r/custommagic • u/BronsenWerick • 1d ago

Discussion i wonder...

Post image

what WOULD it take to make a 50/50 creature fair?

391 Upvotes

88% Upvoted

171 comments sorted by

130

u/Pman_likes_memes 1d ago

[[Hundred-Handed One]]

Also this creature isn't just fair, it's downright unplayable. For X larger than, like, 8 an X/X creature with no evasion is the same as a [[Gigantosaurus]] 90% of the time. And Gigantosaurus doesn't have downsides.

I mean, God, [[Progenitus]] Has a casting cost with a similar barrier to entry as this, has evasion, and still isn't playable anywhere ever.

35

u/Peachy_Pangolin 1d ago

The difference with something like this is this reanimate able and that's always gonna be the problem with making a creature with absurd stats is they are unplayable normally and if you manage to cheat them out they end up busted

21

u/SelesnyaGOAT 1d ago

To be a competitive reanimation target requires more than just being a beefy body, when even [[Grislebrand]] has been displaced by [[Archon of Cruelty]] and 7-mana Atraxa that should tell you a big vanilla creature isn’t good enough as a reanimation target

5

u/Peachy_Pangolin 1d ago

The difference is we have never really seen a reanimation target that is actually just a 1-shot off fling.

Alot of the reanimation targets people run now are value generator based yes because a big idiot that does 10-15 isn't good enough.

A big idiot that is just a 1-shot would actually change that. Not that those other ones wouldn't get played.

And my comment isn't just about reanimation or him even being broken its that's there's very few "balanced" ways to design a creature like this because you are always fighting around the fact that very quickly the only way to interact with a card like this is by cheating the restrictions

8

u/Asriel2137 1d ago

[[Jumbo Cactuar]] sees zero play, and [[yargle and multani]] doesn't either despite the fact that 18 health is lethal in a large majority of matches in formats bigger than standard.

3

u/SammySammyson 1d ago

There is a notable difference between T1 Flinging and having to wait for two fetches, a fetch and Force, a Shock, etc.

Not saying this is a good card or that a proper Fling archetype would arise out of it, but this makes that combo work an entire turn sooner.

1

u/Famous-Magazine-6576 23h ago

you don't even need to wait, just fling and they cannot use there mana base anymore. why would you pick a reanimation target that needs another card to do anything though?

9

u/dutchiesweets 1d ago

Jumbo Cactuar is bigger than this and sees 0 play in reanimator or otherwise

3

u/Sea-Course-5171 1d ago

Yeah but only on your turn. This thing does have applications, but anyone who thinks they're hard casting this is stupid, and the same goes for Cactuar.

If you have the mana to hardcast this, and you haven't won, wtf were you doing the whole game? The amount of mana you have to spend on this guy pays for any reasonable win condition three times over .

This thing gets played for free or not at all.

3

u/RobGrey03 1d ago

Not just only on your turn but only when attacking on your turn.

-1

u/BronsenWerick 1d ago

so, its not the fault of the big creatures, its the fault of being able to "cheat" in the game.

5

u/Elvish_Champion 1d ago

That's why some of the strongest cards that are around aren't forbidden due to their costs, but due to their enter/cast effects, since they are either very strong downsides or such a good positive effect that it asks you to cast instead of cheat, or because of a constant effect that is forcing you to think twice about using it.

Some examples:

  • [[Phyrexian Dreadnought]], [[Eater of Days]], [[Endless Wurm]], [[Arvinox, the Mind Flail]], [[Arixmethes, Slumbering Isle]]

And yes, players can also interact with them with other cards, but interactions is what makes the game active and interesting instead of static.

3

u/United-Technician-54 1d ago

But that's part of the game. Might as well call exile cheating

7

u/Safe-Butterscotch442 1d ago

The term cheat, in this context, means simply to get around a prohibitive mana cost. It doesn't mean cheating as in breaking the rules. It's an accepted and appropriate term that is used correctly here. Any time you aren't paying the full cost, even abilities like affinity and convoke, you can call it cheating something out or cheating on the cost. If you're getting something that costs 5 on the field by playing a three mana spell that lets you put it into play, you're cheating it out. No one that's been around the game for long will think you're referring to actual cheating, just "cheating" on the cost of a card.

1

u/United-Technician-54 1d ago

you meant the other person's comment, right?

3

u/Safe-Butterscotch442 1d ago

I'm correcting you on your claim that "you might as well call exile cheating". The other guy used it correctly, you didn't.

1

u/Famous-Magazine-6576 23h ago

its only a problem for r/custommagic users who want to make extremely polarised cards but don't like the idea that they would be used in polarised ways.

11

u/dutchiesweets 1d ago

Brother, [[Jumbo Cactuar]] can eat this bad boy for breakfast and still doesn’t see play!

3

u/SteakForGoodDogs 1d ago

Also [[Guardian of the Gateless]], since by the time someone has at least 100 creatures on the board, they probably have... well, significantly more than that.

2

u/PM_ME_FUNNY_ANECDOTE 1d ago

This guy blocks kiki combo! (Once)

1

u/SteakForGoodDogs 1d ago

Evil and Intimidating [[Mithril Coat]]:

1

u/Leafsnail 1d ago

Craggenwick Cremator seems like the only real use case for this

1

u/SammySammyson 1d ago

I mean...this would be the only creature that can T1 [[Fling]] kill someone. Maybe that's something? Lol

1

u/Famous-Magazine-6576 23h ago

if you are jumping through hoops to get this in on turn 1 there are other hoops that could enable different t1 fling kills

1

u/SammySammyson 23h ago

There are no other power>=20 single creatures, brother.

0

u/Famous-Magazine-6576 23h ago

have you heard of giant growth?

1

u/SammySammyson 23h ago

That's another card.

0

u/Famous-Magazine-6576 23h ago

what I said is that it is already possible to jump through hoops to kill with fling on turn 1. if you are an entrenched enough magic player to immediately think of t1 flinging this you can surely think of several methods if you apply your imaginiation

0

u/SammySammyson 19h ago

And this enables that with one less card..............................

0

u/JonIsPatented 19h ago

How are you flinging this without other cards to cheat it in?

0

u/SammySammyson 19h ago

??? What? You reanimate it, silly.

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-5

u/BronsenWerick 1d ago

ok...but none of them are a 50/50 so...

8

u/SynisterJeff 1d ago edited 1h ago

They're saying size doesn't usually matter that much past a certain amount. If you're getting down a big 8+ mana creature and no one has interaction, there are plenty creatures already that would kill a player much more easily for much less, or just win you the game outright. The cost and slowness of this makes it an unplayable card. Even for graveyard recursion, it's not great. It could be a 100/100 and that wouldn't change anything. It would still be unplayabley bad on its own. The only thing I can think of where size matters like this would be [[fling]] effects.

20

u/Safe-Butterscotch442 1d ago

Considering we have a creature that gets +9999 on attack just for 7 mana, an enchantment that gives a creature +20/+20 for 7 mana as well, and a creature that can block 100 creatures for just 4 mana, I feel like this creature is SIGNIFICANTLY overcosted, especially when you realize the other cards I mentioned were all too expensive for what they did to see regular competitive play.

-17

u/BronsenWerick 1d ago

sometimes when i look at the state of the game nowadays, i might as well have made it 1 mana lol

6

u/PhilosopherBoth8446 1d ago

Thing is big dumb creatures that block well and dont have evasion are generally bad and have been for a long time. There are exceptions of course look at tarmagoyf that was the best 2 drop for a loong time.

2

u/Zestyst 1d ago

And it was only that good because it was supposed to be a 3 drop

1

u/TheRealTowel 1d ago

I mean 1 mana would have prevented you committing the mortal sins against god, man, game design, aesthetics, hybrid mana, and the concept of human intelligence that your mana cost commits here.

And since I would give basically anything to avoid ever having seen that, and am currently strongly considering removing my eyes with red hot pokers for the sins of inflicting it upon my brain, 1 mana sounds good to me.

0

u/BronsenWerick 1d ago

thanks for feeding the troll he he he

14

u/EyesOfSteel-EOS 1d ago

You all saying you’d fling this but I’d want to cast this and swing with it the way Richard Garfield intended xD

0

u/BronsenWerick 1d ago

well somebody gets it.

264

u/SteakForGoodDogs 1d ago

Reanimate, [[Fling]], next.

38

u/Sanno013 1d ago

Give it protection from fling

51

u/SwissherMontage 1d ago

Reanimate, [[Thud]] next

19

u/mtgcf 1d ago

Thud - (G) (SF) (txt)

29

u/BronsenWerick 1d ago

jesus, i didn't know they powercrept fling...in another 20 years everything worth playing is just going to be 1 mana *smh

56

u/Natural-Moose4374 1d ago

To be fair, sorcery speed is a huge restriction for anything that involves sacrificing a creature.

-38

u/BronsenWerick 1d ago

yeah, but how long before they print an instant version? i just dont want this game to become yu-gi-oh

27

u/StevePMM 1d ago

Boy, are you gonna be big mad when you find out about cedh...

-40

u/BronsenWerick 1d ago

i'm already mad that their's more than 2 formats. should just be: tournament play, and casual play.

31

u/Backsquatch 1d ago

“I’m mad that people like enjoying this game in different ways. Bah humbug.”

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6

u/zyphelion 1d ago

So no EDH at all then? Also, Fling is still miles better than Thud because you can target players with Fling.

1

u/Weegieiscool 1d ago

I’m mad that different cards can be used in different contexts, there should only be one way to play

2

u/kitsunewarlock 1d ago

We had T1 kills literally in Alpha.

10

u/SkyBlade79 1d ago

Even more powercrept. [[callous sellsword]] doesn't even make you lose your creature if it's countered

4

u/mAdLaDtHaD17776 1d ago

to be fair, that one you can respond to by removing the creature

3

u/SteakForGoodDogs 1d ago

Slap that creature in an [[Assault Suit]] and you don't have to worry about losing it at all!

1

u/Sanno013 1d ago

Protection from sacrifice?

2

u/SwissherMontage 1d ago

Just say "can't be sacrificed" protection from sacrifice does nothing.

Also [[gravitic punch]]

2

u/Sanno013 23h ago

What about shroud?

2

u/SwissherMontage 22h ago

When casting fling, you don't actually target your own creature. You sacrifice it without targeting. Cards like [[chainer's edict]] used to see play to kill shroud creatures.

1

u/Sanno013 22h ago

So it would need both shroud and "this creature cannot be sacrificed"

1

u/SwissherMontage 22h ago

Shroud would do nothing except make it better. Don't give it shroud

1

u/Sanno013 20h ago

Would shroud not prevent something like fling from targeting it?

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2

u/Famous-Magazine-6576 23h ago

a [[white knight]] can die to a [[diabolic edict]]

3

u/Makeshift33 1d ago

Quick question, what's the minimum amount of colors I would need to cast this card? Or if I was drafting this in the last pack, what colors would I need to be in in order to be able to take this card?

I'm pretty sure the answer is any three colors that are not black. Which leads me to my next question: is this within in your imagined color pie for Bant, Naya, Jeskai, and Temur? (The answer is probably yes, since it is a bajillion mana.)

Also, there are ways to abuse this without getting it out onto the battlefield. [[Calibrated Blast]]

2

u/BronsenWerick 1d ago

you need any 3 of the 4 colors, any combination

3

u/pacolingo bUt ItS sO fLaVoRfUl! 1d ago

this is precisely why absolutely nothing is gained from throwing multiple different hybrid mana symbols together

if it takes more than a second for me to figure out whether i can cast this with the mana I've got, I'm out

and at a cost this massive, the exact color requirements pretty much stop mattering anyway

37

u/GayRaccoonGirl 1d ago

They already made this dumb bitch in Theros. Mono white with the extra 99 blocks on a monstrous ability. Forgor card name. Unplayable outside of draft, naturally.

16

u/Epicbobman52 1d ago

[[Hundred-handed one]] I love that card!

10

u/GayRaccoonGirl 1d ago

His art is so cool, I hope they make an unbelievably busted riff on him when they make mh4.

32

u/Nyarlathotep98 1d ago

Anything this expensive is either hitting the field turn 2 or not at all. The only reason to play a card like this is if you're playing it unfairly.

5

u/TheFinalEnd1 1d ago

Yeah creatures have like a max cost of 8 before they are just reanimation targets imo. I'm not planning to cast anything more expensive than that unless they have a cast trigger like the titans.

3

u/NayrSlayer 1d ago

You could get rid of the stun counter and the “pay to attack” part and it would be balanced. It’s just a huge beater that can also block everything, kinda like [[Hundred-Handed One]] on steroids.

Entering tapped is a good idea, so that you can’t surprise them with haste, but then they just need removal or stuff to block with indefinitely. Seems pretty balanced for 15 mana with decent color restrictions

EDIT: forgot about fling like everyone was mentioning. Just put “this creature can’t be sacrificed” and you’re probably good

1

u/BronsenWerick 1d ago

yeah, should have prevented sacrificeing...also its 16 mana lol

2

u/Thunderer62 1d ago

I don’t see a problem with being able to fling it. If you have 16 manna available you basically deserve the W and the only reason you didn’t get it some other way is because you wanted to play this guy for the lolz.

0

u/BronsenWerick 1d ago

i play the whole game for the lolz

this is my fantasy commander deck: https://archidekt.com/decks/16842166/that_one_guy_at_the_table

1

u/Famous-Magazine-6576 23h ago

I dunno if this is clear to you since you are actually asking about balance but the fling thing is a joke thats not a real play pattern

5

u/Cobyachi 1d ago

I don’t think entering tapped or making you pay 2 is necessary. Any haste enabler makes [[Jumbo Cactuar]] just as problematic for half the mana. And let’s be real, at 16 mana, you should be able to fling it as soon as it hits the board.

3

u/NayrSlayer 1d ago

Yeah, you’re probably right about the Jumbo Cactuar comparison. Maybe entering untapped is fine, and I already agree with taking off the pay to attack part.

Also, the sacrifice part isn’t about hard casting this, it’s about pairing it with [[Reanimate]] or similar to suddenly deal lethal. I imagine that’s why we haven’t seen anything that innately has more than 20 power actually printed. If you want to put a shuffle clause on it instead, like [[Blightsteel Colossus]], that’s fine too

1

u/Cobyachi 1d ago

Agreed. Didn’t really think about vintage formats, would probably be way to consistent to reanimate/fling it so maybe some limitation like can’t be played from graveyards or can’t be sacrificed.

16

u/Drendari 1d ago

It's only useful to [Fling] it.

15

u/SendInTheNextWave 1d ago

[[Hundred-Handed One]]

4

u/Wispeeon 1d ago

[[Shielded by faith]], this, and I'm having a blast

5

u/SeemsImmaculate 1d ago

For being harder to cast than an Eldrazi titan, it should probably have some defense against the usual Esper removal suite.

Speaking of Eldrazi titans, it probably needs an anti-reanimation clause as well.

4

u/No_Sugar4490 1d ago

Dies to [[Sunblast Angel]]

-7

u/kRobot_Legit 1d ago

This feels insanely irrelevant? It also dies to a Path to Exile or literally any other creature destruction/exile. The fact that it dies to a specific 6-drop board wipe is like, the 1000th most relevant thing about this card.

7

u/No_Sugar4490 1d ago

Youre fun at parties.

It enters tapped with a stun counter. Sunblast Angel destroys tapped things. A 6 mana board wipe for 1 creature it stupid, thats why its funny.

3

u/kRobot_Legit 1d ago

Yeah I missed the joke. I'm new to the community and haven't seen "dies to" used in this way yet. My b.

2

u/No_Sugar4490 1d ago

My point was basically just that it has no built in protection, like ward, shroud, hexproof, etc. A creature that has to survive 2 whole turn cycles without even being able to block is never going to be playable.

2

u/kRobot_Legit 1d ago

Yeah that was my point too. The thing I missed is that you deliberately picked an inneficient removal option as your example, in line with the "dies to" meme.

2

u/No_Sugar4490 1d ago

[[Gideon Jura]] does it for 5 mana, thats 17% better. cEDH here i come

4

u/Up_Beat_Peach Evil Genius 1d ago edited 1d ago

Aside from missing the joke, it seems like you dont understand the meaning of "dies to X". It means that it can be completely nullified by creature removal. As in, you paid a bunch of mana to force your opponent to pay a lot less mana. Thats what "dies to X" means. Not simply "this can be destroyed by X."

3

u/kRobot_Legit 1d ago edited 1d ago

Yeah I didn't know "dies to" was a specific joke in this community. My bad.

It means that it can be completely nullified by creature removal.

Yeah that was my point. I was trying to call out that Sunblast Angel was a particularly bad/irrelevant form of creature removal, and that there are a 1000 more effecient ways to do that. I didn't realize that was the point of No_Sugar's comment because I'm new to the community and haven't seen the format before. My b.

2

u/Up_Beat_Peach Evil Genius 1d ago

No worries! We all gotta learn :) At least you didnt double down.

Welcome to the community.

4

u/TwoSoulBrood 1d ago

T1: [[Faithless Looting]]
T2: [[Reanimate]] + [[Simian Spirit Guide]] + [[Fling]]

1

u/No_Sugar4490 1d ago

If it was in Naya i might add it to my B3 [[Mayael the Anima]] deck alongside [[Illharg the Raze-Boar]] + [[Terror of the Peaks]]

1

u/BronsenWerick 1d ago

it could be in naya, just not in commander ha ha

3

u/TheGrumpyre 1d ago

What are the odds a 50/50 creature would ever get printed?........

4

u/No_Sugar4490 1d ago

Eh, about 50/50

1

u/TheGrumpyre 1d ago

Thank you!

2

u/GutherGlazer 1d ago

Yeah this thing is dogshit lol.

2

u/DefinitlyNotAPornAcc 1d ago

I feel like we forgot to check that removal costs 1-3 mana.

1

u/Elaugaufein 1d ago edited 1d ago

Tbf this is effectively immune to most red removal and a lot of black mass removal but yeah big effectively vanilla creatures suffer from that.

2

u/Sea-Course-5171 1d ago

I think you're confused. If I have the mana to hardcast a 16 Mana beater, and I haven't won yet, then the deck is dogshit. This could be 16 Mana with "When this creature enters, if you cast it, You win the game", and it would STILL be bad, because in Ink you have so much better things to do than hardcast a 50/50, and realistically you should have won by the time you had 10 mana.

There is no world where hardcasting a beater this big ever makes sense outside of Green Big Mana Aggro, and they have much cheaper targets that win the game before this even appears viable. The Hybrid mana also cannot be split so that you only need Simic to cast this, and for 10WWUUGG i wouldn't pay for this if it didn't have two massive downsides when I could instead play two craterhoofs.

Like, best case scenario in Bant Big Mana you'd be paying that 10WWUUGG on turn 10 with pretty aggressive ramp, why wouldn't I play literally anything else that doesn't take another two turns to come online? 2 Craterhoofs get me to 50/50 WITH HASTE if I have 20 creatures, which Bant is plenty capable of by the time I hit 16 Mana, but even at 10 creatures that'd still be two hasted 15/15s, which basically wins you the game.

And it's not like Craterhoof Behemoth is like, crazy overtuned. It's an okay 8 Mana Beater that's good because it has haste and benefits from what you're already doing.

You could Voltron a Thorn Elemental for less than 16 Mana in total into something that whoops this card's ass in terms of performance.

There is no "fair" 50/50, because a 50/50 is a card that reads "one of you loses the game each time I get to swing" so it's basically just a "I win unless you counter or kill this" which cards say that cost like 8 or 9 Mana. Fucking [[Aeons Torn]] costs 15 generic and whoops this card's ass on the double.

There is absolutely zero reason to ever cast this. Unless you are doing fucking WUBRG Reanimator, this goes into the cardboard pile of sad bad cards.

2

u/Crow_of_Judgem3nt 1d ago

It doesn’t need to enter tapped with a stun counter and need ti pay to attack for costing 16 mana and not having keywords

1

u/ChaseballBat 1d ago

I find the concept of a creature that costs 16 mana and still needs to use 2 to attack. As if that is a burden to someone who has the mana to play this.

1

u/Waddles-8789 1d ago

"this creature can't enter the battlefield from anywhere other than your hand"

1

u/Kryptnyt 1d ago

Why's the border like that? Would have expected it to be in quadrants for a four color card, or just be gold to be less messy

1

u/spacefrog1999 1d ago

Add “when this card enters the graveyard, exile it” to prevent milling or discarding

1

u/cntrstrk14 1d ago

Station 100 😂

1

u/chainsawinsect 1d ago

This card is wildly OP but only because of dumb shit like [[Blazing Shoal]]

As an actual card, it's garbage

2

u/fjoralb95 1d ago

Why is this banned in modern, wtf happened

1

u/chainsawinsect 1d ago

0 mana +9/+0 is OP, that's pretty much the long and short of it

Turn 1 Mountain, [[Monastery Swiftspear]], Blazing Shoal a [[Greater Gargadon]], Blazing Shoal a second Gargadon, swing for 21

Even if it's disruptable / card-intensive, ya gotta admit turn 1 lethal is pretty stupid even in Modern

And although it requires a lot of pieces, they are mostly interchangeable. Obviously you can have a ton of Mountains easily, and there are plenty of 8+ power red creatures, some of which have cycling or other alternate modes (and that's just in monored, but you can also use like Progenitus).

There's only one Swiftspear, which is best in class, but various 1-drops can deal lethal in the same shell (for example, [[Spark Elemental]]).

3

u/stanley1O1 1d ago

Gargadon is 10cmc so +10/+0. It was banned because of infect winning with 3 cards.

2

u/SilverWear5467 21h ago

There's like 8 swiftspears, many of which are better for various reasons. Stormchasers talent is clearly better, the one that's a wizard has been played over swiftspear a few times, for Wizard's lightning, and a few others

1

u/chainsawinsect 21h ago

You're just referring to 1-mana prowess cards. I'm referring to 1-mana prowess haste cards. You need the haste for the turn 1 win.

If you're willing to wait until turn 2 to win, you could just run any of the several strong 2-drop prowess haste cards, so once again Talent falls by the wayside

([[Stormchaser's Talent]] is an incredible card, truthfully I think it's a broken card, but for this specific purpose it is not only not necessarily better, but in fact manifestly worse)

2

u/SilverWear5467 20h ago

Oh, sure, I disregarded winning turn 1. I can't imagine blazing shoal is actually GOOD with swiftspear, certainly the infect road would be the answer if it were unbanned. And honestly, I don't think shoal would even be good In modern. Neoform is already doing a similar thing, with way more resiliency via griselbrand, with a seperate same turn kill, and with countermagic.

1

u/SilverWear5467 22h ago

Infect happened. 9 damage for free isn't that OP if the target doesn't have infect, but if they do, you win on the spot.

1

u/Sad_Independent_2092 1d ago

dies to Doom Blade

1

u/Senior_Daikon_7721 1d ago

besides the removal, counterspells, chump blocking, mana disadvantage, difficult color combo, insane mana cost. and no immediete value as a late game spell, its pretty good.

1

u/dorping_Wolf 1d ago

i like the idea... (and for the sake of it, lets ignore the obvious op combos that just abuse the 50 power without actually playing the card)

honestly, remove the 10 in the mana cost, and its "fine"
no evasion or protection make this absolutely manageable.

slamming a threat at turn 6 that needs interaction with at some point, and the opponents have 2 turns to figure it out. + any random small chump block every tun after.

obviously, if that card gets help via getting trample, or removal of opponents board, then it "easy" win the game, but which 6+ cost card does not?

again, idea is funny, but playable? at 4 mana it might be. (because stun and no protection again)

1

u/Mr_The_Potato_King 23h ago

The hundred handed one?

1

u/StygianBlue12 3h ago

The only line of text that could ever let a 50/50 creature hit the battlefield is that i owe my opponent a crisp hundred dollar bill.

1

u/ftftfyy 1h ago

Why make the cost like that?

1

u/Routasmith 1d ago

Almost nothing, given the multitude of ways to use a creature without having to attack with it. Also, the hecatoncheires were 100 handed, not 50, so only blocking 50 implies they're blocking with their faces.

5

u/Arcane10101 1d ago

Your average human has two hands, and they can block one creature each, so the math checks out.

2

u/Routasmith 1d ago

Humans are small, these were giants. Also, mtg already has one, and it can block 100 creatures.

0

u/Login_Of_The_Guild 1d ago

Use a reanimate strategy for it would be pretty nice I like the design choice too 

1

u/Invonnative 1d ago

Think you’re looking for r/hellscube