Am I to assume that only Magic cards are accepted for these contests, or are cards in other templates kosher as well?

In the future non-Magic contests may be held, but this one is definitely going to be for Magic. First contest for Magic Set Editor should probably do something with Magic, don't you think?

Is art required? I've never searched the web for art for this type of thing...

(i.e. Does the user need to find his/her own art, or will someone else find art after the winning card is decided, like on the MTGS Monthly Card Contests?)

No art required. Just the card design, and we'll make it happen. If there's art you favor, link up to it in your post, but there's no guarantee it will be used as I will be seeking the artist permission for any card going on the front page (in other words, if you're linking to art, make sure it's on an artist's site or DA account so I can contact them.)

EDIT: Updated the first post to include info about your concerns Jeske and AI.

Alright. Thanks. I'll try to find something good to submit later on...

I really like this idea. I'm gonna try get it started, seeing as no one else will. Hopefully, we'll get an influx of cards.
Also, who and when did the changes with the Download page. It looks far more concise and user-friendly, however that many pictures, even small ones, is kinda mucking my page loading. Just for feedback there.

Lumine Arbiter
Enchantment Creature - Avatar
Lifelink
: Flip CARDNAME and attach it to target creature.
5/5
//
Luminate
Enchantment - Aura
Enchant creature
Enchanted creature gets +5/+5 and has lifelink.
: Unflip CARDNAME. (A creature can't be attached to another creature.)

This was indeed an older card, I'll admit, but I chose it because casual players are often Johnny players, and this would appeal nicely to one, in my opinion. Also, the final reminder text wasn't there originally, but considering casual players tend not to know that kind of ruling, it's worth adding.
This is subject to the flip/unflip argument, but since unflip is in the glossary of the Magic comprehensive rules (or so I think), I chose to use it.
Oh, and g'luck with a picture. Can never manage good flip pics. Trying to find two similar ones, and then merge them is hard.

Thanks for the submission!

I was the one who did the download page update. I'll figure out something to do with the download page later.

Here's my entry:

The Creator
Legendary Creature - Avatar
, Exile a card from your hand: You may choose a card you own from outside the game with the same mana cost as the exiled card, reveal that card, and cast it without paying its mana cost.
5/5

I figured if you want a card to advertise a card creation program, it should create things as well. For clarification, the ability is supposed to be mana cost, not converted mana cost. EDIT: Made it legendary.

Rather than focus on the exotic mechanics, I'd rather focus on the exotic templates, thus, my submission, followed by a (pictureless) render.

Reversing Portal
4, R
Artifact

5, T: Target exiled card with suspend loses it until end of turn.

(If I need to add the copyright notice, let me know and I'll do it and update the Photobucket copy.)

Vengeful Everspark
Creature - Spirit
Trample, haste
When Vengeful Everspark is put into a graveyard from the battlefield, you get an emblem with “Creatures you control get +2/+2 and have trample.”
To stop the spark is to ignite the fury.
8/3

Also, I have a question: Will future rounds have more specific requirements, like the You Make the Card game?

lol, look what I found lurking in my spare cards file while searching for creativity for my submission

This is a good idea to drum up some more users just from viewing the front page. Almost surprised that this hasn't been done before.
Will make an honest attempt to make something worthwhile and awe inspiring.

So, not sure if I missed it but when is the deadline?

Updated the first post to include a deadline. Great submissions so far everybody! Keep 'em coming and we'll pick a winner via poll Saturday!

EDIT: And yes, future contests will be more specific. This one is open-ended just to get things rolling. In the future, we may even do contests to show off unofficial templates like the Duplex or Horror styles. Right now though I'd like just to get something up that shows the program, the base templates specifically, in use.

Skull Lord
Legendary Creature-Zombie Lord
Whenever a creature you control would be destroyed, regenerate it.
Players: "HOW IS THIS CARD FAIR?" Mark Rosewater: " I could give you 50 ways to counter this card."
2/2

Just Good to shake some humor in. And in the future we can't be pulling infinite five color gods from our arses. So maybe we should show comedy in our cards, or just plain good cards.

I like the idea of making cards to fit specific templates. That would put a different spin on this contest vice the Make a Card and such. Either way, I love card contests as they challenge your design skills. So more the merrier.

This was a card I designed to go into a cube (its owner allowed each of us to put 1 custom card in), so I figure I'd enter it in the contest.

Box of Counters 3
Artifact (M)
Box of Counters enters the battlefield tapped.
3, T: Put a shapeshifter counter on all nonland permanents. (Shapeshifter counters count as all counter types. They cannot modify a permanent’s power or toughness.)
“I’ve got one of everything in here.”

Given the opportunity, I'll submit one of my recent favorites. I doubt it would fit any existing art, but I guess it would look close to the saprolings on Spore Burst or Sprout Swarm, just more... blade-ish. Anyways, here goes:

Blade Cyst
Tribal Artifact - Ooze Equipment
Equipped creature gets +1/+1.
Whenever equipped creature deals combat damage, put a token onto the battlefield that’s a copy of Blade Cyst.
Equip

Mirran Outcasts
Creature - [something] [special rarity]
Level up [2/2]
Levels 1-4 First strike [4/4]
Levels 5+ Triple strike (This deals first combat damage, regular combat damage, and then another round of regular combat damage.) [8/8]
Watermark: Mirran

I just thought, if you want an advertising type card, this is pretty cool because it shows off the colorless leveller template (which doesn't exist) along with a watermark, hybrid mana symbols, and a custom keyword.

PS: I hate the custom keyword but it's an example.

Well, I tried to decide whether I should come up with something new or pick something already designed. I decided that for the purpose of this starter contest that I would submit one of my favorite cards I have ever designed. Behold:

Dragon of the Dawn
Legendary Creature - Dragon
Flying, haste
Overbear 4 (This cannot be blocked by creaures with power 4 or less).
As long as Dragon of the Dawn is attacking, creatures you control cannot be blocked by creatures with power 2 or less.
Only the most couragous warriors could even stand their ground against the magnificent flying beast; all others fled. They soon wished they had fled too.
5/5

If selected you may decide if the new mechanic (overbear) should remain or replaced with just text. Since it would be on the front page I am not sure we would want an unknown keyword... but then maybe we would...

Nice and Simple from my current set.

Crimson Pheonix
Creature- Pheonix
Flying
Whenever Crimson Pheonix Attacks you may deal 1 damage to target creature
0/1
"Learn from nature children. The weak can defeat the strong... when the weak play dirty.- Burik, Garuthil Educator."

How is the forum poll thing going to work?

Hero of Fables

Creature- Human Warrior {C}
: ~ becomes a 5/5 and gains first strike and vigilance. (This effect lasts indefinitely.)
The hero without name; remembered forever in the hearts of children.
1/1

(Got the wording from Memnarch for the indefinite effect. Guess they changed it from when mem' was first printed.)
This is an homage to the first cycle of cards that I made that I felt proud of. It's almost the same as it was originally, but the name had to change :3
I forget if I made this before or after Figure of Destiny came out...

Colbranus the Magnificent
Legendary Creature — Human Wizard Rebel
, : Sacrifice two lands: Destroy all other creatures. Activate this ability only when you could cast a sorcery.
At end of turn, if you control no other creatures, you may return a creature card from your graveyard to you hand.
“There are tens of thousands who worship him as a god. They believe that he is their deliverer, that he will lead them to a promised land. Hero, savior, champion - those are the words they use to describe him. But the truth is that he is none of those things, and the promised land he will bring us all to is hell.”
- Faulcrest, Demonbreaker
3/5

We have have polls here, but their setup only for Mods and Admin to use. I've never tried one though, so if it doesn't work, then I'll set one up elsewhere for this first contest and figure out what went wrong for the second. In any case, you'll have a winner voted in by Sun. 19th, 11:59PM CST.

Renascence Vortex

Sorcery - Epic Arcane All creatures sent to the graveyard this turn are instead put in to play in the playing field of the caster of this card. Creatures gained in this manner do not have summoning sickness. During the upkeep phase of the caster of Renascence Vortex, the caster must pay the casting cost of each individual creature gained with Renascence Vortex or it is returned to it's owner's graveyard. (Return any cards gained through Renascence Vortex to their owners after the game ends.)

So this week is just Magic Cards, K.
So we will be able to submit RAGE cards next week?

Well in this forum we mainly do magic, and RAGE isnt included in the bundle... and people who come to this sight might not know it, it being less popular then magic. I dont know if blending different game cards to compete with each other is good, and if we could only post rage cards during a week, only around 3 cards would be posted because some of us dont know anything about it.

I kinda thought so. It's been out'a print for many years and with that terrible Vegas printing that pretty much killed the game. Thx for your reply.

This particular new feature is A_F's show to run for the most part, but I want to speak up here. I think most weeks it should be Magic, but this could be an excellent way to get the word out about other templates from time to time, if there are enough people who can design cards for those games.

What Pich said. If a game has enough forum representation, then one CotW contest might be for it. Right now though, that means we'll only be seeing MTG for the first few at least. I'll set up another thread where people can throw out a list of games that they would be willing to create cards for that might shine some light on the viability of a contest for another game on these boards, at least for the time being.

*snip*

Zionel the Necromancer

Planeswalker Zionel
Starting Loyalty Counters-3
+2 Put a 1/1 zombie creature token onto the battlefield.
-4 Search your deck for a zombie creature with a converted mana cost of five or less and put it into play.
-10 All creatures in your graveyard have unearth until the end of turn. If a creature would be removed from game after its unearth resolves, shuffle the creature into your library instead.

Artwork-Nathie
http://nathie.deviantart.com/

A reminder - even if the artist seems obvious, credit them on the render. As per the rules, artist credit is required on all renders, no exception.

Here's an old flashy (pun not intended) card back from my legendary set.

Zoidberg, Scuttler Overlord

Legendary Creature - Crab (Put Rarity here)

Flash
Whenever you cast a crab spell, target player puts the top 3 cards of his or her library into his or her graveyard.
When ~ enters the battlefield target player puts the top 13 cards of his or her library into his or her graveyard.

0/3

I didn't give it a rarity since I can't tell where it ranks, and because the original file has it as a common.

Leviathan, Lord of Tides
Legendary Creature - Leviathan {M}
Islandwalk
Whenever you spend , you may tap target permanent. (You spend mana when you use it to cast spells or activate abilities of permanents you control.)

Here's very flashy card I designed a while back which could be cool for the front page:

Zuru, the Firesworn

Brilliance (Each creature you control that shares a colour with this creature has every other ability of this creature.)
Haste, flying
: +1/+0 until end of turn
: +0/+1 until end of turn
4/4

Here's a render because I reckon cards are easier to read that way; and because this card ought to be viewed in full art to appreciate its flashyness

Obviously the cardname and art can both be easily changed if need be.

Spark Phylactery
Artifact-- Relic
If outfitted planeswalker would leave the battlefield due to having zero or less loyalty counters, return it to the battlefield with one loyalty counter on it and unattach Spark Phylactery from it.
Outfit (: Attach to target planeswalker you control. Outfit only as a sorcery.)

Phanes, Dreamscape Prodigy
Legendary Creature - Metathran Wizard (M)
Landfall, hellbent, radiance, threshold - Whenever a land enters the battlefield under your control, if you have no cards in hand, and seven or more cards in your graveyard, you may search your library for a card and cast it without paying its mana cost. If you do, shuffle your library.
3/4

OK, here we go, this one is a tribute sort of to the old rules...you know, pre-M10. Hope you all like it, even if it doesn't win

Scepter of Mana Burn

Legendary Artifact

As long as ~ is untapped, whenever a player taps a permanent for mana, that player loses one life for each mana that permanent produced.

: ~ does not untap during your next untap step. You lose 2 life.

OK, so this card is Legendary in my set because it is an important artifact in the story, so I thought for flavor it should be only a one of deal...though it could potentially be non-Legendary. Anyhow, I hope you all like this one, I thought an artifact and a throwback to some classic M:tG rules might make for a good entry into the contest.

This is something I could really get behind, as for my entry, from Planar Collapse:

Ronald, Tyrant Ranchmaster

Legendary Creature - Human Farmer
Haste, deathtouch
Whenever Ronald, Tyrant Ranchmaster is the target of a spell or ability, or deals combat damage to a player, that player sacrifices another creature.
“This isn’t the Ronald I remember. He didn’t murder his father in cold blood, or have his brother executed. The Ronald I knew wouldn’t have hurt anybody.”
—Phraigsec
6/6
Rare

I would have used the character from the original block, but alas, I wouldn't want to end up opening that can of worms if I won. This (as I mentioned earlier), is based off a friend of mine, and uses his real first name, but this is ambiguous enough that it could be anyone. The one from the original block, also included last name, and he'd hit me, and since he's easily twice my size....

Well, sure. How about a split card?

Spring Forward // Fall Back
//
Sorcery - Divine // Instant
As an additional cost to play Spring // Remove all creatures you
Forward, sacrifice an untapped Forest. // control from combat.
Search your library for up to three // Prevent all damage they
basic land cards and put them into play // would deal or receive.
tapped. Shuffle your library afterward. //

Oops, just noticed my entry had radiance in it - It should look like this:

Phanes, Dreamscape Prodigy
Legendary Creature - Metathran Wizard (M)
Landfall, hellbent, threshold - Whenever a land enters the battlefield under your control, if you have no cards in hand, and seven or more cards in your graveyard, you may search your library for a card and cast it without paying its mana cost. If you do, shuffle your library.
3/4

Just remove the radiance. By the way, Phanes is, quoted from wikipedia: "[...]The mystic primeval deity of procreation and the generation of new life, who was introduced into Greek mythology[...]"

Silent Guardian -
Artifact Creature - Golem
Silent Guardian has protection from colors used to pay it's mana cost.
2/3

...

Wow. Just wow. Must be the most popular competition submission I've seen since starting here.

if i read correctly, 23. well, 24 now:

Alexis, auramancer
planewalker - alexis
[+1]: Put an enchantment-aura token into play attached to target creature. its has "enchant creature" and "enchanted creature can't attack or block".
[-2]: Draw a card for each enchantment on the battlefield.
[-8]: each enchantment becomes a 3/3 elemental creature with flying.
<3>

Chromium, Planeswalker
Planeswalker — Chromium (M)
Starting Loyalty: 5
+3: Look at target player’s hand. You may choose up to two cards. If you do, that player discards those cards. Otherwise, that player draws two cards.
-2: Cast target nonland card in a graveyard without paying its mana cost.
-9: Discard your hand, then draw that many cards. For each card discarded this way, target opponent loses 3 life and you gain 3 life.

Yeah, at least the voting won't be as time consuming as the other competitions!

Now, here's hoping we don't break the polling software.

LOL, I may try out a junk poll with 25+ options later and just delete it if it works.

EDIT: Worked fine, just fine. No issues at all.

Witherbane Armor -
Artifact - Relic Equipment
Equipped creature is indestructible and has vigilance.
Relic — If you control another permanent with the same name, equipped creature gets +2/+2 and gains first strike.
Equip

Akrim the Gatekeeper
Planeswalker — Akrim
Whenever a creature is put into a graveyard from the battlefield, put a loyalty counter on Akrim the Gatekeeper.
[-2]: Return target creature card from your graveyard to the battlefield. It gains haste. Return it to your hand at the beginning of the next end step.
[-2]: You may put a creature card from your hand onto the battlefield. It gains haste. Sacrifice it at the beginning of the next end step.
[4]

Something old, something new. A planeswalker with a triggered ability, that's new. A planeswalker whose activated abilities all remove loyalty, that sounds familiar. But this one has a twist! Astute readers will see that the second half of our Cauldron Dance discreetly replenishes Akrim's loyalty. And while the temptation may be to load Akrim into a deck with four Darksteel Colossi, Akrim works much better alongside more faunacidal creatures like Skinrender and Flametongue Kavu. Reuse, and abuse!

I am aware that Cauldron Dance actually has a slightly different wording: "That creature gains haste," instead of "It gains haste." The former is consistent with all Quicksilver Amulet effects, while the latter is used only on Act of Treason effects and in the reminder text for unearth. Spacing issues on the planeswalker template, and the fact that I can find no obvious reason for this difference, led me to opt for the shorter line.

The art I currently have for Akrim depicts a female angel/demon hybrid, and can be found in Jody Zhou's DeviantArt gallery, but I deliberately chose Akrim to be a gender-neutral name so that art may be substituted.

Thanks for the opportunity, by the way. This contest sounds great, and I look forward both to the results and to future challenges. Great job! This is as good a place as any to say that I really like the work that's been done on the site as of late. I daresay that these forums are the best they've ever been, and are getting better all the time. Thanks again.

Here you go:

A text version:

Lagroth, Dragon of Rage
Legendary Tribal Creature — Dragon
Lagroth, Dragon of Rage gets +2/+2 for each other Dragon on the battlefield.
Flying
: Target player looses 3 life and you gain 3 life.
: Put a red 5/5 Dragon creature token with flying on the battlefield.
5/5

My idea was this: New players like big flashy cards, and they want to make big flashing cards, so why not show them one. I also made a tribal creature, an interesting thing you can do with mse that hasn't been done by wizards.

A link to deviantart: http://browse.deviantart.com/digitalart/?q=badass%20dragon#/d2et1oa