THE LORD OF THE RINGS: The Gathering [Spoiler]

Today, some takes on the Fellowship mechanic (in cronological order!):

  

Here's today cards!

First, the remaining "uncommon commands" of the cycle. The black one is particularly interesting: gives a clever way for black to get rid of enchantments, but not as easily as white or green. Also synergizes with a couple of black enchantments in the set (returns them back to play them again). 

And then there is The One Ring. Not a cumbersome equipment with seven lines of text. Not an expensive five mana artifact that probably doesn't even worth a pick in draft. Just a nice and flavorful two mana artifact that does everything the Ring does in a very clean and funny-to-play way. Of course Fire of the Doom is able to get rid of the ring!

  

jverse Well, the set is almost ready, and in these days I'm testing it with friend. If you want to try out a draft on Planescuptor we can organize it together, give your feedback, and test how the mechanichs feel.

I'd love to play a draft, but I don't think I have the time these days. Too many work and family commitments. Anyway, I look forward to your full spoiler so I can give you some card by card feedback. I've noticed various wording and rules issues on some of your spoilers so far.

Those are indeed strong lands! They are probably weaker than shocks since they are legendary and can't be fetched by the usual means, but 1 life is pretty negligible. Maybe you know already, but WotC pretty much gave up on doing legendary lands since they are a real downer in constructed formats. More recent lands with unique names that should otherwise be legendary simply aren't. If you are planning to use your set for cube or drafting, however, it should be fine.

This set looks really awesome! I'm very interested in seeing the full set. I especially like the Fellowship mechanic, a very cool variation of that party mechanic, although I think I prefer Fellowship because it is wider in terms of targets (or at least feels that way).

Two cards for today

 

Gollum: I wanted to create something special with this one. So I tryed something very risky: a card that can be casted from library. The stats are not impressive, but the upside is as strong as a free extra card in hand. This card could potentially impact constructed format, but it's the kind of design for which is hard to figure out the power balance.

Shadowfox: Yes, haste on a white card is not something you see every day, but given that this horse feels very white, as well as very fast, the flavor led me here. The fact that this has 0 power can almost be seen as a "combat trick" (which white is definitely allowed to have), so maybe haste in this case is fine.

Let me know your thoughts!

P.s. Notice the creature type of Gollum. I'm not sure what a Slith is, but seems kinda fitting well, at least from what I imagine a slith to be

Yes, let's not be fancy and re-type it as you said. Anyway, here some legendary creatures!
  

Here we have a pretty strong one drop, a versatile two drop, and a uncommon build-aroud. The wording of the latter is pretty tricky, though.. I'm not sure this even technically works as intended.

I would like to known also what you think of the two hobbits'  appearance. All these watermarks are pretty, but looks heavy on adventure cards, doesn't they? 

I have to admit that I wasn't even aware of the existance of Lieutenant until now



Yes, this is a problem that I have on many cards. Before "releasing" the set I'll make sure everything is fine. I'm not still sure why this happens though. Maybe the text is too long?




I'm happy to read, because it's exactly what I'm willing to do!




On this my reasoning was that scour from existence is card. Meaning that you can do off-color pie stuff if you pay enough mana: every mono blue deck can run Scour and exile permanents, as long as it reach seven mana. With that said, I agree with your arguments. To be honest the red part of Gandalf was completely dropped after its "reborn" in the story, so I can see make him WU or even mono W. As you said, if it will require white mana to flip, this alone will fix the problem. I think that making "gandalf the white" not a white card is a flavor mistake, both for the name and for the actual character it represent. So I think I'll go for the white-mana-to-transfrom route.




Glad to hear! Actually the ring is very strong: I tested it a few days ago and it's a game winning card in many situations. So I'm updating it to cost 3 and paying 3 life to activate.

Perfect for me! My the way, yes, I know how to offset the flavor bar

The full set is out! Check out the links I put in the first post of this thread!
As always every feedback is super welcomed, so please have a look and leave some comments! 

They definitely are! Thank you, I'll update every mistake as soon as possible. I read the cards dozen of times, but there's no way to spot every mistake, especially for a non-native english like me.
About Decline I can make it cost 3 and say "counter unless they pay 3", or make it cost 2 with "unless they pay 1" (a sort of Censor)

First of all, thank you a lot for your revision. 
Well, I needed to spread fellowship keyword all over, to make things work. As you said, this represent him helping out the fellowship during its journey. Your suggestion on reach is because he has an arc in the pic?
I'm not that sure... Remove+draw is a strong effect, and I found that 5cmc seems appropriate: see Bright Reprisal which is weaker on the removal part but stronger on the draw part. 

Fellowship is mostly present on Green and White. But if you are going deep on drafting, you can also splash blue, to get the most powerful common. At least this is how intended it.

I found that "whenever" on sorceries and instant is not commonly used (infact it means that a trigger ability is involved, which is not really the case). Altough you can find it sometimes (Back//Call)

I'm pretty sure the effects are done in the order in which they appear

Sorry, I don't get why

This is definitely something I need to figure out.
Since Kuldotha Rebirth is a thing, I'm not sure the cost is to high. I could definetely be wrong!

Classic lure[/lure] effect to make other creatures you control deal direct damage

I tested it as a 2cmc with vigilance and it seems a little underpowered. So I tried as 1cmc without Vigilance. A 2/3 for 1 is not absurd if you think at cards as Kird ape or Wild nacatl

They weren't humans since three or four weeks ago   But then I figure out that having Gandalf as Human is flavourful for the Fellowship interactions. An having them as only "Wizard" seems strange

Giving that we are in the "merciless" colors, I like it. One can find a way to sacrifice it before the last effect kicks it. I have to say that I'm not 100% sure to include this cycle of mythic sagas in the final set.. maybe just as "bonus cards"


I'm not sure, all things considered you can attack with the creature only once, so it's not super broken.. Anyway for falvor reason and for safety Im going to change it (maybe cmc <= 2 is too low though)

Of the five implementations, the ones I like the most are the first (the creature) and the last (the fortification). The land feels weird: probably a land with all these abilities is too hard to balance. The aura feels too convoluted, and the artifact not that unique.

The creature as it is has a problem: introducing "fortress" as a new creature type is problematic (think about changelings, which probably would inherit the italic text). The solution can simply be make it an artifact creature, where now Fortress is an artifact type and not a creature type. The idea I'm working on now is the following 


The indestructible keyword is both a bless and a curse: a bless because you can't simply use your Murder to kill a fortress (which is not that flavorful); a curse because you now have to avoid static abilities on this, or the risk is that one can sit behind its indestructible creature and never use it to block.

This version is basically a Regrowth with a Fog incorporated.