The best designed cards in magic

Strictly better.
I can't think of a reason in 999/1000 tournament games why getting an angel isn't better than not getting an angel.
I also prefer this art

bootin

Is also legendary to keep multiple from smacking in like lightning bolt. Beautiful.
Muah.

And just like a deal with a demon, you can't stop until it kills you and you shuffle up for G2.
Perfect in black. 10/10

That's because they're replacing Regeneration with it in terms of how the design cards. Which is fine by me. I can count on one hand the number of times I've seen a single creature regenerated multiple times in one turn in the decade+ I've been playing.

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There are only 123 cards that either have indestructible or grant indestructibility. 10 are the theros gods, and a bunch are from planeswalker. While I'm not saying final judgement is a poorly designed card, saying indestructible is overused is objectively wrong

This is what I'm talking about. Casting k command makes you feel some kind of luxurious

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pretty sure we've cross into power card territory

Modular spells in general are great. One of my Omnath EDH deck's best tricks is pic related. Shuffling Planeswalkers back into the deck in Mono Green is salty and delicious.

>a literal mistake
>elegant card design
Yeah, I don't think so

My vote goes to Bob.
>sure he'll give you information
>you have to win before he stabs you in the back
>perfect black card

You are also my African American friend.

Is it weird I prefer Phyrexian Etchings?

"Vanilla Matters" when?

It's a really well designed card that I'll probably never use because I have a pathologicaly hatred of Cumulative Upkeep. But I like it, along with , Dark Tutelage, and Sign in Blood. You'll never feel as good as you do when you target your opponent with SiB for the win.

You're not alone, I tried to force it into my Karlov deck, but found Greed way better.
I love the card though, great design.

"Black begets black" is something they're doing less, but I always found interesting. The flavor is spot-on and it's beautifully in contrast with Green's all around colorfixing.

>"We're finally prepared to print strong cards in Blue again, the pendulum has swung.....
>...in our new all creatures 'Vanilla matters' set"

Fine by me. Bring on the bargain priced Sea Monsters

I just like it because I can choose to not pay the upkeep whenever I want.

Yeah, like I said, not bad, VERY flavorful, and I'm sure it's got it's uses, but it's 1) Costly 2) Basically requires you to be monoblack 3) Dangerous.

1. It's a little too good.
2. I wish the name was more generic. It's pretty much a staple and I don't like Phyrexia in my Vampire or Zombie deck.

>I wish the name was more generic.

When we visit the Mimeoplasm again.

No better feel than blowing up a Sol Ring or Mana Crypt with this on turn 1.

Having a generic name means it can be more easily reprinted in any given set, just with altered art to fit the plane's flavor.

By having the word Phyrexia in its name, the places it can crop up are cut down, especially now that core sets are dead.

EDH? I'd argue that this is generally better.

I mostly play Duel Commander. I prefer Smelt because it can blow equipment on equip and make them waste mana that way as well.

1) no magic card can be 'Too Good'.
2) who cares about the card name or lore? If your deck gets significantly better with arena, why aren't you running it? We're old walkers traveling the multiverse collecting spells and incantations. If Of course out libraries will be filled with a mish mish of spells from different places .

t. Spike

>Too Good
>No immediate impact on game
>Non-negligible CMC
>Heavy on one color
>Kind of a dead draw late game
>1:1 card to life ratio is tried and true
>Very hard to abuse due to the static nature of its effect (unlike, say, Necropotence)

I gotta say, I'm not seeing it.

>Lore Specific name
I get that, I suppose.

It solves a normally difficult problem for you forever* and puts you on track to win for 3 mana. I'd say that's top flight.

Of course there are cards like Necro that are just completely beyond the pale.

I guess I should take Grasp of Darkness out of my SOI block constructed BG Delirium.

Cards not from SOI block in the deck
Kalitas
Noxious Gearhulk
Filigree Familiar
Grasp of Darkness
Ruinous Path
Transgress the Mind
Hissing Quagmire
Blooming Marsh
Evolving Wilds

>No Magic card can be "Too Good"

It's always good to see new blood in the hobby. Welcome!

I really do like force of will from both a design and flavor perspective. Sure, it keeps you from losing the game that turn, but losing a card matters a lot in the formats where it sees play.
From a flavor point, the idea of a wizard burning away a bit of his sanity to deal with a threat NOW is perfect, even if the card feels rather red.

>no magic card can be 'Too Good'.
>Mox's
>Black Lotus
>Mishra's workshop

For real though.

I nominate Stasis

So simple, yet so strong.

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Fuckyeah I'm a spike. I'm proud of it too.

Jokes on you, I've been playing since 8th edition.

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Then assuming you didn't happen to be gone during them, you've played in environments with cards that were too good for the meta.

find a flaw

The other pitch cards deserve some love, too.
Pyrokinesis is amazing.

These trees form such a beautiful duo. Overwhelming toughness and unique life interactions. Green acts as a sort of potion, and Black as a poison.

What if you accidentally target yourself?

1/2

>Self-proclaimed Spike
>Zero concept of game design of balance
Oh my god I can't believe it how could this happen this is unprecedented in the history of Veeky Forums

>1) no magic card can be 'Too Good'.
Hello.
From a design perspective, this card is a work of art. Beautiful, elegant, neat, and clean, intuitive, functional, and flavorful.
And it breaks the fucking game in two.

2/2
Someone wanna tell me which ability is which season?

oshitwaddup

It's not the cool ass new art with the amazing description
Fucking love this card

Almost all the Gods and god weapons are pretty well designed.

Almost...

I honestly really don't understand this card. It's bafflingly bad, especially compared to the rest of the cycle.

Naturally, I pulled 2...

>1) no magic card can be 'Too Good'.

Yes they can. Cards become too good when they're so superior to everything else that everyone plays them. This creates an environment in which everyone plays some slight variation of the same deck, or something specifically meant to counter that deck.

You might not have experienced the madness of Urza block, but if you started playing in 8th that means you experienced the original Mirrodin block. In which case you might remember pic related, which is a classic case of "too fucking good". Every single deck either ran 4 Skullclamp in the mainboard, or they were designed to deal with 4 Skullclamp. This kind of thing is not good for the health of the game, because it really limits the options for playable decks in a tournament setting. See also: The Eldrazi Winter.

Jitte

ITT: People who think "well designed" means "really strong."

>3 mana for a 5/5
>hates reanimator decks
>can re-use your own creatures in a pinch

The token should go to you not the target, but otherwise it's pretty cool.

Some cards ain't even that strong, you sucker

In some design thing some designer said she used to only target your own graveyard to give you snakes and they made the ability strictly better.

>Playing since 8th Edition
>Has somehow forgotten the utter clusterfuck of broken cards that was Mirrodin Block

Honest question, were you just not aware of the meta at that point? Because it was the worst one since the Tolarian Academy debacle.

They must put duds in cycles on purpose sometimes just for spiciness and to punish the n00bs.

Man, she's not even a trap rare. What a stinker.

youtube.com/watch?v=_FBlsg1PBZI
6 mins in
I do still wish she was better because BG is my favorite color combo

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dat voice of resurgence token in the back
I never noticed

>lands give you clues
>clues need mana to draw cards
>lands give you mana
>sac a clue, tracker gets bigger
>hopefully draw into land with the clue
>more lands, more clues
>more clues needs more mana
>more clues means you had more lands

This is literally the best designed card in the game.

Great art, perfect cost, still an MVP for suiblack.

It's not that she's a terrible card, it's that she's 1) underwhelming compared to the others and 2) all the others at least have static effects. She's basically a worse Necrogenesis.

only the mono colored main 5 have static effects
And she's not the worst, she just isn't great.

Sorry, by static I meant "non-activated." All the others have replacement or triggered effects.

Also, Iroas hands out Menace so nyeh

T.Maro

>Maro
>Having any concept of balance or game design

Did you mean to post this in the Roseanne thread? That's really more his forte.

Iroas is the only of the 10 minor gods that has two abilities that aren't the devotion ability and indestructible

I think I must be missing your point.

Haunted Crossroads has to be one of my favourite pieces of recursion of all time.

>the others at least have static effects
What static effects is on the 9 minors that aren't iroas?

Like I said, by static I meant "non-activated." I misspoke. My point was that it's the only one that only has an ability you have to pay to activate. And it's not a great ability.

She feels like one of the Major Gods that's missing their other ability.

This card just creates such great emotions at the table, your opponent feels violated and scared, while you feel empowered. It's costed well, it's tricky to use since your mana may or may not sync well with your opponent but in the right decks it's quite a powerful card.

I'm a massive sucker for mind games and this card is one of the best ones. Shout outs to EDH matches where you cast this early on, and you watch your opponent frantically digging for the answer/bomb he needs to win but you know exactly where it is.

came to post FoW

givinh up card advantage for tempo is a great design

I think suspend is a better design than the fow cycle

>he thinks RUG delver is a thing in 2016
"Don't lose" is hardly tempo.

It's also hilarious to steal a control player's wincon and just wait for him to run out of cards.

i always thought ratchet bomb was great design. it's a well-costed effect that combines mechanic and flavor perfectly

Eh, I can see why they didn't want to make it eat their yard to give you cheapass deathtouch tokens, but it should've been a MAY rather than a must (and your choice obviously) so that you can just eat their yard without giving them snakes - or DO give them snakes if you have reason to

>Powerful effect
>Significant drawbacks
>Strong in decks that have synergies to work around said drawbacks
>not played in decks that do not

Need me a FTV Realms copy.

i play this because god damn almost nothing causes butthurt in EDH like this card.

That's because she originally did Voice's effect (more or less). The token was commissioned for her.
Then they decided to do a bunch of swapping around, and thus Emmara went from making tokens to being The Fattest Elf.

Seconding this. The purest form of top down card design that creates a powerful and flavourful effect. Any vorthos worth their salt has this cards

>One of the most recognizable enemies in Mtg
>Massive creature with flying/trample, but no annihilator bullshit
>Flavor in that you control your opponent's mind, but also cause them to panic and stress about when it hits
>Ties in mechanics from the set for even more flavor
>Great art
New Emrakul is amazing

New emrakul is shit, and only scrubs complain about annihilator. OG emmy was a very well designed card that acts as "the final boss". And don't say you can't get rid of it. A fucking oblivion ring can take it out. Hell I lost a game by casting it and having essence backlash target it on the stack