White Can Make Treasures Through Optional Taxes but Cannot Force Discard

can create Treasures through taxing effects if opponents have a genuine choice to decline the action, Mark Rosewater said on November 8, 2026, while separate answers rejected forced discard even when it produces parity. His answer about Treasure taxes drew a specific line: triggering whenever an opponent plays a land asks too much of that opponent.

The distinction matters when judging a proposed card: the resource it produces is only part of the design. Rosewater’s answers on November 8 and 9 also considered how a creature copies itself, whether a hand effect forces discard, and a limit on drawing cards.

Treasure Taxes Need a Real Choice

A fan asked whether Monologue Tax contradicted an earlier statement that should not repeatedly create Treasures. Rosewater answered with a condition for taxing cards, rather than a blanket prohibition on repeated Treasure creation: the opponent must have a “true choice” not to take the taxed action.

His rejected example was a trigger on every land an opponent plays. An opponent could technically stop playing lands, but Rosewater called that too onerous. The ability to decline an action is not enough if declining it demands that much.

We think that is the useful design boundary: a tax needs a credible route around it. For a proposed land-triggered Treasure engine, pointing out that opponents can skip their land plays does not meet Rosewater’s stated condition.

Self-Copying Creatures Depend on Complexity

Asked on November 8 whether Tribbles changed an earlier answer about Scute Swarm, Rosewater put the emphasis on complexity. The fan recalled being told that probably would not copy its own creature and asked whether Tribbles represented a change or a bend.

White can make token creatures, so it’s a matter of how complicated the creature self copying itself is.

That allows some self-copying creature designs, with complexity determining whether a particular execution fits. It also sits alongside Rosewater’s November 1 description of ’s development: he called the move toward being more creature-centric its biggest change over time.

Parity Does Not Permit Forced Discard

The discard answers were firmer. On November 8, a fan asked about Balance after watching a Vintage Cube game in which it forced an opponent to discard their entire hand. The question explicitly asked whether producing parity kept that effect within ’s color pie. Rosewater answered, “It is not.”

On November 9, another fan asked about everyone discarding a card and drawing a card. Rosewater rejected that design too. Making the hand effect affect everyone does not make either proposed effect acceptable in . Balance supplies a concrete precedent for the question, not permission to repeat its forced discard in a new design.

The Card-Draw Answer Was One Per Turn

Rosewater’s November 9 answer about randomness came in response to a different question: could do anything randomly? He joked, “Draw a card (although only one per turn). : )” The stated limit in that example was one card per turn.

Drawing a card was the action he offered; making everyone discard a card and draw a card was the separate proposal he rejected that same day.