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Introduction
Welcome to the first community project (may be referred to as CP) for Elements Cygnia (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/card-ideas-and-art/elements-cygnia-elements-the-game-with-your-card-ideas!/)! This will be a group effort, and anybody can join in. However, it is highly suggested to already have some knowledge regarding card designing and balance. And without further ado, let's begin!
The subject for this project is Implementing Field Manipulation series into Cygnia.
Goals:
- Identify what field manipulation exactly is and which cards already in game fit the description
- Discuss/debate some exact details such as:
- How many cards will be in this series (Will it be one for every element? Will some elements get two while others get zero? Would there be a total of twenty four and two for each element? How would we factor in elements that already have field manipulators?)
- Will there be any "archtypes" (i.e. will some cards have almost identical effects but have different elements and themes? Or will every single card be completely new and novel?)
- How should we decide how many creatures, spells, and permanents there will be (or how should we split them at least)
- Design a series that uses our definition of field manipulation and fills in the gap that Elements currently has in that area
I believe that should cover what this CP is about. If I have forgotten anything, please let me know (or any of the Card Curators).
Now, let's start off with the first goal:
Decide how many cards will be in this series and how we'll spread them among the twelve elements.
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Flooding definitely falls under this category, but of other cards I'm not sure.
Cloak does affect the field (1 side anyway).
Sundial does affect every creature in play.
Nightfall does affect all :death and :darkness creatures on both sides.
These would be my first guesses for already existing (semi)Field Manipulation cards.
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Flooding definitely falls under this category, but of other cards I'm not sure.
Cloak does affect the field (1 side anyway).
Sundial does affect every creature in play.
Nightfall does affect all :death and :darkness creatures on both sides.
These would be my first guesses for already existing (semi)Field Manipulation cards.
Ah, that brings up the question of whether or not "realm" cards would fit under what we want to define field manipulation as.
I personally think not, since they affect all field slots the same, so positioning doesn't matter. But that's another thing to discuss: would this be better named as "field positioning" rather than "field manipulation"?
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At the most basic level, Field Manipulation can be split into these groups:
A) Cards that alter slots on the field. (Flooding).
B) Cards that move creatures between slots. (none currently ingame)
C) Cards that change based on the current 'state' of a slot(s).
Cards from group B are generally harder to implement because they are reliant on cards from group A - as a result, group B cards usually have to have some kind of beneficial effect for moving creatures to a different slot. For example, Grappling Hook (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/card-ideas-and-art/grappling-hook-grappling-hook/) rewards moving creatures around by giving the moved creatures evasion. I'd also like to mention Acheron (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/card-ideas-and-art/acheron-acheron/) as an attempt to create an example from group C.
While we could include Eclipse and other mass-buff effects, I feel they stray too far from the original mechanic that we're trying to make more prominent here. To be honest, the current title might actually a bit of a misnomer - "Slot Manipulation" might actually be more fitting.
One other point I'd like to bring up - CI&A usually gets slot-altering cards for creatures but never gets slot altering cards for permanents. We should explore this at some point.
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I've done a few ideas that messes with the field or take location into account.
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I've done a few ideas that messes with the field or take location into account.
Were you also the one who created/made art for that "Aflatoxin for permanents" idea? If yes to either that would be a pretty good example to link here.
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There's also spells and abilities that can specifically target a slot, even if it doesn't have anything in it.
(http://i.imgur.com/SMrQVdQ.png)
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(at work so I have to be brief)
While the goals listed in the OP are a great model for adding an independent series (like Nymphs/Shards/Weapons) into the game, I don't think step 1(looking at the past) is enough preparation for step 2(counting number of additions) for the kind of thing we are trying to add here.
I think we need to not only identify what field manipulation is(and related effects like creature movement that enable the addition of field manipulation) we also need to decide how far to go and when to stop.
For example: How can/will a vanilla photon move? Will it remain unable to move? Will it be allowed to move up a row(up left or up right)? Will it be allowed to move 1 tile any direction?
As for me field manipulation includes(but I am being brief so I might forget things):
Limited movement(up only seems best to me right now) for basic creatures which increased the design freedom for -> Mobile creatures
Effects with area-
Creatures with auras
Spells that hit areas(the smallest non trivial hexagon is good)
Terrain features(can be as small as a single hex or larger) which also imply things to mobile creatures
Formations(Probably by creatures with a guardian ability)
(at home)
Ok. Now I can go into more detail as to the reasoning.
Imagine we wanted to add cards that enabled creature movement and add cards that were balanced around creature movement. Not every deck would include the "move creature" cards. If we wanted to include hostile cards that were balanced around our opponent being able to move their creatures, then we need our opponent to be able to move their creatures. This means 1 of 3 things, either creature moving cards become a card tax, we can't use hostile cards that interact with creature movement, or we need creatures to have some form of movement already.
Basically this kind of project runs into an inverted form of the forced combo problem(the ___ tax problem) when trying to explore its possibility space. As a result we have to make decisions about how much to explore our possibility space(creating ___ tax problems to resolve) and how much of our possibility space to ignore(to avoid the kinds of resolutions necessary for those problems).
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Excelent idea. Someone has to list the CIA threads with the proposed cards
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or we need creatures to have some form of movement already.
Smaller field manipulation concepts - eg "Move this creature one position to the left" - would be so negligible that a spell card to do this would surely just take up space in a deck. Having six "Move the target into an adjacent position" in your deck would be six spaces that you can't use for other cards - and they're so underpowered! And because field manipulation is so non-widespread (currently), chances are that having these cards as a defence strategy would be useless, because there would be so few decks to which field manipulation actually matters.
So what if instead, every creature has a base ability (or rather, the field has an ability) that each creature costs, say, 2 :rainbow to move to an adjacent position? Or if we say that :chroma is the element in which most of the field-manipulation cards are, then it costs 2 :chroma. So rather than having cards to move, it's already built-in. Perhaps there would be cards to enable creatures to travel further per turn, or teleport, or things like that.
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or we need creatures to have some form of movement already.
Smaller field manipulation concepts - eg "Move this creature one position to the left" - would be so negligible that a spell card to do this would surely just take up space in a deck. Having six "Move the target into an adjacent position" in your deck would be six spaces that you can't use for other cards - and they're so underpowered! And because field manipulation is so non-widespread, chances are that having these cards would be useless, because there would be so few decks to which field manipulation actually matters.
So what if instead, every creature has a base ability (or rather, the field has an ability) that each creature costs, say, 2 :rainbow to move to an adjacent position? Or if we say that :chroma is the element in which most of the field-manipulation cards are, then it costs 2 :chroma. So rather than having cards to move, it's already built-in. Perhaps there would be cards to enable creatures to travel further per turn, or teleport, or things like that.
The entire purpose of this CP is to address that problem you mentioned. It was to solve the cycle of the CIA that goes like:
1. Card is irrelevant because there aren't enough relevant cards in game
2. Card doesn't get in game due to irrelevancy, meaning that there won't be any relevant cards anytime soon
Also, a card that was like "Move to an adjacent slot" as it's ability would be UP if it weren't for the nature of this CP. The point is to introduce many cards to make it not UP. Think like Vulture. Vulture would be a useless card if it weren't for cards that also surrounded death effects like Schrodinger's Cat, Boneyard, Bonewall, etc.
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But having a "Move one position" card still means that you can only move creatures six times per game, which might not be enough against decks with lots of FM-based CC. Having creatures/permanents with abilities that move other creatures would be an obvious solution, but FM-CC might necessitate adding movement cards into decks which have no defence against them, which could break that deck.
Having said that, it's very easy to poison and much harder to get rid of poison, and no one complains about that. So maybe it's not as much of a problem as I'm speculating.
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But having a "Move one position" card still means that you can only move creatures six times per game, which might not be enough against decks with lots of FM-based CC. Having creatures/permanents with abilities that move other creatures would be an obvious solution, but FM-CC might necessitate adding movement cards into decks which have no defence against them, which could break that deck.
Having said that, it's very easy to poison and much harder to get rid of poison, and no one complains about that. So maybe it's not as much of a problem as I'm speculating.
Good explanation of the problem. While we could add "move one position" cards and add enough forced combos with it so that we don't feel like it is a forced combo problem, this only addresses the constructive/friendly/helpful side of cards. If we use this, or any similar "add these N cards" solution for creature movement then destructive/hostile/harmful position related effects would be too strong against decks that don't include these creature movement cards. So either we limit our choices to the constructive/friendly/helpful side of cards or we need a solution with stronger design potential.
(While it is hard to get rid of poison, several elements directly combat it. That makes it similar but still significantly different from the potential potential this project has in the way of destructive/hostile/harmful position related effects)
As for your 2:move 1 idea, I think that is too much movement(it is move T hexes) since it makes it too hard to add creatures that are specialized in movement. That is why I suggested upward movement(0-2 hexes) so we could have especially mobile creatures(new cards) that could move 1/turn(T hexes)
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I don't know if this is the kind of thing your looking for, but here it is.
http://elementscommunity.org/forum/card-ideas-and-art/sinkhole-sinkhole/msg437726/#msg437726
http://elementscommunity.org/forum/card-ideas-and-art/freedom-liberty/msg438100/#msg438100
http://elementscommunity.org/forum/card-ideas-and-art/seeding-the-field-seeding-the-field/msg434866/#msg434866
http://elementscommunity.org/forum/level-1-crucible/unbound-unbound/msg1016538/#msg1016538
http://elementscommunity.org/forum/level-1-crucible/diversity-diversity/msg1019282/#msg1019282
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I don't know if this is the kind of thing your looking for, but here it is.
http://elementscommunity.org/forum/card-ideas-and-art/sinkhole-sinkhole/msg437726/#msg437726
I will post others here as I find them.
Your ideas are lovely (I really like the Sinkhole idea, although I'd say that an interesting spin on it would be to have it give 100% chance to burrow rather than instakill, but I digress), but right now we're defining and identifying "field manipulation", as shown in the yellow text in the OP (although the OP may change according to OT's observations). So these should probably be saved for a later "designing phase".
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Sorry for double post, but I feel that this deserves a little bumpity bump.
Does anybody have an idea for a nice, concise wording for field manipulation?
At the most basic level, I think it can be cut down to something like "field manipulation is making use of the position of creatures on the field".
At the most basic level, Field Manipulation can be split into these groups:
A) Cards that alter slots on the field. (Flooding).
B) Cards that move creatures between slots. (none currently ingame)
C) Cards that change based on the current 'state' of a slot(s).
I believe this is the best description so far (probably also since it's one of the only posts describing field manipulation in this manner).
So that's that.
Also, I'd like to go back to something OT said earlier.. let me dig it up..
(at work so I have to be brief)
While the goals listed in the OP are a great model for adding an independent series (like Nymphs/Shards/Weapons) into the game, I don't think step 1(looking at the past) is enough preparation for step 2(counting number of additions) for the kind of thing we are trying to add here.
I think we need to not only identify what field manipulation is(and related effects like creature movement that enable the addition of field manipulation) we also need to decide how far to go and when to stop.
For example: How can/will a vanilla photon move? Will it remain unable to move? Will it be allowed to move up a row(up left or up right)? Will it be allowed to move 1 tile any direction?
As for me field manipulation includes(but I am being brief so I might forget things):
Limited movement(up only seems best to me right now) for basic creatures which increased the design freedom for -> Mobile creatures
Effects with area-
Creatures with auras
Spells that hit areas(the smallest non trivial hexagon is good)
Terrain features(can be as small as a single hex or larger) which also imply things to mobile creatures
Formations(Probably by creatures with a guardian ability)
(at home)
Ok. Now I can go into more detail as to the reasoning.
Imagine we wanted to add cards that enabled creature movement and add cards that were balanced around creature movement. Not every deck would include the "move creature" cards. If we wanted to include hostile cards that were balanced around our opponent being able to move their creatures, then we need our opponent to be able to move their creatures. This means 1 of 3 things, either creature moving cards become a card tax, we can't use hostile cards that interact with creature movement, or we need creatures to have some form of movement already.
Basically this kind of project runs into an inverted form of the forced combo problem(the ___ tax problem) when trying to explore its possibility space. As a result we have to make decisions about how much to explore our possibility space(creating ___ tax problems to resolve) and how much of our possibility space to ignore(to avoid the kinds of resolutions necessary for those problems).
Might it be a good idea to change the OP with a goal or two in between one and two?
I dunno what I'm doing, I'm just bringing up points for discussion (and also since they sorta need to be taken care of, but shh).
Also...
One other point I'd like to bring up - CI&A usually gets slot-altering cards for creatures but never gets slot altering cards for permanents. We should explore this at some point.
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Does anybody have an idea for a nice, concise wording for field manipulation?
At the most basic level, I think it can be cut down to something like "field manipulation is making use of/accounting for the position of creatures on the field".
Yes, that is a good description.
Also, I'd like to go back to something OT said earlier.. let me dig it up..
-snip-
Might it be a good idea to change the OP with a goal or two in between one and two?
Yes. Determining how far we are willing to go would fit nicely between 1 and 2.
As for permanents, I believe while we should focus on the creature zone(due to the potential for creature mobility) we can consider impact to the permanent zone.
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Considering this will require moving and knowing creature slots and maybe permanent slots, is there an image anywhere that shows the exact ordering for where creatures/permanents come out?
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Considering this will require moving and knowing creature slots and maybe permanent slots, is there an image anywhere that shows the exact ordering for where creatures/permanents come out?
I will make one soontm.
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Someone made one of these a long time ago. Someone with a better memory probably knows where it is.
EDIT:
found it in my PC
(http://i.imgur.com/88v9oee.png)
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*Bump*
So
1) Are there any more thoughts on what field manipulation is about?
2) How far are we going and where are we stopping?
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In case anyone is interested, there is already a small amount of headway in this area implemented in openEtG, the spell card "brawl" was put in recently. It causes the owner's creatures to "duel" creatures in opposing slots. E.g. each of the two dueling creatures attack the opposing duelist.
Any of the owner's creatures that do not have an opposing creature to duel end up attacking the opposing player instead.
Also, the implementation of the effect ends up re-readying the abilities of the attacking creatures.
I think something along that line could be very interesting to play with. While that may or may not fit rigorously into a field "manipulation" it would synnergise very well with field manipulation effects. Cards like that could be good as starting points to motivate players to start using field manipulation in decks.
(this also means that there would be some code base for implementing similar effects into cygnia when / if the cards make it that far)
Something else to think about is how to prevent flooding from being OP in combination with field effect manipulation. That seems to be a very common issue with cards that move creatures around the field.
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Something else to think about is how to prevent flooding from being OP in combination with field effect manipulation. That seems to be a very common issue with cards that move creatures around the field.
Two solutions I can think of:
-No new field manipulation cards for :water , forcing a duo with upkeep to use flooding.
-Limit how much you can modify the opponent field (euther by cost or flexibility) and be more flexible with how you modify your own field.
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For the Flooding issue, making the movement limited helps or the movement limitations limited. For example, instead of "move target creature to a new slot", it can be "target creature moves to a random adjacent slot" to prevent automatic movement into flooded slots. As for field limiters, I'd like to use my Meteorite card as an example. It's limited in how much it can impact the field.
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2) How far are we going and where are we stopping?
I know you've probably elaborated quite a bit on this, and I'm probably just being stupid and not realizing it, but could you elaborate on this?
Also, as far as I can tell, I think there really aren't that many limitations that we need to keep in mind. Just:
- No cards that have a mechanic like Flooding since it would partly rely on the opponent having FM cards of their own to not be OP
- No cards in Water to create the possibility of single element instakill of any targetable creature (besides Water ones, but that's not the point)
I mean, are there really any more besides obvious ones?
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2) How far are we going and where are we stopping?
I know you've probably elaborated quite a bit on this, and I'm probably just being stupid and not realizing it, but could you elaborate on this?
Also, as far as I can tell, I think there really aren't that many limitations that we need to keep in mind. Just:
- No cards that have a mechanic like Flooding since it would partly rely on the opponent having FM cards of their own to not be OP
- No cards in Water to create the possibility of single element instakill of any targetable creature (besides Water ones, but that's not the point)
I mean, are there really any more besides obvious ones?
The major limitation is "creatures do not move on their own, yet". This severely restricts hostile field manipulation(since card taxes are bad) unless we change creature mobility. Both sides have merits but we would need to decide on how far we want to go on this(including the option of status quo).
Flooding is related and will be similarly restrictive but less so than the general problem. It is more an example of how restrictive we would have to be if we avoid changing creatures.
There are other decisions to make as well(like how many effects can a tile have, and do we add more passives to existing creatures)
A different way of saying the same thing:
Field Manipulation is a new kind* of threat(what I will be talking about) and a new kind of boon(we can gloss past this for now). Unlike most existing threats, there is almost no way to combat this threat without reserving space for the boon half in your deck. we can choose to add this kind of threat(and thus require most decks have a way of dealing with it) or we can choose not to add this kind of threat. If we add this kind of threat, we can either just accept the card taxes(most decks would need field manipulation cards) or we can spread small countermeasures among a large number of existing cards(creating an alternative but weaker counter to this new threat).
Technically it is many different overlapping kinds of threats. We will see more as we go along. For now we see "move or be rendered irrelevant(flooded tiles, lava tiles, buried tiles, pacifism auras, grouped and fireball'd)". However there will also be other things like "killed by creatures/permanents/tiles I can't destroy since they are on my side".
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Perhaps refrain from hard control cards in this series? That would remove the whole "you must have some FM cards in your deck to stay viable" thing, and instead FM could be taken in a direction of how the Life element works as a whole: worry about your own creatures and basically ignore the opponent (although obviously, there'll likely be some soft control since many FM ideas tend to go towards control anyways).
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Perhaps refrain from hard control cards in this series? That would remove the whole "you must have some FM cards in your deck to stay viable" thing, and instead FM could be taken in a direction of how the Life element works as a whole: worry about your own creatures and basically ignore the opponent (although obviously, there'll likely be some soft control since many FM ideas tend to go towards control anyways).
The difference between Hard and Soft control(assuming you are referring to more than just mitigation effects) only matters when your opponent has access to the reversal effects. The reason both Hard/Soft CC can exist is that all decks can indirectly combat it. Hard/Soft Field Control does not have a indirect counter(besides adoption) yet.
So we have 3 2 kinds of options(2 since I am ignoring the "have card taxes" option). Either we can greatly restrict our design of this set, or we have to change the default creature's abilities. Both are valid options, but it is an choice/decision that will have to be made (and to that end we need people to actually voice their opinion).
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One simple way to introduce creature mobility would be to have a low cost :rainbow permanent that allowed players to choose the slot their creature(s) enter play in.
Its relatively cantrip / trick like in terms of the current meta, so it wouldn't be disruptive, but could be quite a useful utility for other field manipulation cards. As a :rainbow card it could also provide some moderate protection for non-field centric decks without adding a heavy "card tax" to do so.
Another useful ability to start with would be creatures that can move to a chosen slot and swap positions with the current occupant if one is present. If this ability is repeatable (a. la. rustler's photosynthesis ability) then a single slot swapper and a single "play creature to slot" permanent would be everything a deck would need to deftly make use of field based effects by optimizing their own creatures' positions on the field.
(http://i.imgur.com/TTTkbmM.png) (http://i.imgur.com/wanpp4z.png)
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One simple way to introduce creature mobility would be to have a low cost :rainbow permanent that allowed players to choose the slot their creature(s) enter play in.
Its relatively cantrip / trick like in terms of the current meta, so it wouldn't be disruptive, but could be quite a useful utility for other field manipulation cards. As a :rainbow card it could also provide some moderate protection for non-field centric decks without adding a heavy "card tax" to do so.
I think this could be optimized to be a really central card for this series. Perhaps we could make it so that it affects the entire field but also make it so that it's one of the main cards to combo with in the FM design (similar to how Schrodinger's Cat is the most commonly used card to combo with other death effect cards). That way, even if the opponent is unprepared for FM cards, they'll be able to still use FM to their advantage (or at least lessen their disadvantage) in most cases.
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One simple way to introduce creature mobility would be to have a low cost :rainbow permanent that allowed players to choose the slot their creature(s) enter play in.
Its relatively cantrip / trick like in terms of the current meta, so it wouldn't be disruptive, but could be quite a useful utility for other field manipulation cards. As a :rainbow card it could also provide some moderate protection for non-field centric decks without adding a heavy "card tax" to do so.
I think this could be optimized to be a really central card for this series. Perhaps we could make it so that it affects the entire field but also make it so that it's one of the main cards to combo with in the FM design (similar to how Schrodinger's Cat is the most commonly used card to combo with other death effect cards). That way, even if the opponent is unprepared for FM cards, they'll be able to still use FM to their advantage (or at least lessen their disadvantage) in most cases.
This set will be too large to center around a card or a few cards (similar to how death effects are not centered around Cat or Soul Catcher). So while those effects would be expected in the end set, we should not try to balance the set's boundaries by assuming they are in play.
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Alright, oh well.
Anyways, going to make a poll then to decide between the two choices OT said in this post:
The difference between Hard and Soft control(assuming you are referring to more than just mitigation effects) only matters when your opponent has access to the reversal effects. The reason both Hard/Soft CC can exist is that all decks can indirectly combat it. Hard/Soft Field Control does not have a indirect counter(besides adoption) yet.
So we have 3 2 kinds of options(2 since I am ignoring the "have card taxes" option). Either we can greatly restrict our design of this set, or we have to change the default creature's abilities. Both are valid options, but it is an choice/decision that will have to be made (and to that end we need people to actually voice their opinion).
So, any objections to this?
1. Greatly restrict the design of this series
2. Change the default creature's ability
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While I don't think we should have a "center" card for this series I would caution against limiting variety too much. I personally think it would be ideal if we focused on soft effects involving creature field movement only. Hard effects, Permanent Zone, Hand, and Deck Manipulation can be worked on at a later date.
Can someone clarify what the "default creature" is supposed to be? It appears to have just popped up out of nowhere and I suspect I've missed out on some kind of context regarding it.
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So, any objections to this?
1. Greatly restrict the design of this series
2. Change the default creature's ability
1. Avoid creature control effects
2. Give existing creatures some mobility
3? Other solution(specify)
While I don't think we should have a "center" card for this series I would caution against limiting variety too much. I personally think it would be ideal if we focused on soft effects involving creature field movement only. Hard effects, Permanent Zone, Hand, and Deck Manipulation can be worked on at a later date.
Can someone clarify what the "default creature" is supposed to be? It appears to have just popped up out of nowhere and I suspect I've missed out on some kind of context regarding it.
All decks that don't use these new cards use existing cards. Those decks that use creatures are using creatures that are not from these new cards. This is what I meant by a "default/base creature" (since it is a baseline from which especially mobile creatures would deviate from). One of the design challenges we are facing is that there is no existing counters to any CC/Control cards we add beyond those we add ourselves. As such we would be creating a card tax on old decks in that they would have to include some of these new cards or be at a disadvantage(obviously this is bad design). So either we avoid designs that would be unfair to the "default creature" or we change the "default creature" so that the designs are no longer unfair.
Personally I would err on the side of increased variety and accept the costs(needing to change the default/base creature so that the variety is not unfair to them) that come with it.
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I'm still hesistant to change Cygnia's "Default" cardpool because that goes against the original premise of what Cygnia was supposed to be (EtG with card ideas, not another OEtG), but I can understand you point.
Also, I presume moving creatures would involve some form of targeting, which would arguably make Cloak and Quintessence counters. General ideas that punish targeting would be easy counters to add into this set in general, if slot movement requires targeting for the most part.
(Sidenote: I am looking at this under the impression we will be able to distinguish between EtG's original card pool and individual Cygnia 'sets' in an MTG-esque fashion. This would allow hypothetical events organized around them to mix and match sets as needed.)
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I'm still hesistant to change Cygnia's "Default" cardpool because that goes against the original premise of what Cygnia was supposed to be (EtG with card ideas, not another OEtG), but I can understand you point.
Also, I presume moving creatures would involve some form of targeting, which would arguably make Cloak and Quintessence counters. General ideas that punish targeting would be easy counters to add into this set in general, if slot movement requires targeting for the most part.
(Sidenote: I am looking at this under the impression we will be able to distinguish between EtG's original card pool and individual Cygnia 'sets' in an MTG-esque fashion. This would allow hypothetical events organized around them to mix and match sets as needed.)
I completely understand your hesitation even without referencing prior intentions. Both options(technically a continuum) are valid and have their own merits.
While hostile movement of creatures is one of the concerning effects(highlighted by flooding comments), I am more worried about hostile terrain effects(which would bypass Cloak, Quint, Immaterial, Divine Shield, and sometimes Burrow).
Adding more "punish targeting" cards in with this set would not fix the issue of a card tax since the solution card is in this set. Discouraging not using such a card would still be a card tax(double negative intended and not equivalent to "encouraging using").
I was thinking this was going to be a more integrated set than MtG has ever attempted, but I see no reason not to make a list for easy on/off.
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While hostile movement of creatures is one of the concerning effects(highlighted by flooding comments), I am more worried about hostile terrain effects(which would bypass Cloak, Quint, Immaterial, Divine Shield, and sometimes Burrow).
Hostile terrain effects always should have a workaround of some sort IMHO - for example, Flooding does not restrict the first five creatures slots and thus is able to be played around. I would avoid hostile terrain effects that cover the whole field, given that; it seems being able to play around hostile terrain would be a good skill-based weakness for such cards to have.
Adding more "punish targeting" cards in with this set would not fix the issue of a card tax since the solution card is in this set. Discouraging not using such a card would still be a card tax(double negative intended and not equivalent to "encouraging using").
Having an answer to the problem is better than no answer IMHO; also, as I said above, the design for cards like Flooding does allow players to play around them in some form. You did mention avoiding designs that were unfair to a "default creature" is an option and I think this should be followed up on though paying attention to possible balance measures like the Flooding one mentioned above.
And yeah, from the looks of things, the current PF development will ultimately be much more strict about how cards retroactively affect sets than MtG has ever been. Time will tell if the strictness will be worth it.
(Also, out of respect for Zanz's work and due to the fact that OEtG already exists I will likely try to keep Cygnia on the "EtG with card ideas" route.)
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I personally think it is better to go with adding cards that can provide mobility rather than reworking existing creature abilities to allow for movement. At least at the offset.
The exception to that, would be if this were done in the context of adding new effects that modify existing mechanics.
Some examples,
-adding a card that allows creatures to move to new slots when burrowing / unburrowing
-something that forces creatures to move into the slot opposed slot of any enemy creature that they target.
-A spell or buff that allows a creature to evade targeting by moving to an adjacent unuoccupied slot, which would mean an empty slot to its left or right must be available for the evasion to trigger.
--Could make both an amusing alternative and nerf for SoFr
As for the 'central card' idea, I mainly posted the two cards as examples. My main point is that it would be good to make sure that every element has some form of access to movement / positioning mechanics. A splashable :rainbow card is a great way to start, but there should definitely be plenty of other options as well.
This is actually a great way to help further define elemental themes, in terms of how they go about affecting the field.
E.g. gravity could be focused on pushing / pulling, air could use movement for dodging, entropy could have fun with shuffling / randomizing creature positions, etc.
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While hostile movement of creatures is one of the concerning effects(highlighted by flooding comments), I am more worried about hostile terrain effects(which would bypass Cloak, Quint, Immaterial, Divine Shield, and sometimes Burrow).
Hostile terrain effects always should have a workaround of some sort IMHO - for example, Flooding does not restrict the first five creatures slots and thus is able to be played around. I would avoid hostile terrain effects that cover the whole field, given that; it seems being able to play around hostile terrain would be a good skill-based weakness for such cards to have.
Placing the potential for a workaround in the hostile effect rather than in creatures effected is one of our 2 options in this area. This does cut out a lot of design space. For example, "Target tile and adjacent tiles becomes a Bog" would not be allowed since it does not contain a workaround. However there are positives to not changing existing creatures so this is a valid choice, provided we consciously make the choice.
Adding more "punish targeting" cards in with this set would not fix the issue of a card tax since the solution card is in this set. Discouraging not using such a card would still be a card tax(double negative intended and not equivalent to "encouraging using").
Having an answer to the problem is better than no answer IMHO; also, as I said above, the design for cards like Flooding does allow players to play around them in some form. You did mention avoiding designs that were unfair to a "default creature" is an option and I think this should be followed up on though paying attention to possible balance measures like the Flooding one mentioned above.
Clarification: I did was not say adding "punish targeting" cards was a solution, I was describing how/why it would an example of a card tax(since the "solution" card to the problem of "decks need to include some of these new cards" was one of these new cards).
However you correctly repeat how restricting our designs for hostile field manipulation is one of our 2 valid/good design options.
And yeah, from the looks of things, the current PF development will ultimately be much more strict about how cards retroactively affect sets than MtG has ever been. Time will tell if the strictness will be worth it.
(Also, out of respect for Zanz's work and due to the fact that OEtG already exists I will likely try to keep Cygnia on the "EtG with card ideas" route.)
It sounds like you are strongly for option A over B while I am only slightly for option B over A. Unless a 3rd person voices their opinion, we should default to option A(the restrict hostile effects rather than change existing cards option).
I personally think it is better to go with adding cards that can provide mobility rather than reworking existing creature abilities to allow for movement. At least at the offset.
Adding cards that can provide mobility will happen either way(they are one of the main ideas of this set). Those cards are only tangentially related to the current fork in that their existence situationally weakens hostile field control effects(they have no impact on the general strength of those cards).
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*Bump
Ok so now we need to start talking about the general areas we will need to design in.
Some I can think of:
Creatures with Auras(aka making clumped units stronger)
AoE CC(aka making clumping weaker)
Terrain effects(Hostile nerfed until acceptable against existing cards/decks. Beneficial terrain too.) to encourage mobile creatures
Mobile creatures/Cards that move creatures.
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*Bump
Ok so now we need to start talking about the general areas we will need to design in.
Some I can think of:
Creatures with Auras(aka making clumped units stronger)
AoE CC(aka making clumping weaker)
Terrain effects(Hostile nerfed until acceptable against existing cards/decks. Beneficial terrain too.) to encourage mobile creatures
Mobile creatures/Cards that move creatures.
I think this is a good set to start with for now: the first two groups encourage mobility in different forms while acting as counters to each other.
We should probably have some general movement cards made before anything else comes into play, e.g.:
Foreseen Evasion 2 | 1 :time
Move target creature to a slot of your choice.
Draw a card.
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Foreseen Evasion 2 | 1 :time
Move target creature to a slot of your choice.
Draw a card.
Having these kinds of cards will be good, but I think it might be best to keep cards like the one you've made out of Time, simply because it steps on the toes of Precognition, and it will likely overshadow Precognition in many cases once this is a series and FM becomes prevalent.
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I was actually a bit worried that giving card draw to elements out of :time would be too much, but given the existence of SoBr, I'll revert it to my original design:
Swift Maneuver 2 | 1 :air
Move target creature to a slot of your choice.
Draw a card.
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How are you going to solve the targeting issue?
Move target creature to target slot. That's a double target and not something I believe is possible.
I propose this:
Reposition 1 :air
Move target creature or permanent five slots backward. Draw a card.
|
Move target creature or permanent five slots forward. Draw a card.
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Any single use creature movement would have to be balanced against multiple use creature movement. Here are 2 examples:
Creature activated ability: " :underworld: Move to target adjacent tile" (cost quantity and element not chosen)
Permanent activated ability: " :underworld: Move target creature to an adjacent tile" (cost quantity and element not chosen)
As such, I don't think a single use creature movement would be worth much deck space.
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How are you going to solve the targeting issue?
Move target creature to target slot. That's a double target and not something I believe is possible.
I propose this:
Reposition 1 :air
Move target creature or permanent five slots backward. Draw a card.
|
Move target creature or permanent five slots forward. Draw a card.
Not possible in EtG. Cygnia has less coding restrictions. I think double targeting should be considered as a valid option until serprex or fippe debunk it.
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It's obviously not impossible, but I think it's pretty tricky and you need to rewrite some of the game logic (not completely sure though, serprex knows better).
Also: creature and permanent order in Cygnia are (at the moment) different than in Elements. So either you need to take this into account when making these cards, or you need to recode the placement. (The order is simply: Start at the top-left corner, fill the field left-to-right, top-to-bottom)
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This should be simple to make in Cygnia. I still have problems understanding how this is problematic in EtG unless the whole code looks like spaghetti.
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This should be simple to make in Cygnia. I still have problems understanding how this is problematic in EtG unless the whole code looks like spaghetti.
The whole code looks like spaghetti.
EDIT FOR BELOW: Simple spaghetti is still spaghetti.
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Also: creature and permanent order in Cygnia are (at the moment) different than in Elements. So either you need to take this into account when making these cards, or you need to recode the placement. (The order is simply: Start at the top-left corner, fill the field left-to-right, top-to-bottom)
Given that Meteorite is in Advent, we're going to have to address this issue anyway; chances are we'll be doing it the latter way since Cygnia's objective is to stay faithful to EtG.
Re:Double targeting - I can see how it'd be simple or complex but that ultimately depends on the game logic as Fippe said so I'll poke serprex about it.
This should be simple to make in Cygnia. I still have problems understanding how this is problematic in EtG unless the whole code looks like spaghetti.
The whole code looks like spaghetti.
IMHO certain parts of it are actually pretty simple once you figure out their functions, but that's just me.
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This should be simple to make in Cygnia. I still have problems understanding how this is problematic in EtG unless the whole code looks like spaghetti.
History lesson. Once upon a time, there was a Bug/Exploit in EtG:
Normal: If you clicked a targeted spell, you could click on a target or you could click "cancel".
Exploit: It was possible to click both options before the game prevented the "cancel" option from working.
Thus you could cast Lightning as often as you had the quanta for it.
EtG's solution IIRC: was to shorten this window of opportunity until it was no longer possible to pull off.
Multitargeting is a simplified name for saying: Do not recreate this effect & cancel exploit. Few card designers actually understood the underlying exploit so designers were encouraged to avoid multiple targets in order to avoid recreating the exploit out of ignorance.
Meteorite (deal 3 damage to target and 2 neighbors, deaths leave craters[terrain-unpassable]) being in Advent does calibrate our Field Manipulation set.
Q: But is Meteorite weak enough to be fair to existing creatures compared to existing CC?
Q: Given a theoretical balanced Meteorite(may or may not look like the current Meteorite), how much should a "activated ability to move 1" creature cost?
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Q: But is Meteorite weak enough to be fair to existing creatures compared to existing CC?
Assuming Cygnia will gain EtG's placement method, Meteorite will typically be a 4 :gravity for 3 damage against decks with few creatures - more aggressive decks should compare it to Rain of Fire instead. Rain of Fire can wipe out 1-23 creatures at 3 HP for 7 | 5 :fire , whereas Meteor can wipe out 1-3 creatures at 3 HP for 4 | 3 :gravity - the crater really only affects Fractal decks until we start building in more position-based cards. Is the larger potential in RoF worth 3 more :fire , or is Meteor too efficient?
(Note: Once the mechanic of the card is coded into the game tweaking the card's cost will be a minimal issue.)
Q: Given a theoretical balanced Meteorite(may or may not look like the current Meteorite), how much should a "activated ability to move 1" creature cost?
I presume at least 1-3 :underworld (leaning 2-3 :underworld, since this is shaping up to be a form of CC protection) but not greater than that per use - the player in question is loosing at least 1 creature in the right context and movement responses from the other player should only minimize card advantage loss, so 4 :underworld just to avoid some possible CC in the hypothetical Cygnia meta seems silly.
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Q: But is Meteorite weak enough to be fair to existing creatures compared to existing CC?
Assuming Cygnia will gain EtG's placement method, Meteorite will typically be a 4 :gravity for 3 damage against decks with few creatures - more aggressive decks should compare it to Rain of Fire instead. Rain of Fire can wipe out 1-23 creatures at 3 HP for 7 | 5 :fire , whereas Meteor can wipe out 1-3 creatures at 3 HP for 4 | 3 :gravity - the crater really only affects Fractal decks until we start building in more position-based cards. Is the larger potential in RoF worth 3 more :fire , or is Meteor too efficient?
(Note: Once the mechanic of the card is coded into the game tweaking the card's cost will be a minimal issue.)
I was more looking into the effect than the cost/damage ratio (although card economy and quanta economy damage/cost ratios should be examined and tweaked via playtesting).
Meteorite and Flooding being the first of a handful of these cards, we would do well to seriously consider their interaction.
Q: Given a theoretical balanced Meteorite(may or may not look like the current Meteorite), how much should a "activated ability to move 1" creature cost?
I presume at least 1-3 :underworld (leaning 2-3 :underworld, since this is shaping up to be a form of CC protection) but not greater than that per use - the player in question is loosing at least 1 creature in the right context and movement responses from the other player should only minimize card advantage loss, so 4 :underworld just to avoid some possible CC in the hypothetical Cygnia meta seems silly.
I did not understand this. Were you listing both the casting and activation costs for such a creature?(if so I couldn't tell which was which)
Personally I would suggest 1 :underworld activation cost for self move 1 and 2-3 :underworld activation cost for target creature moves(high cost due to presumed synergy with target). The question then becomes what would the casting costs be?
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My apologies for being unclear, I was listing activation only. Aside from scaling up the casting cost to match the vehicle, I'm not certain about those at the moment. Turquoise Nymph implies possibly +0 or +1 :underworld to casting cost since this is an anti-CC method that will (in theory) protect against less cards than Turquoise Nymph.
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EtG's solution IIRC: was to shorten this window of opportunity until it was no longer possible to pull off.
Which is quite sloppy if you consider that you could just add an identification to the effect (queue of effects in case of multitargetting) and deny canceling an effect whose identification is no longer valid (for no longer being pending).
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EtG's solution IIRC: was to shorten this window of opportunity until it was no longer possible to pull off.
Which is quite sloppy if you consider that you could just add an identification to the effect (queue of effects in case of multitargetting) and deny canceling an effect whose identification is no longer valid (for no longer being pending).
Also I'm pretty sure the solution was to drain quanta on activation and not give it back on cancel.
This is interesting, though.
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EtG's solution IIRC: was to shorten this window of opportunity until it was no longer possible to pull off.
Which is quite sloppy if you consider that you could just add an identification to the effect (queue of effects in case of multitargetting) and deny canceling an effect whose identification is no longer valid (for no longer being pending).
Also I'm pretty sure the solution was to drain quanta on activation and not give it back on cancel.
This is interesting, though.
Wasn't that to solve a separate exploit where you would quickly click then cancel spells to gain the quanta infinitely?
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My apologies for being unclear, I was listing activation only. Aside from scaling up the casting cost to match the vehicle, I'm not certain about those at the moment. Turquoise Nymph implies possibly +0 or +1 :underworld to casting cost since this is an anti-CC method that will (in theory) protect against less cards than Turquoise Nymph.
You are correct that the casting cost hike would be vehicle dependent. For simplicity sake let us talk about these examples(vehicles choices via instinct)
S1) 4|5 :underworld: Move to target adjacent tile.
S2) 2|8 :underworld :underworld: Move target creature to target adjacent tile
S3) Permanent :underworld :underworld: Move target creature to target adjacent tile
S4) Permanent :underworld :underworld :underworld: Move target creature to target tile within 3.
EtG's solution IIRC: was to shorten this window of opportunity until it was no longer possible to pull off.
Which is quite sloppy if you consider that you could just add an identification to the effect (queue of effects in case of multitargetting) and deny canceling an effect whose identification is no longer valid (for no longer being pending).
Real-time and client-server programming makes that a lot harder. But you are correct that there is a better way(I am not deep enough into those two areas to know if an ID would be sufficient to remove the exploit by itself).
EtG's solution IIRC: was to shorten this window of opportunity until it was no longer possible to pull off.
Which is quite sloppy if you consider that you could just add an identification to the effect (queue of effects in case of multitargetting) and deny canceling an effect whose identification is no longer valid (for no longer being pending).
Also I'm pretty sure the solution was to drain quanta on activation and not give it back on cancel.
This is interesting, though.
Wasn't that to solve a separate exploit where you would quickly click then cancel spells to gain the quanta infinitely?
Drain quanta on activation still turns one use spells into Eternal spells.
I do not recall any increasing quanta exploits.
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EtG's solution IIRC: was to shorten this window of opportunity until it was no longer possible to pull off.
Which is quite sloppy if you consider that you could just add an identification to the effect (queue of effects in case of multitargetting) and deny canceling an effect whose identification is no longer valid (for no longer being pending).
Also I'm pretty sure the solution was to drain quanta on activation and not give it back on cancel.
This is interesting, though.
Wasn't that to solve a separate exploit where you would quickly click then cancel spells to gain the quanta infinitely?
These sound all like the same bug. Anyway I'm sure serprex is handling this differently in the oetg code (we can cancel and rapid clicking doesn't happen), so that the problem is already inexistent in cygnia.
@OT If we suppose that there is a thread trying to run a method to play the card (cause all of its effects) and another one trying to run a method to cancel (return the card to hand and return the quanta) then the ideal way would be for one thread to lock the object becore it starts running its method so that other threads can't interfere. I'm not sure if that's possible in flash (it is in java and C++) but you can still make something rudimentary defining 2 boolean variables 'playing' and 'canceling' that are set to false when you play the card and get prompted to target. The beggining of the play method could go like
playing=True
if cancelling==True:
playing=False
return
<code to play>
and the beggining of the cancel method would be
cancelling=True
if playing==True
cancelling=False
return
<code to cancel>
there's still a chance that the threads execute their statements in a way that both enter the ifs. In this case, depending on how the rest is programmed, either the prompt for the user to do something would remain or the card would be wasted (in which case you shouldn't be trying to rapid click)
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Things slowed down again. Here are some more ideas.
Terrain:Beneficial:High Ground
Terrain:Beneficial:Bunker
Creature Aura:Stat Boosts
Creature Aura:DR
Creature Aura:Adjacent allies increase potency of activated ability
AoE:Radius 1:Damage up to N targets
AoE:Radius 1:Hamper(delay, freeze, burrow, -X Attack, ...)
Creature:Activated ability:Move 1
Permanent: Activated ability:Move target creature 1
That should be a start(let's stick to :underworld for now, we can assign elements later even if it is obvious now).
@andretimpa
Seems like you know you know a good way to handle it.
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If we're sharing ideas, I'd like to point to the link in my signature, Manta Ray.
And since that fits under creature auras, I think it's worth reminding people that auras can be in almost any shape, as long as it's not super complicated like "the creature two slots down and four to the left gains +2|+2 every turn" (not necessarily super complicated, but much more complicated than it should be). They don't have to be every single adjacent creature. It can be adjacent to the sides, or maybe above and below, or just all creatures on the same row/different rows.
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If we're sharing ideas, I'd like to point to the link in my signature, Manta Ray.
And since that fits under creature auras, I think it's worth reminding people that auras can be in almost any shape, as long as it's not super complicated like "the creature two slots down and four to the left gains +2|+2 every turn" (not necessarily super complicated, but much more complicated than it should be). They don't have to be every single adjacent creature. It can be adjacent to the sides, or maybe above and below, or just all creatures on the same row/different rows.
A cloaking creature aura makes a lot of sense(I was hoping you would share it).
Also the different creature auras makes a good point. Useful shapes I can think of are:
Radius 1(like an emanation)
Cone backwards(like a shadow or a shield)
Line 2 left and right(shield wall)
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A cloaking creature aura makes a lot of sense(I was hoping you would share it).
What do you mean by this?
Also, on a related note, AoE effects also can be in multiple shapes instead of just maybe a "standard" hexagonal shape.
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A cloaking creature aura makes a lot of sense(I was hoping you would share it).
What do you mean by this?
Also, on a related note, AoE effects also can be in multiple shapes instead of just maybe a "standard" hexagonal shape.
What I meant(2 part sentence so 2 parts):
Part 1: Yes, Manta Ray(a creature with a cloaking aura) is a very good example for this set.
Part 2: I saw your Manta Ray right before making the list. Rather that steal your idea, I left it out expect you would reply with it as an example(thus spurring discussion rather than monologue).
Agreed about the shapes of AoEs.
Hexagons, Cones, Lines, Triangles, ...
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I think I've done several adjacent creature affects
Edit: I can't find them though..
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Terrain:Beneficial:High Ground
Terrain:Beneficial:Bunker
Here are two ideas I'd like to share: (may not be accurately costed yet)
Lower Ground Bunker 4 :gravity | 3 :gravity
Permanent
Creatures on the outer edge of the field take half damage (rounded down) from any effects.
Mainly a mass swarm-rewarding card that aims to protect vs. damage-based boardwipes and fireshield (since it rounds down).
Highground Quarry 5 :earth | 4 :earth
Permanent
Creatures in the first 5 (7?) slots generate :earth per turn and aren't affected by terrain effects.
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Semi-bump. I think it would be wise to compile all the field-movement/slot-affecting ideas we can find from other users here, and analyze things from there.
Aside from the rough designs I've posted recently, I also have Acheron (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/card-ideas-and-art/acheron-acheron/) and Grappling Hook (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/card-ideas-and-art/grappling-hook-grappling-hook/). I will also mention Lava Flow (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/level-1-crucible/lava-flow-lava-flow/) since it technically fits (though it is beyond the scope of this project for now.)
Manta Ray (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/card-ideas-and-art/manta-ray-elite-ray/) also seems to have received a lot of discussion and ET recently bumped Amused (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/card-ideas-and-art/amused-amused/), Shielded (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/card-ideas-and-art/shielded-shielded/), Guidance (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/card-ideas-and-art/guidance-guidance/), and Nuisance (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/card-ideas-and-art/nuisance-nuisance/).
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Hm.. I just had another possible idea. Perhaps there could also be cards that utilize creatures/permanents based on their element as well?
For example:
(http://i.imgur.com/Urwqw2U.png)(http://i.imgur.com/v2aAoME.png)
This is similar to the creature auras, but its using elements rather than bluntly saying "Adjacent creatures gain +2|+2".
But anyways, I think that since we're starting to bring up past cards that use FM and make more cards that use FM, we should ask ourself this question:
How many cards are we going to design for this series and how will they be separated between the 12 elements?
I personally think that having one for each element (with Flooding already counting as Water's), but then giving certain elements a second one if needed (which can be decided after we design the card for each element).
Anyways, discuss.
EDIT: Also, archtypes.
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It has come to my attention that there needs to be more purpose for field repositioning.
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It has come to my attention that there needs to be more purpose for field repositioning.
That's partly the reason why this concept is a CP.
It's to stop the cycle (that I mention all the time) where cards with a mechanic like this are useles due to no synergies, therefore none will get in the game to synergize with future cards.
The idea for this Project is to put them all in at once as a loophole in the cycle.
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Thinking logically I think, The Material elements( :earth :fire :water :air) can have cards that mess with slot locations the easiest.
Spiritual elements( :death :life :light :darkness) and Cardinal elements( :entropy :gravity :time :aether) each would need to attempt this unique ways.
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But anyways, I think that since we're starting to bring up past cards that use FM and make more cards that use FM, we should ask ourself this question:
How many cards are we going to design for this series and how will they be separated between the 12 elements?
I personally think that having one for each element (with Flooding already counting as Water's), but then giving certain elements a second one if needed (which can be decided after we design the card for each element).
Anyways, discuss.
I would use the term "Showcase set" to describe a set that has 1 card per usage in order to give a concrete example of the set's idea.
This is not a showcase set and will need to be strictly larger(so a showcase set is a minimum size).
Also we would want at least 6 elements that each have at least 2-3 interesting strategies. Strategies might be 1 card or a 2 card combo. 3 cards that combo in pairs would be 3 strategies unless those strategies are not distinct(Adrenaline Frogs is not distinct from Adrenaline Cocktrices). This is another minimum size.
As such a low estimate would be 18 cards. But I expect we would see closer to 24 cards. We don't want to go too high since quality cards tend to not be dilute.
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Given the general direction of this thread I think we may need a bit more focus if we want to retain people that really want to get this project done. Now would be a good time to start drafting a set structure and fill it in with some general details that would make it easier to design cards and give other designers a baseline to work with.
How many cards are we going to design for this series and how will they be separated between the 12 elements?
IMHO, this is how the set structure should look:
Bare Minimum (5 cards):
- 1 card that is a single use moment card. (Most likely a spell)
- 1 card that is a multiple use movement card.
- One AoE CC card that takes positioning into account.
- One anti-CC card that takes positioning into account.
- One beneficial field card that takes positioning into account.
Building Up to a "Showcase Set" (10-14 cards):
All the requirements of Bare Minimum plus:
- 6-12 elements should possess a card capable of interacting with each other.
- +1 new harmful field card that takes positioning into account.
- + 1-2 AoE CC cards that takes positioning into account.
- +2-3 creatures that give buffs relative to positioning.
- +1-2 cards that are capable of single/limited use movement.
Building Up to a mechanically diverse set(15-22 cards):
All the requirements of "Showcase Set" plus:
- 3-6 elements should be able to create decks that are either fun or efficient with these cards, whether they be monos or multielemental.
- +1 card that is a multiple use movement card.
- +1-2 cards that scale alter themselves based on the current board state.
- +1-2 cards that play with the nature of a creature slot (e.g. a permanent slot that acts as an extra creature slot or a spell that only alters creature slot properties)
- +1-2 field cards that can be either beneficial or malicious.
- +1-2 AoE CC non-creature buffs that take positioning into account.
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showcase Brainstorm(written as self notes, apologies for the trouble decoding)
Constructive
-Formation
--Defensive
--Offensive
-Mobility
--Defensive
--Offensive
Destructive
-Duration
--Damage
--Effect
-Instantaneous
--Damage
--Effect
Each leaf has at least 2 ways to implement.
Discussion continued here for awhile: https://titanpad.com/ETGCygniaProjectFieldControl
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Update from titanpad
Some of the ideas so far(note these are general ideas from which many different ideas could be created that we could choose ideal candidates from):
Earth:
Shelter - An area where creatures are sheltered/can hide(burrowed?)
Defensive formation - Nearby creatures are more resilient(+hp?/DR?)
"To Me" - Some way of drawing creatures toward a point. To enable hiding or forming up. Should include a small internal benefit?
(Meteorite) - AoE CC that leaves (normally?) impassible terrain
Air:
Mobile creature - A creature that can move itself and has an internal benefit for doing so.
Evasion - Creatures that move get % evasion
(Freedom|Liberty) - Player can choose starting slot for creatures
AoE that moves creatures - Tornado? Move in or out?
CC Terrain - ???
Multiple use moving other creatures. Probably an activated ability.
Water:
(Manta Ray)-Nearby creatures are cloaked/protected
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Bump due to discussion slowing down again.
At we currently at the card design phase of things, or are we still establishing the structure?
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Bump due to discussion slowing down again.
At we currently at the card design phase of things, or are we still establishing the structure?
Neither/inbetween, but closer to the card design phase than the structure phase.
We are creating content by identifying concrete FM strategies/methods some elements would use but not going as far as to make concrete cards for those ideas yet.
For example: We know Earth is often defensive and orderly(a trait it shares with Gravity) so we would expect some kind of strategy revolving around clumping its units in order to make them more resilient.
At this stage we don't need to specify what card provides this bonus or the nitty gritty in how it would. However we do need to mark where we would expect to see 1 card or a 2 card combo(and mark the roles of each card).
For example: That "clumping units to make them more resilient" was decided to be a card that could "clump units" and a card that would "nearby units more resilient".
Once we have 2-3 strategies for 4-6 elements, then we will start turning these concrete roles into concrete cards. Aka normal card design. (If the ideas I listed below and above work, then we only need +1 for Water to have 4 elements ready)
Posting/repeating some ideas here to keep bumping
Water:
(Manta Ray)-Nearby creatures are cloaked/protected
AoE - Slow(not freeze/delay, but something new that slows instead of stops) creatures for some time.
[No movement?]
Fire:
Creatures battling / interacting with enemies in the opposing slot
Terrain - CC and Buff(like Rage but maybe something new?)
Obligatory Fireball
[No movement?]
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I find a possible variant of Manta Ray to be a bit out of element given a second look. Protection from damage seems much more like something :gravity or :light would do. If it cloaks though I suppose it could work.
I agree that Fire should not have mobility cards as it will likely instead have lots of slot-themed CC.
Gravity and Air would likely have a lot of movement based cards.
I can see Water and Life having a few movement cards as well. (Underwater movement and expression of vitality, plus Life would like to keep creatures alive).
Entropy could have a creature movement card but it would likely be random.
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just leaving this (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/series/dt's-field-manipulation-ideas-%28series%29/msg1201320/#msg1201320) here...
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Ok another bump time. This time I have a task for all of you card designers:
We have the following positions to fill. Only 1 card will qualify for each position(+1 duplication per element). I encourage you to look at the vague descriptions below as a guide/position to fill and not as an idea themselves. Even the positions themselves are flexible.
For example Shelter might be a creature ability, a permanent in the creature zone, a spell that gives that effect to a creature tile, ... all it needs to do is have an area and have creatures in that area receive some kind of shelter(oh and it has to have an :earth casting cost :P).
Three of these positions have card names next to them. For those positions you can either fine tune that card or suggest a card idea that could replace it in that position. The named cards are there as a means of potential examples and not set in stone.
Earth:
Shelter - An area where creatures are sheltered/can hide(burrowed?)
Defensive formation - Nearby creatures are more resilient(+hp?/DR?)
"To Me" - Some way of drawing creatures toward a point. To enable hiding or forming up. Should include a small internal benefit?
(Meteorite) - AoE CC that leaves (normally?) impassible terrain
Air:
Mobile creature - A creature that can move itself and has an internal benefit for doing so.
Evasion - Creatures that move get % evasion or some other benefit
(Freedom|Liberty) - Player can choose starting slot for creatures
AoE that moves creatures - Tornado? Move in or out?
CC Terrain - ???
Multiple use effect that moves other creatures. Probably an activated ability.
Water:
(Manta Ray)-Nearby creatures are cloaked/protected
AoE - Slow(not freeze/delay, but something new that slows instead of stops) creatures for some time.
Fire:
Creatures battling / interacting with enemies in the opposing slot
Terrain - CC and Buff(like Rage but maybe something new?)
Obligatory Fireball
PS: Please use this forum for storing ideas rather than textpads. Conversation that stop in textpads don't pick back up as easily.
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I'll repost my "simple movement" ideas here, in that case:
Dextera Captain 5 | 4 :light
5 | 5 / 5 | 5
:light :light : Target creature moves 1 space to the right if possible. If it can't, generate :light :light :light :light instead.
Sinistra Spy 2 | 1 :darkness
2 | 1 / 2 | 1
Enter play cloaked.
:darkness :darkness : Target creature moves 1 space to the left if possible. If it can't, cloak it for 1 turn instead.
Gaian Skyraider 7 | 6 :air
7| 2 / 7 | 2
Airborne.
:air :air : Target creature moves one space upwards if possible. If it can't, it gets +2|+0 until end of turn instead.
Cthonic Caveguide 3 | 3 :earth
2 | 6 / 2 | 10
:earth :earth : Target creature moves one space upwards if possible. If it can't, burrow it for 1 turn instead.
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For clarification, could you define "internal" and "external" benefits?
Also, for the spot where Manta Ray is, I don't think that mechanic is necessarily one that belongs to Water. It's only the theme of Manta Rays that made it Water, it would probably suit Darkness or Light better thematically overall (and likely be much easier to design, although obviously the specific elements aren't exactly required for any card submitted at this point(.
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Water is viewed as an element that should have a theme of protection; Manta Ray is thematically fitting
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For clarification, could you define "internal" and "external" benefits?
Also, for the spot where Manta Ray is, I don't think that mechanic is necessarily one that belongs to Water. It's only the theme of Manta Rays that made it Water, it would probably suit Darkness or Light better thematically overall (and likely be much easier to design, although obviously the specific elements aren't exactly required for any card submitted at this point(.
Internal means it comes with the card in contrast to External which requires another card.
Vampires have an External benefit for being Dark(Nightfall).
Red Nymph has an Internal benefit to Rage in that it can Rage itself for additional attack without dying.
If Eagle's Eye gained +1 Attack every time it killed a creature, that would be an Internal benefit to using Snipe.
I think I only put "Internal Benefit" in places where the rest of the role would not necessarily be a benefit in an of itself, so places where we would want to make sure the creature had some benefit.
Fish tend to clump together as a defensive mechanic. This extends to symbiotic relationships like Sharks/Manta Rays and Remoras.
Also remember that Manta Ray is merely an example. That role need not deal with cloak or damage protection. Just some form of protection to the clumped units.
Also the element of the casting costs has been determined for these roles. The other 8 elements would be looked at in a later stage. So keep the casting costs to :air :earth :fire :water for this stage.
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The utility / power of external synnergy is also affected by whether or not the external source is available under the same element.
E.g. 'off-element' is external interaction which tends to further weaken the availability of the synnergy (in terms of deck design) as opposed to 'in-element' external effects which tend to be easier to accomodate in deck construction.
I think cardinal elements ( :aether :entropy :gravity :time ) are probably the next most obvious choice after material elements since cardinal elements all deal with the dimensions / mediums in which things interact (e.g. time, space, order / disorder) and distortions thereof.
These seem like very good candidates for effects that directly manipulate the position of creatures in the field, hand, and deck while the material elements seem good like good candidates for introduce positionally dependent effects.
I think spirit elements may shine for having creature centric field-effects. E.g. effects that cause a creature to influence the creatures near to it (although material elements could certainly have claim... e.g. proximity damage from fire or frost)
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Due to lack of consistent activity on this thread, I'm going to make this post as a soft lock to discussion until someone shows enough interest to spearhead it in the long term again.
@All designers: The problem with projects like these is that they often require one strong central leader to take on the hard work and direct the rest of the group to filling in card niches, but often most designers don't have the time to spare or don't wish to commit that heavily to such a project. I strongly suggest for any designer that wants to continue this project or start something this big in the future to consider if you will want to run this in the long term by yourself, because to be blunt that's often what it boils down to complete something like Gaian vs Cthonic (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/series/community-card-design-gaian-vs-cthonic-%28core-set-1717%29/).