Card of the Week Contest #231: Spells and abilities

"You can't keyword the ability you use" has got to be the most arbitrary condition on a challenge I've ever seen. Especially given since, whether or not I've keyworded it, you won't know because I can just, you know... paste in the reminder text for the entry and then go about my business.



Call of the Abyss 6BBB
Sorcery (Mythic)
Call of the Abyss costs 1 less to cast for each creature card in your graveyard.
Exile all creatures and all creature cards in all graveyards.

Not that I'd keyword this ability, mind you. Very niche cost reduction that I wouldn't want appearing a dozen or more times in multiple colors. But still, I COULD have keyworded it and technically invalidated my entry and nobody would be the wiser. Or likely care.

I see your challenge for a non-keyword ability, and raise you two non-keyword abilities!

aviijp: Welcome to the forums!

Regarding your card, I do like the concept, but costs can't target, so this would need to be "destroy a creature", and at that point there's very little mechanical reason for it not to be "sacrifice a creature". From a balance point of view... this could probably be a little cheaper? Cackling Counterpart says that a copier that's limited in which player's stuff it can target can be three mana at instant speed and have upside. Given the additional cost in this case, I'd say two mana is safe.

Jartis: Welcome to you too!

Again, costs can't target - this needs to be "an opponent becomes the monarch". This card is also... weirdly self-defeating? In a game where the monarch is a thing, fog effects are more useful specifically because they can stop an opponent stealing the monarchy, but this card makes you give away the main thing that'd be worth protecting. Granted, it's a decent way to get the monarch into a game that doesn't have it yet, but it's still pretty conflicted.

Feels gravely undercosted, but I'm at a loss as to how much I should actually cost it. Any suggestions?[/quote]

Thanks for the pointer. I had changed the ability a few times from something where destroy target made sense, but forgot to change it when that part became a cost rather than an ability.  

Infiltrate the Enemy 2R
Sorcery (C)
Target opponent player gains control of target creature you control until the beginning of your next turn.
The next time a player gains control of a creature, that creature deals damage equal to its power to target player that lost control of it and to target creature that player controls.


I rewrote the second part. I think I captured what you were going for?

Summoning sickness is for any creature you haven't controlled from the beginning of your turn. Opponents too. That's why the borrowing spells usually give haste.

Imgur doesn't seem to be accepting my uploads today, so I've added my entry as an attachment.

Attachment Deleted

Summoning Sickness goes away at the beginning of the player's upkeep.  So if you were to give a creature to your opponent during your turn, it will lose summoning sickness during your opponent's upkeep.  If you give your opponent the same creature during your opponent's turn, it will keep summoning sickness until it comes back to your side.

@Mahx Michael : Summoning sickness never goes away. If you didn't control a creature at the beginning of your last (If it's not your own turn right now)/current term, it's effected by it - otherwise not.

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Leaving my concept here for today:

Burn baby burn 
Sorcery
This spell can't be countered.
~ deals X damage to each creature you don't control. This damage can't be prevented.

We already have ruling precedent for this actually. Double faced cards revert to face-up status whenever they're not in play, so Flamedancer's effect would be used to cast itself as Dance of the Desert instead. Transforming is treated as a state change rather than producing a new card, ETB effects don't apply, as such the game should track that a Dance of the Desert in exile as the same Flamedancer that exiled itself.

I see now that targets don't cost, but that raises a bit of a question for me. If you're in a multiplayer game, and the card says "an opponent becomes the monarch"...who becomes the monarch? Do you get to choose? (That was the intent of having it be targeted.) Is it random? I realize it's a bit of a niche case, but it does seem like a lot of their recent designs have been made with both standard and multiplayer Magic in mind, so I want to make sure I accommodate that as well.

As for it being self-defeating, I can see why it would come off that way. In my mind, the intent wasn't to stop the opponent from getting the monarchy, but to stop a massive amount of damage at the cost of losing the crown. If you're gonna hit me for 2 and take it, that's fine. If you're gonna hit me for 28 flying...well...that would kill me anyway, so it doesn't matter if I'm the monarch moving forward or not. In that case, a standard fog effect would probably be better since it would save you and your status, but I think the card has some advantages as-written that keep it in the "useful but not amazing" category, such as introducing the monarchy in a game that didn't have one like you said, and being able to recur itself from your graveyard. Ultimately, the monarchy itself won't likely win you games, it will just help, but losing all your life will almost certainly lose you the game, barring cards like Phyrexian Unlife or Lich or something.

Truth be told, I was also a little wary of making it just a standard fog effect, since fog hasn't been primary in white since...Battle for Zendikar, I believe? But, monarchy is primary in white (and black), and fog is tertiary in white, so I figured the way I put it together just fit within the lines a bit better. Of course, I'm open to suggestions, just thought I should explain my thought process a little ^_^

...yeah...fixed.