Yawgmoth, Master Eugenicist
Custom Cards forum
Posted on July 2, 2019, 8:59 p.m. by DemonDragonJ
Now that WotC has finally printed a card of Yawgmoth himself, I feel that I can do the same; their card depicts him at the beginning of his career, when he was still a human, so my card depicts him later in his life.
Yawgmoth, Master Eugenicist Show
This card depicts Yawgmoth when he was still human, but when he was in a position of power and authority in the Thran empire. At that time, he was the chief physician of the empire, tasked with curing the citizens of a virulent disease that was afflicting the, but, in actuality, he was the one who was infecting them, hoping to cull the weak from the population and breed super-soldiers to conquer Dominaria.
As for the card itself, I felt that he, as with Urza, acquired more colors as time passed, so I made him black and white, since, out of all the two-color combinations in this game, that combination is the most associated with pride, arrogance, and nobility (although black/white and black/blue are close behind). As such, he has protection from the other three colors (a combination that has never been used, before), to represent how he is supremely confident in himself and that only a being who is similar to him (i.e., in the same colors as him) could harm him.
Each of his abilities represents his experiments, whether they are culling the weak or experimenting on subjects. The mono-black ability is a reference to both Greed and Yawgmoth's Bargain , but more expensive than either, since it would be too powerful otherwise. The mono-white ability is there simply because I wanted an equal distribution of colors in his abilities; also notice that two of his abilities involve paying life and two involve sacrificing a creature, another form of symmetry.
What does everyone else think of this card? Does having four activated abilities make him too powerful? If so, should I remove the latter two (as the first two are the essential abilities that I must keep)? Is his mana cost too low?
Suggestions:
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Lose the protection abilities or make it only one color it's protected from.
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Remove the second two abilities.
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Make the first ability sorcery speed only.
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Make the second ability only hit a single of their creatures and a single one of your creatures.
July 2, 2019 9:21 p.m.
PepsiAddicted says... #4
yes, all the above. and i dont like him being white. later he will die in a wave of white mana which was picked by the author because its the very opposite of his powers.
balanced and fair are 2 terms that dont go well with yawgmoth. the reason why they picked an earlier point in his life. same problem as with every fking op storyline character
July 3, 2019 2:59 a.m.
I now see why WOTC decided to create an urza card and a yawgmoth card when they were "normal". The further down the timeline you go, the more insane they get and the more difficult it is to make a card that accurately represents either, without making it overpowered af.
July 3, 2019 5 a.m.
Might just be me, but I can't conceivably picture Yawgmoth outside of mono-black given the lore implications and in-game cards referencing Yawgmoth.
I believe the only two white cards referencing Yawgmoth in flavor text are Death Grasp and Soul Link , but the white isn't necessarily depicting Yawgmoth as much as it does Urza in these cards. Through a similar vein, the only other cards outside of mono-black that mention Yawgmoth in flavor text are of a Grixis shell with the exception of Pernicious Deed . Even then, none of which outright depict Yawgmoth outside of mono-black because they're often portraying other characters for the color pairings. Every card that namely references Yawgmoth in the title is mono-black, so I just can't quite see him being anything else besides that.
Any depiction outside of Yawgmoth, Thran Physician era Yawgmoth is either going to be overpowered or underrepresented as well. I would even argue the face card he did get undersold him marginally. The tricky thing with Urza and Yawgmoth is that they're such powerful entities that I'm surprised they actually got a face card in the first place.
July 3, 2019 8:51 a.m.
DemonDragonJ says... #8
Given that everyone here is saying that my card is too powerful, I need to make some major adjustments to it.
Yawgmoth, Master Eugenicist Show
I increased his mana cost and power, removed his last two abilities, and changed his first two abilities so that he needs to be tapped to use them. How is he, now?
dbpunk, perhaps I could make a red/black/blue version named "Yawgmoth, father of the machines," representing him after he became the ruler of Phryexia.
July 3, 2019 5:32 p.m.
Dude that's still immensely powerful. Even if it is a tap ability, it's still ungodly powerful to have that much easy access life gain or what is essentially a Toxic Deluge at instant speed, for one less and also buffs your stuff, not to mention almost unremovable and essentially unblockable.
You also realize you can have a card without every aspect of the character on it, right?
July 3, 2019 6:11 p.m.
The toxic deluge effect with the anthem on top of that still feels busted. The anthem effect especially doesn't sit well or feel thematically correct.
July 3, 2019 6:13 p.m.
DemonDragonJ says... #11
dbpunk, Dango, what do you recommend that I do to balance the card? Is the protection excessive?
Also, as far as I am aware, the only book in which Yawgmoth actually appears is The Thran, although I have not yet read the Invasion cycle, so perhaps he appears in that cycle, so I am basing my cards off his appearance in that novel.
July 4, 2019 12:08 a.m.
Make the Toxic Deluge effect not hit all creatures, instead have it only have a single creature getting -X/-X and a single creature get +X/+X and lose the protection. Like it's still flavorfill that way and still viable as instant speed removal/buffing.
July 4, 2019 3:54 a.m.
Or alternatively, you could word the Toxic Deluge effect to hit all other creatures besides Yawgmoth, make it sorcery speed, and drop the anthem effect but that still seems rather strong for how it's costed. The ability to do that at instant speed is concerning too. Protection from Temur as a 4/4 body even for the cost could also become an issue. The first ability is okay, but it's a worse variation of Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim 's ability mind you.
July 4, 2019 9:41 a.m.
I would say it's actually better since you're taking your opponents down while raising you up.
July 4, 2019 1:03 p.m.
I must have overlooked that loss of life part, but through a similar vein I would say Brion Stoutarm does a similar effect in a better way.
July 4, 2019 1:39 p.m.
DemonDragonJ says... #16
I have decided to further revise
Yawgmoth, Master Eugenicist Show
I decided to alter his protection ability; it still reflects his pride and arrogance, but in a different way. Now, he considers the nameless and faceless masses to be beneath him; only major figures could possibly be worthy opponents to him. Because the majority of creature tokens are not very powerful, he does not consider them to be a threat.
I wish to keep his two abilities at instance speed, so that they can be used as combat tricks, but I increased their mana costs, to hopefully make them more balanced.
Now, how is he?
July 4, 2019 6:42 p.m.
DemonDragonJ says... #17
TypicalTimmy, would giving him protection from all creatures make him too powerful, and, if I add tapping as a cost for his abilities, could I reduce the amount of mana that they cost?
July 4, 2019 8:06 p.m.
TypicalTimmy I'd probably keep the sac ability at 2 tbh because it's still tapping and even comparable abilities ( Jarad, Golgari Lich Lord , Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim ) are both cheaper in cost and ability cost.
I would make it like this:
Yawgmoth, Master Eugenicist
Legendary Creature - Human Cleric Minion
Protection from creatures and artifacts
, Sacrifice another creature: Each opponent loses life equal to that creatures toughness and you gain life equal to the amount of life lost this way. Only activate this ability as a sorcery.
, , pay X life: Target creature gets -X/-X until end of turn, and another target creature gets +X/+X until end of turn.
4/3
I changed it to artifacts and creatures because Yawgmoth pretty much was unstoppable and had the most able evil artifact beings, the phyrexians, as allies. He can repeatedly sac creatures because he absolutely didn't care about other living beings and then he has the -X/-X as a tap ability so that you still have instant speed removal, but only of a single creature a turn. At the same time, it becomes a combat trick though.
dbpunk says... #2
Tbh I don't just think 4 abilities make him too powerful, look at what each of those abilities does.
2 Mana, sac a creature: each opponent loses a ton of life and you gain that much life. This is gonna be overpowered when combined with cheap creatures that can get bigger and frankly like not many ways to counter it. Like the closest comparison is Jarad, Golgari Lich Lord 's which had it as a 3 Mana ability and didn't gain you life (and that was with a smaller body too with a very comparable Mana cost).
The second ability is way too powerful. Having a two Mana one sided Toxic Deluge that gives your creatures all a buff is insanely powerful.
While the greed effect and Naturalize effect are fine if it weren't for the fact that you had the other two abilities. Hell, all of them are also instant speed, repeatable and any single one other than the latter two would actually be a 5 mana 3/4 no legendary on its own. On top of that, it has protection from three colors which is ridiculously powerful in terms of protection, but that doesn't matter since if it was going to be destroyed you could literally pay 2 and sac it to one of it's two abilities to deal with either an opponent or their troublesome permanent. If you don't instant speed activate one of it's two other abilities.
Dude, you need to balance the hell out of this and I think at the level you have it, no amount of additional Mana would make it more balanced. Yes it's representative of Yawgmoth, but this has way too many abilities, way too powerful of abilities (except the last two) which have no limits except how many creatures and life you have in colors that produce tons of tokens and life gain (and two of the abilities feed each other extremely well) and way too hard to kill.
July 2, 2019 9:18 p.m.