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Renaissance Set — Design Phase
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I also had an idea for Jennel where he/she (what gender are we doing anyway?) creates Art tokens tapped and attacking when he/she attacks.
I see your point about not focusing on set mechanics too much in these legendaries. They probably should have effects independent of the mechanics, especially Compose. Psylian life, in my opinion, is okay, since it's a pretty common thing in the set, and it's the awe factor.
Here's an idea: Maybe they all create little Muses that go along with them. For example, Maren might make green little Muses that give you mana or psylian life.
I like the first art for Jennel
At least it isn't Odric...
Jennel, Watcher from Above
Kedra, of Many Hands
In the case of Jennel, the card name sounds more like a sentence than a name. Most, if not all MTG legendary cards are written with descriptions rather than actions.
Kedra's name was just awkward from any angle. It sounds more like a nickname given by someone who hates him, rather than the accepted title of someone.
It's just a bit of advice. Feel free to take it however you'd like
A couple things:
- The art on Jennel needs changing. Desperately. I liked the first of the artworks you proposed earlier, for example.
- What happened to the characters' art? I see a monk/warrior, an oracle/illusionist, a thief, a warrior/painter, and a giant treefolk druid; instead of a sculptor, a musician, a plagiarist, a painter, and a poet. This is an art-themed set; the focus, or at least much of it, should be on the characters' art. They're not the heroes because they're warriors; they're heroes because they're visionary artists.
They're great cards, but we are missing a heck of a lot of story and flavor.
- The second Kedrah is actually great, except for the name. I guess @NokiSkaur's translation is okay, but I'd prefer a different name altogether. Something to do with plagiarism, probably; I'll think about it.
- What the heck is blink-not??? XD
- Why treefolk? I'm fine with it if there's a definite reason, but dropping one of the most iconic races in Magic and one of the most prominent races on the plane for a bit of a fringe tribe (at least in recent sets) doesn't seem like something we should do. Perhaps you wanted to distance him from Nissa? If so, I think that there is no need, as their genders and characters ave quite dissimilar.
- I don't see the reasoning behind "Who Hates Winter." Or the card in general, for that matter, but I'm assuming you've made a new character to go along with the card design.
@TezzeretofCarmot21 I haven't thought that through yet XD Maybe he's not?
@MagicChess Most of the experimentation on those cards were just for the sake of trying something different ^^ It's important to not get too comfy with early concepts, it's always interesting to challenge them. If we like the new thing, good we made progress. If we don't like it, good, now we know we actually care about that random detail as something that matters
- For the names, well, I wanted to shorten most names to two syllabus because Wizards says it's what works best according to surveys when you have to learn completely made-up words (that's why all factions on Tarkir have two syllabus for instance). But it's not a hard rule, it was just a try
- More specifically, for Maren, I just thought an Ent should have a weird name, not something a human could have x)
- Yes, I thought it would be interesting to see if they still made sense if we don't make all of them about Art. It does have the downsides of making the lore less obvious, though we coud still compensate thanks to the instrument cycle. I thought it had the upsides of loosening the cycle and letting it breathe mechanically by not focusing all the cards on Art. And it also was easier to pick a random artwork. Once again, it's just an experimentation most of those concept cards likely won't make it to the set file, and some of them may end up completely different creatures ^^
- After the first impression has passed, how do you feel about them as non-art-focused cards? Do you think they're too battle-focused? I think Jennel especially ended up much more agressive than I anticipated at first.
- You like the second Kedrah? I like it too, but I'm unsure the rules would actually allow that though?
- I don't know what I'm doing for the names to be honest, I'm just having fun XD The idea for "Blink-Not" was that you shouldn't blink because she's so fast you would be dead if you took youe eyes away from her for the time to blink, it's a nickname ^^
- I found it sad to have 4 humans in the group and Maren sounded too much like Nissa (a quite elf) so I tried a drastic change, just to see how it goes, hence the Treefolk (basically, this is Groot xD)
- Not really, I haven't thought about the character, I named it Who-Hates-Winter because I immediatly thought an Ent would only wake up once the Muses have brought back summer x) I think you noticed now but I'm not super good with names, be glad I didn't give up and literally named it "Mren, Protector of Fatties" because I was *this* close ;p
@atrus159 On Ardent Visionary: WOOOW That's super swingy XD I like the idea but that's probably too flashy for uncommon ^^ I think this is the kind of ability that has the "wow' potential to do a fun mythic! ^^
@ningyounk, yes, it is important to not get too bogged down with early themes, but we kinda sorta moved on from creative design (way too early, in my opinion) and until now these characters have been pretty widely accepted. I have no problem with changing things up; it was just a little out of the blue XD
When I say "focused on art," I don't mean literally Art lords; I just think that the emphasis should be on their artwork and creativity, as opposed to combat/creatures. For example...
- Jennel might focus on +1/+1 counters (sculptures are hard to represent without artifacts XD). My original idea was for him to make combat Art tokens when he attacks, but they shouldn't all be art lords.
- Ekoma might focus on hand interaction (drawing, discarding, revealing, etc.).
- Kedra might focus on stealing things from your opponent, whether it be life, mana, cards in hand, or permanents.
- Salendi (I fell in love with this name when I came up with it, by the way XD I've made a D&D character for it: a high elf evocationist wizard who gets a little fire-happy) might focus on combat damage effects.
- Maren might focus on life-gaining in conjunction with mana production, or creature stat manipulation if we go with a treefolk (though what kind of artist would it be??). I still really like my idea for Maren where he lets you get {g} from psylian life.
Speaking of Maren...
- There are actually 3 humans in the group (you forgot Jennel)
- Yeah, my original idea was way too close to Nissa, but you yourself proposed a change where he is wise and understands people (as opposed to quiet, introspective, and shy).
On flavour text, I also found it a little weird to have a quote from a Grand Muse, I didn't picture them speaking. How are others feeling about it? (Anyways, flavour text is always cool but don't bother yourself too much with it, it's not mandatory for concept cards to be that realistic ^^ Even just a text without an image can be fine ^^)
@MagicChess Designing many cards will help us shape the lore accordingly and avoid getting stuck in creative for too long ^^ Ideally that phase would have been longer but we occur the risk of loosing everyone is we stale for too long on some details ^^
For Jennel, maybe sculpture could be represented as Golem creation?
For Ekoma, it would be super cool if we managed to create a mini-game where you describe a card using other cards, like she uses music as words ^^ I still haven't find how to do it properly yet
For Salendi, sure we can keep this name if you're really attached to it
For Maren, the treefolk thing was just an experimentation, don't hesitate to make some elf cards for him as well if you prefer that idea ^^ For the psylian life thing, no problem as long as he's not a parasitic card to a set mechanic, we can't have only one of the legendaries do nothing outside a specific Rezatta deck. (Also, we have to make sure Salendi is not about ramp in that case.)
Maybe we should consider not having all of them be artists? They could as well have different backgrounds ^^
And second, more importantly, is that they are destined to become the new Muses (as of now; everything is liable to change), so they have to be artists to receive the Gifting in the first place.
Also, I'm not attached to Salendi; that was just a weird, unnecessary anecdote
@Lujikul This makes me want to reconsider a +1/+1 theme for Green/Black instead of the stats manipulation archetype we chose ^^ That creature is clean and effective though it's missing power and toughness
Oops. It's supposed to be a 2/2.
@ningyounk How about Ajani and Dack for walkers ? I can see Ajani fitting in with life matters - I made a concept card I will post soon.
Ajani has arrived
Also, what does virtuoso mean? It's in the color description for red/blue as well as a few other places but its not in the mechanics list.
It's the old name for Compose.