Card Design: An attempt at a comprehensive guide (A community effort I hope)

[OldTrees]

I think that a good estimate for k is 0 quanta for unupped creatures, and something between 1 and 1.5 for upped creatures (i.e. upgrade accounts for a -1 to -1.5 cost reduction, and no change to the base formula).

I do not see how k=0 would make sense. (although it would be easier) k=.5|2 would be ideal in my opinion. It takes the detail into account but in a reasonable minor way. This would also allow a precognitive creature to be balanced at 0|1.5.

[Zaealix]

Hrm... Perhaps this is not the place to bring it up, but there appears to be little to no attempt at spell theory. Seeing as you two have creature theory well covered (in other words, I would need a good deal of time to develop the knowledge of the subject.) I would like to begin attempting to cover a spell theory, of sorts. Any information you have gathered to this end might help accelerate this process, though I think I should also try and start from ground zero, so I don't shoot forward and then stall.

[doublecross]

We have tackled spell theory before, but most of our work isn't on this thread, for reasons unknown.

[OldTrees]

@Zaealix
Thank you for your future attempt

Spell Theory as of now:

Cards cost Xquanta + Y cards.
Precognition costs: 2 +0cards = cost 2
Reverse time costs: 2 +1card = cost 3
A theoretical Precogntion/Reverse Time hybrid would cost around 5 =5 +0cards

However the "draw a card" effect should be almost never used.

3damage bolts = 2vampirism bolts = 2damage +freezing bolts

However no patterns have yet been seen between Reverse Time and Lightning.

[doublecross]

Also, cards that randomly select effects are cheaper than the average individual cost of the different effects, especially if what the different effects are are significantly different.

[Zaealix]

Hrm...So basically, Chaos seed, which costs 1 is cheaper than the spells it generates, but you can't guess what's coming to compensate.
Panedemonium, 3 unupped, 5 upped, uses some sort of 'die roll' to determine if a creature gets hit with a 'Chaos' effect. The increased cost is from not targeting your own creatures with effects that, more likely than not, are harmful.
and the ,  , and bolts all mesh with each other.
For a pattern between Reverse Time and Lightning...Hrm, I came up with the idea that Reverse time basically multiplies the cost of any card it's used on, and removes all buffs/debuffs...While Lightning stands as a way to simply destroy the creature, freeing up any quanta it's abilites use, but removing the creature and setting back the TTW for that deck by how much damage potential was lost. Almost metagamish to try and figure that one out...

[OldTrees]

Panda hits all target creatures with a chaos effect.

[Zaealix]

Hrm...Ok, so far, here's what I have in mind for spells. All spells have a maximum application and a minimum application.
Basically, how much they can do to how much they will do. For example, Fire Bolt is 2 quanta, and has a minimum application of 3 damage to target.
The maximum is technically unlimited, but let's say 520 damage to target, since that's the current maximum HP anyone can have (barring the spell-reflecting shields, there is no reason to not hit your opponent with an attack that is that powerful) Or to use a trickier example, Thunderstorm is 2 quanta, and does 1 damage to all enemy creatures. Minimum application is 1 damage to 0 target(s), while the maximum would be hitting X(being the max number of creatures you can have out.)
For buff/debuff spells, I'm going to springboard off of your earlier discussion of Power/Resilliance. Blessing, for example, gives a creature +3+3, increasing both it's power, and resilliance. Liquid shadow, gives the creature the vampirism ability, which can increase the TTW of your opponent, while placing a flat limit on it's resilliance (That one's a metagamer).
If we judge spells as thus, we should be able to get a good idea of the base value of a spell, without having to consider the cards they are used on.(Using deflageration on a bone shield to using it on a Gravity shield)

[OldTrees]

For bolts the amount of reserve quanta can be used as another type of a cost

The min/ave/max situation is useful but there is a threshold below which the card will not be played. However that threshold is cost/benefit dependent

Also as Fruit connoisseurs we need to be able to compare apples to oranges.

[Zaealix]

Ah, so apples to oranges? Well now, for CC to buffs, we have increasing a friendly creatures resiliance, to decreasing(or one might say, fufilling) an enemy creature's resiliance. There is also increasing a Creature's power, or decreasing an enemy creature's power (Note that killing a creature is seperate from debuffing it's attack potential) There are also more unusual spells, like Quint, which sends resiliance through the roof via rendering all CC but attack shields useless. Momentum I would describe as a Power booster, but it can improve Resiliance via immunity to shields...But one of the nastier ones to compare are the unpredictable Spells, Momentum, Chaos Seed and Power, and it's AOE cousin Panda. So basically, any spell that makes it harder to kill a creature, whether by improving it's HP, or granting it immunity, is a Resiliance booster. Any spell that makes a creature more able to kill people, is a Power Booster. A spell that makes it harder for a creature to kill you, is a TTW reducer for your opponent/Power reducer. And attack spells that kill enemy creatures or sets them up for dying, is a Resiliance reducer. And if the spell only applies to the opponent's life, it is a TTW booster (or maybe part of the TTW formula?)

[OldTrees]

That is a good start.

Is there a way to add a quantitative aspect (cost calculations/comparisons) to these qualitative assertions?

[Zaealix]

Err yes...But I'd work by using existing spells, and the applications of this data to real suggestions would take time and effort. I think I maybe over my head on this...Then again, maybe it's not as clunky as I'm imagining (having to look over every existing spell in Elements before being able to properly compare X spell.)