The Random Card button in Gatherer gave me this Spirit to work with. Well, it looks like it could be a Horror, too. But because of those floating glowing thingies, it has to be a Spirit. Most, if not all, of the Spirits in the Kamigawa block have floating stuff surrounding them. ...I know - please bear with me, Vorthoses, for not knowing what those things are or what they're called.
First thing I did was take note of all the black effects in Betrayers of Kamigawa.
And then before delving too far into what kind of an effect I should have on this creature, I noticed that there are no common black creatures with a converted mana cost of 1 except for this guy. I didn't want black to have absolutely no common creatures to cast on the first turn, so I decided that I must retain the mana cost of one black mana.
Next, I found that there was a lack of the following: deathtouch, swampwalk, regeneration, haste, lifelink, and boosting power. Haste is rarely done in black, and I'm not about to put it onto a one-mana creature as part of my "safe" designing. Regeneration on a Spirit would be counter-synergetic with Soulshift only working with dead Spirits. Besides, a regenerating one-drop at common would be annoying for Limited. Lifelink is just like deathtouch as not having existed, yet. But, you know, the art just doesn't seem to depict a thing that would be gaining life.
That leaves swampwalk and boosting power. Well, assuming I don't do life loss. Because this guy totally looks like something that is infectious. ...heh, on that note, it does look like a creature with Infect. But that doesn't exist in Betrayers of Kamigawa.
Well, with swampwalk, Plague Beetle already exists. But a functional reprint is a possibility. Cases in point: Lantern Kami is a Spirit version of Suntail Hawk and Wandering Ones is a Spirit version of Merfolk of the Pearl Trident.
Man, a Tormented Soul would be perfect for this slot. It does what swampwalk does but a little differently, it's a Spirit, and the art does seem to indicate that this creature is going through some hard times. Poor guy.
But we can't do that. So let's just do a Plague Beetle functional reprint. This guy is practically eating swampy stuff.
...Hey, wait a minute. Perhaps swampwalk wasn't done because it would make it harder for this guy to die (or cause other creatures to die). And that means less Soulshift-iness!
Side note: I've been ignoring the boosting power because it seemed like the best way to do it that was appropriately matched with the art was sacrificing it. Or relating it to dying. Somehow. But I can't have it grant temporary upon him dying, because it would most likely be during combat after damage is dealt - and that is not useful.
Oh, I know! Let's relate swampwalk to that good ol' trigger used frequently on Spirit cards: "Whenever you cast a Spirit or Arcane spell, ..." That way, it doesn't mean that you'll always have a creature that both doesn't kill creatures and is hard to kill, thus denying soulshift a bit. In this case, it'd be encouraging more Spirit/Arcane decks. How encouraging of the parasitism that is Kamigawa block. Oh, well. Lastly, this sets it apart from Plague Beetle and Tormented Soul.
The swampwalk only happens occasionally. How about whenever it spits out some swampiness to guide its way? As if it always has swampwalk, it just needs its own filthy juice to be spat out. A Bespatter! ...I just really want to use this word, and it fits the criterion of being alphabetically placed before Blessing of Leeches, and it does look like this guy is spitting out stuff.
DONE!
Fun fact: AFTER naming this card, I looked at the entry of "mire" on Dictionary.com, and - "bespatter" is used within its examples of uses with verbs! CRAZY RANDOM HAPPENSTANCE!
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