It's a difficult situation when card ideas become a reality, but won't get added to Reliquary because Zanz came up with the same idea on his own.
One one hand, the idea was not an inspiration, so it didn't really contribute to anything. On the other hand, the person did design a card idea that made it to the game. Does it even matter whether or not Zanz saw the idea? Shouldn't we reward the person regardless, because he did have a great idea?
To make things worse, there's always a possibility of Zanz using the idea as an inspiration without knowing it.
When we have ideas, those ideas come from something. Our brain uses lots of things like our own experiences, movies, other games, books, etc., and takes pieces from here and there, combining everything to "original idea". It's not that "original" really, because you are most likely using something you saw somewhere else.
It is possible, in theory, that Zanz one day glances at an idea, his brain likes it and stores it somewhere deep in the subconscious. Later when it comes time to develop new cards, Zanz's brain takes that piece of data from the subconscious, but without the knowledge of where it came from. I'm not saying it has happened, I'm only saying it's possible. I know because it happened to me.
I made a card idea once. I thought it was great and I knew it was my original idea. But before I posted it, I saw someone else had done the same exact idea. I then realized that I had seen this idea before! I also realized that since the idea by the other person was so unique, the only possibility was that I had stolen the idea without realizing it! I thought I had come up with the idea myself, when in fact it had been stored in my subconscious.
I'm torn on whether or not identical ideas should be added to the Reliquary. Both solutions have advantages and disadvantages, so it's not an easy question.
Main argument for using the current system is that we know for a fact that the idea helped Elements development. Adding non-inspirational ideas as well could lead to Reliquary spam, because every time we get a new card, the owner of some similar idea would demands it to be added to Reliquary.
