Card of the Week Contest #440: The Power of Fanfiction

Despite their rocky first interactions, after living together, it only makes sense that the two gems would begin to catch feelings for one another.

I thought it was implied that the characters in the card should belong to the Magic: the Gathering IP, but I suppose the submissions can be more interesting this way. 

I knew we were requested to write a non cannon fanfiction of cannon characters.
I go for it.

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Narset is agoraphobia and anthropophobia.
She is dreaming a day people gain mana from nonland source to cast noncreature spells comes.

Narset Transcendent glad to give you a nonland, noncreature card. It's happy for her so she get more loyalty to you.
She fears vast and empty exile area. Once she was a creature and didn't fear it for she didn't gaze straightly.
For now she is a planeswalker and get known how exile is, it is unacceptable for her.
Forcing her to exile a spell loses her loyalty.
And she completely rejects you when you instruct her to forbid your opponents to cast a noncreature spell.

Narset, Parter of Veils is resisting quietly with her forbidding ability.
If they draw only one card per turn, eventually she can avoid to see both land and creature enter the battlefield.
Searching for a noncreature spell for you doesn't suffer her but requesting her to return rest of cards, which includes lands and creatures, to the bottom of your spacious library nevertheless you know she is an agoraphobia makes her feel discontent with you.

Narset of the Ancient Way loves to give you mana for a noncreature spell.
She knows that you will spend the mana mixing with land mana but she don't feel unsatisfied with it. This is a great step to her ideal world.
A little life extra is an evidence for her agreement.
But she feels upset your demand to discard a nonland card. Why not a land or creature card? She feels distrust with you.
And when your true intent, which only aim to take advantage of noncreature spells, comes to light, she disappoint you.
She expected you to be a partner in noncreature, nonland paradise.

As you know, she don't like lands and creatures.
Hanweir is very disgusting her for it is a land and a creature.
She can't bear the fact that such a thing is in this multiverse.
So she gets full of thanks to the one who killed Hanweir.

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Maybe I edit it later.

featuring wacky woohoo pizza man and local witch that broke smash 4



"Transform" is closer to "Tag Team" here, akin to how fighting games like Marvel vs Capcom 3 work — in those games, having characters quickly switch out to support each other with various synergies and combo moves is important, and Dante and Bayonetta both have had a decently long stint in iconic fighting games (MVC and Smash) respectively so this is a card that puts them both together to try to represent a piece of the wildest wackiest overblown combat routine they would probably come up with just for fun if they ever met. In this case, the starting loyalty also doubles as a fighting game "meter", which is usually spent to perform big flashy special attacks or utility moves.

The ability to transform twice in a turn is intentional — both characters (and the games they feature in) emphasize being able to quickly "combo" (perform a lot of attacks combined together) to quickly destroy opponent in a flashy, fun looking fashion. Especially skilled players will be able to make these characters do so for seemingly infinite amounts of game time, so I wanted to try and capture that feel here via a lot potential "moves" happening in a turn.

Accounting for both characters and their sheer range of movesets (given that both franchises were started by the same person, this is not surprising) is tough, so I decided to try and focus on iconic things they do that are familiar to players using them. For ultimate’s Dante’s ult is specifically based off the idea of using his "Quadruple S" skill in DMC5 where you constantly want to keep him maxed to continue ’slowly’ comboing forever via Sin Devil Trigger wheraas Bayonetta’s is based on Infernal Climax (specifically the part in Smash where you have to mash to try and fill a second gauge for more damage, which is represented by casting as many spells as you can in that window.).

Yes, that's intended. Quadruple S doesn't refill gauge, but instead requires full SDT gauge to start and keeps SDT Gauge from decreasing for the first five seconds of Sin Devil Trigger. You need to cancel out of it before those five seconds end so that you can use it again. Firing it at 8 is meant to represent doing a sloppy execution of it where you miss the five second window, though I'm aware this is creatively interpreting how it works a bit.

For some of you want to know why I choose BinaryBolas as my username (for basically everything these days), here's my reason.



Captain Marvel and Nicol Bolas are two my favorite characters overall. These two characters reflect my playstyle and personality in different circumstances: while playing RPGs, I prefer build a character similar to CM: Lawful/Neutral Good, strong, capable but flawed with space of improvements; while playing strategy games like card games and Total Wars and so on, I prefer playing "evil do-ers" or "control playstyles". In card games in general, I like removal, disruption, counterspell and attrition. Thus, Bolas is my go-to persona as a card gamer and strategy games in general. Also, they are two of the earliest character I knew when I first got interested in popular media.

So what's the "fan fic" aspect of this? If you ask me about my preferred fantasized persona, I would say I want to be a character that's possessed by these two souls, taking control of the body in different circumstances. This, in my head, can breed interesting story arcs, make great character developments, and is my ideal image of a protagonist: conflicted, talented/capable (both of these are above-average powerful) and freshly written (not just hero/villain). Also, body-snatcher plot is interesting. The title for Bolas is "the renamed" since, if I remember correctly, when Bolas is prisoned in his meditation realm, they erase every one of his name so that he can't be summoned anymore. To release him from his prison, he needs to be renamed.

As for design choices, it's a transformable modal double-faced card. The tranform requirements are worded to encourage the shift between the two personas. I know planeswalker design can be number-sensitive about its loyalty settings, so feel free to recommend any better designed values. The -3 on Bolas side is working as intended, since two personas don't share their powers, usually. (As you transform while having permanents you don't own controlled by its -3 ability, if you don't control other Bolas planeswalker, you won't control any since the front face is not Bolas, hence the controlled permanents will be returned to their owners)

Since I like these characters so much, it can be designed mega-powerful like the previous Bolas planeswalkers. I choose to make the design more "constructed playable".

**THE FOLLOWING INCLUDES SPOILERS FOR THE ANIME THE WORLD GOD ONLY KNOWS**
In the anime World god Only Knows, weakened demons inhabit the "hole in the heart" of certain girls. The protagonist, Keima, ends up tricked into a contract by which he has to try to make those girls to fall in love with him to expel the demonic soul (on pain of death if he fails or does not work hard enough for it). As a consequence, however, the memories of the whole thing vanish along with the demon. Even so the growth and feelings the experiences bring to both Keima and the girls remain with them.

Among those girls was Nakagawa Kanon, an idol with a desperate need not to be "invisible" as she puts it. In the course of the arc, she becomes increasingly dependent on Keima, but ultimately he chooses to reject her proposition to "sing only for him" so that she may grow to value herself without the need for other's validation and attention. The spirit is released after a certain emotional moment, and memories are gone.

Thus far - and with the addition of a few details I'm not mentioning here but which fans of the series will be aware of - the cards are designed to depict this dynamic. However, Keima's last ability in the card is where I decided to put the nuance that changes their dynamic into the fanfiction dynamic. Instead of distancing himself from her, Keima cold have taken some of the opportunities he later had to grow their relationship anew. He could be there and support her, without need for her to be dependent on him, but nonetheless made happier by his presence.

As I don't want to overstay my welcome, I'll end here though anyone who's curious I'd be quite willing to share why I choose this particular duo or about any other details of the card 's design and what those are based on.

The Will fanart I managed to get is one of him and Rowan being in New Capenna, which lined up perfectly with the plot I had in mind.

At the end of Throne of Eldraine: The Wildered Quest, Garruk promises to protect the twins, as he owes them much for freeing him from the Chain Veil's influence. This card represents the possibility of that protective stance turning romantic towards Will, who had risked very his life for Garruk's sake.

Garruk senses danger approaching the twins in New Capenna and seeks to protect them despite his distaste for civilized settings. However, Will has become apathetic at best and antagonistic at worst following the amputation of his leg and refuses Garruk's help, claiming he doesn't need Garruk's coddling. Despite this, Garruk persists. In one of those sickeningly sweet montages that possibly involves a Garruk finding a suit that will fit him, Will notes how Garruk endures the discomfort of New Capenna for his sake and eventually begins to relax and open up.

Cue saxophone music and HEA.

Anyway, from a mechanical standpoint:
1. Garruk's  represents him warding Will from harm.
2. Will's is something I'm surprised he's never had, as his specialty is ice magic. Anyway, aside from being a means of protection, it can also aid creatures to get damage through, e.g., Garruk's beast, more so Garruk if pumps it with his .
3. Both planeswalkers' second abilities have a small deviation from what is usually offered by their own colors. This reflects them opening up to each other and aiding each other: Will's magic further pumps Garruk's beast, and Garruk's creatures make it easier for Will to cast his spells (flavor-wise, imagine Garruk's summons protecting Will as the latter focuses on casting).
4. Garruk's ultimate is just reflective of him exhausting his creature summoning prowess to protect Will, while Will's ultimate continuously fills your hand with options, both for Garruk's emblem and for his own spells.

sdfkjgh: Happily Ever After; perfect for a couple that met on Eldraine.