Creating Vanilla Creatures (not a card)

[Ephraim]

I was reading over the list of what is needed for the set and one of the requests was for inventive blue creatures. Rather than try to fill those slots immediately, I first wanted to ask what place vanilla creatures will have in TMD's set. Will there be any vanilla creatures? If there will be, will they have gone through the card-creation process as well, or will they be added by the administration, rather as an afterthought? Obviously, creating a vanilla creature doesn't really seem like the proper purpose of the card-creation forum. However, blue in particular should have at least one or two. Before I take one for the team by suggesting some vanilla (or almost vanilla) creatures, I want to make sure that this is generally seen to be an appropriate move.

[rvs]

We've had some discussions in the past, and concluded that it would be sort of useless to make vanilla creatures. HOWEVER, I think if you can make one that has really superb flavor, that adds something to the storyline, then by all means make it. However, usually, those cards can easily be fitted with a more common ability, to make them less boring.

[dandan]

I suggested a vanilla 5/5 Green creature for 5 mana to fill a Common slot as it would be solid in Limited and I got a very strong negative reaction. As we take Limited into account when we make cards we should take it into account when we make the set IMHO but I appear to be a minority.

Matt managed to get a vanilla 1/1 creature in by hiding it behind a CC of 0.

[Matt]

A zero-mana 1/1 isn't really vanilla; it's special ability is being free. It's the same reason why I don't consider Savannah Lions to truly be vanilla; its special ability is being the cheapest, fastest guy in the set. The only way to make a creature with no abilities interesting is to lower the cost, relative to the p/t.

The problem with vanilla creatures is that you really can't create them; since there's nothing to play with except the p/t and mana cost and MAYBE the creature type, it's already known what the standard levels are. One mana can get you Two mana will get you a 2/2 (2/3 if double green). Three will get you a 2/3 (or a 3/3 for green). Four mana can get you anything as big as 3/4, unless you're green, in which case you can go up to 5/4. We already know that toughness <<< power, and furthermore, exactly how much less. And so on. The 'vanilla creature' equation was solved a long time ago.

[Ephraim]

My question then is, why doesn't our set have any? They appear everywhere, frequently. Sure, they're just filler, but you're quite right - they fill slots that need to be occupied for Limited to be worthwhile. How close to "not vanilla" would be appropriate? Would a mimic of Storm Crow be okay? Further, can/should we conclude as a whole that vanilla creatures should or should not be in the set at all. If they should be, they don't have to be the subject of card creation. A couple of posts in an all-encompassing vanilla creatures thread would be sufficient. Even if the creature isn't strictly vanilla, nobody wants to waste time designing a 3/2 flier for {U} (which, by the way, has never been done before; being equivalent to Wayward Soul, but being somewhat better than Cloud Elemental or Cloud Spirit, it'd probably be Uncommon.)

[Matt]

Vanilla means NO abilities. Storm Crow is not vanilla.

We do not want any vanilla creatures in our set. They're BORING and LAZY and seeing as we have INFINITE TIME to work on this (i.e. are not on Wizards' three-month schedule) there's no reason to include that junk.

We also have plenty of creatures that are limited workhorses. Jacob in particular has designed a ton of these.

[Ephraim]

Very well, if we're following the strictest definition of vanilla (I've never counted "flying" as an ability of any real weight), I'll go ahead and start that 3/2 creature. If blue needs creatures, I'm happy to make them.

[Matt]

One big 'problem' with such plain creatures is that they start giving you ideas for improving them. That 3/2 flyer for 1UU is almost certainly overpowered for blue - it's almost strictly better than Trained Armodon, which is only the size it is because it's green, the creature color.

Compare to Rishadan Airship, for example. So now I'm thinking - well, give it a drawback. But then all of a sudden, it's not really plain and boring anymore. Plain cards have a tendency to attract little abilities like sprinkles on ice cream.

[Jacob Orlove]

We also have plenty of creatures that are limited workhorses. Jacob in particular has designed a ton of these.

The secret to making cards like that is finding a good size and ability to complement a good name and flavor text. Now that I'm thinking about this, I realize that I should probably go back and revise the flavor of a few of my early cards.

Anyway, like Matt said, truly vanilla creatures are boring, as are most creatures with a lone keyword ability (which you correctly view as basically vanilla). You really need either a synergistic ability or a mix of abilities to make a creature truly interesting--even for draft. Decisions are the heart of magic, and if a creature forces you to think about more than just when to cast it and whether to attack or wait to block, then it's a better card from the designer's standpoint.

Plus, Wizards makes a number of vanilla creatures for the base set and to exemplify new mechanics--neither of which we really need to do.