MAGIC: THE VALIANT - An Introduction

The back of the cards.

Last week I had the idea of making a Shadowman Magic:the Gathering "joke" card to post on the Facebook page for the Shadowman Unleashed campaign that is currently going on. 
As soon as I finished the card I looked at it and thought "WOW, this IS really cool" (I think in Portuguese, though); and after reading the reactions of my fellow fanboys and fangirls I was even more inspired to produce some more cards (I guess it's all your fault, gang :P).
The idea soon turned into an obsession in getting a playable MTG set entirely based on VALIANT comics for me and my girlfriend to play with. And in less than a week I had designed 60 cards, making it the first ever (that I know of) Collectible Card Game based on VEI's properties. I have to say that a big part of this effort was also due to the reactions of the community at Valiantfan.com- since they dug it so much, I really wanted to give them a full playable set asap.
So, 6 or 7 days later this was done and ready for print. I had so much fun doing it that I really didn't noticed how fast I was working until the end.
This article will consist of several parts, where I will talk a bit about the process behind the choices I made for the cards. So, let's dive into this.

1) SO WHAT IS THIS, ANYWAY?!
Like I explained above, this is a Magic:the Gathering set based on VALIANT comics characters. It consists of 60 cards and it's fully playable on it's own or with other Magic cards. I advise against this last option though, since I designed the cards to be a standalone set. You just need some basic lands and you're ready to play Magic: the VALIANT (as I call this project)

2) ARE YOU SELLING THESE?
No, that's illegal. This is a fan-made work, and of course, I DON´T OWN ANY OF THIS.

3) WHERE CAN I SEE THE WHOLE SET?
I'll be posting every single card here but if you want to see them right NOW! here's a link for my Facebook gallery.

4) CAN YOU EXPLAIN TO ME EXACTLY WHAT YOU DID?
My job was this, basically:
1) Find a particular panel/illustration that would REALLY say what the card or character is all about. It's harder than it sounds, and sometimes I would get frustrated for not being able to find an image that was 100% what I wanted. Also, one has to find the right angle for the picture, which is not obvious at all sometimes.
2) Make sure that all stats given to the card are fair and that they give the player a true sense of the character. This is the most important and brainy stuff, imho.
3) Choose/adapt the right mechanics and keyword abilities, which is of course  tied with the point above
4) Choose a quote that not only informs the player about the card, but it's also badass. Or just plain fun ("Paff, paff"?)

The one that started it all...

5) Choose a title. See point above.

5) SO, WHERE CAN I LEARN HOW TO PLAY MAGIC?
Here, this is the official Wizards of the Coast tutorial page. It's really easy to learn, but I warn you it's a hell of an addiction once you start playing.

6) WHAT KEYWORDS DID YOU USE IN THIS SET?
Battlecry, Vigilance, Scry, Ninjutsu, Trample, Shroud, Shadow, First Strike, Double Strike, Frenzy, Regenerate, Metalcraft, Lifelink, Deathtouch, Living Weapon, Kicker. Most of these are present in standard yearly sets with others being from past blocks that I felt were too good not to use (shadow and ninjutsu for examples)

Ok, now that the most logical questions were answered (my guess, if there's anything in particular you'd like to know, shout it on the comment section), I will now take a look at the cards, grouped by their respective color.

NEXT: WHITE