Gunnerkrigg/MTG card thread

[http404error]

Apr 7, 2013 13:30:15 GMT imaginaryfriend said:

Welcome to the forum, Androkguz! Have you seen http404error's Google Doc? I think they were preparing for a poll on mechanics once they gathered enough choices.

I have taken over the job of keeping the thread afloat and for fun am making not just single cards but a making/reversioning a vintage set. Am up to 117 done/posted at last count. It may possibly be useful by encountering some pitfalls early that you guys will eventually have to deal with (like the shortage of unidentifiable empty land art). I am mostly keeping my mouth shut about the modern set because I haven't played MTG since early on, but am advocating for some things in the proper set by what I'm doing with the old-timey stuff [like for instance, adding archaeologist as a human class but maybe not students and teachers (as classes), and Jones as an artifact] and eventually helping with the art.

I've been lax in my work on the set certainly, and I was pretty sure it was going to quietly die. But no, THIS GUY had to keep bumping the thread to keep me coming back. So... good work. Keep it up, sir.

I need to organize more tightly if this is going anywhere. I'm setting up a google group as a mailing list to communicate, as people don't really check the forum that often (well I'm probably the worst for that).

If you want to join up with the devignopment team, hit up this link for hopefully more reliable updates and communication! groups.google.com/group/gkcmtg

[GK Sierra]

Apr 24, 2013 1:31:38 GMT imaginaryfriend said:

What I'm doing is a lot easier than what you guys are doing. And I admit I took a week or so off around tax day to deal with other problems and to meditate extensively on the relationship between the individual and government.

Haha! Nothing like tax day to make you think good and hard on the finer points of being a citizen.

I like to pretend that by sending my 1040 in, I am purchasing a single wing tile for some outlandishly expensive stealth bomber. It makes me feel slightly better.

[Morpheus]

Hey, I've been pretty much completely absent from this stuff for a while now, but if there's anything that needs to be done I'd still be glad to be a part of it again.

[tpman]

Apr 24, 2013 1:31:38 GMT imaginaryfriend said:

What I'm doing is a lot easier than what you guys are doing. And I admit I took a week or so off around tax day to deal with other problems and to meditate extensively on the relationship between the individual and government.

Speaking of relationships, what should be the relationship between the mythic in GC and legendary things in MTG? If I was a planeswalker who came to GC the ability to make/unmake or modify legends would probably be the second most interesting thing that has come up in the comic so far (and possibly a candidate for a neutral mechanic).

"Legendary" creatures in MTG are just specific individuals as opposed to generic unnamed Grizzly Bears or Demons or whatever. I figure most "mythical" things would just be ordinary cards and only story characters could be legends.
I hope that answers your question, but I didn't really follow it to begin with so I doubt it.
By "make/unmake or modify legends" did you mean a character that could rewrite the stories that gave life to mythical creatures? That could be cool.

[tpman]

There should never be multiple copies of a legend or planeswalker on the field at the same time. There can be multiple copies of the same card in your deck though because the card isn't so much a representative of the creature/walker itself as the spell used to cast it. When a second copy of a legend or planeswalker enters the battlefield they are both destroyed. WOTC doesn't like to write the flavour of their mechanics in stone but it's generally agreed that casting the spell that would summon a legend that's already present either acts as an unsummoning or crates some sort of lethal paradox.
It's worthwhile to point out that creature cards were originally "summon" cards. Presumably they changed it because having a battlefield full of "summon goblin"s wasn't as intuitve as a field of goblin type creatures.

[tpman]

You're right about the reasons behind the rules switch.
The people who play the game are indeed suposed to be planeswalkers, but I've never heard anything about walkers being in multiple places simultaneously. Maybe somebody in the storyline did it once but it's not something that can be done by default. Maybe you were thinking about how the old walkers weren't so much a physical being as something that existed outside the physical plane and their physical bodies were just "representations".
I'm all for crazy experiments with legendaries.
If you have any question these guyscommunity.wizards.com/go/forum/view/75842/134866/Flavor_and_Storylines know a shocking amount about MTG lore and are glad to answer anybody's questions.

[http404error]

Messing with the legend rule would be cool. Mirror Gallery already does something akin to that, but we could definitely make some cool splashy card that can do something cool with Legends.

However, we really don't know how the whole myth generation thing works in the comic yet... well I suppose speculation would get us far enough, but I dunno what we could do on a card to represent that.

[http404error]

The problem is that legendary is strictly a drawback and only affects deck composition and matchups (whether your opponent also has the card). Players won't WANT to make their stuff legendary, even if you're also giving it beneficial and efficiently costed stat boosts and abilities. If there's one thing I've learned from Making Magic, it's that abilities should provide an upside. I can see one card in the set that makes things into legends, being a unique standalone card. Not a whole mechanic or theme. The "legends matter" theme has also already been done in Kamigawa.

[androkguz]

Imaginaryfriend: Kamigawa was the set where they messed up with the legendary status the most, and that set was a failure because there doesn't seem to be much to do with it.
I don't know what else can be done with the legendary status: it is a cool thing when a few cards have it, but making it a key part of the set seems to go against it's coolness.

For the record, I think we can reduce it to only about 10 legendaries to the set because
1- Nonbasic lands have very often represented specific places without being legendary
2- Lots of characters don't need to come in as legends, just as a particular kind of creature. For instance, rather than include Mr Eglamore, we could include a "Dragon Slayer" card.
3- Coyote, Annie, Kat, Renard, Ysengrim, Jones, zimmy have to go in, but most of the others don't. Magic books are always full of characters that never show up as cards: it is the special ones that get printed as legends.

[http404error]

To be clear, the set will have a fairly large number of legendary creatures and probably a few cards that interact with legends at most. I think it's a good idea to "genericize" some minor characters to reduce the legend glut unless we go with an all-in legend theme, which is unlikely.

[androkguz]

I don't really see how could your idea about switching on and off the legendary status can be used for more than one weird card, but keep trying. Keep in mind that such thing would be a rules mess.

[androkguz]

I guess the first thing we really need to answer is: What's the Court's theme? What's the Forest theme?
Some thoughts:
-The Court/Forest duality is the fundamental Blue/green conflict. Maybe there is almost no green Court theme cards nor any blue Gillitie themed card. The other 3 colors have reason to be in both sides.
-I like the idea of court stuff being represented in non-basic lands and gillitie stuff in basic lands. I don't know about you but I think that's a solid base for a set. Tons of cards can be designed that care about your lands

[tpman]

Which do you guys recommend: Photobucket, Imgur, or something else?
I figure I should start posting my work and I may as well start using the best site from the get-go.

[http404error]

Imgur is the best in my experience. Photobucket has pesky accounts and bandwidth limits and nasty things like that.

[tpman]

I should mention that the folks at YMTC are a pretty nice group of guys (and of course girls).
If you have questions you may as well ask the pros. Power balance, flavour whatever you want they got it. Also there's a wording clinic where you can get answers pretty fast.

[tpman]

Alright, what's everbody's feelings on including the following in the set?

Split cards
Levellers
Hybrid mana
Double Faced Cards

For readability just copy the list with a short answer next to each item. Feel free to add comments below that.

[http404error]

Split cards - no
Levellers - no
Hybrid mana - probably not
Double Faced Cards - no

Also, I'm really really busy until, like, summer. I won't have much time to dedicate to the project for a while, but I'll keep tabs on it and respond to ideas and queries, etc.

[androkguz]

I am perfectly cool with hybrid mana in any set actually.
Double faced cards and levelers I don't really see as something Gunnerkrigg-y
Split cards I love and have been used in many sets. They could be used for Court//Forest duality. We could have a cicle of monocolored split cards that have, for instance, white as it is for the Forest and white as it is for th Court.

Worship // Civilization W
Understanding // Mysteries U
Kill // Me B
Fun // Music R
Show // Teeth G

By the way, Fairies should totally be a theme and should definitely be a somewhat red thing. Behaviour wise, they are the redest creatures of the story.

[tpman]

Split cards - Probably not but I could be convinced
Levellers - Sounds like a good idea for the students actually
Hybrid mana - Probably not but I could be convinced
Double Faced Cards - No

[GK Sierra]

Awesome new cards. I must update my archive.

[GK Sierra]

>does 3 damage to you

Certainly busts the myth that "little white lies never hurt anybody"

[GK Sierra]

Jul 15, 2013 5:00:58 GMT imaginaryfriend said:

I got one or two more cards posted but more importantly I think I figured out what to do with the creature shortage. Walls. The comic has plenty of walls. I think I'll whip up all the old standbys and see what that does to the balance.

I like walls. I'm always a turtle in any strategy game I play.

[GK Sierra]

Aug 12, 2013 3:37:29 GMT imaginaryfriend said:

^Voodoo Doll and Sol Ring. I have never ever seen Voodoo Doll actually in play.

You've put a deck together with it and played?

What were your impressions on balance? OP? Any good combos?

My friend who first introduced me to MTG is coming down for a visit and I thought I would print out some ghetto-rigged cards and see whats what.

[GK Sierra]

Father daughter conflict, I love it!

Good that it's not just a slugging deck. The devious ones that take time to deploy always have the best flavor.

[Daedalus]

Heh, I've been messing with making MtG cards for Gunnerkrigg characters without having seen this thread. I've played the game a lot with older and more recent sets, but never gone seriously into designing a set.

Would it be interesting to anyone to see what I've been messing with, despite that it won't fit the mechanics you guys have dreamed up, and there will be significant overlap of characters?

Of course, someone would have to instruct me on the use of image tags.

[Daedalus]

I shall do so when I find time (by end of week, almost certainly). Thank you very much.

[Daedalus]

Oct 16, 2013 5:18:16 GMT Daedalus said:

I shall do so when I find time (by end of week, almost certainly). Thank you very much.

I'm still going to post mine eventually. Sorry. (wince)

[Daedalus]

Feb 16, 2014 17:01:16 GMT Daedalus said:

Oct 16, 2013 5:18:16 GMT Daedalus said:

I shall do so when I find time (by end of week, almost certainly). Thank you very much.

I'm still going to post mine eventually. Sorry. (wince)

RISE FROM THE GRAVE, MtG THREAD!

Hah, finally got to it! Here are three of the cards I was playing with the design of, though obviously it will not fit the mechanics you guys had hammered out. I have a bunch of others, but I'm still tweaking mana and activation costs. I wanted to put the 'gods' frame from Theros on two of the cards, but my computer won't accept that template  I hate the old card frame (no offense) so I've used the modern version or timeshifted without Ale and Wenches.



This is meant to be a great ability, but nothing totally game-breaking (see Arcum Dagsson, or Master Transmuter), which also feeds into the other side of the card. She builds things out of old parts (or coat hangers) into new machines - which would imply she can search for non-creature artifacts as well, but that might be too powerful and doesn't synergize with everything else. Once her cult is built (five or more's a crowd) then she transforms into RoboKat. She has decent stats, but is not meant for attacking. Can be taken out by a lightning bolt.

EDIT: crud I should add a 'X cannot be zero' clause to that...









(Other side of Kat the Artificer)

This is the crazy-powerful form of Kat. To reference how people have to die to implant her as a Goddess in the Ether, she requires everyone to die for her to transform. But, once she does, she'll keep recurring them and bringing them back from death (as Kat already did to the old Diego-style robot). This neatly fits with her 'gathering artifact creatures' theme for the first half. Notice she can't turn back into a human, hinting at how the process of goddess-ification may not be voluntary. Her stats are also the inverse of Coyote below, and double her stats as a human.









This is Coyote. He's crazy, and not normally a super helpful guy to keep around. But, if you have some way to manipulate probability on your side (hi Andrew!) he'll stay because you've piqued his interest, and help only you rather than helping/hindering everyone. Plus, you get his benefit first anyway. And, of course, I've always wanted to put 'cannot leave the battlefield' on a card



I'll add some of the others once I finish them, if you want. What do you think so far?

[fwip]

You guys are making me want to get into MTG. I've played a couple of times, but this is pretty awesome.

[Daedalus]

A couple more:




You knew this had to happen. He will get tossed around like a hot potato, making people's lives terrible, until he grows to monsterous size and kills everyone. The idea of giant Boxbots rolling over battlefields like tanks makes me terrified.









Jack takes people's power, like an empathic spider. Interesting combo potential and early game threat. Plus, +X/+Y is not something you see often.







I tried to capture the idea that her powers are out of her control, and lead to disaster for people (and players) around her, plus the idea of things she imagines becoming reality whether she wants it or not. She's good for lots of damage early, but unless you have Gamma around, her detriments outweigh her benefits in the long term. This still feels like a sloppy design to me though...









Smitty removes all random components to the game, as much as is feasible within the rules. Plus, he's crazy with Coyote, haha!







Plus, bonus, a promo version of RoboKat:




I had a couple of reprints I had created, which fit GKC's flavor. I'll add those later.

What do you think so far?