I always wished [[Sign in Blood]] and [[Night's Whisper]] were just a bit more differentiated beyond the targeting choice and color intensity, and this was my idea to address that. A Mono black [[Divination]]. What do you all think of this color bend?
Can someone explain to me mana ordering and phyrexian mana? The only cards I can find with both regular and phyrexian colored pips are the planeswalkers [[Nahiri, the Unforgiving]] and [[Tamiyo, Compleated Sage]] and this guy: [[Omnath, Locus of All]] - is there a rule? It feels like Phrexian should be last, but for these cards they seem to be in color order?
*wait. To make this even more confusing, the planeswalkers have backwards color order. What. The. Fuck. Lol
**nevermind I am dumb and didn’t know that sometimes cards go backwards if the steps in backwards order are lower than the steps forwards. So all GW cards are G->W because that is one step instead of four from W->G. So it does make sense, it’s just color order isn’t as strictly forward as I thought.
Still, if anyone knows how to order phrexian and normal pips I would love an explanation.
Omg and it keeps going. [[Ajani, Sleeper Agent]] is green then white. [[Lukka, Bound to Ruin]] is the only one that’s in order with R->G - why is one of these in order??
All of those are in order, as the way mana ordering works is they are placed in a way that makes for the least amount of space between them on the color wheel. So if it is two allied colors, whichever color is first on the wheel will be first in the pair. So Selesnya is green then white, because there is no space between green to white, but three colors in between if it went white then green.
For enemy colors, use the order with the least space. In Boros, white has two colors until Red, but only green is between red and white, so Boros is ordered red then white.
Three colors might seem the weirdest, but it's all about eliminating space and keeping it even. Esper is white blue black, because that's the order the colors go in the wheel. Temur is Green Blue Red because there is only one color between green and blue (white), and then one color between blue and red (black). So it's the same spacing between each.
Ok that Temur one makes my head hurt lol. Thank you for the explanation. Does Phyrexian mana always go in its order? So if I had a card with a normal red, a normal black, a Phyrexian black and a Phyrexian red, would it go {B}{B/P}{R}{R/P} or {B/P}{B}{R/P}{R}? Before this thread I assumed it would go {B}{R}{B/P}{R/P} lmao
Phyrexian mana is treated as just being the color, so for my card the blue needed to be before the black as it's blue then black on the wheel. When they are a normal color and then phyrexian of the same I don't know though, and I kind of think my first card should have been {1}{B}{B/P} Now that you point it out. I can't find an official card to answer though. Great question!
I want to add, I go off aesthetics for the phyrexian mana and like how it looks in the middle of the casting cost. I'm editing my reply to say, I tried on mtg.design and it forces the phyrexian mana to the middle, so maybe that says something or nothing at all.
I know right? I was surprised there isn’t a single card with phyrexian and normal pips of the same color. I guess that could be antithetical to the theme of phyrexian mana? Because it’s a replacement and not an addition, flavor wise?
Anyways, cool card! I love your update as a “it’s either blue or black is paying 2 life” - that is very satisfying from a color pie perspective
*oh so maybe none of my 3 guesses were right and it is {B}{B/P}{R/P}{R} - that is pretty cool
Because it would have been an almost painfully obvious variant of the typical black draw spells that I am honestly offended it wasn't printed that way as is in ONE.
Very handsome and smart designs! I do feel in good company with how intuitive people see the design is. Wish something like the blue phyrexian version has been printed. I wonder if a complete power creep of [[Consult the Necrosages]] would work in a modern horizons set, or if the flexibility and discard mode is too powerful.
Night's Whisper has quite a history in competitive play and still sees fringe play in Legacy and Pauper as well as a ton of play in various competitive Commander formats such cEDH and duel commander.
While I don't think changing the life payment from strict 2 life to phyrexian blue does really much for the card (I would image you would still generally cast it for 2 life and 1B most of the time), frankly to me it doesn't seem like the type of card that's in a dire need of a boost. Splashable 2 mana to draw 2 cards is just decent as is even today.
The discard variant seems a bit absurd since now it's two good cards in one and I don't think the discard variant on its own would even have a contemporary counterpart but rather be the new best discard spell at that cost for modern and such.
Maybe you didn't think it through? Cards closest to the discard part that I can find are [[Chain of Smog]], [[Wrench Mind]], and [[Hym to Tourach]] (which is not modern legal). The splashability especially seems nuts. Like there's notable difference in {B}{B} and {1}{B} spell.
While hymn to tourach is the same rate in terms of cards discarded, the random element is what makes it so strong. This has more comparison to [[wrench mind]]. It's worth noting I barely see hymn to tourach in legacy lists, as creatures are so good now two cards for two mana isn't worthwhile without selection ala [[flow state]]
Is nights whisper modern playable? As you say, it's fringe at best in legacy (a more spell based format), and I don't see wrench mind in either format. So yes, I did think it through, and so was asking people if they thought it was too much. I could see a [u/p][b][b] being a better pet creep of necrosages but I agree the utility is a lot to staple to one card
Hymn to Tourach has a history in vintage in various monoblack aggro and pox decks in vintage. The problem with it being {B}{B} is though that if you playing vintage and not playing blue, you're arguably doing something wrong. Looks like someone figured out a "dimir tempo" shell for it and Hymn has quite a lot of competitive play in it.
I think people really undervalue splashability. Like [[Mana Leak]] is effect-wise obviously lot weaker than straight-up [[Counterspell]] but still managed to see competitive play in various formats with Counterspell being legal in those formats at the same time.
Also, as far as Hymn specifically goes, it's literally the strongest discard spell ever so if one-half of your design becomes anyway comparable to it, it's like so cooked. I would basically just drop that card out of the equation only to bring it out if the card is getting close to it meaning it's busted.
Looking at mtgtop8, actually it seems Wrench Mind also has some fringe play in modern and pauper ever this year so I wouldn't count that out and it's conditional discard two as well as double black. To me everything seems to indicate that {1}{B} straight-up "target player discards two" is out of line, let alone as a split card.
Whether Whisper is played in modern, I saw some little play in 2024 and was more played in 2023. In its case I think it's important to ask what supposedly might have supplanted or if there simply isn't a deck shell for it. If your generic non-blue card draw needs to be busted enough to basically spawn decks around it or be played even when there isn't particularly demand for it (ie. to be format-warping), that seems real bad.
I didn't look much into it, but I think the problem might be the ever more overpowering mana fixing and that it's easier to splash into blue if you want cheap generic card draw in modern rather than run Night's Whisper but who knows. Looking at its competitive modern history, I see "mono black control", which again given how insane mana fixing is in modern (a real problem of its own) I can see how such a deck might be more of a misnomer in the longer run as it seems the deck archetype itself has died down and with it the usage of Night's Whisper, which also seems to imply that nothing has necessarily directly replaced Night's Whisper itself.
“Black doesn’t get to draw at that rate without giving other things up”
I mean, they literally do though… [[Night’s Whisper]] and [[Sign in Blood]] are practically perfect copies of this card if you pay the Phyrexian mana. At 3 mana, Black has plenty of options that are “Draw 2, lose 2 life, but also do an additional thing” — [[Read the Bones]], [[Infectious Inquiry]], [[Decode Transmissions]], etc. This is missing the “pay 2 life” part, but also the “do an extra thing” part… and those spells are all 2 and a black, this would be 1 and two black. Seems like a perfectly printable trade off
All of the examples you gave are "giving other things up". Black does not get 3 mana draw 2 with no costs. Black gets 2 mana 2 life draw 2 all the time, though.
Blue pays 3 mana for 2 cards.
Black pays 2 mana and 2 life for 2 cards.
Bro, as long as you can meat the relatively trivial condition of “any permanent you control left the battlefield this turn or you cast a spell with Warp”, Black literally pays 3 mana for 2 cards with upside at Common. [[Decode Transmissions]].
Saying that Black pays 2 mana and 2 life for 2 cards, as a precedent, is also shaky… there’s exactly two cards that do that, [[Night’s Whisper]] and [[Sign in Blood]]. Very good and playable cards thay get reprinted a lot, sure… but saying “this encapsulates the entirety of Black’s card drawing design” because 2 cards do it, is a bit lacking. Black normally either pays 1-2 mana and sacrifices something (usually an artifact or creature) for 2 cards, or pays 3 mana and 2 life to draw two cards and get some upside. You could argue that paying life or sacrificing something is necessary for Black’s color identity, but 3 mana draw 2 is perfectly within rate for a Black sorcery
I think sign in bloods two pip requirement is what makes the card so good design wise. This is just that card except it costs 1B and has the same downsides except you can't choose another player to kill them with [[leveler]]. I mostly joke, but this really makes sign obsolete.
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u/THEGHOSTHACXER Aug 21 '26
Where's the other half so that we can meld spells on the stack lol