Adamant - Failed MtG Mechanics

[@ouroboros1672]

Adamant was definitely a success in the format it was designed for, which was Limited. It's not only at common and uncommon by accident!

[@Arethusa01]

Really? I thought paying 3 one-colored mana is too difficult to work with in Limited? Maybe it's Throne of Eldraine specifically

[@dyne313]

I agree, it didn't fail.

[@xana3961]

@@dyne313 the fact they never brought it back or really did anything with it just leaves it pretty boring, all things considered. Really, more should have been done with the mechanic. It absolutely should be another incentive to play mono-color cause the best way to play is to use 3 different colors as if you had all five.

[@gabisrot]

​@@Arethusa01Throne of Eldraine in limited was a set designed to be able to play monocolor decks. It really worked in draft, a favorite draft set of many players in part for this reason.

[@SwedeRacerDC]

I didn't play limited at this time and didn't even buy any packs from this set so I completely missed this mechanic, but I'm glad it worked in limited. I wish they still did more to make it work outside of limited a little better. I suppose giving some rare or mythic ones could've broken the limited scene, but it would be nice to see them support this more for mono colored commander decks. Commander and limited are really the only two formats I play or care about, so I understand the need to balance this

[@imaginarymatter]

I hope they bring this mechanic back in Commander as a way to push mono-colored decks.

[@BorkBigFrighten2]

I mean, they can just do that with heavier color pip usage, since Adamant cards aren't usually worth casting without the colored mana anyways. That's really the biggest problem with the mechanic. It's not a *bad* mechanic, but it just adds needless complexity to cards that practically aren't different from just having more color pips.

[@zyibesixdouze4863]

they cant be because Urbog and Gaea exist

[@mark1A100]

the difference is flexability in limited. adamant let you have a depreciated version of an effect as splash toround out the deck​@@BorkBigFrighten2

[@irtnyc]

Can't be colorless though. Monocolor sure, good idea. WoTC has basically ruined the game by "pushing" too many multi color, 5c, and legendary everythings. It's not even clear they like their own game universe and its fundamental mechanics anymore.

[@michaelmichael1881]

Saying that adamant is a failed mechanic is a bit of a stretch I think. In limited format it is great. I remember using Outmuscle with adamant to my Garenbrig Paladin to clear the way and push damage through, bring it back with once and future, and repeat that again. My opponent was really sad when he realized that the creature that fight does not trade since it gains indestructable with adamant.

[@hildumpthecow5319]

9:48 IMO, Outlast is STILL a worse offender. It's literally the Abzan Clan Mechanic from Khans of Tarkir! Every other Clan mechanic has some sort of history. The Jeskai mechanic is Prowess, the Mardu Mechanic is Raid. Both of these are now decidious mechanics. The Sultai Mechanic - Delve - is one of the most broken mechanics of all time. Even the second worst Clan Mechanic - Temur's Ferocious, while awful in Standard, is HUGE in Commander. Outlast is just kind of...there. And yet, somehow, Abzan STILL managed to be the most powerful Clan in Khans Standard! (without using a single Outlast card, of course)

[@sandwichboy1268]

Outlast is held back by being sorcery speed. If I could hold back a blocker and combat trick, then simply outlast if I didn't use them...

[@davestier6247]

Yeah even in my completely all in +1 counters deck (hamza) outlast isn't good enough to warrant even a single card that has it 😂

[@DeathToRain]

​@@davestier6247 Even the two that give everything lifelink and flying?

[@davestier6247]

@DeathToRain I run eldrazi monument and akromas memorial

[@JesGolbez]

I liked Adamant. There are ones of us!

[@juanlopesss]

Adamant was excelent in limited and gave benefits for playing mono color

[@petrri323]

Adamant is devotion for non permanents. Thing is, there’s better versions of almost all the adamant cards, so for standard, yeah. Sealed on the other hand, Great sealed mechanic.

[@MageSkeleton]

i really liked the Adamant mechanic, it allowed WotC to experiment more with card effects while also rewarding playing who played a more concentrated color. Like for example, they could had done a version of smothering tithe where it was one white and three generic, gain a tapped treasure token unless opponent drawing a card pays one. Or, if you paid the adamant cost noted by a unique counter being put on the enchantment, those treasure tokens entered untapped instead.

[@Strongpoint_S]

Not all cards\mechanics are meant for all formats. It was good in limited for which it was designed. It wasn't useless, unfun or unbalanced in draft. It is like saying that Colossal Dreadmaw is a failure of a card.

[@fernandobanda5734]

I don't think you can afford to give each card two colors. It would take too much text and players would immediately think they'd need two colors to play them. I think you want to start with a common like: Vantress Gargoyle 4 2/2 Flying Adamantish - For each UU spent to cast this creature, it enters with a +1/+1 counter on it. That way you have a respetable 3/3 flier for 4 that you can stuff in any two-color deck, or you get a 4/4 in monocolor. Just two states, just one paragraph, enough space to introduce more complex effects later.

[@santiagoteruel4145]

The way you are describing it, it seems to me wizards didn't choose to make it work that way because that would incentivise playing two colours instead of mono colored as it was intended

[@adamcartrette4037]

Adamant in concept works best to give cards of lower rarity a chance to work as a higher rarity level card.

[@welcomeback2912]

If the design was more focused on the color wheel and a slightly better design this would have been amazing. Imagine a 4 drop 2/2 weird wizard with prowess, and if you paid with 3 blue you draw two. Its just divination plus weird. Rather than slapping +1/+1 on everything they could have just slapped on each colors favorite effects, lighting bolt, giant growth, murder, divination. Even given that they're one time effects its still an entire extra spell that requires no mana fixing on mono spells. You could play reducers or payoffs to account for the mana costs, like impact tremors or thunderous snapper. Imagine encouraging dual color decks with adamant requiring other colored identity mana. A red spell that also bounces creatures, a black creature that also finds you land.

[@Vanessa_exe]

even just having things like X spells with multiple adamant effects would create interesting X spells, a XUU 'each opponent mills X' spell but Adamant Red burns for each instant and sorcery milled, or black makes a zombie for each creature like dread summons, or white gets you a life for each card milled just a variety of interesting effects you could slap onto cards

[@marcoottina654]

15:00 or so The first Ravnica block had monocolored cards that "do more" if you have spent some mana of the other paired color. Anyway, a comeback would have been nice

[@WookieRookie]

I think that the main problem with Adamant is it was used on so few cards. If it were at least 20 cards with at least two or three rares, it would be more wholesome. I think that we will see return of Adamant soon.

[@DuskyPredator]

This sounds kind of cool with the idea of being creative in still going for multi-colour and have a reason for colour fixing effects, which I usually ignore.

[@arrowrandoman]

Adamant has fun flavor potential. If it was used in a set with great multicolor synergy, it would represent a defiance, a determination to use one color, at least mostly one, anyway. With that, I would think the Guildless from Ravnica, but perhaps there are other ways of going about it. I mean, Devotion is a rework of Chroma, so maybe we'll get a similar rework in the future.

[@DraggaRyuu]

I think it's poor to call this a failed mechanic when it was barely explored and was quite good in its Limited format. I don't think every mechanic needs to be broken in all forms of play to be a success at what its intent was, and Adamant was there primarily for Limited.

[@jacksonbyrne64]

It's a failed mechanic BECAUSE it was barely explored

[@Lcngopher]

I ran foreboding fruit in my cat oven deck at the time and it was a solid card. Another way for the deck to make foods

[@jaredwonnacott9732]

I legitimately thought Yorvo had Adamant and was surprised when you said there weren't any rare or mythic Adamant cards from Eldraine. I had to go check. I guess that triple green cost did its job, at least in my head, as I've always associated it with Adamant.

[@Kokonutzlz]

You bring up that Snake from Brother's War as an example of how to rework Adamant. I think there are other mechanics from Brother's War that works better as a template: Prototype! Throne of Eldraine already introduced Adventures, which played with the frames and textboxes of cards. Prototype is in a similar space, where it adds replacement Power/Toughness and Mana Cost. Adamant could be reworked to an actual different mana cost. Example of Embereth Paladin: Name: Embereth Squire, 4R for a 4/1 Human Soldier. (Adventure, Hero, Journeyed): Name: Embereth Paladin, 2RRR for a 5/2 Human Knight

[@SergeiMosin]

I dunno, it feels like it was a pretty solid concept, but there's also the overload effect that does something very similar and I'm convinced they would've been better served just leaving it as overload

[@dragade101]

It felt like they took a Limited mechanic and named it. Hopefully designers come back and make respectable rare and mythic cards when they design a future set. It’s a fine variant of kicker. So lets see it again.

[@autobotjazz1972]

Adamant's weak spot is that it was unfocused as the rewards for it were all over the place and often not quite worth the effort of having to have 3 mana of one color to make it worth it in constructed play.

[@mcbuckets2399]

I would love to see a set which encourages a main color and a splash. Adament would be a great mechanic for that set

[@NeufAtora]

It seems similar to Chroma from Lorwyn/Shadowmoor, where it's a bit too non-specific to really do a ton. Maybe there'll be a future mechanic that makes it better like Devotion is for Chroma

[@TheMightyBattleSquid]

Some people really struggle with the idea that a mechanic can be perfectly serviceable even if it has been used badly before. Even WotC themselves, ESPECIALLY Maro, claimed that the storm scale list would never come back because the mechanics themselves were bad. How many times has storm come back now and no one even talks about those cards anymore in the same tone because they actually balanced for it this time?

[@hungryLIKEALI0N]

I had completely forgotten this mechanic existed, it was so overshadowed by the adventure cards.

[@TheEvolver311]

It was a limited mechanic

[@aaron9797]

i like seeing mechanics that are different i would like to see a set with adamant and converge; bolster and support; connive and explore

[@wesleyjudson599]

I like the idea of a cycle of cards that interact with Adamant to make it a single color payoff. Something like; "As an addition cost to cast a green spell with the Adament keyword, you can pay any amount of mana in addition to paying its mana cost. If you do, you do Y thing X number of times, where X is the amount of green mana spent to cast the spell." AND/OR "If you cast a green spell with Adamant, if you cast it without spending mana of any color other than green mana, do Y. Otherwise, do Z."

[@wesleyjudson599]

You could then make the cards themselves Adamant, with mana of a single type, and generic mana. (ie, 3G) So the cards are flexible, but reward you the more you focus on a single color.

[@sandwichboy1268]

Only problem there is DAMN bro that's wordy.

[@wesleyjudson599]

​@@sandwichboy1268 Compare to most modern or standard rare cards, its really not. But I understand that not everyone likes the complexity of current MtG, so you do you.

[@julianlastname5730]

It’s made for limited to reward one color decks, while still functioning in two color decks, it’s not meant to be good in constructed

[@Sleep-65]

I LOVE ADAMANT!!

[@DynamicSheep]

Adamant is FIRE and I can't wait for it's return!

[@BuFFoTheArtClown]

So... To improve Adamant, you turn it into... Kicker :) Got it!

[@irtnyc]

Tangent: In what era did the geniuses at WoTC decide that "return" was the right rules verb to describe putting stuff from the graveyard into play? (When, very often it has never been there before, and the entire deck is built around that concept.) Do they still use this inane wording in other mechanics and rules text templates?

[@Arethusa01]

I would say "Forecast" could be in this series since only 1 card that does anything competitively.

[@ВасяПупкин-ш3ф4у]

This is devotion like mechanic, and next set was theros with devotion, so wotc may thought that they'll work well together, but missed...

[@serradelahorne8289]

Really like the idea of fixing it in a manner similar to Bladecoil Serpent, good idea.

[@timothyheck3377]

Adament is definitely not a good ability, i understand people saying it was "good" in limited, but honestly even in limited it wasn't the best, alot of the cards got outclassed or just skipped over, and if you did run them youd have to either build mono color or hope to get 3 of the same mana. It's completely unstable in anything now. However, i do think it would be cool if they brought it back to help mono colored decks.

[@SwankiestPants]

once and future is great in my marwyn deck but other than that one I forgot adamant was even a thing

[@nickd6303]

I guess you could say it failed because standard quickly shifted away from mono color after throne.

[@Y0G0FU]

Adamant was excellent in Limited. But "too balanced" for anything else. Definetly something they should revisit and maybe add better effects and some rare cards to the Adamant pool.

[@TweedleDeem]

feels like a mechanic that'd be created for a world where devotion is too strong for whatever reason as an excuse to remove pips lol.

[@JohnSmith-l1r]

Adamant was designed as a limited mechanic and was a good limited mechanic, hobestly about half of mtgs are designed for limited. To create a feel good limited environment.

[@artstsym]

It's just not a very well thought out mechanic. People talked some shit about Addendum, but at least there was a choice to be made there. The "choice" with Adamant is "at creation, do I go mono?" which simply isn't that compelling. See: companions.

[@zombiexpanda]

I think Adamant is just a bit too constrained with it always being centered around using specific mana, while also still being way too wordy. The point of keywords is to try and shorten the cards text or help people understand the mechanic easier. This implementation doesn't really hit either of those list items. I hate to fall back to the meme of it but it quite literally could have the keyword be kicker and there'd be zero savings on the wording.

[@davestier6247]

Adamant is kicker. Everything is kicker.

[@CharlesLeeRay812]

Or Horsemanship. Kicker and Horsemanship that's all you need to know!!

[@colefrantz4728]

Adamant would have been fantastic sadly they didn't give adamant a good enough upside to warrant its cost

[@scottsena2897]

They should try to bring back Grandeur.

[@andrews6013]

The bad part is I was thinking that it had to be from oce age

[@rainbowcrash6990]

Throne of eldraine was literally when i tapped out of magic lol

[@william7546]

Adamant could have been good, it's the opposite of domain, but they were scared to give us really good adamant cards. I wouldnt say that they went all Banding on it.... Buttttt not too far from the mark.

[@Darkrocmon]

Adamant AKA Mono Color Kicker

[@kennydarmawan13]

1:10 Don't you mean Haktos's weak point?

[@SannyTrademark]

Please do a video on the party mechanic from Zendikar Rising 🙏 most forgotten and worthless mechanic ever

[@Kristina-dl2jv]

new video yay 🎉

[@7Alberto7]

Amazing!!

[@wiresculptor5951]

just like haunt adamant wasnt bad what they chose to do with it was/is

[@therudecanadian8068]

I think they just didn't support this ability enough. Its a great ability. But the potential is kinda wasted here.

[@andersonsamuel123]

Why play adamant when you can play devotion?

[@elimeece7462]

Why not both?

[@NoahMoorman]

Why play magic when you can play Card Fight Vanguard

[@elimeece7462]

@@NoahMoorman why would I put effort into learning another game with no evidence it will survive 5 years?

[@NoahMoorman]

@@elimeece7462 ................. you're not fun at parties.

[@elimeece7462]

@@NoahMoorman I'm a blast at Commander

[@dyne313]

I don't agree that the mechanic is a failed mechanic.

[@FriteVerte]

Most retyped comment on this series.

[@WangerZ3291]

"Under utilized" should be more appropriate

[@FriteVerte]

@@WangerZ3291 yeah but lets be honest it wouldn't get as much views. Or as much involvement in the comments 😂

[@WangerZ3291]

@@FriteVerte ah yes, the concept of attracting attention.

[@NoahMoorman]

Ah but mechanic has never been in my play group so It definitely is a failure

[@apostle33328]

Warcraft to Magic, huh?

[@martinithechobit]

They were....adamant it would work. HAAHAH.

[@rukeyazu8669]

Bah-dum tsh

[@rorschach1]

Adam Ant didn’t fail. I think he was Wonderful

[@gasury8927]

report this guy as "spam" he is using theduellogs voice. and or scam if he is the same XD

[@slightgraph89]

Video good

[@OlgaZuccati]

I'll say that the mechanic just looks sort of boring. yeah, you can play those in mono colored decks, but decks with dual lands can pay for those just fine. Just feels like a very boring mechanic

[@sifins1579]

I agree that the mechanic is a failed mechanic.