Enchantment — Aura
048/275 Common

Enchant creature, Concentration (If enchanted creature is dealt damage or targeted by a spell or ability, sacrifice this enchantment.)

Spells that target enchanted creature cost more to cast.

Reduce any combat damage dealt to enchanted creature by 1.

Creating Concentration, one of this set’s unique mechanics, opened up a brand new pocket of design space to explore. The flavor was there — like many spells in D&D, they should have some persistent effect until the caster’s concentration is broken!

But there were still questions to answer. How should these feel different from an average Aura? How to mitigate the “feels-bad” scenarios where an opponent breaks Concentration immediately? What sorts of effects reward players for protecting their enchanted creatures over multiple turns? What effects might each color have to use this mechanic differently?

Mage Armor was one of the first of these spells designed, and it serves as a baseline. The effect is pretty tame compared to other, flashier options in the set, but it trades a scaling payoff for a solid, persistent layer of protection that makes it harder for opponents to break. This is a good option in blue to protect an under-statted Wizard or make any creature dominate combat against 1-power tokens and early game enemies!

Originally, this card gave Ward 1 instead of the wordier “Spells that target enchanted creature cost 1 more to cast,” until I realized during a playtest that Ward is structured in an inconvenient way. Technically, players could still target the enchanted creature without paying the Ward cost. Their spell would be countered, but the creature would already have been targeted, breaking Concentration! Magic is a silly game.