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[Failbird105]

Okay, guys, sorry to impose, but I thought up a concept this morning and it has been HOUNDING at my brain and I just had to get it out there because my own card theme unfortunately doesn't really have anything that fits(of course, I can absolutely skip out on the card theme for the sake of making a well meshing card, but still). But the fact that we had waifus and are kinda working on figuring out some solid weaknesses to make nice high-stat beatsticks out of, it gave me a brilliant idea.

First off will require adding a new Verb to the games mechanics. This has of course been done before with Banishing. That verb being Equip. Idea being that Equipped cards get 'attached' to another card, essentially making them a non-entity on the field for as long as the Equipping card remains(without dedicated effects interfering). They can't be targeted individually by another card(again, without dedicated effects), nor damaged([insert dedicated effects clause]), and in turn would have effects that related to being equipped.

The main thing just being to distinguish Equipping from essentially being self-Card Casting with extra buffs and keep anti/pro-banish cards from triggering off Equipping.

From there, we make Pilots, who can Equip themselves to specific types of Card, and Mechs/Vehicles/etc., that have high stats but can't attack, defend, or deal damage unless equipped with a Pilot.

The reason why this would be imposing on you guys is that... well, 1, as I said, I don't exactly have much in the way of vehicles or pilots in my deck. I mean, funnily enough I do have a matching pair but otherwise nothing and it'd essentially mean a dead card for one turn unless I spend my Victory Points on it, and even then it'd be a dead card for the rest of you for a turn and only at its best in specifically my deck. And 2, I only get to make one non-Reward card this turn so I can't do it all myself. So, instead, I came up with a pair of cards that works for two of your decks!


One for The
*Card Name: Dragon Pilot Waifu
*Card Picture:
*Background Color: Green and White
Attack: Low if any
Hearts: Low
Stars: 0
Card Effect: At the end of each turn this spends not Equipped to a Card, you may Equip it to one Aircraft card you control. If you do, that card gains +1/+1. If the Equipping card is also Draconic, it gains an additional +1/+1.
Flavor Text:
Metadata: Equipped cards are intended to be in a sort of vague 'off the board but still in play state', that can be damaged and destroyed but require dedicated anti-equip cards to do so.
Reference: https://hisomaso.fandom.com/wiki/Hisone_Amakasu

And one for Gabriella
*Card Name: Morphing Jet Dragon
*Card Picture:
*Background Color: Red and White
Attack: High
Hearts: Medium
Stars: 1?
Card Effect: This cards attack is Halved while not Equipped with a Pilot.
Flavor Text: It's more comfortable in there than it looks.
Metadata: Intended to count as both a Aircraft and a Dragon, since he's a Dragon that turns into an Aircraft
Reference: https://hisomaso.fandom.com/wiki/Masotan

[NUKE9.13]

Alright, with two games finished (in our favour, nice), and the other two nearing their conclusion, let's actually figure out what we're going to be designing next phase. I doubt they have any more surprises up their sleeves, and we've seen how our current cards work out in actual combat.

The first question to be asked is "What do we need to win?"- what cards are we missing to be able to win the game reliably?
The second question is "What do we need to not lose?"- what cards have they shown that we lack counters to?
The third question is "What can we do that is wild and crazy?"- while I value pragmatism, ideally we would combine utility and uniqueness.

1a: I think we lack consistent pressure- stuff that can force the enemy to react to us, rather than vice-versa. If we control the pace of the game, we'll have an easier time setting up a wincon like an unblocked PGW or a big MoB. This is the role which I imagine Demon Footsoldier being ideal for- it won't win games by itself, but it trades favourably with most of their cheap creatures, and has enough damage output to force them to respond to it.
1b: I think we lack some amount of consistency. Destructive Analysis would be a way of both finding and enabling MoB, or finding whatever other trump card we need. But other methods could also be used. A creature that scries on ETB, a card that lets you shuffle your entire hand back into the deck and draw that many cards, or even a token generating spell that can chum up the board more effectively whilst we dig- there are many options.
1c: Resource generation hasn't been a major problem so far- SWW and Refinery have provided enough stars-, but if we want to do more expensive stuff in the future, something that generates more stars at once could be good. Lifegain- ideally tied to something else, not by itself- could also be useful for longer games.

2a: UB kills Firebase, but we might want more options- sometimes we won't want to wipe our own board, and sometimes their Firebase might have extra hearts. A creature with 4 power and haste, or a spell that deals damage to a single target would both be simple counters, but we might want something like their BFG that can bounce it or our own cards. I considered star-drain, but they are able to generate an awful lot of stars, so that seems impractical.
2b: Meteor and Storm Cell remain threatening, although Fog is a pretty good counter to Storm Cell. Stuff that wants to die, like Lifeboats, would help a bit by making them reluctant to play these cards, but it won't stop them from playing them if they need to.
2c: I'm not actually worried about Card Cancer or Gateless. Card Cancer, as I've said, is a very good counter to cards we do not have yet. Gateless, so far, doesn't really hose anything major of ours either. But we should keep them in mind, and not design cards that could be heavily countered by them.

3a: Demon Footsoldier falls a bit short in this category, I feel, but I also feel like a more complex card would struggle to cost 0 and have 4/4 stats.


I think it'd be good if everyone explained what card they intend to design, and why they think it would be a useful card for us.
I feel that Demon Footsoldier (4/4, lose 1 life at start of turn) is a good pick, for reason 1a above, but I'm open to being convinced otherwise.

Also, if anyone has other answers to the three questions I posed, or feels that some of the answers I provided are wrong, it would be good to discuss that.

[notquitethere]

I'll be trying to combine an answer to several of our weaknesses (lack of second-tier star gen, lack of punishment for Meteor) into a single card:

Lifeboat Launch
1 star
0/0
Put into play seven Lifeboat tokens.

Lifeboat - TOKEN
Blue background
0a/1h - Cannot attack. Cannot protect. Gain a star and two hearts when the lifeboat leaves play.

Wiping them with a board wipe gives us a huge boost, and we can destroy them with Nightly Sweep ourselves. This would essentially stop them from Storm and Meteor. Added bonus: in the Naval Yard, it won't matter that they can't protect, because they'll have to be targeted first.


That said, the fact is, their trash is a bit better than our trash, but we can sometimes put it out faster. Their basic creatures just have better stats, and Wooly's ping effect is a hard counter against cards like Restless Spirit. (It was pleasing to steal that effect with Hell-Broth just now). Like Wooly and Ghost Eel are the same stats, but theirs is always useful to play, and ours has an effect which is nice but currently irrelevant (it's main benefit is being a ghost which can be played alongside Stygian).

Because of this, often they can sometimes clear out our side quicker than we can clear theirs— we have poor momentum. My lifeboat idea doesn't solve that problem. Would few (3?) tokens that can protect be better? Then it puts up an annoying wall they're forced to work through.

[NUKE9.13]

Would few (3?) tokens that can protect be better? Then it puts up an annoying wall they're forced to work through.

I think so. Blockers are worth a lot more, since they have no choice but to kill them.
Besides, the seven tokens version generates 7 stars and 14 hearts for 1 star and 1 boardwipe... while it won't always work, when it does, it would be busted. Three blockers has a lower ceiling, even though the floor is higher.

Edit: Not a serious proposal:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

*Card Name: Everything Is Fine
*Card Picture:
*Background Color: Orange
Attack: 0
Hearts: 0
Stars: 3
Card Effect: You can only play this card if you have 1 heart remaining, and no cards in play.
  You win the game.
Flavor Text: I'm okay with the events that are unfolding currently.
Metadata: Not a serious proposal.
Reference: This is fine meme.

[notquitethere]

I agree, having them be blockers keeps up momentum and will be really annoying for them, while being roughly as powerful as Meteor Strike for star gen.

[Failbird105]

I think the big thing we want to focus in on is big cards with negative effects. Not only does it help us ignore their gateless gate, it gives us stronger and/or tankier front lines that can handle a storm cell or 2 out of 3 rolls on a Meteor.

With that said, I feel like Vehicle cards that need to be Equipped with a Pilot/Driver are very good ways to do this. While they will come out slower, they'll be stronger for it, and will be semi-modular due to the different potential pilots having different abilities.

I also say we should try to get a win condition that isn't the Mountain this turn. They'll almost certainly be stacking their decks to be anti-mountain and sending at least one person to the Caldera(if they don't claim it this round somehow), so having an alternative will really throw them off.

[notquitethere]

Edit: Not a serious proposal:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

*Card Name: Everything Is Fine
*Card Picture:
*Background Color: Orange
Attack: 0
Hearts: 0
Stars: 3
Card Effect: You can only play this card if you have 1 heart remaining, and no cards in play.
  You win the game.
Flavor Text: I'm okay with the events that are unfolding currently.
Metadata: Not a serious proposal.
Reference: This is fine meme.

Alternative win condition cards are an interesting idea. Like "If your opponent has no cards in their deck, they lose" + a bunch of mill cards. Or:

Fluffy Kitten
0/1 Cannot protect. Cannot attack. If this card is destroyed by one of your opponent's cards then you win the game.
You monster!

This would straight up deny them their board wipes, and use their card cancer to our advantage.

I think the big thing we want to focus in on is big cards with negative effects. Not only does it help us ignore their gateless gate, it gives us stronger and/or tankier front lines that can handle a storm cell or 2 out of 3 rolls on a Meteor.

With that said, I feel like Vehicle cards that need to be Equipped with a Pilot/Driver are very good ways to do this. While they will come out slower, they'll be stronger for it, and will be semi-modular due to the different potential pilots having different abilities.

I see the value in a whole deck themed around pilot/drivers... but relying on specific combos of cards for a win can be a bit dicey. What's to stop the enemy just killing our pilots or machines before we can play both cards? The low speed seems a bit risky, unless the cards are expensive enough to definitely live for two rounds.

[Failbird105]

In theory nothing is stopping them, but it would force them to focus down a card that doesn't do much of anything yet instead of dealing with any active threats we may potentially put out. Not to mention it seems to cost as little as one star to be able to play two cards in one turn. We could easily make something that makes cards faster to play. Or just make a vehicle that doesn't take an action to play.

[notquitethere]

Make equipment cards free-to-play by default and I think we might be on to something.

[NUKE9.13]

I can agree with making another wincon, but I'd also agree that making that wincon a two-card combination is pretty sketchy. Like, why not a vehicle that costs the sacrifice of any card with attack to play, with the flavour being that the sacrificed creature is now the pilot?

[Stirk]

We're pretty safe to just make whatever we think is cool this round with no regards to things like strategy or wincons after wiping the last round. We could make an excuse as to why but really it just seems more fun that way

[NUKE9.13]

I think strategy is cool, checkmate.

[notquitethere]

I think our current balance of collaboration and doing our own thing is working okay. Every player can make what they want, but we do talk about what we, as a team, need. As far as I can tell, we've all used each other's new cards this last round, which is a good sign.

[notquitethere]

Did we ever settle whether the non-storm boardwipes like Meteor Shower and Bombardment would target face down cards?

[NUKE9.13]

Did we ever settle whether the non-storm boardwipes like Meteor Shower and Bombardment would target face down cards?

I thought we did, but I can't find it. But the consensus was that they do, and Supernerd didn't correct it when they did in Battlefield 3, so I assume they do.

Well, they don't target them, cos they don't target anything. But they affect them.