Concept - Alternate upgrades

[jazzfan27]

So, I was thinking maybe it would be fun to have an alternate upgrade card.  When you upgrade you get the standard upgrade 90% of the time and the alternate upgrade 10% of the time.

The idea wouldn't be a super-upgrade, but an alternate one.

For instance,

NAME: Golden Hourglass ELEMENT: Time COST: 4 TYPE: Permanent ATK|HP: TEXT: : Hasten Draw a card from your deck.	NAME: Enchanted Hourglass ELEMENT: Time COST: 4 TYPE: Permanent ATK|HP: TEXT: :earth  : Hasten Draw a card from your deck. Immortal.

ART: IDEA: NOTES: SERIES:

What do you think?  Would you be interested in expanding the card pool in this way?

[dragonsdemesne]

Well, that's an interesting way of doing things... I've seen places where people have suggested a second upgrade for things, but it was always shot down on the basis of being overpowered.  (I mean, how much more efficient can you make something like Damselfly or Thunderbolt?  3/3 for 0, or a 7 damage spell or something? :p )

This would give people another task to work on in the endgame when they are near a trainer edition.  Mind you, they could just keep buying and selling the 90% standard upgrades until they got the 10% one, but it would still take a lot of electrum to do.

[russianspy1234]

oh god the shrieker rushes...

[jawdirk]

I think this would be cool, but it would be better if you could choose which upgrade to get. The upgrades should take the card in different directions so that different decks would use the card depending on how it was upgraded.

[ZephyrPhantom]

For reference:
Alternate Story Series
The Underground Upgrade (Series)

Game-wise, note that alternate upgrades will usually only introduce half as many options as a normal card with an upgrade. (An alternate upgrade technically introduces only 1 'variant' while a normal card can introduce 2 'variants' on the same card, unupped and upped.) 

Like dragonsdemense mentioned, though, it does provide more endgame focus than a normal card would. Choosing an upgrade would be better in this case IMHO - making it chance-based just makes it more grindy and can disrupt newbies who want a certain 'variant' of the upgrade.

[moomoose]

a while ago i made a similar topic, dont recall it getting very far though.  i see z's point, and agree to an extent, but to me the bigger issue is that it seems more like an elements 2 concept than something that would just be patched in.  conceptually, i love the idea of having choices to tailor cards to your preference, but i havent gotten the impression that zanz is willing to implement such a dramatic update.

[Drake_XIV]

I'll move this to Design theory for the time being.  This seems to fit more in GS&F though.