Fan Card Design Hub: Discussion (+Card Design Contest Discussion)

[eternamemoria]

Wait, I just noticed the Golem’s ability. Yeah, it is too strong, soecially because you will generally be using your BBS anyway. Make the tokens 4/4.

EDIT: but that is all IMO, and I’ve yet to reach S-rank.

[coldhands]

@eternamemoria I gave the Golems such text because I imagined them as those huge sleeping guys that would wake up 2-3 turns after they’re summoned (Keeping the BBS cooldown in mind) and then go back to sleep… But they’re over the top right now as 12/12s (stats that I’ve came up with before deciding on giving them the text). Right now I’m thinking of either changing their Bloodbond text to something like: “can move this turn”, “can attack this turn”, “can move OR attack this turn” or reduce their stats to 6/6… Maybe even both…

[polinchi]

In my personal opinion, i find actually interesting the ones that work around the timer, because no submisions have stated anything like that yet, and i like tempo oriented stuff while also putting pressure on your opponent. But how would the card that resets the timer work once the BBS is able to be played everyturn?

[coldhands]

I accidentally replied to a submission in the monthly contest thinking it was this topic… I feel dumb now, lol

[qeltar]

I almost did that with my card, but decided it would be too confusing, especially if tied to a minion that could be removed between opponent turns.

BTW feedback on my card is welcomed. I am always coming up with hare-brained ideas but this is my first submission.

[excogitator]

I personally think that it is a bit overpriced. Maybe there is something that I don’t get, but the ability seems a bit small for 6 mana. For 6 mana, you only get an egg that has the potential of being a 2 drop and +1 attack the turn it is played. At that point in the game, other generals can easily remove eggs and artifacts through damage. Sure, you an run away and start an army of eggs, but then the +1 attack feels a bit awkward.

I think that lowering its cost or making it summon more eggs could make it work. Maybe I’m just missing something major, but I can see this as a 3 cost card.

[excogitator]

Plot twist: the expansion is focused on minions with their own activated, Bloodborn-esque abilities. Remember how the cipher text for Keliano refers to a tribe that were “not Bloodborn, yet not bloodless?” This expansion might introduce minions with abilities with the same mechanics as Bloodborn spells.

[johnbob78]

I’d like feedback on this:
Bloodbound Silencer
Neutral Minion
6 Mana- 5/6
Bloodbond: Put a Blood Siphon in both players hands.

Blood Siphon:
10 Mana Spell
You cannot cast ANY spells (including this) while this is in your hand. If you replace this card deal 4 damage to your General.

I know this fits much better with last month’s theme, but I thought the Idea was cool so I wanted to make it fit.

Basically it’s a card that, upon activation of a BBS will put a card that prevents spells from being played in both players hands. You have to replace the card to play spells again and if you do, you take 4 damage. I also like it’s synergy with Sphynx as if a player has riddle being cast around, they can do this at 9 mana: Cast Riddle -> Summon Blood Silencer -> Use BBS to lock down the opponents replace and their spells. All for taking 4 damage!

Kills Spellhai
Hurts Cassyva
And maims the options of every other deck.

[archer4]

Can blood siphon itself be cast while it is in your hand? If so, the 9 mana combo wouldn’t lock them down, as they’d just cast blood siphon. Other than that, however, I very much like the design of this card, it gives a nice tech against spell-heavy decks and has a similar Loatheb-feel to it, which I loved in HS. I’d probably give it a little buff in stats though, changing it to a 6/6 statline, because it hurts you as well. That seems balanced to me.

[johnbob78]

No the no casting ability applies to Siphon as well.

[archer4]

Oh, I see. Is the 3 mana just an arbitrary choice, then?

[johnbob78]

Pretty well must be 15 characters this system

[dewize]

I thought of making it 4 mana at first. Because 5 is a bit much iMO, 6 directly conflicts with Makantor. But unlike the Anyssian horn thing, it does not give a Wraithling but an actually usable unit. It’s quite hard to balnce.
I’ll prolly stick with 4 tho, with good enough mana tile usage you could equip it and yse your BBS in the same turn.

[akurane]

Just want some feedback on my submission~ The idea seems a bit bland, but I think it could still be a good card

Card Design Contest: November

I guess I’ll go with a more simplistic design this time~
Blood Doctor
Neutral Minion
5 mana 5/4
Opening Gambit: Reactivate your BBS.
Purpose

This card is meant to improve the usefulness of a general’s BBS while providing a usable 5 drop in most decks. When used, this will reactivate your BBS, even if you already used it on that turn. Of course, this effect is more powerful in some decks than others (Vaath, Reva, Argeon, and possibly Lilithe), while also helping other generals like Starhorn (or do little like in Zir’an), which is why I made the card a 5 drop to prevent the card from being chain summoned (unless Magmar uses flash reincarnate or Abyssian uses darkfire sacrifice).

[painfulelegy]

Throwing my hat in the discussion ring for my card:

Card Design Contest: November

Essence Transfuser
Neutral Minion
2 Cost / 1/3
Opening Gambit: Your bloodborn spell becomes a general’s ORIGINAL bloodborn spell.

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Sometimes you’re just stuck in a situation where your BBS just isn’t good enough for you. You playing millhorn and up against an Aggro Reva who just eats up all those cards you give them? Reach the late game against Faie and can’t properly race the clock with that Roar? Or maybe you’re just Kaleos and you want to be able to do something this game. Essence transfuser lets you play it out and now use their own BBS against them! Normally a card like this would simply give you the opponent’s ability or original ability, but that makes the card feel like it’ll either be dead in hand, or just a body later. By having it select the general and give you their ORIGINAL BBS, this means that you can play this card early as a start of game drop and either opt to keep your bbs if it fits your strategy better, or steal theirs early to change up your game plan; in addition to not making the opponents copies of it do nothing after the first one has been played. It also means that later in the game, your second and third copies aren’t simply ‘vanilla 2/3’ in anything that’s not a mirror match, and give you the ability to either use them simply as a body block, or to transfer your BBS back to your original one for its utility. The BBS would, of course, take the other properties of your BBS (whether or not its active and its current cooldown), so playing multiple wouldn’t let you use multiple BBSes in a turn, and also wouldn’t mean that you set back your own bbs to the 2 turn count in the late game, and would allow you to use their bbs that turn if you hadn’t used yours. A strong, permanent affect on the game, that can help generals with more conditional BBSes be able to reformat to better deal with other situations when the game pulls it up, while also not being interfering to the opponent’s play as much as ‘swap BBS’ would.

[eudaimonia]

First batch of card reviews incoming. I’ll try to keep this updated, but I’ve got a busy week ahead of me. First impressions are that this first wave of submissions is setting the bar high. Keep it going!

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Oranos

@oranos

• Sharic Vampire is brilliant, and I think it outpaces the other designs by a long-shot (perfect execution on flavor and cost/stats). However, I do have some minor gripes: (1) I think the flavor would fit even better as an Inxikrah (given their Krah’zul ritual that allows them to absorb the powers of their prey) and (2) I don’t quite see this being used in Abyssian. I’d argue that a fascinating ability like this should be opened up to all factions as a Neutral.
• Imp is waaaay too polar, and would be an absolute nightmare in Gauntlet.
• Bloodtear Sorcerer is good, but pales in comparison to the Vampire.
• The time-based BBS interaction is interesting, but I think it may be too out there in terms of complexity (and the wordings of ‘Bloodborn timer’ and ‘increment’ feel off to me).

[details=Qeltar]
@qeltar

• Keywords are always separated by a line-break, which would push your wording past the 125-character limit.[/details]

Akurane

@akurane

• I like the overall effect and simplicity, but (and I know this will be frustrating) I think it may be too simple/safe.
• Also, in regards to the flavor, “Blood Doctor” makes much less sense to me in comparison to a time-oriented theme (e.g. Time Maelstrom reactivates your General).
• I don’t think there’d be anything wrong with spicing-up the stat distribution.

SmashTheHamster

@Smash_the_Hamster

• While I do appreciate the “epic” nature of the design, for me it’s simply too overdone/extreme. Additionally, cards that require entirely new mechanics/UI elements enter overly-complex territory.
• I don’t quite see why Bloodbond should be tied to the removal of the board, which results in a “tacked-on” sort of feeling.
• I’d recommend revisiting the name (e.g. tie it to lore, or something more concrete/thematic).

Archer4

@archer4

• I would heavily recommend revisiting the balance considerations with this design. 7 Mana for 27 stats-worth (with next turn potential of 16 more stats) is enormous.
• The “Surround” wording is not used.
• Perhaps consider a better statline with a less extreme Bloodbond effect.

PainfulElegy

@painfulelegy

• The ORIGINAL specificity is, for me, confusing/superfluous, and is not used by any other card.
• I’m struggling to see the playability in this design. Would it really be necessary to steal an opponent’s BBS and then revert back to your own in the mid- or late-game?
• An Opening Gambit “copy BBS” effect is a fairly weak, unengaging interaction (especially considering the statline).

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Cold52

@cold52

• The overall ability combination is convoluted, and I don’t really understand the reasoning behind either ability (or why they should go together).
• The first ability invites too much confusion, and is probably impossible to implement.
• What happens with Reaper of the Nine Moons, Fenrir Warmaster, Draugr Lord, Unseven, or Sarlac?

DeathsAdvocate and WhaleWhiskers

@deathsadvocate & @whalewhiskers

• Currently, your submissions are ineligible as they do not interact explicitly with a BBS.
• In other words, the abilities could be triggered without ever casting a BBS (e.g. Wraithling Swarm; Juxtaposition) which goes against the prompt.
• I would recommend considering effects that are not localized to only one General, as those will be much harder to accurately balance and word.

Polinchi

@polinchi

• As the ability is currently worded, it is not clear how Kaleo’s, Reva’s, or Cassyva’s BBS would work by “triggering twice” (e.g. do they get to cast on new targets?). Why not try a different wording/interaction that would allow an equivalent result?
• This design seems very difficult to balance, as Generals like Vaath, Faie, Argeon, and Lilithe would benefit extremely as compared to other Generals.

[painfulelegy]

-Original is there to specify that if your opponent copies your BBS, you’ll get their original BBS and not your own BBS (to prevent it from just being a dead card later, as well as allowing for a reversion and not making the card just a vanilla body after one person has changed BBS)
-Being able to swap back can be useful in a situation wherein, say, your own ‘Teleport a minion/Deal Double damage to minion’ BBS may actually provide more value at that point than the duplicated ‘increase your attack’. Though it’s mostly there to be able to make the card not simply be uncastable if you don’t want to steal their BBS early on.
-Purpose of it being an unengaging minion is mostly to ensure that in situations where it’s not useful, it still provides value, as well as allowing it to be used by all factions, rather than being forced into a spell.

My original thought for this minion was for it to probably be something closer to:
4-5 mana / Stats undetermined as of yet
Opening Gambit: Swap both general’s Bloodborn spells.

But that seemed a bit too disruptive to the opponent. It might work as both an Opening Gambit and Dying wish in conjunction (so it reverts back on death); but interaction in the form of disruption feels a bit too technical and complex compared to a relatively simple design. But I think that may just be the responses to my old MtG designs pushing me to scale back too much.

[phayze]

@oranos
The blades that Sajj wields are Spinecleaver and Thunderclap (just FYI)

As for the name, Mind Shocker seems good. If I had to suggest another one, it’d be Chronopsionist. If that’s too complex (which it probably is) maybe Chronobender or Timelost Psionist. Choose as you please.

[qeltar]

@eudaimonia - Thanks. Ugh, I spent 20 minutes rewriting that to even get it to fit in that amount without it being broken English. I’ll try to edit it again, though I doubt it’s going to be a finalist anyway.

[karma97]

Would anyone mind giving their opinion on my submission?

Sunforge Squire
Lyonar Minion
1 Mana, 2/1
Bloodbond: Give this minion +2 health
Zeal: At the end of your turn restore 1 health to your General.

Purpose: Healyonar decks need cards they can play for tempo in the early game, this card also benefits zoo and aggro Argeon lists. It can also be played in the mid-late game with a BBS to get a 2/3 that restores 1 health to your general. I think of this card as Lyonar’s Katara, or Abyssal Crawler.