"Reworked" vs "Original" vs "Recycled" mechanics

[EMaxxi]

For the last 2 years I've been under the impression that "reworked" mechanics have become more and more common. By that I mean mechanics that work similar to older mechanics and/or tap into the same design space.
Power creep aside, I think this is a very bad trend because it's getting harder to remember all the little differences between the mechanics. 
The most obvious (and most recent) example are Disguise and Cloak being power-crept versions of Morph and Manifest, and I think it was a terrible idea to put out a commander precon that mixes Morph, Megamorph, Disguise and Manifest in the same deck, especially when said deck is (allegedly) targeted at new players.

I preferred their design philosophy from mid/late 2010s, when they were more willing to straight-up recycle old mechanics and were generally introducing less new keywords per set (Tarkir and Ravnica sets being the notable exceptions).

What is your stance on this topic?
Are you having any issues keeping up with all the mechanics and their variants, or do you think this is fine?


EDIT: quick "recap" of all the mechanics that came out since 2021, the year when the shift to reworked mechanics became more evident - to me, at least:

- Kaldheim: Boast is a fairly generic payoff for attacking but I woud still consider it an original mechanic. Foretell is also something MtG had never done before.
- Strixhaven: Learn is the most "out there" mechanics we've had in a while. The only new thing Magecraft does is triggering off copied spells. Ward was a much-needed nerf of Hexproof (i.e. good but not original).
- D&D Adventure in the Forgotten Realms: Pack Tactics is another generic payoff for aggro, and a cross between Battalion and Formidable. Now, many people, (me included) have a love-hate relationship with Venture into the dungeon. Still, I think it was very original and probably the second most "out there" mechanic in recent memory (after learn).
(Where things start going downhill...)
- ISD: Midnight Hunt: Daybound/Nightbound is a desperate attempt at making werewolves tranformations "easier to track". It failed spectacularly, but because Graveyard Trespasser is so good, we kinda HAVE to play with it. Decayed Zombies were an interesting take on token makers because you had to find a way to use the tokens beyond attacking and blocking. Disturb was a flavorful take on flashback, but not very original. Coven was fairly novel imho. Returning mechanics: Flashback and Investigate.
- ISD: Crimson Vow: Training was advertised by MaRo himself as "reverse Mentor". Cleave is "reverse kicker". Disturb is back from Midnight Hunt and Exploit is back from DTK.
- Now, I'm gonna dedicate a paragraph to Blood Tokens and artifact tokens in general (Map, Scrap,...). We do NOT need all these tokens. Please stop. Clues (card draw), Treasures (mana) and Food (life) are more than enough. Any additional unique token ads complexity to the board.
- Kamigawa Neon Dynasty: The only truly new mechanic is Configure, a new take on equipment. It feels similar to Living Weapon, but it's different enough to count as an original mechanic imho. I don't consider Modified a mechanic, just an umbrella term for enchanted, equipped, and "counter-ed" creature. Ninjutsu and Channel are back from OG Kamigawa. For what it's worth, Neon Dynasty also introduces Compleated.
- New Capenna: Shield Counters are interesting for being the first counters with intrinsic rule meaning since +1/+1 and -1/-1. the other family mechanics are either variants (Blitz~Dash, Casualty~Kicker - yes every mechanic is just Kicker) or just lazy (Connive and Alliance).
- Skipping Baldur's Gate ...
- Dominaria United: Kicker is back, specifically off-color Kicker, and is the main set mechanic alongside Domain. the "new" mechanics are Enlist (generic aggro payoff that saw 0 play outside of limited) and Read Ahead (variant of Sagas).
- The Brother's War: Nothing special here. I can tolerate Powerstone tokens since they stay on the field and fill a different role than Bloods/Maps/Food/etc. Unearth is a returning mechanic, so nothing new (they changed the flavor from "Disentombing Zombies" to "Discovering ancient relics", but that's it). The return of Meld was nice, but the mechanic is too much "out there", imho.
- All Will Be One: The awkwardly named "For Mirrodin!" mechanic is just Living Weapon. Toxic is a harder-to-break Infect. Proliferate is Proliferate. Corrupted gets some free "novelty points" simply because it can only work in a set like Phyrexia.
- March of the Machines: Battles are a completely new card type, so very novel by default. Incubate introduces transforming tokens and it felt quite new to me. Same with Backup and ability-sharing shenanigans.
- The Lord of the Rings: Tempted by the ring is another love-hate mechanics like Dungeons. Proof that things can be too novel sometimes.
- Wilds of Eldraine: Bargain is just "Kicker-sacrifice an artifact, enchantment or token". Roles tokens are original. Celebration is nothing special, but still less lazy than Alliance. Adventures return.
- The Lost caverns of ixalan: I like the flavor of Descend, but in the end it's just a harder-to-abuse Threshold. Craft is just a special way of flipping DFCs.
- Muders at Karlov Manor: Disguise and Cloak are power-crept Morph and Manifest (and the whole reason I'm writing this). Cases are just Quests but with a better layout. Suspected reminds me of Unleash from RTR. Investigate returns.
- Outlaws of Thunder Junction: Crime and Outaws are umbrella terms for "targeting your opponent or their stuff" and "bad guys creature types" respectively. Plot is a cross between Suspend and Foretell. Saddle is just Crew but for living beings (mounts), which I think it's genius, but not very original gameplay-wise (very willing to change my mind, though).

Thanks for bearing with me 

[Landale]

Honestly the only ones that really bug me are Disguise/Cloak and Day/Night.

Day/Night just adds obnoxious tracking that never goes away, even when relevant cards do, so I absolutely loathe it to be completely honest.

Disguise/Cloak, however, is really just a minor annoyance. On one hand, the terms are more generic so we could theoretically see them more often, and I hope they do since Kadena, Kaust, and Yarus could really use the support. On the other hand, cards like Expose the Culprit slip through the cracks and ignore older related mechanics so they only work on a smaller subset of cards than you'd think.

[Morganator 2.0]

Creativity is finite.

It's an uncomfortable statement, but it's true. It's why you'll see comedians recycle old jokes. Why your favorite band's new stuff isn't as good as the old stuff. And why doing a remake of a series/movie is easier than making something new. People get writer's block, they run out of ideas, and they face burnout.

Product overload has pushed everyone to their limits. Consumers can't keep up with all the new releases. Game stores are having trouble with purchasing the right stock that will sell, often leading them to buy copious amounts of a  product that won't sell, or too little of a product that's in demand. And card designers have run out of ideas. It's getting harder and harder to make something unique and special that isn't just a rehash of older cards. And to meet deadlines, sometimes they must.

Credit where it's due, Universes Beyond helps with this. The characters, items, and settings give a prompt for designers to work off of. Think of a lightsaber; a sword that can cut through anything. So as a simple design, it's an equipment artifact that destroys a non-lightsaber artifact when the equipped creature attacks. Done. Designed. All that's left is to work out the mana and equip costs.

But even still, there's a lot of product coming out. So of course card designers will default onto something familiar. It's easier to balance, and you don't have to think as much when designing the cards. By rehashing old mechanics, designers can pump out the cards quickly and move on to the next thing. Just as Hasbro intended.

[anjinsan]

A lot of the time mechanics are reworked for a reason. There were a lot of issues with some of these mechanics, so creating something similar but better-adjusted lets them overcome that. Toxic is your prime example: infect is much-loathed and really quite hard to balance because the effect of pump spells etc are now thrown way out of whack. Toxic is a lot easier to quantify and therefore a lot easier to get the numbers right on. I don’t think many people wanted to see infect back, but toxic was mostly OK.

Fading and vanishing are an older example.

Disguise/cloak is annoying for sure. It perhaps works well in draft as the environment is kinda balanced around it. In a format like EDH the differences are largely irrelevant, so we just have 4+ similar-but-slightly-different variants which doesn’t matter much but is a bit confusing.