Magic: The Gathering Drive to Work Podcast - #432: Guildpact, Part 3

Episode Date: May 5, 2017

This is the third and final podcast in my three-part series on the design of Guildpact.

I'm pulling out of my driveway. We all know what that means. It's time for another drive to work. So I've been spending the last couple podcasts talking about Guildpact. I'm not done yet. I got up to M. Okay, so I'm up to Mizzium Transreliquit. Transreliquit? It's an artifact that costs three. For three, it becomes the copy of target artifact until end of turn and for one blue and a red so three, one blue, one red it becomes that artifact permanently. So the idea is

it's an artifact that I can play and if I'm not playing it in a blue and red deck, you know I'm not playing it with Izzet, okay it's an artifact that can temporarily turn into things but if I'm playing it in a blue red deck I have a little sort of, you know I don't have to pay for it every turn. I can temporarily turn into things. But, if I'm playing it in a blue-red deck, I have a little sort of, you know, I don't have to pay for it every turn. I can turn it into something and leave it there for a while.

So, this is part of the cycle of artifacts that are useful. Useful in any deck, but are more useful in the right color deck. Okay, Moratorium Stone. It's an artifact that calls one. Two and tap. Excise a card from a graveyard. Two, white, black, and tap and sacrifice it. Exile target non-land card from a graveyard.

All copies in that graveyard and in, I think, in play. Hold on a second. You exile a card from a graveyard. So two and tap, you exile a card from a graveyard. Two white, black in tap, you exile target non-land card from a graveyard, and then all copies in graveyards and on battlefield with the same name are exiled. So the idea is, if I'm playing, if I'm just playing this in a non-Orzhov deck, non-white-black deck, I can get rid of things in the graveyard, because there's things that can come back. But if I'm playing this in an Orzhov deck, I can not only use it to get rid of graveyard things, but I can get rid of things sharing the same name on the battlefield as well. And so once again, it just an artifact, part of the cycle. It's an artifact that's more effective

when used for its particular guild. Okay, next. Mortify. One white black. It's an instant. Destroy target creature or enchantment. So one of the things that's kind of cool is black, for example, can destroy creatures, but it

can't destroy enchantments. But green can destroy enchantments, but can can destroy creatures but it can't destroy enchantments so this is but green can destroy enchantments but can't destroy creatures so you kind of mix and match and put them together

and you get a nice clean spell there's people who thought this was part of a cycle although technically it wasn't part of a cycle

but there was a clean sort of cards that do blank or blank, but we didn't quite finish the cycle because it wasn't a cycle, but some people thought it was. Okay, Niv-Mizzix, Aerie of the Firemind.

It's a land. So we made a cycle of lands that were tied to different guilds. So they all tap and added a colorless mana, or they had an activation cost that required colored mana of that guild. So this one would cost two blue red. So four mana, one blue, one red. So four mana total, two which was generic, one blue, one red. Tap, exile top card of a library until next turn.

You can cast it if it's an instant or sorcery. So this is kind of a little bit of a precursor of what we call Impulsive Draw in Red, where you kind of exile atop a library, you can cast it. Well, this is playing around, and obviously Izzet has an instant sorcery theme, and so this card helps you interact with instants and sorceries. Okay, next we get to Niv-Mizzet, the Firemind. Two blue-blue, red-red, legendary creature, legendary creature, dragon wizard. It's 4-4.

He flies, because he's a dragon. And whenever you draw a card, you deal one damage to target creature or player. And then he has the ability to tap-draw a card. So Niv-Mizzet is the leader and founder of the Izzet. In fact, Izzet is named after Niv-Mizzet.

Niv-Mizzet. That's where Izzet is named after Niv-Mizzet. Niv-Mizzet. That's where Izzet comes from. He's the leader. He's a super smart dragon. Magic has a bunch of really smart dragons. And he is the leader of the Izzet. So we wanted to make a card. I think the idea of this card was to make a kind

of fun combo-y card. And then it combines kind of the highlight of blue and red. What does blue love to do? Blue loves drawing cards. What does red love to do? Red loves doing direct damage. So it kind of combines them together. And the neat thing about this is if you sort of draw extra cards, you're going to do extra damage. So you can do a lot of cool things here. The other thing to remember is when you draw a card and discard a card, even looting, you're still drawing the card. So even when you don't go up in card advantage, you still can get damage out of this thing.

Okay next, Ogre Savant, 4 and a red, for a 3-2 Ogre Wizard. When it enters the battlefield, if you paid blue, return target creature to owner's hand. So basically it's a 3-2 creature for 4 and a red, but it becomes a mana ward. It becomes a creature that bounces a creature if you play blue. So instead of 4-R, if it's 3-blue-R, then it has this extra ability of bouncing something as an enter the battlefield effect. Like I said, this was a cycle where every color sort of... I think it was two cycles, but I think it went once one direction and once the other direction. I believe that's how we did it.

But anyway, this was something that was sort of a different way. Because the idea is sometimes when you're playing multicolor, if you get stranded, meaning I draw one of the colors but not the other color, you know, like this card obviously if you have blue and red, you want to cast it with blue and red. But if you get kind of stuck and you don't have blue but you have red,

you still can cast it. And so we were trying to make sure we have some this isn't technically a multicolor card, but cards that are optimized with two colors but that don't always require two colors necessarily. Okay, next.

Order of the Stars. So it costs one white. It's a 0-1 human cleric as it enters you choose a color it has defender also and then it gets protection

of the chosen color so it's like a really good defender against one color now obviously this was an environment where we expected people to play multiple colors so the idea was

it doesn't really shut people down as much as it slows them down in one aspect because if you're playing an environment where people are playing more than one color, in a mono-color environment, this thing is pretty brutal because it, I mean, even then, it only stops one creature. And because it's zero power, it doesn't kill them.

But the idea, essentially, is something that's supposed to slow your opponent down, which is something that both white in general likes and Orzhov as a guild likes. Okay, Orzhov, guild mage. Remember, all the guild mages are hybrid-hybrid, two mana, both of which are hybrid. This is white or black because it's Orzhov as a guild likes. Okay, Orzhov guild mage. Remember, all the guild mages are hybrid-hybrid, two mana, both of which are hybrid. This is white or black, because it's Orzhov. So it's white or black, white or black. It's a 2-2 human wizard.

And then two and a white target player gains one life. Two and a black, each player loses one life. So one of the things we're trying to do is we want to... They're all two mana, two twos. And they want to have two activations. This is of the things we're trying to do is we want to, they're all two mana, two twos, and they want to have two activations. This is how the cycle works. One activation was with one color, one was with the other. I think they're all parallel costed. You know, like this one is

two and a white and then two and a black. The tricky part was, one of the cool things about white and black is we like to look for opposites. That's always cool Well white is the life gaining color and blacks the color that makes players lose life So it's kind of cool to say oh, okay. I gain life you lose life The problem was that we wanted to have a parallel costing and gaining life and losing life are not the same me gaining one life is not as Not as powerful effect as me making you lose one life. So what we ended up doing was, instead of it,

so we sort of paralleled them in a slightly different way. So the idea is either I target a player who gains a life, or the block ability is each player loses a life. So one player, you know, it's gain a life, lose a life, there's that parallel. But then we switched it from, well, one affects one person and one affects two people. But the idea is the one can affect anybody, although normally you're going to gain a life,

but it's like, it went from target player to each player, but we needed to do that. I mean, we had a lot of parameters on the design, and when you do that, you have to figure out where you're willing to bend on the parameters. Okay, next. This is Orzhov Pontiff, One white black for a 1-1 human cleric. It's got Haunt. Remember the Haunt mechanic? So when it enters the battlefield or a haunted creature dies, you get to choose one of two abilities. Either creatures you control

get plus one, plus one until end of turn, or creatures you don't control get minus one, minus one until end of turn. So I talked to you before about Haunt. One of the things about haunt is it's both an enter the battlefield effect and a leaves play effect essentially and the issue is when choosing effects that make sense for it one of the problems is usually the reason creatures leave the battlefield is they're in combat. So you need to pick effects that when a creature dies are relevant. So the problem is how do you do an effect that might be combat oriented but yet still

relevant when a creature dies? And the answer was what this card did is that okay I'm going to let you choose one of two things that are related thematically you know I get plus one plus one, my creatures get plus one plus one your creatures get minus one minus one it's thematically connected and also

one affects more white, one affects more black. And it has a thing where, well, when I ETB, I mean, I might want to kill your creature. But when I ETB, maybe I want to pump my team before I attack. But when my haunted creature dies, eh, I'm probably doing minus one, minus one. I mean, there's a few exceptions, but probably is what I'm doing. So by doing the modal thing, we were able to do something that was combat,

make a haunt card that was combat relevant, which was a tricky thing to do. Next, Orzova, the Church of Deals. It's a land, tap, add, see, for three white, black, so five mana total, three generic, one white, one black. You tap, and target player can draw a card and pay a life. So this was, we gave Orzhov a card drawer. White doesn't really draw cards repeatedly, where black does. So we did it the black way.

But anyway, one of the things, the other thing is it's target player draws a card. So if I need to kill my opponent, my opponent's low enough in life, I can actually use this to, I give them the card, but I also make them lose the life. And so it being targeted allows you to use it mostly for yourself, but occasionally when my opponent's low enough

that this can matter and affect the math, you can do that. Okay, next, Austere Thrall. Three and a black for a 2-2 Thrall. White and tap, Tap target creature. So this is a good example of another off-color activation. The idea is it's a 2-2. It's a black 2-2 creature. But if I want to be real effective with it, I need to use the white ability.

The off-color white ability does something white does. Black doesn't tap creatures, but white can. So the idea is if I have access to white, then this card gets to do something a white card does. And so it's another way for us to make a card that is, you know, optimizing two colors, but not specifically two colors. Okay, next. Paralectrics Feedback. Three and a red for an instant.

It deals damage to spell's controller equal to its converted mana cost. So the idea, if there's a spell on the stack, you get to do damage based on how much that spell costs. So if someone casts a spell that's a 6 mana spell, you can spend your 4 mana and deal 6 to them. So the bigger the spell, the more damage it does. But notice it does damage to the spell's controller, so I can't cast a big spell and then shoot it at you. Okay, Petra Hydrox. 3 in a hybrid. The hybrid is blue or red.

So four mana, three generic, one blue or red. It's a 3-3 weird. Whenever it's the target of a spell, you return it to owner's hand. So what it means is it's kind of got a shroud-ish-like ability in the sense that your opponent can't target it to try to kill it without you having... Well that your opponent can't target it to try to kill it

without you having, well, if they try to target it to kill it, it'll bounce it, so they can't kill it with targeted kill. And if they try to kill it with untargeted kill, and you have the ability to target it in some way, you can also bounce it to save it. But

it also means your opponent can sort of get it out of play by using an ability that wouldn't kill it but targets it. I think, is it target by spell? Hold on, yeah. Target by spell, so it's not by an ability. It has to be targeted by a spell. But for example, there's times I've seen where someone uses a giant growth

to get it out of the way so that their creature can get through. So it is technically considered a downside, but there are ways to make it upside. Petrified Woodkin. Green, green. Oh, sorry, six green. So seven mana, six of which is generic,

one of which is green. So it is an elemental warrior. 3-3 elemental warrior. It can't be countered. It's got Bloodthirst X. And it's got protection from instance. So what Bloodthirst X means is, X is the amount of damage dealt this turn.

So normally when you do Bloodthirst, Bloodthirst normally locks in the number, right? So Bloodthirst says, oh, I'm Bloodthirst 2. Well, if you do damage, I get two counters. But this card is Bloodthirst X. X defined as the amount of damage. So the more damage you do, the bigger this creature gets to be. So like it's a 3-3, but if you've done 4 damage, it's a 7-7. If you've done 8 damage, it's an 11-11.

So it has potential to be really big and exciting. It also has protection from instants, making it a little bit harder to kill. And it can't be countered, so... Can't be countered is kind of a blue thing. Protection from Instants is kind of an anti-black thing. So it's a green card that kind of has some protection against the natural elements of its enemy. Pillary of the Sleepness. One white black. It's an aura. It's an enchantment.

Enchant creature. Enchanted creature can attack or block. And then enchanted creature has the beginning of upkeep. Lose one life. So the idea is I sort of use it. It's a pacifism, but it's a pacifism that's slowly bleeding my opponent. Very Orzhov. So the idea is I keep you from attacking.

I'm stalling. I'm delaying. I'm helping protect myself. But that same thing will help me win the game. That if I just keep that creature out long enough, you know, it can do damage and win me the game. Next, Pyromanics. One and a red. Instant.

Replicate one R. So deal one damage to our me the game. Next, Pyromanics. One and a red. Instant. Replicate one R. So deal one damage to our creature or player. So essentially, for every one and a red I spend, I get to do one damage, and I can spend it however I want. So for example, for two mana, I get to do one damage. Four mana, two damage. Six mana, three damage. You know, eight mana, four

damage. And I get to spread that around, so I get to distribute however I want, so I can break up the damage. And this is a good example of a lot of the replicate effects. What we wanted was smaller effects, so that we could let people replicate it a bunch of times. Rabble Rouser, 3 and a red, Goblin Shaman, 1, 1, Bloodthirst 1. For red and a tap, attacking creatures get plus X plus O until end of turn,

where X is the card name's power. So the idea is it's a 1-1, it's Bloodthirst 1, so if you manage to get in play with Bloodthirst, it's a 2-2, and its ability gives an attacking creature plus X plus O. So if it's a 1-1, it gives it plus 1 plus O. If it's a 2-2, it gives it plus 2 plus 2. So the Bloodthirst matters. And because it says power, if you can giant growth

or do something to it, you also can do combos where you can, like a fun thing to do with this is I make it bigger. Maybe I put an enchantment on it. I some way make it bigger. And then that allows me to enhance other things. Okay, next, Revenant Patriarch, four black spirit, four three spirit. Enter the battlefield and if white was spent to cast it, target player skips their next combat phase. And card name can't block. So it's a 4-3 creature that can't block, and if you spend blue,

you force them to not be able to attack next turn. I'm sorry, if white is spent. So once again, it's a card that is good at sort of doing preventative stuff for Orzhov, but it also has something that can help you attack and win the game. Rumbling Slum. One red, green, green. Four mana, one generic, one red, two green. It's a 5-5 elemental.

At the beginning of your upkeep, deal one damage to each player. Note, this is not to each opponent. It's to each player, so it does damage you, but it's damaging you and your opponent at the same time. And it's a four mana, 5-5, so that's pretty good. Next, we have Sanguine Praetor. 6 black black. It's an Avatar Praetor, 7-5. Black sac a creature. Destroy each creature with a converted mana cost equal to the sacrificed creature. Note, it's not equal to or less. It is the damage equal to the creature. So, I feel like this is something that we can...

We like to do this where something is more precise, where it's not a matter of... Like, I have to stack a creature thinking about what do I want to do? It's not just I get everything smaller than it. I get things at its level, and that's kind of... That creates fun gameplay.

Savage Twister, X, red, green, is sorcery. And it's from... I'll repeat, by the way. It's. It is from, a repeat by the way, it's a reprint from Mirage. The card, Savage Twister, deals X damage to each creature. So the idea is that I can, I think at the time what it was

was it was combining Hurricane and Earthquake. But anyway, it's a very potent spell. I mean, I guess, I don't think it hits players, but Earthquake and Hurricane. But ironically, this cannot be done in just mono-red.

I think at the time we were trying to find a red-green effect, and red had this theme of sort of hitting ground creatures, and green hit flyers. And so it's like, whoa, it hit the ground creatures and the flyers. Although red is Pyroclasm and stuff. So I'm... Anyway, this is... I mean, we put it in the set because it was a good card. It played well. It fit Gruul.

But I will admit that it is... It is not... It does not need a lot for the green. The redness of the card, from a color pipe perspective, can do what the card does. Next, we have Skizmotivate. It's instant that costs one blue and a red, so three total, one generic, one blue,

one red. Target creature gets plus four, plus O until end of turn. Oh, sorry, and another creature gets minus four, minus O until end of turn. So what it does is red will grant power boosts and blue will grant power shrinks. And so this makes one plus four plus O and another minus four minus O until end of turn. Usually in combat, this would be pretty potent where I make a creature that either gets through,

do more damage, or a creature that, you know, seemingly was going to die, kill another creature. And I also make something that probably was going to kill one of my creatures, not kill one of my creatures. Sometimes you'll combine them in one thing where, like, I fight you, and I get bigger, and you get smaller, so that I'm able to kill you without you being able to kill me. Next, Shadow Lance is an enchantment for one white.

It's an aura. Enchanted creature hits first strike, and then for one and a black, enchanted creature gets plus two, and it'll end of turn. So this is another card. This is a card with an off-color activation. It's a white card, so it grants First Strike for W,

which by itself is not a great card. You're not going to necessarily play that most of the time. But the idea that you have a little boost in black because one thing about First Strike is First Strike is better the bigger the power. Well, this thing makes your power bigger, so that's pretty good. Next um good next shrieking grotesque two in a white it's a gargoyle uh two one two one gargoyle flies and when it enters the battlefield to be paid black

target player discards the card so we put gargoyles into the orgeau because they have sort of this religious motif and gargoyles are associated with like churches and things. And this is another one where the off color, if you pay the color, like this card is a two and a white card, but if you pay one white black it has the additional bonus of target player discards the card when enters the battlefield. Okay next, Solhana Starfletcher. Two and a green. It's a 1-3 elf druid archer. When it enters the battlefield, you choose a color, and then you tap to add that color to your mana pool.

So this is kind of like a Birds of Paradise, except you have to lock into one color. It can produce any color, but only one color, and you decide that when you play it. And this is one of the things about making a multicolor environment is trying to find different ways. And our goal was we wanted people to play two-color and not play five-color.

And the problem with, like, Burned Paradise is tap for any color is if you have too much of that. I mean, we did have a Burned Paradise in Ravnica, by the way. But if you have too much of that, it makes it too easier to spread to three, four, five colors. So this card was trying to lock you in and saying, okay, I'll

help you, but I'll just help you with a singular color. You know, I'm good in a two-color deck. I'm not so great in a five-color deck. Okay, next. Skargan Firebird. Four red, red for four, three, Phoenix. So six mana total, four generic and two red.

It's got Bloodthirst, three it's got Flying, and then for red, red, red, return from the graveyard to your hand, but you only can do it if the opponent's been damaged. So this is kind of a cool card. The idea is it's a phoenix that has Bloodthirst, so you want to keep trying to bring it back when you've done damage because it's bigger, But you've got to keep coming back with it. And the trigger for having it come back is kind of... It's not technically Bloodthirst, obviously, because Bloodthirst is only tied to the counters. But it's like Bloodthirst.

It's like, oh, did you damage your opponent this turn? And the cool thing is if you have the mana to both buy it back and cast it, which I know is a lot of red mana, the fact that the thing that allows you to get it back is the same thing that makes it Bloodthirst. So if you have four red, red, red, red, red, red, so nine mana, five which is red, you can guarantee it'll bring it back with Bloodthirst.

That's a lot of mana, a lot of red mana, but it's possible, especially in a mono-red deck. Okay, next, Skeletal Vampire. Four black, black. Vampire Skeleton. Three, three Vampire Skeleton with Flying. Vampire skeleton. Three three vampire skeleton with flying. When it enters the battlefield, you make two one one black bat creature tokens with flying.

For three black black, sacrifice a bat. You create two more one one bats. And if you sac a bat, it regenerates. So the idea essentially is it comes in play. It's got some bats. You can use the bats to make more bats. So the idea is every bat you bats, you can use the bats to make more bats.

So the idea is every bat you sacrifice, you can make more bats. But it requires five mana to do that. So the idea is if I get enough mana, I can start really pumping out the bats. And then I also can use the bats to protect this thing, because for no mana I can sac a bat to regenerate it. So once I have some bats out, it's a very hard card to kill until you get rid of my bats. So if you want to kill the vampire, you kind of have to kill the bats first before you can kill the vampire. Okay, next. Sky Swallower.

Three blue blue Leviathan. 8-8 Leviathan. Flying, because it's a Leviathan in the sky. And when it enters the battlefield, the opponent gains control of all your other permanents. So it's like it's an 8-8 flyer. That's pretty powerful. But what's the cost of an 8-8 flyer? For 5.

For 5, I get an 8-8 flyer with the small downside of I just have to give you everything I have. Now, there's ways to build around this. There's ways where when I cast this, I don't have much to give you. So I get a big creature, and I'm not giving up that much. But this was a fun, you know, it was kind of a neat concept, the giant leviathan in the sky. Okay, next. Skyrider Tramee, four and a white, a 3-3 human soldier. It is flying as long as it's enchanted. I talked about this on a previous podcast. There's an enchantment theme, an aura theme

in the set. Well, here's a little card. You know, five mana for three, three, nothing great. But if you get enchanted, it gains flying. That sets become pretty good. So, you know, even if it's about a small thing, a mage mark or something on this, you know, the fact that it gains flying just really, like it really makes it want to be the target for your aura. Okay, next, Souls of the Faultless.

White, black, black. So three mana, one white, two black. It's a 0-4 spirit. It's got Defender. And whenever the card is dealt combat damage, you drain attacking player equal to the damage. So it's a 0-4. Let's say they attack with a 3-3.

If I block your 3-3, I'm going to drain you for 3. I'm going to do 3 damage to you and gain 3 life. So this is a really good card that both, once again, is a very Orzhov card. It both is defensive, it slows down the opponent, and it can slowly, incrementally do damage to them. Okay, next, Starved Rusalka. Ooh, the Rusalkas. So Green Spirit, 1-1.

Notice this is a full cycle. So green and sacrifice a creature gain one life. So the Rusalkas were all one mana spells. They all cost a single colored mana. They were 1-1. And then for a single colored mana and the act of sacrificing a creature, they did some small

effect. In this case, gain a life. The idea being is I can always sacrifice this creature. So at bare minimum, it's G-1-1 sac this, gain a life. The idea being is I can always sacrifice this creature, so at bare minimum it's G1-1 sac this gain a life, but the fact that I can sac other creatures, so for example let's say I'm going to chump block a creature. Like my creature's going to die to stop your creature from damaging me

and I'm getting nothing out of it, I'm not killing your creature, I'm just chumping. Hey, I can block, sacrifice it to this, your creature's still blocked because once it's blocked, it's blocked and then I get a gain of life. And so the Rusalkas were another sort of just little mini-theme built in. One of the things

we like to do in Ravnica sets is there's a general theme that runs through all three sets. So, for example, like the shock lands or the guild mages, you know, there's things that run through, that are cycles of 10 that run through everything, right?

But what we also want to do is make each set sort of have its own identity. So we will do cycles that are only in that set. The mage marks are only in the set. The Rusalkos are only in the set. The Nephilim are only... These are cycles that are just in guild packs. Ravnica's not doing anything like them.

just in guild packs. Ravnica's not doing anything like them. And... Yeah, Ravnica and Descention's not doing anything like them. This was just a guild pack thing. Okay. What is next? Next is Steam Core Weird. Okay.

Steam Core... Steam Core Weird. Three and a blue, so four mana, three generic, one blue. It's a 1-3 Weird. When it enters the battlefield, if you paid red, it deals two damage to a target creature or player. So this is another one of the ones that upgrade if you pay. So it's three and a blue for a 1-3,

but for two blue R, you get to shock something when it comes into play. So once again, you probably aren't going to play this if you're not playing blue and red. But, it's not that this card's meant to go in a non-blue-red deck. It's meant that if you happen to draw blue but not red, you can play it if you need to. In a pinch, you can play it.

I mean, obviously, you'd prefer to play it with red, but if you have to, you can. Next, Stitch and Time. One blue-red. So, three mana, one generic, one blue, one red. It's a sorcery. You flip a coin, and if you win the coin toss, you take an extra turn. So we had sort of a 50-50 time walk.

Half the time, you take an extra turn. And if you play it with, like, Crouch Thumb, then three-quarters of the time, you take an extra turn. Okay, next. Storm Herd. Eight white, white sorcery. You create X11 white pegasus tokens with flying, equal to your life total. So the idea is, this costs 10 mana, but you're going to make a lot of flying creatures. Let's say I cast this and I happen to be at 10 life

while making 10 1-1 flying Pegasuses. I saw this deck played for fun and life-gaining decks really like this deck because it was a good win condition in that I just gain a lot of life and at some point I just cast equals my life total and I have some crazy number of flyers that's hard for you to deal with.

Okay, next, Streetbreaker Worm, three red and green, five mana total, three generic, one red, one green, for a 6-4 Worm. So, this is a vanilla card. The fun thing about this is, in the original alpha was Craw Worm, which was four green green

for a 6-4 creature. And so this is three red green. Now, given it requires two different colors, not one, but it's a full mana cheaper than a crow worm. To sort of show you sort of how when you go to multiple... Not that crow worm was particularly good in the first place, but when you get multiple colors, though,

you get a savings. Okay, Sword of Perons. An artifact that costs four. It's an equipment. If the equipment is tapped, your creatures get plus one, plus O. If the equipment is untapped, your creatures get plus zero, plus one. And then for three mana, you can tap or untap equipped creature. So if equipped creature is tapped, your creatures get plus one, plus O.

So if it's attacking, it kind of boosts the other tapped creatures that are probably attacking. If it's defensive and it's untapped, it's making the things that are kind of defensive more powerful. And then you have the ability with your mana to tap or untap the enchanted creature. So you have some ability to manipulate it. So I can attack with it, boost my attackers, and then pay mana to untap it, and now I'm boosting my blockers. Okay, next. Teysa, Orzhov Scion. One white black for a legendary creature, a 2-3 human advisor. If you sac three white creatures, you get an exile target

creature. And whenever another black creature dies, create a 1-1 white spirit token with flying. So we made two cycles of legendary creatures. One cycle was, I think, the leader of the clan, and they could do whatever they wanted. But the other one, what we did about it is we wanted you to maximize that card by playing both colors. And taste is a good example where if I, you know, if I, for example, if I make a creature, whenever a black creature enters the battlefield, I get to make a one white spirit token. And whenever, and I need white creatures to sacrifice.

So the idea is if a creature is both white and black, it both gives you a token when you play it, and you can use it as a sacrifice effect. So it maximizes and makes it stronger. Teysa would come back in Return to Ravnica because she's a fun character. Tibor and Lumia! Two blue-red, legendary creatures, human wizards, 3-3. So there's two people

on this card. If you cast a blue spell, target creature gets flying until end of turn. And if you cast a red spell, you get to do one damage to non-flyers. So this is another good example of, just like Tasa, it's a card in which it's maximized if you're playing blue and red.

And the idea here is if I play a blue and red card, it will make my, I can make the creature that might die to the red effect, I can make fly with the blue effect. Because it does damage to non-flyers. One of the cute things about this is you want them to be connected and so by making damage to non-flyers the One of the cute things about this is you want them to be connected. And so by making damage to non-flyers,

the flying part matters. If I make something flying, then I can use my blue to prevent damage from the red part, which is pretty cool. Next, Tin Street Hooligan. It's one in a red, so two mana, one generic, one red, for a 2-2 Goblin Rogue.

When it enters the battlefield, if green mana was spent, you get to destroy a target artifact. So it's either a 1-R-2-2 Goblin Rogue. When it enters the battlefield, if green mana was spent, you get a destroyed target artifact. So it's either a 1R 2-2 or it is a RG 2-2 destroy an artifact. So that is pretty cool. Okay, next, Torch Drake. Three and a blue for a 2-2 Drake. It is flying and it is one and a red, plus one plus O to end of turn. So it is a blue drake, a flyer, that has fire breathing. It has a little more expensive. Basic fire breathing is kind of a single red for plus one, plus O. But this is one and a red. But the idea essentially is, will I play a 2-2 flyer for four mana?

I might. I might. It's the kind of thing. It might not be my first pick, but, you know, it's the kind of thing where, you know, my 22nd, 23rd pick, maybe I put that in. It's flying. But, ooh, if I have red mana, wow, I'm much more excited to play it. And it becomes much more potent in a blue-red deck. Train of Thought. It's a sorcery.

One blue. Replicate. One blue. Draw a card. So this is another nice thing where it's a nice, clean, simple effect. And then for every two mana, although one of these be blue, I get to draw a card. So it's a nice, clean replicate effect. And then for every two mana, although one of these be blue, I get to draw a card. So it's a nice, clean replicate effect. Ooh, Lashed! The

Hate Seed. So two red-greens, a legendary creature. It is a... I think an 8-8 Hellion? My handwriting is not so good. I think it's an 8-8 Hellion. Oh, no, I'm sorry. It's 0-0. That's a 0-0. But it comes into play with a plus one, plus one counter

for each red creature you have, each red permanent you have, and each green permanent you have. Now, note, if you have a red and a green permanent, it gets a counter for you. It gets two counters. And then you can remove a counter from it to deal one damage to a target creature

or to create a one, one saproling. So one of the cool things about this is that it comes in and counts your stuff. You know, it costs four mana, so hopefully you've got some stuff out ahead of time. And then it just gets bigger, and then the bigger it is, the more you can use itself. This is also a fun creature.

It's legendary, so you can sort of play one and use it up and then if you have another legendary one, you can play the next one in your hand. Okay, next. Wee Dragonauts. One blue-red. It's a 1-3 Fairy Wizard. It's got Flying. Whenever you cast an instant or sorcery, it gets plus two plus zero until end of turn. So it's a 1-3 that becomes a 3-3 every time you cast an instant or sorcery. And if you cast multiple instant sorcery, it can become a 5-3 or a 7-3 or you can go up. So this was a popular card. It also just, it's a nice clean way to play aggressively into the

instant sorceries. A lot of times we do stuff that sort of helps you play them, but this one's more like, no, no, it helps you win. It turns your instant sorceries into sort of concrete damage that can help you win the game. Okay, next. Wild Cantor. Wild Cantor costs a single hybrid

mana, it's red or green, so it costs either a red mana a single hybrid mana. It's red or green. So it costs either a red mana or a green mana. It's a 1-1 human druid. You can sac it to add one mana of any color to your mana pool. It's kind of a funny overlap between red and green because green is the permanent... Green is like Llanowar elves and that kind of thing that have a permanent mana,

and red is a temporary mana. So the idea here is it leans a little bit toward red in the sense that it a temporary mana. So the idea here is this leans a little bit toward red in the sense that it's temporary mana, but green occasionally dabbles in that because obviously permanent mana is a little better than temporary mana. And so this is a little 1-1 that you sort of can use to sort of bump up your spell. Like I play it turn one and then in turn three I can play a four drop or turn four I can play a five drop. Next, Witch Maw Nephilim. So this is the non-red one.

So it's green, white, blue, black. So it's 4 mana, 1 of every color but red. It's a 1-1 Nephilim, a little smaller. Whenever you cast this spell, you put 2 plus 1 plus 1 counters on card name. And whenever you attack, it gains trample if you have power of 10 or more. Oh, we used this trick once before. So the idea here is it's a 1-1. It can keep getting bigger.

And then when it gets big enough, it gains trample. The reason I think we did 10 or more is we had one other creature that had the same trigger. And also it means if you somehow can get one other plus one point counter on it, by some means you can speed up the trample by one turn. And as I explained before with the Nephilim, the Nephilim were always tricky because it's very hard to design, like, what exactly is a white and black, or I'd say a green and white and blue and black ability.

So we just tried to pick things that were a unique feeling. And I admit, this is the kind of thing that maybe this could even be mono-green, I don't know. But we were trying to just make exciting splashy cards at least effects we hadn't quite done before speaking of the nephilim of the last card of the day today last card of my podcast is your tiller nephilim this is the non uh green one so it's white blue black red four mana one of each color but green to two two nephilim when it attacks you return target creature card

from your graveyard, tapped and attacking. So the idea is, when it attacks, everything attacks. When it attacks, it brings along a dead creature to attack with it. And every time it attacks, that creature sticks around. It doesn't go away. So essentially, it lets you reanimate things.

Not just reanimate them, aggressively reanimate them, because you get attacked with them. It's limited to your graveyard, but it is... And the other thing we've tried to do, which is tricking the flavor, is trying to get a sense of... that the Nephilim was kind of playing in space where... I don't know.

We were trying to get a flavor that felt a little anti-the-color that it wasn't, but once again, that's really, really hard to bring out. I think the biggest drawback against the Nephilim, and they were not particularly popular, was they just didn't have their color right. Like, people kept saying, why is this this four colors? It just didn't quite feel right. And the answer to that is, without some tricky thing like two guilds getting together or something, where you're bringing things that have pre-existing color definitions to them,

it is really hard to do four color. Anyway, so I managed to... I wasn't sure whether this would take three or four podcasts. The answer is it took three podcasts. So that, my friends, is all I have to say about Guild Pack. So the plan is I will get to Descension. It won't be right away, but the next time I do one of these, I'll talk all about Descension,

which has the three final guilds, where I talk Azorius and Rakdos and Simic. White, blue, black, red, and green-blue, specifically. Anyway, I'm now at Rachel's school, so we all know what that means. It means this is the end of my drive to work. Instead of talking magic, it's time for me to be making magic. I'll see you guys next time. Bye-bye.