#two if we count Obeka

[melleonis]

exactly one good thing about Thunder Junction

[mtg-brokentoken]

I recently (like minutes) became a follower of @anomolee on TikTok, and stumbled across this

1. How do you know how many of each color to put into a multicolor deck?

Assuming EDH, you want about 36 lands or 40 cards that make mana (including mana rocks). One thing I do is sort cards not only by color, but the number of specific mana symbols it has. Blade Historian is a great example for this, in a red/white deck, you’re likely be able to play it on turn 4. But if you’ve also got Forests as some of your land spots, you need to ask yourself if it’s something you want to play on turn four, and prioritize red/white mana sources, or if it’s okay to play later turns instead. Cards like Evolving Wilds help to sort for what you need, as do multicolor lands. I do tend to count how much of the deck is a certain color, but then lean a bit harder into colors that have more mana symbols.

So recently I made my Obeka deck. A LOT of cards in it have “beginning of the next end step” wording, like Hellkite Courser and Elemental Appeal which has a whopping RRRR mana cost. My blue and black cards only have two mono colored cards with multiple mana symbols, so counting cards by mono-color I have 25 red cards (8 with multiple red required), 12 blue, and 7 black cards. So my mana sources are mostly red, then blue is about half the number of red, and black doesn’t have as many sources. Multicolor lands and things like Command Sphere can complicate this, so if we said it was 40 basic lands I would probably do about 25 red, 10 blue, and 5 black. I might need to drop Mountains to add more Swamps or something, but that’s about where I’d start.

2. How do you add loyalty counters to planeswalker that only have minus abilities?

Kasmina, Enigma Sage is one route to take, it gives planeswalkers an ability so they can add their own loyalty counters. Ajani Unyielding is also a great planeswalker that compliments others, his ultimate adding 5 loyalty to other walkers. And then there are non-planeswalker options. Doubling Season only increases the loyalty counters added as an EFFECT, so it doubles the loyalty they come in with, but an up arrow with a number only gets that number, in the case of Ajani Unyielding, though, it ~says~ to put loyalty counters on the walkers, so that is an effect. There’s also Gilder Bairn and Vorel of Hull Clade that can but don’t call it out directly, and some cards that state it as an effect as well (directly or otherwise).

3. Who comes up with the names for cards?

That seems to be a wide group of people, as some have “pet cards” they make early on and the names don’t change, but many do end up adjusting to better fit the theme and naming conventions for the plane/set. So Magic Staff, but many of them.

4. I have a card that says “target creature gains deathtouch until end of turn”, can I use that on somebody else’s creature?

Yes. In multiplayer games this can be especially potent because you can use someone else’s creature after blockers are declared to get rid of a threat you aren’t currently dealing with. Someone has a Stormtide Leviathan and you can’t even attack but you can give a creature deathtouch and make it fight the leviathan? You might even be able to get rid of both threats!

5. If my creature with Trample fights another creature, does the excess damage go through?

No, Trample is specific to combat damage. So damage from the fight mechanic wouldn’t normally go through. Aegar, the Freezing Flame is one example of how you could make it work.

6. If I have Chatterfang out and cast Ezuri’s Predation, do the Squirrels also have to fight?

I admit, this one I had to look up, so I pulled up Chatterfang on Gatherer and it does confirm that because Chatterfang’s effect says “instead” it basically counts as Ezuri’s Predation make ALL the tokens. So they do fight, too!