by the way there's a funny statement made by "Putting Yours Eggs In Your Basket: A Follow Up"
Quote from French »
Still more of you might consider making a Custom Core Set, possibly containing reprints of cards from other custom sets. This is a unique idea, but don't forget the rules of a Core Set's construction: All reprints. No Legends. No multicolor. These last two statements may one day be broken, however.
Hear that guys? Core sets can't have original cards because that will NEVER HAPPEN.
I was thinking about how to manipulate rarity in my set
one time last year, for my set I input a strange pack size, something like 10 commons 5 uncommons 2 rares. Which in hindsight is very confusing, because it's hard to remember the pack size (I'm not sure what the exact number was, I'm guessing) and nobody will abide by it anyway.
So I would not do that again. I'd keep it the good ol' 11:3:1
But I realized I wouldn't have to adjust the pack size anyway, since I can instead manipulate rarities by making having fewer rare cards, and more commons. The fewer rares there are in a set, the more likely you will open any specific rare.
so question is how rare should a rare be? It's up to anyone but I might try 2-to-1
meaning any uncommon is exactly twice as rare as any common
and any rare is twice as rare as any uncommon
I did the math, and I came out with 11:6:4
(for every 11 commons, there should be 6 uncommons, and 4 rares)
If this is abided by, it would result in a 4:2:1 rarity ratio (any given rare appearing four times as often as any given rarity)
For a 273 card base set that would mean 143 commons, 78 uncommons, 52 rares
For a 168 card expansion that would mean 88 commons, 48 uncommons, 32 rares
There's been a new Nuts & Bolts article to add. And Fight Club part one and part two talk a lot about design in general, as well as specifics about combat. And, I think Let's See What Develops deserves a spot; knowing how development contributes is important when you're learning about design.
I suppose these points have been made elsewhere in Rosewater's writing, but I think that this Tumblr post is a nice, concise summary of some very useful advice for amateur designers.
Edit: Actually, now that I think about it, all those points get covered in more detail by other articles... though there is a lot of chunky nuggets of design stuff in the rest of that blog. Oh, and the new article on color bleed (here) is an important one too.
Bit of a necro, sorry, but I just realized that the list of Mark's articles on color are incomplete. We're missing the series he did for the Alara shards which, truth be told, are a bit of an odd way of examining the groupings, but still hold a lot of great information. So, here they are (in chronological order):
I'm a proud member of the Online Campaign for Real English. If you believe in capital letters, correct spelling, and good sentence structure, then copy this into your signature.
Well, if you need help starting a new set read these:
Helpful Articles:
♦ Nuts & Bolts: Card Codes
♦ Nuts & Bolts: Design Skeleton
♦ Nuts & Bolts: Filling in the Design Skeleton
♦ Hate is Enough
♦ Bursting with Flavor
♦ The Year of Living Changerously
♦ The Ten Principles for Good Design, Part 1
♦ The Ten Principles for Good Design, Part 2
♦ Just the Artifacts, Ma’am
♦ Cards Every Set Should Have
♦ Design 101
♦ Design 102
♦ Degign 103
♦ Putting Your Eggs in Your Basket
♦ Putting Your Eggs in Your Basket: A Follow-Up
♦ Know How, Part 1
♦ Know How, Part 2
♦ A Different World
♦ Zen and the Art of Cycle Maintenance
♦ Slow and Steady
♦ Instant Winners
♦ Equipment To Be
♦ This Land is My Land
♦ Fight Club, Part 1
♦ Fight Club, Part 2
♦ Let's See What Develops
The colors:
G: It's Not Easy Being Green
W: The Great White Way
U: True Blue
B: In the Black
R: Seeing Red
:symwu:: Slow and Steady
:symub:: Pretty Sneaky Sis
:symbr:: Hedonism With Attitude
:symrg:: Aaaargh!!!
:symgw:: Group Think
:symwb:: Playing By Their Own Rules
:symbg:: Life and Death
:symgu:: Improving Upon Nature
:symur:: Creative Differences
:symrw:: Disorderly Conduct
Other Helpful Websites
♦ Fantasy Name Generator
♦ Windows Alt Codes
♦ Spell Generator
♦ Monster Generator
♦ Monster Name Generator
♦ Thesaurus
♦ D&D Name Generator
♦ For Those Starting A New Set
Raritys:
Multiply the following numbers by your set size to get your ratio:
-Ocb777
Converted Mana Costs:
LAND: 0.04434
0: 0.00500
1: 0.11460
2: 0.20123
3: 0.21101
4: 0.18918
5: 0.12256
6: 0.06708
7: 0.02751
8: 0.01319
9: 0.00409
10: 0.00318
11: 0.00068
12: 0.00045
13: 0.00000
14: 0.00000
15: 0.00045
-Pichoro
If you find any articles that are not up here leave a comment and it will be updated. Thanks!
-Yogi Berra
R Citizen Cane (Feldon of the Third Path)
- Main Cube
- No Brains, All Feelings Cube
R Citizen Cane (Feldon of the Third Path)
http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/mm/101
by the way there's a funny statement made by "Putting Yours Eggs In Your Basket: A Follow Up"
Hear that guys? Core sets can't have original cards because that will NEVER HAPPEN.
R Citizen Cane (Feldon of the Third Path)
Your Necromancy skill has risen by 1...
I was thinking about how to manipulate rarity in my set
one time last year, for my set I input a strange pack size, something like 10 commons 5 uncommons 2 rares. Which in hindsight is very confusing, because it's hard to remember the pack size (I'm not sure what the exact number was, I'm guessing) and nobody will abide by it anyway.
So I would not do that again. I'd keep it the good ol' 11:3:1
But I realized I wouldn't have to adjust the pack size anyway, since I can instead manipulate rarities by making having fewer rare cards, and more commons. The fewer rares there are in a set, the more likely you will open any specific rare.
so question is how rare should a rare be? It's up to anyone but I might try 2-to-1
meaning any uncommon is exactly twice as rare as any common
and any rare is twice as rare as any uncommon
I did the math, and I came out with 11:6:4
(for every 11 commons, there should be 6 uncommons, and 4 rares)
If this is abided by, it would result in a 4:2:1 rarity ratio (any given rare appearing four times as often as any given rarity)
For a 273 card base set that would mean 143 commons, 78 uncommons, 52 rares
For a 168 card expansion that would mean 88 commons, 48 uncommons, 32 rares
-Yogi Berra
R Citizen Cane (Feldon of the Third Path)
-Yogi Berra
http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showpost.php?p=4557651&postcount=1
TheWarden's Creative Commons Music Pick Project (Retired):
http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=336498
Edit: Actually, now that I think about it, all those points get covered in more detail by other articles... though there is a lot of chunky nuggets of design stuff in the rest of that blog. Oh, and the new article on color bleed (here) is an important one too.
R Citizen Cane (Feldon of the Third Path)
GWU - Peace, Love, and Understanding
UBR - Looking Out For Number One
RGW - Searching Within
WUB - Striving for Perfection
BRG - Following Your Heart
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***Former MCC Organizer***
Come join us! Show us your creative side.
I'm a proud member of the Online Campaign for Real English. If you believe in capital letters, correct spelling, and good sentence structure, then copy this into your signature.
When in doubt, call a judge.
Objectivist here. Hit me up to talk philosophy.
Otherwise, a FAQ update is in the works already. This will be included there.