Yomiji, Who Bars the Way
One of my favourite flavour texts ever written. Tragic and moving.
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- Doombringer
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Member for 10 years, 9 months, and 29 days
Last active Thu, Jun, 30 2022 21:08:23
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Our next podcast is us both talking all about Dan's game Faeria. However we will definitely do the "What makes a bad mechanic" sometimes in the next few months.
Keep the mechanic submissions coming!
Many here are talking of "objective" storytelling mistakes yet either don't specify what those mistakes are or direct to storytelling guidelines that are not always applicable. Include links, backup and explanations if your going to claim the stories are "objectively" badly made.
Definitely. I'd also probably upload it to youtube etc.
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In this episode:
Card Renders:
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Reuben Covington
Twitter: @reubencovington
Email: reubencovington@gmail.com
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Dan Felder
Twitter: @DesignerDanF
Email: minimallyexceptional@gmail.com
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All cards that can shuffle a deck in Dreamscape have reminder text. Similar to Bestow not detailing the way it handles creatures being removed from under it and morphnot explaining lots of things reminder text has to allow the players to play the mechanic. The current reminder text covers the vast majority of gameplay involved.
As mentioned in the FAQ milling unlike card drawing is done all at once, meaning it would enter the graveyard.
I'll archive the streams so they are available for later viewing as well.
Thoughts?
As mentioned by several others Defensive Stance was deliberately bad as a developmental tool for color balance in limited
Also you are still ignore the very important comprehension complexity, aesthetic elegance and focus costs that most of your designs and all of your redesigns have.
Contemplate the Silence 2U
Enchantment (R)
At the beginning of your upkeep, if you control no other nonland permanents, draw a card.
Moan has had its costs tinkered with to differentiate, also the two 2/2 ETB tapped sorcery vs two 2/2 vigilance instant I hope is enough small changes to make it acceptable as both colors really want the card.
Even if it potentially was you still have to factor in that it has to not just be one set but a set every three months. Stretching credibility as each card ends up restricting the design space of the other. As mentioned in Maro's Reprint Podcast this weekend the design space in magic is large but not infinite, especially when taking into account complexity, aesthetic concerns, limited curves, and dozens of other factors.
It shows that could make a single "functionally better" card, however doing this creates minor issues that compound as you attempt to apply this to a whole set, making the product overall worse.
Example:
Aven Battle Priest 3.0 5W
Creature - Bird Rebel Ally Cleric
Flying
When Aven Battle Priest 3.0 enters the battlefield, you gain 3 life plus an additional 9 life for each of your opponents beyond the first.
3/3
In the lens of your "functionally better" and "playability" worldview this card is exactly the same in ORI limited yet more playable. But its not elegant, its has more complexity, it pulls focus from the themes of that set. You said you enjoyed Vanilla creatures earlier and that you wished they where more playable. Yet consider why you like them?
I like them because they are easy to understand, they allow you to stop processing comprehension complexity for a moment and focus on other aspects of the game. Me and Dan talked about comprehension complexity in our Podcast
For similar reasons this card would be less popular among certain players that either v2.0 or the original. Now you personally may think v3.0 is great, but magic is many games for many people.
And this is all without getting into how nowhere has WOTC or the definition of "collectable card game" promised that every card has to be playable, thus making your fraud argument seem fairly flimsy.
So please clarify your fraud argument.
Lets start with a definition:
So you would you show me where the "deliberate deception" is?
What is the "unfair or unlawful gain"?
or what "legal right" are you being deprived of?
Sovereign of Eternity 5C
Creature - Eldrazi (R)
Colored spells cost C more to cast.
“When the titans leave, bismuth, dust, and the bitter taste of our failure will be all that remain.”
—Ugin
5/6
Judging in ProgressDONEDesign -
(2/3) Appeal: Spike loves the options and efficiency here, thinking of the best way she can leverage the options to her advantage. Timmy loves X spells, especially ones that scale as insanely as this. However the XX is a minor concern. Johnny has nearly no interest in a card like this.
(0.5/3) Elegance: This is not an elegant card. A cost of XXR is already a mana cost that sacrifices elegance and adds comprehension complexity to gain versatility. This can also be aesthetically patched to some degree with cards like Fall of the Titans, having the two targets mirror the two X's etc. However with your card you continue adding X's both increasing the targets and the options, while also having 3 options to the double X's thus not having similar mirroring of 2. Even 4 options would of been better aesthetically. Figuring out what this will burn, destroy and sacrifice is an exercise in itself which can be fine for a rare (see Conjured Currency) but doesn't make for an elegant design. Finally the flavor text feels unneeded tacked on just for the requirement of the challenge, Choose cards rarely have flavor text even with the dot point templating change.
Development -
(3/3) Viability: This works within the rules of the game and the color pie. You even made sure to include "up to" on your X targets so that the cards works as intended.
(1.5/3) Balance: I'm pretty sure this card is very strong, bordering on slightly overpowered, especially with the combinations of damage and land destruction. The 4R mode of bolting two creatures and having each opponent sac two lands is a brutal standard play depending on the environment's toughness and even more so in an enviorment with playable artifacts. The land destruction finally makes this completely backbreaking in limited which is worth keeping in mind despite being a rare.
Creativity -
(2.5/3) Uniqueness: We have had modal spells with X variables like Invoke the Firemind. However we haven't had a "Choose X" spell, especially one where the effects scale on X too.
(2/3) Flavor: The flavor text is reasonably generic and doesn't help create more of a sense of the card's flavor. Wreaking Blow however is a nice name but again isn't super descriptive.
Polish -
(2.5/3) Quality: Looks good except for the unitalic "then", maybe that is deliberate but to me it looks like mistake.
(2/2) *Main Challenge: Main challenge complete
(2/2) Subchallenges: Both challenges complete
Total: 18/25
*An entry with 0 points here is subject to disqualification.
Design -
(2.5/3) Appeal: Timmy isn't such a fan of sacrificing his stuff but likes the variable damage aspect, spike likewise likes the resource game of turning one resource into another, giving them plenty of choices whiles its also fairly efficient. Johnny also likes the resource change but the payoff isn't at all interesting to him. Overall it appeal to most of them but not to a massive extent.
(2/3) Elegance: The card for the most part is really elegant, not a elegant as Shrapnel Blast however, due mainly to the exile clause. However the converted mana cost while having interesting gameplay and allowing the cheap cost means its not as clean as well.
Development -
(3/3) Viability: Full marks, this card is red and viable.
(2.5/3) Balance: Theses types of cards can be difficult to evaluate power level wise, I suspect its a little on the weak side as the CMC means it is super hard to "cheat" the card outside of most older formats. But its fine if narrow.
Creativity -
(1.5/3) Uniqueness: The CMC and exile clause do a good job at differentiating this a little from the previously mentioned Shrapnel Blast, but not enough for a high uniqueness mark.
(2.5/3) Flavor: Flavor text is great, not sure why a furnace exiles however.
Polish -
(2.5/3) Quality: The quoted character for the flavor text needs to be on a new line. Otherwise fine.
(2/2) *Main Challenge: Fits the challenge.
(2/2) Subchallenges: Subchallenges complete
Total: 18.5/25
*An entry with 0 points here is subject to disqualification.
Design -
(1.5/3) Appeal: Spike likes the options and the ability to get a lot of value by playing well. It isn't a big enough effect for timmy most of the time and is of little interest for johnny however.
(1/3) Elegance: "Spend only blue mana on X." is both a restrictive and inelegant line of rules text, there is a goodreason it is so rarely using in modern design. Likewise the Exile is probably not needed outside this challenge and the X spell mana being a different color is super weird. I know you want the mono color subchallenge points but I think your overall score would of been higher with simply a blue/red multicolor spell.
Development -
(2/3) Viability: Because of the color restriction of the bounce this strictly fits in the color pie however that blue mana restriction is less likely obvious to non designers and I can imagine the cries of "Since when does mono red bounce?"
(2.5/3) Balance: a RR Pyroclasm with upside is probably pushing it a tiny bit but the double restriction needed is probably fine for the most part.
Creativity -
(2.5/3) Uniqueness:While it is inelegantly stapling two base effects together it is doing it in a fun way that we haven't seen before for the most part.
(1.5/3) Flavor: The name fits really well but the flavor text is a big letdown, both not being super interesting but also not fitting the feel of magic.
Polish -
(2.5/3) Quality: The "Then," isn't required. Overwise its fine
(3/2) *Main Challenge: Yep!
(2/2) Subchallenges: Yes, even though I suspect it wasn't worth it.
Total: 18.5/25
*An entry with 0 points here is subject to disqualification.
Design -
(3/3) Appeal: Spike loves the options, Timmy may find the big mana and ability to kill huge amounts of creatures exciting while Johnny wants to use the big mana to combo off and maybe do something silly with the flip side.
(0/3) Elegance: Your a brave soul, in these types of challenges Planeswalkers and DFCs are some of the highest risk cards to make. They have so many developmental knobs to tweak but leave you with inelegant looking designs without strong top down flavor to tie it together. Your card has a nice idea, a Planeswalker with only minus abilities that leaves a effect when it dies. Thats cool. However your abilities don't seem to tie together well and them all being -X loyalty makes the choices less interesting, the card harder to balance, the death less meaningful AND the card less elegant. Even the backside has the random planeswalker damage ability which is cool but yet another unnecessary element in a already overstuffed design.
Development -
(2.5/3) Viability: Rarity and color pie are fine, the BB sac ability is maybe more Red now days however. My main issue is that this design as isn't at all viable to print.
(0/3) Balance: Historically DFCs and Planeswalkers are some of the hardest cards to mentally playtest, design and evaluate. Likewise X spells and how they scale also are tipically more difficult to figure out. This combines all these difficult elements and showcases how easily it can go wrong. Now thats not a critique on you as a designer you took on one of the most challenging card types and combined it with other elements that are also super tricky so its not surprising how broken this is no matter how good you are. All the -X modes range from just strong to bonkers (the -X/-X attack mode is a one sided board wipe if you have an equal number of creatures.) Even if they kill this it makes a super powerful effect, especially if your the player is building around it.
Creativity -
(2.5/3) Uniqueness: We have had Garruk's DFC but that was very different. This is a cool new space to explore but it didn't come together in execution.
(2.5/3) Flavor: By far my favourite part of the card is the story it tells. Her abilities are unfortunately a little all over the place flavor wise with both sacrifice and exile themes etc.
Polish -
(3/3) Quality: Good. Even got the color indicator.
(2/2) *Main Challenge: Yup!
(2/2) Subchallenges: Flavor text on the backside checks out
Total: 17.5/25
*An entry with 0 points here is subject to disqualification.
theazurespirit: 18.5
TriceDefied: 18.5
Solesticio: 18
thenoodler: 17.5
Galloping Dread
Creature - Nightmare (R)
When Galloping Dread enters the battlefield, creatures you control get +1/+0 and gain haste until end of turn.
2/2
Plague with Distress
Sorcery (U)
Trance - Plague with Distress costs 1 less to cast for each tapped creature you control.
Target player sacrifices two creatures.
Manic Researcher
Creature - Human Wizard (U)
Prowess (Whenever you cast a noncreature spell, this creature gets +1/+1 until end of turn.)
When Manic Researcher enters the battlefield, return an instant or sorcery card at random from your graveyard to your hand.
2/3
Nature's Precept
Sorcery (U)
Until end of turn, target creature you control gains deathtouch and "Whenever this creature deals combat damage to a player, draw two cards."
Flashback
Daumas Patrol
Instant (C)
Put two 2/2 white Knight creature tokens with vigilance onto the battlefield.
Premonition 3-
Serene Light
Enchantment - Aura (C)
Enchant creature
Enchanted creature can't attack, and its activated abilities can't be activated.
"Bathe in dreamless sleep, never again to know the worries of the world."
-Jemmara
Dreamscape Entwiner
Creature - Human Wizard (C)
Dreamwalk (This creature can't be blocked by untapped creatures. Tapped creatures can block it.)
When Dreamscape Entwiner enters the battlefield, you may return target tapped creature to its owner's hand.
3/2
Raise the Lost
Instant (C)
Return target creature card from your graveyard to your hand. You gain 3 life.
Flashback
Snatching Murkbeast
Creature - Beast (C)
Nightmares have to be inspired by something.
2/4
Charred Visionary
Creature - Goblin Shaman (C)
First strike
2/2
Jorallen Battlemage
Creature - Human Shaman (C)
As long as you have a face-up card in your library, Jorallen Battlemage gets +1/+1.
"The flames of the future always blow in my favor."
2/1
Gardener of Wisdom
Creature - Plant Elemental (C)
Gardener of Wisdom enters the battlefield with X +1/+1 counters on it, where X is the number of creature and/or land cards in all graveyards.
At its core is a seed. Nurtured by the past and hopeful for the future.
0/0
Sunbloom Elf
Creature - Elf Druid (C)
Whenever Sunbloom Elf becomes tapped, add
The elves of the Sunwood Haven worship the beauty of nature, rejecting the Dreamscape's illusionary realm.
1/3
Reality Gateway
Artifact Creature - Wall (C)
Defender (This creature can't attack.)
You may have Reality Gateway enter the battlefield tapped.
In reality, a fortification. In the Dreamscape, a denial.
0/6