Sunday, May 10, 2015

Update on the supplemental product

As a recap, I'm building an EDH supplemental product because I can. Its focused around 4 color creatures, using art from the Angelarium, http://www.trueangelarium.com/treeoflife/ The initial design can be found here: http://lefowens.blogspot.com/2015/05/new-project-edh-supplimentals.html
I collected a good amount of feedback on the creatures so I updated their wording. 


Gevurah got a small update. He got bumped to a 4/4. It was pointed out that having a 3/3 without much protection that costs you 4 colors of mana that instantly dies to removal would be kind of not fun. Until I do testing and find out which of these should be more vulnerable I agree with that sentiment. Its likely that some of them will go back to having 3 toughness later but my initial playtest will be with four toughness or better. The other change Gevurah got was to word his activated ability to be "sacrifice another creature." That is a more modern template and fits better with his character.


Hessed got a major change. Her second static ability was too dangerous to put on a card that does other things. I wanted to go for more of an Earthmother vibe with her and so changed the static ability to be Crucible of Worlds. She now has that feel to her. I realized that there was a better interaction between the active and the reworded static effect, so the cards that get exiled go to the yard. You get access to the lands you exile. I also want the nonblue card to be a bit larger than its counterparts so she remains a 5/5.

Edit* This art done by Noah Bradley

Ein'Sof got an increased mana cost on its effects. I'm hopeful that adding a mana to each ability is enough. I really wanted the p/t to be able to match up to the creature tokens it makes to give a sense of connection between the tokens and the main creature, thus Ein'Sof is a 3/4 instead of a 4/4. I think changing the creature type to seedling should also prompt a connection, though seedlings with haste don't make too much sense. They will probably go back to plants. The Landfall ability has proper wording now. I cut out some of the text when I first wrote it, but it is text that needs to be there.



Keter was virtually unchanged. The only thing that got updated was the wording of his first ability to another creature. This is done for both practicality, he shouldn't exile himself, and flavor. Keter is the Hub of the Wheel, not subject to it. The wording about drawing a card is also more explicitly tied to the exile effect.


Yesod got a little wording update on the copy effect and retaining its ability to shapeshift. A note, it is intentional that Yesod transforms into the creature and loses its name/legendary status/etc. It is more in line with the fantasy of Yesod searching for new identities, for perfection.

One last note, I got a lot of feedback about the creature type. Divinity is a word used to describe something more than mortal. These creatures should feel new and different. I think it is entirely defensible to use something that hasn't been used before. The Nephilim exist with only 5 creatures. There are going to end up being 15 Divinities by the end. If this doesn't test well as a way to separate the creatures I'll move to something else, Nephilim being the next appropriate type.

Speaking of, the decks will have 3 legends each, as usual. However, more 4 color legends would be very difficult to do. As such, I decided to split the smaller legends into two 3 color cards, 1 Shard, 1 Clan, for each deck. That way if you want to use a different legend you only have to cut one color. This also means that none of the three color combinations will repeat.

The breakdown is currently set to be:
Gevurah - UBRG: Grixis (UBR)/Sultai (UBG)
Hessed - WBRG: Jund(BRG)/ Mardu (WBR)
Ein'Sof - WURG: Naya(WRG)/ Temur (URG)
Keter - WUBG: Bant (WUG)/ Abzan (WBG)
Yesod- WUBR: Esper (WUB)/ Jeskai (WUR)

I will be going deep in the tank to build the next set of generals. They should be along in a few days.
Thanks for reading, cheers!

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