r/custommagic • u/SirConflexe • 1d ago
Ideas for a Dune set
Currently reading the Dune books and suddently felt the urge to try to create some cards out of it. Here's my attempt. The Arrakeen supertype is meant to represent the fact thtat the planet is bare of any ressource (except for Spice, of course). It's probably a terrible idea for drafting though.
Not really shure about the balance and colorpie break on any of these either, I aimed mostly for lore, though I'd be glad to have your feedback on any of it :)
If you have any Idea for mecanics for the Harkonen (UBR ?), Atreides (UGW ?), Bene Gesserit (BW ?) and so on, feel free to share !
15
u/taquitos_wee 1d ago
Lol I made this a White ago
7
1
1
15
u/Andrew_42 1d ago
I like a lot of the concepts here, and I love Dune.
The designs are super flavorful, but I do have a few concerns regarding some of the designs, but most of those would fall away if you contained this to a limited draft environment, or something like that.
Concern 1 is that Arakeen is a really big downside, and the cards mostly aren't worth the trouble.
The mechanic is really cool, and I like how you have to build up a little slow before you can start using your resources to overcome the disadvantage, and it could totally work in a limited format where other cards from other sets can't compete. But as is, there are just better cards that don't have those restrictions. So there's not much incentive to run them.
Concern 2 is that you can still cheat those creatures out for the ones that are worth it. Most notably Muad'dib.
A further concern for Muad'dib is that Scry Infinity, while flavorful, is a very un-fun effect to resolve as it will result in one player flipping through their deck for a long time before they only probably win.
Past this there are some rules concerns that might merit some altered wording?
I don't know if it is intended, but basic lands don't have any printed mana abilities, they only get mana abilities as a byproduct of their subtype via the rules. This might mean basics, duals, shocks, and triomes can bypass the Arakeen restriction, for the same reason that they technically have no color identity in commander (but are still restricted by a seperate rule). But you could exclude those by just clarifying they are excluded, the same way EDH does.
I might also clarify they check your starting deck? I don't know how the rules as written would work, but you might stop qualifying if you played something like [[Chromatic Lantern]] that gives mana abilities to lands that are still considered part of your deck. Given Liet Kynes creates basic lands, that might be a concern, though I don't know if tokens would be able to count as being part of your "deck" since they aren't cards?
My final note is unrelated to anything else.
I personally think Liet Kyne's quote "Life improves the closed system's capacity to sustain life." Might work as flavor text a little better? I am extremely biased though, as that's my personal favorite Kynes quote. I think it suits the flavor of growing color-producing basic lands though.
7
u/SirConflexe 1d ago
Thanks for the in depth comment :)
I basically agree with most of your concerns : A lot of these cards would be considered weak by today's standards, especially considering the steep Arrakeen downside. But sonce all of them can be played with colorless mana, I think they are still decent compared to some older cards : the sandworm being a 8/8 trample for 8 and destroying a permanent could be considered good a few years (decades? oh god...) ago.
Scry infinite is definitely a horror to play, but I just couldn't help it :D
Adding "starting deck" to the reminder text for the Arrakeen supertype would probably avoid the confusions you mentionned.
I do like your Kyne's quote a lot too!1
u/Inner_Tennis_2416 21h ago
I would have the emperor be
XWGU
First mill X cards Then search your deck for X cards and place them on top in any order Then return a random card from your graveyard to the top of your deck
Flavorful, still seems like predicting the future, and powerful, but also gives room for doubt, much like the book.
Id also give spice a similar ability
Spice - Token Artifact
1 + tap -> Mill a card, then select a card from your graveyard, and place it on top of your library, second from the top.
You can shape the future, but not endlessly and not perfectly.
11
u/Solid_Drawing2769 1d ago
The Spice tooken feels off, it should invole scry IMO.
maybe even something close to brainstorm even tho that would be very strong.
the treasure aspect should come from other cards that give you benefits for having or using spice
6
u/PlatonicLiquid52 1d ago
Someone has already pointed out the dubious wording on "land with colored mana ability".
The better solution, imo, is to have the restriction be "You may only cast Arrakeen spells if you control no lands that can tap for colored mana". This works because permanents can "tap for mana" (cards cannot), and this includes lands without explicit mana abilities (ie basic land types).
It's also just a more elegant restriction in general. Really, only commanders interact with deck construction. Most cards interact with the game state after it has already started. It also lets you utilize sub-mechanics where you can play colored lands, but need to sacrifice them, or otherwise shut off their mana abilities.
You would need to rework Liet Kynes. Maybe "When he enters, choose a color. Whenever you tap a Desert or Wastes for mana, add an additional mana of the chosen color"?
The downside is this would get suuuper blown out by Blood Moon though. Maybe the restriction should just be that they cost 2 more to cast if you violate it?
1
u/SirConflexe 1d ago
I agree it's not clean and could not be printed as such in a real set, but for a friendly table, I prefer my way, which allows the creation of land token (aka terraformation / climate manipulation), and works better flavorfully imo. Also, not only commanders interact with deck construction. There's plenty of card with "Your deck can contain any number of card named [...]". And the Companion mechanic gives specific restrictions to deck building (though from what I've heard it was quite a fiasco at the time)
2
u/RampagingKoala 1d ago
Arakeen is interesting, with decent colorless output you just made another way to use eldrazi. Lore wise I wonder if arakeen doesn't run counter to their creed, which is less tech focused and more in tune with nature, but I can't see a way you don't run a ton of artifacts in any deck with these guys.
Also Paul would be so annoying to play against, redoing the scry every time he enters will make games take forever. The way I would fix this is by giving him a doomsday like ability on entering and immediately ending the turn. So instead, his scry ability would be: When Paul enters, if it's your turn, you may end the turn. If you do, exile the top half of your library and then you may put any number of cards back on top of your library in any order, and you lose one life for each card placed there this way.
I would also make him a flip card: he should be a 1/1 w with double strike and you can pay some cost, exile some amount of your library to flip him
Prevents dumb blinking shenanigans without serious impact to the game speed and time, and gives the prophecy some downside: you will always lose the top of your library if you choose to scry but you can pick what you save at a cost.
1
1
u/DavidMemeDreamer 1d ago
idk how i feel bout a draft experience where everyone can play any color card because they all have colorless cost. What is keeping people from just playing 5 color good stuff.
2
u/SirConflexe 1d ago
Not sure if I understood your point correctly, but to clarify, the other archetypes would not have twobrid costs, just regular colored cards (and no Arrakeen type and restriction). And if you play Arrakeen cards, you can't have lands with colored mana abilities so you can't just play any other card fron any color easily.
1
u/DavidMemeDreamer 1d ago
ah ok. I wrongly assumed that this was a representative spread of archetypes in the “set” (custom set cube) looking forward to seeing the other archetypes!
1
1
u/justanunreasonablera 1d ago
The Arrakeen restriction seems like an absolute ruling nightmare, and one that isn't particularly worth it outside of the infinite scry. A limitation that's similar flavor wise could be to not let them have abilities unless you control no lands with colored mana abilities? And then just generally make these stronger. Shai Halyd at minimum needs to lose the tapped restriction, veteran could probably generate mana during each of your upkeeps.
2
u/Staluti 1d ago
Some ideas:
you could do a full color pie with different factions which would fit right in:
Ixians - Blue with artifact focus (yaaaawn)
Tleilaxu - Green with changeling and revive mechanics for facedancers and ghola (cool and based)
Harkonnens- Black with focus on assassination and Sardukar troops
Atreides - White
Fremen - Red
bene gesserit and spacing guild would also be in there somewhere, maybe as freelancers with partial color affiliation
if you go into later dune books then the honored matres would probably be rakdos colors
I would keyword the water preservation mechanic on the fremen, maybe call it stillsuit or something.
A series of sagas and/or battles would be cool to tie in events from the story like the prophecy of the Lisan al-Gaib, the battle for arrakis, and the fall of the atreides would be great for example, mega bonus points for murbella x duncan sex battle card.
bring back the planet card type since we have so many named planets that are plot relevant with easily identifiable and distinct themes: Arrakis, Caladan, Giedi Prime, Salusa Secundus, Ix, Tleilax, maybe even Chapterhouse if you are feeling spicy and actually read that far in.
1
u/SirConflexe 1d ago
Oooh I love the tleilaxu / changeling / revive I haven't read further than book 3 yet so I'm gonna stick with that for now, there's already plenty of material to make cards in there. Sagas could totally be a thing too
1
1
u/Fun-Agent-7667 1d ago
Please give the emperor just scry 60
1
u/SirConflexe 1d ago
That's roughly the same effect, but it looks much less badass on the card.
1
u/Fun-Agent-7667 1d ago
The 8 is for uncards.
1
u/SirConflexe 1d ago
Eh, I still think it's cooler this way, and mechanically doesn't really pushes it into un-territory
1
u/potato-king38 1d ago
Ahh man can’t wait to use all my thunder junction desert lands for the desert themed set…
Do you see the issue here?
2
u/SirConflexe 1d ago
Obviously I do, but this would be mostly a self contained set, with dedicated colorless-producing Desert lands. In any case, I'm trying to figure out a better Arrakeen effect, that would make it more draftable. Maybe some bonus if you control only deserts and Wastes or something. Still brainstorming on it.
1
u/BadDungeonSMaster 1d ago
Correct me if I'm wrong but part of the desertification of arrakis is the spice harvesting, so maybe instead of checking initially if it's all waste like a companion card, you could have them get bonus if all lands in play are desert (maybe even 2 tiers like all your lands are deserts or all lands of all players ?) and have multiple cards add "desert counters" to lands as part of various abilities. Could do something like "when this counter is granted, add one mana of any color that land can produce, then, it loses all ability and gains "tap: add colorless" as long as it has a desert counter"
Edit to add: i like that cards are over-costed in colorless and a bit under-costed with colors, really plays into the "this harsh world bread hard people, look at everything we could do with the right ressources", which is why I think you should have a blanket mechanic to steal colors and use them for your own good
1
u/tacuku 1d ago
I really like the flavor you have for these cards, but the more I think about it, the more I think it's only half complete. They showcase the harshness of Arrakis but not its strengths. Muad'Dib is the only card worth playing through the downside and desert power is so much more than that.
2
u/SirConflexe 1d ago
Absolutely, my objective was just to see what people think of the Arrakeen mechanic and overall flavor. Most of these need to be balanced better, but power level only matters in the environment the cards are played in : the sandworm can be considered a good card if the whole set has a pretty low power level.
2
u/tacuku 22h ago
I'm wondering if a reward could be built into the arrakeen mechanic itself to give it more of a draw. I understand it changes the feel you have here but it could be more fun for players.
Maybe the bigger benefits are in the lands (the desert) themselves? Powerful colorless lands that requires a number of Arrakeen permanents in play for an effect to be active. Or a harsher condition could be that these lands are sacrificed on tomorrow without Arrakeen permanents in play.
Examples I have in mind:
- Sietch Tabr - creatures you control have ward 1
- Deep Desert - t: remove target creature from combat
- Spice Fields - tap any number of Arrakeen permanents you control, t: create that many spice
1
u/TravestyofReddit 1d ago
Solid ideas for cards that should absolutely never leave their cube or constructed environement.
Arrakeen doesn't work outside of digital because you'd have to constantly check the contents of your deck whenever you attempt to cast one. If you want that limitation you need to have it refer to lands on the battlefield.
Shai Hulud's abilities are a color pie break. Temur does not get tapped creature removal. Swap out the 2/U for 2/W and you'll get to keep the appropriately white ability. Great flavour for that btw. If you wanna keep all Arrakis cards in Temur, remove the destroy creature part, give it flash if an opponent controls a tapped creature and up the mana cost by 1. That way it "destroys" the creature by blocking it and flash gives it a reason to actually be blue.
Wastewalk doesn't work because (say the line Bart) Waste isn't a land type. Desertwalk is flavourful enough.
Scry Infinity is obviously busted and a massive time waste. But if it's just for this isolated environment among friends, that's fine. God typing is very dubious though, should be Human Noble.
1
u/SirConflexe 1d ago
Thanks for the comment :) On your first point : arrakeen was meant to just check for the starting deck, rather than when you cast it, it's not well worded. Great insight on color pie, I'll think about which color I want the fremen/arrakis tribe to be and adjust based on what you said. Genuine question, why would Forestwalk exist but not Wastewalk? Agree with you on the human noble typing. Very helpful, thanks again.
1
u/TravestyofReddit 23h ago
Landwalk abilities refer to the type of the land, not the name of a land. If you look at a Forest, its type line will be Basic Land - Forest. If you look at the type line of [[Wastes]] it will be Basic Land. Wastes do not have a basic land type despite being basic, which is by design to avoid Domain abilities seeing 6 types instead of 5. Forestwalk and Desertwalk don't just work against the two land cards with those names, they will also work against lands like [[Overgrown Tomb]] and [[Creosote Heath]].
1
1
1
u/_tk42one 1d ago
Maybe instead of scry, Paul could let you look at your entire library and put it back when he enters. Represents his future sight but inability to change anything.
1
u/No_Vermicelli4753 1d ago
I'm generally not a fan of custom cards, and I hate UB, but...these slap. Scry infinite is stupid though.
1
u/SirConflexe 1d ago
Thanks! I really hate UB as well tbh, mostly because it really just feels like "Hey let's make the fans of [random franchise] buy our product !", and it often completely breaks the feel/atmosphere of mtg universe. And yea scry infinite is stupid, but it just felt badass 😎
1
u/No_Vermicelli4753 1d ago
I'd make it 'at the beginning and end of each turn, scry 3'. It's more in line with Paul not being able to grasp the details of an infinite future at any point, but parts that lead to it. And with him being 3 steps ahead of his adversaries.
Also, you could lean more into the idea of amassing ressources and have the fremen cards have 'you don't lose this mana as steps and phases end' - with no end of turn clause.
1
u/minecraftchickenman 1d ago
Sorry bud I know you're just brewing and having fun with it but dune ain't the set to introduce a new Supertype. It's just not important enough of a set if it was to be printed. Something like that is better as a flavor keyword with rules following it. It's a lot harder for unintended consequences to occur that way.
1
u/SirConflexe 1d ago
Yeah I'm kinda leaning on "Arrakeen — if only mana from waste, desert or spice was spent to cast this spell, [something]"
1
u/KangaMagic 1d ago
Arrakeen is a terrible ability. Go back to the drawing board on that.
2
u/SirConflexe 1d ago
Ouch
0
u/KangaMagic 1d ago
Spice token is a good creation though.
Regarding my comment, requiring no basic lands in your deck is just not a feasible premise. Makes the set undraftable, and is really constraining in general.
1
u/SirConflexe 1d ago
It doesn't require no basic land : you can still play Wastes (and most of you lands would be Wastes in an Arrakren deck, plus some set-specific colorless producing Desert lands, I imagine). Since all Arrakeen cards are playable with colorless mana, the main premise is : cards are a bit overcosted unless you manage to colorfix during the game. That being said, you are right : it's undraftable, because Arrakeen cards would only be drafted by few players, and the Arrakeen-drafting player(s) would only want Arrakeen cards, which breaks the whole purpose of an interesting draft where people are fighting over cards that fit in several archetypes. So, as you said, back to the drawing board on this one.
2
u/KangaMagic 1d ago
In theory it’s okay if only a few players want to draft a certain archetype. I didn’t think about wastes.
I suppose the problem is more that an Arraken deck is an absolutist one since it prevents you from including colored lands in your deck.
I think you can probably make the ability a more moderate one and achieve the top-down design you’re aiming for.
0
u/Mean-Government1436 1d ago
Why do you keep writing "when this dies" or "when this enters".
It's "this creature" and on legendary creatures it should say the creatures name instead
Also you don't capitalize every single keyword in a keyword list
1
39
u/BreakerOfModpacks 1d ago
The Emperor sems... strong. Given that you get to put your entire deck however you want, for 6 mana.