In Gavin Verhey's GMM from a week ago, he talks about the difficulty of adding combat keywords into blue. Is there something preventing Skulk from being more prevalent?

Yeah, it’s harder to process and has less design space that we initially imagined. The mechanic was designed with the idea that it might become evergreen, but it didn’t work out.

Different user, but on the topic of top down design in UB cards, one thing that stands out to me is how unique the card feels and how well its abiilites both establish it as a homage to an existing character and a unique, exciting game piece in Magic the Gathering
The Street Fighter Secret Lair cards are some of the best examples of this with the untap symbol on Ryu mirroring the quarter-circle input and the way the card working essentially letting you pull off a special cancel in card form. It took fairly simple abilities and stretched them into a way that was mechanically unique and filled a space that isn't filled by other cards.
Whereas I look at a card like Michonne from TWD Secret Lair and while there are clear allusions to Michonne's character, it's nothing that feels especially Michonne, let alone exciting as a card. She's equipment matters (in a color combo that really doesn't have much for that) and even the equipment she was printed alongside belongs to a different character (whose card has no benefit from being equipped with it at all), she doesn't do much that's exciting besides be a decent body in combat, it doesn't feel like you get anything special from playing Michonne mechanically, leaving her somewhat lackluster when compared to even other cards from her same Secret Lair, let alone some of the high points of UB design. You can tell Michone is a top down design, but nothing feels all that exciting about her or novel and while her abilities do harken back to her lore and character, they don't do much to excite the player.

At least that's my perspective on it, it definitely is a very subjective topic.

I designed Michonne (and all the Walking Dead cards) so I can get into the specifics. At the time, we were restricted to evergreen abilities, so I had a lot less paint metaphorically to work with. (Glenn having his ability listed as skulk happened in development.)The card represents very early Michonne, so she comes with her two zombies, which were a key part of her early appearance. Michonne starts as a loner and she has two Zombies on leashes that she uses as protection. Those two Zombies play heavily into her backstory. I made her an equipment matters creature because her defining character, especially in her early appearance, was her mastery of her sword. She’s black/green because I was trying to capture the wild nature, out for herself, early version of Michonne. I like pushing themes to colors that don’t traditionally do it as it forces players to have to make a new deck rather than just plug into a premade deck. There are plenty of available equipment for a black/green deck. Lucille was never meant to go with Michonne. It was just a cool object from the show that we liked as the secret card.Her cost and power/toughness were up to play design to figure out. I took a stab, but that type of balance happens later. I do appreciate that we later dropped the evergreen restriction as that allows for a lot more nuance of design, but I’m proud of Michonne’s design given the constraints I had to work of. I read the Walking Dead comic, long before the TV show, and I spent a lot of time getting the essence of the characters.

There you go!I'll list a whole bunch of abilities and you list whether or not it's an evasion ability:a) bandingb) can only be blocked by creatures of the same colorc) can't be blocked unless the opponent pays 1d) creatures you control have flyinge) deathtouchf) first strike g) flankingh) if you have a creature with flying in your graveyard, this creature has flyingi) menacej) protection from red k) shadowl) skulkm) tramplen) 1: target creature can't block this turn o) 1: target creature can't block this creature this turnp) 1: this creature can't be blocked this turnq) when this creature attacks, it gains flying until end of turn r) when this creature attacks, chose one - it gains flying until end of turn or it gains vigilance until end of turns) when this creature attacks, tap all creatures controlled by opponentst) when this creature enters the battlefield, target creature gains flying

Here’s my best guess at the answers:A - noB - yesC - I think so but I’m not sure. That creates a blocking restriction but I don’t know that it “restricts what creatures can block” the attacker. It restricts all of them unless the condition is met, but it has nothing to do with the creatures themselves. D - The resulting flying is an evasion ability. I don’t know if the ability that grants the evasion ability is itself an evasion ability. I’d say no. E - noF - noG - noH - see DI - yesJ - yesK - yesL - yesM - noN - the Comp Rules are ambiguous. 509.1b says only static abilities can be evasion abilities, so any activated ability is an automatic no. The glossary definition doesn’t have that stipulation, so I think it’d be a yes we go by that. O - see NP - see NQ - see D; flying is but I think the ability that grants flying isn’t. Also, the 509.1b definition rules out all triggered abilities, though the glossary definition doesn’t. R - see QS - noT - see Q

Hey mark, the card Frodo Baggins tempts the ring, it's certainly thematic but isn't this a colour pie break? the ring tempting you gives out skulk, looting and other effects which neither white nor green has access to.

It’s a bend, but not a break.

"Flying exists because the game wants a subset that can only be blocked by itself. To replace that in a way that fulfills the same function, you end up creating an evasion ability that turns into “can’t be blocked” in constructed formats." See, now I'm confused again because you just said you were okay with evasion mechanics that still allowed your opponent to block with cards outside that set. Wouldn't this description not apply to "The Skulk Set", or the "Ward but for Blocking" set?

I don’t mind adding evasive abilities in addition to flying. That’s a big difference than replacing flying.

Can I get an if/when on seeing Skulk again?

If. It was harder to use than we thought and had less design space than we thought.

Why doesn't Odric, Blood-Cursed include Ward to replace Skulk? Then it would have 13 keywords, Innistrad's lucky number.

The number of keywords changed a bunch, so I don’t think anyone realized that it was twelve because it was a subtle change over time.

You've mentioned that skulk was an unsuccessful attempt at an evergreen blue/black keyword. What did players dislike about the mechanic?

It wasn’t as much dislike as disinterest. Few hated it, but few loved it.

"thekingofpho asked: Hey Mark, I requested this before, but can you make a black enchantment, with a white activated ability? Can it also include an evergreen keyword?" we have Behind the Scenes from SOI. it's a black enchantment with a white ability that grants Skulk. not evergreen but closest we have so far.

FYI

Mark, isn't Skulk already going to White as we saw a similar ability sometimes in the past and recently in Eldraine? It fits and helps White much more than Blue as the later already gets unblockable.

White has had little creatures that can only be blocked by little creatures.