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Underwater Set - Design Phase
Hello there my fellow smiths! I've recently been working on a custom card set, and realized that I should get more opinions on it. Here is the briefing:
The World: The lore is in a bad place right now, but I will be working on the lore a lot more soon. The basic concept is of a world mostly comprised of sea. Empire of (non-tribal) merfolk and other under-sea creature thrive in these depths, until now. Humanity and other beings of Earth have created machines of magic that can raid the underwater depths, and steal from the sea. The armies of the ocean fight back against the new onslaught of invaders. I'm not sure about this yet, it needs a lot more development.
Design:
- Theme
Currently, I have two main themes. Humanity is in Mardu, and are about equipments and enchantments. The main theme of the set is tapping matters, and I've approached it in several ways...
- Attacking
- Tapping for activated abilities
- Spells tapping creatures to get effects.
- Mechanics
- Dive (Whenever this creature becomes tapped [effect]).
- This just generally fits flavor, and is a great fit in this set.
- Convoke (Your creatures can help cast this spell. Each creature you tap while casting this spell pays for {1} or one mana of that creature's color.)
- This is a very simple mechanic that goes well into the theme of tapping your own creatures.
- Conspire (As you cast this spell, you may tap two untapped creatures you control that share a color with it. When you do, copy it and you may choose a new target for the copy).
- While this was just filler in Shadowmoor, I think it could do some good here. It's in here since convoke only really cover GW.
- Duelist (As long as a permanent is attached to this creature, [effect]).
- An aura theme in BW and an Equipment theme in RW help support this.
- Cycling (cost) (Discard this card: Draw a card.)
- We need a way to smooth out the set, and cycling helps. Also, I imagine it as though the sea flows and pushes away your last thing and the tide brings you one anew.
- Word (needs a better name) (When this creature dies, you may exile it from your graveyard. If you do, [effect]).
- This was added i since we needed GB to do something. : D
-Archetypes
- Blue-White: Dive
- All about diving, this control strategy uses a mix of conspire, convoke, and dive, to slowly win the game.
- Blue-Black: Conspire
- All about conspire, this strategy play a few token producers or hard to kill walls, then wins via conspire.
- Black-red: Duelist Aggro
- This uses both auras and equipment to activate duelist early and swing in.
- Red-Green: Word Aggro
-Attack with a bunch of cheap costed creates and get good effects when they die using the mechanic Word.
- Green-White: Convoke
- Play a bunch of early token producing spells, then tap dive creatures and tokens to create huge monsters. This archetype wins by going wide and tall.
- White-Red: Equipments
- Story wise, this symbolizes one of the human factions, the inventors. Mechanic wise, the goal is to get duelist and equipment matters cards on the field then go to town.
- Red-Blue: Prowess
- Get down guys with prowess then play a bunch of spells to hopefully close the game quick.
- Blue-Green: Tempo Dive
- Basically the more aggressive version of the dive strategy.
- Green-Black: Aristocrats
- Sacrifice a bunch of dudes with the Word mechanic and get value from that.
- White-Black: Auras
- Play auras on guys with duelist, and play auras such as pacifism. Story wise, this represents the other human faction, those who use magic the dive down into the depths.
The World: The lore is in a bad place right now, but I will be working on the lore a lot more soon. The basic concept is of a world mostly comprised of sea. Empire of (non-tribal) merfolk and other under-sea creature thrive in these depths, until now. Humanity and other beings of Earth have created machines of magic that can raid the underwater depths, and steal from the sea. The armies of the ocean fight back against the new onslaught of invaders. I'm not sure about this yet, it needs a lot more development.
Design:
- Theme
Currently, I have two main themes. Humanity is in Mardu, and are about equipments and enchantments. The main theme of the set is tapping matters, and I've approached it in several ways...
- Attacking
- Tapping for activated abilities
- Spells tapping creatures to get effects.
- Mechanics
- Dive (Whenever this creature becomes tapped [effect]).
- This just generally fits flavor, and is a great fit in this set.
- Convoke (Your creatures can help cast this spell. Each creature you tap while casting this spell pays for {1} or one mana of that creature's color.)
- This is a very simple mechanic that goes well into the theme of tapping your own creatures.
- Conspire (As you cast this spell, you may tap two untapped creatures you control that share a color with it. When you do, copy it and you may choose a new target for the copy).
- While this was just filler in Shadowmoor, I think it could do some good here. It's in here since convoke only really cover GW.
- Duelist (As long as a permanent is attached to this creature, [effect]).
- An aura theme in BW and an Equipment theme in RW help support this.
- Cycling (cost) (Discard this card: Draw a card.)
- We need a way to smooth out the set, and cycling helps. Also, I imagine it as though the sea flows and pushes away your last thing and the tide brings you one anew.
- Word (needs a better name) (When this creature dies, you may exile it from your graveyard. If you do, [effect]).
- This was added i since we needed GB to do something. : D
-Archetypes
- Blue-White: Dive
- All about diving, this control strategy uses a mix of conspire, convoke, and dive, to slowly win the game.
- Blue-Black: Conspire
- All about conspire, this strategy play a few token producers or hard to kill walls, then wins via conspire.
- Black-red: Duelist Aggro
- This uses both auras and equipment to activate duelist early and swing in.
- Red-Green: Word Aggro
-Attack with a bunch of cheap costed creates and get good effects when they die using the mechanic Word.
- Green-White: Convoke
- Play a bunch of early token producing spells, then tap dive creatures and tokens to create huge monsters. This archetype wins by going wide and tall.
- White-Red: Equipments
- Story wise, this symbolizes one of the human factions, the inventors. Mechanic wise, the goal is to get duelist and equipment matters cards on the field then go to town.
- Red-Blue: Prowess
- Get down guys with prowess then play a bunch of spells to hopefully close the game quick.
- Blue-Green: Tempo Dive
- Basically the more aggressive version of the dive strategy.
- Green-Black: Aristocrats
- Sacrifice a bunch of dudes with the Word mechanic and get value from that.
- White-Black: Auras
- Play auras on guys with duelist, and play auras such as pacifism. Story wise, this represents the other human faction, those who use magic the dive down into the depths.
This discussion has been closed.
Comments
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1mHLLTbqSA8iCcnIgCm1lK2WLQbm3Qfu7Wv8lLp4mOhk/edit#gid=0
Yeah, I probably should change it.
Also, I think your currently unnamed mechanic should be Drown or maybe Submerse.