New Evergreen Mechanics

[MaximumCDawg]

Starting with Origins, we have some new evergreen mechanics: Scry and Prowess and stuff we don't care about.
http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/making-magic/evergreen-eggs-ham-2015-06-08

There's a hint that we might get lots of new toys in these abilities coming down the pipe. 

Sam Stoddard has remarked that he thinks Evergreen mechanics get overused initially and so "I hate to say it, but I am sure that prowess and menace, and maybe scry, may be overused in the coming year or so[.]"  From: http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/latest-developments/standing-issues-2015-06-19

I think this is significant.  Prowess and Scry are both Vintage-level abilities on the right cards.  "So what," you might say.  "Banding is Vintage-level, too, if you drew three cards as well."  Yeah, I know, but these mechanics are designed to encourage Vintage-relevant development in a way that other abilities are not.  Playing lots of cards in a single turn is something Vintage exploits better than anyone else.  Scry is a very relevant mechanic and looks like it's going to be blue's primary card advantage mechanism going forward, with Red getting the instant but short-term drawing.

I think this means we should expect better things out of the next few sets than prior sets.  Two of the new mechanics to showcase lend themselves well to what Vintage wants to do.

Now, I could be wrong.  I though Prowess signaled cheap cantrips in Khans, and instead we got worse-impulse.  But, if Sam is to be believed, both aggro-tempo style decks and Storm might be getting shots in the arm.  I'm eagerly anticipating what they do next.

[tito del monte]

I wish I shared your optimism. To me, it sounds much more like "lazy design incoming guys!" - I expect to see a slew of once playable effects on cards that cost twice as much to cast with "Scry 1" tacked on the end.

That said, I do like the new Prowess Ophidian! Hope that's a good sign for the future of the mechanic.

[Protoaddict]

WOTC has been very cautious with cantrips because of blues dominance but also because of Modern and how having too many cantrips was breaking it, which I think is likely the only real way to break scry for vintage at this point. Getting more crystal balls printed will have little to no effect on the format. Maybe it will open up other colors, provided it is in those colors, but I am not banking on it. A red Cantrip would not be the worst thing.

Likewise, Prowess is great but how much better are the cards going to get than what is already printed? Monastery Swiftspear does not see play and on paper it is like the ideal creature. If it is something in the 3CMC slot its going to have to compete with Mentor and I don't think we are going to get a card that is straight out more powerful than that.

On the other hand, Spell Mastery is interesting because the requirements are virtually non existent in vintage.

[xouman]

Spell mastery is really interesting because it's indeed quite easy to trigger (and not impossible to hate at all). Also we have "Renown", with one near-interesting card:

Relic Hunter 1W
Creature - Human Soldier
Renown 1 (When this creature deals combat damage to a player, if it isn't renowned, put a +1/+1 counter on it and it becomes renowned.)
When Relic Hunter becomes renowned, you may search your library for an Equipment card, reveal it, put it into your hand, then shuffle your library.
2/2

Not a SFM by any means but this also gets the CA parity and grows to 3/3 after connecting. While renown itself is pretty meh for vintage, triggering abilities can be interesting (when becoming renowned destroy an artifact, draw a card, remove a graveyard, look at hand and discard a card, put a creature into play...) while pumping a creature.

[bactgudz]

Likewise, Prowess is great but how much better are the cards going to get than what is already printed? Monastery Swiftspear does not see play and on paper it is like the ideal creature. If it is something in the 3CMC slot its going to have to compete with Mentor and I don't think we are going to get a card that is straight out more powerful than that.

There's still room for an efficient flyer or otherwise evasive critter with prowess.  Someday they will combine the keyword unblockable with the keyword prowess, it's just a matter of how they price it.

[Protoaddict]

I mean, the bar that we have to surpass at this point is delver I think. A creature for U that was 1/1 with prowess would not be strong enough, likely if you put flying on that it would not be strong enough, if you made it a 1/2 with flying and prowess it may not be strong enough, and then your starting to veer into unsafe territory for other formats.

Maybe if we get something with a relevant creature type like merfolk I would change my tune, but I don't see it happening.

[rikter]

Likewise, Prowess is great but how much better are the cards going to get than what is already printed? Monastery Swiftspear does not see play and on paper it is like the ideal creature. If it is something in the 3CMC slot its going to have to compete with Mentor and I don't think we are going to get a card that is straight out more powerful than that.

There's still room for an efficient flyer or otherwise evasive critter with prowess.  Someday they will combine the keyword unblockable with the keyword prowess, it's just a matter of how they price it.

They came halfway there with Elusive Spellfist in dragons, you get the unblockable but only the power half of the prowess trigger.

I like relic hunter, the bootleg SFM...I mean you would never play it over SFM in a format where its legal, but I like the design. I think it might be a playable modern card, combined with a sword package to tutor up.