Unwritten Rules

[Scaredgirl]

I was just saying that he probably felt defensive about his ideas because in the first few replies, people were saying that his "unwritten rules" were mostly wrong.

Yes, this was most definitely what happened. But that's how forums work, people post ideas, everyone talks about them. There are no "unwritten forum rules" that prohibits us from speaking when we feel something is wrong. Anyone who only wants positive feedback should never post on a public forum.

If you read what Essence said, it's easy to understand what he meant.
"No cards that kill a creature without taking it's HP into account on some level"

Don't concentrate on the first part of the rule. It's the last part that's the key. He's saying:

There can be instant-kill cards IF they they HP into consideration.
There cannot be instant-kill cards that DON'T take HP in consideration.

And that second part is wrong because we have those. A better version of that rule would be:
"No cards that instantly kill any creature without any limitations or preexisting effects."

This would be much better because it basically says: "Instant-kill cards are easily overpowered so don't use them without some limitations" which is helpful to understand when designing cards. However even that rule doesn't work because of Mutation because Mutations kills everybody.

And mutation isn't a direct kill spell because it has a good chance to create an abomination or sometimes a mutant. A shockwave requires a combination of cards to instantly kill a creature and mutation doesn't always entirely kill them and can even be used to improve your own creatures. For these reasons, the cards aren't quite like an instant kill spell.

I've heard this one before. Sure, Mutation doesn't "kill" a creature, it only changes it, right? Wrong.

When a Photon gets mutated into a Golden Dragon, you think it's still the same Photon inside? You think it has the same hopes and dreams as that original Photon did? I don't know about that, maybe these creatures have a soul, but it makes no difference in this game.

When we talk about gameplay, Mutation simply kills the creature, then creates a new one to replace it. There's nothing left of the original creature, and what the creature originally was, had no effect in what the new creature is like. How can that not be classified as killing?

Lets say we have 2 cards.

Card A: Kill target creature
Card B: Transform target creature into a Photon

Card A is clearly an instant-kill card, but card B isn't? Think about it.

... an element of chance, which is only seen in mutation so far and is unlikely to be used in any non-entropy card, and since it is already on an entropy card, it seems unlikely that it would be used on another entropy card in fear of that card being too similar to mutation.

Fallen Elf has the Mutation ability. Exactly the same as the card.

[midg3333]

If you read what Essence said, it's easy to understand what he meant.
"No cards that kill a creature without taking it's HP into account on some level"

Don't concentrate on the first part of the rule. It's the last part that's the key. He's saying:

There can be instant-kill cards IF they they HP into consideration.
There cannot be instant-kill cards that DON'T take HP in consideration.

And that second part is wrong because we have those. A better version of that rule would be:
"No cards that instantly kill any creature without any limitations or preexisting effects."

I am aware that the original post wasn't entirely correct in the wording. I agree with your version.

I've heard this one before. Sure, Mutation doesn't "kill" a creature, it only changes it, right? Wrong.

When a Photon gets mutated into a Golden Dragon, you think it's still the same Photon inside? You think it has the same hopes and dreams as that original Photon did? I don't know about that, maybe these creatures have a soul, but it makes no difference in this game.

When we talk about gameplay, Mutation simply kills the creature, then creates a new one to replace it. There's nothing left of the original creature, and what the creature originally was, had no effect in what the new creature is like. How can that not be classified as killing?

Fallen Elf has the Mutation ability. Exactly the same as the card.

While i agree that mutation does effectively remove the targeted card from the game, it does give a reimbursement (doubt i spelled it right  ). In terms of things like bone wall and scavenger, a mutated creature also doesn't count as a casualty, but that is just a random technical game thing, so i'm not actually too worried about that. That being said, mutation isn't as good as a true "instant kill" card in most cases when targeting an enemy creature and is nowhere near as bad as an instant kill card when targeting your own creatures (assuming you targeted a weak creature  . Pretty much, I would classify an instant kill card as something that had mutation's effect but without the creation of a mutant/abomination. If you don't feel the same way, that's fine, but no amount of arguing is going to change anybody's opinion on this matter, so i'll stop here.

Oh and as for fallen elf/druid, they have the ability "mutation" as you said. Most spells do have a creature that can 'cast that spell' once per turn and mutation is no exception. When I say that there won't be a card with a similar ability to mutation, I was talking about something that wasn't exactly the same, but had that killing effect included in it. If that was too confusing, I meant something like chaos seed having a chance to instant-kill something, although the more i think about it, the more it seems possible that chaos seed could actually incorporate that effect without becoming OP.

[miniwally]

I've heard this one before. Sure, Mutation doesn't "kill" a creature, it only changes it, right? Wrong.

When a Photon gets mutated into a Golden Dragon, you think it's still the same Photon inside? You think it has the same hopes and dreams as that original Photon did? I don't know about that, maybe these creatures have a soul, but it makes no difference in this game.

When we talk about gameplay, Mutation simply kills the creature, then creates a new one to replace it. There's nothing left of the original creature, and what the creature originally was, had no effect in what the new creature is like. How can that not be classified as killing?

Lets say we have 2 cards.

Card A: Kill target creature
Card B: Transform target creature into a Photon

Card A is clearly an instant-kill card, but card B isn't? Think about it.

Well I believe that this spark still has the same hopes and dreams as he did when he was a pest but now he had to live alone as an outcast http://elementscommunity.org/forum/index.php/topic,5549.0.html

BTW Druid doesn't have the mutation ability it has the improve ability which gives no chance of turning it into an abomination or dying it just mutates it.

[Scaredgirl]

BTW Druid doesn't have the mutation ability it has the improve ability which gives no chance of turning it into an abomination or dying it just mutates it.

It's not "Improve", it's "Improved Mutation". It says "Improve" on the creature because there's no room for "Improved Mutation".

Looking at those cards, it's clearly the same effect because even the name is identical. Only difference is that Improved Mutation creates and elite creature while Druid doesn't, and that is to prevent having only one upped card in your deck which you could use to create an army of upped creatures.

[miniwally]

Well it still seemed to me that he was saying druid /improved mutation can kill creatures.

[Lanidrak]

Okay, I'm jumping in a bit late to this whole disagreement / argument / issue here. But what the hell.

To take it back to Essences original point about unwritten rules.

I think it is valuable to think of some aspects of card design as non-progressive and think of an unwritten rule against these ideas. Sure, a Graveyard has been suggested in the past, it is a core feature that the game is missing on some levels, but, if we had an unwritten rule against it - it would stop a lot of new posts coming to the Idea's Section and writing their amazing dream of a Graveyard function. Something which a lot of us older forum members have known and heard about countless occasions in the past.

The point about 'instant kill cards' - sure they do exist, and one that ScaredGirl forgot to mention was Paradox. It does take hitpoints into account, but only if the creatures attack is higher. That will instantly kill a creature of 200 hit points, if it has 201 attack points. Now, the point I'm making here is, that 'instant kill cards' DO exist. But, for the most part they are easily forgotten about. See my example with paradox. Mutation has a very low chance, I think it is 10% to kill a creature. Shockwave, sure it instantly kills a creature if it meets the criteria of being frozen.

To many new and old people of the forums, you say 'instant kill cards' and they DON'T think of Paradox, Shockwave or Mutation. They think of things like:
1. Finger of Death - Deal 500 damage to target creature. 12
2. Reaper's Scythe - Kill Target Creature (regardless if it is immortal or not) 10
3. Total Annihilation - Kill all creatures in play. Cost 20

Or any other variation of this theme. We have a lot of new people coming to this forum, and let's be honest, they see the Idea's section and think 'I HAVE AN IDEA' and rush off, new topic, submit... It does annoy me on some level to STILL, consistently see poorly thought out, bland and unoriginal ideas being posted. It is a common fact about forums, that people rarely (if ever) use the Search feature to check if their idea has already been submitted. Instead they post their ideas and say sorry.

What would be really good is if we had the member-base, activity and commitment, to assign a handful of Forum Members to some sort of post which filters through ALL NEW posted Idea's, and anything that fails to meet certain criteria is simply not added to the board. Instead, the originator of the idea is messaged, informing him that this post 'quoted' lacks the criteria to be on the Idea's section, please fix it if they want to have their idea posted.

But the truth is, we don't have the resources to assign people to this mammoth task. Instead we simply  have every tom, dick and harry putting their scrambled thoughts and garbage (sometimes) on to the Ideas section. And, in this sense, I feel some sort of unwritten rules will be beneficial - not so much as to hinder a poster's creativity, but to cut down on the number of 'Forum Veterans' who get angry, and leave comments which stray far from the constructive - just because the idea is of a Graveyard, or an Instant Kill card, or poorly written/thought out.

Anyways, that's my two cents on the matter. I don't care who is wrong or right on this, whether ScaredGirl was harsh in her admonishment of Essence, or if Essences 'Unwritten Rules' were too stringent. What truly matters is that we have a discussion that leads to the forum being improved!

Peace out!

[Scaredgirl]

Anyways, that's my two cents on the matter. I don't care who is wrong or right on this..

Well, I do. Truth and facts are what we are supposed to find out here. If we start banning negative feedback and opposing opinions, then what's the whole point of posting and getting feedback? Making egos bigger?

If a person disagrees with "unwritten rules" (or any other theories posted on this forum), he or she has the right to say that. Simple as that. If everyone just says "great idea!" to each thread, nothing ever gets better and everything stays the same.

A lot of people see having opposing opinions and theories as something highly negative like "bashing" or "arguing". That's pretty ridiculous. It's called a discussion, and that's how ideas get improved in real life, and on forums.

If you want something where you get an idea and it stays the same until the end of time and you can never question it, we already have that. It's called religion.

The point about 'instant kill cards' - sure they do exist, and one that ScaredGirl forgot to mention was Paradox. It does take hitpoints into account, but only if the creatures attack is higher. That will instantly kill a creature of 200 hit points, if it has 201 attack points. Now, the point I'm making here is, that 'instant kill cards' DO exist. But, for the most part they are easily forgotten about. See my example with paradox. Mutation has a very low chance, I think it is 10% to kill a creature. Shockwave, sure it instantly kills a creature if it meets the criteria of being frozen.

I didn't forget Paradox. I didn't mention it because it's one of the cards/abilities where Essence's "unwritten rules" are absolutely correct because it instantly kills a character BUT it takes HP into consideration, just like Essence said.

It's cards like Mutation and Shockwave where the unwritten rule fails. The "improved version" of that rule I mentioned earlier takes care of all three.

[Essence]

I love the fact that the one rule SG is going off about is the one rule that I DID actually get directly from a conversation with Zanzarino.

That said, I don't care about your reasoning one whit.  Turning a Photon into a Wyrm is not killing it, it's turning it into something else.  There is no death, because it doesn't trigger Vultures, Boneyards, or Bone Walls.  Period. 

Shockwave I've already discussed.  Zanzarino told me outright that kill-spells that didn't take HP into account were a no-no.  He apparently believes that Shockwave is complex enough and difficult enough to pull off that it is allowed a unique exception to that rule -- but that doesn't mean that the rule isn't still firmly in place in Zanz' mind. 

And that's really the point of the whole thread -- if you can figure out what unspoken ideas are in Zanz's head and work around them, you'll be better off in terms of meaningfully contributing to the game.  Anyone getting caught up in any more detail than that has missed the entire point.

[Scaredgirl]

I love the fact that the one rule SG is going off about is the one rule that I DID actually get directly from a conversation with Zanzarino.

If you read my posts, I actually pointed out flaws in many of your "rules", not just that one.

I don't know what Zanz has said, but I'm pretty sure the case here is that he simply nerfed an overpowered card, and you assumed that was some kind of "unwritten rule" against instant kill cards. I'm sorry but it doesn't work like that. What Zanz is looking for is game balance, not some weird stubborn rule that instant kill cards are a no-no. And it's this same game balance which is the reason why you don't see that many instant kill cards.

And here's the funny part: what Zanz said is actually irrelevant. Crazy huh? It's irrelevant because there are cards that kill instantly which proves there is no "unwritten rule" against that, or if there is, it's can be easily broken.

[Essence]

At this point, everyone understands both of our points, and they've already decided who they agree with.  There is no point to continuing this "conversation".

[Scaredgirl]

At this point, everyone understands both of our points, and they've already decided who they agree with.  There is no point to continuing this "conversation".

There's the problem. You see this as a competition where we both have an opinion and then we try to get people to "join our side" and the one who gets more votes, "wins". I don't see it that way.

These are only theories we talk about here. In the world of science, scientists have different theories, discuss about them, tweak them, make them better. They don't make up a theories and just hold on to them without admitting even the possibility of being wrong. I think you have more of a "religious" way of defending your ideas which makes this discussion almost impossible.

I have an aggressive style of posting because I'm used to saying what I mean. If I disagree with something, I'm going to say it without sugarcoating it. I prefer this type of posting because not only it helps make theories better by giving honest feedback, it also means that when I say something positive, the person will know I really mean it. If this offends you, I apologize. My goal is never to bash members, and what I say should never be taken personally.

I've said my piece and added a couple of new things in this list of "unwritten rules". Now I am going to move on to other things and other threads.

[Lanidrak]

Mental note to self: Unwritten Rule #1: Never get into an argument with Essence or ScaredGirl.