take out something like Rishadan Port, and it's too ineffecient to effectively mess with someone's mana base long term.
I think the way I have it set up now does that, but I noticed I hadn't removed that part of the description so I've updated it now!
legendofa says... #2
Is the intention to turn a land into only a forest, overwriting other land types and abilities, or to add the forest type on top of its other types and abilities? I know what the specific rule here would be, I just want to make sure it's what you're aiming for.
January 20, 2025 2:03 a.m.