Magic: The Gathering Drive to Work Podcast - #613: Lorwyn Cards, Part 3

Episode Date: February 22, 2019

This podcast is the third in a four-part series about the card-by-card design stories of Lorwyn.

I'm pulling out of the driveway. We all know what that means. It's time for another drive to work. Okay, the last couple times I've been going through Lorwyn, talking about different cards in Lorwyn. I'm not done yet, so we shall continue on with that. So we are up to Lignify. So Lignify is one and a green, so two mana, one of which is green. Tribal Enchantment. It's a Treefolk Aura. Enchant a creature as a Treefolk with base. Enchant creature. Enchanted creature is a treefolk with base power and toughness 0-4 and loses all abilities. So this is a good example. I just wanted to bring it up because this is the kind of card, if you

ever heard me talk about how we sometimes break color pie because we're sort of, it's not clear what color a cannon can't do. So one of the ideas of green, one of the weaknesses of green is it's over-relying on its creatures. And what that means is that if you have an empty board, if you have no creatures in play, you are not supposed to have spells that make it easy for you to deal with creatures. So this is a break in green. Green's not supposed to do this. Blue is the color of transformation. For a while we let white do it. But anyway, green is not supposed to be the color that does this.

And it is a fundamental break in green mechanically. But I just want to bring this up in that, hey, I turn you into a tree folk, feels pretty green, like the flavor feels pretty green. So one of the dangers that we run into in making cards is that it is not hard to make something that mechanically isn't supposed to be done and flavored in a way that goes, oh, that feels right. And so this is a really good example of something where the flavor justifies something that is not supposed to happen.

It's not supposed to be done. This is not supposed to be a green card. But it's very easy to fall in the trap of oh, well, what color would turn things into a tree folk? And the answer is like a multicolor card. You know, not a monocolored card,

not a green card. And that's one of the dangers of flavor is flavor is more flexible than mechanics. So you can always justify something with flavor. That doesn't mean you're supposed to do it. Okay, next, Liliana Vess. Three black black. Legendary planeswalker Liliana.

She comes with a loyalty of five. Plus one, target player discards a card. Minus two, search your library for a card, then shuffle your library and put that card on top of it. Minus eight, put all creature cards from all graveyards onto the battlefield under your control. So this is a good example of the early Planeswalker cards. This is Liliana's first appearance, or all Planeswalkers' first appearance.

So she is designed to be a very black card. The real issue here is tutoring, for example, which is her middle ability, isn't particularly a Liliana thing. Her ultimate is Liliana. She's a necromancer. She raises things from the dead. That is straight up Liliana. She also is good at

killing things, so destruction effects and stuff like that is fine. We let her have a little bit of discard just because she does play a little bit in that space. So her ultimate is Super Liliana. Her first ability is the kind of thing that she can do.

We don't focus on it, but it's something like as a smaller ability she can do. And the middle ability, eh, that's not at all Liliana. That was just an example of us making a black, like a very typical black planeswalker for the first time out. But anyway, the other interesting

note about Liliana is Liliana vests anagrams to a villainess which Brady, who made her, swears up and down that that was not an anagram on purpose, but I don't know. It is an interesting anagram, nonetheless. Okay. That's Liliana anagram, nonetheless. Okay, that's

Liliana. Next, Mad Ante. It's two and a black creature or goblin shaman. Other goblin creatures you control get plus one, plus one. Tap regenerate another target goblin, two, two. So a couple things about this. One is when we start pushing things into other colors. So, for example, last time we did Goblin Tribal was an onslaught. I mean, before Lorwyn. And it was a mono-red deck. Just all the goblins were in red and you built a mono-red deck. And one of the things I explained is we wanted to branch out. We wanted to get in other colors. So we just give you more options and more choices that can make more different designs. So one of the things that we tended to do in this set is

we saw opportunity to make cards that existed in one color but make them in another color. So we refer to any creature that buffs other creatures and grants them some ability as lords. But kind of the traditional lords is the plus one, one lord now red has done that um numerous times so one of the cool things about this is it's another um you know boosting lord a stat boosting lord but it's in black and that's not something that you've seen before so one of the things about stat boosting lords is they're really good for encouraging you to play that tribe and so i

think we wanted you to say hey if you want to play black goblins and not play red okay we got you back here's the card that lets you do that um and i think the idea of because we're in black we can grant something that red can't grant which is we can regenerate so that was um regeneration has since been phased out, but at the time, regeneration was something that black could do, and so nowadays we tend to, black will grant indestructible to end of turn, which is sort of the

flavor-wise how we do that stuff nowadays. Okay. Makeshift Mannequin. Three and a black instant. Return target creature cards from your graveyard to the battlefield with a mannequin counter on it. For as long as that creature has a mannequin counter on it,

it has, when this creature becomes a target of spell or ability, sacrifice it. Okay, so in, what was it? Was it Antiquities? No, it wasn't Antiquities. It was Legends, I think. There's a card called Xenic Poltergeist, which was this little ghost

that was cheaper than normal, and when you targeted it, it would dissipate. And the idea being it's this wispy little ghost, and that you get it cheaper, but if you ever sort of concentrate magic on it, you can dissipate it. We've since moved that ability from black to blue, and now we tie it to illusions, and the idea

of, oh, well, it seems real, but if you ever sort of poke or prod it, it's not real, it's an illusion. And so this ability, no longer is in black, is now in blue. So the interesting idea here was we took an ability that at the time was in black, and combined it with another ability, the other ability being

a raise dead, or, I'm sorry, an animate dead. So I'm going to animate a creature. And so that's sort of the fun challenge here is one of the things that's neat to do in design is trying to find mix and matches that are kind of cool mix and matches. And here's an example of I get a reanimate ability, which traditionally we had it made more expensive but by giving this sort of what now we call the illusion ability at the time was the demon pulcherize ability

allows you to do it a little bit cheaper and make something where there's a little more suspense so if I can get this big giant creature out but oh if you can have any spell that targets it you can get rid of it

so anyway I think that's kind of a cool spell even though we wouldn't based on some color pie stuff we wouldn't do that today if you can have any spells that target it, you can get rid of it. So anyway, I think that's kind of a cool spell, even though we wouldn't, based on some color pie stuff, we wouldn't do that today. Okay, next. Marrow Commerce.

Marrow, M-E-R-R-O-W. One and a blue, tribal enchantment, merfolk. At the beginning of your end step, untap all merfolk you control. Okay, so what's going on with this card? So, one of the things you try to do when you do a tribal set is you want to give each tribe some flavor that's unique to how they're interacting. And one of the things we did with merfolk was,

we did the thing where you tap some number of merfolk to generate an ability and so a lot of the way the merfolk work in this set because merfolks are white and blue which is a more control-age color is we do something in which you you kind of want to keep your merfolk up and you want to use rather than attack with them you're more likely to use use them as resource to tap so one of the neat things about this ability is that this allows you to sort of make extra use of the merfolk because if you know you're going to untap at the beginning of your end step, it allows you on your turn to make use of your creatures, untap at the end of the

turn, and then you can make use of them again on your opponent's turn. The cool thing about it is that if you decide you want to take an attack strategy, and there's some reasons, I mean, merfolk, there's more control-ish merfolk that doesn't attack as often, and then there's more aggressive, there's two different ways you can draft it. If you go the more aggressive route where you're attacking with creatures, this is nice too, because it gives me like pseudo-vigigilance. I can attack my creatures and then they untap and I can use them for blocking. So this is a neat effect in that it sort of has a dual purpose and that's one of the things that's kind of fun to do is we can design one card that can use different ways. There's two different routes you can use the merfolk if you're drafting. Whenever we do tribes, we tend to do two strategies, there's two archetypes Like, there's two different routes you can use the Merfolk if you're drafting. There's seven...

Whenever we do tries, we tend to do two strategies. There's two archetypes. So there's two different ways you can play it. And the neat thing about this card is it plays into both versions. Like, each archetype will use this.

Archetype, sorry. Will use this, but not in the same way. It'll use it differently. And that is kind of cool. I mean, that's something where, you know, it definitely is a neat thing. So let's talk about another card.

Mero Rejere. Rejere? Rejere. R-E-E-J-E-R-E-Y. Rejere? So it costs two and a blue. So three mana total. Two generic, one blue.

Creature, Merfolk Soldier. Two, two. Other Merfolk creatures you control get plus one, plus one. Whenever you cast a merfolk spell, you may tap or untap target permanent. So once again, merfolk have this sort of control-y aspect where you can tap them. But once again, sometimes you want to be aggressive. This is a good example where it turns all merfolk spells into Twitter. Twitter is tap or untap target permanent.

The reason you might want to do this, you might want to untap your own merfolk, like the last spell did, so maybe you can reuse resources, or if I'm trying to get through an attack, I can use it to tap my opponent's creatures. Or, in a controller's deck sometimes, I can tap lands as well

as other things. But there's a good example of, we have a particular think of how merfolk are going to work, and we make cards that sort of do that, so that, you know, I mean this card also buffs your merfolk, so it allows you, if you want to take a more aggressive approach, I can buff my merfolk, I can use my merfolk to tap down my opponent's creatures, and then attack with them. But I do like how we get a general strategy, a general sort of path of how you can do, and then we make cards in those colors that sort of push you towards that general strategy. Okay, Mirror Entity. Two and a white for a creature, Shapeshifter.

Changeling. X. Until end of turn, creatures you control have base power and toughness. X. X. and gain all creature types one one um so the idea of this card is it turns all your creatures um into sort of um unless you sort of change the shape of all your creatures and the more man you have the bigger it can become um and so this is definitely a card where, now, once again, power, toughness, sort of stat setting. For a while we used to do it in white. We've now sort of moved it over to blue. So this effect would be more blue now than it would be white.

But it was a neat sort of different kind of effect that sort of said. It's sort of sad. And the reason we put Changeling on this thing is because we had shapeshifters, whenever there were cards that were flavored of things changing shape, we tended to put... This has changed not mechanically because it needed Changeling, but more because flavorfully, to do the kind of card we wanted to do and make sense of a Changeling.

So that's why it's a Changeling. Okay. Mistbind Click it's a changeling. Okay. Mistbind Click. Mistbind Click. Creature. It's got three in the blue. And it's a Fairy Wizard. So four mana total, three generic, one blue.

Creature, Fairy Wizard. It is... What are its stats? It is... it is, what are stats? It is it's a 4-4 and it has Flash, Flying, Champion of Fairy

and when a fairy is champion with Mistbond Click, Tap-O-Land target player controls. So the idea is, this is something you play in your fairy deck that is, this is champion, and the idea, once again, is champion uses evolution.

So the idea is, if I'm playing a fairy deck, this allows me to sort of turn one of my fairies into a much bigger fairy. It's got flying, because all fairies have flying. It's got flash, because you want to be able to surprise people.

A, because you can turn your small fairy, maybe a 1-1 into a 4-4, so that can help you win combats. And it also can be used, you might want to do this at the end of turn, because if you tap out your opponent's lands at the end of their turn, then on your turn they can't do anything.

I mean, borrowing some spells without mana. I mean, barring some spells without mana. But anyway, this was definitely a cool card. Okay, next. Moon Glove Extract. Artifact. Costs three. Sacrifice Moon Glove Extract.

It deals two damage to any target. This is a good example of direct damage is in red, but we want to make sure there's some means in which you can deal with things if you're not playing red. This is probably such a way that it doesn't undermine red. Red is going to do...this requires three mana to be able to use it, and red is going to be... This requires three mana to be able to use it. And red is going to be able to do that damage much cheaper than this. But it's a way to give other colors access to direct damage

that's not quite as efficient as a red direct damage spell. Mosswort Bridge, Land, Hideaway. So Hideaway says, This land enters the battlefield tapped. When it does, look at the top four cards of your library, exile one face down, and put the rest on the bottom of your library.

Tap, add green. Green and tap, you may play the exiled card without paying its mana cost. It pushes you to control of total power of 10 or greater. So once again, hideaway was originally

a mechanic called treasure, where you would put something away and under some, you would take the top card called treasure, where you would put something away, and under some, you would take the top card of your library, you would put it, you would sort of exile it, tie it to the spell, and whenever the spell did something, you got it. And originally it was a much bigger mechanic, it was at much lower rarities, and it ended up being complicated enough

that we put it up to rare, It's just a cycle at rare. The one reason it is keyworded is the text didn't fit on the card if we wrote it out. But when you keyword something, you don't have to have exact legal text. You just have to kind of be in the ballpark. And so the reminder text was short enough that we could fit it on a card. So the only way that we could do that was to actually give it a keyword. So even though there are only five cards in the set, a cycle, a rare, that have it, we did keyword it. That's what we do very often. We don't often keyword things that there's only five of. But anyway, this saw a decent amount of play.

This, I think, was the best of the Hideaway Lands. Each one of them had a different condition. Basically, the idea was, if you're doing what the color really wants you to do, and for green, it's play lots of creatures, get a lot of power of creatures out. But it's not that hard in a green deck. You know, green deck naturally is going to spell a lot of creatures.

So this wasn't a condition that was horribly hard to meet. I mean, it's a more later game condition, but it's something you'll definitely eventually do. And so, you know, it is something that was... You know, something that definitely... Like, you would put it in your deck, and then just late game, you'd get extra card advantage, and that would help you be the thing that helps finish out the game.

But anyway, I thought the hideaway stuff was cool. It was sad a little bit. It didn't quite work out. The earlier version of Treasure was a little complicated, but it was fun. Okay, Mold Drifter. So Mold Drifter costs four and a blue, so five mana total, four generic, one blue.

It's an elemental, flying elemental, 2-2 flying elemental. When Mold Drifter enters the battlefield, draw two cards, evoke two in the blue. You may cast the spell for its evoke cost. If you do, it's sacrificed when it enters the battlefield. So the original evoke, in fact, I believe Moldritcher was the exact card I made. Originally, the way Evoked worked was this was a card drawing spell.

It was a sorcery that said, okay, draw two cards, you know. Or it might have been, I think it was a sorcery. Anyways, like, draw two cards. But it's like, oh, but, you know, to you, draw two cards, sorcery. But you want to pay an extra two, it'll turn into a creature and stick around. That's how it originally worked.

So the idea is you had two costs. You can spend two and a blue or four and a blue and four and a blue, you got the creature and two and a blue, you didn't. The rules didn't really work out so what we came up with was this idea that, well, we'll make it a creature. It's always a creature but if you don't pay the cost, it just

sacks it in a turn. I'm sorry, sacks when it enters the battlefield. Now one of the cool things about that was because this was a tribal set and there were reasons that you cared about having tribes and stuff, it being a creature, even if just for a brief moment, often there was means and reasons

why it mattered. For example, there were cards, like, I know there's a card that cares about when a goblin goes to the graveyard. Like, oh, not that this one's a goblin, but there are other ones that are a goblin. Like, if I play that and don't cast it and it immediately dies, oh, it triggers a goblin going to the graveyard.

And so that is definitely cool. Okay, Nameless Inversion. One and a black tribal instant shapeshifter, Changeling. Target creature gets plus three, minus three, and loses all creature types until end of turn. So this is a good example where we take something the trick making changeling, making creatures

that are changelings aren't particularly hard. You want things that kind of naturally can change what they are. You look at a lot of the changelings that are creatures. Although there are a few that are more French Vanilli. Anyway, the spells are a little bit trickier. The idea we liked here is that it did...

So it's going to kill the creature. Oh, well. It's something that... Plus three, minus three is a neat effect because it can be used as a negative to kill things or we can use it on the positive on a big three to do more damage. And the idea that it loses all creature types, just a little, how do we make this feel a little shapeshifter-y?

The reason shapeshifter-y is important is there's a lot of way to interact with cards not on the battlefield. For example, regrowing things from your graveyard and stuff. And this being a changeling card means you get to get those with that. That if I'm trying to get back a goblin from my graveyard, I can get back Nameless Inversion being Changeling. It is every creature type.

Anyway, the removal of creature types allowed us to sort of get the flavor we wanted, and then we can make it a Changeling. Okay. Nath of the Guiltleaf. Three black green for a legendary creature. It's an elf warrior. At the beginning of your upkeep,

you may have target opponent discard a card at random. Whenever opponent discards a card, you may create a one one green elf warrior creature token. Four four.

So this is five mana, three generic, one black, one green. It's legendary. It's an elf warrior. So the idea was elves were in black and green.

So we were trying to find a lord for the elves that did something fun but felt black-green. And that's when we realized that there was synergy. We liked the idea that you could make 1-1 elves, that felt very elf-helping. But we were trying to find a way that really made it sort of black. And the idea of putting a discard effect to this and then rewarding you for the discard by making the elves is kind of cool. This is okay.

Well, if you want to play this in your elf deck, it means you needed a certain amount of discard. You know, and for example, one of the reasons it's fun to push cards into tribe into second colors is people have made a lot of elf decks nobody really ever played discard in an elf deck

that wasn't something you normally did and this card says okay you want to build a different kind of elf deck? Well guess what I reward you for discard I'll give you a lot of elves for discard is there a way to sort of make elves matter in a discard deck? and it just sets you down a different path you know what I'm saying? It allows you to build something

that you've never built before. And that's one of the cool things is, okay, now there's a black-green elf discard deck. Well, no one's ever made that before because there's no... You know, that isn't something that was a thing you needed to do.

So, anyway, I thought that was... I thought it was cool. Okay. Next up. Oaken Brawler. Three and a white for a treefolk warrior. Two, four.

When Oaken Brawler enters the battlefield clash with an opponent. If you win put a plus or plus encounter on Oaken Brawler. So once again clash as an opponent. If you win, put a plus or plus on counter on Oaken Brawler. So once again, clash as you each reveal the top card of your library. Whoever has the higher converted mana cost wins the clash.

And then you can put the card on top or bottom of your library. So essentially you scry one and then play this little game where you're scrying one. So this is the kind of clash that I think worked best. Where there was something that mattered, but you're going to play the card regardless. Some cards, like the vector between them is so high that you just felt like defeated if you didn't win. You know, this card is better if you win the Clash,

and you want to win the Clash, and you can play this in something like a Treefolk deck that just has a chance of having higher spells, so your chance of winning the Clash is a little bit higher. But, you know, but it's something that is... This is one of the Clash cards I like better, just because what we found is, if you have too much variance, it just, I don't know, it just caused lots of problems. Okay, next, Oblivion Ring, two and a white enchantment.

When the Oblivion Ring enters the battlefield, exile another target non-land permanent. When the Oblivion Ring leaves the battlefield, return the exiled card to the battlefield under its owner's control. So, this is where Oblivion Ring started, the first time we did Oblivion Ring. I'm pretty sure the first time we did Oblivion Ring. So, one of the things that's interesting is we had introduced the idea, like, I like the idea of white being the color of answers that can be answered. And we do pacifisms, things like that, and arrests. But this thing, the idea here was, what if you could sort of just get rid of it while it's there?

This ability, Richard Garfield made these creatures called Nightmares. He actually designed it originally for Odyssey, but we ended up using it in Torment. He actually designed it originally for Odyssey, but we ended up using it in Torment. And the idea was they were black creatures, mostly, that when they entered the battlefield, something went away. When they died, you got it back. And the idea that while these nightmares are in play, they're so scary that they're affecting you. We later realized that this ability just makes a little bit more sense in white. Like, let black be the color that just kills things and kills them.

And white be the thing that says, well, you know, as long as I'm in play, I'm dealing with it. But if you deal with my creature, you get it back. And so we made this card as a nice, clean version of it. I mean, the effect becomes so popular now

that we just refer to it as the Oblivion Ring. Like, oh, we need an Oblivion Ring. Now, these days, we're more often to do it as on a creature than on an enchantment, which interesting, circled back up to how Richard had done

the Nightmares. I think we were thinking like, oh, a lot of White's removal is enchantment-based. That's where I think we came with Oblivion Ring. But we now realize that it's kind of hard to move enchantments, especially in red and black. And on creatures, more decks have answers to deal with creatures, so it just

felt a little bit better. Okay. Una's Prowler. One and a block. Creature, Fairy Rogue. It's a 3-1. Flying, because it's Fairy. Discard a card. Una's Prowler gets minus two, minus one until end of turn. Any player may activate this ability. So it's a 3-1 creature that anybody

can discard a card to make it into a 1-1 creature. Now, I will admit, I am not a huge fan of activated abilities that other players can activate, mostly because there's a lot of mental energy that needs to be spent on the board and understanding what you can do. And while if you're an advanced player, you need to track what your opponent can do, normally it's like, well, my opponent can do the things they can do. I don't have to monitor them so closely.

But when we do things in which you can activate something they can do, it just makes you pay more attention to their side, where it just sort of, I think, causes extra complication. And it makes people, even in games where there isn't anything they can do, always look to go, ooh, is there something I can do? And just adds extra mental energy in a time and place that I don't think it adds a lot to the game. Like one of the things we've been trying to crack down on is

when am I making you do mental work that really isn't going to pay off most of the time? Because the game already has a lot, I mean, it makes you exert a lot of mental energy. Let's focus. Let's make you exert your mental energy in a place where it's going to matter and not kind you exert your mental energy in a place where it's going to matter and not kind of waste your mental energy

in a place where it seldom matters. I think, by the way, the reason this is any player, like, why not just say opponent? The answer is there are reasons for you to want to have things in your graveyard in black and so this does enable you to get things to your graveyard. It's not something you do all the time

because obviously it's negative to your creature. But it is something when if you need an enabler to get stuff to the graveyard, this is kind of a cutesy way to do that. And I think that is something that we thought was fun. We like things where they have a

very obvious direct thing and then there are sort of sideways things. Pestermite, two and a blue. Creature, fairy rogue. Flashline, two, one. When Pestermite enters the battlefield, you may tap or untap target per minute. So this is another twiddle effect. So the interesting thing is the major creatures in blue were merfolk and fairies.

Merfolk in blue, white, and fairies in blue were merfolk and fairies merfolk and blue white and fairies and blue black one of the things we like to do is have a theme that runs through the color to allow the color to have an identity then it can mix and match in different ways for example tapping and untapping now this is a fairy it's not a merfolk but you'll notice that both merfolk and fairies for different reasons can use tapping in different ways like I said merfolk and fairies, for different reasons, can use tapping in different ways. Like I said, merfolk has this theme of tapping themselves as a cost for resource, where fairies have this sort of trickery thing,

and so it allows you to sort of, like, you could play this in your fairy deck because it is a fairy, or you can play it in your merfolk deck because it works well with some of the stuff merfolk is doing. So it is neat in that it's a blue card that helps blue because one of the things that you want is if fairies only ever go on the fairy deck then only ever the fairy

player picks them up and then they're always playing the same sort of deck. Where if you crisscross a little bit and say, well, this is a fairy clearly the fairy deck will want to play it, but oh it's kind of synergistic with what the Merfolk are doing. Hey, maybe the merfolk wouldn't mind playing this fairy in their deck. Ponder.

I think this is where Ponder first showed up. Ponder costs a single blue. It's a sorcery. Look at the top three cards of your library, then put them back in any order. You may shuffle your library. Draw a card. There are some cards early on in Magic

where we let you brainstorm and stuff, let you look at the top cards. We keep going back there. The idea is, usually they're blue cards that cost a single blue mana and sort of help you smooth mana early on. What we've discovered, though, is this is very powerful. And Ponder has been this card that, like, it's not a card on the surface that seems like a powerful card. It's like, oh, I can, you know, just look at my cards and then replace this. You know, but actually it is quite powerful.

Ponder is played in mini format. So it's interesting to see how true that is. Okay, next. Quill, Slinger, Bogart. Three and a black. Creature, Goblin Warrior. Whenever a player casts a Kithkin spell, you may have target player lose one life.

Three, two. Okay, so this is an interesting thing where sometimes when we make cards, the idea is it can be used in two ways. Either it can be used as a sideboard card against something, or it can be used to encourage you to play something. So here it's a goblin, it's a black goblin, right? So what this is saying is, okay, if your opponent is playing Kithkin, you can sideboard this in as an answer to them playing Kithkin. Or, if you're playing a deck where you're mixing and matching with Kithkin,

you can play this so that you can use your... It helps your Kithkin do damage. And so, it's a neat effect we do from time to time. In Theros, we did a card called Chain of the Rocks. It does something similar where it works against red because you need a mountain, or you can play it with red if you're playing red-white in that case. And it's a neat way where it has a little bit of flavor.

It does this neat thing where it plays, oh, goblins hate Kithkin, but it creates this synergy where it might make you want to play goblins with Kithkin. And I think that is pretty cool. Okay, so I'm almost at work. and I think that is pretty cool. Okay. So I'm almost to work. Okay.

Next. Scarred Vinebreeder. One and a black. Creature, Elf, Shaman. Two and a black. Exile an Elf card from your graveyard. Scarred Vinebreeder

gets plus three, plus three until end of turn. One, one. So once again, this is a good example of elves are now in green and black. Elves aren't traditionally in black. And we're always... One of the things that's exciting when you get to do designs in a new color is you get to start doing things you don't normally get to do.

And so that's one of the things that I always find fun is... You know, I've made a lot of elf cards. And, you know, you've kind of tapped out, I mean, not that you can't make new elf cards, but like all the basic abilities you've done with elves and green, because we've made a lot of green elves and a lot of green elf cards. But black, all of a sudden, like,

oh, I could care about, like, dead elves. That's not something that, you know, green will do. And so you've got to make a card That's not something that green will do. And so you've got to make a card that's pretty cool that says, okay, now elves are working in a different regard. Now maybe you want to sacrifice elves or be more aggressive with your elves. It just makes you sort of build and play in a different way. And I think that is pretty cool.

You know what I'm saying? One of the things that is true, I mean, I've been making magic a long time. It's always neat when you get to do something you're used to doing, but get to do it in a way you're not used to doing. And there's a couple of ways that happens. In this particular case, okay, we're bleeding something. We're taking a tribe that's in one color and bleeding it to another color.

Sometimes we'll do that with mechanics. We'll do themes where we bend things a little bit. And when we bend it, it allows us to, you know, do things that we wouldn't normally do. Other times, like this, you know, we're doing a creative bend where we get a play around something. Like, elves aren't normally black, so we get it being black. But whenever you get a play around in space

you don't normally get a play around, one of the things I always try to do is maximize in that space because this is a good example where this is not a card you're going to make in a normal set like I talk about this all the time that one of my favorite things to do when you're making a design is whenever I can design cards that can't go in any other set I'm not I'm sort of not wasting a resource you know if I make a generic card that can go anywhere, I'm using up something that could be used somewhere else. But if I make a card that like, this is the only set I can make that card. Like this, for example, is a black elf tribal card. Well, how, I mean, maybe, maybe, you know, in the future somewhere, maybe we'll come back to lore or something. But I mean, it's not often you get

to do a tribal card in black with elves. So I'm really getting to design something that's very unique to the set I'm making it in. And that is something that really, you know, it helps define and give you some sort of general,

it just makes you make things you can't make. And I don't know, as a designer, I'm always trying to do that. Okay, guys. I am now at work. So by judging of the alphabet,

I think I'll have one more Lorwyn podcast to do. I hope you guys are enjoying it. It is fun for me, especially on a set that's a while, like Lorwyn is a while ago. So it's fun to sort of go back and revisit things of days of old. But anyway, I'm now at work. So we all know what that means. It means it's the end of my drive to work.

So instead of talking magic, it's time for me to be making magic. I'll see you guys next time. Bye-bye.