Having read your answer to a question about removing mana screw, this is my response to you. Being a big fan of both MtG and riot games' Legends of Runeterra, and having played Mojang's Scroll (may it rest in peace) I've found that resource generation and designing around the cost of creating that resource can be interesting. I find that LoR's system, by also using a region system similar to the color pie, but maxing out with 2 regions means it's more about resource management of cards in hand, and tools to use to advance the game plan of reducing your opponent's life to 0, and Scrolls was unique in that you had to give up scrolls to add to your mana cap to generate a resource, so it was interesting design. Overall, I've found that in games that use a universal mana system in which everyone gets an additional mana to spend each turn, it becomes a challenge of "how do we maintain a level of variance that ensures the game doesn't get stale?" I think that magic as it is designed now could never be changed to prevent mana issues. The game was always designed around the variance that lands provide. Games like hearthstone and LoR went with deck building restrictions and other systems to ensure enough variance is maintained. If a game is designed to provide mana to each player each turn, other design choices must be made to ensure variance is maintained. I personally think each system has its pros and cons, and each game I've played has done well to design around the pros and minimize the cons.

I think I forgot to make an important point in my answer. I was talking about making a trading card game that was designed to appeal to both enfranchised and non-enfranchised gamers. If you’re aiming at a more enfranchised gamer, like yourself, you do have more options open to you because that type of gamer is much more comfortable handling complex decision trees and tension. That style of gameplay though can drive away less enfranchised gamers. One of the big reasons players exit a game early on is being overwhelmed by it. They get too caught up in the choices they’re asked to make to enjoy the fun of the game. This gets into what I call lenticular design, where you create your game in such a way that the more complex decisions are hidden to the less experienced player. The mana system does that really well. I hope this clarification helps.

If Riot, the gruul mechanic from Ravnica Allegiance, was made today, would the choice be between a +1/+1 counter and a haste counter?

I’m not sure the haste counter would add much as it seldom matters beyond the first turn.

I LOVE UNSANCTIONED! Especially Flavor Judge (aka Vorthos's UnCard) since I invented a Format like it during Onslaught! I felt that Remove Soul shouldn't counter Soulless One, Akroma's Vengeance shouldn't destroy her or Ixidor, Lay Waste shouldn't destroy Wasteland, etc. You can choose to play Flavor(or flip a coin)before any game. You all must agree on something making sense(Like Borborygmos wielding Chariot Of Victory as a fist weapon)or it happens normally. Try it, all my play groups love it!

Happy to hear that.

Mark, why does "Fog" (Green) gets printed much more frequently than global damage prevention (White)? It seems pretty unfair that Green gets both big and (recently) mana-efficient creatures and still gets a "Fog" almost every set, while White's rarely getting damage prevention from multiple sources - like Safe Passage or Riot Control - and counts mostly on little creatures. Making the White version more frequent would also reinforce its "defensive color" aspect.

Many years ago we moved Fog to white. White didn’t end up needing it as it had so many other defensive tools, so we moved it back to green.

Could silver-border care about multiple instances of a keyword? Double haste gained through riot for example? (I'm pretty sure black-border can't)

Silver border can care about that. I’m not sure it happens enough to be relevant though.

Maro, First off, happy new year! Hope you enjoyed the holidays. I was wondering about the Riot mechanic - if a creature has multiple instances of Riot, as from having the ability on it's own card and then from an enchantment granting it, do both trigger separately like Flanking with Cavalry Master? So would you get to choose twice whether to get a +1/+1 counter and/or to gain Haste? Have a great day!

Yes, you would. You could even chose haste twice as a pure intimidation tactic. : )

Unless he switches guilds, could you relay to Creative that having "Riot" the mechanic be in a different guild from the "Lord of Riots" feels very off? Despite the different connotations of the word riot, it feels like a Dragon's Maze sans dragons problem.

I can point it out. Locking specific words to specific guilds because of card names seems like it might cause more problems than it would solve though.

will creatures with Riot be on a low curve? because the bigger the creature the least the counter matters rather than haste

As the game progresses, the opponent’s creatures get bigger, so the extra +1/+1 counter might matter.

Is Riot a hint that nested keywords might happen more, or are evergreen mechanics considered exempt from that aversion?

Evergreen keywords are considered known enough that we allow them to be nested. Suspend, for instance, granted haste to creatures.

To combat slight memory issues with haste on riot, could you put a counter on it and say creatures with this type of counter have haste?

Having a counter on it would cause more confusion than it would solve.