I need to hear your reason for hating Ascension. You gloss over it and then went on to discuss Solforge. I love both the iOS and physical version. Why the hate?
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Sometimes I feel like the word "interactivity" around here is akin to the word "electrolytes" in sports drinks. The public doesn't really know what it means, but they figure it's a good thing to have.
Great show as usual. I have an unrelated question: Through various card creation contests I've come to realize that I'm really bad at mental playtesting. Do you guys have any tips for the novice(ish) card creator regarding that?
I need to hear your reason for hating Ascension. You gloss over it and then went on to discuss Solforge. I love both the iOS and physical version. Why the hate?
Ascenscion in its physical version is a game I can't stand due to how painful and unengaging I find it. The decisions are pretty easy to make as to what you want (and all good decks tend to end up wanting a lot of the same things - everyone wants to banish cards, everyone wants high-honor constructs, everyone wants deck filtering and so on so the factions in the base game aren't super meaningful), so you spend very little time engaged in the core decision process and most of the time just groaning when people take the things you want.
Other players are extremely difficult to interact with, so you're only negatively invested in others turns with them maybe buying stuff you want. It also feels extremely dispiriting as players snowball beyond your control. While a full understanding of the game does open up a variety of strategies, it's very painful as a new player and you often feel things are even more hopeless than they really are. The core mechanics also don't push people in different directions for dramatically different builds, which means monsters can often clutter up the board and lead to no one wanting to buy anything. This is made worse by players still wanting to compete for most of the same cards. Again, in the base game - I have limited knowledge of the expansions.
The division between mystics and the heavy infantry is painful too. Players with 2 runes left over end up getting pushed towards heavy infantry while players blessed with 3 early on get the mystics. It's often a better move to simply purchase nothing rather than dilute your well-built-rune-deck with the heavy infantry early game. At least it certainly feels this way. This results in an unsatisfying turn due to RNG or getting pushed further behind and being able to buy even fewer things.
Star Realms fixes all my issues. It feels much more interactive, it provides obvious and compelling reasons to focus on specific factions (which often means you and your opponents are engaged in different aspects of the gameplay), it's full of interesting decisions such as when to scrap your cards for their more powerful one-shot effects. This makes even the basic purchase-this-when-you-have-no-good-options-card interesting. Unlike the clash between mystics and heavy infantry, there's only one ship here and it can be used to generate 2 gold (like a mystic) or it can be trashed (banished) in the same turn it's played for a 2 damage boost on top of the gold. This lets you rip them out of your deck and feel great about doing it when they start cluttering things up, while also making them great for both long game decks and aggressive ones. It's just brilliant.
Oh, and the art is a lot better too.
I have a particular hatred toward ascenscion because it was SO CLOSE to being a game I loved but just did not work for the reasons I've mentioned and more. I felt bad while playing it in the physical version. Almost-great games I find so much more offensive than obscenely bad ones. Star Realms pushed it to fully great. It's awesome. It's everything Ascenscion was trying to be. I love it, and I reccomend checking it out the demo free online if you haven't already. Or just buying it. If you can find it in stock physically, it's only like $15.
Note that in the IOS version of ascenscion when playing against a single AI, the turns are so fast that it hardly matters. You get very little painful waiting and more time spent on your decision than in angst.
Great show as usual. I have an unrelated question: Through various card creation contests I've come to realize that I'm really bad at mental playtesting. Do you guys have any tips for the novice(ish) card creator regarding that?
Yes. Just actively try it.
This sounds super simple, but by mentally trying to imagine yourself in the actual game and thinking about what you'd do with the card - your brain does something different. I have no explanation for why it works so well.
You can practice this skill easily. Pick a non-digital game you like, then change a rule. Try to imagine how that rule change would FEEL to play with, how it changes your decisions and experience, what it would do to the game. Then try it and see if you were right. Take monopoly and add a rule that says anyone who gets an effect that sends them to jail NOW means that they can send another player to jail instead of them. Magic Formats are a goldmine for this too.
Pause the game whenever they talk about a proposed change. Mentally playtest it (you don't need to know anything about diablo really, it's almost better if you don't). Then see what they say about how the change worked out. If you get it right, awesome. If you got it wrong, try and figure out what you missed and how you could have gotten it right. Even getting it wrong is great, because you get to see more examples of game systems' causes and effects. This improves your future guesses by expanding your knowledge base.
After several years of practicing this skill, I managed to predict them all correctly when I saw this video. But that only came after practicing a lot and getting a lot of other ones wrong. When you develop this skill enough though, you appear to other designers to be a kind of clairvoyant. Use the power wisely.
Great show as usual. I have an unrelated question: Through various card creation contests I've come to realize that I'm really bad at mental playtesting. Do you guys have any tips for the novice(ish) card creator regarding that?
To add to Stairc's advice, you can practice mental playtesting while playing games (whether it's magic or some other game). When professional magic players talk about playing a certain card "being their best line" they mean that when they mentally playtest each option in their hand, boardstate, etc, the most effective outcome of that mental playtest is playing that certain card. Next time you play a game of magic, or some other game where you're permitted time to think, try to mentally playtest your options whenever you come to a crossroad. From there, mental playtesting can also be leveraged when considering sideboarding or deck editing options: "How would the game go if this Natural Connection was a Plummet instead?"
I think these options alone won't get you to the clairvoyant stage that Stairc mentions, but they're small stepping stones you can use to get to the point where you can fully leverage his advice.
To be fair, trying to predict the best tactical play while you're in a game already is a little bit different than trying to predict how a card will feel to play with once you're in a game. Looking from inside the game is kind of defeating the purpose.
I would add that researching human behavior with books like Predictably Irrational also helps give you foundational knowledge. But the most important thing is just to mentally engage and try to do visualize the gamestate and imagine how it feels to have that card in hand. It's mental-fu, but I've seen people instantly rocket up their accuracy when they close their eyes and try for the first times.
There was a point Reuben started to mention but then the discussion went another direction, about moving randomness around. Magic derives a lot of its variance by adding randomness to its resource system. Hearthstone wants to change that while preserving this variance so it moves the randomness from the resources to the cards' effects. This is all very well and good, but it's not clear to me that you can freely move randomness around with impunity. I think there's a fundamental difference between "I don't know when I will be able to play this card, but when I do, I will know exactly what the card will do" versus "I know exactly when I will be able to play this card, but I don't know what the card will do." I think the complaints against Hearthstone's RNG are because players seem to dislike randomness #2 more than #1.
Good point. But it's pretty clear that people complain a lot about the RNG of not being able to do anything too. RNG is always going to be a scapegoat, that's one of its roles, so players blame the RNG rather than themselves. If people weren't complaining at all about losing to RNG, that could actually be a problem... Because then they're forced to blame themselves.
I think that the Hearthstone complaints come from the sheer AMOUNT of RNG. Often it can feel too swingy and makes the game feel arbitrary. They also use the more hated icons of randomness, such as things like Mad Bomber. The game is also pitched as an E-Sport, making this particularly egregious. Most of HS' variance doesn't even need Mad Bomber style cards. A lot of it comes from their cards happening to match up well against yours, the standard luck of the draw, risk vs. reward plays and topdecking a 2 cost card when you have 10 mana... While they draw a 7 cost one.
If you want to read more, I wrote an article on the topic. It's something I think about a lot, since I'm currently designing Faeria.
To be fair, trying to predict the best tactical play while you're in a game already is a little bit different than trying to predict how a card will feel to play with once you're in a game. Looking from inside the game is kind of defeating the purpose.
While I agree that it's pretty different, it sounded like Todris was having trouble getting in the right headspace to succeed at mental playtesting. If that is a challenge, it can be useful to try to get into that headspace from a place of comfort/familiarity which I presume a game of magic would be to someone on MTGS. Once it's easier to identify that headspace and slip into it, one should have an easier time slipping into it outside of a game as well. My advice is very much limited to that aspect. Yours definitely dives into what one should do once in that headspace.
I would add that researching human behavior with books like Predictably Irrational also helps give you foundational knowledge. But the most important thing is just to mentally engage and try to do visualize the gamestate and imagine how it feels to have that card in hand. It's mental-fu, but I've seen people instantly rocket up their accuracy when they close their eyes and try for the first times.
Great reference material. More than just picturing how a card plays, it's important to imagine how a card feels to play.
I get you now Piar. And yep Todris, Predictably Irrational is excellent. If you have already read it, I'd reccomend Drive by Daniel Pink or anything ever written by Dan and Chip Heathe. In general, you can't go wrong with Dans.
I'm glad you guys talked about this topic, but BOY is this episode all over the place in subject matter. The section on netrunner was more talking about the game as a whole and not its resource system. No wonder this episode was this long. Outlines, outlines, outlines...
I've hit on this topic on the Custom Magic Channel before, and at the time I was the only one who saw magics mana system as not ideal (there are better systems out there.) In addition to some of the things you mentioned as pros and cons, there is the fact that lands just are not fun for the average player (which, for the record, no one in this section of the forum qualifies as before someone jumps in with their personal experience.) It's not just figuring out the mana base is complicated of flooding and screw, but having a huge chunk of your deck just to provide energy is pretty dull. Drawing lands is generally unexciting and stacking up your deck with them feels like stuffing it with filler. There is a reason the casual players are bored and disappointed when the get a rare land in a pack, or see a duel land that enters tapped, etc... The mechanics of Zendikar address this to a degree, but those mechanics are not consistently part of the standard metagame, and they only lessen those feelings, not negate them.
The games you used as examples or otherwise mentioned cover a fair range of options. Some others from games I've tried and enjoyed (though not always for their resource systems):
Infinity Wars/Bloodwars(I think... its gone extinct after 5 years): Cards take time once placed on the board to activate. Depending on the game, they may be interactable or not based on which game. UFS (Universal Fighting System): Cards have a "difficulty" check When you play them. Discard the top card of you deck, and compare its difficult check compared to the card you're playing it. If it matches the difficulty or exceeds it, you play it successfully. Each card you play in succession adds 1 difficulty to the original cards cost, so combing/stringing cards gets harder each time. You can tap cards you control to add to the check though, so over time it gets easier. You can only string together a card that share an element type (like a magic color) and each card counts for 3 (out of a potential 12) types. Yugioh: Cards are often free (though sometimes have a card or life cost), or heavily tied to a tribal synergy. Cardfight Vanguard: Cards start a level one, and by building your board pyramid style allows you to play high level cards (A pair of level ones allow you to play a level two, and three level ones with a pair of level twos gets you your level 3 card.) The first TCG I designed on my own used this kind of system, and that was a decade or so ago.
Another non specific example would be games where decks have a point limit and cards are all worth a certain number of points to include based on how powerful they are. There are also plenty of game systems besides that dont really have "costs" on cards persay, but rely more on limiting the number of cards you draw and pushing the variance based on how few cards you can draw. Games like these often divide play into rounds where both players get the same number number of cards to win said round, and once that is done all cards are discarded and a new hand is drawn.
Part of the reason that my round 2 challenge for this Months MCC asked players to draw inspiration from another TCG is exactly that I feel magics mana system is not without flaws nor the best option conceived. In many of the chats and debates I've had with people here and in other venues of MTG custom creation, it quickly becomes clear that many of those folks have little experience outside of Magic. A weakness which I felt the MCC round clearly exposed. Part of being a good designer is drawing experience from as many relevant sources as possible, and how could you not consider other TCGs with that standard in mind? Don't settle for having played a couple cards games, yet alone just playing Magic. There are Hundreds of card games out there, dozen upon dozens that have or had commercial success for a number of years that are worth examining. Especially for how they handle resources, amongst other things.
But those bring in the necessity of weighing risk and reward.
That's true if you like deck building. (I like it myself.) However, the modus operandi of designers tend to be to keep streamlining (i.e. dumb down) games until players take no effort and thought into what they're doing or putting into their decks, but randomly click stuff and throw cards down.
Hearthstone has variance, so does every card game in existence, so that's not saying much. That's just the inherent variance found in all card games. Hearthstone's major problem, as above, is too much streamlining and very little thought on the player's end. Every deck has the same curve. The same amount of 2 costs cards, up to 6+ costs, and so on, works for almost every deck you build. But the worst culprit, there is not much resource management at all. Everything is free (another modus operandi of designers to keep players happy, at least for a while.)
Compare to the variety of decks you can build in Magic. Some decks have low curve, from 1cc to 3cc only. Midrange decks range from 1cc to 6cc. Slower decks or ramp decks can go even wider, 1cc to 10cc. And so on. Other resources system tend to neglect this about deck building variations.
The podcast didn't provide any direct solutions that could "fix" or improve Magic's mana system. What specific tweaks or changes, and what things to keep, do you propose? That still has to meet certain criteria: maintain Magic's high skill level; probably should keep the land card type; balances between 1 color, 2 color, 3+ color decks.
Let's look at systems that are closer to Magic's. Hex has resources cards just like Magic. Both suggest a similar amounts in decks (around 24 of 60 cards taken up by them). In Hex, all spells are paid by generic mana, but most cards also have a "threshold" requirement of specific color(s). As long as the colors of your resources meet or surpass this threshold, you can play the spell (by paying the cost, of course.) Furthermore, Hex removes the tedium of tapping individual lands.
A notable difference from Magic is, Magic requires specific colored lands for every spell you cast per turn. Let's say you have 2 plains and 2 swamps. You can play White Knight and Black Knight on the same turn. But you can't play White Knight and Cartel Aristocrat on the same turn (not enough white sources). However in Hex, if you have 2 white resources and 2 black resources, you can play a WW and BW creature on the same turn because WWBB satisfies the threshold for each card.
Another under-looked resource system is Shadowfist. Shadowfist do have Site cards that generate power, but power is not associated with any faction (i.e. generic). It has a similar threshold system to Hex, but in Shadowfist the resources provisions come from the spells themselves. Cards (i.e. creatures) in play and in the graveyard provide resources into a resource pool. These resources are like threshold in Hex, as long as you control a certain amount of cards from a faction, you can play more expensive cards from the same faction. So weaker cards have lower or no resource requirements; these are the bedrock of the deck that together allows you to play stronger cards. Since the resources come from the cards themselves, there are no arbitrary deck building rules (ala Hearthstone and Netrunner.) So you can build multi-faction decks easily, probably easier than Magic, since you don't have to worry about inaccessible rare (or out of print) lands, or subject yourselves to weaker lands that cost you tempo or life disadvantage. Also sidesteps the need to set aside a portion of the deck for land cards. Most importantly, since the resources come from creature cards themselves, they can do other things besides "tap for mana".
The podcast didn't provide any direct solutions that could "fix" or improve Magic's mana system. What specific tweaks or changes, and what things to keep, do you propose? That still has to meet certain criteria: maintain Magic's high skill level; probably should keep the land card type; balances between 1 color, 2 color, 3+ color decks.
In another forum I made a post touching on this and the changes I personally would implement onto Magic. I know you weren't asking me, but it is pertinent to the topic and I would like to know what people on this forum think:
Quote from chochky »
One big criticism MtG has had in comparison to more modern ccgs/lcgs is that it is too deck dependent and draw dependent. You draw one card each turn (with a high chance of it being a land card which likely won't do much on its own), and have no real way to draw more cards or do much of anything without the right cards in your hand. The choices you make are entirely dependent on what you draw. This was an observation made in retrospect by Richard Garfield himself*. Card games that came after MtG circumvented this by allowing you to draw cards or gain resources regardless of what was in your hand (Netrunner, Vampire: The Eternal Struggle, The Spoils, and Star Wars: The Card Game come to mind), allowing you to actually play the game even if you draw a bad hand (which leads to a more satisfying experience overall).
If MtG were to be rebooted or redesigned from the ground up, it would need more of that. You need to be able to draw cards and do things on your turn even if you have a bad hand of cards. This is particularly important in limited where your deck is less fine tuned and harder to make work than in constructed. Land cards should also do something other than just tap for mana; basic lands are often boring being literally filler that are only there to allow you to play everything else in your deck**.
So I would introduce the following:
1. A player may "3: Draw a card" as a sorcery. Balance all other card draw accordingly.
2. A player may play a card from their hand face down as a colorless land for their land play that turn. This would help minimize the worst screw while making it a calculated risk. Balance colorless decks accordingly.
3. Get rid of generic basic lands. Instead, set the default power level for lands as being a land with a basic land type and simple ability (ETB, or activated, etc). Each such card would be limited to 4 copies (like everything else), but the beginner's box set (see below) would contain multiple 4x of such lands.
4. Release a basic "Deckbuilder Toolkit" type of box set that is totally nonrandom containing workhorse cards (including full playsets of the lands mentioned above) for multiple archetypes as well as several standard format staples so that newbies can start the game KNOWING EXACTLY WHAT THEY ARE GETTING without it all being total jank. An updated version of this box set would be released every few years (every year is unnecessary).
* "Sometimes, in trading card games, it feels like the cards are playing you; the card you draw each turn defines the game. In Netrunner, you definitely play the cards, and you have enormous latitude in how you play them. One measure of this is the question, "How much would it affect things if I knew my opponents’ cards?" For a game like Magic: The Gathering (and even more so with many Euro-style games), for a lot of players and a lot of situations, the answer is, "Not much."" - Tapping the Source Code, Interview with Richard Garfield, Fantasy Flight Games. https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/news/2012/7/13/tapping-the-source-code/
The one major issue I see with my own proposed changes is the increase in game complexity. Magic is already quite complex and my ideas would further increase the game's learning curve for new players.
With regards to resource systems in other games, the Harry Potter tcg is an interesting specimen which I haven't seen mentioned. It basically feels like a cross between Netrunner and Magic. You draw a card at the beginning of each of your turns, then you have a "combat phase" of sorts were your creatures can deal damage to the opponent. After, you then get to take two actions (in your "main phase" of sorts). An action can be playing a card (some card types cost two actions to play) or drawing a card. There are Lesson cards (mechanically the same as basic lands), creatures, spells, and some other more exotic card types. To play a card, you need to already control at least one card of the same color/symbol (cards in the game are one of 5 different colors, like in mtg). You also need to control a number of Lesson cards equal to or greater than the cost of the card - this is a "land threshold" type of system as opposed to tapping lands (the Harry Potter tcg has no tapping). After you've taken your two actions, your turn ends. What is interesting here is the player choices inherent in spending your action points - you are heavily constrained in the number of cards you can play each turn, and you can dig yourself out of mana screw/flood by sacrificing tempo. Note that in this system you can in practice play two "lands" in a single turn by spending both of your action points to do so, alleviating mana flood. Overall it is a resource system that is interesting despite its simplicity.
I would limit the card draw to once a turn. Maybe companion rule:
2: search your library for a basic land and put it into your hand. This costs a land play. Activate as sorcery and only once per turn.
Another idea is more a bit complicated, but doable and balanced. players start the game with 3 Luck counters. You use them to draw cards or search basic lands, as above. Each activation costs one luck counter. That way you can't draw through your whole deck.
(I bet charbelcher decks would love these additional rules. )
A lot of problem with new rules for MTG mana system comes from how the eternal meta works. Any improvement in consistency might break those formats - but people should keep in mind the real problem is the cards itself and not the new rules.
WotC for years were quite negligent with this. MTG mana system being flawed is utterly obvious - it's the single feature most CG after MTG tries to change or improve upon. Basically everyone in the industry rejected MTG mana system - and you can't turn a blind eye on that.
The new scry rules helps a lot but it's not enough, not even close. However, I think a great deal of MTG issues can be solved with card design (and scry being evergreen is great for that). Solving a 'system issue' with sporadic cards may sound strange but it's done all the time in MTG. For example, a problem in MTG combat is that attacking is relatively difficult because the defending player has enormous advantage by picking blockers. However that is not a real problem because the game has grown to solve this with evasive abilities, combat tricks, removal, general disable (bounce, tapping, etc), alpha strike spells like overrun and so on.
I feel like something similar have to be created for land floods and screws. Set designs have to incorporate more ways, in ALL colors, for players to fix their land draws.
A lot of problem with new rules for MTG mana system comes from how the eternal meta works. Any improvement in consistency might break those formats - but people should keep in mind the real problem is the cards itself and not the new rules.
WotC for years were quite negligent with this. MTG mana system being flawed is utterly obvious - it's the single feature most CG after MTG tries to change or improve upon. Basically everyone in the industry rejected MTG mana system - and you can't turn a blind eye on that.
The new scry rules helps a lot but it's not enough, not even close. However, I think a great deal of MTG issues can be solved with card design (and scry being evergreen is great for that). Solving a 'system issue' with sporadic cards may sound strange but it's done all the time in MTG. For example, a problem in MTG combat is that attacking is relatively difficult because the defending player has enormous advantage by picking blockers. However that is not a real problem because the game has grown to solve this with evasive abilities, combat tricks, removal, general disable (bounce, tapping, etc), alpha strike spells like overrun and so on.
I feel like something similar have to be created for land floods and screws. Set designs have to incorporate more ways, in ALL colors, for players to fix their land draws.
Agree. Things like scry as evergreen and the new mulligan are the way to solve the weakness. A fundamental change is not feasibly workable, and is not only way in any case.
The spreading of 'card draw' to red and white getting some card draw 'officially' (as sanctioned by MaRo) also helps.
Some ideas in this vein:
-Giving red more mana producer (or effective mana production via reduction) cards, not in the style of Pyretic Ritual (not to say we should see none of those, but not more of them) because of developmental reasons, but more like Hardened Berserker. This already seems to be kinda happening.
-Let black tutor for swamps a little more, or return lands from grave to hand.
-Let white have some creatures that tap for mana for creatures only. Convoke sets a reasonable precedent.
-Give blue island-changing auras that add the island part ('island in addition to it's other types') not replace the land's effects, as to better for mana-fixing rather than disruption
If I had a nickel for every time someone chose to mulligan, then checked the top card of their library, and then wished they'd kept, I'd have a enough nickels to buy a Black Lotus.
Each player should be allowed to scry before announcing whether or not they're going to keep. I won't be surprised if WotC gets there.
Each player should be allowed to scry before announcing whether or not they're going to keep. I won't be surprised if WotC gets there.
Maybe, that's definitely worth considering. It could make things to consistent though, I would be pretty surprised if WotC didn't think of that when testing the current version.
Each player should be allowed to scry before announcing whether or not they're going to keep. I won't be surprised if WotC gets there.
Maybe, that's definitely worth considering. It could make things to consistent though, I would be pretty surprised if WotC didn't think of that when testing the current version.
I'm sure they did. And they probably decided to go with a "weaker" way to test the waters.
The issue is eternal formats that have enough tools and cheap spells to not experiente the same problems limited and Standard does. Imo se should only think in those chamges in terms of Standard and limited.
And in these case even something like partial Mulligan (HS system were you discard and draw any cards on your initial hand) wouldnt be too good.
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Ascenscion in its physical version is a game I can't stand due to how painful and unengaging I find it. The decisions are pretty easy to make as to what you want (and all good decks tend to end up wanting a lot of the same things - everyone wants to banish cards, everyone wants high-honor constructs, everyone wants deck filtering and so on so the factions in the base game aren't super meaningful), so you spend very little time engaged in the core decision process and most of the time just groaning when people take the things you want.
Other players are extremely difficult to interact with, so you're only negatively invested in others turns with them maybe buying stuff you want. It also feels extremely dispiriting as players snowball beyond your control. While a full understanding of the game does open up a variety of strategies, it's very painful as a new player and you often feel things are even more hopeless than they really are. The core mechanics also don't push people in different directions for dramatically different builds, which means monsters can often clutter up the board and lead to no one wanting to buy anything. This is made worse by players still wanting to compete for most of the same cards. Again, in the base game - I have limited knowledge of the expansions.
The division between mystics and the heavy infantry is painful too. Players with 2 runes left over end up getting pushed towards heavy infantry while players blessed with 3 early on get the mystics. It's often a better move to simply purchase nothing rather than dilute your well-built-rune-deck with the heavy infantry early game. At least it certainly feels this way. This results in an unsatisfying turn due to RNG or getting pushed further behind and being able to buy even fewer things.
Star Realms fixes all my issues. It feels much more interactive, it provides obvious and compelling reasons to focus on specific factions (which often means you and your opponents are engaged in different aspects of the gameplay), it's full of interesting decisions such as when to scrap your cards for their more powerful one-shot effects. This makes even the basic purchase-this-when-you-have-no-good-options-card interesting. Unlike the clash between mystics and heavy infantry, there's only one ship here and it can be used to generate 2 gold (like a mystic) or it can be trashed (banished) in the same turn it's played for a 2 damage boost on top of the gold. This lets you rip them out of your deck and feel great about doing it when they start cluttering things up, while also making them great for both long game decks and aggressive ones. It's just brilliant.
Oh, and the art is a lot better too.
I have a particular hatred toward ascenscion because it was SO CLOSE to being a game I loved but just did not work for the reasons I've mentioned and more. I felt bad while playing it in the physical version. Almost-great games I find so much more offensive than obscenely bad ones. Star Realms pushed it to fully great. It's awesome. It's everything Ascenscion was trying to be. I love it, and I reccomend checking it out the demo free online if you haven't already. Or just buying it. If you can find it in stock physically, it's only like $15.
Note that in the IOS version of ascenscion when playing against a single AI, the turns are so fast that it hardly matters. You get very little painful waiting and more time spent on your decision than in angst.
Yes. Just actively try it.
This sounds super simple, but by mentally trying to imagine yourself in the actual game and thinking about what you'd do with the card - your brain does something different. I have no explanation for why it works so well.
You can practice this skill easily. Pick a non-digital game you like, then change a rule. Try to imagine how that rule change would FEEL to play with, how it changes your decisions and experience, what it would do to the game. Then try it and see if you were right. Take monopoly and add a rule that says anyone who gets an effect that sends them to jail NOW means that they can send another player to jail instead of them. Magic Formats are a goldmine for this too.
Also, watch videos like this: http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1017794/Through-the-Grinder-Refining-Diablo
Pause the game whenever they talk about a proposed change. Mentally playtest it (you don't need to know anything about diablo really, it's almost better if you don't). Then see what they say about how the change worked out. If you get it right, awesome. If you got it wrong, try and figure out what you missed and how you could have gotten it right. Even getting it wrong is great, because you get to see more examples of game systems' causes and effects. This improves your future guesses by expanding your knowledge base.
After several years of practicing this skill, I managed to predict them all correctly when I saw this video. But that only came after practicing a lot and getting a lot of other ones wrong. When you develop this skill enough though, you appear to other designers to be a kind of clairvoyant. Use the power wisely.
Remaking Magic - A Podcast for those that love MTG and Game Design
The Dungeon Master's Guide - A Podcast for those that love RPGs and Game Design
Sig-Heroes of the Plane
I think these options alone won't get you to the clairvoyant stage that Stairc mentions, but they're small stepping stones you can use to get to the point where you can fully leverage his advice.
I would add that researching human behavior with books like Predictably Irrational also helps give you foundational knowledge. But the most important thing is just to mentally engage and try to do visualize the gamestate and imagine how it feels to have that card in hand. It's mental-fu, but I've seen people instantly rocket up their accuracy when they close their eyes and try for the first times.
Remaking Magic - A Podcast for those that love MTG and Game Design
The Dungeon Master's Guide - A Podcast for those that love RPGs and Game Design
Sig-Heroes of the Plane
Thanks for the catch, fixed.
Also I definitely think this wasn't the most structured episode we have done and think we will certainly re-visit the topic in the future.
Are you designing commons? Check out my primer on NWO.
Interested in making a custom set? Check out my Set skeleton and archetype primer.
I also write articles about getting started with custom card creation.
Go and PLAYTEST your designs, you will learn more in a single playtests than a dozen discussions.
My custom sets:
Dreamscape
Coins of Mercalis [COMPLETE]
Exodus of Zendikar - ON HOLD
Good point. But it's pretty clear that people complain a lot about the RNG of not being able to do anything too. RNG is always going to be a scapegoat, that's one of its roles, so players blame the RNG rather than themselves. If people weren't complaining at all about losing to RNG, that could actually be a problem... Because then they're forced to blame themselves.
I think that the Hearthstone complaints come from the sheer AMOUNT of RNG. Often it can feel too swingy and makes the game feel arbitrary. They also use the more hated icons of randomness, such as things like Mad Bomber. The game is also pitched as an E-Sport, making this particularly egregious. Most of HS' variance doesn't even need Mad Bomber style cards. A lot of it comes from their cards happening to match up well against yours, the standard luck of the draw, risk vs. reward plays and topdecking a 2 cost card when you have 10 mana... While they draw a 7 cost one.
If you want to read more, I wrote an article on the topic. It's something I think about a lot, since I'm currently designing Faeria.
Remaking Magic - A Podcast for those that love MTG and Game Design
The Dungeon Master's Guide - A Podcast for those that love RPGs and Game Design
Sig-Heroes of the Plane
Great reference material. More than just picturing how a card plays, it's important to imagine how a card feels to play.
Remaking Magic - A Podcast for those that love MTG and Game Design
The Dungeon Master's Guide - A Podcast for those that love RPGs and Game Design
Sig-Heroes of the Plane
I've hit on this topic on the Custom Magic Channel before, and at the time I was the only one who saw magics mana system as not ideal (there are better systems out there.) In addition to some of the things you mentioned as pros and cons, there is the fact that lands just are not fun for the average player (which, for the record, no one in this section of the forum qualifies as before someone jumps in with their personal experience.) It's not just figuring out the mana base is complicated of flooding and screw, but having a huge chunk of your deck just to provide energy is pretty dull. Drawing lands is generally unexciting and stacking up your deck with them feels like stuffing it with filler. There is a reason the casual players are bored and disappointed when the get a rare land in a pack, or see a duel land that enters tapped, etc... The mechanics of Zendikar address this to a degree, but those mechanics are not consistently part of the standard metagame, and they only lessen those feelings, not negate them.
The games you used as examples or otherwise mentioned cover a fair range of options. Some others from games I've tried and enjoyed (though not always for their resource systems):
Infinity Wars/Bloodwars(I think... its gone extinct after 5 years): Cards take time once placed on the board to activate. Depending on the game, they may be interactable or not based on which game.
UFS (Universal Fighting System): Cards have a "difficulty" check When you play them. Discard the top card of you deck, and compare its difficult check compared to the card you're playing it. If it matches the difficulty or exceeds it, you play it successfully. Each card you play in succession adds 1 difficulty to the original cards cost, so combing/stringing cards gets harder each time. You can tap cards you control to add to the check though, so over time it gets easier. You can only string together a card that share an element type (like a magic color) and each card counts for 3 (out of a potential 12) types.
Yugioh: Cards are often free (though sometimes have a card or life cost), or heavily tied to a tribal synergy.
Cardfight Vanguard: Cards start a level one, and by building your board pyramid style allows you to play high level cards (A pair of level ones allow you to play a level two, and three level ones with a pair of level twos gets you your level 3 card.) The first TCG I designed on my own used this kind of system, and that was a decade or so ago.
Another non specific example would be games where decks have a point limit and cards are all worth a certain number of points to include based on how powerful they are. There are also plenty of game systems besides that dont really have "costs" on cards persay, but rely more on limiting the number of cards you draw and pushing the variance based on how few cards you can draw. Games like these often divide play into rounds where both players get the same number number of cards to win said round, and once that is done all cards are discarded and a new hand is drawn.
Part of the reason that my round 2 challenge for this Months MCC asked players to draw inspiration from another TCG is exactly that I feel magics mana system is not without flaws nor the best option conceived. In many of the chats and debates I've had with people here and in other venues of MTG custom creation, it quickly becomes clear that many of those folks have little experience outside of Magic. A weakness which I felt the MCC round clearly exposed. Part of being a good designer is drawing experience from as many relevant sources as possible, and how could you not consider other TCGs with that standard in mind? Don't settle for having played a couple cards games, yet alone just playing Magic. There are Hundreds of card games out there, dozen upon dozens that have or had commercial success for a number of years that are worth examining. Especially for how they handle resources, amongst other things.
That's true if you like deck building. (I like it myself.) However, the modus operandi of designers tend to be to keep streamlining (i.e. dumb down) games until players take no effort and thought into what they're doing or putting into their decks, but randomly click stuff and throw cards down.
Hearthstone has variance, so does every card game in existence, so that's not saying much. That's just the inherent variance found in all card games. Hearthstone's major problem, as above, is too much streamlining and very little thought on the player's end. Every deck has the same curve. The same amount of 2 costs cards, up to 6+ costs, and so on, works for almost every deck you build. But the worst culprit, there is not much resource management at all. Everything is free (another modus operandi of designers to keep players happy, at least for a while.)
Compare to the variety of decks you can build in Magic. Some decks have low curve, from 1cc to 3cc only. Midrange decks range from 1cc to 6cc. Slower decks or ramp decks can go even wider, 1cc to 10cc. And so on. Other resources system tend to neglect this about deck building variations.
The podcast didn't provide any direct solutions that could "fix" or improve Magic's mana system. What specific tweaks or changes, and what things to keep, do you propose? That still has to meet certain criteria: maintain Magic's high skill level; probably should keep the land card type; balances between 1 color, 2 color, 3+ color decks.
Let's look at systems that are closer to Magic's. Hex has resources cards just like Magic. Both suggest a similar amounts in decks (around 24 of 60 cards taken up by them). In Hex, all spells are paid by generic mana, but most cards also have a "threshold" requirement of specific color(s). As long as the colors of your resources meet or surpass this threshold, you can play the spell (by paying the cost, of course.) Furthermore, Hex removes the tedium of tapping individual lands.
A notable difference from Magic is, Magic requires specific colored lands for every spell you cast per turn. Let's say you have 2 plains and 2 swamps. You can play White Knight and Black Knight on the same turn. But you can't play White Knight and Cartel Aristocrat on the same turn (not enough white sources). However in Hex, if you have 2 white resources and 2 black resources, you can play a WW and BW creature on the same turn because WWBB satisfies the threshold for each card.
Another under-looked resource system is Shadowfist. Shadowfist do have Site cards that generate power, but power is not associated with any faction (i.e. generic). It has a similar threshold system to Hex, but in Shadowfist the resources provisions come from the spells themselves. Cards (i.e. creatures) in play and in the graveyard provide resources into a resource pool. These resources are like threshold in Hex, as long as you control a certain amount of cards from a faction, you can play more expensive cards from the same faction. So weaker cards have lower or no resource requirements; these are the bedrock of the deck that together allows you to play stronger cards. Since the resources come from the cards themselves, there are no arbitrary deck building rules (ala Hearthstone and Netrunner.) So you can build multi-faction decks easily, probably easier than Magic, since you don't have to worry about inaccessible rare (or out of print) lands, or subject yourselves to weaker lands that cost you tempo or life disadvantage. Also sidesteps the need to set aside a portion of the deck for land cards. Most importantly, since the resources come from creature cards themselves, they can do other things besides "tap for mana".
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In another forum I made a post touching on this and the changes I personally would implement onto Magic. I know you weren't asking me, but it is pertinent to the topic and I would like to know what people on this forum think:
The one major issue I see with my own proposed changes is the increase in game complexity. Magic is already quite complex and my ideas would further increase the game's learning curve for new players.
With regards to resource systems in other games, the Harry Potter tcg is an interesting specimen which I haven't seen mentioned. It basically feels like a cross between Netrunner and Magic. You draw a card at the beginning of each of your turns, then you have a "combat phase" of sorts were your creatures can deal damage to the opponent. After, you then get to take two actions (in your "main phase" of sorts). An action can be playing a card (some card types cost two actions to play) or drawing a card. There are Lesson cards (mechanically the same as basic lands), creatures, spells, and some other more exotic card types. To play a card, you need to already control at least one card of the same color/symbol (cards in the game are one of 5 different colors, like in mtg). You also need to control a number of Lesson cards equal to or greater than the cost of the card - this is a "land threshold" type of system as opposed to tapping lands (the Harry Potter tcg has no tapping). After you've taken your two actions, your turn ends. What is interesting here is the player choices inherent in spending your action points - you are heavily constrained in the number of cards you can play each turn, and you can dig yourself out of mana screw/flood by sacrificing tempo. Note that in this system you can in practice play two "lands" in a single turn by spending both of your action points to do so, alleviating mana flood. Overall it is a resource system that is interesting despite its simplicity.
(Edited for templating/formatting.)
2: search your library for a basic land and put it into your hand. This costs a land play. Activate as sorcery and only once per turn.
Another idea is more a bit complicated, but doable and balanced. players start the game with 3 Luck counters. You use them to draw cards or search basic lands, as above. Each activation costs one luck counter. That way you can't draw through your whole deck.
(I bet charbelcher decks would love these additional rules. )
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WotC for years were quite negligent with this. MTG mana system being flawed is utterly obvious - it's the single feature most CG after MTG tries to change or improve upon. Basically everyone in the industry rejected MTG mana system - and you can't turn a blind eye on that.
The new scry rules helps a lot but it's not enough, not even close. However, I think a great deal of MTG issues can be solved with card design (and scry being evergreen is great for that). Solving a 'system issue' with sporadic cards may sound strange but it's done all the time in MTG. For example, a problem in MTG combat is that attacking is relatively difficult because the defending player has enormous advantage by picking blockers. However that is not a real problem because the game has grown to solve this with evasive abilities, combat tricks, removal, general disable (bounce, tapping, etc), alpha strike spells like overrun and so on.
I feel like something similar have to be created for land floods and screws. Set designs have to incorporate more ways, in ALL colors, for players to fix their land draws.
BGU Control
R Aggro
Standard - For Fun
BG Auras
Agree. Things like scry as evergreen and the new mulligan are the way to solve the weakness. A fundamental change is not feasibly workable, and is not only way in any case.
The spreading of 'card draw' to red and white getting some card draw 'officially' (as sanctioned by MaRo) also helps.
Some ideas in this vein:
-Giving red more mana producer (or effective mana production via reduction) cards, not in the style of Pyretic Ritual (not to say we should see none of those, but not more of them) because of developmental reasons, but more like Hardened Berserker. This already seems to be kinda happening.
-Let black tutor for swamps a little more, or return lands from grave to hand.
-Let white have some creatures that tap for mana for creatures only. Convoke sets a reasonable precedent.
-Give blue island-changing auras that add the island part ('island in addition to it's other types') not replace the land's effects, as to better for mana-fixing rather than disruption
RUNIN: Norse mythology set (awaiting further playtesting)
FATE of ALARA: Multicolour factions (currently on hiatus)
Contibutor to the Pyrulea community set
I'm here to tell you that all your set mechanics are bad
#Defundthepolice
Each player should be allowed to scry before announcing whether or not they're going to keep. I won't be surprised if WotC gets there.
Maybe, that's definitely worth considering. It could make things to consistent though, I would be pretty surprised if WotC didn't think of that when testing the current version.
RUNIN: Norse mythology set (awaiting further playtesting)
FATE of ALARA: Multicolour factions (currently on hiatus)
Contibutor to the Pyrulea community set
I'm here to tell you that all your set mechanics are bad
#Defundthepolice
I'm sure they did. And they probably decided to go with a "weaker" way to test the waters.
And in these case even something like partial Mulligan (HS system were you discard and draw any cards on your initial hand) wouldnt be too good.
BGU Control
R Aggro
Standard - For Fun
BG Auras