Gnomes in Magic: The Gathering

Bottle Gnomes by Ben Thompson

Eight. This is the number of gnome cards in Magic: The Gathering – seven Gnome creatures and one Gnome-token-creating card. Of all the 10,000+ unique cards in Magic, Gnomes are represented on a severely miniscule portion of Magic cards. To put this into perspective: the rare, mythical Yeti appears on MORE Magic cards than the Gnomes. As beings that appear prominently enough in multiple other magical fantasy-related properties, Gnomes are due for their time in the Magic spotlight. With all of the vast number of unexplored planes of the Multiverse, there HAS to be a plane amongst them home to Gnome creatures – and I’m not talking about artifact creatures.

Sins of the Flesh

There are those who prefer Gnomes stay as they mostly have been established in Magic: The Gathering – as artifact creatures. I have a problem with this. When Mirrodin was first designed, initially, Gnomes were filling in as the small artifact creatures for the metal world. Creative didn’t like them and replaced them with the more-fitting Myr creatures. Thank goodness for this decision as the kind of Gnomes that are depicted on artifact creature cards are: lawn gnomes! And if Magic chooses to stick to its guns and keep the creature type Gnome only represented on artifact creatures, the potential for a rich array of Magic cards is killed and the type Gnome stifled from continuing to see more cards printed with that type. Magic isn’t exactly yearning for more lawn gnome cards. But the “lawn variety” is how Gnomes have always been in Magic, right? …Actually, no.

The very first (and the only one of its kind) Gnome printed in Magic: The Gathering is Quarum Trench Gnomes. This is a non-artifact flesh-and-blood Gnome creature that matches the flavor found in other popular works of swords & sorcery. In Dungeons & Dragons, the Gnome race is available for you to choose for your player character. In World of Warcraft, again, fleshy Gnomes are readily-available to choose for your character. And Gnomes are not just found in popular video games – in the board game Small World Underground, one of the races is Gnome. Red Dragon Inn 3 has a Gnome character deck. With Gnomes this prevalent in fantasy works, and with Magic’s recent focus on resonance, we’d be remiss to not create a plane of proper Gnomes.

An aside regarding World of Warcraft gnomes: Interestingly enough, the story behind flesh gnomes is that they were originally created as "mechagnomes," non-flesh gnomes. Later, they were affected by the "Curse of Flesh," which transformed mechagnomes into flesh gnomes. This whole flesh-and-non-flesh existence of gnomes in WoW is eerily similar to Magic: The Gathering's artifact Gnomes and... single flesh Gnome.

Gnome Man's Land

I’ve discussed this Gnome subject before on Twitter, and it’s been pointed out to me that Dwarves, one of the strongest and most popular races to use in a work of fantasy, don’t even get a lot of cards printed. The newest Dwarf cards in Magic: The Gathering make up four in Eventide – and that was four years ago! They’ve been trumped by Goblins as the core red creature race (which is fine) which causes Dwarves to sit on the sidelines (though, there are those who believe Dwarves deserve to fill in the role of white’s missing iconic race – a thought that is supported by Eventide Dwarves being red-and-white hybrid creatures). So with the ever-popular Dwarves not getting cards printed, what hope do Gnomes have?

Actually, in his column “Thirty-Two Short Columns About Dwarves,” Mark Rosewater confirmed that there WILL be new Dwarves in Magic: The Gathering someday and even went so far as to state that there will be specific Dwarf card names printed. So, really, Dwarves are not a question of whether they’ll return, which helps the case for flesh Gnomes being a possibility in the future.

Metrognome by Jeff Laubenstein

When I sat down to spellsling with Ken Nagle, Magic: The Gathering designer, in Oakland during the Magic World Cup Qualifier; I asked what he thought about Gnomes in Magic. He brought up the fact that Creative isn’t too keen on Gnomes (as they are now). But he also mentioned that Gnomes were a bit too silly for Magic, along the same lines as Squirrels. They don’t quite match the theme of dueling planeswalkers casting spells of a more… serious nature. To be fair to Ken, since he works on the inside of Wizards, he wouldn’t want to reveal something crucial like “Yes, we’re doing Gnomes again someday,” or “No, we will never do Gnomes.” when answering my queries in regard to Gnomes.

Whatever the case may be, I disagree with the claim that Gnomes are not serious enough to be included in Magic: The Gathering. Here’s why: Faeries and Noggles. Faeries seem a bit on the preposterous side, when you judge them in works outside of Magic, especially when you consider Tinkerbell from Peter Pan going into combat. However, despite this, the flavor of Faeries has been molded appropriately enough for Magic. In Magic, faeries are tricksters, something that aligns with blue’s illusory/deception tactics. It also helps that they fly, supporting blue’s dominance in the flying creatures department. Noggles, on the other hand, are anthropomorphic miniature donkeys whose heads are comically disproportionate to the rest of their body. …They’ve only appeared in Eventide, whose setting was more accommodating for this type of creature, but I fail to see how Gnomes cannot find a place in Magic while chibi donkeys can get printed on some cards.

The Red Dragon Inn 3's Wizgille by Rose Besch

So how WOULD Gnomes fit into Magic: The Gathering? When they do make an appearance in Magic, I’d put them primarily in blue and secondary in red. Here’s why: Gnomes, in at least Dungeons & Dragons 3.5, have a favored class: Illusionist. Illusions are a blue thing. Gnomes love pranks and giving nicknames to folks in Dungeons & Dragons – something I associate with being red. In Small World Underground, the Gnome race is represented by an image of a gnome with a giant drill burrowing – quite red AND reminiscent of Magic’s Quarum Trench Gnomes. In Red Dragon Inn 3, Wizgille the Tinkerer is a character labeled as a Gnomish Artificer. Also, her tinkering sometimes blows up in her face. This feels very blue with some red thrown in (Magic’s Goblins usually gets artifacts blown up, showing red’s relationship with artifacts). In World of Warcraft, Gnomes are known to be expert tinkerers who refine their works into reliable and useful pieces of technology – something that I associate with blue. WoW Gnomes are also quite eccentric and obsessive with their engineering, something that is fitting of Ravnica’s Izzet League guild.

In fact, I highly believe that if flesh Gnomes were something that appeared before Ravnica was created in some significant manner in Magic: The Gathering, we would have seen at least a Gnome or two within the Izzet guild. For example, take a look at Wee Dragonauts; those are supposed to be Faeries strapped to that jet-like device. But those could easily be Gnomes. I actually have a more difficult time believing them to be Faeries (perhaps they were originally concepted as something other than Faeries - perhaps Gnomes?). Another example is the faerie with goggles depicted in the art of the card Electrickery. Given that gnomes love trickery and fun names like Electrickery (or Magic 2013’s Switcheroo), a gnome depicted in the art would be more fitting than a red faerie. In fact, a monored Faerie creature card doesn’t even exist in Magic! The only red Faerie creature in existence is Wee Dragonauts, and that’s already blue, a color that Faeries are a better fit for (Faeries inherently have flying while red is the second-worst color at flying).

Wee Dragonauts by Greg Staples

Gnomes, Assemble!

When Magic: The Gathering was first created, Gnomes weren’t as prevalent as they are now in popular fantasy games. Now that Gnomes have more presence in these non-Magic works, I believe it’s just a matter of timing before we’ll see flesh Gnomes show up.

Take, for example, Werewolves. Werewolves had a scant number of cards in Magic: The Gathering – until something happened in popular culture. There were a lot more horror-themed and zombie movies than before. And Twilight happened, featuring vampires and werewolves. This caused Wizards to greenlight the plane of Innistrad, the horror-themed block, thus breathing life into the Werewolf creature type. I wouldn’t be surprised if there will be more Dwarf cards making an appearance in Magic due to The Hobbit trilogy coming out, featuring thirteen dwarves.

Here’s what I imagine could happen for Magic: The Gathering at some point in the future: a steampunk fantasy-themed plane with an artifact theme. This artifact theme would be different from Mirrodin in that there would be a focus on building steam-powered technological innovations. And with a focus on this steam-powered technology, I would imagine the flavor of the world would naturally have technologies that enable land-dwellers to take to the skies and the seas. Merfolk, the iconic blue race, don’t need technology to explore the depths of the oceans, and they certainly don’t tend to fly sky high. What other core race can we use in a steampunk fantasy block with an artifact theme? Oh, yeah! Gnomes! They’re pretty good at assembling contraptions, right?

Actually, in regards to “assembling contraptions,” a steampunk world would be perfect for actually finding a home for what’s teased on Steamflogger Boss: the Rigger creature type, and “assembling” Contraptions. Assembling can be a keyword action associated with a keyword mechanic. For example, scavenge’s reminder text says to only scavenge as a sorcery; a verb! A Contraption would be an artifact subtype, and a creature with the Rigger creature type would have something to do with Contraptions.

Steamflogger Boss by Warren Mahy

Gnomes in this steampunk world would make for great blue creature replacements for Merfolk. They would sport creature types like Wizard, Artificer, and Rigger. The inclusion of Gnomes with their ingenuity and intellect regarding artifacts could be contrasted with red Goblins being clumsy and volatile with their equipment with a tendency to scrap their artifacts or blow them up.

But that’s just one possible environment for Gnomes. What’s important is the fleshy Gnome becoming a significant creature type for at least one block, whenever that will be.

Gnomeward Bound

Along the way, another way for Wizards to tell the world, “Hey, we recognize flesh Gnomes as something that are possible in Magic: The Gathering.” is to include a Gnome creature in one of the Magic Core Sets. Ever since Magic 2012 contained one strange “Salamander folk” creature named AmphinCutthroat when there have never been humanoid Salamanders before in Magic, I’ve been given hope that there might be a Gnome creature given the same treatment. Magic 2013 increased the number of cards that showed glimpses of other planes with its legendary creature cycle and the Shandalarian Rings cycle. From now on, whenever a new Core Set is released, I’ll be on the lookout for a flesh Gnome creature card.

Small World Underground's Gnomes by Miguel Coimbra

Lastly, you might ask – who cares?  Well, I know I at least care. I don’t know how many other people are as much of a fan as Gnomes as I am, but I’d like to believe that I’m not alone. Mark Rosewater was passionate about bringing poison back, and it took him well over a decade to return them in Scars of Mirrodin’s infect mechanic. In this case, my own personal passion will be getting those fleshy Gnomes printed onto a bunch of Magic: The Gathering cards. If I end up designing Magic at Wizards of the Coast someday, on my agenda will be to increase the number of Gnomes in Magic from eight to a whole lot more.

Cheers,

Bradley Rose

Guts of Glory: A Kickstarter Board Game

Too Long, Didn’t Read: If you like board/card games and are a fan of thematic/flavorful (hah, literally) games that are humorous and easy to pick up and play; check out the Guts of Glory board game on Kickstarter.  It’s a game about becoming the eating competition champion and is set in a post-apocalyptic world. Radical, right? The game’s Kickstarter has already met its goal, so you’ll know you’ll get a copy if you back the project. NOTE: The Kickstarter has just 15 hours to go, so click here to check it out and become a backer if this game sounds awesome to you.

Now, for the long version:

Kickstarter at PAX Prime 2012

It’s PAX Prime 2012, and I was walking into the Sheraton hotel where the Kickstarter area was and saying hello to a couple peeps at the Cards Against Humanity booth.  I also meandered around, looking at each of the Kickstarter booths to see if anything interested me. One booth caught my eye – there was a card game project! If any game, physical or digital, has a card-based component; my infatuation with the game automatically increases in at least the tiniest bit, regardless of whether I’ve experienced the gameplay or not. This card game I saw, and eventually played, is glorious – no, really, it’s called Guts of Glory.

Technically, it’s a board game, but it’s just as much of a board game rather than it is a card game as 7 Wonders is a board game rather than a card game. It’s got the necessary non-card components, but the meat of the whole game is within the cards themselves.

All the Glory Details

I won’t go too much into detail in how to play Guts of Glory here, as that is best explained by the creators themselves on their Kickstarter. With that said, in this game, you chew and spew (spit out) foods and condiments, competing with the other players to be the first to make it to the end of the “road to glory.” The world that this food-eating game takes place in, though, is a post-apocalyptic one – a great design choice, opening the doors for all sorts of card designs with fun concepts.

If this game were set in the modern-day world, imagine the kind of food and condiment cards you’d include in this game – the craziest you might be able to get are the tofu/veggie replacements and foods that are more unusual like frog legs (depending on your audience, this might not be unusual). Not as exciting!

Nay, with the post-apocalyptic theme, where food is scarce and meager, you then have liberty to not only be unrealistic; but, storywise, being hard-up for food means you’re masticating and swallowing some more unusual stuff.

Where this game excels – besides being a game that is more accessible to a wider audience than a complex fantasy swords-and-sorcery type of game like a lot of products out there – is its flavor. The food-eating flavor is baked right into the design of the game. Here’s what I mean:

Instead of an abstract row of three cards that each player must place more cards into at the beginning of each of their turns (like with some card games); you “refill the tray of food.” That’s so grokable (something that is easy to understand and “get” the concept of) for a player. Of COURSE you refill the tray of food – it’s an empty food tray with no food on it!

When you choose a food or condiment from the tray to put into your mouth, you “chew” it. And – get this – your mouth’s flavor (hehe) has also been leveraged into the game’s design. Your mouth has empty card slots laid out in a row: the sides (of your mouth) chew food while your tongue (in the middle of your mouth) handles condiments (because you taste with your tongue!). When you finish chewing, you swallow it and get glory.

You always have to chew something new every turn, but your mouth can get full, so you end up spewing something every now and then. That’s when other players can “catch” this spewed food into their own mouths to chew and swallow. Doing this is “more glorious,” so it becomes worth more glory points.

The foods and condiments themselves consist of cards like: the Hot Hot Hot Sauce, Dentures, and Snack Product (which looks like a Twinkie – and if you’ve seen Zombieland, you’ll know that the Twinkie, humorously, doesn’t expire and survives even through apocalypses).

Do, Do, Do, Do You Have It? GUTS!

I found out all about the game by having it demoed to me by Jesse Fuchs, one of the creators of the game. Even while I was running late for a popular panel at PAX I wanted to attend, I wanted to finish up the game session that Jesse demoing with me. I enjoyed the game and wanted to return at a later time to talk more about card games and the advice I was asking for regarding production of them. And he gave me a demo copy of my own before I left! Nice guy!

So, Guts of Glory: a flavorful game – in more than one sense of the word – that’s easy to pick up and light-hearted. Pick it up if you’re looking for another multiplayer out-of-the-box card game to enjoy that’s different from the usual popular card games you might find.

As of the time I post this, though, there’s only 15 hours left for the Kickstarter, and it’s already met its goal, so you’re guaranteed to get yourself a copy. Check it out!

Super Retro Game Review or: How I Learned Something about Super Crate Box and Loved Super Hexagon

A couple weeks ago, despite being nearly broke; I decided that spending one dollar for the iOS app Super Hexagon is worth the investment.  And it was, as one dollar buying enough content for a blog post topic is quite cheap; compared to, say, a Borderlands 2 purchase! (Besides, you know, having a ton of fun. Though, it was not my intent to buy Super Hexagon just for the sake of writing about it.) When I purchased Super Hexagon and tried it out for the first time, I was visiting friends at their place at the time.  I didn’t expect this, but the three of us got sucked into passing around my iPad trying to one-up each other’s high scores – just like at the arcades of olden times I only hear about.

A few days after competitive Super Hexagon-ing with my buddies, I fired up Steam and re-discovered Super Crate Box. I played it some time ago on PC, and I remembered enjoying the game. I was in the mood to play it again, so I did; and I noticed something: it’s not as fun as Super Hexagon.

Why was this, though? Both games have much in common: retro graphics, simple gameplay, one-hit game overs, and the goal of getting as far as possible before dying. But I have MORE fun with Super Hexagon. Then I figured it out: Super Hexagon evolves the challenges presented to the player over time during the gaming session whereas Super Crate Box does not.

Super Fun Challenge

In the Super Mario games, you encounter koopas, goombas, and some platformer obstacles in each level. However, as you progress through Super Mario, you find that there are red koopas that are “smarter” than the green koopas you first encountered, flying goombas, different enemies such as flying cheep-cheeps and spinies, and more difficult and differently-arranged platformer obstacles. The challenges presented to the player keep changing as the player progresses further into the game.

Even with the matter-of-seconds gameplay of Super Hexagon contrasting with Super Mario’s lasting-quite-a-bit-longer-than-a-few-seconds play sessions, Super Hexagon still manages to increase and vary the obstacles over time. When you start up a game of Super Hexagon, you aren’t presented with the same challenge you find when you’ve passed the ten-second mark or thirty-second marks – and you DEFINITELY don’t experience what you find after you’ve survived 60 seconds. Instead, the game is at its slowest in the beginning, and you start off with some obstacles with multiple ways to get past them before being presented with a nearly-hexagon-ish obstacle with only one way to get past them – and so on and so forth. Super Hexagon’s gameplay changes up things and/or becomes increasingly difficult as you progress further into the game.

Even better, Super Hexagon doesn’t just throw the same obstacles at you at each point in time in the game – you might get Easy Obstacle A in the beginning in one game while Easy Obstacle B is thrown at you in the beginning of your next game. But this is like icing on cake, and I’m digressing.

In Super Crate Box’s case, the game doesn’t change up the gameplay as you progress through the game. It’s the same enemies doing the same exact thing – over and over again. The same map, the same open area at the top of the screen where enemies drop in from.

Wait! Don’t worry. I’m aware of Super Crate Box’s additional maps and the harder modes that have enemies spawn from other places other than the top of the screen. This is actually what I believe to be a mistake: you can only play on one map and in one difficulty mode with each session.

When you play Super Crate Box, it’s like you’ve got a D12 die for your weapons and another die for what and how frequently enemies spawn, and you just keep rolling and dealing with the results until you end up with an unfavorable outcome and lose. If it evolved its challenges like Super Hexagon does, then the metaphorical die rolled for challenges would change over time instead of being the same thing rolled over and over again.

Super Other Games as Examples

You might point out examples such as Pac-Man where the game uses the same map with the same enemies over and over again. However, as you complete each map, the ghosts become faster and the power pellets don’t last as long as before. The gameplay still evolves, just only in the difficulty manner.

Also, I consider Ms. Pac-Man an improvement over Pac-Man for the reason that it DOES add those additional maps for a player to play through within one play session. So, Ms. Pac-Man does have both “increase in difficulty” and “variance of obstacles” as part of the evolution of challenges presented to the player and this makes it more fun.

And why is having challenges that evolve important for a game (for single-player games, at least)? People’s brains like learning things. When you learn, your body makes sure that you feel good (“You’re having fun!”), so that you can keep on learning. When we play games, we have fun because we are trying to figure out how to solve the problems in the games – we’re learning. But once a player has learned everything there is to know about the game, the game becomes tedious and simply an exercise. This is why Solitaire is not as exciting as Magic: The Gathering when you’re looking to game (for those who like Magic, that is) – because you’ve already mastered Solitaire.

On a side note, Solitaire can still be enjoyable in the sense that it’s relaxing just going through the motions. It’s why some people bake or go for a jog when they’re stressed or need a time-out. Personally, when I just want a relaxing activity, one of the things I like to do is play the original Super Mario Bros. I already know how to beat the whole game and have saved Princess Peach multiple times – but it still feels nice to play Super Mario Bros. every once in a while.

So, with Super Crate Box, when I’ve already learned that two out of the three enemies simply, drop down from above, walk straight, drop down into the fire, then become faster and run straight until they die; I’ve stopped learning. When I’ve already figured out how to use each of the thirteen weapons in the game; I’ve stopped learning. Now I’m just going through the motions and dealing with random weapons and random rates of randomly selected-from-three-available-enemy-types enemies.

Super Crate Box is Still Super Fun

Don’t get me wrong: I still have a lot of fun with Super Crate Box. In fact, whilst writing this and stopping to check out something Super Crate Box, I ended up having stopped writing for quite a while and getting sucked into playing it. Gamers gonna game.

It’s just that it’s not as fun to me as Super Hexagon is – and I am fully aware that games can only be designed well enough to a certain point to achieve fun before the fun-ness of a game becomes based upon the player’s gaming preferences. For example, I’m not much of a fan of first-person shooter games, but I’m sure Borderlands 2 is a great game and does what it does well.

But even with Super Hexagon’s and Super Crate Box’s similarities, each game has something different to offer that can’t be compared with anything from the other game. Super Hexagon has simplistic controls and music and visuals that contribute toward a unique experience. Super Crate Box is a platformer, has more personality, and has as a deeper well of unlockable content that encourages you to play over and over again.

Super Crate Box could have been better. But, keep in mind that this game is still good, and it’s no slight against Vlambeer, the developer of the game, as circumstances and certain decisions determined the overall outcome of the game. And that outcome is a fun game with many fans; a feat that I have yet to pull off myself.

Until next time, may the challenges your players face during a play session of your game do what a Pikachu does when exposed to a Thunder Stone.

How to Design a Bad Card Game

A friend of mine obtained a card game called Tentacle Bento. And as some of you may know, I kinda sorta LOVE card games. So we played it. ...And it’s bad.

I know – I’m a bit late to the “Let’s write about Tentacle Bento!” party. However, I’m not writing about how the game objectifies women and trivializes rape. There’s already been tons of discussion and articles on this topic you can find in places elsewhere on the web and within the blogospheres. No, what I’m actually going to cover is how horribly un-fun Tentacle Bento is. Tentacle Bento is bad game design!

To help illustrate how poorly-designed Tentacle Bento is, I’m going to strip away the theme of the game and just focus on how the game works mechanically. This way, you wouldn’t be distracted by all the fun flavor of capturing anime school girls with your tentacles hiding the fact that it doesn’t play all that well. This same phenomenon can be found in some video games (“Look at those beautiful cutscenes! Just ignore the fact that the gameplay isn’t all that great!”).

How to Construct a Bad Card Game Deck

The first thing you do is obtain two playing card decks and a sharpie.

Of the four Jokers, three will be a part of the deck. Write an ‘A’ on one, a ‘B’ on another one, and a ‘C’ on a third one. Set aside the fourth one to determine the Direction of Play during the game.

Of the eight Aces, mark four of them, all different suits, with a star symbol. The remaining four should each have a smiley face written on them.

Mark all the 2’s, 3’s, 4’s, 5’s, and 6’s with a triangle symbol. All the 7’s, 8’s, and 9’s should be marked with a circle symbol. Also, mark four 10’s, each one a different suit, with a circle symbol. The remaining 10’s and the Jacks, Queens, and Kings are to be marked with a square symbol.

All the cards will form one deck except for the one unmarked Joker card to be used separately from the deck during the game.

How to Play a Bad Card Game

In this Bad Card Game, the goal is to score as many points as possible by matching Squares, Circles, and either Triangles or Stars. Forming three cards of the same suit of a Square, Circle, and a Triangle or Star can score you even more points. When the players randomly draw all four Smiley Face Aces from the deck, the game ends!

Now, using that deck you constructed earlier, grab four players and shuffle the cards of the deck except for the one unmarked Joker. The one Joker card you set aside should be placed face-up on the table. As long as the Joker card is face-up, you go through each of the players’ turns clockwise. While it is face-down, counter-clockwise. Deal seven cards to each player. If any player has any smiley face Aces in their starting hand of seven cards, they shuffle them back into the deck and are dealt replacement cards again until they have no smiley-face Aces. Lastly, discard the top card of the deck. If THAT is a Smiley Face Ace, shuffle it back into the deck and repeat until you don’t get one. Now, somebody goes first.

The first step of a player’s turn is the Draw Step. There’s three ways to draw cards in this game:

1) Draw a card from the deck.

2) Draw the top card of the discard pile.

3) Draw a card from anywhere in the discard pile plus put into your hand all the cards that are positioned above it. The card you drew must then be used to form a Circle-Square-Triangle/Star match where all the cards are of the same suit.

If the card you draw from the deck is a Smiley Face Ace, you must immediately play it, setting it face up on the table, and it affects all players with a game effect. Once there are four Smiley Face Aces on the table, the game ends. The fourth Smiley Face Ace’s effects do not take effect.

After you draw your card or cards, you can play Joker cards, form matches, and add Triangles to certain existing Perfect Matches you have made. Perfect Matches are matches where all the cards are of the same suit.

Joker cards ‘A’ and ‘B’ each do some kind of game effect that restricts a player and can be passed around from player to player indefinitely. Joker card ‘C’ does a game effect that messes with a player of your choice then gets shuffled back into the deck.

To form a match during your turn, you must choose a Square and Circle card from your hand then choose either a Triangle or Star card. A match with a star card will contribute one point toward your score. If you match with a Star card instead, it must be a Perfect Match. A match with a star card will cause a special game effect to happen and will count five points toward your score. A Perfect Match using a Triangle card instead of a Star card will result in a defined-in-the-rules game effect (one of which is flipping over the set-aside Joker card), depending on which suit was matched.

Lastly, you can add any additional Triangles you have in your hand to existing Perfect Matches of yours that do not contain a Star card. Imperfect Matches cannot have extra Triangles added to them. Each match can have a maximum of three Triangle cards. Each Triangle card in a match counts as one point toward your score.

The very last thing you do during your turn is discarding. If you have any cards left in your hand at the end of your turn, you must discard a card. Then the next player according to the Direction of Play Joker card takes his or her turn.

When the game is over, count your points from the matches you have then subtract the number of points total from your hand. Each Triangle in your hand is negative one point while each Star in your hand is negative five points. Player with the most points wins!

How to Strategize in a Bad Card Game

So, to win at this game, you need to score the most points by the time all the four Smiley Face Aces are randomly drawn by the players. How do we make sure we do our best to score the most points and win the game? Well, here’s how:

Since forming matches is what scores us points, we’ll look out for matches we can make. However, the best matches to make are Perfect Matches. This is because you can freely add up to two extra Triangles to those one, scoring more points. So, we’ll avoid doing Imperfect Matches.

To further add to the incentive of making Perfect Matches, when you draw from the discard pile from any position to have that card form a Perfect Match, you get to put all the rest of the cards that were placed above it into your hand. This is a massive card advantage over the other players. You get a lot of cards, and you deny the other players those cards you now have in your hand. And now you are likely to make even more matches as well as pick up MORE cards from the discard pile to form Perfect Matches

So, with this strategy, here is how your decision-making abilities break down: Does a card in the discard pile, when put into your hand along with all the cards on top of it, contribute to form a Perfect Match? If so, do that. During your turn, only make Perfect Matches unless there are three Smiley Face Aces out since the fourth one can pop up at any time. In that case, try to empty your hand as much as possible.

Now, get out there and win doing this! So much fun, right?

How to Determine a Bad Card Game

A good game should have several meaningful choices for the player to make. Tentacle Bento fails at this miserably. When one choice is hugely beneficial as compared to the other choices, then it results in really just one choice existing for a player to make, which causes the game to degenerate into not being fun. Chess gives you a ton of choices to make, many of which are just as good as other ones. Magic: The Gathering allows you to decide whether you should cast this spell now or later or whether or not you want to cast this spell over the other one in your hand with your limited amount of mana. In Tentacle Bento, the only real option you have to win at this game is to form a match of three cards of the same suit. That’s it.

And there is a BIG advantage to waiting to forming a same-suit match with a card from the discard pile since you get to pick up so many cards and deny others those same cards. This results in those players being unable to catch up to the player that is winning. The player that gets ahead is more easily able to get even more ahead.

The Girl cards (Triangles, in my earlier Bad Game example) are all the same except for suits. It would be beneficial to the game if there were effects associated with the girls. Stuff like drawing cards, taking cards from the discard pile freely, or messing with matches that exist. That would make each girl card a lot more interesting and meaningful. I know that it adds a layer of complexity, but adding just the minimum amount of extra game text on these cards would be necessary to steer the game toward being fun.

The boon of getting all the cards above the card in the discard pile you select to form the same-suit match is just ridiculous. This has to change. It’s a huge power imbalance that randomly happens to players when they just so happen to draw the right suit and card type.

The game randomly ending with the Event cards (Smiley Face Aces in my example) isn’t an elegant way to end the game. Also not elegant: Returning those Event cards back to the deck when drawing them in your initial hand. Figure out a different way to end the game.

The Character cards are a great idea to have in this game. After all, an all-girls school still has the faculty of teachers, janitor, cook, headmaster, etc. Having just three Character cards in a deck of over 100 cards is woefully not enough. Adjust the ratio of Character cards to the other card types in the deck to allow a more-plentiful amount of Characters.

Also, the Mayhem Effects that happen (the extra defined-in-the-rules game effects from forming a Perfect Match with a Triangle instead of a Star from my example) are not significant enough to shake up the game. It’s boring. Also, since the effects aren’t written anywhere besides within in the rules, it’d be helpful if the game effects associated with each suit were easier to remember or written somewhere more noticeable.

How to Conclude a Bad Card Game Blog Post

With that said, the good things that this game has going for it are: high-quality artwork, a lot of clever and witty euphemisms, and great thematic choices for the different suits of Sexy, Cute, Sporty, and Smart along with their associated Girl, Capture, and Location cards. I feel like this game can be quite enjoyable using the same deck of cards if the rules were re-written.

Tentacle Bento: An unfun card game whose sole selling point is the theme of what one could interpret as to possibly imply as hentai tentacle rape.

Murder, He Wrote

Murder by Allen Williams

As I was clickity-clackity-ing a response to Trevor Murdock’s guest post on fellow Magic: The Gathering design blog Goblin Artisans, I found that what I had to say would require a number of words resulting in a far greater size of a reply than would be usual for a blog post comment. Then it hit me that I’ve found my next blog post topic. Thanks, Trevor, for writing about Murder and pondering about the possibilities of “The Perfect Cycle.”

At What Cost?

First of all, you saw that Cancel and Murder both cost 1CC and sought the possible three other cards in the cycle of 1CC “perfect spells.” I appreciate this endeavor as it only serves to strengthen us as designers. However, I don’t consider anything a pattern until I have three instances of such a pattern. In my case, I would chalk up Cancel and Murder’s similar mana cost to coincidence.

Additionally, Cancel used to be Counterspell, and the “perfect” effect of “Counter target spell” had already been created at UU. If Cancel was never introduced to fix the power level of Counterspell, we would have just a single card left, Murder, in a supposed perfect 1CC cycle.

What I do pay attention to, though, is the wording of the effect and the name of the spell that produces such effect. I consider both Murder and “Destroy target creature.” to be such a perfect marriage of flavor and elegance. The same goes for Cancel and “Counter target spell.” Why is this? Because every part of the card makes sense, the effect is boiled down to its simplest form, and the card couldn’t be designed any other way. As an example, Time Stop’s “End the turn.” is a beautiful design. You can’t use fewer words to produce Time Stop’s effect. And it does feel like you’re stopping time. The turn is a progression of time, and you just ended it.

Yet, Time Stop costs 4UU – six mana. That’s just a result of how powerful the effect is in terms of gameplay. The same goes for Cancel and Murder.

Painted By Numbers

I’ve noticed something when I’m trying to think of the most basic form of other effects: Spells with effects that have numbers in them often fail at being those perfectly elegant designs. Cards like Lightning Bolt and Giant Growth are fantastic staple cards of Magic: The Gathering. But there’s just one teeny-weeny thing that probably couldn’t be helped that stop them from entering the same realm as Cancel and Murder: A Lightning Bolt dealing three damage is arbitrary. A Giant Growth growing your creature three sizes larger is the same way. But they’re perfect gameplay-wise. …Just not in regards to flavor.

Divination by Howard Lyon

An example of an attempt to make sense of cards that use arbitrary numbers in the effect to go with the name is Divination. I love that “Draw two cards.” is just three words, but it actually doesn’t make sense to me why Divination is just two cards. Why not one card or three? As somewhat proof that there is something there to worry about in terms of the numbers used in the effect, consider the Magic 2013 art of Divination: There are two keys depicted. Ah, you see? Two keys in the art make the drawing of two cards make a bit more sense for Divination, right guys?

Ah, but you might say that, by this logic, all cards that require a numerical value in the effect are doomed to be “imperfect” and never be able to be considered as highly as Cancel and Murder. This is where I point out Hex. Hex destroys six target creatures specifically, yet, the name itself doesn’t just mean that something negative is happening to the targets – it also means “six.” Perfect.

 So when we’re designing cards that use numbers, if we seek to boil down an effect of say, “CARDNAME deals 5 damage to target creature or player,” we should look for why the effect is dealing five damage specifically and name the spell accordingly. For this effect, I would say that something involving a hand or foot, which have five fingers and toes respectively, would serve this purpose. The fact that we have two eyes can help serve to craft an effect that involves the number two, for example. Foresee was almost a perfect card if it weren’t for the pesky “then draw two cards” within the effect. Seeing into the future is what Scry is doing, and the play on words with “fore” and “four” means “Scry 4” makes sense. And, yes, the art is also doing what Divination’s art is doing in that it’s helping the spell make more sense to the player.

Creature from the 2/2 Black Lizard Horror Lagoon

When it comes to card types, I don’t worry about that too much for the same reason I don’t with the mana cost. These things just serve the gameplay and are not as important as the name and the effect. However, when it comes to creatures, I believe it gets a bit trickier to achieve “perfection.”

First of all, in most cases, a creature’s name can’t be as elegant as sorceries and instants due to the fact that, for example, Goblins come in all sorts of shapes and sizes across the planes. But Murder is always about killing. You can’t just design a card called Goblin (or Angel or Vampire). What kind of Goblin is it? Naturally, to help create “perfect creatures,” just like with cards like Cancel and Murder, you’d have to use names that aren’t specific to a certain plane. So, a name like Raging Goblin is perfect. While Goblins vary across the planes, there will always be rage.

Thoughtweft Trio by Wayne Reynolds

So, we’d need to leverage the name to make sense for the rest of the card. The rest of a creature card to keep in mind is the creature type(s), abilities, and power/toughness. I’d say that the power/toughness is the most difficult to just make “perfect sense” of all (I don’t believe it’s impossible. I don’t have an example in mind, but I bet a word like “trio” in the name of a creature card could help the use of “3” in the power/toughness).

For creature types, consider the type “Giant.” Giant is a race. But, taking a page from “Hex,” it has a double meaning in that it could also mean large. So, if we have, say, a Giant Warrior as a name for a card, those words could be the creature types, too. Cat Warriors exist, and it’s of type “Cat” and “Warrior,” and its 2/2 does a decent job at portraying that there is more than one of  them. Not perfect, of course, but a decent job.

If a creature has “Mountainwalk,” perhaps it is card called “Mountain Walker.” Of course, this example leads to an arbitrary power/toughness and creature types that don’t make the best of sense. But, you catch my drift. Let all the components of a creature card work perfectly together to create that card that couldn’t have existed any other way.

Here’s another attempt: Flying Warrior as a name, creature type “Insect” “Warrior,” and it has the flying ability. The art depicts a fly holding a sword. A flying warrior! That leaves the power/toughness not tying in perfectly with the name, types, and ability. Ah, well. Also, perhaps the word pun of “flying” with “fly” was too much of a stretch.

Lastly, I’ll leave you with a card that tries to be perfect in regards to the power/toughness (by employing the power of homonym puns), but must be silver-bordered, and doesn’t quite make sense flavorwise for the creature type used and how large the power and toughness is as well as what makes this Warrior of the Tutu variety (besides depicting it within the art):

The Pikachu Problem

Typhoid Rats by Kev Walker

I didn’t expect this to be my “first post in a long while” written piece because, after all, this is regarding card game design that isn’t “serious.” By that I mean fan game design. While certain fan art can be a serious work of art, most are simply …just fanism. And this, I believe,  is the case for a Magic: The Gathering set that I veered off of my “serious” path of doing a “four colors matter” set to work on: A Pokemon Magic set. 

I Choose You

Doing a Pokemon Magic: The Gathering set has been attempted before by other enthusiasts, for sure, but just as with many others who do fan art or fan fiction of, say, Pokemon; this doesn’t stop those artists from doing yet another awesome illustration of a Gyarados or a slash romance between trainers Red and Blue. This set is just something I need to get out of my system. It’s an expression of my love for the franchise (Well, the first generation of Pokemon mostly) through the medium that I love to work with: game design.

Originally, I was messing around with working on a Pokemon Magic: The Gathering set back in college. I knew less of what I was doing in Magic set design then than I do now (not that I am as competent and polished as an actual Magic R&D card designer at the moment), so I thought I’d take another crack at it. It also helps that I just got a shiny new laptop bringing in all sorts of increased productivity and possibilities.

Now, before working on the skeleton of the Pokemon set’s design, I have to find my themes in both flavor and mechanics. Since I’m using an IP that is already fully-fleshed out, I need to leverage that into whatever mechanical themes I’d be focusing on. So what is the flavor of Pokemon?

What? It's Evolving!

Obviously, the most important part of Pokemon is the monsters themselves. So this means this Magic: The Gathering set would be heavily creature-focused. How focused on creatures? Math time: the average Magic set usually has about 50% of its cards as creature cards. The normal number of cards in a set that isn’t basic land is 229. How many Pokemon are there? Over 600. Holy crap. …The good thing is that the number of Pocket Monsters initially capped at 151 in the Pokemon Red & Blue games (Generation I). Also, the first generation is the only generation I truly love, so I’m partial to this decision on a personal level. Anyway, since 50% of 229 cards is 115, and that 151 Pokemon (let alone any non-Pokemon creatuers like Gym Leaders) is well over 115, that means this set will definitely be creature-oriented.

Now, there’s a lot more to Pokemon than just that fact that there’s a bunch of monsters. There are the 15 different types of monsters (17 in the second generation of Pokemon onwards) and the strength & weaknesses among them, Pokemon battling, catching Pokemon, and evolving Pokemon. This last trait is something that is inherent to the very nature of Pokemon and is something that most Pokemon do. When Pokemon gain enough experience and level up, they evolve into a different Pokemon, usually into a larger, more-developed version of their previous self.

Thus, I believe evolving – an important aspect of Pokemon – needs to be represented mechanically. Now, I haven’t figured out what the evolution mechanic would be, yet, but I did think about something important related to evolving: Not all Pokemon evolve the same way. Usually, a Pokemon evolves by leveling up enough to a certain level. However, in other cases, some Pokemon evolve through exposure to some kind of elemental Stone or by being traded.

Evolution Charm by John Avon

The various methods of evolving a monster is a great design in the Pokemon games. Your first experiences of evolution might have been with your starter Pokemon or with the evolves-very-early-in-levels Caterpie or Weedle. Then, as the game goes on, you find out that there is more than one way to evolve a Pokemon, which keeps the evolution mechanic exciting. The pinnacle of the evolution of evolution (hehe) was that Eevee not only evolves through an elemental Stone, but evolves into one of three (now, like, seven or something as more Pokemon games are released) different Pokemon depending on which one of three elemental Stones you chose to use on it. Exciting!

When designing a Magic: The Gathering set, when you introduce a new game mechanic (evolving a Pokemon creature card), you start with the simplest form of that mechanic, so players can learn the new mechanic in its least complex form. Then you further develop that mechanic with new twists when the mechanic appears again in a subsequently-released Magic set that continues the same theme as the first set (the Pokemon theme).

I can’t just throw in all 151 Pokemon into the first set of what would be a Pokemon block (sets in the same world that are released within a few months of each other are called a “block”) because some of those monsters have the more-complex version of the evolution mechanic. Well, I could always just ignore any twists in the evolution mechanic found in the games and settle for one set with all Pokemon creature cards evolving the same way. However, I believe that doing this would be a disservice to the flavor of Pokemon.

O.K., better plan: Use the second generation of Pokemon (a hundred more of them exists in Generation II to bring the total to 251 Pokemon) and include only Pokemon that have the basic evolution in the first set. The more-complex evolutions would only be in the second set. Ignoring for now the reworking of the number of monsters for figuring out how creature-saturated these two sets would turn out to be, there’s a wrench thrown into the design: Pikachu.

I Choose You, Too: Electric Boogaloo

Pikachu is a Pokemon that has become the mascot of the whole franchise. In the anime, the main character persisting throughout the series is Ash, a Pokemon trainer who owns a Pikachu that has been with him since episode one. Since there’s a limit of six Pokemon that a Pokemon trainer can carry at one time, all other captured Pokemon exceeding six must be put into a special storage (Don’t worry – Professor Oak cares for them. Somehow). So, whenever a new season starts where Ash would catch new Pokemon, Ash makes sure to empty his roster of six Pokemon. …except for Pikachu – because Pikachu is SO important. Pikachu even has its own Game Boy game version – Pokemon Yellow. And even various incarnations of Pikachu that are not Pikachu are released in later generations!

But why is Pikachu a problem for the Pokemon Magic: The Gathering set design? It’s Pikachu’s evolution. Pikachu evolves not through the basic form of evolution but by Thunder Stone, one of the elemental Stones. O.K., so I can just have the Pikachu card in the second set, right? No way. What kind of Pokemon set would be without a Pikachu card in it? The first set would be without Pikachu. Pikachu represents Pokemon. I believe that the theoretical players that would open up the theoretical booster packs of the first Pokemon set should be able to find a Pikachu card among the first few opened quite easily. So, Pikachu will need to be in the first set, but the evolution mechanic execution needs to accommodate for this problem.

Isamaru, Hound of Konda by Christopher Moeller

On an aside, while I can include a legendary creature named Red’s Pikachu (Red is the name of the trainer in the Pokemon games Ash is based on), and this particular Pokemon would never evolve just like in the games and anime series: 1) I believe that Red’s Pikachu needs to be at least be a rare card, if it existed, which means it’s going to, well, rarely show up in booster packs; and 2) Red’s Pikachu at the common rarity is too weird with that name (most, if not all, other Pokemon creature cards would have just the name of themselves with no possessive noun affixed to it) and would mean putting the “legendary” supertype at common, which has never been the convention for legendary creatures (and for good reason). If the “legendary” supertype is ever put on common cards, this set is not the set to explore such an avenue in Magic: The Gathering design.

So, Pikachu will be a common card (the most prevalent card rarity) named simply Pikachu. I’m not getting into what to do about the color or colors Pikachu would be or whether its Lightning Pokemon type will be represented – What’s most important, currently, is how the execution of the evolution mechanic will impact this special corner case.

What I could do is have the evolve mechanic appear on the evolved forms of Pokemon only and then put it on a Raichu (the evolution of Pikachu) card which would appear in the second set. However, would this work with whatever the evolution mechanic would eventually end up actually doing?

Additionally, I need to look out for the “baby Pokemon” that was introduced in Generation II, which introduced a pre-evolution of Pikachu named Pichu. A baby wrench in the design, too. So, using the convention of putting evolution on evolved Pokemon, Pikachu would need “Evolves from Pichu (Reminder text.)” (Or however the mechanic would be templated). Though, these baby Pokemon evolved through Happiness Level in the games (Oh, boy. How complex).

Gotta Catch 'Em All

Here are the next steps in the set: Find out what other themes in Pokemon can be represented mechanically and figure out how the evolution mechanic will work exactly. From there, I can then make sure to figure out an execution of evolution that would still accommodate Pikachu’s problem.

This is the current stage in this fan-tastic Pokemon Magic: The Gathering set design – and I'm totally halting development of that more serious “four colors matters” set because of this (No worries, I'll get back on it). This peculiar issue with Pikachu prompted me write about it in this blog post, thus kick-starting my return to writing about Magic design. Thanks, Pikachu. It also helps that I was amused at the opportunity for a cute and whimsical title for a game design blog post: The Pikachu Problem.

Vs. the Vs. System

One day, Ethan Fleischer, a Great Designer Search 2 finalist, tweets a tweet regarding Vs. System, the superhero (mostly) Marvel and DC Comics collectible card game released in 2004 by Upper Deck Entertainment. Vs. System is no longer supported by Upper Deck, but, for a while, it was reasonably popular and even had its own Pro Circuit with $1 million given out in cash prizes every year (the equivalent of Magic: The Gathering's Pro Tour). But, today, I'm going to talk about the Vs. System's game design itself, or, rather, what was wrong with it.

I was trying to tweet Ethan the myriad of reasons why Vs. System was flawed, but then I realized I was going to need more than a few 140-character tweets to do so. That's when I went on this tangent of a blog post, but it's a good tangent. So you'll know what not to do when you design a card game. Or, perhaps, we'll be able to spot these same mistakes in some other card games out there.

A quick aside: I love Vs. System, and I played it for years (I even quit Magic for a period of time just to devote myself completely to the game. Gasp! The blasphemy!), but that doesn't mean that Vs. System didn't have its faults. I love the comic book "mythologies," and I love card games, so putting those two together was just heaven. The game system to support it, sadly, wasn't perfect (However, I believe it's a lot better than a lot of card games out there, but that's almost a baseless statement since I haven't played most other card games out there. I know, I know, as a game designer, it's important, so... "I'll get to it.").

Oh, and I'm not bashing Upper Deck Entertainment. It's cool, guys. Don't come after me. I don't have very many nice things, anyway.

So, let's see where it fell short. When I talk about various parts of Vs. System, I'm going to compare it with Magic: The Gathering, so I'm assuming you're already familiar with Magic (If not, then... go learn and play it. And then become addicted to it. And then come back and finish this. Well, actually, if you get that far, I don't really care if you finish this post or not. We'd have another #mtg player in our midsts! ...Where was I? Oh, right.) I'm not going to fully explain how Vs. System works, though, since that'd be too many extra words mucking up the point I'm trying to get across. There are five main problems I can see with the Vs. System, and they are as follows:

Problem #1: Lack of "Colored Mana"

In Magic: The Gathering, cards have a converted mana cost. A card with a converted mana cost of two could cost you in a variety of different ways, such as 1R, RR, RG, and 2. The important part is that in addition to have the correct amount of mana, you also need the correct type of mana. And there's five basic types: white, blue, black, red, and green.

In Vs. System, though, the resources you have (lands) always produce "colorless" resource points (mana). This was O.K., since every character and equipment card you play (creatures and equipment in Magic) only require you to pay a "converted mana cost." Pay 3 or 5 instead of 2G or 3UU. Imagine if this existed in Magic:

Notice the mana cost. That's crazy! With this, all non-green decks (especially blue) now have something a lot more inappropriately powerful to include in their decks at turn four. Well, besides counting planeswalkers.

So, that's what the cost in the left-right hand corner of this Vs. System card is supposed to be; a generic cost:

So, for every single deck you include Hal Jordan in, once you got to five resources, you can play this card with no restrictions, even if the rest of your deck wasn't Green Lantern-aligned (The teams in Vs. System are like the colors in Magic). Mind you, those numbers (ATK and DEF) in the lower left and right-hand corners (like the power and toughness on Magic cards) are average for a character that costs 5, but Hal Jordan also has, like, four extra abilities on top of that (Not that this was a powerful card. There were other, more powerful, cards during the days I played Vs. System, and I'm sure there's even more powerful cards released during the time I didn't play).

This isn't a good part of Vs. System as the generic costs shrink the card pool of "good cards" down. There's less variety to choose from. So, taking that into consideration, why wouldn't you just play every card that was ahead of the curve in the game? Well, when there were more-powerful characters, there were unorthodox drawbacks used to limit who can play the card. Here's three examples of such measures:

(Oh, yeah, Vs. System went through a facelift in its card template like Magic did in Eighth Edition. This one's the old one version.)

Sabretooth, Feral Rage is a card that's better than average in terms of stats. At 4-cost, you'd normally get a 7 ATK and 7 DEF in terms of stats. He's an 11 ATK / 7 DEF, so he could even take out 5-drops (That's huge in a game based practically all around combat.) So, apparently, the solution was to force you to discard a Brotherhood card (He's a Brotherhood-affiliated card). That's like adding a line to a good red Magic card: instead of putting, for instance, an extra red mana symbol in its mana cost, and it says: "As an additional cost to cast CARDNAME, discard a red card." Putting these sort of restrictions is fine on a card-by-card basis, but not as one of multiple "hacks" used to get around the fundamental flaw of the costing system for cards.

Here's another technique: forcing you to reveal another X-Men card from your hand. Each kind of drawback limits the player in a different way, but a lot of it, I suspect, is trying to get around the cost in the upper-left hand corner. It'd be pretty tragic if you had a dedicated X-Men deck and you had no other X-Men cards in your hand at the time you want to recruit Wolverine. Here's one more:

That little bold-faced word at the beginning of the text in the text-box says "Loyalty". And that's a keyworded drawback for: You can't recruit The Joker (cast it, play it) unless you control another character sharing a team affiliation with The Joker (in this, Arkham Inmates). So, once again, a dedicated Arkham Inmates deck would be out of luck to play this guy if you controlled no other Arkham Inmates.

You get the point. By the way, here's a couple of the benefits of using characters from the same team besides getting around these text-box limitations: Preventing breakthrough (trample) and team attacks (like "gang blocking" in Magic, except, in this game, you "gang attack"). It's not very impressive. It would be better if there were some streamlined kind of restriction, like "Fantastic Four mana" as in the colors of Magic. Oh, yeah, that's another problem:

Problem #2: Too Many "Colors"

This problem wouldn't have been visible right from when Marvel Origins and DC Origins were first released (Set 1 and 2, respectively). There are different team affiliations in Vs. System, which function like Magic's colors of mana. However, the problem was, there are too many team affiliations! You might have speculated what teams were coming up, but I don't think anybody anticipated just how many were going to be released with the future sets. Here's how the teams expanded (I'm only counting major teams. There were some cards in a set, like the first set, that were affiliated to a special team, like Negative Zone, that only had a couple characters of that team.):

Marvel Origins: X-Men, Brotherhood, Fantastic Four, Doom, Sentinels
Teams-to-Date: 5

DC Origins: Gotham Knights, Arkham Inmates, League of Assassins, Teen Titans
Teams-to-Date: 9

Web of Spider-Man: Spider-Friends, Sinister Syndicate
Teams-to-Date: 11


Superman, Man of Steel: Team Superman, Revenge Squad, New Gods, Darkseid's Elite
Teams-to-Date: 15


Marvel Knights: Marvel Knights, Crime Lords, Underworld, X-Statix
Teams-to-Date: 19


Green Lantern Corps.: Green Lantern, Emerald Enemies, Anti-Matter, Manhunters
Teams-to-Date: 23


And then the number just goes up from there. You can read a list of all the teams and the sets they were released in here. Green Lantern Corps. is where I stopped playing the game. It may or may not have correlated with the fact that there were too many teams, but I remember thinking, at the time, "This is getting ridiculous. Not only are there too many teams, but some of these teams are just silly." Some characters weren't created as a part of a team, so sometimes, Upper Deck would take liberties or find some kind of common factor among a bunch of characters then group them all in a team. Ugh. Vorthos would be very sad.

And a problem with having this many teams is supporting those teams as more sets are released. If someone had an Arkham Inmates deck and looked forward to new sets that would give cards specifically to their Arkham Inmates deck, they'd be disappointed if there weren't actually any cards in a new set. So, Upper Deck sprinkled in cards from old teams in sets where there's a bunch of cards for the new teams introduced. But, as more teams are made, more chunks of cards need to be devoted to old teams to keep those players happy. Otherwise, you could just ignore it... Or find some other solution. But, it's a problem that forces an answer. It helps, though, that Vs. System is divided into Marvel and DC, cutting the teams needing new cards in half.

A couple of solutions I saw happen were making dual-affiliated characters and re-using teams from the past. I like that latter solution, but there's only so many combinations you can do before you run out. It's like you're doomed, and you're scrambling to extend your lifespan by doing this, but you'll eventually die, anyway. ...Man. Here's an example of the former solution:

This guy is part of the Injustice Gang and The Rogues. ... Vorthos hates the teams but loves the nod toward Magic's Boomerang.

Problem #3: Threshold Costs


This is for the other two card types in the game. Characters and Equipment are recruited (cast, played) using resource points (mana) from your resources (land). Plot Twists (instants) and Locations (...pseudo-lands), however, use threshold costs. This means that they are free as long as you have a certain number of resources. If you have three cards in your hand that have a threshold cost of 3, then you hit three resources or more (turn three or later, in most cases), then you're going to be able to play all three of them at-will for free. This means that these cards, like Characters and Equipment, don't require a devotion to a particular affiliation. Except, it's even worse since they don't cost anything. Then things like the card below happen:

This was the marquee attack pump card in the first set. Yeah, that's right. Every single team in the game has access to giving an attacker +5 ATK (+5/+0). This is very weird. Isn't there at least a single team that is controlling, more defensive that wouldn't have access to something like this? Is there no Team Color Pie (Oh, wait a minute. On an almost unrelated note, yeah, there is)?! I remember Doom being more about control. But, not only is the Dr. Doom team like that, it also has access to the savage beats. Grawrar, now the separation between "good" cards and "bad" cards shrinks ever more.

Problem #4: Rising Increase in Stats Vs. Cost


This is a big one. Creatures and the combat phase are a big part of Magic. Vs. System is no different with its characters, except it's even more important for this game. As such, characters are a big part of the game. There's different stats at each "cost-level." You pay 3 for a character, the average stats are 4 ATK and 4 DEF. In Magic, there's also the expected average stats for a creature at a given cost. For a white creature, you pay 3 mana, you can expect probably a 2/2 with an ability or an effect, and it varies little from there. And when you pay four mana, its stats might not even increase by +1/+1. Here's a good example from Magic 2011:

You can see that there's even only +1/+0 in difference between Wild Griffin and Assault Griffin. Granted, getting only +0/+1 wouldn't have been much of a bonus. There's Makindi Griffin to show proof of that (Go, go, griffin examples). And then Cloud Crusader shows what happens when you put more white in the cost: you get a bit more of a bonus. In general, there's a linear correlation between cost and power (For 1 more than Cloud Crusader, you get Baneslayer Angel, and that's just ridiculous, but I digress).

In Vs. System, though, the characters show a non-linear correlation between cost and power. I'm going to count distributions in stats between ATK and DEF together. For example, a 1/1 (1 ATK and 1 DEF) is 2 points, and a 1/2 or a 2/1 is 3 points. Here's how it goes:

Cost 1: 2-3 points
Cost 2: 4-5 points (Average Increase in Power: 2-3 points)
Cost 3: 8 points    (Average Increase in Power: 3-4 points)
Cost 4: 14 points  (Average Increase in Power: 6 points)
Cost 5: 18 points  (Average Increase in Power: 4 points)
Cost 6: 24 points  (Average Increase in Power: 6 points)
Cost 7: 30 points  (Average Increase in Power: 6 points)
Cost 8: 38 points  (Average Increase in Power: 8 points)

Vs. System ames are usually decided by around turn 7, at least, when I was playing. Perhaps sooner with more powerful cards out now (Similar to how Vintage is in Magic. Actually, "Vs. System's Vintage" is called Golden Age). Now, let's say you missed your 7-drop character. What can you do? Well, if you're lucky, you'll still maximize the 7 resource points you'll get in the turn by playing two characters. Let's say you get a 6-drop and a 1-drop character. You add them up, and you're only getting 27 points worth. And that's the best you can do. A 5-drop and a 2-drop or a 3-drop and a 4-drop will yield 22 points. Now, that's a huge difference, especially in a combat-oriented game.

You might be wondering, though, about how it's not like people are hitting their drops every turn because... wouldn't they run out of cards? Well, no, because Vs. System had you draw two cards every turn. And because you can play any card as a resource (you play resources by putting a card from your hand face down), and because Plot Twists and Locations can still be useful in the resource row by being flipped face up from that row (in locations' case, it only works while as a resource), unless you have a specialized strategy (like the New Brotherhood deck focusing around a card called The New Brotherhood, incidentally, that specifically said it only worked while you had four or less resources out), you'd be crazy NOT to play a resource card face down every turn, assuming you're playing a reasonable deck.

So, what we have so far is the pressure to always hit your curve every turn. Turn 2, play a 2-drop. Turn 3, a 3-drop, and so on. If you draw a 4-drop on turn 6, you're going to hope that you DON'T have to play that card and instead be able to play your 7-drop. So, what do you do with such cards? Well, you could play it face down as a resource, but that wouldn't be optimal, since you'd want a plot twist or resource down there. Maybe you have some kind of effect that calls for a discard from your hand or a reveal, like the Sabretooth and Wolverine cards I showed earlier. Yeah, that's it. Whew, not a COMPLETE waste if you draw a character with less cost than the turn it is.

Vs. System had printings of tutors to smooth out this huge swinginess nature of games, games being decided by whether or not you drew an appropriate-costed card by a certain turn. Some teams didn't even have a tutor, so they had more variance. On top of that, some teams even had a cheap character that could tutor for a plot twist (a character tutor, if needed). This must have contributed to why the deck, dubbed "Common Enemy" (named after the team-up card, which crossed affiliations of all cards in your deck of Fantastic Four and Doom, and even cantripped), which had two character tutors, and a 1-drop plot-twist tutor, did so well.

So, to balance out all the difference in smoothing betweens teams that had tutors and teams that didn't, Vs. System started seeing all sorts of character tutors, a popular one being 1-drop character tutors. Here's a few of those:

In summary, make power versus cost linear, so strategies such as white weenie and goblins can be supported. Or, at least, not be punished in a game where you recruited a 4-drop and a 2-drop on turn 6 against your opponent's 6-drop.

Problem #5: Initiative


One of the major differences between Magic and Vs. System is that players share the same turns in this game rather than take their own turns as in Magic. However, what players took turns being in control of was something called "initiative." This just means that, in each phase/step of a turn, the player with initiative did their stuff first. So, in the "main phase," the player with initiative gets their resource points and spends them recruiting characters and equipment, then once that player was done, the other player gets to do the same. This is the same with combat, where the initiative-controlling player attacks the other first, then (if that player wasn't already pulverized) the second player does their combat. At the end of each turn, the iniative is passed.

The part that matters is due to how Vs. System's combat system works. As opposed to Magic, where creatures attack players and the opponent chooses how to block, if at all; you attack the opponent's characters with your characters. The result is that the player with the first initiatiave in combat will most likely incapacitate the opponent's characters to where, when it's the opponent's turn to attack, they wouldn't make much of a difference, in any. It's disabling your opponent's ability to respond. Now, this is fine and dandy since you each take turns having initiative. The problem is when you're building your deck.

When you win the die roll before a match, you choose whether to go on odd or even initiatives (first or second, respectivey). You're going to want to choose the initiative that most benefits your deck. But, when you don't get the initiative you want, your character choices at those certain turns (since it's important to curve out) might not have been optimal. Granted, some characters are good both on offense and defense, such as the Sabretooth card mentioned earlier, but there are characters that are better or worse when you're on defense.

So, now, not only do you have to deal with trying to reduce the variance in your draws in hitting your curve, you have to worry about what you're going to do when you don't get the initiative you want. That's a lot of swing.

A Now For Something Not-So-Completely Different: IP

There's one last problem that isn't related to the game's design: using existing intellectual property. Part of why Magic is so successful is that it doesn't have to rely on other IP. Magic's creative team can come up with whatever they need to fit the needs of the game. And it works the other way around, too. Wizards of the Coast can use both the creative and the design to work together and build off each other to make for the best that Magic can be. With Magic, like other games that come up with their own flavor, you can start a new set by designing to a cool world, like those card games that do use existing IP, or you can shape the world to a cool design.

With Vs. System, by relying upon superhero comics, they were doomed from the beginning. Well, different design choices could have extended the game's lifespan more, but eventually, the game will and is supposed to die.

However, I'm an optimistic guy. I think that, perhaps, if there's some kind of "using existing IP engineering," you can ensure that the content you're relying upon is stable enough and growing at a rate that isn't slower than the rate that you're consuming content for your designed sets. What you don't gotta do is just take an IP and use it until you just run out of steam. Kinda like how (I suspect) some card games are made solely to take advantage of the popularity of the IP and rake in the money only to be abandoned later on. This is similar to how many video games of movies are created: It's just extra merchandise (Ugh. Evil.). ...Well, that's just a guess.

Post-Mortem

Sooo, this might be the time where I go turn my criticism into constructive criticism. Well, if Vs. System wasn't already "dead," it'd be useful. But, still. I should be suggesting different ways of addressing the problems I mentioned as well as talking about what Vs. System did right, for goodness' sake. In addition to talking about what went wrong, you talk about what went right, then you learn from that stuff and improve and do better the next time (In this case, being better at TCG/CCG design). Like how many developers in the game industry, after each game is finished -- called a post-mortem.

So, here we go -- Oh, look at my word count. Is it that much already? I... should go see what's up with the #GDS2 Twitter feed. ...Bye.

Cheers,

Brad

P.S. All images used either as-is or for alteration in this blog post are copyright either Wizards of the Coast, Upper Deck Entertainment, Marvel Comics, and/or DC Comics.