The Pitch
In standard Magic games, players take the role of planeswalkers who encounter one another and duel. Each participant arrives fresh to the fight, fights for nothing, and fights to the death (0 life). What if they show up bloodied from their last encounter, fight for important sites across The Multiverse, and rather than be destroyed, flee to fight another day?
Overview
Linked Campaigns use two teams of three decks (whether that's three decks with three players or three decks with one player on each team is up to you). Each round, both teams put up one deck to duel while the other two decks recover from their previous battles by removing attrition points (they may choose to use the activated ability of a location instead).
Duels are fought for control of a location in the Blind Eternities, which is revealed from a location deck before the dueling players mulligan. After the mulligan, both dueling players lose 2 life or mill 6 cards for each attrition point they started the duel with. At the end of the duel, each player totals up the attrition for their deck (Every 2 life before their starting total and every 6 cards milled and/or exiled gains one attrition point). The winning team takes control of the location card and places it in their Team Command Zone. Location cards have points and the first team to 20+ points wins the campaign.
The persistent damage ensures that even whenever a fight is close, the winner is that much weaker for their next game. The location cards add value to each duel without having an in-game effect that creates a 'win more' environment. Both systems give a player a way to reconcile the value of staying in a game for the possible victory (winning the location) against the value of conceding (to prevent unnecessary attrition).
The Blind Eternities and other zones
The Blind Eternities is the name of the deck of cards representing locations from across the Multiverse. Each location card has a point value, from 1 to 9. Many of the low-point locations have a special ability which allows you to destroy locations, replace locations, or help your team recover when they're behind. Locations' abilities can target other locations, which means that they are capable of targeting and affecting locations in another team's command zone. Whenever locations are sacrificed or destroyed, they're put into a common zone called The Graveyard of Eternities instead of into a player's graveyard. You may only use a location's ability once per round.
Current Locations
The Linked Campaign system is currently only concerned with its own balance and functionality, so having locations that affect duels is not a priority. It's important to remember that teams take turns activating location abilities; you cannot use one location ability in response to another.
Standard Removal - 3 points - Sacrifice [CARDNAME]: Destroy target location.
Replacement Removal - 2 points - Sacrifice [CARDNAME]: Destroy target location. Its controller reveals the top card of The Blind Eternities and puts it into their command zone.
Renewal Location - 2 point - Sacrifice [CARDNAME]: Put a location from The Graveyard of Eternities on top of The Blind Eternities.
Victory into Recovery - 1 points - Your team loses this round's game: All decks on your team (even the deck playing) remove two attrition points (this is in addition to any recovery by decks that aren't playing). A game of Magic is not played this round and the opposing team reveals and gains control of the top card of The Blind Eternities.
Swing Location - 6 points
Low End Points 01 - 7 points
Low End Points 02 - 7 points
Medium Points 01 - 8 points
Medium Points 02 - 8 points
High End Points 01 - 9 points
High End Points 02 - 9 points
Manipulating Acceleration - 2 points - Sacrifice [CARDNAME]: Look at the top three cards of The Blind Eternities. Put two of those cards into The Graveyard of Eternities and the remaining card on top.
Recovery into Acceleration - 1 points - 0: Look at the top card of The Blind Eternities. You may put it on the bottom of The Blind Eternities.
Playtesting indicates these thirteen locations give the campaign forward inertia without running too quickly or having the removal eliminate the ways to win. Play with the current set of cards takes attrition points into account, but all victories so far have won by collecting points.
I really like this idea, especially since it can be played with 2-6 players, and even more if you decide to play it in a FFA manner. The six deck system works even if you don't want to follow the campaign system, as you can simply host a tournament where you get to keep battling opponents until your last deck dies, and then you are out. Obviously the last man standing wins.
I never thought about it in a tournament environment. Sorting winners by round according to their attrition points makes a certain amount of sense. It also means that a player who barely won their last game is at a disadvantage against a player who handily won theirs. Using three decks would make for a long tournament, but probably no longer than a campaign.
Removing the points tosses up a few potential problems. If you allow a few duel losses without being eliminated, red decks can kamikaze. By emptying a hand full of burn before conceding, they can inflict disproportionate attrition on an opponent. Similarly, white decks can get a serious case of Homersimpsonitis later in the campaign/tournament. They can heal up to remove attrition, concede, and leave their opponent with their starting attrition and a victory while they're fresh for their next fight. I don't know a lot about dredge decks, but theoretically they could get a lot of help by using attrition to dump cards into their graveyards. These are all tactical decisions, but crafting an environment that makes a smart player weigh their costs is the trick.
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In standard Magic games, players take the role of planeswalkers who encounter one another and duel. Each participant arrives fresh to the fight, fights for nothing, and fights to the death (0 life). What if they show up bloodied from their last encounter, fight for important sites across The Multiverse, and rather than be destroyed, flee to fight another day?
Overview
Linked Campaigns use two teams of three decks (whether that's three decks with three players or three decks with one player on each team is up to you). Each round, both teams put up one deck to duel while the other two decks recover from their previous battles by removing attrition points (they may choose to use the activated ability of a location instead).
Duels are fought for control of a location in the Blind Eternities, which is revealed from a location deck before the dueling players mulligan. After the mulligan, both dueling players lose 2 life or mill 6 cards for each attrition point they started the duel with. At the end of the duel, each player totals up the attrition for their deck (Every 2 life before their starting total and every 6 cards milled and/or exiled gains one attrition point). The winning team takes control of the location card and places it in their Team Command Zone. Location cards have points and the first team to 20+ points wins the campaign.
The persistent damage ensures that even whenever a fight is close, the winner is that much weaker for their next game. The location cards add value to each duel without having an in-game effect that creates a 'win more' environment. Both systems give a player a way to reconcile the value of staying in a game for the possible victory (winning the location) against the value of conceding (to prevent unnecessary attrition).
The Blind Eternities and other zones
The Blind Eternities is the name of the deck of cards representing locations from across the Multiverse. Each location card has a point value, from 1 to 9. Many of the low-point locations have a special ability which allows you to destroy locations, replace locations, or help your team recover when they're behind. Locations' abilities can target other locations, which means that they are capable of targeting and affecting locations in another team's command zone. Whenever locations are sacrificed or destroyed, they're put into a common zone called The Graveyard of Eternities instead of into a player's graveyard. You may only use a location's ability once per round.
Current Locations
The Linked Campaign system is currently only concerned with its own balance and functionality, so having locations that affect duels is not a priority. It's important to remember that teams take turns activating location abilities; you cannot use one location ability in response to another.
Standard Removal - 3 points - Sacrifice [CARDNAME]: Destroy target location.
Replacement Removal - 2 points - Sacrifice [CARDNAME]: Destroy target location. Its controller reveals the top card of The Blind Eternities and puts it into their command zone.
Renewal Location - 2 point - Sacrifice [CARDNAME]: Put a location from The Graveyard of Eternities on top of The Blind Eternities.
Victory into Recovery - 1 points - Your team loses this round's game: All decks on your team (even the deck playing) remove two attrition points (this is in addition to any recovery by decks that aren't playing). A game of Magic is not played this round and the opposing team reveals and gains control of the top card of The Blind Eternities.
Swing Location - 6 points
Low End Points 01 - 7 points
Low End Points 02 - 7 points
Medium Points 01 - 8 points
Medium Points 02 - 8 points
High End Points 01 - 9 points
High End Points 02 - 9 points
Manipulating Acceleration - 2 points - Sacrifice [CARDNAME]: Look at the top three cards of The Blind Eternities. Put two of those cards into The Graveyard of Eternities and the remaining card on top.
Recovery into Acceleration - 1 points - 0: Look at the top card of The Blind Eternities. You may put it on the bottom of The Blind Eternities.
Playtesting indicates these thirteen locations give the campaign forward inertia without running too quickly or having the removal eliminate the ways to win. Play with the current set of cards takes attrition points into account, but all victories so far have won by collecting points.
Removing the points tosses up a few potential problems. If you allow a few duel losses without being eliminated, red decks can kamikaze. By emptying a hand full of burn before conceding, they can inflict disproportionate attrition on an opponent. Similarly, white decks can get a serious case of Homersimpsonitis later in the campaign/tournament. They can heal up to remove attrition, concede, and leave their opponent with their starting attrition and a victory while they're fresh for their next fight. I don't know a lot about dredge decks, but theoretically they could get a lot of help by using attrition to dump cards into their graveyards. These are all tactical decisions, but crafting an environment that makes a smart player weigh their costs is the trick.