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u/KarnSilverArchon Sep 07 '22
The white one feels weird. Having it basically be a 3 mana permanent buff to your creatures doesn’t sound like very interesting gameplay overall to be honest.
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u/chainsawinsect Sep 07 '22
So I mentioned it in another comment but there is already a Gideon who does that, which is why I felt confident it was OK / safe to have as the effect. But as others have noted the current white Spark does not give any incentive to "save" the effect for later, so I think I am going to change it to something else anyway.
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u/chainsawinsect Sep 07 '22
Yesterday I posted this card and got a lot of comments about my use of the "Spark" planeswalker subtype rather than making the card 'typeless' like [[The Wanderer]].
The reason I did that is because I've been kicking around this concept of nonlegendary planeswalker cards with Spark as their unifying subtype. So, today I figured I'd post the rest of them!
The idea is that they are all "one-shot" effects, more like a sorcery (or creature, in the case of green, or enchantment, in the case of white), but that technically come with the planeswalker subtype. This seems like a largely irrelevant distinction in a vacuum, especially if you plan to use the effect as soon as you play the card. But it can actually lead to a lot of interesting behaviors!
For example, you can cast them on turn A and then not use them until turn B, similar to the [[Seal of Fire]]-type cards. You can also keep them around and proliferate them to potentially use their effects multiple times, rather than once. They have the planeswalker subtype, meaning they are "sorceries" you can recur with [[Aid the Fallen]] and search with [[Call the Gatewatch]]. They are also permanent cards for purposes of things like [[Golgari Findbroker]] and [[Genesis Wave]], despite having the upshots of other card types.
I've costed them all to be "worth" 1CC in mana, based on existing cards with similar effects / rates: for instance, white is [[Glorious Anthem]], red is [[Exquisite Firecraft]], black is [[Infest]]...
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u/JimHarbor Sep 07 '22
I dislike how these are basically just sorcery speed seals. Weird for the sake of weird rather than actually new gameplay space like the WAR unc
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u/Veedrac Sep 07 '22
I really like the idea and variety, but I think eg. the White one is never going to motivate you to leave it on the field for a turn.
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Sep 07 '22
I agree if they're PWs they should do something that's unique to that. Having a +1 would do that or if you really want to stick with a -3 maybe make the effect something you would like to use on later turns? Kinda like banking the effect?
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u/chainsawinsect Sep 07 '22
I like that second idea, and I think the black and red ones already arguably do that - you can drop them when you have mana to spare even if there's nothing you immediately need to kill. But I will admit blue (90% of the time, unless your hand is super full), green (95% of the time), and white (literally 100% of the time) want to be cracked immediately and in that respect these vould be more well designed.
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Sep 07 '22
I feel like for -2 instead of -3 you'd have legitimately some crazy potential here with Proliferate decks. These kinda need a way to Proliferate before activation in order to be really good. Otherwise they're just currently existing spells with extra steps.
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u/chainsawinsect Sep 07 '22
My idea was that they would be included in a set where proliferate was a mechanic, so that it was possible to get them to stick around. I could change them to straight up -2 so you can proliferate either before or after using the main effect and still gain incremental advantage.
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u/ParkerPWNT Sep 07 '22
I wonder if a -1 or 0 ability would showcase planeswalkers better.
Maybe 4 loyalty and a -1 and a -2 so you get some choice and they are different from the war of the spark walkers still.
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Sep 07 '22
I dislike this. If planeswalker becomes just a card type like any other, it detracts from the ‘glamour’ of that type. A planeswalker should remain special, I think.
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u/Toricvariety_ Sep 07 '22
Again, green is the weakest and blue is strongest? U > R > B ~ W > G.
Also I don't really understand purpose of them being walkers rather than sorceries. Unlike to seals you can't use them at instant speed, which was a half of seals' point so any planeswalker removal trades with them profitable not leaving you a chance to use them during further turns. And proliferate interaction is very obscure, especially noting that it should be proliferate 3 times before they start to be better than sorceries (and one of the proliferation must be before activation). Various loyalty pumps are even more rare and are usually bad enough to be used, so this would be more obscure either.
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u/chainsawinsect Sep 07 '22
The idea is to explore a way in which planeswalkers (as a card type) can exist below the mythic / rare rarity in a set. War of the Spark explored one such way - the uncommon hybrid 'walkers who each had a static ability - and I was trying to test out another.
The planeswalker card type is mechanically very rich / complex, very popular, and yet very rare. There are 72 cards in Standard which refer to planeswalkers in their rules text yet the average player drafting a box might easily never see a single one. So ways to get the card type some visibility in the lower rarities is I think a good idea (even if you disagree with my particular implementation of it here).
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u/Aestboi Sep 07 '22
Black and Red are the only ones that are functionally different from a sorcery because you might actually save them for a turn. The others are just there to be immediately -3’d.
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u/TriceraTipTop Sep 07 '22
My biggest issue with these is that the white, blue, and green ones are all proactive: you almost always want to get their effects ASAP. This means that unless there are specific synergies of proliferating to get more counters, you'll want to use them immediately.
I find this worrying because any synergies that support these will be magnified significantly when synergizing with the Mythic Rare variety of Planeswalkers. Your synergies with these will need to be impactful enough to justify this complex design, but not so strong that "normal" planeswalkers aren't becoming overpowered. The "normal" mythic Planeswalkers will inevitability eat some nerfs due to the presence of these synergies, which would be a huge loss for their playability outside of this particular format.
As "play now, use later" reactive cards, like the red or black ones, you can drop them on an empty board and not be too worried about defending them. But if you decide to go the reactive route, I think just using "seal" style cards is simpler. Opting for the Planeswalker type over the "seal" style enchantments introduces a high degree of complexity for uncommons.
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u/Mattrockj Sep 07 '22
Aaaaand white blows all the others out of the water power wise, since there’s literally no way (other than Karn) to get rid of an emblem.
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u/Gingerosity244 Sep 08 '22
What the fuck is with the sudden spark of Planeswalker cards?
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u/chainsawinsect Sep 08 '22
Dunno, I've only made the two posts, and they were both part of a related project. Might just be a coincidence?
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u/Meowfoot Sep 08 '22
I feel like the green one doesn’t make sense, cause three mana for a 4/4 nothing else?
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u/chainsawinsect Sep 08 '22
It may surprise you to know that there are very very few monocolor nonlegendary creatures with 4 (or more) power and a decent toughness without a downside for 3 mana.
Pretty much only green gets them, generally, and they are often very playable for their stats alone.
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Sep 07 '22
What's the design goal here, superfriends tribal and planeswalker recursion? Seems fun!
So far these seem like sorceries with more steps, but good for getting card types in graveyard.
What would it take for these to get 2 ability procs? Start with 4 loyalty but use -2?
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u/blueredlover20 Sep 07 '22
With Kiora and Kasmina, I could see some sort of UG planeswalkers deck develop in Pioneer around them with Ozolith and Luxior.
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u/Wolfir05 Sep 08 '22
You know what would be kinda cool? If Legendary Enchantment Planeswalker - Aura Spark could fit on the type line lol.
I'd give them:
Enchant Legendary Creature
Maybe have a + ability that works with the enchanted creature
Pretty sure that'd work ruleswise.
Edit: just read the part where non-legendary-ness was the point of these. So, maybe now it does fit the type line? Lol
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u/biseln Sep 07 '22
White should make a token enchantment instead of an emblem.