Stun

Green Access to Land Stun

May I request if Green could have access to land stun as a form of control ?

I don’t think we plan on doing much land stun in any color. Green is second to red in land destruction, but that’s also something we do in limited amount.

Colors Green Lands Limited Red Stun

Stun Counter Limitations

Are non-white, non-blue cards that put stun counters on your own permanents as a limitation or drawback (as seen on The Beast, Deathless Prince and Pugnacious Hammerskull) an open design space or one of the "maybe an infrequent bend" cases?

It’s an area we can explore. Exert played in this space.

Beast Bend / Break Design Space Exert Permanents Pugnacious Hammerskull Stun The Beast, Deathless Prince

Power Words in D&D

For the Question Mark who asked about other Power Words existing -- FYI, D&D does have spells called Power Word Stun and Power Word Heal as well. : )

FYI

Dungeons & Dragons Humor Spells Stun

'Stunning' a Permanent's Ability

Are there ways to "stun" a permanent (such as a planeswalker or a land), so that its ability can't be activated until end of turn?

The detain mechanic from Return to Ravnica.

Detain Lands Mechanics Planeswalkers Return to Ravnica Stun

Land Destruction Alternatives

If the concept of Land Destruction causes player ire, yet old heads like me think it’s a vital stop gap, can we sidestep the problem? Phasing them out for X turns or X number of stun counters? Functionally the same, less feelsbad than the straight Armageddon.

Phasing them out causes most of the same issues.

Armageddon Lands Phasing Stun

Counter Mix

I know -1/-1 and +1/+1 counters are unlikely to mix in the same set, but is there anything preventing -1/-1 and stun counters from being in the same set? Thanks!

We put stun counters in sets with +1/+1 counters, so no.

Stun

Set Mechanic Consideration

Would "modified" being a set mechanic mean that stun counters are unlikely to be used for removal in that set? Or is that an acceptable level of weirdness, where tapping and stunning your opponent's thing might boost their modified count? (Same with -1/-1 counters i suppose but those aren't used much anyway)

It’s not a huge issue as you can’t use stunned creatures when its stunned and then the stun counters go away.

Creatures Mechanics Stun

Stun Counter Proposition

What about UR giving opponents' blocking creatures a stun counter? For red, this punishes both the choice to block and subsequently attack, and slows down the opponent (a la exert or Urabrask The Hidden). For blue, stunning is a classic.

We don’t have red stunning creatures.

Blocking Blue Creatures Exert Izzet (U/R) Red Stun Urabrask the Hidden

Stun Counters Discussion

Now that stun counters exist, is there any chance we revisit land stunning as a form of "land destruction lite"?

The issue was we didn’t like the gameplay, not that there wasn’t a memory aide to help players remember their land didn’t untap.

Game Play Lands Stun Tap / Untap

Exert Mechanic Insight

Just want to say that, as a fan of exert and Amonkhet block limited, I'm very glad you aren't considering changing it to use stun counters. The block had lots of built in ways to untap creatures or give them vigilance to get around exert, which would interact completely differently with stun counters. Significant functional errata is something to avoid regardless, but I think it's a particularly bad idea to make such errata in a way that would completely change the mechanic's own limited format.

It changes things more than I think most people think it would.

Amonkhet Creatures Errata Exert Functional Errata Limited Mechanics Stun Tap / Untap Vigilance

Counter Mechanisms

Do stun counters and finality counters mean that pre-existing cards with the older versions of those abilities that don't use counters are unlikely to be reprinted in standard? If so, how much is that considered as a factor in the decision of whether to make the shift to counters going forward?

Not necessarily.

Card Printing Reprints Standard Stun

Mechanics and Intended Features

Changing exert to stun counters would be a large change since it stops working with untap effects and being able to use those, such as Vizier of Tumbling Sands, is an intended feature of the mechanic. Same is true of persist/undying using finality. It is a feature, not a bug, that you can sac a persist/undying creature twice, reanimate it, then do it twice more. Also, changing old effects to use scry or surveil was largely a buff and these changes would be nerfs which generally upsets players.

Fine points.

Creatures Exert Mechanics Persist Persist Reanimate Sand Scry Stun Surveil Tap / Untap Undying Vizier of Tumbling Sands

Errata and Stun Counters

Re: Errata-ing stun counters. I think I didn't make myself clear enough. If you take the card Opt, it used to say "Look at the top card of your library. You may put that card on the bottom of your library." When scry became evergreen, it was changed to "Scry 1." which plays the same on its own but has a functional difference when combined with other cards (now it triggers "When you scry" abilities). Surely making a card use stun counters when it didn't before would cause a functional change with proliferate and other effects, but Wizards already accepts those edge cases when updating text to evergreen keywords like scry. So why are counters different? Are they seen as a bigger change (less of an edge case) or something?

It’s less of an edge case.

Errata Evergreen Keywords Opt Proliferate Scry Stun The Library Triggered Abilities

Finality Counters Query

Just verify, on the context of “… the functionality has to remain the same (to make such an errata like putting stun counters on exerted creatures or finality counters from an older spell). The mere existence of proliferate makes turning something into a counter different even if the text is identical, and in none of the provided cases it is.” With Finality Counters, does it make a difference if a permanent has one or more finality counters on it?

I don’t believe so.

Creatures Errata Proliferate Stun

Token Mechanic Changes

What are the chances of changing older mechanics to include the new types of tokens, such as putting stun counters on exerted creatures or finality counters on undying or persisting creatures?

It’s introducing errata, as those swaps aren’t exactly the same, so I don’t think the chances are high.

Creatures Errata Mechanics Stun Tokens Undying

Deciduous Counter Type

If/when: Turning the “If this permanent would leave the battlefield, exile it instead of putting it anywhere else.” text that recent cards like Magar, Geth and Realmbreaker give to permanents returned to the battlefield into a deciduous counter type? Stun counters prove that R&D is willing to have counters with semi-sizeable reminder text.

If.

Deciduous Game Design If/When Permanents Stun The Exile Zone

Red's Stun Counters

Can red put stun counters on artifacts and/or lands?

We experienced with red locking down lands a few years back and the results weren’t great.

Artifacts Lands Red Stun

Snow in UW Archetype

Hi Mark.My very first Secret Lair was the Eldraine Snow Lands and it kinda got me excited for the possibility of Snow in Wilds. Blue White has the flavour of Snow, but none of the mechanical relevance. I enjoy Stun Counters and have put some new cards into my Snow deck, but it bugs me a little. Was it ever considered to include Snow into the UW archetype in Wilds? Even if it was just a tag on all the relevant creatures I would have been happier.

We did talk about it.

Blue Creatures Flavor Lands Secret Lairs Stun White

Stun Counters Idea

If Stun Counters existed back in Amonkhet, do you think you would've used them for the Exert mechanic?

Probably.

Amonkhet Exert Mechanics Stun

Exert Errata Discussion

""Are there any plans to errata, exert - put a stun counter on this creature?" "There are no current plans to do that."" - I would hope not, I do not want to suddenly have to worry about my opponents proliferating stun counters on my Glorybringer. It sounds like an errata that makes sense, but would change the functionality of the mechanic.

Change of functionality is the biggest issue.

Creatures Errata Exert Glorybringer Mechanics Stun