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January 14, 2009, 07:29:10 PM
Reply #15

Elf_Lvr

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Re: Brave New World spoilers!
« Reply #15 on: January 14, 2009, 07:29:10 PM »
Aalistair the Violent (G)(G)(G)(G)
Planeswalker - Aalistair
+1: Untap all basic lands you control.
-2: Alistair deals 2 damage to target creature.
-6: Search your library for up to 4 basic land cards and put them into play tapped. Shuffle your library afterwards.
Loyalty: 5
R

I don't know about him. His first ability seems really good - compared with Garruk, for example. Sure, it's limited to Basics, but what else will you use in a mono deck? The last one, on the other hand, seems underpowered unless you're somehow ramping into a Blaze-like effect. I guess it could be extremely good - depending on if you have some green (X) spells in this set.

Quote
Abel the Treacherous (U)(U)(U)
Planeswalker - Abel
Chroma - As Abel comes into play, put a loyalty counter on him for each blue mana symbol among the costs of permanents you control (Abel counts itself).
+1: Look at the top 3 cards of your library. Put them back in any order or shuffle your library.
+1: Destroy target creature. You lose 4 life.
-11: Gain control of all permanents.
Loyalty: 0
R

I love the Chroma planeswalker. I'm not sure if "Destroy target creature," is a very '(U)' ability. Although if you're bleeding the pie a little, I can see it working. Not sure if his last ability should really steal land, though - that's a bit out there.

Quote
Baal the Corrupted (B)(B)(B)
Planeswalker - Baal
-1: Draw a card. You lose 1 life.
-2: Return target creature card from your graveyard to play.
-5: Return all creature cards from all graveyards to play under your control. Those creatures gain haste. At end of turn, remove them from the game.
Loyalty: 4
R

Hah. I love this guy for the universal Unearth. I've always had a soft spot for that. Anyways, I'd have to see how he plays - I can understand that the ability costs less because he has no way to add to himself.

Quote
Lyn the Enthralling (W)(W)(W)(W)
Planeswalker - Lyn
+1: Gain 3 life.
-2: Gain control of target creature.
-8: Remove from the game all creatures you don't control.
Loyalty: 5
R

I'm iffy on stealing any creature for -2. That's a really good ability. But I guess for pure white cost, it's gotta be pretty good.

Quote
Morwen the Furious (R)(R)(R)
Planeswalker - Morwen
+1: Morwen deals 2 damage to target player.
+1: Destroy target creature with power 3 or less.
-2: Change the target of a spell that has a single target. You may play this ability any time you could play an instant (if you play this ability during your turn, it still counts as your Planeswalker ability used for the turn).
-5: Put 3 6/1 red elemental creature tokens in play. They have haste, trample and "at end of turn, sacrifice this creature".
Loyalty: 3
R

I might just get rid of the second "+1" ability altogether to remove clutter. The first two together make it really, really good - choosing between 2 player damage and essentially 3 creature damage is a heck of a lot better than Chandra, for example. Yeah, I know Chandra sucks, but it's a lot of escalation, you know?

Anyways, for "brothers" some of these sound awfully... female.  :P
Happy Hunting!
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Maybe you guys can find a bard and have your story of heroic Balrog proximity put into verse.

January 14, 2009, 07:32:14 PM
Reply #16

FM

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Re: Brave New World spoilers!
« Reply #16 on: January 14, 2009, 07:32:14 PM »
Actually, I named Morwen after the character from LotR: the Third Age. I didn't know the name was used in another story, though, but all of those names are "borrowed" names, exactly to show that those Planeswalkers are not "beings", but simply humans. Also, all of the names have a tie-in either with their associated color, their nickname or both, associating them with the characters from where I've got the names.

January 14, 2009, 07:48:01 PM
Reply #17

FM

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Re: Brave New World spoilers!
« Reply #17 on: January 14, 2009, 07:48:01 PM »
@ elf lvr: I never stated they were MALE brothers, just a linguistic issue, they are, in fact, brothers and sisters, Morwen and Lyn are female.
I thought about changing Abel to non-land permanents, but then, he'd suck since in a control vs. aggro match-up you wouldn't use it because it's too slow, and you'd need to keep the board clear anyway, so let's assume an aggro-heavy meta, Abel would be left in a sideboard. But then again, why boarding him in against control? If you EVER got to go off, he'd suck as well, and his adding ability is not that great anyway. I expect Abel to be ABSURDLY hard to go off, so that's why his truly IS a "I win" ability. But c'mon, it's not NEARLY as broken as Garruk, going off the following turn after it hist play!
On this subject, Aalistair is actually there to stir curiosity and doubt on players. You see, you make a deck full of basics, you can drop him for free at turn 4, sacn him at turn 5 and at turn 6 have all the mana available for, say, a Titanic Ultimatum. However, that is assuming you draw all those basics on time! However, he fits a "simpler" design for monogreen decks: filtering. You get 4 extra lands out of your way, QUICKLY, not to mention you can play Aalistair, untap, use up the four mana how you see fit. Then, next turn, you sac him, get 4 lands out, play a SECOND Aalistair and untap them all. Didn't see THAT coming, now did ya? ;)
As I said, all of them have a tied in ability and a bled ability, so I'd rather keep the red walker with 4 of those anyway. Also, chandra has an important advantage, her ultimate is far more impressive, her middle ability, which you will almost never use, IS better for then you really HAVE to use, and she starts off with a BUNCH more loyalty. No, I actually think Chandra is better, overall, than Morwen, but Morwen fits the Sligh strategy in which red excels at, specially monored, which is what I'm trying to depict. I'll give some thought to what you said about the first 2 abilties overlapping, though, I might change one of them.
And as for Lyn, I took that ability directly from Nicol Bolas' Planeswalker card that is coming out in Conflux. I thouht about raising its cost, but let's face it, she costs A TON to come down, has a sucky ability (at most) for adding counters, and takes forever to "go off", so I decided is was a nice enough trade, so as to try and make her more useful. So you see, if you're not very far behind, you can try to turn the tables by stealing their biggest beater - FOREVER, I might add -, otherwise, if the game is crawling, you can make it crawl more and then wipe their board completely.
Thanks for the review, gp for ya!

January 15, 2009, 02:41:02 AM
Reply #18

leokula

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Re: Brave New World spoilers!
« Reply #18 on: January 15, 2009, 02:41:02 AM »
And here they are! Each brother, of course, represents a color, I'm sure you already knew that, duh! BUT which one is each? And how will their abilities tie in with the set's theme? Each of them will have a strong tie with their native color, or course, and will show their "evil" nature, what drove them to turn on their brothers.
Well, enough waiting, here they are, in all their glory! My first ACTUAL cards for Brave New World, the five brothers!

Aalistair the Violent (G)(G)(G)(G)
Planeswalker - Aalistair
+1: Untap all basic lands you control.
-2: Alistair deals 2 damage to target creature.
-6: Search your library for up to 4 basic land cards and put them into play tapped. Shuffle your library afterwards.
Loyalty: 5
R

I think the +1 ability is very overpowered and his -6 ability is not that awesome. The +1 ability provides a lot of speed already. I'd use -6 to do something else.

Abel the Treacherous (U)(U)(U)
Planeswalker - Abel
Chroma - As Abel comes into play, put a loyalty counter on him for each blue mana symbol among the costs of permanents you control (Abel counts itself).
+1: Look at the top 3 cards of your library. Put them back in any order or shuffle your library.
+1: Destroy target creature. You lose 4 life.
-11: Gain control of all permanents.
Loyalty: 0
R

I like him, but the second one should be like -2 IMO.

Baal the Corrupted (B)(B)(B)
Planeswalker - Baal
-1: Draw a card. You lose 1 life.
-2: Return target creature card from your graveyard to play.
-5: Return all creature cards from all graveyards to play under your control. Those creatures gain haste. At end of turn, remove them from the game.
Loyalty: 4
R

I don't like him having all less abilities. I know u're bending the design here, but I personally don't like it. BTW did you read the 18 rules for planeswalkers design at Daily MTG?

Lyn the Enthralling (W)(W)(W)(W)
Planeswalker - Lyn
+1: Gain 3 life.
-2: Gain control of target creature.
-8: Remove from the game all creatures you don't control.
Loyalty: 5
R

I think 3 life is just too much and the -2 is a lot of color bleeding if you ask me LOL :)

Morwen the Furious (R)(R)(R)
Planeswalker - Morwen
+1: Morwen deals 2 damage to target player.
+1: Destroy target creature with power 3 or less.
-2: Change the target of a spell that has a single target. You may play this ability any time you could play an instant (if you play this ability during your turn, it still counts as your Planeswalker ability used for the turn).
-5: Put 3 6/1 red elemental creature tokens in play. They have haste, trample and "at end of turn, sacrifice this creature".
Loyalty: 3
R

I just love the -5 ability man, that's very very awesome and old skull. I would just drop the -2 ability.


About the lands, I know they fit the theme and stuff, but bottom line is there's no reason to use them over basic lands. I think they should have a very small benefit, something like "when it comes into play untap a creature / land"... don't know, but just add something to distinct if from basic lands.

January 15, 2009, 04:22:36 AM
Reply #19

Thranduil

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Re: Brave New World spoilers!
« Reply #19 on: January 15, 2009, 04:22:36 AM »
Aalistair the Violent (G)(G)(G)(G)
Planeswalker - Aalistair
+1: Untap all basic lands you control.
-2: Alistair deals 2 damage to target creature.
-6: Search your library for up to 4 basic land cards and put them into play tapped. Shuffle your library afterwards.
Loyalty: 5
R
I'm with the others, the +1 ability seems hugely powerful and the -6 not particularly. I think his first ability should be: "+1: Search your library for a basic land and put it into play tapped." (or maybe 2 lands, I'm not so sure about the balancing for MTG) and then make the ultimate something more exciting like making some kind of behemoth! :twisted:

Abel the Treacherous (U)(U)(U)
Planeswalker - Abel
Chroma - As Abel comes into play, put a loyalty counter on him for each blue mana symbol among the costs of permanents you control (Abel counts itself).
+1: Look at the top 3 cards of your library. Put them back in any order or shuffle your library.
+1: Destroy target creature. You lose 4 life.
-11: Gain control of all permanents.
Loyalty: 0
R
I'm agreeing with LK - I think it would be better if the second ability was -1 or -2.

Baal the Corrupted (B)(B)(B)
Planeswalker - Baal
-1: Draw a card. You lose 1 life.
-2: Return target creature card from your graveyard to play.
-5: Return all creature cards from all graveyards to play under your control. Those creatures gain haste. At end of turn, remove them from the game.
Loyalty: 4
R
I see no reason why the -1 ability couldn't be +1.

Lyn the Enthralling (W)(W)(W)(W)
Planeswalker - Lyn
+1: Gain 3 life.
-2: Gain control of target creature.
-8: Remove from the game all creatures you don't control.
Loyalty: 5
R
I'm also leaning towards gaining 2 life being enough. And given the ultimate is about creatures, it would be cool to have something different for the second ability.

Morwen the Furious (R)(R)(R)
Planeswalker - Morwen
+1: Morwen deals 2 damage to target player.
+1: Destroy target creature with power 3 or less.
-2: Change the target of a spell that has a single target. You may play this ability any time you could play an instant (if you play this ability during your turn, it still counts as your Planeswalker ability used for the turn).
-5: Put 3 6/1 red elemental creature tokens in play. They have haste, trample and "at end of turn, sacrifice this creature".
Loyalty: 3
R
I would definitely get rid of one of those abilities - there isn't enough room on the card for the -2. For interest, I would get rid of one of the +1 so that you can keep the instant ability.

Thranduil

January 15, 2009, 04:58:34 AM
Reply #20

FM

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Re: Brave New World spoilers!
« Reply #20 on: January 15, 2009, 04:58:34 AM »
I must say, I'm not liking the tie-in of Aalistair's abilities with his subtitle as well. I guess I'll mess around with him a bit.
For Lyn, I gave her more lifegaining than Ajani because she has to build for 1 more turn to go off, and even after she does, let's face it, it's not as close to a guaranteed win as Ajani is. But I think I'll slash 1 loyalty from her, in order to keep the second ability so she can fit in control strategies (and control VS. control match-ups, even). You see, even though both abilties tie in to creatures, they are severely different from one another, specially in when you'd use one or the other, so I don't think it's as overlapping as the ones on Morwen (which I'll do something about it, as well).
I'll leave Abel's second ability as adding loyalty, because he won't come into pay with a lot of loyalty most of the time anyway, and building up to his ultimate will be a tremendous pain, and let's face it, his first ability is nice, but not nearly as good to be worth it to keep using it. Also, he drains your life pretty quickly with th second one, so I think it's a steep enough price to pay in order to gain one loyalty out of it.
As for Baal, Jace is a blue Planeswalker, the color of card drawing, and it costs 1 to draw a card from him, thus, I gave Baal the same ability, at the added cost of 1 life, so it's probably more than enough. Also, I gave him only reducing abilities exactly because his abilities are all awesome when you consider his cost. Dread return, the most used reanimation spell right now, costs either 4 mana or 3 creatures, or both. He costs a single (B)(B)(B) and can bring back two creatures, I think even this might prove to be too much in the end. And then, his last ability is just awesome. You have to jump through a hoop (not even "some" hoops, since it's not that hard to pull off), but if you do, he goes off the turn he lands, which is absurdly powerful. Then again, it won't be worth it to pull it off early, since the graveyards won'tbe so filled. Or will they? ;)
Well, I'll edit them and repost them later.
PS: For the lands, that's exactly the idea, having them being no different from basics, except for their type (also, I think giving them any ability would make them too good, they ALREADY have an awesome ability, which is you CAN play ANY NUMBER of them in your deck, they ARE basic lands, not only lands with basci land types). Why? You'll understand after a few more cards.

January 15, 2009, 10:11:29 AM
Reply #21

FM

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Re: Brave New World spoilers!
« Reply #21 on: January 15, 2009, 10:11:29 AM »
Ok, here they are, again, revamped (as necessary)!

Aalistair the Violent (G)(G)(G)(G)
Planeswalker - Aalistair
Split Second.
+1: Put a 3/3 green elephant creature token into play. Sacrifice an untapped land.
-2: Alistair deals 2 damage to target creature.
-6: Creatures you control gain +1/+1, trample and double-strike until end of turn.
Loyalty: 5
R

Aalistair was the one who underwent the most changes. I didn't like the final result tie-in with his name, ramping up mana does not seem very "violent" to me. I actually liked him for that small interaction I showed EL, sacking on to get 4 lands, playing another one from hand, untapping them all. However, that really IS overkill, and he might end up being way too good. So, how do you like him now? "Violent" enough? A few explanations. I gave him split second as a way to depict his "violence", meaning he WILL come down. I gave him an old-school ability leokula might recognize (since he knew Ball Lightning, he might know Rogue Elephant), not to mention being an ADDING ability that gives you creatures... at a cost (thus effectively having a cap). You halt your mana development, or even shrink your manabase if you don't draw more lands. Sure, he can build your army on his own, but for how long? Is it worh it to "lock" yourself out of the game? I mean, you drop him, make 2 elephants, and then they wipe the board clean. You're now down 1-2 lands in relation to them and have a useless planeswalker. I think it might cut it. As for his ultimate, I didn't want it to be Garruk's, so at first I made it give trample, double-strike and shroud. But consider this, with Garruk, you swing with a 2/2 as a 5/5, a 3/3 as a 6/6 and a 4/4 as a 7/7. With Aalistair, they'd swing at 4/4, 6/6 and 8/8. Essentially the same, but let's face it, you have more 2/2s than 4/4s, specially early on, so that +1/+1, even though looking puny, makes him a BEAST when associated with double-strike!

Abel the Treacherous (U)(U)(U)
Planeswalker - Abel
Chroma - As Abel comes into play, put a loyalty counter on him for each blue mana symbol among the costs of permanents you control (Abel counts itself).
+1: Look at the top 3 cards of your library. Put them back in any order or shuffle your library.
+1: Destroy target creature. You lose 4 life.
-11: Gain control of all permanents.
Loyalty: 0
R

I thought about changing the second ability to lowering Loyalty. However, the first ability is pretty sucky 1-2 out of 3 turns, so I like giving the player another option. Not to mention, that option costs a GREAT deal of life (1/5 of your life for a creature? OUCH!) AND requires a creture to be targeted anyway, so I'm guessing it's fine. However, there IS the possibility that he becomes TOO useful, between toying with the first 2 abilities, so I'll keep him as long as the set makes it into playtest. When it does, I might change it around if he's too powerful (however, I don't really see his ultimate going off that easily, so that might balance him a bit, but I could be wrong).

Baal the Corrupted (B)(B)(B)
Planeswalker - Baal
-1: Draw a card. You lose 1 life.
-2: Return target creature card from your graveyard to play.
-5: Return all creature cards from all graveyards to play under your control. Those creatures gain haste. At end of turn, remove them from the game.
Loyalty: 4
R

Baal is remaining intact, for now. As I explained before, drawing cards in MtG is REALLY good (you don't draw NEARLY CLOSE as many cards as in LotR, except in dedicated decks), so gaining a counter out of it might be too much. I'm having a bit of second thoughts about his ultimate, though. I love the ability, but I don't think it's game-winning enough to justify going through the motions. I'm considering letting the ability instead remove the creatures from the graveyards and putting tokens into play (this way, even a grave full of 1/1s will be enough), so as to depict him "changing" the creatures by giving them the unholy semblance of life present in undeath. Any thoughts? Or would it be too close to Morwen? Personally, I like as it is, so you can build your deck around him (let's face it, a dedicated deck would win with their graveyard alone) instead of simply building a deck and jamming him inside.

Lyn the Enthralling (W)(W)(W)(W)
Planeswalker - Lyn
+1: Gain 3 life.
-2: Gain control of target creature.
-7: Remove from the game all creatures you don't control.
Loyalty: 4
R

For now, I'm keeping Lyn. Perhaps if someone can point future interactions that would make her life-gaining too good, I might tone it down. However, costing twice the white mana of Ajani and having all but useless abilities against an empty board, I think it really IS fine to up the gain a bit. Her loyalty, though, is now 4 (I lowered her ultimate by 1 as well, to keep the turn-count intact), mainly as to not allow her to take 2 creatures AND live through it.

Morwen the Furious (R)(R)(R)
Planeswalker - Morwen
+1: Morwen deals 2 damage to target player.
-2: Change the target of a spell that has a single target. You may play this ability any time you could play an instant (if you play this ability during your turn, it still counts as your Planeswalker ability used for the turn).
-5: Put 3 6/1 red elemental creature tokens in play. They have haste, trample and "at end of turn, sacrifice this creature".
Loyalty: 3
R

I lost her second ability in order to make room for the instant-speed one. I think the first ability is STILL balanced enough with her having such a low loyalty number and her ultimate being rather "counterable" (damage spells, removal, bounce, tap abilities, etc).
« Last Edit: January 15, 2009, 10:18:18 AM by Felipe Musco »

January 15, 2009, 10:13:53 AM
Reply #22

FM

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Re: Brave New World spoilers!
« Reply #22 on: January 15, 2009, 10:13:53 AM »
Thanks for the reviews, I'm handing you all some much-earned gp!

January 15, 2009, 06:01:43 PM
Reply #23

Thranduil

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Re: Brave New World spoilers!
« Reply #23 on: January 15, 2009, 06:01:43 PM »
Forgive my ignorance, but what does Split Second do?

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January 15, 2009, 06:42:18 PM
Reply #24

FM

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Re: Brave New World spoilers!
« Reply #24 on: January 15, 2009, 06:42:18 PM »
When a Split Second spell hits the stack, players can't use the stack until it resolves. They still gain priority, so they can use morph, and triggered abilities will still trigger and go onto the stack, but they may not willingly put something there (aside from "may" triggers). Long story short, he can't be countered. It means MORE, but this is the more obvious consequence.

January 16, 2009, 08:17:04 AM
Reply #25

SomeRandomDude

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Re: Brave New World spoilers!
« Reply #25 on: January 16, 2009, 08:17:04 AM »
Morwen's first ability is a bit OP, think, Sulfuric Vortex only better.
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January 16, 2009, 08:47:52 AM
Reply #26

Elf_Lvr

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Re: Brave New World spoilers!
« Reply #26 on: January 16, 2009, 08:47:52 AM »
Just thinking, FM, but wouldn't the ultimatums be better suited for your last set?
Happy Hunting!
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Maybe you guys can find a bard and have your story of heroic Balrog proximity put into verse.

January 16, 2009, 11:12:27 AM
Reply #27

FM

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Re: Brave New World spoilers!
« Reply #27 on: January 16, 2009, 11:12:27 AM »
Just thinking, FM, but wouldn't the ultimatums be better suited for your last set?

They would, their all allied-color-oriented. However, they are raw POWERFUL spells, and I'd like to show the experiments made as soon as they came into the world by then. You see, the way I picture them in the set, Cruel Ultimatum is a BLACK spell (of course, not by the rules, but in a sense Baal designed it BY HIMSELF, "borrowing the other colors of mana). I want those spells to appear early on to show that, even though they were able to bleed the pool like crazy, in the end some types of mana are still better suited for some tasks than others, and they'd LEARN that, which would then "encourage" them to ally with the allied colors. You see, you'd be much more inclined to side with Abel and Morwen if you knew that their magical help would help you get effects like the one in Cruel Ultimatum... This is also why these are the only allied-colored multi-colored cards in the set, and why the set has to little of them, I want them to remember later how much power they attained when combining the colors, which is why I have to show it early on. The other multi-colored cards will be all enemy-colored, and all significantly weaker, to show exactly this.

January 16, 2009, 11:17:27 AM
Reply #28

FM

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Re: Brave New World spoilers!
« Reply #28 on: January 16, 2009, 11:17:27 AM »
Morwen's first ability is a bit OP, think, Sulfuric Vortex only better.

Not really, as Sulfuric Vortex costs one less (R), being easier to cast; is an enchantment, being harder to get rid off; and prevents lifegain, which is one of the biggest resons it's so awesome. Now, comparing it to Chandra, THAN you might be right, it's strictly better than Chandra's ability, and she costs 2 less mana to cast. However, she's less versatile than Chandra and harder to build up (I lowered her loyalty to 2 again, btw), and her ultimate is easier to get around.

January 19, 2009, 06:23:46 AM
Reply #29

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Re: Brave New World spoilers!
« Reply #29 on: January 19, 2009, 06:23:46 AM »
Well, since no more comments came, I'll assume the 'walkers are finally fine and move on later the afternoon. ;) Sorry for no updates during this weekend, but I was taking the bar test, at least the first one (it's split in 2 parts here) anyway.