Terezia, The Mournfull & Tibalt, Pursuer of Pain
Custom Cards forum
Posted on April 17, 2015, 1:31 p.m. by kengiczar
Given the somewhat Tragic story of Tibalt I wanted to make a figure in hell that would welcome him with open arms should he be defeated and fall (literally) into hell. Terezia is that Planeswalker. The name Terezia is the Hungarian form of Teresa/Theresa which depending on the origin means either "Summer", "Harverster" or just named after an island named Theresia.
Terezia stands behind the gates of hell welcoming the accepted, occasionally mourning them. When the longstanding population of Devils on Innistrad is threatened she will come to the surface and pull their enemies into hell. She is the reason Sorin would not dare wage war upon them. Without further ado:
Terezia, The Mournfull
Cost: 
Starting Loyalty: 4
+3: Each opponent sacrifices a nontoken creature.
-2: Each Player who attacked you on their last turn sacrifices two nontoken creatures.
-11: Each player sacrifices 5 permanents.
I wanted the Powerlevel to be high much like the Eldrazi block. She is highly effective in commander or Standard. She needs to plus twice to ultimate or three times to ultimate and not die. In short she punishes large Voltron style decks so is a very good top end for a Rakdos deck for Rakdos players who are sick of just putting out a big creature only to watch it get hit by a Path to Exile.
With Terezia I actually built her card after making the following:
Tibalt, Pursuer of Pain
Cost: 
Starting Loyalty: 3
+1: Exile the top two cards of your library. You may put one of them into your hand.
-2: You may cast a card Exiled with Tibalt, Pursuer of Pain without paying it's mana cost.
-6: Gain control of all cards in Exile. You get an Emblem with "Once per turn you may cast a card in exile for free".
So incase anyone doesn't know Tibalt's lore can be found here: http://magic.wizards.com/en/story/planeswalkers/tibalt
So Tibalt is a guy who has went through a lot and been frustrated by failure as a Sticher. This incarnation of Tibalt is him reattempted to learn some of the magics involved with creating Skaabs, but this time instead of making body parts with it he intends to use that magic to access further knowledge. Even if you have to exile two Lightning Bolt with this guy it isn't all bad because if he lives you get to cast the exiled cards for free or next turn. I wanted to make a Tibalt that was powerful and a modern staple much like Liliana of the Veil.
Sparda1127 says... #3
Tibalt is good, but way too overpowered. His +1 and -2 are okay because it's a one-time deal, however; his ultimate is too good.
It would be better if you removed control of all cards in exile and worded it like: "You get an emblem with 'On your upkeep, you may cast a card from exile without paying its mana cost. Remove this card from the game entirely at the end of the turn.'"
That way, your opponent doesn't just create an infinite Wrath loop for free while they build some form of combo.
April 17, 2015 1:48 p.m.
Hm yeah I don't want any real combos to be possible "just" with his ultimate. if anything I wanted it to be a way to use both your own red cards and the opponent's Path of Exiles that have become exiled if you ultimate him. I'll have to think carefully about how to convey that.
April 17, 2015 1:56 p.m.
tibalt: either take away the "draw" part of the first ability, or the "without paying it's mana cost" part of his second ability. people throwing out emrakuls' with a planeswalker non-ultimate-ability might get abused a bit. i know i would.
terezia: you or a planeswalker you control, that way she can protect herself better, a 6 drop walker should kick ass and protect itself well.
April 17, 2015 2:05 p.m.
FAMOUSWATERMELON says... #6
Terezia is either OP or UP... Her +1 is very good, her -2 is decent, and her ult is totally underwhelming, especially since she costs 6 mana.
Tibalt looks pretty fun, but it doesn't really seem to fit with either his lore or red...
April 17, 2015 2:10 p.m.
@kynrayn your absolutely right about the wording of Terezia's second ability. I'll fix it exactly like you suggested. And for Tibalt, I definately don't want to take away the draw portion so i'll remove the "Without Paying it's Mana Cost".
@FAMOUSWATERMELON The lore for Tibalt implied that he had no problem with the "Stitching" part of being a Stitcher since he moved on to live subjects. This leaves me to presume he failed at the whole "magic" part of it, which if you check out all the Skaabs such as Skaab Ruinator is the Exile portion of the card. This new incarnation is him finally learning to master the higher mental magics seen in red cards, mainly exile.
So that's a bit of a stretch but wizards has already stated that they want to use exile as a form of card advantage for :
Here are some of the newer red cards that showcase this best: Chandra, Pyromaster, Act on Impulse, Commune with Lava.
April 17, 2015 2:30 p.m.
FAMOUSWATERMELON says... #8
kengiczar It's not the exile part that I'm talking about, it's the "play without paying mana cost" part. That kind of stuff is almost exclusively for blue and green. The only time where you see those things in red are with instants and sorceries only (Chandra Ablaze).
April 17, 2015 2:36 p.m.
So his second ability has been changed from:
-2: You may cast a card Exiled with Tibalt, Pursuer of Pain without paying it's mana cost.
To one of these:
-1: You may cast a card Exiled with Tibalt, Pursuer of pain until the beginning your next upkeep.
-1: Choose a card in Exile. Until the beginning of your next upkeep you may cast it.
With the first option the drawback is you can only use cards exiled with Tibalt but the benifit is don't have to choose when you activate the ability. This is great for spells like Spell Snare or even Cryptic Command.
Now the second option is much better if you wanted to use Tibalt in your typical Rakdos deck with cards like Vexing Devil. Notice that you have to choose right away. Now notice that you can pick any card in exile! So your opponent used Swords to Plowshares or Oblivion Ring? Don't care, -1 and recast Vexing Devil!
Also notice that the second option does allow for shenanigans with Dissipate. Awesome.
April 17, 2015 2:51 p.m.
@ FAMOUSWATERMELON You're absolutely right then, I didn't understand what you meant but now I gotcha. I do want to keep it more interesting than just instant/sorcery spells though, and I think having to -1 to pay mana to put out a blocker or cast Oblivion Ring is fine.
April 17, 2015 2:55 p.m.
That Tibalt doesn't feel like Tibalt. Idk, something about just drawing all these cards doesn't sit right with me. It's a VERY powerful 'walker that needs to be balanced, but it doesn't mesh well with Tibalt's powerset.
April 17, 2015 3:05 p.m.
That Tibalt is too good to be a Tibalt. His +1 is crazy good, maybe on the level of OP, so he'd definitely be a staple in red midrange decks and maybe aggro too to dig for gas in modern. I'd suggest to balance him a little bit, lower his starting loyalty to 2, just to make him a little less, well, good.
April 17, 2015 6:44 p.m.
After thinking it over I definately want the Tibalt I designed to have three starting loyalty. Here's why:
I tap out to play Tiablt, Pursuer of pain. I plus 1 immediately. Now he's out of Lightning Bolt range. He can't be killed by the most played red common in the history of magic. Let them swing at him with Goblin Guide.
He can still be killed by Lightning Helix, an uncommon so it's possible to trade up rarity wise with the right colors.
He can still be killed by Vampire Hexmage, one of the strongest utility vamps ever printed despite it being an uncommon which is ok with me because Vampire Hexmage is a 2 cost creature and if they sacrifice it for utility that's less damage to my face and less Vampire Synergy they have.
He can still be killed by Abrupt Decay, as befitting such a powerful 2 drop, color restrictive rare.
He can still be stopped by a Phyrexian Revoker, which is cast preemptively. This means i'll have to waste precious burn on the revoker the turn it's cast or delay playing Tibalt.
He can still be hit by Beast Within but the good thing is I at least get a 3/3 and card in hand from his +1, which is fine because it's a green removal spell, and it's uncommon while Tibalt is Mythic.
He can still be hit by Vindicate, a 3 drop rare from Apocalypse that is faster, and much more flexible than modern's removal.
He can still be killed by Hero's Downfall, which trades up in rarity and speed.
He can still be killed by Dreadbore which again, trades up in both terms of rarity and cost for the right colors.
He can be stopped by Pithing Needle, something any artifact deck in modern should already have in side. Hell if you put this guy in your 
deck an artifact player can just keep you from activating your fetches and snicker while they assemble an uber Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas.
There are so many (to be honest not usually played) answers to him, and a walker like him forces people to use cards besides Lightning Bolt and Delver of Secrets Flip if they want to 1 for 1 him. People can trade up by killing him with uncommons, commons, rares and plenty of other things.
This guy doesn't synergies with Tarmogoyf, which I see as a huge + in terms of card design. I mean this Tibalt is strong enough that he'll definitely see play, and goes into a wide variety of decks but is completely answerable. As long as people have answers, not a single lol-powerful common.
Also the fact that he can be played in control, burn, goblins (cuz card advantage?), Izzet, or with cards like Wild Nacatl is completely intentional. This definitely takes up one of the Loxodon Smiter or Spellbreaker Behemoth slots from the main, but may force them to use more shock-lands and or filter lands if the really want to play him early, making him weak to bloodmoon. Imagine that secnario, mono red plays this guy and so does Naya, but Naya is actually hindered by this guy vs Mono R because of Blood Moon. A mono colored walker working "best" in his colors? Sounds like Garruk Wildspeaker or Liliana of the Veil. This guy is also just fine in a Boros deck.
All in all I hate how the format is warped so badly by Lightning Bolt. I mean WotC has already indicated that they don't want commons to be so strong but that doesn't mean it's ok to design like they don't exist. People should have to either two for one this guy, double swing at him with lower costed creatures, or use 1 time control specific instants such as Abrupt Decay.
All in all he's very balanced when you consider the removal available versus the removal that's played. I am still debating which version of his -1 I want to run though.
Ohthenoises says... #2
Tibalt's lore is fucking terrifying, for such a shitty walker I've always loved his lore.
I really like yours but damn if he isn't a bit OP.
April 17, 2015 1:34 p.m.