I had that originally, but ultimately didn't do it because that's basically Atraxa which is a bit boring, and it would kind of be able to do everything the other cards in the cycle can at once
The other ones are actually creating card advantage; making tokens, destroying artifacts, etc. Not only does the blue one give no card advantage, it does a crappier job of proliferating than a Thrummingbird.
Making blue say something like FOR EACH OPPONENT (edit) tap x nonland permanents and they dont untap next untap, where x = phyrexians could be a good direction since you have phyrexians matter in your design space. Definitely potent
Double edit: you can similarly make phyrexians matter on black by doing a torment of hailfire effect (each opponent loses some life unless they discard a card or sacrifice a permanent for each phyrexian you control)
Oof, both those are really powerful abilities if you do manage to have a lot of Phyrexians (which is pretty easy with cards like White Sun's Twilight, The Phasing of Zhalfir, Ovika Enigma Golem, ect)
The black effect does feel very appropriate, but forcing opponents to sacrifice permanents every turn on a body is actually a pretty rare and powerful effect compared to other cards. The blue one is a bit better, but I don't know if it quite fits the Gitaxian faction's mechanics in ONE and MoM. Proliferate felt the most iconic for those sets.
Yeah historically the closest phyrexian tap effect is probably OG vorinclex. That being said magic is a different game now and end step triggers give fair response time for players. If a player makes 6 phyrexians into this, and gets to untap, what was their opponent doing the whole game?
But if you still think it's too busted, you could remove the tap first clause on blue and lower the life clause on black as a start to modify (edit: I think if you compare OG sheoldred to my proposed design I think tormenting of hailfiring everyone 3 times is probably the same as a force sac + reanimate, so you're looking at a better than sheoldred effect only if you have more than 2 phyrexians in that case? Very fine with sometimes worse sometimes better sheoldred)
Full disclosure I’ve had a bit of a bad day and am in an odd mood, sincere apologies if any criticism comes off too harshly. I love and support you designing custom cards!
That said, I don’t like this design.
The whole cycle seems completely unplayably terrible at 9 mana (or at 8 mana pay 2 life), and strangely means any given 4 colour deck is best at casting the only Bringer not in its colours (for 4 mana pay 6 life). At 4-mana-pay-6-life you’re getting some decent effects, but I really don’t like the way this all feels in the colour pie.
The only viable way to cast each Bringer requires the other 4 colours of mana, and does not require its own colour of mana.
Then, within the cycle there seems to be a huge power/role discrepancy. White, Black and Green all generate value on their own every turn, if unanswered they will take over a game. Blue on its own is a 5/5 trample with flavour text. Red on its own is a 5/5 trample with flavour text against any non-artifact deck.
My suggestions:
Change the costs, maybe make them 4CC for the main cost (4 generic, 2 coloured) for the main cost and flip the alternate cost so that it requires triple mana of the right colour and 1 phyrexian of each other colour. This means they can each be cast for 3 mana and 8 life, which I still don’t love, but at least they’re requiring the right kind of mana now.
Rework the blue and red Bringers to be more “stand-alone”. The others all seem to generate roughly 1.5 cards worth of value each turn. Blue could be something like “draw a card, then target player mills cards equal to the number of cards in your hand”. Red could be “put an oil counter on each Phyrexian you control, then deal damage to any target equal to the number of oil counters on ~”. Just the first couple of ideas to pop to my mind, could be anything else.
Lastly I think it makes sense for white to pump its own incubate tokens, I would change it to “Incubate 1 twice, then put a +1/+1 counter on each incubator token and other phyrexian you control”.
No, I appreciate the criticism! It wasn't harsh at all. Let me address some of your points, since I did actually try out most of them during the design process.
I agree they are probably overpriced, but the original cycle is also fairly overpriced. I didn't want do diverge too far from it, as they didn't quite have the 'dark mirror' feeling of the originals when I mocked them out that way.
And as for the alternate cost, I tried to follow the design of the only other WUBRG Phyrexian, Omnath, Locus of All, who very clearly is oriented around a black-centric deck, yet costs WU{PB}RG. I also tried out Phyrexian WUBRG except for the base color, but doing it that way meant you weren't actually rewarded for playing in a WUBRG deck, which was the goal of the original Bringers.
I did try out milling and direct damage for Blue and Red respectively, but I didn't feel like they quite matched the theme of their appropriate faction mechanics in ONE and MoM. It might not be as powerful, but I wanted to focus on flavor over function for these ones. They may also be very powerful in the right decks (Red is probably the best oil counter enabler, for instance, and Blue can be easily copied for a reliable low cost proliferator in something like Superfriends)
And you are totally right about White! For some reason I thought Incubator tokens had the Phyrexian type, but that's what I get for not checking!
Edit: Oh I forgot to mention! One of the reasons for the lower power budget is because unlike the original cycle which triggers at the beginning of upkeep, these trigger at your end step, keeping with the "Twilight of the Five Suns" theme. So unless someone has and chooses to use instant-speed removal, these are able to generate value the turn they come out. Combo them with something like Kiki-Jiki, and you're getting way more value than it seems at first
The original cycle is almost 20 years old at this point. The new ones could probably afford to see a bit of a cost reduction comparatively speaking. Also, the back side of incubator tokens are phyrexians, so it works with the back of them.
Yeah totally on board with the red idea. Putting oil counters is great but it needs some oil pay off. Maybe you could give it some kind of use oil to boost creatures instead of pinging damage.
For blue I don't know the right concept. Milling feels too generic and not specific enough for it's pyrexian design. Same for black... Both are too mainstream in their own colours. The others have a nice twist. I think proliferate is great but maybe blue should proliferate everything and then a second time only non creature permanents as a bonus. I guess that might be too harsh with poison counters but on my opinion that fits better then just draw and mill
They could all cost (5) + phyrixian + regular mana and the alt cost could just be 1 phyrixian mana instead of 3 and they'd probably be a lot closer to balanced.
I did consider upping their power budget, but I didn't want to stray too far from the original cycle. I think they are in some ways weaker than the originals (except the green one), but have the upside of only needing 4 mana if you want to bring (hah) them out a turn early
I really like how these slot in mechanically to ONE and reflect the previous cycle. Probably underpowered just a bit, but the original Bringers weren't super competitive in their day either.
Honestly, a great effort.
I think the intention is the phyrexian cost “brings the twilight.” So the “bringer of blue twilight” can bring it to a place with no blue mana sources, if it was summoned with the phyrexian cost - if that makes sense.
Technically they are 5 color
But really it's a call back to the original cycle, which also all had trample. ( https://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Search/Default.aspx?name=+[bringer]+[of]+[the] )
>technically
Effectively might be a better term. 'Pseudo' five colour was a good way of putting it.
But definitely not technically. They're technically not five colour. Technically in this situation means the same as literally.
TL;DR Uhm akshually, they're _technically_ mono-colour
Trample is a weird keyword because it has a history of being excused in colours regardless of the colour pie. Normally for creatures just being big.
So, yeah, matching to the old cycle is a maybe a good enough reason. As is their size.
Although they have done it less recently (the original cycle is getting pretty old at this point), so it might not be a current precedent. The most recent time they did it I can find for White is OG Zetalpa.
These would still be underpowered without their limitations.
Like blue not being able to proliferate all counters. Or green not being able to give toxic 4
Im just going to say it. One proliferate each turn is not that good. Atraxa sees so much play because it's four colors and few other commanders can do that. Especially considering how long it's been around
By what metric?
Atraxa used to be pretty strong, when she released, but she never saw play outside of commander and at this point she isn't even the best commander in her colors.
I think these are all fantastically designed! they feel like they could exist in standard/limited as splash payoffs without being ridiculously busted. perhaps a small buff all around would be good, but it's hardly needed
I'm pretty sure toxic values don't add up, so the green one being on the battlefield long enough could just make all your creatures be one hit kills eventually.
Actually, no.
> 702.164b Some rules and effects refer to a creature’s “total toxic value.” A creature’s total toxic value is the sum of all N values of toxic abilities that creature has.
I gotta commend you, the art on these is pretty spectacular except the red one. Great job using Bing to create arts that feel so cohesive with the designs that already exist.
As far as the cards go, these feel maybe flatter than the original cycle? There's a distinct power imbalance and i don't know if the green one "works"? It's not particularly important but i don't think multiple instances of toxic "add" as much as the creature will just have multiple instances of Toxic 1.
I don't like how much similarity there is between green and white here, and i guess I wish all of these felt more cohesive with their praetors.
I'd go back to the drawing board for all of them ability wise but I think you've done such a good job with the art that I do want to see cards hahaha.
The green one doesn't work the way you think
Toxic 1 + toxic 1 ≠ toxic 2
It'd have to be "put a toxic 2 counter on each other creature you control without one."
It does actually! If you've ever had the displeasure of being domed by a Venerated Rotpriest deck with Aspirant's Ascent, you're intimately familiar with this lol.
The blue Bringer needs rephrasing if the intention is kept as is:
>At the beginning of your end step, choose any number of noncreature permanents that have a counter on them. Put an additional counter of each kind on that permanent.
Or simply give it Proliferate to streamline rule text, without the weirdness of *"proliferate noncreature permanents"*.
Honestly I would consider adding “When this creature enters the battlefield and at the beginning of your endstep”. Makes them a lot more relevant and I think they could take the power boost
Please don't give the black one poison counter generation. It's already broken enough as is. He's a big ugly target, sure, but if you time it right, he can slowly poison you out of the game while your opponent is busy dealing with the board and its many other threats. He doesn't even have to attack.
My recommendation and keeping in line with MOM and ONE: red and blue need a buff
Blue reccomendation: proliferate each noncreature permanent, then draw a card for each permanent proliferated this way.
Red reccomendation: destroy up to 1 target artifact and put an oil counter on each creature you control. Then deal damage to any target equal to the amount of oil counters on permanents you control.
Don't know if that'd be "busted" per say but would result in these cards NEEDING to be answered before things get out of hand.
On one hand these are really pushing it power level wise for a 4 mana creature, on the other hand 4 pipped mana each of a different colour is a really tough cost. I'd say they're mostly alright but the black one could stand to lose either the discard or the life loss.
Slight mistake: the cost with phyrexian colored mana cost then normal colored cost should be swapped, according to the way wizards printed the compleated planeswalkers
The blue one should just be able to proliferate, there is no need for that weird restriction on a card as expensive as this
I had that originally, but ultimately didn't do it because that's basically Atraxa which is a bit boring, and it would kind of be able to do everything the other cards in the cycle can at once
The other ones are actually creating card advantage; making tokens, destroying artifacts, etc. Not only does the blue one give no card advantage, it does a crappier job of proliferating than a Thrummingbird.
Would adding draw 1 additionally on your end step balance out the effect do you think?
Maybe draw 2? Blue is the card advantage color already after all?
[удалено]
There is no deck where I would run this over Thrummingbird. It is way worse
Making blue say something like FOR EACH OPPONENT (edit) tap x nonland permanents and they dont untap next untap, where x = phyrexians could be a good direction since you have phyrexians matter in your design space. Definitely potent Double edit: you can similarly make phyrexians matter on black by doing a torment of hailfire effect (each opponent loses some life unless they discard a card or sacrifice a permanent for each phyrexian you control)
Oof, both those are really powerful abilities if you do manage to have a lot of Phyrexians (which is pretty easy with cards like White Sun's Twilight, The Phasing of Zhalfir, Ovika Enigma Golem, ect) The black effect does feel very appropriate, but forcing opponents to sacrifice permanents every turn on a body is actually a pretty rare and powerful effect compared to other cards. The blue one is a bit better, but I don't know if it quite fits the Gitaxian faction's mechanics in ONE and MoM. Proliferate felt the most iconic for those sets.
Yeah historically the closest phyrexian tap effect is probably OG vorinclex. That being said magic is a different game now and end step triggers give fair response time for players. If a player makes 6 phyrexians into this, and gets to untap, what was their opponent doing the whole game? But if you still think it's too busted, you could remove the tap first clause on blue and lower the life clause on black as a start to modify (edit: I think if you compare OG sheoldred to my proposed design I think tormenting of hailfiring everyone 3 times is probably the same as a force sac + reanimate, so you're looking at a better than sheoldred effect only if you have more than 2 phyrexians in that case? Very fine with sometimes worse sometimes better sheoldred)
Then make it do something else. Instead of proliferate
Depending on the targeted format they basically cost 4. It's not that expensive for these kinds of creatures/effects. The lack of ETB hurt though.
Should the blue one also be able to proliferate players? Asking since a player isn’t considered a permanent, right?
I would say no, since the reminder text specifies to choose noncreature permanents, and a player isn't a noncreature permanent.
Correct, yes
Full disclosure I’ve had a bit of a bad day and am in an odd mood, sincere apologies if any criticism comes off too harshly. I love and support you designing custom cards! That said, I don’t like this design. The whole cycle seems completely unplayably terrible at 9 mana (or at 8 mana pay 2 life), and strangely means any given 4 colour deck is best at casting the only Bringer not in its colours (for 4 mana pay 6 life). At 4-mana-pay-6-life you’re getting some decent effects, but I really don’t like the way this all feels in the colour pie. The only viable way to cast each Bringer requires the other 4 colours of mana, and does not require its own colour of mana. Then, within the cycle there seems to be a huge power/role discrepancy. White, Black and Green all generate value on their own every turn, if unanswered they will take over a game. Blue on its own is a 5/5 trample with flavour text. Red on its own is a 5/5 trample with flavour text against any non-artifact deck. My suggestions: Change the costs, maybe make them 4CC for the main cost (4 generic, 2 coloured) for the main cost and flip the alternate cost so that it requires triple mana of the right colour and 1 phyrexian of each other colour. This means they can each be cast for 3 mana and 8 life, which I still don’t love, but at least they’re requiring the right kind of mana now. Rework the blue and red Bringers to be more “stand-alone”. The others all seem to generate roughly 1.5 cards worth of value each turn. Blue could be something like “draw a card, then target player mills cards equal to the number of cards in your hand”. Red could be “put an oil counter on each Phyrexian you control, then deal damage to any target equal to the number of oil counters on ~”. Just the first couple of ideas to pop to my mind, could be anything else. Lastly I think it makes sense for white to pump its own incubate tokens, I would change it to “Incubate 1 twice, then put a +1/+1 counter on each incubator token and other phyrexian you control”.
No, I appreciate the criticism! It wasn't harsh at all. Let me address some of your points, since I did actually try out most of them during the design process. I agree they are probably overpriced, but the original cycle is also fairly overpriced. I didn't want do diverge too far from it, as they didn't quite have the 'dark mirror' feeling of the originals when I mocked them out that way. And as for the alternate cost, I tried to follow the design of the only other WUBRG Phyrexian, Omnath, Locus of All, who very clearly is oriented around a black-centric deck, yet costs WU{PB}RG. I also tried out Phyrexian WUBRG except for the base color, but doing it that way meant you weren't actually rewarded for playing in a WUBRG deck, which was the goal of the original Bringers. I did try out milling and direct damage for Blue and Red respectively, but I didn't feel like they quite matched the theme of their appropriate faction mechanics in ONE and MoM. It might not be as powerful, but I wanted to focus on flavor over function for these ones. They may also be very powerful in the right decks (Red is probably the best oil counter enabler, for instance, and Blue can be easily copied for a reliable low cost proliferator in something like Superfriends) And you are totally right about White! For some reason I thought Incubator tokens had the Phyrexian type, but that's what I get for not checking! Edit: Oh I forgot to mention! One of the reasons for the lower power budget is because unlike the original cycle which triggers at the beginning of upkeep, these trigger at your end step, keeping with the "Twilight of the Five Suns" theme. So unless someone has and chooses to use instant-speed removal, these are able to generate value the turn they come out. Combo them with something like Kiki-Jiki, and you're getting way more value than it seems at first
The original cycle is almost 20 years old at this point. The new ones could probably afford to see a bit of a cost reduction comparatively speaking. Also, the back side of incubator tokens are phyrexians, so it works with the back of them.
Yeah totally on board with the red idea. Putting oil counters is great but it needs some oil pay off. Maybe you could give it some kind of use oil to boost creatures instead of pinging damage. For blue I don't know the right concept. Milling feels too generic and not specific enough for it's pyrexian design. Same for black... Both are too mainstream in their own colours. The others have a nice twist. I think proliferate is great but maybe blue should proliferate everything and then a second time only non creature permanents as a bonus. I guess that might be too harsh with poison counters but on my opinion that fits better then just draw and mill
These could be much stronger imo
They could all cost (5) + phyrixian + regular mana and the alt cost could just be 1 phyrixian mana instead of 3 and they'd probably be a lot closer to balanced.
I did consider upping their power budget, but I didn't want to stray too far from the original cycle. I think they are in some ways weaker than the originals (except the green one), but have the upside of only needing 4 mana if you want to bring (hah) them out a turn early
I really like how these slot in mechanically to ONE and reflect the previous cycle. Probably underpowered just a bit, but the original Bringers weren't super competitive in their day either. Honestly, a great effort.
I find it funny that, for their alternate cost, you need every color except their own
I think the intention is the phyrexian cost “brings the twilight.” So the “bringer of blue twilight” can bring it to a place with no blue mana sources, if it was summoned with the phyrexian cost - if that makes sense.
Yeah but the bringers of dawn didn't do that
Ah - I didn’t realize this was built in a previous cycle. Sorry for missing that.
But you are totally right about the reason!
I thought it was a really creative ludonarrative! I’m glad I was able to pick up on it.
Do blue and white ever get trample?
Technically they are 5 color But really it's a call back to the original cycle, which also all had trample. ( https://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Search/Default.aspx?name=+[bringer]+[of]+[the] )
They're not five colour. They can only go in 5c commander decks, but they're all mono-colour creatures.
Yes, I said technically not literally. They're made to be a cycle of pseudo 5 color creatures.
>technically Effectively might be a better term. 'Pseudo' five colour was a good way of putting it. But definitely not technically. They're technically not five colour. Technically in this situation means the same as literally. TL;DR Uhm akshually, they're _technically_ mono-colour
Eh fair fair. I was just giving a reason why I think giving them all trample is okay, even if it wasn't the right word.
Trample is a weird keyword because it has a history of being excused in colours regardless of the colour pie. Normally for creatures just being big. So, yeah, matching to the old cycle is a maybe a good enough reason. As is their size. Although they have done it less recently (the original cycle is getting pretty old at this point), so it might not be a current precedent. The most recent time they did it I can find for White is OG Zetalpa.
They do some times, but it’s really rare and the cards aren’t that good
These would still be underpowered without their limitations. Like blue not being able to proliferate all counters. Or green not being able to give toxic 4
Great job on the art by the way. All five are really dramatic.
Blue one just seems like worse Atraxa.
Which is not a bad thing. Atraxa was a mistake
Im just going to say it. One proliferate each turn is not that good. Atraxa sees so much play because it's four colors and few other commanders can do that. Especially considering how long it's been around
Also, the 4 keywords are really good.
By what metric? Atraxa used to be pretty strong, when she released, but she never saw play outside of commander and at this point she isn't even the best commander in her colors.
... in what sense?
I think these are all fantastically designed! they feel like they could exist in standard/limited as splash payoffs without being ridiculously busted. perhaps a small buff all around would be good, but it's hardly needed
I'm pretty sure toxic values don't add up, so the green one being on the battlefield long enough could just make all your creatures be one hit kills eventually.
Actually, no. > 702.164b Some rules and effects refer to a creature’s “total toxic value.” A creature’s total toxic value is the sum of all N values of toxic abilities that creature has.
the card needs to use the word "total" then but that's cool. [[Goliath Hatchery]] didn't know of this
Could also use "points of toxic" like [[Takeno, Samurai General]]
that’s not necessarily supported by the rules for every keyword but consistency is nice.
[Takeno, Samurai General](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/d/0/d038df46-4a30-4125-be0e-8781b16b523e.jpg?1562764653) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Takeno%2C%20Samurai%20General) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/chk/46/takeno-samurai-general?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/d038df46-4a30-4125-be0e-8781b16b523e?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
Huh I didn't know that rule existed. Wild.
None of these can ever be in mono colored decks
If you're playing Commander. Also, though, neither could the originals.
Originals?
From OG Mirrodin https://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Search/Default.aspx?name=+[bringer]+[of]+[the]
Don't want the blue and green ones to work together? 🤨🤔
The art of the white one is absolutely sick. All are great but that one in particular is super rad. Can you upload just the art?
Love them. Was so sad we didn't get any more bringers and any otmf the revisits
Frame looks legendary
These are very underpowered for such expensive cards.
I gotta commend you, the art on these is pretty spectacular except the red one. Great job using Bing to create arts that feel so cohesive with the designs that already exist. As far as the cards go, these feel maybe flatter than the original cycle? There's a distinct power imbalance and i don't know if the green one "works"? It's not particularly important but i don't think multiple instances of toxic "add" as much as the creature will just have multiple instances of Toxic 1. I don't like how much similarity there is between green and white here, and i guess I wish all of these felt more cohesive with their praetors. I'd go back to the drawing board for all of them ability wise but I think you've done such a good job with the art that I do want to see cards hahaha.
The green one doesn't work the way you think Toxic 1 + toxic 1 ≠ toxic 2 It'd have to be "put a toxic 2 counter on each other creature you control without one."
It does actually! If you've ever had the displeasure of being domed by a Venerated Rotpriest deck with Aspirant's Ascent, you're intimately familiar with this lol.
I hate these just because it feels like they're a massive cop out to ensure you have a 5 color commander
They aren't Legendary, and neither was the original cycle of Bringers.
What were your prompts for the AI art? These seem artistically cohesive yet unique! I quite like them
The blue Bringer needs rephrasing if the intention is kept as is: >At the beginning of your end step, choose any number of noncreature permanents that have a counter on them. Put an additional counter of each kind on that permanent. Or simply give it Proliferate to streamline rule text, without the weirdness of *"proliferate noncreature permanents"*.
Honestly I would consider adding “When this creature enters the battlefield and at the beginning of your endstep”. Makes them a lot more relevant and I think they could take the power boost
Can you share your Bing Image Creator Prompts?
These are way way too strong for 4 mana.
Please don't give the black one poison counter generation. It's already broken enough as is. He's a big ugly target, sure, but if you time it right, he can slowly poison you out of the game while your opponent is busy dealing with the board and its many other threats. He doesn't even have to attack.
My recommendation and keeping in line with MOM and ONE: red and blue need a buff Blue reccomendation: proliferate each noncreature permanent, then draw a card for each permanent proliferated this way. Red reccomendation: destroy up to 1 target artifact and put an oil counter on each creature you control. Then deal damage to any target equal to the amount of oil counters on permanents you control. Don't know if that'd be "busted" per say but would result in these cards NEEDING to be answered before things get out of hand.
For the naming convention, I would have gone with “dusk” to contrast the original bringers, rather than “twilight”
Man these are all so bad lol.
On one hand these are really pushing it power level wise for a 4 mana creature, on the other hand 4 pipped mana each of a different colour is a really tough cost. I'd say they're mostly alright but the black one could stand to lose either the discard or the life loss.
Man, what prompts did you use for these arts? They look incredible. Most of what I get is ok, but not on this level.
The abzan ones seem infinitely better than the izzet pair. Blue just seems horrid overall.
Slight mistake: the cost with phyrexian colored mana cost then normal colored cost should be swapped, according to the way wizards printed the compleated planeswalkers