Quantum Meditation | Quantum Channeling

[OdinVanguard]

NAME: Quantum Meditation ELEMENT: Other COST: 0 TYPE: Permanent ATK|HP: TEXT: 0: Target a card, produce N+4 of its quanta. Return to deck. Reverb: n = number of reverb cards played before this one.	NAME: Quantum Channeling ELEMENT: Other COST: 1 TYPE: Permanent ATK|HP: TEXT: 1: Target a card, produce N+6 of its quanta. Return to hand. Reverb: n = number of reverb cards played before this one.

ART: OdinVanguard, created using Inkscape and GIMP IDEA: OdinVanguard NOTES: "Today will be surprisingly mundane" "Take some time to focus your energy today. The results will be invigorating" Intended both as a general quanta production utility, or even as a potential alternative to pillars while also helping promote use of reverb cards in a wide range of deck strategies. Note that the upgraded version returns to its owner's hand rather than their deck. This change should have a significant impact on its utility. Although it loses anti-deckout properties, it gains the potential for very rapid escalation. The trade off is that it requires several uses before it begins to pay off and is vulnerable to quanta denial tactics. The double edge nature of reverb will certainly shine if both players are employing these as quanta sources. Particularly the upgraded version. SERIES:

Spoiler for old version:

NAME: Quantum Meditation ELEMENT: Other COST: 0 TYPE: Permanent ATK|HP: TEXT: 0: Target a card, produce N+1 of its quanta. Return to deck. Reverb: n = number of reverb cards played before this one.	NAME: Quantum Channeling ELEMENT: Other COST: 3 TYPE: Permanent ATK|HP: TEXT: N : Target a card, produce 2N of its quanta. Return to hand. Reverb: n = number of reverb cards played before this one.

ART: OdinVanguard, created using Inkscape and GIMP IDEA: OdinVanguard NOTES: "Today will be surprisingly mundane" "Take some time to focus your energy today. The results will be invigorating" Intended both as a general quanta production utility, or even as a potential alternative to pillars while also helping promote use of reverb cards in a wide range of deck strategies. Note that the upgraded version returns to its owner's hand rather than their deck. This change should have a significant impact on its utility. Although it loses anti-deckout properties, it gains the potential for very rapid escalation. The trade off is that it requires several uses before it begins to pay off and is vulnerable to quanta denial tactics. The double edge nature of reverb will certainly shine if both players are employing these as quanta sources. Particularly the upgraded version. SERIES:

[ARTHANASIOS]

Upped one is underpowered. We must always take the chance we have no more reverb cards to play. In that case, the unupped one will produce 1 quantum for 0 cost while the upped one 0 for a cost of 3.

[kaempfer13]

Upped one is underpowered. We must always take the chance we have no more reverb cards to play. In that case, the unupped one will produce 1 quantum for 0 cost while the upped one 0 for a cost of 3.

You got it backwards, reverb cards become stronger when they are replayed (and extremely weak early game). Atm the upped version is the only reverb card that allows you to replay it without loosing a card draw because of it and pays for itself after 2 uses. So this is a card that permanently buffs all reverb cards every turn while eventually giving more quanta than it costs.
It would seem that reverb cards are supposed to be played in a rainbow ( in "tha Deck"-style with sundials to stop the bleed in early game where reverb cards are next to useless and the upped version is effectively cheaper (QT>any other pillar)). All the reverb cards I've seen are too slow too use in duos and monos effectively, but a rainbow like that can work.

Potential problems:
-Soul catcher-syndrome: The card isnt very strong on its own and encourages basing most of your quantabase on a few copies making bad draws likely and PC deadly.
- Niche card: It's either reasonable (or op) in reverb decks or useless in general (This applies to all reverb cards really)
- Upped only: strong snowball effect, cost effectively nothing to increase reverb counter by 1 and gain a lot of quanta (at first I thought the effect cost nothing and was going to suggest to make it scale with 1N only, but this is fine)
- Unupped only: I think its too weak; you really want quanta production to happen early game and cards like nova and immolation are intended for fast decks, which remotely fair reverb decks simply wont be, as these cards are necessarily stronger in late game (besides this card requires an extra turn and can be countered by PC). Increase it to give N+2 (3 on first use) or more. Most of the time its also a really bad topdeck, since lategame you usually have enough quanta (remember all the games you needed any non-pillar card to gain the advantage? I don't it's too many), and it will happen again and again if you use the ability (you can play it and not use the effect to increase reverb counter).

Btw which cards are valid targets for the ability? I suppose permanents and creatures on either side of the board are a no-brainer, but what about other cards and cards in your hand (or by extension your opponents hand  ).

P.S.: A series where cards become stronger the more of its kind are left in the deck could be interesting too.

[OdinVanguard]

Thanks for the input.

I have updated to hopefully make the cards a little less situational.

The unupgraded is buffed to produce N+4 quanta.
This is based off of considering unupped nova and quantum pillars. Since normal pillars produce 1 quanta while quantum pillars produce 3 at random. So, since this is, at first, like a delayed nova except focused, I reason that 4 (12/3 = 4) is reasonable as a start.

The upgraded version then, is based off this as well, except the net of +4 comes at a buyin of 2 . Note that it now produces N+6 instead of 2N so, like the unupped version, it is still somewhat useful early on, but will now remain comparable in production potential late game.

[kaempfer13]

isn't N at 1 already when you play the card (before you use the ability)? Upped is too strong now, being replayable each turn (without losing a draw) is a huge deal in reverb decks and its effective growth is the same as before when I already considered it a useable card. (Also it acts more like a super pillar with some cost and 1 turn delay, but consistent output each turn; dev costs 2 for sth slightly better than 2 pillars) I actually kinda liked how it's ability had  cost that scaled with N, it allowed some interesting synergy with QT where you could play an expensive card of an element of your choice while compensating for the cost with elements that you may not need right now.

[OdinVanguard]

N would start at zero because reverb is worded as: "Reverb: n = number of reverb cards played before this one."
So when you play the first reverb card in a game then there would be 0 reverb cards played before it...
I suppose it could start at one though. I actually like that a little better but the wording just barely fits right now...

The idea is that 'n' is internal to each reverb card and gets assigned statically when that card is played. So the only way to get a better value is to play it again... hence why reverb cards all have a mechanism of going back to the player's hand or deck.

The unupped I think i have down right now... the upped I'm still working on though. I can revert to old version if that one seems like a better fit.

[kaempfer13]

Well, I think its slightly less confusing if N was a global variable that increases by 1 after a reverb card leaves the hand, and each time an effect with N in it triggers the current N will be taken (though this may be a bit confusing with the  card). From a programmers perspective it would be annoying to store a different variable for each card like this (not difficult just annoying), and if a player uses multiple copies of this card they(and their opponent) would want to know hom much quanta each of them gives without having to memorize a different value for each (on most other reverb cards its immediately visible and you can of course replace N in the card text with its value at the time). It can make a small difference in playorder (not sure if for better or worse and if its more or less strategic than before). Thats a minor thing though and just like my opinion.
And I want to get back at upped being op, I think its ability should cost N and give N+4 quanta. (making it a triple pillar that increases N by 1 each turn, is delayed for one turn and can convert quanta).
Also clarify the targeting of the ability pls.

[OdinVanguard]

Okay, targetting first. My idea as I was building this was that it would function the same way as 'quantum locket' (currently in cygnia and OEtG). IRC quantum locket can target any card in play or in either player's hand. It should be straightforward, flexible, and intuitive for this card to do the same then.

As for the implementation of reverb, I am fine with what you propose too. Having it draw from a single global variable. As long as this is not too counter intuitive from a player perspective... again, as much as it sucks, there just isn't much wiggle room for tweaking the wording on the card... it just barely fits into its two lines of text space right now.

Now for handling the upped... If the ability costs N and gives N+4 then the relative payoff decreases each time it is used. E.g. the ratio of the net quanta gain relative to the input quanta asymptotically approaches zero... So basically, as it gets used more, it becomes more of a converter and reverb pump rather than an actual quanta source... in a sense then, it looses utility as more reverb is played.

While I'm not 100% against having a reverb card that starts good and tapers off, I'm wondering if players will find this worth the price of an upgrade or not...