River's Rebuke slight adjustment.

Kinesia

River's Rebuke is not around much yet, but it has no downsides.
It's a one-sided board wipe in blue that destroys supports as well.

As more people get it and when it can be crafted it's going to change the meta too much.
Better to start talking about it now.

It needs _some_ drawback without totally neutering it.

Most board wipes in other colours (that traditionally have them) destroy your own things as well and that is the intended balance. But that is boring and doesn't suit.

Some other "bounce" cards (which this effectively is) will only affect cards not tokens (since legally they can't go back to the hand.)

So what if River's Rebuke only bounces and destroys non-token supports and creatures?

It is still EXTREMELY powerful and works against most things, but it has a single weakspot now. 

DBJones

Sounds workable. Another possibility is having it give back some mana to all the cards it bounces (5-10 maybe? Or charge then halfway, rounding up?) so you still get a free turn, but your opponent has a good chance of getting key cards back out right away.

Gideon

Would you be opposed if the only thing they changed was it’s rarity from rare to mythic?

Kinesia

No, because it breaks your expectations too much for the different colours. Blue isn't meant to be able to do this with supports normally.
Bouncing is fine and bouncing supports is actually ok since they are "permanents" but bouncing _every_ permanent with no drawback and being totally one sided... This is now superior to wrath of god and the great aurora and all kinds of things.

But since it's returning things to hand, just having it not affect token supports or creatures would pretty much fix everything.

One of the issues is that it gets rid of the PW ability "emblem" supports even, so blue suddenly has NO downsides and is the best colour automatically.

If you have this you play it in every node... All other board wipes have a drawback of some sort. 


The token thing is just one suggestion and not out of line since some other removal spells specify "card"  especially when returning to hand.
There might be other worthwhile fixes, but just increasing cost or rarity doesn't help. It needs some way that you can play around it _realistically_ once you know the opponent has it.

I can beat _starfield_ more reliably than this (which just trumps starfield automatically without trying) It has zero drawback and can come from nowhere.

Tilwin90

You are aware that the wording in this game is a mess anyway and bouncing cards makes no sense in paper magic. But I agree it should leave both tokens and lands alone.
To be honest I would allow it to overflow the hand like crazy though it could get quite ridiculous with tons of cards in hand... Which might actually be fine. 

wereotter

Kinesia said:

No, because it breaks your expectations too much for the different colours. Blue isn't meant to be able to do this with supports normally.
Bouncing is fine and bouncing supports is actually ok since they are "permanents" but bouncing _every_ permanent with no drawback and being totally one sided... This is now superior to wrath of god and the great aurora and all kinds of things.

Blue has Cyclonic Rift, which not only does exactly this, but can be done in paper magic on your opponent's turn, and in multiplayer effects literally everyone at the table who isn't you. River's Rebuke is an exact translation of its paper counterpart with the only exception being that it destroys creatures that can't be returned to hand. I would say that perhaps the only change needs to be that it doesn't destroy what can't go back to hand, but that your opponent is allowed to have more cards in hand than usual if you bounced them all back.

Bouncing everything back to hand is pretty common in blue as this is its version of effects like Wrath of God, Blasphemous Act, or Black Sun's Zenith. Most effects return your stuff too, but there are a handful of spells that only effect your opponent.

Volgara

Did the recent increase in cost help balance it out?

Mainloop25

Volgara said:

Did the recent increase in cost help balance it out?

Yes but not only that, a lot of cards that help cast it quickly rotated out. Even more so once HOU rotates out.

Kinesia

Cost didn't change things for me at all, it's still the number 1 go to for blue.