Just want to make sure that's all working correctly. It looks like this system makes the critiques count a lot when there are not many critiques, which I sort of thought was what we were trying to fight. It seems like our current system is quite taxing for the hosts, is it bad to revert to raw points?
Raw points are mostly OK in my opinion, since the Top 8 are generally 'top 2 from each of 4 teams', which eases some of the warping from small team vote concentration.
If you wanted to adjust for team size variance and still factor in crits, you could use a much simpler scoring formula that uses a simplified scaling factor:
Top3 + Crits + ( Votes * Team/Judges) ... and optionally scale that value up as CCL currently does so fractional points are easier to see.
So for equally sized teams, VT/J = V; if you have, say, 3 team members and 6 judges, VT/J = V/2 which adjusts accurately for vote density issues, and the math is a little bit easier to set up correctly in a spreadsheet if you should care to do that.
I personally don't have any serious objections to error-correction changes like that. Forgetting to add a missing piece or needing to change a card name isn't that big a deal; it's not like you are substantially changing the design of the card.
In this rounds challenge, can I add another color to my card as long as my random cards color is present or do I have to use the exact color(s) of my random card?
If you've established a preexisting multicolored theme, you can add a color to a monocolored card. Otherwise please use exactly the random card's colors.
So my card was Just Fate. A sorcery from portal second age, a set famously without instants. The oracle text has since changed it to an instant. Is it okay if I make my card a sorcery?
Doh! I honestly didn't expect anyone to generate a basic land. I'm going to revise the rules for that case — if your random card would be a basic land, you may get a new random card instead. (Development isn't going to pull out a basic land for development reasons, that would be crazy.)
Zoomba — Nope. Just regular colors, not Commander-style color identity.
Dropping players in general — I'm sorry to see you folks go. We've had some really cool designs this time around and we'll miss you.
I'd like some advice from veteran CCL hosts. Am I making challenges that are too difficult to read or understand clearly? I don't want CCL players to lose potentially good designs to challenge technicalities; this is supposed to be a design contest, not Simon Says.
willows, the rules for Round 2 say that the card can't share a type with a previously submitted card. Does this mean card type, or were you referring to subtypes (such as creature types) as well?
I'm gonna let other people handle the design question 'cause I dunno what the rules are for hosts and that.
The intent was "card type", i'll edit to clarify. I don't especially care about subtypes, just don't want people to get into a rut designing one creature after another or whatever.
I don't have a good like operational definition of tension, but the way Maro described the tension in Tempest might help to explain:
- Shadow is an aggressive attack strategy; the Tempest creatures with shadow top out at CMC 4. (Time Spiral fills out the high cmc band later on.)
- Buyback is a slow control strategy.
These mechanics want opposite things — Buyback needs time to build its mana base, shadow wants the game to be over before buyback can make that happen.
Apparently the set didn't fully succeed in expressing that tension, but the idea was in the designers' heads anyway. I hope that helps?
That's a good question - I feel like we've had a couple of cases of people posting reused card designs, and a few cases of people asking for pre-contest feedback on ideas before they go into the submission threads, and posters asking if that kinda thing is kosher.
I'd like to have an explicit decision one way or another (For my part, I think either is cool, whatever, we're all friends-or-acquaintances here and there's no need to make this more strict and competitive) but no matter what that decision is it should be in the rules.
Also I'll throw my hat in to run a month when there's a need.
If you wanted to adjust for team size variance and still factor in crits, you could use a much simpler scoring formula that uses a simplified scaling factor:
Top3 + Crits + ( Votes * Team/Judges) ... and optionally scale that value up as CCL currently does so fractional points are easier to see.
So for equally sized teams, VT/J = V; if you have, say, 3 team members and 6 judges, VT/J = V/2 which adjusts accurately for vote density issues, and the math is a little bit easier to set up correctly in a spreadsheet if you should care to do that.
Sure.
Zoomba — Nope. Just regular colors, not Commander-style color identity.
Dropping players in general — I'm sorry to see you folks go. We've had some really cool designs this time around and we'll miss you.
I'm gonna let other people handle the design question 'cause I dunno what the rules are for hosts and that.
The intent was "card type", i'll edit to clarify. I don't especially care about subtypes, just don't want people to get into a rut designing one creature after another or whatever.
- Shadow is an aggressive attack strategy; the Tempest creatures with shadow top out at CMC 4. (Time Spiral fills out the high cmc band later on.)
- Buyback is a slow control strategy.
These mechanics want opposite things — Buyback needs time to build its mana base, shadow wants the game to be over before buyback can make that happen.
Apparently the set didn't fully succeed in expressing that tension, but the idea was in the designers' heads anyway. I hope that helps?
I'd like to have an explicit decision one way or another (For my part, I think either is cool, whatever, we're all friends-or-acquaintances here and there's no need to make this more strict and competitive) but no matter what that decision is it should be in the rules.
Also I'll throw my hat in to run a month when there's a need.