Imperial Taxation (formerly Vow of Poverty)

[Ephraim]

Vow of Poverty

Enchantment

Whenever a player plays a spell, empty that player's mana pool.

***

This is a techy, rare-calibre (narrow-scope), rules maker that I was thinking about today. I'm pretty sure that the way "playing a spell" works, the spell is played only when all costs for it have been payed, so this always allows a spell to be played if its controller has sufficient mana to play it, but never allows that player to float mana. As previously noted, I know that the applications for this card are limited, but if Wizards can print [card]One With Nothing[/card], then this card is okay.

[Ephraim]

Current Wording:

Imperial Taxation
{W}
Enchantment

Spells gain "As an additional cost to play this spell, empty your mana pool."

[asmoranomardicodais]

I think the card's fine, just don't use such a cool name for such a bad card.

[Marco]

That card name is really, really cool. The card itself is okay (unique and somewhat interesting). I guess it works the way you intend it to...

[dandan]

I like the card (as in like the concept, I'd hate to find one in a booster)
I like the name.

I don't like the name on this card. The two aren't remotely connected.

To be honest, I'd put the ability in Green. Green is the colour of not mana burning, and has had cards that limit the colour of mana produced based on what has been played.

Still, White needs no reason to make up an obscure rule, so I don't have a strong objection to it being White.

I'd probably give it Cycling 2 to make it suck marginally less. Hell, this card could cost 0 to reflect the power level of the effect. (Would a 0cc Instant be Gold?)

[Matt]

I like this a lot. However, as a triggered ability, instants are immune. Is that a problem?

[Ephraim]

I like this a lot. However, as a triggered ability, instants are immune. Is that a problem?

It is a problem, but it isn't one that I can see a way to fix without a ridiculous amount of rules text. I'd rather leave this with a bit less functionality than make it harder to understand than it already is.

[Shadow-Walker]

If you're floating mana then you probably dont have enough mana total to play your instant or need to wait for another spell to resolve so I see this being very rarely played around despite it being a triggered ability.

[Machinus]

Obviously, this is good against decks that produce a lot of mana at once but do not use it at once. This includes combo. But in general, this will reward decks with lots of individual mana sources, and hurt those that play cards like upheaval and gilded lotus. I don't think this will affect control decks because they do not float mana.

One thing this prevents is forking your fireblast. That is really cool.

[Matt]

No, it DOESN'T prevent Forking a Fireblast, for the reason I already mentioned.

Float {R}
Play Fireblast, saccing two mountains.
This triggers
Respond to the trigger with Fork
Fork resolves, 4 damage
Trigger resolves, mana pool is already empty so it does nothing
Fireblast resolves, 4 damage

I thought about trying this wording:

All spells have "Empty your mana pool."

But that still doesn't fix the Fork/Fireblast thing (which I really want to do because that's one of the most common examples of floating mana).

Could we word it like: "As any player plays a spell, empty that player's mana pool"?

If that doesn't work, what about "All spells cost more to play, where X is the amount of mana in that spell's controller's mana pool"? I'm pretty sure that would work, but it's kind of ugly.

[Marco]

what about "All spells cost more to play, where X is the amount of mana in that spell's controller's mana pool"? I'm pretty sure that would work, but it's kind of ugly.

Actually, I kind of like that.

[Shadow-Walker]

"Each player can not play spells or abilities if his or her mana pool is not empty and he or she has a spell or ability on the stack."

[Ephraim]

With that wording, it just means that players who are "forced" to generate excess mana can't play any more spells until they pass the phase and take mana burn. That isn't what I intended for this. I just wanted it to siphon off any excess mana. I'd like to change this card's name, though, to open up "Vow of Poverty" for The Atog Lord's cycle. I was thinking of using "Imperial Taxation" as a tongue-in-cheek reference to Legend of the Five Rings, where any excess gold produced when paying for a card is lost. According to the rulebook, they go to the Emperor as taxes.

[Ephraim]

24 Hour Clock

[Matt]

I still don't like how this doesn't stop Fork/Fireblast. That's one of the most common uses of floating mana, so to make a floating-mana hoser that doesn't hose that instance seems, well, pointless.

[Ephraim]

It would break the fourth wall pretty grossly, but how about I word it such that the enchantment creates a new statebased effect:

Whenever a player would get priority, if there is mana in that player's mana pool, empty that player's mana pool.

[Matt]

"As any player plays a spell, empty that player's mana pool"

Is there any reason this wouldn't work?

[Norm4eva]

It depends on when 'as' is, I guess.  With Meddling Mage it's pretty clear but the specifics of announcing spells aren't always widely known.  You might want to use reminder text like "(Empty that player's mana pool after costs are paid.)" or else people will be getting shit for tapping their land and then announcing a spell instead of doing it the proper way.
Eph's right about the fourth wall thing, I hate it when a card mentions the stack outside of reminder text. God forbid a spell ever read "The next time a player would receive priority..."

[The Atog Lord]

How about:

All spells gain "As an additional cost to play ~this~, empty your mana pool."?

[Marco]

Was Matt's other idea overlooked? Because I think it was pretty cool:

All spells cost X more to play, where X is equal to the amount of mana in that spell's controller's mana pool.

Alternatively, I think The Atog Lord's idea would work.

[Norm4eva]

Well the cost is determined when the spell goes on the stack, so with that wording you could still play your spell and then float mana before you pass priority, after you've paid for the spell.  I think this card is trying to avoid floating mana during a spell entirely, ie to avoid Fireblast/Fork, or Upheaval floating UG only to replay your Mongrel and Rootwallas (least favorite thing to see during OdBC )

[Ephraim]

I think that I am going to go with The Atog Lord's suggestion. It has the advantage of brevity and also states unambiguously just how this card works.

[LordHomerCat]

I don't think the current wording works entirely, like, it wouldnt prevent upheaval-tog or something, although it would prevent forking a fireblast.  What about if you made it like, "All spells have 'Empty your mana pool' ."?  Actually, come to think of it, that would stop the upheaval problem, but leave the fork one.  Is there any way to word this so it would stop both of those possibilities, or is that even the intent?

[Matt]

Exactly why won't think stop Upheaval/Tog?

[Shadow-Walker]

You tap with upheaval on the stack.

[Matt]

Well, crap. What about

"Players can't play mana abilities except during the announcement of a spell or ability."

That stops Upheaval, but lets Forkblast work. And at the cost of making Mana Leak a hard counter, and Nether Void a hard lock. God damn it. I'm starting to think there's no way to prevent mana flotation entirely.

[Shadow-Walker]

How about 2 clauses:
All spells gain "As an additional cost to play ~this~, empty your mana pool."
If a spell would resolve, remove it from the game instead, unless that spell's controller empties his or her mana pool.

[asmoranomardicodais]

Or:

"Each player may not have more than one spell on the stack at a time. Whenever a player has no spells on the stack, empty their mana pool."

[Ephraim]

Now the suggestions are getting into effects that prevent people from playing stacked instants at all, regardless of whether or not they tried to float mana to do it. Once again, I note that the most effective, albeit most objectionable wording thus far is the one I suggested that uses the wording for a state-based effect.

[Godder]

How about: Spells gain "Empty your mana pool."