Freesia TCG design

[Despain]

okey!!!! first off i'm putting these here because I can't really think of another forum for them. i was thinking "game and application development" but this is still waaay in the early design stage so i guess this is the best place for it. if you don't like it bite me i'm above the rules  :wooper:

Background: Because I have waaaay too many projects going on, it's been a recent thing of mine to try and merge them together. This is one of my attempts to merge a number of my fantasy worlds together. Also I LOVE Magic: The Gathering and I've been half-designing TCGs for many years. Rather than make it into an RPG or anything like that, I decided to go back to TCG design and I'm trying to tell the stories in that way. I think it will work better as a storytelling medium because I have a lot of smaller interconnecting stories to tell with a lot of characters, rather than a single overarching narrative.

okay get on with it alrady!!!! ufucking troll

missingno's
F R E E S I A

Basically, this topic is about the design process and I am looking for feedback and help! A lot of this is too similar to MTG, so I'm going to want some ideas and stuff to help make this feel more original. You don't have to be a Magic player to help me out with this. In fact if you don't play the game it might be even better.

One of the big differences is that there's no direct energy sources, but rather your mana is a single resource that you add to and subtract from over the course of the game. The costs of some cards add to the mana and the costs of others take away from it. This cost is shown in the upper-right corner of each card (with the exception of creature cards, which cannot play themselves and need to be put into play by another card. But more on that later!).
If you're familiar with Magic, this is a lot like the loyalty counters on Planeswalker cards. I thought of this a long time ago though, of course. 

Races:
There are ten races in the world of Freesia. These races are primarily based on location rather than true physical race. For example, within the country of Sova there are a number of different peoples, yet in the context of the game they are all part of the larger "race" of Sovan. Some individual creatures or characters have a further class (such as "Wizard" or "Lionrider"), which would mark these smaller differences. On their own, these races (and classes) do nothing to a card, but they are used for interactions within the game.
If you're familiar with Magic, this is similar to creature types. The concept has been expanded and the ten races of Freesia become the primary classification for all cards, becoming more similar to Magic's five colors.

• Sovans, primarily humans hailing from the country of Sova. Sova is a land of savannas where lions roam, dotted by large stand-alone walled cities.
• Dazcans, from the salt-desert to the south of Sova. Dazcans have scaley, bark-like white skin, but otherwise are like humans. Their culture has developed technology slightly more advanced than the other nations to make up for their homeland's natural lack of magical energy.
• Elves, from the Gradan forest. Elves are gray-skinned, from spending their lives away from the sun under the canopy of the forest. Rather than traditional arms, they have squid-like tentacles that allow them to swing from the trees.
• Daramites, the desert nation in the south. High mountains surround the desert and as a result the people of Daram are very inclusive. Nomad tribes wander the desert while others have built massive vertical cities that reach high into the sky to avoid the heat of the sands.
• Veians, in the north of the continent of Asliona there is a plain of metal. Thousands of years ago another world collided with Freesia creating this anomaly, and now Vei is as much a part of Freesia as Sova. The blue-skinned, graft-obsessed Veian people inhabit this lifeless world.
• Phantines, large elephant-people who inhabit the mountains surrounding Daram. They are renowned for their metalworking and value physical strength. The metal-land of Vei fascinates them as a resource, but its distance from their ancestral homeland prevents them from making full use of the abundance of natural metals.
• Ghasticans, the nation of Ghastica is on the other side of the Gradan forest, opposite the bountiful Sova. Ghastica is covered with swamps and marshlands. The inhabitants of Ghastica are primarily human, but there are also The Lost People, who are informally called "spirits", who have the ability to "blink" between Freesia and their own ravaged half-plane.
• Angels live in clouds cities in the sky. They believe that they are the connection between the gods and the non-flying peoples of Freesia and as such have a sense of elitism. They are powerful but rarely deal with the people below the clouds.
• Mer inhabit the underwater cities along the western coast of the Aslionan continent. Knowledge-seeking and always curious, the Mer have a reputation for pushing natural magic beyond its limits. They're also known for their exceedingly complicated class and governmental structures.
• Sect, insectlike creatures and the guardians of Freesia. They live far under the ground and their lives are devoted to taking care of the mana engines that keep the plane functioning. Their existence is largely unknown to the majority of the people, although there are many myths and legends about them.

In addition to that, there are Otherworld races, which are simply from worlds that are beyond the scope of natural Freesia.

Okay cool (lol boringgggg you suc misingno!) now onto more interesting things: the cards themselves.

CREATURES
Like Magic, creatures are the main type of permanent in the game and the primary damage-dealers.

Spoiler: Creature Cards

http://bb.xieke.com/files/freesia_maybe2.png[/img]

http://bb.xieke.com/files/freesia_maybe4.png[/img]

Creatures are the main fighters of the game. They have three stats: attack, defense and life, which aren't hard to figure out. Damage dealt to them stays on them untils it's cleared or the creature leaves play. Defense prevents damage dealt to them in one blow. For example, if a creature with 5 attack engages a creature with 2 defense, 3 damage would still be dealt. If that creature's life is 6, it would die after two turns of this.

Creatures cannot be played on their own. If you look in the top-right corner, you'll notice that they don't have an "up" or "down" cost, but a level. Other spells (events, characters, etc) allow you to put creatures into play.

Another special note is that creature damage cannot finish off the game (unless of course it says otherwise on the creature). Creatures may bring an opponent's life total down to 1, but all damage beyond that by creatures wouldn't count. Lethal damage to players can only be dealt by characters.

CHARACTERS
Characters are most similar to Legendary creatures in Magic.

Spoiler: Character Cards

http://bb.xieke.com/files/freesia_maybe3.png[/img]

http://bb.xieke.com/files/freesia_maybe8.png[/img]

For the most part characters function like creatures. They have attack, defense and life which works just like regular creatures. There are a few major differences, though.

First of all, the character cards represent actual named characters, rather than a generic monster. Because of this, there can only be one character with the same name in play at any given time. If a second character is played with the same name as the first, the first one is removed from the game, and returns to your hand when the other one leaves play.

Secondly, as I mentioned above, characters can deal lethal damage to an opponent to finish off a game. This is in order to preserve the "epic" feeling of an actual story. It only makes sense that a named character would be able to end things, right? You can tear away at your opponent's life with creatures and characters, but once they're down there, it's up to a named character to finish the job.

The last big difference between characters and creatures is that characters can be directly played. You'll notice that they have "up" and "down" mana costs in the top right corner, and they don't have levels.

EVENTS
In Magic, these would be sorceries.

Spoiler: Event Cards

http://bb.xieke.com/files/freesia_maybe5.png[/img]

http://bb.xieke.com/files/freesia_maybe101.png[/img]

Events are spells that have a one-time use and then are discarded. They can only be played during your turn. The effect of the spell is written in the text box. Most events deal with playing creatures.

ACTIONS
These would be similar to instants in Magic, except that in Freesia they can only be played in response to something or on an opponent's turn.

Spoiler: Action Cards

http://bb.xieke.com/files/freesia_maybe12.png[/img]

http://bb.xieke.com/files/freesia_maybe9.png[/img]

Actions are typically responses to things that the opponent would do. They cannot be played during your turn (unless an opponent plays an action during your turn, in which case you can act against his action). Like events, they have a one-time use and are discarded after they take effect.

FIELDS
Fields are closest to enchantments or artifacts in Magic, in that they are permanents often with global effects.

Spoiler: Field Cards

http://bb.xieke.com/files/freesia_maybe61.png[/img]

Fields are played and remain in play until they are destroyed. Their effects typically alter the rules of the game.

http://bb.xieke.com/files/freesia_maybe7.png[/img]

 

[badmonur]

Great art, good idea but it feels like youre kinda....copy pasting magic.
*covers head*

 

[Despain]

Great art, good idea but it feels like youre kinda....copy pasting magic.
*covers head*

yes I agree with this which is why I'm trying to get people to help me flesh some things out. i mean every tcg obviousy copies magic in a number of ways, but i haven't really played any games other than magic and pokemon

 

[Shadow_Strike]

Well, even the text is copypasta. "As it comes into play, it deals X damage to Y creature and opponent controls." is very MTG esque in wording. Not even Yugioh or Pokeman did that.

You need a unique system of health and damage, because a 3 attack and 3 defense guy or a 30 attack and 30 defense guy, is in retrospect a 3/3.

You do have a pretty cool mana system, and I think with good balance it would work.

 

[Despain]

Well, even the text is copypasta. "As it comes into play, it deals X damage to Y creature and opponent controls." is very MTG esque in wording. Not even Yugioh or Pokeman did that.

This comes because Magic's templating is perfect. I can't think of a better way of wording this kind of stuff. Maybe I can change the tense or something.

You need a unique system of health and damage, because a 3 attack and 3 defense guy or a 30 attack and 30 defense guy, is in retrospect a 3/3.

The health and damage system is very different from Magic, which only has attack and defense, and damage is reset after each turn. In this game each creature and character has individual life points, and the defense stat actually acts as defense (preventing damage), rather than as HP.

 

[Grathea]

Hmm, this is pretty sweet, Des.
I've never played Magic, and the only TCG I've ever really played was Pokemon, although I did end up making a pretty neat one back in the seventh grade that used a regular deck of trading cards and was fairly Magic-esque, albeit much more limited. Way more fun than regular cards imo.

Anyways, here's my opinions on what you should do to make this more unique, and just general thoughts.
I like the ten races idea, and I recognize a bunch of them from ideas you've mentioned. They seem to go really well.
It seems like you've got a bunch of really neat stories here to tell, and it shows in the character descriptions.
I like the creature/character dynamic.
I REALLY like the Labrynth Champion, I think it's really cool.
Nick Baxa seems really sweet.
Original art would be a cool step, but what you've got looks pretty good too.
I think there needs to be some way to dispel fields, they'd just get HUGELY annoying otherwise. Also since there can only be one, resolving what would happen if both players had fields would be a big thing to do.

I like the mana system.
Basically, main changes/things I'd work out would be:
Multiple fields issues.
Working out dynamics: What strategies each race has, works well against strategically, etc.
Also it needs to accommodate different play styles (Johnny, Spike, whatever the third one is) - maybe having certain races being more predisposed to strategy/brute force/balanced?

That's my basic input, I'll mull this over and give you more detailed input later on, man.

 

[Despain]

Also since there can only be one, resolving what would happen if both players had fields would be a big thing to do.

When did I say there can only be one? You can have as many fields as you want.

Working out dynamics: What strategies each race has, works well against strategically, etc.
Also it needs to accommodate different play styles (Johnny, Spike, whatever the third one is) - maybe having certain races being more predisposed to strategy/brute force/balanced?

Yeah, this is a balance thing that comes a bit after the actual mechanics of the game are worked out. For the most part things are pretty much impacted by flavor (like I mentioned that the Dazcans had higher technology (which means cowboy guns), so they would have more cards that do direct damage to creatures to represent that, or the angels are very elitist and angel cards would typically only affect other angels in a positive way).

 

[Despain]

http://bb.xieke.com/files/freesia_maybe121.png[/img]

eeeeeeeehhhhh

 

[Grathea]

Also since there can only be one, resolving what would happen if both players had fields would be a big thing to do.

When did I say there can only be one? You can have as many fields as you want.

Eh, I must have misinterpreted it then. What happens if you have multiple fields with contrary effects? Would they cancel out? Which field's effect would take priority, if two fields effected the same thing?

Anyways, with that out of the way, it looks pretty neat. Get working on the details man!

 

[Mascarpone]

Just curious, is that artwork made for you or just borrowed to fit the card descriptions, and if the former, how much dick did you have to suck for it o_O

From what descriptions you have thus far, It sounds playable at least. And the card layout is attractive. Which I REALLY Appreciate <<.

It kinda cuts off at "fields" but i gather what they do. I'm curious about your cost systems, but as stands it's a good ground work. I'm interested in reading more.

Also this makes me want to try and ressurect the old card game me and my old roommate were working on back in the day..


Edit: btw the name "Leather Neverdie" is kinda priceless.

 

[Zekallinos]

Intresting, let's read this...

The first thing is, what is the storyline? It's in my opinion, very important. While you might not release this commercially and make a serie or anything, notice Magic's planes (dimensions) that are pictured as each being a sand grain in a ocean, and that allows very easy addition of "grains" to form new editions, or whatever. It stays consistent, simple, efficient. (And even with that, the individual planes storylines (Kamigawa, Ravnica, Dominaria, etcatera) are very original compared to other things on the market.)

Did you have to insert elves  :dead:. Always those damn elves. We'll at least those differ from the fantasy-standard one, but why not call them Gradans while at it?

For the Defense/Life thing, I hope you are going to exploit that to the max. Most defense reducing spells would be too strong if they dealt the same amount of direct damage to the life, but would be limited since you can't reduce it under 0 so most of the time that extra would be wasted. You could have 50 things that weakens a monster, all equally balanced and usuable in different situation (kind of like magic's 50 destroyers. Oblivion ring is versatible, but works only if it stays in play, unmake is more safe, but only on creatures, terror is easier to cast, dark banish has 2 colorless unlike unmake, etc).

By the way, it will be a pain to keep track of individual monster's life when they are many on the game.

Speaking of which, you do know that most of your card's cost is Mana + One card from your hand right? The major problem I see is that annoyance of being unlucky and getting only Events or only Creatures. You absolutly need both, so if you draw 1/card turn it would take at least 2 turns to invoke something, enough to be dealt alot of damage (not to mention the rather low odds of getting the right level creature and such).

Fireslide. 1 damage what to all creatures and players? Always be very very precise. (and lol hot potato)

Well, even the text is copypasta. "As it comes into play, it deals X damage to Y creature and opponent controls." is very MTG esque in wording. Not even Yugioh or Pokeman did that.

This comes because Magic's templating is perfect. I can't think of a better way of wording this kind of stuff. Maybe I can change the tense or something.

You can change some wording, yes. "Creature" for "troop" (since you said you can't play them directly, but rather invoke them from characters or w/e, it would be kind of fitting, since they are not really seperate entities are much as Magic's monsters), "comes into play" for "enter the game", or whatever (I'm sure you can think of something better).

When did I say there can only be one? You can have as many fields as you want.

How does it work?

...

Well, anyhow, nice initiative, and good luck with that (especially proper balance for the races). Oh, and I hope whatever I was writing while reading is not just nonesense :tongue:

 

[FlippyD]

I suggest you play a variety of card games, just to get into the swing of new ways to approach card games. Here's my picks:

Fluxx
Munchkin
And my personal favorite, Lunch Money (or Beer Money, depending on how pedo you are.)

 

[Zalcanthrias]

The Field card aspect of the game reminds me of Yu-Gi-Oh!; I'm surprised you didn't include "Spell", "Trap", and "Ritual" cards (cards types familiar to Yu-Gi-Oh!). I've played the Pokemon TCG, the Yu-Gi-Oh TCG, and the MAGIC TCG. I'm interested to see what this game can turn into.

 

[Venetia]

I don't actually know anything about card games. But the graphic layout of the card looks nice and simple. I worry, however, that it looks TOO much like magic cards. I instantly thought it was a magic card until I read about it.

But like I said I don't know about card games and only remember what magic cards look like from watching my husband play it.

Also "Freesia" always makes me instantly think of flowery aerosol spray (a Freesia is a VERY pretty and very nice-smelling kind of flower that lots of aerosols and perfumes try to copy ... but as a housekeeping wife and a woman of course that's why I'd correlate that hah)

 

[Zekallinos]

Ah yes, you could always try and change the place of some of the elements to dis-resemble MTG.

 

[Despain]

Just curious, is that artwork made for you or just borrowed to fit the card descriptions, and if the former, how much dick did you have to suck for it o_O

I grabbed it from DeviantArt. Placeholders for while I'm in the design phase.

The first thing is, what is the storyline? It's in my opinion, very important. While you might not release this commercially and make a serie or anything, notice Magic's planes (dimensions) that are pictured as each being a sand grain in a ocean, and that allows very easy addition of "grains" to form new editions, or whatever. It stays consistent, simple, efficient. (And even with that, the individual planes storylines (Kamigawa, Ravnica, Dominaria, etcatera) are very original compared to other things on the market.)

Storyline comes first. Like I said in my first post, this game comes from being a mishmash of countless fantasy stories that I've come up with in the past. The entire story is set on one world, Freesia, but it's a huge world, and stories progress chronologically (like Magic did back on Dominaria before they felt the need to jump around to other planes). The biggest piece of flavor here is that a lot of simultaneous stories are being told here. Rather than one overarching story, there are three or four major storylines that all take place in the same world, interconnecting here and there. For example, one of the stories has a dude from our world (Nick Baxa) trying to find his way home, which takes him to the planet's core with the Sect, while another story focuses on the Veiian invasion of the Mer Empire, and yet another would be based around a space fighter who crashes in the Gradan Forest. One thing I'm looking forward to doing is having a lot of variety within the same world, and I'm designing it with that in mind.

Did you have to insert elves?

I HATE the traditional elves and wanted to take them and break the stereotype. As you can tell, I've warped them as much as I could while keeping them realistic. In the stories, they act very unlike traditional elves. Even though they have the whole forest thing going on still, they're typically a vicious and very brutal people in contrast to the typical "lol high fantasy" elf bullshit.

By the way, it will be a pain to keep track of individual monster's life when they are many on the game.

The game is designed to be played online over a website, which would have memory for each creature. Just click a button to add or remove damage counters.

Speaking of which, you do know that most of your card's cost is Mana + One card from your hand right?

You mean in terms of summoning creatures, right? This is something that I thought about, and it might not be shown too well here, but the "one to one" creature-summoning spells wouldn't be the norm at all. You can see for example, Wind Render, which lets you throw down three creatures for the price of one. Additionally I was thinking that field cards or characters would let you play creatures as well. And there's always cantrips. But yes it's something that I've thought about, and it will have to be dealt with on the individual card level I think.

Fireslide. 1 damage what to all creatures and players? Always be very very precise. (and lol hot potato)

My natural instinct was "Fireslide deals 1 damage to each creature and each player." But I was trying to break the Magic templating.

Eh, I must have misinterpreted it then. What happens if you have multiple fields with contrary effects? Would they cancel out? Which field's effect would take priority, if two fields effected the same thing?

They'd most likely just stack up, like in Magic. You can have an echantment that reads "creatures can't attack alone" and another that reads "creatures cannot attack alone". The end result? "Creature cannot attack."

Also "Freesia" always makes me instantly think of flowery aerosol spray (a Freesia is a VERY pretty and very nice-smelling kind of flower that lots of aerosols and perfumes try to copy ... but as a housekeeping wife and a woman of course that's why I'd correlate that hah)

yes i like freesia's that's why i chose the name

 

[FlippyD]

You should probably write "1 damage to all Players and Creatures in play" for Fireslide.

 

[Rayne Aven]

Coming from someone who has been playing Magic competitively for the past few years, I have come to the sad conclusion that there really aren't that many people who care about a TCG's storyline. I think it stems from the fact that card games don't really need a storyline to be entertaining, where in other media, like RPGs, story becomes part of the whole gaming experience. Think about other card games, like poker. It's absolutely amazing game with some of the most incredible design ever, and the lack of a storyline actually makes the game easier to understand because, to people who just want to play a game, a story becomes extraneous material.

As for the design aspect of the game, like badmonur said, the game is very close to Magic. That, however, is kind of irrelevant because most TCGs don't really differ from Magic to begin with. I loved how the whole "up" and "down" mana costs work. I also liked the creature type system; it's so much more structured and easier to understand than Magic's. The fact that a character has to take out the opponent may be a bit troublesome. This means you would have to severely limit the amount of destruction spells you put into the game, as a skilled player wouldn't even care about creatures, they'd just kill characters and creatures wouldn't matter in the long run. The players should have to care about what the opponent has out.

All in all, though, this looks like a great game with a tremendous amount of thought put into it. I hope this will come out soon, and if you need some cards created, just ask.  :thumb:

 

[Stardust]

You beat me!  I was just starting to work on the design for a TCG.  Mine won't be online since I have no programming experience, but I was still planning on getting criticism and such here. :tongue:

Anyway, on to helping you!  I've played the Pokemon TCG, Yugioh TCG (still play it in the Gamers' Guild at my school), Duel Masters TCG, and Magic TCG.  I'm least familiar with Magic because I only made a deck so I could play with other Magic people, but I still understand the basic structure.  And I have to say that each one of those is different from each other.  Some aspects are common, and needed, in all TCGs, but they were all different in some way.  Pokemon had the life counter pebbles and evolution, Yugioh has the rituals and out of play, Duel Masters had the system where monsters were used as either mana or battlers, and Magic has the life stat which is reset after each turn.  You need something unique, and so far, you don't have that.  Of course, that's why you put this here.

Since you're concentrating on story (to be honest, I didn't even know Magic had a story behind it), you could have a sort of reputation system between the races.  On the stronger, leadership cards, you could have a thing where they have conflicts with other races and certain stats are decreased or abilities are lost.  Commoners are usually more accepting of other races, so you can omit them from this system if you'd like.  It's a suggestion.  It's all I have right now, but I'll work on some more ideas later.
:thumb:

 

[Despain]

You need something unique, and so far, you don't have that.

Emphasis on storytelling was intended to be my "hook". The whole character vs creature thing, for example, is meant to evoke the feeling of a story. Ideally each duel would not be just a game of Freesia, but each one would also tell a story.