Retracing My Steps

After taking a little time off for some much needed rest, I've had some more time to think about my GDS2 submission. On this, the eve of the 8 finalists moving into the most exciting part of the competition, I'd like to take a quick moment to go over my designs and talk about exactly why they weren't quite up to par.
I'll preface this by saying: I haven't looked too deeply into the finalists' submissions. Part of that is just that I've been busy; I usually go play Magic on Thursday and Friday nights, and I was out of town for the weekend away from my computer. But a little of it is also that I wasn't really ready to read them until I had satisfied myself about my own entry.
I'll skip the essays because I feel like there's not much more I can say on those; instead I'll jump right to the design test, where I feel like I have the most improvement to make.

Part I - The World

 A. What is the name of your world?Atheram

It's a name. Not much to say about it. I was trying to capture the feel of the word "Æther" without being too archaic.

B. Describe your world in one sentence or one sentence fragment. (15 word maximum.) For example: An adventure world where the land itself attacks all visitors.

A world unstuck in reality, where the material and immaterial are confused and entwined.

Again, I feel like this speaks for itself.

C. Describe the flavor of your world. (250 word maximum)

On a small plane nestled in the folds of the Blind Eternities, things weren't dying. They would cease to live, certainly, but their essences lingered. The afterlife had become a closed loop, and was twisting itself around and through the plane like a nine-dimensional moebius strip. At the same time, noncorporeal creatures (elementals, spirits, and illusions, among others) were growing more fantastical and erratic, while some corporeal beings were beginning to become ungrounded, getting more spectral. Something had shifted this world from its place in reality, and that jarring displacement has caused the the spirits of the afterlife spill out and cycle through the plane in an endless cycle of not-quite-life and impermanent-death. Reality is broken, and the conceptual is becoming more solid than the actual. This is Atheram, a world caught between the real and the unreal - between the body and the essence. A world of enchantment... and enchantments.

Taken pretty wholesale from my writeup on the wiki, I made this well before it was asked for and was really satisfied with it.

D. Describe your world through the lens of its mechanics. (250 word maximum)

The focus of this block is enchantments. With the world slipping out of reality, the abstract is overtaking the ordinary. As such, enchantments are going to be much more prevalent. There will be Enchantment Creatures - fragile beings that Release their essence when they die. You'll also see Auras with Emulate that don't quite work like you'd expect - they affect the world around them rather than the creature they're attached to. There's also a theme of a broken afterlife, with some creatures having some way to return after "death," and the return of Haunt, but with a twist: Hauntings now act like creature enchantments, allowing creatures with Haunt to continue to affect the game even when they die.

I definitely didn't get close to the 250 word limit with this, and I really should have. On my wiki, I had even written up some short overviews of some of the mechanics; Release especially I would have liked to share my reasoning behind. I don't really know why I didn't add more to this; mostly I was really trying to be as concise as possible, but I feel like this was too concise. Here's some of what I would like to have tried to integrate:

"How can Enchantment Creatures feel different from regular ones? Well, how are they different? As opposed to Artifact Creatures, which usually are colorless, enchantment creatures are basically the same as regular ones in terms of casting cost. What IS different is that they are more fragile. They can be hit by more removal. So how do we use that? We give them something to do when they're destroyed.

"In the world of Atheram, enchantments are becoming creatures and creatures are becoming enchantments. What if, when you destroy their corporeal form, it releases their essence? That the creature becomes an enchantment, or enchantment analogue."

Part II - The Cards

1. Feature Article

Embra Brightflame (mythic rare) 

1RG

Planeswalker - Embra

Starting Loyalty: 3

+1: Until the end of your next turn, red and green mana doesn't empty from your mana pool as steps and phases end.

-2: Put an X/X Elemental creature token into play, where X is the amount of red and green mana in your mana pool.

-5: Return each card in your graveyard to your hand.

Overall, I like this one. I wanted to make a relatively cheaper planeswalker, and I was pretty fond of the first ability. The other abilities were pretty much made to complement that one. Straightforwardly, as with the -2 ability, and less explicitly with the final, where it works fine on its own, but by having a huge amount of mana in your mana pool you'll be more able to play the cards you return.

One of the things I'm not really happy with is the color. I didn't really think that this was very interesting as a monogreen 'walker, though it certainly could have been. I'm still not entirely sure, but if I were doing this again, I might have stuck with monogreen.

2. Making Magic

Kyra, the Lost (mythic rare)

1GG

Legendary Enchantment Creature - Elf Spirit

3/3

You may play Kyra, the Lost from exile.

Release 5 (When this card goes to a graveyard from the battlefield, you may exile it. If you do, put another enchantment card with converted mana cost 5 or less in your hand or graveyard onto the battlefield.)

This is a card I've made a couple times in a couple forms. This iteration introduced Release to the design, which I'm actually quite pleased with. (Before, it was just playable from exile and exiled itself upon death.) I do feel like that type line is a little clunky, but it's probably just under okay.

Like I mention in the commentary (which I'm not including here, but I am revisiting), all Enchantment Creatures will have Release. The standard will be for their Release amount to be 1 less than their cost, but I wanted Kyra to be splashy. That may not be the best way to introduce the mechanic though, so I'm not sure that was the best idea.

3. Serious Fun

Soul Battery (Rare)

[http://community.wizards.com/magicthegathering/wiki/Labs:Gds/gds2/setzerg/Cards]

5

Artifact

Whenever a creature goes to a graveyard from the battlefield, put a charge counter on this.

T, remove X charge counters from this: Return target creature card in a graveyard with converted mana cost X or less to the battlefield.

This was actually designed by my brother. It is basically amazing in multiplayer due to more graveyards and more deaths. The main issue I have with this is that it's a little black for a colorless card, though Mimic Vat has a similar effect and pulls it off, so who knows.

The main change I wanted to make to this was to add a sacrifice to the ability, but I'm not 100% on that. Mainly, the effect could get really dumb if repeatable, though the charge counters mitigate this. Additionally, as a wiki card, I was barred from making significant changes.

A minor templating issue too, which I just missed: "this" should be the name of the card, and for clarity it should say "under your control." I don't believe that templating was a major concern for the judging, however.

4. Limited Information

Sink into Muck (common)

[Black Enchantment Handler - http://community.wizards.com/magicthegathering/wiki/Labs:Gds/gds2/Seeonee/Prototypes/Black]

3B

Sorcery

Each opponent sacrifices an untapped permanent.

For Limited, I wanted to show how black has a way to deal with the inevitable enchantments that would be around. This is an elegant design that I liked, though it probably doesn't serve the need that I'm trying to push it as, which is inaccurate black enchantment removal. It's close to Misguided Rage; I made it black since that was where it was needed and the more directed targeting made it blacker in my eyes. The cost could definitely have been something like 1BB, but that's a minor enough change that is more Development than Design.

5. Savor the Flavor

Wrench into Being (uncommon)

[Turn Magic to Flesh - http://community.wizards.com/magicthegathering/wiki/Labs:Gds/gds2/setzerg/Cards]

1B

Instant

Target nonaura enchantment becomes a 4/2 Elemental creature in addition to its other types until end of turn.

This is a bit of a color shift. I'm mainly doing it as a way for black to be able to deal with enchantments (though inefficiently) but also for black to have a reason to care about enchantments. Colorwise, enchantments turning into creatures was white and green, but black seemed like the sort of color to give a body to immaterial concepts - think of Horrors, or the picture I had in my head, summoning Death as an entity (as in the failed attempt at the beginning of Sandman, or the Rite of AshkEnte). So I feel like it could simply be very flavorful and top down. Thus, the Savor the Flavor preview.

6. Building on a Budget

Fecund Enchantress (rare)

2WW

Creature - Human Druid

0/2

Whenever you cast an enchantment spell, you may draw a card.

Whenever an enchantment you control is put into a graveyard from the battlefield, you may draw a card.

This seemed like a pretty obvious design. I suppose that that's a mark against it. The other part of it is that there's a ton of possible card advantage. I dunno if it would see play at 4 mana. I mean, I would play it, obviously. And I guess I am the target audience here. In any case, this seems like exactly the sort of card I would expect to see a deck from Jake van Lunen on. I felt pretty confident about this despite it being maybe too obvious.

7. Top Decks

Aflame Elemental (rare)

2RRR

Creature - Elemental

5/1

Haunt (When this card is put into a graveyard from the battlefield, exile it haunting target creature.)

Haunted creature gets +5/+1.

When haunted creature is put into a graveyard, it deals 5 damage to target creature or player.

I felt pretty uncertain about this column in general. It's this sort of card that I don't really feel like I'm good at designing. I stuck to something pretty aggro. It's a natural 3-for-1, usually. It's a little awkward if it's your only creature when it dies, but not so much as to not want to play it. The balance on this is really weird; on the one hand, it's not a great creature to begin with, but it's a big swing once it becomes an "enchantment." I intentionally made sure that it wouldn't be too hard to get rid of after haunting, so that the third ability is relevant and that the second ability isn't ridiculous, but I'm still not really happy with how this wound up.

8. From the Lab

School of Thought (rare)

2UU

Enchantment - Aura

Enchant Creature

Emulate - Each creature you control other than enchanted creature gets all activated abilities of enchanted creature.

This is one of the first cards I came up with for the set. When you consider the idea of global local enchantments, it's basically one of the first, most interesting ideas. The wording is a little awkward (since it requires that "other than enchanted creature" clause) and I'm not sure that another wording wouldn't be better, but it gets the idea of Emulate across pretty nicely, I think.

9. The Week That Was

Inspiring Glow (uncommon)

2G

[http://community.wizards.com/magicthegathering/wiki/Labs:Gds/gds2/Seeonee/Prototypes/Green]

Enchantment - Aura

Enchant creature

Enchanted creature gets +2/+2.

When enchanted creature leaves the battlefield, choose one -- draw a card; or return ~ to its owner's hand.

This is pretty basic. I feel like it wasn't particularly saying anything valuable, but I also wasn't really sure of what I could really do with this column. it wasn't clear what was desired here. It was probably a pretty weak design, but it was at least

10. Latest Developments

Warweary Villa (rare)

Land

T: Add 1 to your mana pool.

3WW: Warweary Villa loses all abilities and becomes an enchantment with "Creatures you control get +1/+1 and have first strike."

It is a weakness of mine to make really obscure punny references for no particular reason. I wanted to make something Stalking Stones-esque, and that could be part of a cycle. I wasn't sure about the colorless mana; it certainly could have been white (but I would probably have put in "comes into play tapped"), but what I like about this is that  it makes a relevant land drop in the early game, or acts like an enchantment late-game. It also would make the virtual enchantment density of the set higher. It may be a little complex for a cycle though, and I might have wanted to put reminder text on there that "(this effect does not end at end of turn.)"

Overall, I feel like I probably went to hard into the Enchantment theme - not all of the previews had to be so strongly themed. I definitely know what I would have liked to do better and I do feel like I've learned something valuable from doing all this work.

Looking back to figure out why you did things a certain way and analyzing what went right and wrong is a good exercise to keep in your toolbox. This applies to all sorts of things, including deckbuilding. Being able to divorce yourself from a deck you've made and examining the problems or missing parts is an important part of making it the best possible. So be sure to keep looking backwards.

Next time, building with a builder and something I call the Trident.