You Make the Card run off, a consideration

If you're reading this, chance are you're into Magic: the Gathering.
And if you're into Magic: the Gathering, chances are you're aware that Wizards is running the fourth "You Make the Card" promotional contest event thing.
And if you weren't;
Hey. You.
Wizards is running the foruth "You Make the Card" promotional contest event thing.
Which is pretty neat.

Basically, YMTC is a recurring thing Wizards has been doing irregularly since Onslaught block, wherein the hand the reigns of design over to us, the unwashed masses who don't have the fortuity to work at Wizards of the Coast for a single card.

Over the course of many weeks, a variety of polls are held to narrow down the focus of the event and ultimately decide what shall be printed.

Last week, the vote was for what card time would be considered; everything sans Planeswalker was up for vote.
The vote was close.
Like really freaking close.
Like 25 votes out of several dozen thousand votes close.

So, this week, they're doing a runoff between the top two contenders;
enchantment and land.

And here I am, as a half-arsed writer and would be designer who occasionally remembers that he has a blog on blogspot to tell you my opinion.

Now, don't get me wrong, I love me some enchantments.
Statisically, they are the hardest to remove card type and they've historically lacked the attention that some of the other card types have had giving them a wide berth of potential effects left to print.

But I'm a lands kind of guy

#TeamLand

Here's why I'm voting land (again) and why you should, too!
1. It's a challenge to design. Lands can't be countered. Any deck can play them without reprecusion. Land destruction has been nerfed to the point of irrelevance. There's a lot of valves that need to be very carefully adjusted to make them compelling and safe. And that makes me excited~
2. They need more love. It took Wizards until Prophecy to build a set around the theme of lands, and it took them until Zendikar to do it in a way that most people don't speak of in the same way that most of us speak of infectious diseases. There is SOOOOOOOOOOOO much untapped design space left for lands that no matter what kind of player you are, there is definitely something a land can do for you.
3. It's something for everyone. Simple enough; anyone can run lands. They have fewer restrictions towards gameplay since they don't compete for spell slots.

I'd love to hear your own opinions on the matter and don't forget to vote yourself!

Someone else's bad luck

Wowsers, it's been a while since my last post. Sorry about that.
School's gotten back in swing for me, and I've become a lot more active on the Wizards forums. Also, that Planeswalker creation contest I'd been participating in eventually started dying down, so I kind of lost the desire to keep writing about it.

But I've found a new thing to offset all that. The You Make the Card Forum, a place to show off your designs and get critiques for them, and do likewise for others.

A regular feature of that forum are contests; there's usually at least one daily. The host of the contest picks some sort of theme, and everyone tries their best to make an interesting card to that theme.
I've taken a shine to doing these contests.

My latest contest:


Black miracles

As you may recall, Miracles are one of the new mechanics featured in Avacyn Restored. They allow you to cast powerful effects for a fraction of the normal cost when you draw that card the first time in a turn. Lead designer Mark Rosewater has been trying to get this effect in the game since at least Tempest block (October 1997!).

The miracle cards tended to end up of one of two categories, in my eyes. The first were utility effects; stuff that color does all the time, but at significantly lower costs. Hallowed Burial for 1 mana, Evacuation for 2 mana, and so on.

The second are nostalgia cards. Cards that mimic popular, powerful cards of ages old. Time Walk, Decree of Justice, Wheel of Fortune.

 
These cards are the most exciting because they give newer players a very powerful taste of yesteryear, and they let older players relive some seriously good nostalgia. Good times all around.

In Avacyn Restored, for flavor reasons, these cards weren't allowed in black. Understandable, but I really want to see what Black is capable of doing in this design space, and I don't think I'm the only one.

I'd love to hear what you have to say on the subject and feel free to drop by the forums to join in the fun.