Land Designs

Planar Confluence
Land 
: Add 
: Add one loyalty. Activate this ability only any time you could cast a sorcery. (Loyalty can be used to activate Planeswalker abilities, but does not add loyalty counters to any Planeswalkers you control. Loyalty leaves your pool between turns and phases.)

Wow, really? Well, I suppose that "a bit of a mess" describe my designs pretty well. I'm still stuck back in Ice Age most of the time. Haha.

Anyways, I guess that means I need to pick the next theme. Hmm...well, WotC has done creature lands and artifact lands, and I just made a Theros deck to play with my friends yesterday, soooo...

Next Challenge: Create an Enchantment Land that is also a basic land subtype (Forest, Island, Mountain, Plains, Swamp, or Wastes)

I know. That's why I said "basic land subtype" instead of "basic land type". Trying to be careful in my wording.

Also, I think the thread rules specify a need for a render?

1. Unless you're actually planning to make a card that is a Wastes, this is all pointlessly pedantic.

2. If you are planning to make a card that is a Wastes, then Wastes would be its subtype, and this discussion is still pointlessly pedantic.

No, that is not correct. I'm looking for a card that has the name of a basic land as its subtype, regardless of whether the land is one of the five basic land types, or a Wastes. As in, the same way that cards that are not the original card Desert from Arabian Nights can still be "a desert" because the card's subtype is Desert. For the basic land types, this has additional rules associated with it. For the card Wastes, it does not. Both of which should probably be taken into account when deciding what the card will do. Sorry if this condition was hard to understand.

EDIT: Please note that the Desert example isn't picked arbitrarily. Arabian Nights also introduced desertwalk and cards that could not take damage from deserts. Because the more modern deserts have specifically the "Desert" subtype, the abilities of these old cards interact differently with them than if that type were "dunes" or something. The fact that the subtype used is the name of an existing card that other cards already interact with is relevant from a mechanical standpoint. So, in the case of this challenge, a card having the subtype "Wastes" would not be able to be searched by cards that pull basic lands, but could be searched by cards that pull Wastes specifically, and would interact with other effects that specify Wastes in their text.

This requirement hasn't been strictly enforced, but you can do so as the challenge creator if you want. It was just a way of making the judging more interesting, really.

It's worth emphasizing that basic land types have the tap ability innately and so every card in this challenge needs to have a downside so that it's not just a better basic. Saying this mainly cause like Jartis your land produces the turn it comes down since it triggers its own landfall. On turn two, if you play a second Bountiful Isle, you get

On top of that, making a card an enchantment is pure upside against most decks which means you need to be even more careful (see the artifact lands, which were a massive mistake)

.. with all that out the way, I decided that an enchantment land should have some enchantment properties that lands don't usually have, like triggered abilities. Tricky challenge but the result was this

Bonus points if you get the reference

All right, looks like it's about time to judge these.

Jartis First of all, I'm glad that you took off the Landfall, as that made the card a beast. Even as it is, it might be a pretty powerful land, but it has much less potential to spiral out of control. Still, Constellation is a solid choice of mechanic. If anything, this design might be a little too obvious?

Neottolemo It looks like you never got around to changing your entry, so this doesn't technically meet the requirements of the challenge. That said, it's an interesting direction to take things. ETB tapped and a sacrifice requirement balance out the double-mana generation well, I think, and the opportunity to get mana the first turn it's out, as well as scry, offers an interesting choice and underscores the enchantment aspect.

For the next three entries, let me just get out of the way first that I appreciate tying in your submissions to the Theros gods, so as not to repeat myself. That's an easy way to emphasize the enchantment aspect from a thematic standpoint, and I don't consider it a cheap tactic at all.

Also, I think everyone who provided a render had a good eye for art, and picked images that are both striking and appropriate.

kinotherapy First of all, thank you for being the first person to give a render and first to use the half-enchantment frame. The ability almost feels like it should be Constellation, especially with the flavour text, though it makes sense that it isn't. It has an appropriately "Thassa-like" ability, though I think it plays a little safe.

gateways7 Like with the previous card, the ability seems very in keeping with the god you're trying to evoke, but also very safe. Especially as a tap ability, it actually feels like something that could be on a land without it being an enchantment, so I think that more could have been done to play up that aspect.

Flo00 I got the reference right as I was reviewing the card. Essentially, your card is a land with a built-in Thassa's Ire. The pun makes me smile, but this choice actually made me question the higher cost for the ability than the card it's based on. I'm assuming it was to compensate for the card also being a mana source itself, but going from 3U to 5U probably wasn't necessary since it also makes a more desirable removal target.

melono There's a lot going on, here. The first thing I notice is that this is a card with two downsides. First, it hurts you when it comes into play. Second, it lets your opponent(s) get the benefits too. On the other hand, in a team game, it also helps your team, so there's that. My first thought was that this might actually err on the side of making you pay too much for what could easily be a CMC1 effect on its own (creatures you control have vigilance), but then I considered that the original run of artifact lands were Never-Reprint-This strong with just being artifacts and coming in untapped. So this is probably a reasonable amount of downside.

gamma3 Some really good theming on this one. My main concern is that the ability might be a little too strong. For the cost listed, a return to hand might be better, given that it's a repeatable effect.

Daij_Djan This was the only legendary land, even with the three god-inspired ones, and it's an interesting one for sure. It's a nicely vicious, very Black ability, and some decks could probably even be built around it. Like with the "Spirited Battlegrounds" submission, this comes with a couple of built-in downsides. It's a well-named card that sounds like something you could see in a set, and generates some interest for just what kind of horrors take place in/issue forth from this temple. Since we're at the end, I'm going to tip my hand a bit and say that I almost picked this as my winner.

Final thoughts - I enjoyed seeing what everyone came up with. The only thing that really disappoints me is that everyone played it pretty safe. I would have liked to see people get a little more "out there". Maybe some stronger effects with stronger drawbacks. Maybe something like a dual land with a modified version of Land Tax built in...eh, I'll keep that idea for future use.

In any case, my final pick is "Spirited Battlegrounds". I feel like this card has a really creative approach to designing something both land and enchantment, and showed a good understanding of the inherent challenges in balancing such a thing. Ultimately, what put it above the second pick though is that I feel like its effects would be more fun to play a game with. So, congratulations to melono on winning.

Growing Cityscape
Land
: Add
: Add for each basic land you control.

There are a few lands that do this, besides Tolarian Academy and Gaea's Cradle, so let me post those now for those that want some inspiration:

Serra's Sanctum which is also from Urza's Saga.
Itlimoc, Cradle of the Sun
Vault of Catlacan
Crypt of Agadeem
Cabal Stronghold and Cabal Coffers
And Cloudpost

Possibly there are more, but those are the ones I found.

Here's a variant on Mishra's Factory. I'm not sure whether something like this can be balanced so I gave it cycling for when you won't be able to generate mana or assembly-workers.