Subject: MISC Date: Tue, 21 Jul 1998 11:46:08 -0400 From: Jeff Fitch To: fkusumot@ix.netcom.com A Magic:The Gathering guide to Creature card creation. Well I'm writing this article in hopes that maybe someone from Wizards of the Coast will view it. Why? Well maybe it will help them understand how to make better creatures in the future. In this article I will explain my opinions on how a creature card should be created and lead you through the making of 3 cards. The first step in creating and creature card should be to determine it's rarity. Is it going to be a common, uncommon, or rare. I will create a common card to begin with. Now that we have the rarity, common, we have to determine color. To do this we have to look a certain common abilities associated with each color. White: Landwalk, Shadow, Creature Pumping(+1+1), Protection from Black or Red, Banding, Prevent Damage, Flying, First Strike. Green: Poison, Venom(destroy creature blocking or blocked by), Pseudo-Rampage, Landwalk, Gain Life if creature is put in graveyard, Tap to add mana, Regeneration, Untap land. Red: Landwalk, Target creature gains Mountainwalk, Tap pay mana deal 1 damage, First Strike, Target Creature Unblockable. Black: Shadow, Can not be blocked except by Walls and Black Creatures, Landwalk, Poison, B: +1+1 until end of turn, Sacrafice to look at opponents hand and make them discard a card, Regenerate. Blue: Shadow, Flying, Tap deal damage, Landwalk, Return Creature when comes into play, If creature damages opponent opponent puts card of library into graveyard. These are but a few of the many common abilities associated with creatures. The next step is to determine the color of our new creature. Wel shall make him White. Now we need to know what his power and toughness will be. Lets make him 2/2 for now. That is a base cost of 1 colorless and 1 white. Now we will give him to abilities, lets say First Strike and Protection from Red. Now his Cost should be up to 3 color less and 1 white. We can the take away 2 colorless for 1 white. We now have a creature that reads: Name| 1WW| 2/2| Protection from Red. First Strike. A good solid common creature card. Now we can move onto Uncommon creatures. These are tricky because they usually have a semi-unique ability and they have no real template of abilities to choose from although they can receive any ability from the common cards. We will make are Uncommon Red. He will be 4/4 this gives him a base of either 2 colorless and 2 red or 4 colorless and 1 red. For purposes such as uncommons, 4 colorless 1 red is a good starting point. We will give are friend here Trample and Mountainwalk. This brings his color total up to 6 colorless 1 red. Now we must decide is he broken at 3 red and 2 colorless or should he be 2 red and 4 colorless. 5 cost is good and he is less splashable then before, but he is also uncommon which should entitle him to a little more leway on cost. So if he were common he should cost 2 red 4 colorless so for his uncommon nature he will cost 1 colorless less. Our friend now looks like this, Name| 3RR| 4/4| Trample. Mountainwalk. He is a good uncommon because he has 1 common ability which should cost nothing and 1 not so common which should cost 1 colorless. Now we move onto the most difficult challenge, the Rare. The rare may gain abilities from commons at 3 for every 1 colored mana. If the rare is also of a Legendary nature it should receive either a special ability or just a bonus to power and toughness. Now that we have that part established let us make a rare of the color Blue. It will have a 5/5 power/ toughness. Since he isn't a legend he should cost 3UU. This is a good establishment since he doesn't have any special abilities yet. Now we will give it the ability to Fly. Thats good but lets also give him a kind of special ability. How about 2UU, Tap: Set aside Top card of your library. You may play this card as if it were in your hand. If you can't put card on bottom of your library. Well he now has a unique ability so now lets change him to a legend. His ability costs 4 mana and so we should either increase his cost by one colored or decrease his power and toughness by 1 each. I would personally opt for the latter. Now we have a creature that says Name|Summon Legend| 3UUU|5/5| Flying. 2UU, Tap: Set aside Top card of your library. You may play this card as if it were in your hand. If you can't put card on bottom of your library. Well I hope this has been at the very least, entertaining. I do not work for WotC and so don't know how they make creatures up but this is just a method that I would use. Jeff Fitch phitch@hotmail.com |Team Teim |"I used to |"Sleep thats |"You know | |(Once again |believe in |where I'm a |what the | |proving |things |viking." |best thing| |there is an |when I was |- Ralph |about duct| |I in team) |your age" | |tape is?" | | |-Homer S. | |-Me |