Commander Supplement Update

I've been working on the product and trying to resolve some of the issues. First things first, I'm going to post the current state of the cards I've already shown.
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 I don't think that actual affinity is going to show up in Ein'Sof's deck, but if it does Binah is going to be rewritten as affinity for lands.

 Chohkmah was changed. It now does all the tutoring itself. That way you can block him and stop the effect. I'm still not happy with this one.
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Da'at being a tap ability felt weird since giving him haste was worthless. I rewrote him like this but if tap abilities become a focus of that deck then he can be rewritten easily.
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I am not overly happy with Netzach. I like the overall flavor, but the on-hit trigger could use some adjustment. I just haven't found anything that I like better for the idea of, "At what price glory?"

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Tiferet is probably going to lose the activated ability. The trigger has proven more powerful than I originally thought it would be.

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Hod got reworded to a weaker version. I couldn't use the intended wording of "Hod has all abilities of creatures on the battlefield." The game can't reconcile multiple p/t setting abilities, which is why he had the initial wording. It proved too confusing since p/t setting abilities are an odd bunch overall.
This version is still very strong and has a lot of build around potential.

Zadkiel is the most changed. I was inspired by a dark reflection of Trostani. The only real thorn in my side with this current version is that he reconverts the tokens into life after they die. I think the proactive nature of the current wording is better than relying on killing opposing creatures. I might be wrong though, and he should be reworded as Grim Feast.
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  After some time, I realized that the idea to include some number of cards in the sideboard and have only 1 four color card per deck was not the correct direction.

1 - Its unintuitive. Players, especially new players, would be confused by this decision. Even though the sideboard would make it easier to scope down to a smaller configuration, it would still require some amount of work.
2- Its a waste of potential. According to Maro, 4 color doesn't have enough room to be a whole set on its own. That was the initial impetus to do 4 color commanders. What that implies, which is what I neglected, is that 4 color is something they will only do once. So if I'm doing 4 colors, I should do 4 colors.
3 - It makes the task of designing the decks and cards significantly harder. Breaking the decks up by color that way pushes away from having three color cards, or even two color cards that aren't the center color pair. This was the last straw, as the decks obviously want to spread out color wise.

Once I made the decision to have another set of 4 color commanders, the question became, how many legends did I want to make? Previous iterations of the commander product have had 1 primary legend, one alternate of the same colors, and one minor legend, such as Basandra and company. I really liked the idea of having 1 shard legend and 1 clan legend. Especially since three color as a theme likely isn't going to happen again for a long time. If the decks feel too busy later on and I want more slots, then I'm likely going to have to cull either the shard legends or the clan legends.

Resolved to make another five 4 color legends, I realized that one of the tried and true ways of formulating a cycle is the iconics. Magic's iconic creatures exist primarily to be used as figureheads. To lean on when making big splashy creatures. It seemed a natural fit. The allied pairs are best for this, since these are more nonX cards. Nonwhite feels like it wants to be centered on B/R as a pairing. The previous cycle wasn't design with this in mind since at the time I wasn't planing on having more than a single four color card per deck. As such, Gevurah, Tiferet, and Uriel are a unit and are centered more on U/B. Pushing more toward the centered allied pair feels more correct for the new cycle, and might cause further changes down the road.
The problem is that since the new commander cards are iconics in four colors, there will have to be some overlap between them on potential creature type. I drew out a map of the possible options based on the allied color pairs:

B/R - Dragon/Demon
R/G - Hydra/Dragon
G/W - Angel/Hydra
W/U - Sphinx/Angel
U/B - Demon/Sphinx

Those are the two possible options if I hold to the allied pairings. I felt that was important since it preserves a sense of the color pairs nature. B/R's shared enemy is White, so it makes sense that the nonwhite card be a demon or a dragon. Its worth noting that both the demon and the dragon would include black and red in its mana cost, but also that whichever one wasn't chosen as the nonwhite card would be white. This means that there would be a demon or dragon that is partially White. I think that's an acceptable cost for the cycle. I chose to use the first set of pairings. I am not adverse to changing them later, but I liked this set.

Also of importance to me while making these cards was that they be very concrete. The Angelarium art lent itself to the abstract. I like value oriented engine generals and the first five 4 color commanders were very much in that vein. Where those cards are abstract and esoteric, these cards would be almost physical. They should have combat keywords and put the opponent under threat of death.

When looking over the history of aggressive cards in blue, it struck me that Psychotog's abilities were a great fit for a Dragon. Its essentially Firebreathing by using your graveyard. I didn't like the idea of pumping toughness though since that isn't the flavor of Firebreathing on a Dragon. The discard ability also fed Gevurah. It was originally a +1/+1 counter. I wanted to have a greenish feel to the card, and a +1/+1 counter for pump helped that. Over time, I realized that it only made sense as a +1/+1 counter it was on him personally, a la Lotleth Troll. The current ability feels much more aligned with a breath weapon. A corrosive, acidic presence on those he flies over. Mechanically, it resets our Undying creatures while functioning as a discard outlet and removal that's dependent on hand size.

I like Krometh the most of all these cards. It feels the most complete. The only thing I would consider changing is the keyword it grants. I choose Menace because it plays well with the power pump, and it pushes the card to be more toward Black. I'm not going for total color coverage, but if I can help  represent some of the inherently weaker colored aspects I'd like to. While on the surface Krometh doesn't seem to fit Hesed's deck, the fact that it's an X spell makes all the difference. Hesed is about accruing lands. Krometh rewards a high man count. Hesed wants to be aggressive. Krometh rewards aggression. The two cards dovetail while not appearing to be related.

The first thing that's getting changed about Ilikris is her name. Beyond that, she feels pretty strong. Complex but simple. You want to have enough spells to feed her, but enough token making that her trigger is worthwhile. Ein'Sof is about permanent accrual. It makes tons of permanents and tokens. Ilikris fits into that mold nicely, but also rewards you for playing spells. This feels like the most concrete theme of the decks. Red keeps getting cards like Flameshadow Conjuring, so having qualitative tokens to copy in Red and Blue is going to be an interesting directions to build towards.

Wold is a riff on Drogskol Reaver. I have always loved that card and wished it had been a legendary. It also felt like a solid place to land on the nonred card since both green and black appreciate lifegain to various degrees. I will say that he and Keter currently fightt each other a bit over creatures in the graveyard. They both need to eat those creatures for their effects. I don't think its too much of a problem, since its what you would refer to as a good problem to have. Wold provides the life for Keter to get creatures back and a huge card advantage train runs right over your opponents. Due to Wold drawing a card on trigger, there isn't much lost there in any case. 

                                            
Melkoth was the most difficult of my designs. The other creatures in this deck wanted to care about creatures. Melkoth wanted to care about reanimation and attacking for the sake of the other 3 color generals. Its very similar to Yore-Tiller, but honestly that's fine by me. While the other Nephilim were notable only by their lack of a Legendary supertype, Yore-Tiller was the real deal. Another card that fell flat to me was Atheros. I didn't get why it was your opponent that was paying the ferryman. So, Melkoth was born. He takes the dead on a journey to the afterlife, and takes his toll. As a Demon he shares a part in all deals. I initially wanted the growth ability to be an instead, and Melkoth would deal damage by milling. Unfortunately, while "instead of gaining life" would be fine...."instead of losing life," causes all manor of issues with the rules. I like the current execution, but it does feel somewhat awkward that the nongreen creature grows. It also lacks any combat abilities, but that's mostly because it is going to be super enormous almost instantly in a game of EDH.

The previous EDH products all had a political mechanic of some kind. The Tempt cycle and the Offering cycle rewarded the multiplayer nature of EDH. I decided to use the 4 color nature of the set and tie it to the political cards. I present - Mandate.

The actual text is going to be all development. In general, I wanted there to be two proactive options and two answers on each card. In addition, the answers are things like, "Target player sacrifices a creature." That way, it requires cooperation to solve problems that the table is having. Casting these should be an event that forms or splits alliances.

With multicolor being such an important aspect of the product, its going to be important to have a set of cards to smooth out color issues. Since there are about 60 new cards, cards like Command Tower get put into each deck. These three cards are going to be in the vein of Command Tower and appear in all five decks.

The names are clearly not final. These colorless fixing options should help alleviate mana problems since I am now dedicated to 4 color as the theme.
60 - 20 Legends = 40
40 - 5 Mandates = 35
35 - 3 = 32

32 cards is quite a bit left to fill. There probably isn't enough room for anymore 4 color cards, but there's certainly enough room for some more three color cards. The themes are starting to become clearer as well. I'm probably going to do a series of brainstorming articles on the themes of each deck and potential new cards to but into them.

Cheers!

Origins Spoiler Review

Its spoiler season, the best time to be a Magic player. Like I've done for the last few sets, I'm going to talk about the cards' usefulness in EDH. If a card doesn't show up, then I have nothing to say about it.

Spoiler found here: http://www.mtgsalvation.com/spoilers/149-magic-origins

White:
Archangel of Tithes - This is a very interesting effect. Note that giving it vigilance lets it have both effects. I can see this in Heliod, since WWW is solid for devotion, and taxing blockers is really good. Potentially in Darien since taxing blockers is relevant there as well. I don't think this stands up for Kaalia or other angel focused decks on its own. Still a neat card.

Hixus, Prison Warden - The entered the battlefield clause does not specify from hand, so this guy does work as a commander. I still don't like him over more proactive monowhite options like Linvala or Elesh Norn. Also, when Hixus is a known quality people will only attack you for lethal. That does make him a solid rattlesnake, but I don't know what you are doing in monowhite that you are trying to buy that much time for. As a creature in the 99 though, Hixus is really good. He can eat indestructible or protection creatures. He also combines well with a blink strategy, a la Roon of the Hidden Realm. Its especially potent with Roon since it creates the rattlesnake effect it normally has as a commander.

Kytheon Iora/Gideon, Battleforged - I am very low on this card both in the 99 and as a commander. He just doesn't do enough on either side. His creature side is worse than the other low cost options. I was initially thinking maybe he would be fine in duel commander, but honestly that slot belongs to Thalia for a reason. This card does nothing disruptive. I think the card is fine in other formats, and the overall design is cool, but not everything is made for EDH.

Relic Seeker - A weaker Stoneforge Mystic is still a good card. This wants to be in something aggressive, since its triggered by attacking. I like this in Jor Kadeen, some W/B decks, Thalia, etc. I don't like this in W/U or W/G as much since those decks don't need the card advantage or tutor effect nearly as much. The exception is Rafiq since the effect is something that Rafiq loves, and it can happen before you even cast your general.

Starfield of Nyx - Wow. So much brewing can happen with this card. The obvious place for it is Bant Enchant, but its effect spreads over to W/B or W/R very easily. Repeatable card advantage and the potential to turn into a huge attacker will find homes in EDH since the games tend to be slow enough to make the grindy nature of the card work. Homes include Zedruu, or Rubinia.

Vryn Wingmare - The new Glowrider flies! This guy is a solid addition to white disruptive decks. The aforementioned Thalia plays this guy in both regular and duel commander. It also shows up in most places Relic Seeker is likely to show up. There are now tons of three mana 2/1 flyers with hate abilities.

Blue:
Alhammarret, High Arbiter - Whammy!

Day's Undoing - I know there has to be ways to break this card, but I can't think of any off the top of my head. Also, the obvious place of Nekusar apparently doesn't work. The end the turn line is apparently being changed so that all triggers generated by casting the spell are eaten mid-resolution. Still solid to cast off a Leyline of Anticipation or Vedalken Orrery.

Displacement Wave - The sorcery tag is the only thing keeping this from being outrageous. As is, it is mostly meh. In a permanent lite deck, like most combo decks, this is worth a shot. Decks like Dralnu and Melek tends to have no tokens and this potentially generates mana for them by bouncing Sol Ring, Chrome Mox, etc. Definitely a card to keep in mind. Its straightforward use is to get rid of all tokens.

Harbinger of the Tides - This is a nasty surprise that I think will wind up in most of the decks that Hixus would be in.

Jace, Vryn's Prodigy/Jace, Telepath Unbound - I don't think this guy warrants a slot as a commander, but in the 99 he can be pretty solid. There are plenty of U/x decks that want to loot and the flipped side's -3 is pretty solid. While planeswalkers have to be judged on what you get from 1 activation, these walkers are different in that you can get them back with Karmic Guide or Reveilark. I think that Jace in a deck with Reveilark is going to be pretty sweet since he loots you into other good targets for lark.

Jace's Sanctum - More love for the Dralnu/Melek crowd, this card is a 1-2 punch of sweet. The cost reduction makes it easier to cast lots of instants and sorceries, and then rewards you for doing so. The reward...helps you find more instants and sorceries. I really like this card for EDH and think that those sorts of decks, or Jeleva, are going to make room for this immediately.

Mizzium Meddler - A 1 time Spellskite that can happen at instant speed. Another card for blink value shenanigans, a la Roon.

Soulblade Djinn - I don't know why he couldn't have said "Creatures you control gain Prowess." It would have felt far more to the point than their execution. I do like the card though, and blue attack oriented decks have felt lacking in EDH for a long time. Sure, there's Edric, where this guy fits pretty well, but decks like Sygg, either one, have been lacking some Oomph for a while. The addition of aggressive prowess creatures, especially in an environment with a legacy card pool, is going to only push blue's attacking side up.

Black:
Dark Petition - I love this card. Tutoring is something you should keep down in casual EDH environments, but in a more competitive atmosphere this card is bonkers. Any storm deck wants this immediately, and even fairer decks love what is essentially another 2 mana tutor. It does come with the caveat that you want to be reasonably instant and sorcery heavy, but that's not too much of a burden. I will be playing this in Dralnu, and wouldn't be surprised if this saw legacy play.

Demonic Pact - This card is amazing. Its one of the most flavour win cards of all time. Its probably not worth jumping through hoops for it in EDH, but if you can sacrifice enchantments on demand (Ertai maybe?) then it is a very cool card.

Kothophed, Soul Harvester - He's big, he flies, he draws tons and tons of cards. He works as a general and as a threat in the 99. One of the premier EDH cards of the set. expect him to show up in a lot of games. As a demon he's instantly a hit in Kaalia, and many reanimation based Grixis and Rakdos decks are going to find room for him. As a general, he's likely going to see play as a Staxs variant. I don't know if he's going to ever see play in other stax decks. If he does, then he's worthwhile in Obzedat or Vish Kaal  where you have a continual influx of life and easy ways to get rid of him.

Languish - This card deals with smaller, swarmy decks. Its especially good against Eldrazi Monument and creatures that interlock to make small creatures large like Elves. Its the right mana cost and makes both a good second Mutilate and second Damnation. You'll want to be largely creatureless or not care if your smaller creatures die. To that end, this probably works in Kothophed, Geth, Tymeret, etc.

Liliana, Heretical Healer/Liliana, Defiant Necromancer - The first spoiled of the transform walkers, people have had plenty of time to find homes for her. She's a fine general and quite good as a normal creature. She's good in Ghave or other sac for value decks. As a commander she works as a resource denial strategy, aka stax. As a nonstax general she loses a lot of punch since other generals utilize a higher resource count better.

Malakir Cullblade - While this card seems innocuous, this is a very powerful effect in a format where 2-3 other people are casting creatures. Putting him in the above mentioned stax oriented decks is a great way to continually feed him. I don't know if he's worth it, but he seems like he could get really big really fast.

Tainted Remedy - A welcome hate card, this works very well in Punisher type decks. I would find room for this in my Kaalia deck. There isn't a lot of strategy here, unless you also have a way of giving your opponent life, a la Beacon of Immortality.

Red:
Avaricious Dragon - This guy is pretty sweet. He wants to be in some insanely aggressive deck like Urabrask where you are casting everything at sorcery speed anyway and just trying to get people dead. I'm less than optimistic that he sees lots of EDH play since resource accrual is so vital to so many game plans. The dragon creature type might get him some play in something like Karrthus, but this seems like a monster for Standard, not EDH.

Chandra, Fire of Kaladesh/Chandra, Roaring Flame - This one also falls a bit short in both forms, as the creature version can't keep going past its third activation and the only useful part of the planeswalker is the ultimate. Unfortunate, but this one seems like a pass for EDH.

Chandra's Ignition - Chandra's Ignition on the other hand is the real deal. Paired with creature abilities like lifelink, deathtouch, or infect, its going to be a house. It works best if cast on a creature with Hexproof so it can't be interrupted by the opponent. I like this in Godo, since that deck is loaded with equipment to enhance it. It also works well in Uril, since he has Hexproof, and generally will be enormous. The other side is that for a deck like Uril, there won't be too much splash damage. Ignition is a card that interacts best with a vertical strategy. I don't think I'd want this too much in Jor Kadeen, for instance, because that deck wants to build out as much as up.

Flameshadow Conjuring - Another red bomb, this works incredibly well in a variety of red strategies. This works in the Kolaghan deck I posted a month or so ago. It is also crazy good in Sedris or Marath. All around a good addition to the EDH repertoire. Honestly, you are really going to need a reason not to run this in a deck with red mana since it gives infinite value. Works well with legends that have etb abilities now, since you just keep the real one and pay R to double the effect.

Pia and Kiran Nalaar - Kind of out shined on the sacrifice ability by Bosh, they do give you a ton of artifacts on repeat castings/blinks. There's a Jeskai artifacts deck out there that this card fits right into. Unlike Bosh, actually just casting PKN is totally legitimate as well. A middling general that's pretty ok as a dude in the 99.

Green:
Managorger Hydra - This guy gets enormous really really fast. Play him somewhere with green that appreciates large creature or lots of spells.

Nissa, Vastwood Seer/Nissa, Sage Animist - Decidedly meh as a general, Nissa is pretty good as a creature. Lots of decks run Civic Wayfinder-type effects already, and flipping her is pretty trivial in EDH. Like Jace, she's got good value in a shell with Reveilark and the planeswalker side is essentially a Coiling Oracle every turn. That's a lot of value for not much investment. I think I like Nissa the most of the creaturewalkers for EDH. I think my first placement for her is Roon or Ghave, but there's plenty of places for her to slot into.

Woodland Bellower - Another creature with a crazy enter the battlefield effect in Roon's colors? What are you doing wotc! Seriously though, this guy is a house. Unfortunately for EDH players, he's probably good enough for Standard and he's a mythic. I would pick some up if you intend to play a green value dudes deck if you can get him under three dollars.

Multicolor:
Shaman of the Pack - I didn't mention the other elves since they don't really do something new for EDH elves, but Shaman of the Pack is interesting because it adds a new dimension to Nath. Shaman wouldn't be particularly interesting as just another toy for Edric, but because of the black in its cost, it slots into Nath quite well and plays off of his ability to make lots of elves. That deck is also more combat damage oriented and the Shaman can kill an opponent easily. Being a creature, its easily repeatable through sacrifice and return. I can see this being a player in some G/B elves decks.

Artifacts:
Alhammarret's Archive - Oloro's new best friend, this doesn't go in everything. You have to be actively drawing cards to get a bonus, unlike Thought Reflection which affected your draw step. This is still one of the chase EDH cards in the set since so many decks people play draw cards. Its particularly amusing with Sylvan Library. Initial thoughts, Oloro, Trostani.


That wraps up the first week of spoilers. I'll be back next Saturday, for the next batch. I think the whole set will be spoiled by then, but if not then its no biggie. Feel free to respond in the comments with what you think of the cards.

Dooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooommmmed

E3 just happened, and while I was not initially excited about any of the material, I watched the Doom 4 coverage.

Holy shit.

Doom 4 looks like everything I've ever wanted in a Doom game. Its a true return to form for the series. Not only did it look sleek and smooth, the addition of a takedown system implies so much about the game play. It means you are frequently going to be in close quarters with the enemies, and the risk of getting pummeled is going to be worth it to conserve ammo. Sure in the demo the Doomguy took a bit less damage and ammo wasn't a big concern, but that's the demo. They didn't want to run the risk of getting run over while building hype. A bit less ammo return, a bit more damage income and we have a true successor to the Doom of old.

What's interesting to me is the degree to which people have been shitting on the game. It boggles my mind how some people go through life. I'm no blind optimist. I don't see things always working out or being the best possible outcome. However, to decry this game based on what we've seen is ludicrous. The most vocal complaint is that the levels look like they were ported over from Doom 3. Here a shocker, WHO FUCKING CARES. The levels in Doom 3 were totally, completely, outrageously fine. Claustrophobic corridors and tromping through Hell were the only parts of that game that didn't need improvement. The lighting in the demo was good, the action was consistent and frantic, the enemies had diverse behavior. The graphics were outstanding, but honestly the game looks about as good as Doom 3 looked for its day.

Honestly, it could be a straight remake of Doom 3 with improved game play for all I care. Literally level by level. I mean, that's essentially what it is, since every Doom has been a remake of the game before it. The story has always been the same, and the narrative has always worked. They didn't call the explosion of FPS games in the 90's Doom Clones for nothing. That formula of being one guy outnumbered and outgunned has functioned for years and years. At some point though, *cough Doom 3*, the other titles on the market innovated in the right direction. They didn't slow down, they sped up. They didn't add in extra narrative, they just did more with the little bit of exposition they felt they could get away with. Instead of being outraged that Doom 4 appears to borrow from Halo I'm ecstatic. Halo had the right amounts of narrative, at least while under Bungie's control. Halo, though, is essentially a PG13 game. Doom is the R rated alternative. Its violence is gory, over the top and pulls not punches. Or dismemberments. Or decapitations. Instead of fighting some alien armada, you are fighting the literal forces of Hell itself.

I am cautious about my enthusiasm. I can understand why the community would be as well. Doom 3 seemed like a game that was impossible to fuck up, and they somehow forgot what it meant to be Doom while making it and fucked it up. If the presentation was any indication though, they remembered. Maybe some new blood helped spice it up. Maybe after the catastrophe that was Doom 3 they realized the freebie was over and they had to sing for their supper again. Whatever it was that made them look at the genre with fresh eyes and not assume they knew better since they started the revolution it seems that Doom 4 is going to benefit from immensely.

Response to Evergreen Eggs and Ham

MaRo's article today talked about adjustments made to the evergreen keywords of Magic. Evergreen is something that trips people up so I'm going to take a moment to define it the way that WotC defines it. Evergreen means that there will be an instance of the keyword in 90+% of all Magic sets. They are things that show up in every set unless there is some specific reason not to include them. This is different from things like cycling and kicker which are considered deciduous. They aren't a part of every set, but they can be used for any set they needs them. A recent example of a deciduous mechanic would be hybrid mana.

Adjusting the evergreen keywords happens relatively infrequently. In fact, we are losing essentially the only tool that has been used to define them. The core set has always been the place that changes to keyword status premiered. Not that it can't be done in a normal set, as has happened on one or two occasions. The last core set brings with it a significant change to the game's keyword actions, but they are almost all positive.

A keyword of my own for this article is going to be variance. Almost all of the keyword changes revolve around how much variance they produce. Variance is the degree of inconsistency in a thing. How divergent it is. This is not a bad thing, you want games to play out differently. Its part of Magic to have variance in the game. However the keywords in question just leaned too much on variance to be justified.

First off, let me just say that Scry being keyworded was a long time coming. Its been brought back again and again. Its simple, and reduces variance without adding card advantage. It can be a rider on the back of anything. As MaRo states in the article, they kept reinventing the wheel looking for more minor library manipulation. Scry has been the best execution of that premise since Fifth Dawn. I could go on about how cool it is to know that you're going to have a defined library manipulation mechanic in sets that you are building, but I'll shut up.

Intimidate is being replaced with Menace("This creature must be blocked by two or more creatures.") for variance reasons. Color based evasion has lots of problems. They are essentially the same problems that Landwalk brings to the table. The example used in the article is Lifebane Zombie. It was outrageous against green based decks...and virtually useless against most other decks. There wasn't some scheme to deal with it either. You just took three a turn until you died. Conditional unblockability is fine if there is some condition that is reasonable to meet. Menace makes your creature unblockable, unless they are willing to potentially lose two creatures. Intimidate's condition can't be played around.

In other words, Intimidate and Landwalk are high variance mechanics. In some games they do nothing. In other games, they are extremely powerful. There is nothing that the opponent can do in the face of these cards as beating swampwalk is a deckbuilding consideration. While I can see some argument that Landwalk in particular lends itself to smart metagaming, there are plenty of opportunities to have smart meta gaming decisions that don't necessitate high variance keywords.

The move of Protection to deciduous is perhaps the most saddening of the changes. Retiring Landwalk is historic. Its been around since the beginning. However, the game has grown beyond it. Protection will still be around, but it does have the same issues of variance that Intimidate and Landwalk have. The most used protection was protection <color>. That obviously has the same issues.  The problem is almost entirely about static protections. Reactive Protection, a la God's Willing, is completely fine since its temporary and can be played around. Also, protection for other, more narrow things like Instants is largely fine since it most often leaves the card with other vulnerabilites. I'm glad that Protection wasn't removed altogether, but its probably for the best that it isn't something that they are forcing themselves to use.

Intimidate and Protection also had the problem of being confusing to newer players. Intimidate was much harder to use in a multicolor environment and also in a colorless environment. The article mentions morph, but its also bad against Eldrazi. Protection is a keyword that advanced players can still mess up since there are a lot of rules surrounding exactly what it does. Again, that's fine when there are cards out there that are worth the complexity, but not on something that you feel you have to use.

The changes are all a net positive. Magic as a game depends on variance. No two games play out exactly alike, and variance helps prevent some amount of lame duck situations since catching running draws is a very real thing. That said, too much variance and the game also starts losing fun. It becomes too swingy. The mechanics removed from the game are all high variance mechanics. They either do nothing, or blow your opponent out of the water. The addition of Scry is also anti-variance as it gives all of the colors a minor library manipulation. The only real concern here is that they don't want to overdo the reduction to variance, since it is an important part of the game. I don't think this is likely to happen, but reducing variance too much would lead to a less fun game.

Prowess is being added as a primarily blue keyword. Thus ends the long search for a blue creature based combat keyword...maybe. Wizards knows a lot more about Magic design than me, but I see a lot of problems with Prowess being slotted into Blue. First, Prowess wants you to be proactive. Blue is reactive. Prowess as a combat trick wants you to cast spells during combat. Blue has a number of instants, but most of them involve bouncing creatures, tapping creatures/etc. Essentially, Prowess works very poorly with counterspells, and only slightly better with Blue's suite of removal. All the Prowess creatures I can bring to mind and White or Red. Obviously there's a reason they thought it is good enough. It just always seemed contradictory to Blue's nature to me.

In summation, a solid selection of changes with the caveat that they are going to have to change how Blue works a bit in order to see Prowess stick.

Building Gevurah Who Hungers

I'm back! It feels good to be writing again. Vacation was excellent, but now its back to the grind.
The first experiment I want to do is to build idealized versions of the 4 Color Commanders. This will help reveal the various themes that the final precon could be about. Then I'll pick one, and scale it appropriately. This deck IS NOT the pre-constructed deck. This is me feeling out what goes well with the generals and what themes the deck wants to be about. The tappedout link is here: http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/gevurah-who-hungers/. Obviously Karona is a placeholder, and the deck is a couple cards shy for the creatures below.

The Commander for this deck is:

Four colors is a lot of space to work with. The nature of the card lends itself well to milling, creature loops, counter manipulation, and power matters. The lesser legends in the deck are: 

These also push us in slightly different directions. Tiferet cares about removing cards from your graveyard and +1/+1 counters. Uriel wants you to be reanimating/recurring creatures. In both cases, Persist and Undying are excellent additions:

Furystoke Giant
Glen Elendra Archmage
Murderous Redcap
Puppeteer Clique
River Kelpie
Woodfall Primus
Flayer of the Hatebound
Geralf's Mindcrusher
Mikaeus, the Unhallowed

What other recursive creatures are there for the deck to take advantage of?

Reassembling Skeleton
Bloodghast

This section could be quite beefy, so I picked the least intensive of the various options.
The deck is also going to be generating a significant number of +1/+1 counters. Is there a way to utilize those as a resource?

Ooze Flux
Korozda Gorgon
Spike Rogue
Novijen Sages

If this became the major theme of the deck, I would put in the other Spikes, Triskelion, etc. As is, we mostly want to be eating counters off of our Undying creatures and fueling removal/card draw from Gevurah. -1/-1 counters are a bit harder to use, but would help us increase the longevity of our Undying creatures even further.

Scarscale Ritual
Black Sun's Zenith

That gives us a strong line of counter manipulation effects that can be pushed one way or another. I suppose one area that could be expanded on would be putting +1/+1 counters on other creatures to power up our Persist creatures. More concerning though, how do we get Gevurah to get lots of triggers?

Life From the Loam - Particularly awesome with Tiferet as it gives out up to 4 counters per turn.
Stinkweed Imp
Consuming Aberration

These grow Gevurah at a very rapid pace. Another direction the deck can go is for a Large Man Plan. It already has some pretty enormous creatures, and Gevurah is no slouch for size:

Lord of Extinction
Disciple of Bolas
Greater Good

Now for some nuts and bolts cards that go into virtually every EDH deck. Not all of these made the final list, but they were common to many of the decks I looked through that I have previously built.
Vampiric Tutor
Demonic Tutor
Entomb
Unfulfilled Desires
Sylvan Library
Explosive Vegetation
Cultivate
Skyshroud claim
Sakura-Tribe Elder
Tooth and Nail
Birthing Pod
Doubling Season
Fires of Yavimaya
Cauldron Dance
Seize the Day
Avenger of Zendikar
Regal Force
Sidisi, Undead Vizier
Solemn Simulacrum
Duplicant
Fact or Fiction
Frantic Search
Thought Scour
Breaking//Entering
Buried Alive
Reanimate
Necromancy
Twilight's Call
Izzet Charm
Dread Return
Whip of Erebos
Wheel of Fortune
Rune-Scarred Demon
Lightning Greaves
Night's Whisper
Sepulchral Primordial
Diluvian Primordial
Molten Primordial
Phyrexian Delver

For the artifact mana, I included mostly color generating sources. 4 colors is a lot to cover.

Golgari Signet
Izzet Signet
Simic Signet
Rakdos Signet
Sol Ring
Mana Crypt
Gilded Lotus
Coalition Relic
Chromatic Lantern
Commander's Sphere

It might be correct to go all the way up to Obelisk's here. There's a good chance they'll make the final pre-con. As is, I'm reasonably happy leaving them out. The lands were literally everything I could think of that tapped for maximum numbers of colors.

Vivid Marsh
Vivid Creek
Reflecting Pool
Command Tower
City of Brass
Mana Confluence
Tarnished Citadel
Exotic Orchard
Thespian's Stage
Evolving Wilds
Transguild Promenade
Terramorphic Expanse
Rupture Spire
Shimmering Grotto
Savage Lands
Crumbling Necropolis
Opulent Palace
Frontier Bivouac
Polluted Delta
Verdant Catacombs
Scalding Tarn
Misty Rainforest
Wooded Foothills
Bloodstained Mire
Watery Grave
Overgrown Tomb
Steam Vents
Breeding Pool
Stomping Ground
Blood Crypt
2 Forest
2 Swamp
2 Island
Mountain
Ancient Tomb

That's that! I had a ton of fun putting this together. I'll be back in the near-ish future to do Hesed, then the rest in order. After that comes settling on a precon theme and figuring out what new cards I want to make.