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[Mesa]

Descriptive title, I know.
For those who don't know what Hearthstone is - the Bay 12 thread about it is this way, but in short it's a casual card game by Blizzard set in the (World of) Warcraft universe.
That thread could use some reviving anyway, but that's a whole different story.

Anyway, my favorite pastime lately is browsing the customhearthstone subreddit (which has some solid resources on its wiki, such as balance tips and suggestions for websites to art hunt on) and making my own cards via the Hearthcards website.

So while there's a bit of an entry barrier to this thread, even if you don't know all the gimmicks of Hearthstone (and neither do I, frankly), you can still have a fun time. This isn't Magic the Gathering with its quadrillion rules, anyhow.

So yeah, this thread is basically gonna be where I'll try to test some of my game design skills, but feel free to chime in, too. Like I said, it's not very difficult to do if you've played or watched a slight bit of HS before and enjoy this sort of theoretical discussion.
Disclaimer: As much as I like to read the Wowpedia, I haven't played any games in the Warcraft universe apart from Hearthstone, so there's gonna be a lot of cards that might plain not make sense in the context of the games' lore. (I'm getting better at it though.)
Another disclaimer: I couldn't be bothered to find all the artists who made the art I use for these, but in any case, no copyright infridgement is intended, yadda yadda, I'm just here to have fun.

Spoiler: My first batch made earlier, most of which was received well on the sub. Lots of images ahead. (click to show/hide)

First off, a new keyword/mechanic, used in some cards later down the line.

Some of them are more of a hit than others, and I don't really have any sort of overarching design pattern or theme, at least not yet, so it's kinda haphazard. I'll probably try making more spells and weapons to get a good hang of them since I've only made two (and fairly broken, possibly) spells so far, and no weapons. :r
And I'm still pretty bad when it comes to stat and cost distribution, but once again, I'm getting there.



I think that's all for now. Don't hesitate to comment on the cards I made, bring in your own, and just generally have some nerdy af fun. :p

[IronyOwl]

Hah, I like most of these. I'm too awful at this game to be reliable at balancing, but most of them look pretty reasonable balance-wise.

[Cheeetar]

Metamorphosis seems strong enough to be an auto-include in pretty much any deck that relies on minion types (that isn't a 'hold this in your hand for effect').

[IronyOwl]

On thinking about it some more, I like Impatient Assassin, but I don't think I can say that it's a well-made card. It's potentially a complete board wiper when paired with Cold Blood, and otherwise just kind of useless for its cost. I'm reminded a little of Patron Warrior. A good card probably shouldn't be that swingy.

[Mesa]

On thinking about it some more, I like Impatient Assassin, but I don't think I can say that it's a well-made card. It's potentially a complete board wiper when paired with Cold Blood, and otherwise just kind of useless for its cost. I'm reminded a little of Patron Warrior. A good card probably shouldn't be that swingy.

A friend of mine suggested to change ts Rampage to "Gain Windfury.", making it a bit less of a 4-cost board clear spell in disguise.
Could also give it slightly less than trash stats too but that's debatable.

[IronyOwl]

On thinking about it some more, I like Impatient Assassin, but I don't think I can say that it's a well-made card. It's potentially a complete board wiper when paired with Cold Blood, and otherwise just kind of useless for its cost. I'm reminded a little of Patron Warrior. A good card probably shouldn't be that swingy.

A friend of mine suggested to change ts Rampage to "Gain Windfury.", making it a bit less of a 4-cost board clear spell in disguise.
Could also give it slightly less than trash stats too but that's debatable.

That could work.

I wouldn't want to lose the idea of a 1/1 gnome that's still dangerous under the right circumstances, though it's true that it'll remain a somewhat swingy/combo reliant card so long as it's got that gimmick going on.

[miauw62]

I'm a magic player, so I'm obliged to be pedantic and say "do you mean gain windfury until end of turn?"

[Mesa]

Yesterday I started working on a rather sizeable expansion set with a friend, and I'm taking this quite seriously, but it's hella fun. That said I could use some third-party feedback on the overall concept.
Also only a few cards have art atm, since it's FAR easier and more simple to just make the mechanics of a card first then look for good art later, plus it vastly reduces the hassle of changing the card once you've made the fancy picture version.

(generally when you see things written in first person, it's him talking, not me. Unless it's in the notes section, in which case it could be either of us.)

[IronyOwl]

Haven't gotten around to reading it proper, but I'm not a fan of the Surge mechanic. It feels too pseudorandom, because "has mana at end of turn" isn't usually a thing you can plan for or do a great deal about. I guess it's similar to "has X or more minions" in that you can't really predict it, except that having X or more minions usually somewhat predicts game state (which in turn justifies added power better) and is known to be risky because of board clear (which in turn justified avoiding it for general, well-known reasons). "Crap I shouldn't have still had mana" isn't really a reasonable or common thing to predict or address, under most circumstances, which makes whether or not your enemy can exploit it mildly rush/early game-countered and largely random.

[spfifle]

Surge is maybe a little random, but for ones that activate at the end of your opponent's turn or at the beginning of your's, it at least makes your opponent play a little bit sub-optimal as opposed to the the immediate crapshoot of a joust. Boost is fine; imo it's a shame that 'choose-one' was given to druid, because it's always been a bit of a damper on card design. Just flipping through the cards there are a number of pretty interesting ones, but the balance does need some tuning for sure. Some like Rock Flayer or HW:Serenity are way under curve, while some like Felhunter, Podling or Kilrogg are much too good. Also I don't see the use case for Hammer of Banishment over ironbeak, with the sole exception of against deathlord.