Card of the Day - Shadowcloak Stalker, Frigid Rebuttal, and Clear Away

There's a card an awful lot like this in Alara Reborn, it seems, only it isn't an elf, it costs one [U] more, and it has flying. Oh, and it doesn't have quicken. I can't really claim Wizards copied me on this one because I made it after I had seen their card, but I'm going to anyway.

I'll get you for this, Wizards, you no-good thieving rat-fink bastards!




The five cards with quicken I've shown you up to this point have been a cycle, of sorts. However it might be more accurate to call them a four-card cycle and a blue card that hangs out with the others on occasion. See, the others are just normal cards going about their business that just so happen to have quicken. Frigid Rebuttal has quicken and knows it. And it bases its ability off this knowledge. It breaks the fourth wall, if you will.

That is actually a completely inappropriate phrase for the occasion.

Regardless, quicken is more than a neat gimmic with Frigid Rebuttal; it is an integral part of the card.




Clear Away doesn't have quicken, but it chills with cards that do. I wonder why the hunter from Left 4 Dead is in its art, but only a little. He's not hurting anybody. Is it a crime to wear a hoodie and feast on the uninfected? I don't think so.

P.S. It has come to my attention that I am not consistent with the names of Card of the Day posts that showcase three or more cards. Sometimes I include the word "and"; sometimes I do not. This is a very tragic situation. Please join me in weeping.
P.P.S. I would again like to point out that I do not own any of the cards I create, so they are impossible to steal.

Original Art - Shadowcloak Stalker
Original Art - Frigid Rebuttal
Original Art - Clear Away

Card of the Day - Remember Agony, Incite Fury, Whitetower's Call

Quicken, if not my absolute favorite among keywords I've designed, is certainly in the upper echelons (I think fervor probably takes home the gold). Like cycling, it's fairly simple and it doesn't really have that much impact on the rest of the card (for most cards). However, also like cycling, it causes you to think about, and possibly play, the card differently.

Here's how it works, basically. You play a spell with quicken just like you would any other spell. You pay all necessary costs of the spell and it goes on the stack. From that point on until the spell with quicken resolves, it's as if all spells have flash. Since any spells played during this time go on the stack on top of quicken, they resolve first. Note that players may only play spells as though they have flash during this time. Quicken has no effect on abilities, so it doesn't let you sacrifice your Bloodpyre Elemental.




One of my favorite things about quicken is that it's a different ability depending on which type of card it's on. On sorceries, it's a minor drawback, allowing your opponent to respond to the card with spells they wouldn't normally be able to play during your turn. In Remember Agony's case, this might mean that they get rid of a card that they absolutely don't want to lose. Of course, your opponent is unlikely to hold on to their spells just on the off chance that you play a quicken card. That's why quicken would have been a good thing to have in Prophecy or better yet a full rhystic block, but with rhystic done right (yes, that is possible). With players leaving lands untapped to pay for rhystic spells and to power up reverse Scoria Cats, quicken would be much more of a drawback on sorceries, and could allow for both more interesting and more powerful cards.




On instants, quicken is an advantage. Cheap instants with quicken act like more versatile variants of the namesake spell but with different side-effects.

The most fascinating things you can do with quicken aren't actually on the quickening cards themselves. Given an abundance of quickening cards at common, you can create sorceries that have different effects when it's not your turn. You can do seemingly nonsensical things like giving a creature the ability "When CARDNAME comes into play, counter target spell." In a quicken-free format this is useless, barring some Elvish Piper action. Ideally, you could use that creature to counter your opponent's Incite Fury or have it ride on the back of a Whitetower's Call to do some instant-speed countering. Of course, when you're messing around with quicken, everything's instant speed.

P.S. Remember Temporal Adept? He's all about quicken.
P.P.S. I really dislike Incite Fury's name. Not a huge fan of the art, either.
P.P.P.S. Whitetower's Call used to be called Idle, but it seemed a shame to waste such an elegant name.

Original Art - Remember Agony
Original Art - Incite Fury
Original Art - Whitetower's Call