Knight of Symmetry (and rule question)

[Harlequin]

This comes dirrectly from my submission for CDC3. 

Original Card:

Knight of Balance
Creature - Human Knight
If Knight of Balance has power equal to it's toughness then it has Protection from Red, Protection from Black, and First Strike.
: Knight of Balance gets +1/+0 until end of turn
1/2

So it pays homage to Black and Silver Knight, without being strictly better/worse than either. 

The ability is intended to be static.  So it statically toggles on and off in correlation with power and tougness.  This does not use the stack (but obvisouly the pump ability does use the stack).  This creates an Interesting drawback: You can't save him twice.  For example, lets say cast shock on him.  In response I activate his +1/0 in an attempt to make him Pro-Red.  Now in response to the pump, you Lightning Bold him.  Even if I have all the White mana in the world, I can't prevent both spells from landing (because if I activate the pump again in response he will Pro-Red the Lightning Bolt, but then be a 3/2 for the shock).

Rules Question:
How does a creature gaining and loosing first strike effect combat?

Lets put up a scenario:  So I control the card above (as printed).  I declare him as an attack and in that step I pump him to a 2/2 (which makes him Pro-Red-Black, First strike).  Now blockers are declared and because he is Pro-Red-Black all your Goblins and Zombies are worthless.  Now we move on to the First Strike Damage step.  I assign 2 points of damage to you and when I get priority I pump him say.. 2 more times (makeing him a 4/2 who looses first strike).  Now what happens when we enter the normal combat damage step?  Do I get to assign 4 MORE damage to you (effectively giving him one-and-a-half strike?)


As a result of that rules question I offer the following resolution:

Current Wording

Knight of Equity
Creature - Human Knight
If Knight of Equity has power equal to it's toughness then it has Protection from Red, Protection from Black, and First Strike.
: Knight of Equity gets +1/+0 until end of turn, you can not use this ability while Knight of Equity is in combat.
1/2



That means you can still have him gain protection at any point durring your opponent's turn, even durring combat... so long as the Knight Himself is not in combat.

[andrewpate]

No, the "one-and-a-half" strike trick does not work.  During the regular combat damage step, two types of creatures assign damage:  those that did not assign damage during the first strike combat damage step and those with double strike.  So giving first strike after the first strike combat damage step will not prevent the creature from dealing damage, and taking it away after that step will not let it deal damage twice.

[Mr. Nightmare]

What andrewpate says is correct, and I'd like to add a point.  It's possible to utilize the Pro-red/black and First Strike to evade blockers, and then before first strike damage has been assigned (ie: after blockers are assigned) pump him again to assign 4 damage to your opponent.

[OfficeShredder]

Considering nantuko shade is the only pump creature in recent history (I guess frozen shade might have been popular in '93) that was used extensively, I think it's worth erring on the side of power.  The ability to swing for four damage unblocked for 6 white mana against some decks isn't exactly threatening.

one interesting thing is you could alter knight of balance's power and toughness with other spells to grant or take away the ability... Orcich Orihflame (however you spell that), could be used as a sort of "mini-combo" with this, so you don't have to keep pumping him (as an example, I'm sure there are other more efficient ways of doing it).  Not that it's terribly exciting, but imagine if you also have a glorious anthem out.... now he's a 3/3 first strike pro red pro black, and is turning into a mini-akroma

[andrewpate]

While I agree that pump creatures are often bad, Nantuko Shade is hardly the only one of any quality.  I'm going to assume that you meant creatures that cost some amount of mana for some kind of net gain (barring Morphling and Psychatog from consideration, for example), and confining "recent memory" to not include the Ice Age pump knights; there, we still have Avarax seeing decent amounts of play in Beasts decks during Onslaught Block's tenure, and maybe some others of which I'm not thinking immediately.

On the whole, I think that there's a sentiment on this forum to want every card to see play.  It seems like every thread involves lots of debate about exactly how aggressively-costed something can be and still be acceptable.  And while that's fine as an exercise, almost every card we make would have to be nerfed a bit if we were ever to actually try to produce a "TMD Set" as has been suggested in the past.  Every card we make is Nantuko Shade.

[Harlequin]

I agree with the power level vrs cost agruement.  But I think this card is not poorly costed at all.  If I wanted to design the card as a creature that started unblockable then delt tons of damage I would have tried to push a 4 mana guy with a 1 mana pump.  However I thought by making the pump ability cost double white, it would curb the power dramatically.  In order to deal 6 unblocked damage you need 10 white mana, and its only 6 damage this turn.  Next turn you still have a 1/2 chump.  Last I checked Akroma was 6 long lasting damage with better evasion for 9.

All in all, this creature is inefficent.  Most of the time he's a 1/2 vanilla creature for double white.  if you leave WW open then you've got some evasion / protection from spot damage. 

[OfficeShredder]

While I agree that pump creatures are often bad, Nantuko Shade is hardly the only one of any quality.  I'm going to assume that you meant creatures that cost some amount of mana for some kind of net gain (barring Morphling and Psychatog from consideration, for example), and confining "recent memory" to not include the Ice Age pump knights; there, we still have Avarax seeing decent amounts of play in Beasts decks during Onslaught Block's tenure, and maybe some others of which I'm not thinking immediately.

On the whole, I think that there's a sentiment on this forum to want every card to see play.  It seems like every thread involves lots of debate about exactly how aggressively-costed something can be and still be acceptable.  And while that's fine as an exercise, almost every card we make would have to be nerfed a bit if we were ever to actually try to produce a "TMD Set" as has been suggested in the past.  Every card we make is Nantuko Shade.

The pump knights were used because it was much more mana efficient (being a 2/1 vs. a 1/2).  Also, they had protection naturally, and didn't need to be pumped.  So no, I wouldn't say this card is as good as nantuko shade, especially when you consider white doesn't have nearly the same level of disruption as black had, which let the shade swing in for damage every turn.  I think that as is this is a decent card, I don't think the ability to swing for four unblocked is a massive benefit, considering the amount of mana you're sinking into it.  I would probably play silver knight in my WW deck before I played this

[Anusien]

Why do we need to bother with the fancy symmetry stuff?  I don't really see it adding a lot to any games its in (besides confusion).  Why not just make it a 2WW 2/2 with those abilities and pump for WW?

[OfficeShredder]

Your opponent can rancor it to nerf the pro-red and black abilities.

This card is way too vulnerable