WINNER: "Quest" Variant - This idea adds a special set of "side quests" to the game that give players alternative goals. In addition to "winning the game," players will also compete to complete quests that give them either in-game rewards or victory points that can decide the true winner of the game just as much as traditionally "winning" does.
It was at that moment that I realized: I'm kinda just making these things up. We can just write the rules the way we want them to work. People will have fun, and people will get it.
This poll is based on the previous thread. These were the ideas people mentioned they liked. (Each was mentioned by multiple posters, the others weren't really acknowledged at all.)
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"In the beginning, MTG Salvation switched to a new forum format.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
It was at that moment that I realized: I'm kinda just making these things up. We can just write the rules the way we want them to work. People will have fun, and people will get it.
This sounds very interesting but I'm having a problem finding the original thread that explains these variants (some I'm familiar with, but others I am not). Am I just a forum noob or what am I missing here?
This sounds very interesting but I'm having a problem finding the original thread that explains these variants (some I'm familiar with, but others I am not). Am I just a forum noob or what am I missing here?
There have been multiple threads for this project so your confusion is understandable. I should probably add descriptions of the options to the OP.
Challenge Decks(Face the Hydra, Battle the Horde, Defeat a God, etc.) - These decks feature special cards designed to be face in a solo or cooperative experience. Each would feature a challenge deck with variant rules to be played autonomously, probably along with an accompanying Magic deck. As show by the three existing decks, there are many different ways to approach this design, and the challenge decks could play wildly differently from each other and the existing ones.
Archenemy(2010) - Archenemy is a variant format designed for one-vs-many matches. Each deck comes with a special Scheme deck made of 10 over-sized cards. The Archenemy gets 20 extra life and sets a Scheme into motion each turn that helps them fight off their multiple opponents.
Hidden Roles(Mafia, Bang!, The Resistance, etc.) - This idea is to add a "hidden roles" variant to magic, based on other popular games like Mafia or Bang!. At the beginning of the game, players are assigned a role card at random and keep it secret. Through the course of the game, it's up to players to deduce which other players are on their side, and try to defeat their hidden opponents.
"Quest" Variant - This idea adds a special set of "side quests" to the game that give players alternative goals. In addition to "winning the game," players will also compete to complete quests that give them either in-game rewards or victory points that can decide the true winner of the game just as much as traditionally "winning" does. This is probably the vaguest of the ideas since it's just the general concept.
Duel Decks - These are Duel Decks like the many WotC has made over the years (Two theme decks based on factions or planeswalkers designed to be played against each other). The main difference here would be an increase in the amount of new cards.
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"In the beginning, MTG Salvation switched to a new forum format.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
It was at that moment that I realized: I'm kinda just making these things up. We can just write the rules the way we want them to work. People will have fun, and people will get it.
Alright, it's been a couple of days, and it looks like Quest Variant is our winning idea.
Naturally, "Quest variant" is also the most vague and unexplored of these options, which means we have a lot of work to do figuring out what exactly we want to make. Let's start with the foundation: we have a general idea of what we want this variant to be, but how do you think it should work specifically?
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"In the beginning, MTG Salvation switched to a new forum format.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
It was at that moment that I realized: I'm kinda just making these things up. We can just write the rules the way we want them to work. People will have fun, and people will get it.
Setup and Default Behavior
Each player has a separate Quest Deck, containing only Quest cards. When the game starts, everyone shuffles their Quest Deck and puts the top card of it onto the battlefield under their control.
At the beginning of a player's upkeep, that player may sacrifice a Quest he or she controls. If they do, they put the top card of their Quest Deck onto the battlefield. If a player controls no Quests to sacrifice, he or she may do this without sacrificing a Quest.
Quest Counters and Victory Points
Each Quest has certain conditions that, when met, put quest counters on them. These are generally formatted as triggered abilities.
Quests also have a "Store" ability, templated as Store N--COST. This means (COST, remove N quest counters from this Quest: you gain N victory points.)
When a standard Quest leaves the battlefield, all quest counters on it are lost--so storing at appropriate times is part of the strategy!
The Quest Card Type
Quests are not permanents. They exist on the battlefield, and thus can be destroyed, gained control of, exiled, etc.--but ONLY by abilities that specifically affect Quests.
Some Quests have triggered or activated abilities. These work like normal.
Quest Subtypes
Some Quests have a subtype called Ongoing (or maybe "Indeterminate" or some other name?). These do not have a Store ability. Instead, they continue gathering quest counters, and whenever they leave the battlefield, those counters are stored automatically.
Other Quests have a subtype called (for now) Singleton. As soon as a Singleton's trigger resolves, you immediately gain some number of victory points and sacrifice the Singleton.
Quest Interactions
Some cards may affect your Quest Deck--for instance, letting you put another Quest onto the battlefield without sacrificing one you have, letting you search for specific Quests, putting Quests back into your Quest Deck, etc.
Quests do not ever go on the stack. They go directly from the Quest Deck to the battlefield, for example. A Quest changing zones can never be responded to. Once a Quest is on the battlefield, however, some cards may destroy it, exile it, put it back in your Quest Deck, make you sacrifice it, etc. Some Auras can enchant Quests (For example, to make them indestructible, to change their Store costs, to make them un-sacrificeable, to steal them, etc.).
If a Quest would be put into a player's hand for any reason (for example, if it was in your graveyard and something let you bring any card type back into your hand; or if a similar situation put it into your library and then you draw it; etc.), instead that player reveals the Quest and puts it on the bottom of his or her Quest Deck.
Win Conditions
If you're the last player left alive, you gain 10 victory points (number can be adjusted...depends on the environment, I suppose). The player with the most victory points when the game ends wins. If multiple people are tied for highest, the person who won normally wins. If no one tied for highest victory points was the conventional winner, they all win as a group, and any other players lose.
So for example, these could be cards:
Aggressive Behavior Quest
Whenever all creatures you control able to do so attack together, if you control three or more creatures, put a quest counter on Aggressive Behavior.
Store 3 -- 4(4, remove 3 quest counters from this Quest: you gain 3 victory points.)
Taste for Blood Quest -- Ongoing (When an Ongoing Quest leaves the battlefield, remove all quest counters from it and you gain that many victory points.)
Whenever a creature you control deals 6 or more damage to an opponent, put a quest counter on Taste for Blood.
*EDIT* Examples of Singletons. Renders only because it's late and I'm lazy
Simple example: Necromancy Practice
More complex and dynamic example: Treasure Hunter
Well, that's my take on it. It does need some flavor flourishes (like not using Deck for the Quest Deck, since Magic calls the main deck the "library" for flavor), but it's a skeleton of an idea.
*EDITED for formatting and some new details added*
In terms of some flavor ideas:
The Quest Deck might be called something like the Temple or the Chambers? As in, the place you go back to when you get new orders. I was thinking "base", but that's a bit modern for the fantasy setting; and then I thought Oracle, but that's not a place and it already has meaning in the MTG metaverse. So...yeah, those are the two ideas I could think of.
Sacrificing a Quest could be called abandoning it, but that's the same as schemes in Archenemy...I don't know if that's a problem or not.
...just thinking about how they all sound:
"Reveal the top quest of your temple. If it's Ongoing, put it onto the battlefield."
"Reveal the top quest of your chambers. If it's Ongoing, put it onto the battlefield."
"Target quest's controller abandons it."
"Target player returns a quest that player controls to his or her temple."
Yeah, I think I like "temple" best. And "abandons" is fine if there are no other suggestions.
One last note: I'm wondering if quests should have colors (with color indicators)? It would make them more dynamic, as it's another property to interact with; I don't know. What do you guys think?
I'm also starting to think I have regular quests and Ongoing ones backwards...it seems like if you can store the points and continue the same quest more, THAT is more ongoing than one that you have to stop in order to get the points...maybe those should be switched?
And by that, I mean "I've said way too much here, I'll turn the floor over to other people and shut up now"
My initial reaction to your idea IMP is that it's very, very complicated. You can compare the level of complexity of your variant to say Archenemy or Planechase. You have strange new permanents with different subtypes and abilities as well as alternate rules as to how to use them. I think the best implementation of this idea needs to be a little simpler, most likely keeping the quests off of the battlefield.
I have some ideas, but first there are a couple of points I want to address. The first is the idea of a "quest deck" or any kind of personalized set of quests. Is this something we want to do? From a logistic standpoint it makes sense; much like Planechase which is officially meant to be played with individual decks (but never really is), it means we're not asking people to mix their collections together. From a gameplay perspective, it seems like it could lead to very streamlined decks meant to most efficiently complete predetermined quests. Sure, the same could be said for other variants too, but at least all of those had more potential to be playable with any deck, while this could lead to some pretty degenerate situations if your deck is built right, and some pretty lackluster gameplay if it isn't.
The second is whether or not quests should be shared, individual but revealed, completely secret, or a mix of both. Having quests available to anyone opens up a new level of competition, and secret quests adds additional mind gaming (is this bad attack just bait to trigger another quest?) One mechanic in particular I enjoy is from a game called Alien Frontiers, in which you recieve three "quest" cards that can each be completed in one of two ways (one during the game, one at the end of the game).
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"In the beginning, MTG Salvation switched to a new forum format.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
It was at that moment that I realized: I'm kinda just making these things up. We can just write the rules the way we want them to work. People will have fun, and people will get it.
I think secret quests are a bad idea, as you then need to somehow keep track of your quest progress without anyone else knowing you're doing it... which is just a memory headache when you've still got a full game of Magic to keep track of.
Keeping the quests in the command zone (and thus non interactive, like emblems) is fine, but they should definitely be visible to everyone. The question then becomes: what happens to a quest you've abandoned? It clearly shouldn't go into a graveyard... unless there's a separate "quest graveyard" for abandoned quests?
Another point to consider is how common should multiple simultaneous quests be? In my description above, I was considering that should be very rare, with usually only one or two going on at a time (hence the sac-to-draw default mechanic); but do we want players to have to keep track of multiple quests at once?
The idea of quests having in-game completion and end-game completion is interesting; perhaps you could elaborate? The only possible quest type I can imagine for an end-game is "if you completed (list of quests), you complete this quest"... what else could there be once the game is over?
As for shared or not, I think that it should be like Planechase: leave it up to the players whether they want to use a shared, global quest deck or individual, per-player ones. Or we could combine it: everyone shuffles in quests they own into a shared deck, then divides it evenly among the players to make their own individual decks. Unique player-identifying sleeves would be required for that, though.
I think secret quests are a bad idea, as you then need to somehow keep track of your quest progress without anyone else knowing you're doing it... which is just a memory headache when you've still got a full game of Magic to keep track of.
I've always thought of quests to most likely be one-time things as opposed to repeated effects (thus making them different from the actual quests from Zendikar. Maybe we should start calling them "missions" for now?)
The idea of quests having in-game completion and end-game completion is interesting; perhaps you could elaborate? The only possible quest type I can imagine for an end-game is "if you completed (list of quests), you complete this quest"... what else could there be once the game is over?
There could be plenty of ways to manipulate your end game status. For example:
Friends till the End (N Points)
When you win or lose the game, if you control a creature with power 4 or greater, complete this quest.
Lost in Thought (N Points)
When you win or lose the game, if the number of cards in your library is less than half the original total, complete this quest.
And so on. The original mechanic from Alien Frontiers looked something like this:
Necromancer Training (N Points)
This quest is completed either - When a creature is put onto the battlefield from your graveyard; or, when you win or lose the game, if there are 7 or more creatures cards in your graveyard.
In the original game, these cards were kept secret, which means players could aim for either over the course of the game and, most importantly, you always had to second guess people's intentions. What seemed like a questionable play might be due to a secret objective (this is why I'm a big proponent of at least some element of secrecy.) The dual nature of the objective cards meant you always had at least some choice of direction.
I feel like the hardest obstacle we face here is making this variant not only fun to think about and build around, but also fun to play.
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"In the beginning, MTG Salvation switched to a new forum format.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
It was at that moment that I realized: I'm kinda just making these things up. We can just write the rules the way we want them to work. People will have fun, and people will get it.
Setup
Each player starts with a predetermined amount of Quest cards. Note that quest cards do not count as spaces in your "library", and you still have to have the necessary amount of cards needed. Each player brings (let's say 10) their quest cards, and then the shuffle them into one big deck, or the "Quest Deck". The Quest Deck can not be affected by abilties that affect player's libraries, hands, graveyards, or cards they own from outside the game. Only cards that affect the "Quest Deck" directly can affect the deck. At the beginning of the game, each player, starting with the player that goes first and in multiplayer games, going around in the order of the game, takes a quest card and places it FACE DOWN in the command zone. And the game begins.
Quest Deck and Quest Completion
Because the size of the quest deck is determined on the number of players that are playing, it needs to be a sizable amount, so each player would put in 10 quest cards of their choosing. Whenever a player completes a quest, that player reveals the quest card in the command zone, and receives the amount of "quest points" (or whatever we'll call them), and puts the quest on the bottom of the quest deck. Note that when a quest is completed, a player may NOT respond with a spell on the stack (Think of the completion having Split Second), as to not interfere with completion.
Quests
The quest cards compose of the completion clause (what you have to do to complete the quest), the abandon cost (I'll get to this later), the reward (what you get when you complete the quest), and a signature line (or something else to determine who own's what, to prevent stealing). The player may look at the quest in their own command zone as whenever they want. This cannot be affected by permanents that do not directly reference the card. Quest cannot be taken by affects that return them to their owners (Gruul Charm for example).
Abandoning a Quest
Because it may be impossible for a certain deck to complete a certain quest, on each quest there is an option to abandon the quest for a certain amount of colorless mana, or other costs (sacrificing a creature, losing quest points, etc.) However it needs to be noted that the cost needs to be high enough as to not let players sift through the quest deck for a quest they want (this is unfun). Whenever a player abandons a quest, they reveal their quest, pays the cost, and puts the quest on the bottom of the quest deck, and receives another quest. Abandoning a quest cannot be interfered with a spell or ability. Players can only abandon a quest only when they could cast a sorcery. Abandoning a quest does not enter the stack.
Rewards
Whenever a player completes a quest, they receive a reward. In RPG games, they would receive loot. In order to replicate this, some quests will offer both quest points, and alternative bonuses (like putting +1/+1 counters on creatures, gaining life, putting tokens into play etc.) This does not enter the the stack so it can't be interfered with (can't be countered, and has priority), but is affected by abilities that have ALREADY BEEN ACTIVATED PREVIOUS TO THE ABILITY (Havoc Festival). Quest points cannot be removed by spells and abilities.
Signature
Because all the quest cards will be shuffled together, it is important that players are able to distinguish their cards from other peoples. So put some kind of box where the player can put their name (cards are able to withstand pencil and Sharpie, so it could work). This has no other practical applications to the game (can't be affected by Gruul Charm ability).
Winning
Whenever a player loses the game, they are unable to complete other quests or gain quest points. When a player loses the game, they put their current quest card in the bottom of the "Quest Deck", and pick up their cards. When all other players have lost the game, the winner receives a number of quest points for winning (can be decided by us or the playgroup), and the person with the biggest number of quest points wins the game overall.
I think this is everything.
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- I think complete quests should just be left face up on the table for each player (rather than being sent to the bottom of the deck). This means that no extra tracking is required, they can just add the points up at the end.
- I like face down quests, but having all of the quests be face down doesn't seem like a good idea. It's hard to have interesting counter play when you have no idea what your opponents want to do. A little of that is good, but I think some of the quests need to be revealed (either for each player or perhaps communal quests in the center that anyone can complete).
- Is there a reason we need to "abandon quests", it seems just as easy for there to be a flat cost that allows someone to pick up a new quest.
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"In the beginning, MTG Salvation switched to a new forum format.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
It was at that moment that I realized: I'm kinda just making these things up. We can just write the rules the way we want them to work. People will have fun, and people will get it.
The reason of the varying the cost of the "abandoning quest" is to prevent the player from simply "skimming" the quest deck in search of a quest that they can complete (probably the one they put into the deck). Having the cost being varied (higher for easier quests, lower for harder quests, or the opposite maybe) is so that player is able to abandon the quest, especially a hard quest that they may or may not be able to do, but we really should be pushing the players to complete the quests, so the variance in my opinion is needed.
As for face up quests... I like the idea of them being face up giving static bonuses (like a Glorious Anthem type of effect). I'm guessing that some quests will have the clause "This quest must be face down" or the opposite "This quest must be face up".
Have "Secret" on some quests would make the design simpler.
I'm also wondering how many quest cards we will need. We need enough as to not have too many repeats, but the supplement can't be entirely quest cards.
The reason of the varying the cost of the "abandoning quest" is to prevent the player from simply "skimming" the quest deck in search of a quest that they can complete (probably the one they put into the deck). Having the cost being varied (higher for easier quests, lower for harder quests, or the opposite maybe) is so that player is able to abandon the quest, especially a hard quest that they may or may not be able to do, but we really should be pushing the players to complete the quests, so the variance in my opinion is needed.
To me, it seems like this just increases the chances of a player being stuck with a quest they can't complete. I feel like players will already have enough incentives to complete quests that we don't need to "force" them.
I'd also like to bring up again the idea of having each quest have two conditions, which reduces the chances of players getting stuck.
As for face up quests... I like the idea of them being face up giving static bonuses (like a Glorious Anthem type of effect). I'm guessing that some quests will have the clause "This quest must be face down" or the opposite "This quest must be face up".
Have "Secret" on some quests would make the design simpler.
Another idea is to have some quests dealt face down to players, and others face up in the middle of the table. Anyone can complete the ones in the middle, but they also have individual ones only they can complete.
I'm also wondering how many quest cards we will need. We need enough as to not have too many repeats, but the supplement can't be entirely quest cards.
Well if each player is supposed to have 10, and we're most likely making 4 decks, 40 seems about right. If some quests are "common" and appear in multiple (or every) deck, then maybe less in terms of unique cards.
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"In the beginning, MTG Salvation switched to a new forum format.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
It was at that moment that I realized: I'm kinda just making these things up. We can just write the rules the way we want them to work. People will have fun, and people will get it.
]Setup
Each player starts with a predetermined amount of Quest cards. Note that quest cards do not count as spaces in your "library", and you still have to have the necessary amount of cards needed. Each player brings (let's say 10) their quest cards, and then the shuffle them into one big deck, or the "Quest Deck". The Quest Deck can not be affected by abilties that affect player's libraries, hands, graveyards, or cards they own from outside the game. Only cards that affect the "Quest Deck" directly can affect the deck. At the beginning of the game, each player, starting with the player that goes first and in multiplayer games, going around in the order of the game, takes a quest card and places it FACE DOWN in the command zone. And the game begins.
That's about as far as I have read before a big red exclamation mark appeared in front of me.
Shuffling your card together with another persons cards is really unappealing. There are a multitude of problems from the fact that each player will want their own cards back yet cannot differentiate them in a way that is visible on a face-down card to the fact that many people will simply not feel good about it.
Compare this to Planar Magic. There are two suggested ways of playing: (1) each player has their own deck of planes/phenomena; (2) a single deck exists for all players. And I don't know how it works in your group, but the single deck in our group is provided by a single person every single time.
Is it really necessary to shuffle the cards of multiple owners together?
---
And no, I don't want to write on my pristine cards. I want them pristine.
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Planar Chaos was not a mistake neither was it random. You might want to look at it again.
[thread=239793][Game] Level Up - Creature[/thread]
I think the best solution is just to copy Planechase's formula. Each player has their own deck of (lets say) 20 unique quests. At the beginning of the game each player draws two/three quests from their deck in secret then reveals the top one to the table. The secretly drawn ones are private quests while the revealed ones are available for anyone.
This version keeps cards separate while allowing for the game to be easily replicated using a single quest deck (deal 2 to everyone and flip the top N cards equal to the number of players). The uniqueness rule ensures that no one can build a super streamlined quest completion deck, and the fact that everyone will have a chance to complete some of your quests discourages choosing only the easiest ones to complete.
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"In the beginning, MTG Salvation switched to a new forum format.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
It was at that moment that I realized: I'm kinda just making these things up. We can just write the rules the way we want them to work. People will have fun, and people will get it.
Hello. New to this thread. Hopefully not saying anything redundant. Here's my thoughts. Each player has TWO unique decks.
First the quest deck:
15 Quests, each one having multiple "steps" required to complete it. Each quest has a number in the p/t corner that represents how many reward points it awards you. When the game begins, each player turns the top three quests of his or her deck face-up. Whenever a quest is completed, it is set aside, you note how many reward points you got, and you turn the top card of your quest deck face up so you always have three active quests. There are no private quests.
The second "deck" is sort of a misnomer. It's more like a second hand, and it's the Rewards Deck:
The rewards deck is full of normal magic spells except rather than having mana costs, they have reward costs. The limit would probably also be 10 or 15 cards for this "deck." You can look at all your Rewards Deck cards at any time, and they are hidden from your opponent until you cast them, again making this deck more of a second hand.
Why I like the system I just described:
I think this allows for much more customization than might otherwise happen. Obviously you need your quests and your main deck to by in synch, but still: Do you load up your Quest deck with lots of easier but lower-reward quests, or do you go for bigger, more challenging quests. It also REALLY allows for customization of the Rewards deck. Do you want a lot of super cheap rewards or do you go big and expensive?
That's just how I would do it. My two cents. (Plus, it gives us more to design, which seems fun?)
I can see what you're going for, but I don't like the trade offs. Having two types of new cards and two new separate decks is a lot more complexity (and takes up a lot more space). Collecting and spending points adds in another level of bookkeeping, as well as taking the focus away from quests as a alternate way of winning (why collect quest points to spend them on bonuses when I could just build a deck that wins at Magic?). The lack of private quests takes away a lot of the potential for mind games or surprise plays since everyone's goals are always revealed.
I think as we move forward we should kind of define what it is we want this product to be. For instance, here are the things I think we're looking for:
- Offers an alternative method of play (i.e. quests) that incentiveize new strategies beyond that of a normal magic game
- Is simple (should involve no more special rules than those needed for Planechase or Archenemy)
- Is playable out of the box without preconstructed decks (quests should work with any deck, not just ones fine tuned to use them)
- Can be played with only one quest deck
Does anyone agree/disagree with the above or have anything to add? Figuring out exactly what target we're shooting for makes it a lot easier to aim.
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"In the beginning, MTG Salvation switched to a new forum format.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
It was at that moment that I realized: I'm kinda just making these things up. We can just write the rules the way we want them to work. People will have fun, and people will get it.
If we're using face-down quests, have the number of points start at maximum and the quest complete at zero. That way, other players know to brace for impact even if they don't know exactly what that impact could be.
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Challenge Decks (Face the Hydra, Battle the Horde, Defeat a God, etc.) - These decks feature special cards designed to be face in a solo or cooperative experience. Each would feature a challenge deck with variant rules to be played autonomously, probably along with an accompanying Magic deck. As show by the three existing decks, there are many different ways to approach this design, and the challenge decks could play wildly differently from each other and the existing ones.
Archenemy (2010) - Archenemy is a variant format designed for one-vs-many matches. Each deck comes with a special Scheme deck made of 10 over-sized cards. The Archenemy gets 20 extra life and sets a Scheme into motion each turn that helps them fight off their multiple opponents.
Hidden Roles (Mafia, Bang!, The Resistance, etc.) - This idea is to add a "hidden roles" variant to magic, based on other popular games like Mafia or Bang!. At the beginning of the game, players are assigned a role card at random and keep it secret. Through the course of the game, it's up to players to deduce which other players are on their side, and try to defeat their hidden opponents.
"Quest" Variant - This idea adds a special set of "side quests" to the game that give players alternative goals. In addition to "winning the game," players will also compete to complete quests that give them either in-game rewards or victory points that can decide the true winner of the game just as much as traditionally "winning" does. This is probably the vaguest of the ideas since it's just the general concept.
Duel Decks - These are Duel Decks like the many WotC has made over the years (Two theme decks based on factions or planeswalkers designed to be played against each other). The main difference here would be an increase in the amount of new cards.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
Comic Book Set
Archester: Frontier of Steam (A steampunk set!)
A Good Place to Start Designing
Naturally, "Quest variant" is also the most vague and unexplored of these options, which means we have a lot of work to do figuring out what exactly we want to make. Let's start with the foundation: we have a general idea of what we want this variant to be, but how do you think it should work specifically?
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
Comic Book Set
Archester: Frontier of Steam (A steampunk set!)
A Good Place to Start Designing
So for example, these could be cards:
Aggressive Behavior
Quest
Whenever all creatures you control able to do so attack together, if you control three or more creatures, put a quest counter on Aggressive Behavior.
Store 3 -- 4 (4, remove 3 quest counters from this Quest: you gain 3 victory points.)
Taste for Blood
Quest -- Ongoing
(When an Ongoing Quest leaves the battlefield, remove all quest counters from it and you gain that many victory points.)
Whenever a creature you control deals 6 or more damage to an opponent, put a quest counter on Taste for Blood.
*EDIT* Examples of Singletons. Renders only because it's late and I'm lazy
Simple example: Necromancy Practice
More complex and dynamic example: Treasure Hunter
Well, that's my take on it. It does need some flavor flourishes (like not using Deck for the Quest Deck, since Magic calls the main deck the "library" for flavor), but it's a skeleton of an idea.
*EDITED for formatting and some new details added*
In terms of some flavor ideas:
The Quest Deck might be called something like the Temple or the Chambers? As in, the place you go back to when you get new orders. I was thinking "base", but that's a bit modern for the fantasy setting; and then I thought Oracle, but that's not a place and it already has meaning in the MTG metaverse. So...yeah, those are the two ideas I could think of.
Sacrificing a Quest could be called abandoning it, but that's the same as schemes in Archenemy...I don't know if that's a problem or not.
...just thinking about how they all sound:
"Reveal the top quest of your temple. If it's Ongoing, put it onto the battlefield."
"Reveal the top quest of your chambers. If it's Ongoing, put it onto the battlefield."
"Target quest's controller abandons it."
"Target player returns a quest that player controls to his or her temple."
Yeah, I think I like "temple" best. And "abandons" is fine if there are no other suggestions.
One last note: I'm wondering if quests should have colors (with color indicators)? It would make them more dynamic, as it's another property to interact with; I don't know. What do you guys think?
I'm also starting to think I have regular quests and Ongoing ones backwards...it seems like if you can store the points and continue the same quest more, THAT is more ongoing than one that you have to stop in order to get the points...maybe those should be switched?
And by that, I mean "I've said way too much here, I'll turn the floor over to other people and shut up now"
I have some ideas, but first there are a couple of points I want to address. The first is the idea of a "quest deck" or any kind of personalized set of quests. Is this something we want to do? From a logistic standpoint it makes sense; much like Planechase which is officially meant to be played with individual decks (but never really is), it means we're not asking people to mix their collections together. From a gameplay perspective, it seems like it could lead to very streamlined decks meant to most efficiently complete predetermined quests. Sure, the same could be said for other variants too, but at least all of those had more potential to be playable with any deck, while this could lead to some pretty degenerate situations if your deck is built right, and some pretty lackluster gameplay if it isn't.
The second is whether or not quests should be shared, individual but revealed, completely secret, or a mix of both. Having quests available to anyone opens up a new level of competition, and secret quests adds additional mind gaming (is this bad attack just bait to trigger another quest?) One mechanic in particular I enjoy is from a game called Alien Frontiers, in which you recieve three "quest" cards that can each be completed in one of two ways (one during the game, one at the end of the game).
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
Comic Book Set
Archester: Frontier of Steam (A steampunk set!)
A Good Place to Start Designing
Keeping the quests in the command zone (and thus non interactive, like emblems) is fine, but they should definitely be visible to everyone. The question then becomes: what happens to a quest you've abandoned? It clearly shouldn't go into a graveyard... unless there's a separate "quest graveyard" for abandoned quests?
Another point to consider is how common should multiple simultaneous quests be? In my description above, I was considering that should be very rare, with usually only one or two going on at a time (hence the sac-to-draw default mechanic); but do we want players to have to keep track of multiple quests at once?
The idea of quests having in-game completion and end-game completion is interesting; perhaps you could elaborate? The only possible quest type I can imagine for an end-game is "if you completed (list of quests), you complete this quest"... what else could there be once the game is over?
As for shared or not, I think that it should be like Planechase: leave it up to the players whether they want to use a shared, global quest deck or individual, per-player ones. Or we could combine it: everyone shuffles in quests they own into a shared deck, then divides it evenly among the players to make their own individual decks. Unique player-identifying sleeves would be required for that, though.
I've always thought of quests to most likely be one-time things as opposed to repeated effects (thus making them different from the actual quests from Zendikar. Maybe we should start calling them "missions" for now?)
There could be plenty of ways to manipulate your end game status. For example:
Friends till the End (N Points)
When you win or lose the game, if you control a creature with power 4 or greater, complete this quest.
Lost in Thought (N Points)
When you win or lose the game, if the number of cards in your library is less than half the original total, complete this quest.
And so on. The original mechanic from Alien Frontiers looked something like this:
Necromancer Training (N Points)
This quest is completed either - When a creature is put onto the battlefield from your graveyard; or, when you win or lose the game, if there are 7 or more creatures cards in your graveyard.
In the original game, these cards were kept secret, which means players could aim for either over the course of the game and, most importantly, you always had to second guess people's intentions. What seemed like a questionable play might be due to a secret objective (this is why I'm a big proponent of at least some element of secrecy.) The dual nature of the objective cards meant you always had at least some choice of direction.
I feel like the hardest obstacle we face here is making this variant not only fun to think about and build around, but also fun to play.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
Comic Book Set
Archester: Frontier of Steam (A steampunk set!)
A Good Place to Start Designing
Each player starts with a predetermined amount of Quest cards. Note that quest cards do not count as spaces in your "library", and you still have to have the necessary amount of cards needed. Each player brings (let's say 10) their quest cards, and then the shuffle them into one big deck, or the "Quest Deck". The Quest Deck can not be affected by abilties that affect player's libraries, hands, graveyards, or cards they own from outside the game. Only cards that affect the "Quest Deck" directly can affect the deck. At the beginning of the game, each player, starting with the player that goes first and in multiplayer games, going around in the order of the game, takes a quest card and places it FACE DOWN in the command zone. And the game begins.
Quest Deck and Quest Completion
Because the size of the quest deck is determined on the number of players that are playing, it needs to be a sizable amount, so each player would put in 10 quest cards of their choosing. Whenever a player completes a quest, that player reveals the quest card in the command zone, and receives the amount of "quest points" (or whatever we'll call them), and puts the quest on the bottom of the quest deck. Note that when a quest is completed, a player may NOT respond with a spell on the stack (Think of the completion having Split Second), as to not interfere with completion.
Quests
The quest cards compose of the completion clause (what you have to do to complete the quest), the abandon cost (I'll get to this later), the reward (what you get when you complete the quest), and a signature line (or something else to determine who own's what, to prevent stealing). The player may look at the quest in their own command zone as whenever they want. This cannot be affected by permanents that do not directly reference the card. Quest cannot be taken by affects that return them to their owners (Gruul Charm for example).
Abandoning a Quest
Because it may be impossible for a certain deck to complete a certain quest, on each quest there is an option to abandon the quest for a certain amount of colorless mana, or other costs (sacrificing a creature, losing quest points, etc.) However it needs to be noted that the cost needs to be high enough as to not let players sift through the quest deck for a quest they want (this is unfun). Whenever a player abandons a quest, they reveal their quest, pays the cost, and puts the quest on the bottom of the quest deck, and receives another quest. Abandoning a quest cannot be interfered with a spell or ability. Players can only abandon a quest only when they could cast a sorcery. Abandoning a quest does not enter the stack.
Rewards
Whenever a player completes a quest, they receive a reward. In RPG games, they would receive loot. In order to replicate this, some quests will offer both quest points, and alternative bonuses (like putting +1/+1 counters on creatures, gaining life, putting tokens into play etc.) This does not enter the the stack so it can't be interfered with (can't be countered, and has priority), but is affected by abilities that have ALREADY BEEN ACTIVATED PREVIOUS TO THE ABILITY (Havoc Festival). Quest points cannot be removed by spells and abilities.
Signature
Because all the quest cards will be shuffled together, it is important that players are able to distinguish their cards from other peoples. So put some kind of box where the player can put their name (cards are able to withstand pencil and Sharpie, so it could work). This has no other practical applications to the game (can't be affected by Gruul Charm ability).
Winning
Whenever a player loses the game, they are unable to complete other quests or gain quest points. When a player loses the game, they put their current quest card in the bottom of the "Quest Deck", and pick up their cards. When all other players have lost the game, the winner receives a number of quest points for winning (can be decided by us or the playgroup), and the person with the biggest number of quest points wins the game overall.
I think this is everything.
MY DECKS
Standard
BBBMono Black DevotionBBB
Modern
WUBEsper Token/SuperfriendsWUB
Commander (EDH)
WBRKaalia of the VastWBR
Custom Set - Kolros, the Mana Distortion
- I think complete quests should just be left face up on the table for each player (rather than being sent to the bottom of the deck). This means that no extra tracking is required, they can just add the points up at the end.
- I like face down quests, but having all of the quests be face down doesn't seem like a good idea. It's hard to have interesting counter play when you have no idea what your opponents want to do. A little of that is good, but I think some of the quests need to be revealed (either for each player or perhaps communal quests in the center that anyone can complete).
- Is there a reason we need to "abandon quests", it seems just as easy for there to be a flat cost that allows someone to pick up a new quest.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
Comic Book Set
Archester: Frontier of Steam (A steampunk set!)
A Good Place to Start Designing
Keeping quests face up after completion lets them give static bonuses to the game, like emblems. I think that would be cool.
Art is life itself.
As for face up quests... I like the idea of them being face up giving static bonuses (like a Glorious Anthem type of effect). I'm guessing that some quests will have the clause "This quest must be face down" or the opposite "This quest must be face up".
Have "Secret" on some quests would make the design simpler.
I'm also wondering how many quest cards we will need. We need enough as to not have too many repeats, but the supplement can't be entirely quest cards.
MY DECKS
Standard
BBBMono Black DevotionBBB
Modern
WUBEsper Token/SuperfriendsWUB
Commander (EDH)
WBRKaalia of the VastWBR
Custom Set - Kolros, the Mana Distortion
To me, it seems like this just increases the chances of a player being stuck with a quest they can't complete. I feel like players will already have enough incentives to complete quests that we don't need to "force" them.
I'd also like to bring up again the idea of having each quest have two conditions, which reduces the chances of players getting stuck.
Another idea is to have some quests dealt face down to players, and others face up in the middle of the table. Anyone can complete the ones in the middle, but they also have individual ones only they can complete.
Well if each player is supposed to have 10, and we're most likely making 4 decks, 40 seems about right. If some quests are "common" and appear in multiple (or every) deck, then maybe less in terms of unique cards.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
Comic Book Set
Archester: Frontier of Steam (A steampunk set!)
A Good Place to Start Designing
That's about as far as I have read before a big red exclamation mark appeared in front of me.
Shuffling your card together with another persons cards is really unappealing. There are a multitude of problems from the fact that each player will want their own cards back yet cannot differentiate them in a way that is visible on a face-down card to the fact that many people will simply not feel good about it.
Compare this to Planar Magic. There are two suggested ways of playing: (1) each player has their own deck of planes/phenomena; (2) a single deck exists for all players. And I don't know how it works in your group, but the single deck in our group is provided by a single person every single time.
Is it really necessary to shuffle the cards of multiple owners together?
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And no, I don't want to write on my pristine cards. I want them pristine.
Finally a good white villain quote: "So, do I ever re-evaluate my life choices? Never, because I know what I'm doing is a righteous cause."
Factions: Sleeping
Remnants: Valheim
Legendary Journey: Heroes & Planeswalkers
Saga: Shards of Rabiah
Legends: The Elder Dragons
Read up on Red Flags & NWO
This version keeps cards separate while allowing for the game to be easily replicated using a single quest deck (deal 2 to everyone and flip the top N cards equal to the number of players). The uniqueness rule ensures that no one can build a super streamlined quest completion deck, and the fact that everyone will have a chance to complete some of your quests discourages choosing only the easiest ones to complete.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
Comic Book Set
Archester: Frontier of Steam (A steampunk set!)
A Good Place to Start Designing
First the quest deck:
15 Quests, each one having multiple "steps" required to complete it. Each quest has a number in the p/t corner that represents how many reward points it awards you. When the game begins, each player turns the top three quests of his or her deck face-up. Whenever a quest is completed, it is set aside, you note how many reward points you got, and you turn the top card of your quest deck face up so you always have three active quests. There are no private quests.
The second "deck" is sort of a misnomer. It's more like a second hand, and it's the Rewards Deck:
The rewards deck is full of normal magic spells except rather than having mana costs, they have reward costs. The limit would probably also be 10 or 15 cards for this "deck." You can look at all your Rewards Deck cards at any time, and they are hidden from your opponent until you cast them, again making this deck more of a second hand.
Why I like the system I just described:
I think this allows for much more customization than might otherwise happen. Obviously you need your quests and your main deck to by in synch, but still: Do you load up your Quest deck with lots of easier but lower-reward quests, or do you go for bigger, more challenging quests. It also REALLY allows for customization of the Rewards deck. Do you want a lot of super cheap rewards or do you go big and expensive?
That's just how I would do it. My two cents. (Plus, it gives us more to design, which seems fun?)
I think as we move forward we should kind of define what it is we want this product to be. For instance, here are the things I think we're looking for:
- Offers an alternative method of play (i.e. quests) that incentiveize new strategies beyond that of a normal magic game
- Is simple (should involve no more special rules than those needed for Planechase or Archenemy)
- Is playable out of the box without preconstructed decks (quests should work with any deck, not just ones fine tuned to use them)
- Can be played with only one quest deck
Does anyone agree/disagree with the above or have anything to add? Figuring out exactly what target we're shooting for makes it a lot easier to aim.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
Comic Book Set
Archester: Frontier of Steam (A steampunk set!)
A Good Place to Start Designing
Art is life itself.