Starfish | Sea Star

[darkrobe]

NAME: Starfish ELEMENT: Water COST: 4  TYPE: Creature ATK|HP: 2|2 TEXT: : Split Starfish is divided in two. New starfish will gain +1|+1 per turn till they reach 2|2	NAME: Sea Star ELEMENT: Water COST: 2  TYPE: Creature ATK|HP: 3|3 TEXT: : Split Sea Star is divided in two. New Sea Stars will gain +1|+1 per turn till they reach 3|3

ART: Darkrobe. although better art suggestions would be appreciated IDEA: Darkrobe NOTES: So this is inspired by my thoughts about animals that can regrow appendages. I thought wouldnt it be cool if we had something like seastars in the game that could be cut in half and then regrow. That was the inspiration for this card. some notes: the stats of the "split in half" stars are half the stats of the original star (duh) rounded down. so if you split a 3|3 star in half. you get 2 1|1 stars. Split stars do not lose the split skill. However, if you split a 1|1 star it will die for real. So in game play. say you play the upped sea star. you then split it. you can have 2 1|1 stars. you let them heal. next turn you split those. you have 4 1|1 stars. if you wait you can split those again and have 8 1|1 stars, or you can leave them alone and have 4 3|3 stars after a few turns. The +1|+1 per turn only lasts until you reach the summoning health and attack. you wont get a 5|5 star from the regeneration. SERIES: Water synergies revisited (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/index.php/topic,35041.0.html)

[Naesala]

So it's a variation of Deja vu? The healing factor is nice but the initial stat reduction makes them even more vulnerable do creature control.

[darkrobe]

something like that. im thinking that when you split them it might be like "killing" the original star. so it might trigger death effects. add to the synergy between water and death.

[Brontos]

I like it.
It's a bit too costy as it doesn't keep buffs on it like Déjà-vu does.

[darkrobe]

ah, but as it is, it doesnt lose its skill either. so you dont keep buffs but you can generate multiple creatures. course, the faster you generate, the weaker they will all be. so its sort of balanced in that way.

[dragonsdemesne]

I think it's a cool card, and it seems reasonably balanced.  I am curious why you used death for the activation cost, though.  I would have thought life would be more fitting, since the starfish is reproducing.  There's already a water/life duo card in forest spirit, but then, there's already one in chrysaora for water/death, too.  I'd like to be able to suggest a fitting element for this card that hasn't already been paired with water (like say entropy or darkness) but life seems to be the best fit in my opinion for this.

This card might be really fun with fractal and shard of patience

[darkrobe]

I think it's a cool card, and it seems reasonably balanced.  I am curious why you used death for the activation cost, though.  I would have thought life would be more fitting, since the starfish is reproducing.  There's already a water/life duo card in forest spirit, but then, there's already one in chrysaora for water/death, too.  I'd like to be able to suggest a fitting element for this card that hasn't already been paired with water (like say entropy or darkness) but life seems to be the best fit in my opinion for this.

This card might be really fun with fractal and shard of patience

haha. its true. i could see it argued either way. I chose death because in my initial thoughts I was trying to kill the star by ripping it in half, the starfish just tends to ignore my puny attempts to kill it that way. but i do see how this could be life. its a matter of perspective i suppose.

[darkrobe]

also, although you do have a point that water has a death synergy already. the synergy is specifically poison related. its not one that extends to the other aspects of death like bonewalls, graveyards and condors. I think the way this card is it would greatly change the kind of water death decks people could make. I also think it would be good for trios. like you mentioned, it could be fun with fractals, but because it has a strange sort of mitosis, it could also synergize with feral bond. I could easily see the creation of life death water trios with this card, since you could probably power the ability with a mark.

[TheManuz]

I think that fits. Maybe could fit also, since it deals with spreading things away, somehow.

On the card: the unupped costs too much, imho. Make it costs 2 , it's balanced by its low stats anyway.
Upped seems fine to me.

EDIT: on the technical side, i suppose those starfishes would be implementes considering current stats and maximum stats.
So, when you split a 4|4 you get two 2|2 that have 4|4 as maximum stats. Basically, this creatures regenerate 1 ATK and 1 HP per turn.
This also means that if (for example) a starfish attacks a fireshield, it would takes 1 damage and regenerate it the next turn.

I don't know if there are other way to implement this, but i think it's fitting, since the ability to divide comes from a great regeneration ability.

[darkrobe]

I think that fits. Maybe could fit also, since it deals with spreading things away, somehow.

On the card: the unupped costs too much, imho. Make it costs 2 , it's balanced by its low stats anyway.
Upped seems fine to me.

EDIT: on the technical side, i suppose those starfishes would be implementes considering current stats and maximum stats.
So, when you split a 4|4 you get two 2|2 that have 4|4 as maximum stats. Basically, this creatures regenerate 1 ATK and 1 HP per turn.
This also means that if (for example) a starfish attacks a fireshield, it would takes 1 damage and regenerate it the next turn.

I don't know if there are other way to implement this, but i think it's fitting, since the ability to divide comes from a great regeneration ability.

on your technical notes. I thought so too. I considered a couple options for how it would work. but thought this was the best approach. It means that both the unupped and upped are best dealt with with instant kill CC rather than something like poison. Also, because this regeneration ability only occurs when the star is below 4 health, if faced with something like a fire shield, the healing would start at 3hp  giving you 4 hp and then the -1, so the star would be continuously stuck at 3 hp.

I was trying to balance damage ability with survivability.

Edit: i considered having the health and damage regen occur randomly, this might have made for more synergy with  . but i thought it might get to complicated that way. so i went with the more straightforward option.

[OldTrees]

http://elementscommunity.org/forum/index.php/topic,33313.0.html (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/index.php/topic,33313.0.html)

Could you let me know your thoughts about the quanta cost balance of Starfish | Sea Star. are they priced right?

Adjusted Cost = Total Quanta Cost + Types of Quanta

Starfish

Turn	1	2	3	4	5	6	7
Number	1	2	4	8	16	23	23
Total Attack	2	2	4	8	16	18+14=32	46
Total Damage	2	4	8	16	32	64	110
Adjusted Cost	5	7	9	13	21	28	28

Sea Star

Turn	1	2	3	4	5	6
Number	1	2	4	8	8	8
Total Attack	4	4	8	16	32	48
Total Damage	4	8	16	32	64	112
Adjusted Cost	5	7	9	13	13	13

Starfish achieves 110|112 damage on turn 7|6 for an adjusted cost of 28|13. [exponential swarm of creatures, swarm regenerates attack and hp]
Firefly Queen achieves 108|95 damage on turn 8|7 for an adjusted cost of 23|21. [linear swarm of creatures, swarm generates quanta]
Lava Golem achieves 96|91 damage on turn 8|7 for an adjusted cost of 14|13. [single creature, low hp, hp grows with attack]
Steam Machine achieves 90|90 damage on turn 7|7 for an adjusted cost of 18|18. [single creature, has lots of hp]

Unupped appears relatively balanced. The upgraded should have a high win condition cost, a slower win condition or both.
A turn 6/7 win condition with Sea Stars traits would be balanced around a ~25/20 adjusted cost.

[The_Mormegil]

Maybe +:death for the upped activation cost?