With so many games combining RPG and CCC abandoned it's time for a new one to pop up.
Hunting Triad
This game follows the exploits of three protagonists. Who they are, I do not know, neither where they are from. They all arrived here though on the plane of Quercus to journey into a nameless forested wild. They are driven, they are hunting.
What is it they hope to achieve? Slay a monstrous creature? Find an ancient treasure or the ingredient to a miraculous medicine? Search for a new home? Do they even have a common goal or each their own agenda?
All this I do not know. All this is up to you... and so is their success.
Mana Pool, Life Total, Cards in Hand:
Each of the three protagonists is assigned a mana pool of six mana. For these first steps you can draw mana of any color from this mana pool, but once the characters are created their mana symbol will be more well-defined.
Each of them also starts with a life total of 10 and four cards in hand. These resources can be replenished over the course of the adventure. A protagonist is at risk both of being destroyed as a permanent and of being depleted of its life total. Beware!
Other zones than the hand and battlefield are black boxes. Cards may be drawn from the unknown library and die and go to the graveyard. But there they currently cannot interacted with. If a character has special interest in interacting with a zone (e. g. an ogre necromancer) then this may change at my discretion immediately after character creation.
Step 1: Character Creation:
The first step of the game is the creation of the three main protagonists. Anyone can design a card representing a character. There is just one restriction: The submitted character must have converted mana cost between 1 and 3 (inclusive).
For each character include also the following three pieces of information (as brief as you want): Background: Where are they from? What have they been doing? Do you have a name? Appearance: Stature, size, sound of voice, fur color, number of eyes etc. Goal: What are you hoping to find in this place far from home and civilization.
The story will start with the chosen protagonists getting played from hand as one of the four initial cards paid with from the initial resources available.
Three best designs will be accepted.
Step 2: Travel Preparations
What good is a character in the wild without something to keep them alive. A piece of armor? A magic blessing? Or just exquisite training and a special heritage? Maybe they have an animal companion?
As soon as three characters are submitted additional cards may be designed to aide them on their adventure. Each such card can only use the resources left over after character creation. Any individual submitted card also must have converted mana cost between 1 and 3 (inclusive).
After the protagonists are played their support cards are played from their respective resources. You may suggest a protagonist to receive a certain blessing, but circumstances may force changes e. g. if a character is not chosen as protagonist.
No character will receive more than two preparations.
Step 3: I Wanna Go Places
While the protagonists venture into the wild they might come across places they do not know. Maybe no one has laid eyes on that place in decades. Or maybe they just followed a path to that one cave everyone talks about.
Choose the first location!
The location is once again a card design of your choice representing a place. There is no mana available to support it. It cannot cost mana to play.
It will be in the game once the first two steps have been completed. It must fit as a location in the wilds of Quercus.
Only one design might make it in this category, but there might be a chance for runner-ups.
All These Steps...
Anyone can design up to one card for each of the three steps/challenges, but please state clearly which challenge a particular design is for. Multiple designs by a single player may make it in, but I will weigh towards including designs from different players for tiebreakers and close calls.
You may choose to play favorites with your cards and give one of them extra weighed. It will be factored in though I won't make promises.
Note also that untouched by the number of designs I state I will accept at this point, you can submit more of them than the specified threshold unless stated otherwise e. g. more than three characters can be proposed even though only three will make it in right now.
I Like Your Way of Thinking
Someone else designed a card you really like and you think should win? Good, because then you can give them your vote of confidence. Anyone can give their seal of approval to any number of other designs.
I'm a harsh, cruel and maybe a little arbitrary god when I distribute points towards the designs. But if you band together you may sway me with your votes as each of them will be counted as an additional point for a player.
Please, be sure to make clear whether your approval should count as a point. I suggest a bold Favored Designs: *foo*, *bar* using the card names. Remember: You favor individual designs, not players.
The Enemy Is Watching
Lastly... You might be tempted to make heavy investments into expensive spells and characters in these first steps. But you know not everything that lies ahead, not everyone who might be watching.
I'm back! And I've noticed that there has been much good going on in the vein of Custom Card Creation Adventuring GamesTM. Since I really liked the idea behind the Ragtag Adventurers Game, I'll let the revived thread be heavily inspired by it.
Maybe this time we'll make it to 200 posts...
In this game you will design creature cards to send them onto challenges. All creatures will work together and form adventuring parties so no one has to face the dangers alone. Success and failure in the challenges will shape your future encounters.
Rules:
Post a creature card that represents an adventurer.
Put it into [Box][/Box]-tags. The number of lines (excluding name/mana cost, type line, flavor text and p/t) is limited to four lines.
You are free to suggest a rarity, but I'll be the final judge on that.
Blatantly overpowered cards will be made Mythic Rare and receive an extra penalty or might be hit by a terrible fate. Don't do this. Your teammates might not be happy about having to live with less life, so consider your actions.
Example Card Formating:
Phantom Warrior :1mana::symu::symu:
Creature — Illusion Warrior
~ is unblockable. "There are as many pillows of illusion as flakes in a snow-storm. We wake from one dream into another dream."
—Ralph Waldo Emerson, "Illusions"
2/2
Counts as one line of rules text.
Tips:
Mana cost will matter since creatures will actually need to be cast (see below).
Rarity will matter and influence the Accumulated Rarity Penalty which in turn determines the difficulty of your party's encounter. You should aim for common (see below).
Even an adventuring party profits from a good curve. You might find yourself thankful for Llanowar Elf and Boros Recruit.
The Recruitment Process:
I'll wait for about a day or two or until there are between about six or ten submissions. The submissions will be evaluated and assigned rarities and according penalties for their parties. Conversely well-done designs might bestow a small bonus upon its team.
In exceptional cases I might reject a submission. I'll expect that only to happen when I can't determine what a card is meant to do (e. g. because of bad grammar) or it won't work well for logistical reasons (e. g. Un-card mechanics, excessive coin-flipping).
The submitted creatures will be equally and randomly distributed among to two adventuring parties.
The Encounter:
The challenges will be assigned to the newly formed parties. Each challenge will consist of a game in which I will play both sides to the best of my abilities. The adventurers side will start "in hand" with a few basic lands at their disposal (number and type dependent on party composition). The challenge side will have predefined resources stated for each round.
Note: The party gets at least four lands and at least one land per party member. The best composition is determined at the beginning of the encounter.
Only additionally drawn cards are discarded during cleanup.
Penalties may influence parameters of both sides.
Players will have numerical values for library size that can be depleted so a victory by alternative win conditions is possible though the sides won't attempt to draw cards during their respective draw phase unless they are at 0 cards. Unless otherwise stated the challenge side will have a library of 20 cards.
Cards otherwise drawn will be taken from a small random library made up of 50% basic lands and 50% basic spells (Death Ward, Unsummon, Raise Dead, Shock, Battlegrowth).
The adventurers are start players unless otherwise stated.
Aftermath:
Depending on outcome of the battles some adventurers may die and others may live. Among the surviving ones the most distinguished ones might earn themselves the title of team leader for the next round of challenges and go out questing again in the next round.
Balance:
Each team member adds a Rarity Penalty (RP). The RP is for each rarity is as follows:
Rarity
Common
Uncommon
Rare
Mythic Rare
RP
3
5
7
9
The Accumulated Rarity Penalty (ARP) is the sum of RP for all team members. It will result in following changes to the challenge:
Round 1 Challenges:
The following four encounters will be split equally among the two parties. They have to face both encounters in the randomly determined order. The parties will be able to regroup (game state including life is reset and not "continuous").
The Ogre Bandits
3 life
Traveling the mountainside you run into two surprisedGray Ogres (2/2, vanilla; on the battlefield, tapped). You need to dispatch them quickly in case there are more around! (Opponent draws a Mountain and a Gray Ogre each turn.)
Lair of the Spider
5 life
In the deepest woods you encounter a Giant Spider(2/4, reach; it and one Forest on the battlefield). You have to fight it in unfamiliar ground and need to be cautious to not go into its trap (three Forest and two Arachnus Web in hand).
Blood Suckers
5 life
You travel through a vast and murky wetland (five Swamps on the battlefield) as you notice the sound of leathery wings approaching (three Vampire Bats (0/1, flying, ":symb:: +1/+0. Twice per turn.") and three Dakmor Bats (1/1, flying) in hand).
Kill us both!
4 life
The coastal path seemed safe until you met with three marauding Merfolk of the Pearl Trident(1/1, vanilla; them and four Islands on the battlefield). Their mysterious ally watches from the shadows (Clone in hand).
Action Enforcement Rule: If five turns pass without the adventurers attacking or casting a spell, then they are considered retreating from the stalemate; living in shame for abandoning their quest.
"The powers are in balance, but they won't be for much longer. Our choices will matter once more."
The Idea:
I once again try to make the concept of a custom card game - this time I want to emphasize the RPG elements more.
Each player will be represented by a creature permanent of his/her own choice (restrictions, see below) and will have access to a small hand of cards - as the player advances the most likely thing to increase is the hand size. At first the hand is restricted to two cards - which in this game will also mean once you designed those two cards you are restricted to them until you free up your spell slots by an obligatory rest.
Roleplaying shall be the main way to navigate through this game with card creation will mostly happen in the inevitable conflicts. But since I plan to allow spells also to be used outside combat, card creation may happen at any place (need a ladder? summon one!).
At all times you will be provided with an amount of mana that increases as you advance through levels, which will regenerate slowly if it is depleted for spells.
How to Get Started:
If you feel like trying this out, you will want to start with designing yourself. You should be a common/uncommon creature with a mana cost of 2C, CC, CD, 2H, HH, HC or 3.
You will not be legendary - and if fitting the place you may meet other characters with the same "cardname". Nevertheless you will want to add a flavor description for yourself including a name. As you advance you will be able to develop yourself.
Don't consider yourself restricted to magical classes - as long as you are sentient, you are fine. Just keep in mind that I will expect your spell designs to make flavorwise sense, e. g. if you are a Soldier, call your damage instant "Guided Strike" rather than "Fireball Spell".
Feel free to be a Kithkin, but not assume you are from Lorwyn (but maybe the Lorwyn-like part of this world a few weeks travel away ;)). Otherwise I won't impose restrictions.
In addition to this your starting stats will be:
Money: 100 Lifes: 3 Hand: 2 Library: 1
(your mana pool will be given to you in reaction to your character creation - it will be based on your designs mana cost - hybrid might be tricky ^^)
You do not need to decide immediately, what is in your hand and library.
Once you are done, you can decide where to go. You start in Tellis (s. b.) and can explore the place and the surroundings. There are notes to point you towards preset quests (check out the "Rumors"), but if you want to go freeform, feel free.
Oh, and you decide whether you want to go solo or form a party.
The Setting:
To not step onto anyone's toe this is a place in a generic custom fantasy world. It will be the typical middle-european tolkienesque setting. But you are free to assume that the wrold is just as diverse or even more diverse than earth/dominaria considering cultures, settings, races.
The starting point will be the town of Tellis:
Tellis is a medium sized independent town. It is ruled and protected by a local class of knights and the mages of the nearby Pentarch Tower - a stronghold as well as academy in the mountains, where all five colors of magic try to cooperate.
The highest ranked noble and ruler of the region is Sir Miro Watherton, who is close to the white mages of the Pentarchy.
Tellis is not far from the coast in the west, where the Merfolk dwell around rocky islands called the Barriers – ships can pass through that barrier only at nearby Fellport. North of Tellis lie the Tarpeak Mountains, east of it the vast Greywood.
Tellis was founded by humans and is mostly populated by them. Elves, Goblins and Ratfolk are known to live in the region, but often not directly in the town except for Northest (s. b.).
Close to Tellis or within it, miscelanous places can be found:
Heida is a resident elven druid and healer – together with his wives and disciples he is an exceptionally civilization friendly member of the local elves. He attempts to create understanding on both sides – his garden is a respected place for most, especially the farmers from the surrounding regions.
The red dragon is an association of sell swords with a mixed reputation. While they are cheap and good at their job, members are known to sometimes dob into crime when money is sparse. The authorities have an constant eye on the Dragon's.
The Dragon's Head is a bar where always members are to be found.
The wizard school is well visited by strangers – founded by members of the blue chamber (one of them, Cal Everend, is residing the school) this is a place for exchange of arcane knowledge and research. The local library has not as rare and precious books as the blue chamber themselves, but certainly may help a stranger who is willing to pay.
Heliman is a local man of wealth, if not of blood, who supports a colony of artisans near the town center. The people are eccentric, but open-minded. Most famously a couple of artificers recently started constructing plowlings which are a great help to the local farmers.
More infamously they also created lightning cockroaches which destroyed large amounts of crop.
Northest is the northwestern part of the town, where the cultural and racial diversity is increased as opposed to the main town.
The Northest Inn is known to be cheap if you do not bother the diversity.
Rumors:
Since a while repeatedly reports can be heard about elves attacking travellers on the route through Greywood.
A travelling adventurer returned from a journey into the mountains with valuable goods last week - he wouldn't tell anyone about it, but people speculate about a treasure hoard.
The townsfolk is afraid to wander southwards to Stickcreek Valley apparently a bog wratih haunts the place.
Someone broke into the house of Sir Sunilec apparently stealing not a thing, but his wife has fallen sick of a mysterious illness.
A two-headed springjack was born on Ademar's farm. Truely the end must be near!
Players (current max: 8):
Gerrard's Mom (Renly) *Horseshoe Crab
Rimeshade *Arcane School
Mr. Quidam *Horseshoe Crab emkorial *Horseshoe Crab
Doom Lich *Arcane School
DeusofCalamity *Horseshoe Crab
void_nothing *Horseshoe Crab
Socrates *???
...
Pendle *Horseshoe Crab
due to the popularity of [Dueling Grounds] among testers I decided to open it up for everyone interested. My experience with an earlier game tought me though that some things are better outsourced, so while I personally am going to moderate only two duels at a time, I see no reason to not have other people fill my role to open this to a wider audience.
This thread is for organisational purposes only: Mods and players finding each other and feedback considering the rules (which are in no way clearly outlined yet).
I may also keep track of games in this post if it seems helpful.
I use a format nicknamed Type I (though I'm also thinking about adding more refined formats). Other moderators may try to improve upon the idea (or dislike aspects like the revealed cards in the starting hand), if you are planning to do so, please let your players know beforehand (in your signups would be best).
" for Type I">
In this game two players will play against each other using custom cards they create while playing.
First five hand cards will be designed and revealed to the opponent, then the remaining two hand cards are designed as well as the top three cards of the library.
Subsequently whenever the top card of the library is drawn, but not yet designed five more designs are submitted. The cards in the library are always submitted in order from top to down.
Whenever unknown cards are revealed or searched new design are necessary.
All designs are reviewed by the moderator of the game and changed if necessary at his or her discretion.
To sign up, just post here and be sure to put as the very first line whether you want to moderate a game or play or both (so anyone can find the information quickly).
Outsourcing Game 2 of Gerrard's Mom and seratonin from here.
Please, start the title of PMs pertaining to your game with [Game 2] for easy identification. Thanks.
The rules are as before:
First five hand cards will be designed and revealed to the opponent, then the remaining two hand cards are designed as well as the top three cards of the library.
Subsequently whenever the top card of the library is drawn, but not yet designed five more designs are submitted. The cards in the library are submitted in order from top to down.
Whenever unknown cards are revealed or searched new design are necessary.
All designs are reviewed and changed if necessary.
some of you may recall me, may even have entered the dungeon. You will not go there again - at least not yet. But you may help pave the way.
In this game two players will play against each other using custom cards they create while playing.
Each player who wants to sign up just needs to post in the thread and provide three example cards. Those cards will be considered to be in their starting hand in their next game.
After the signups are closed the players will be chosing the rest of their starting hand as well as the top three cards of their library and send those to me via PM. Then they will be assigned to an opponent.
Naturally I reserve myself the right to change any custom card submitted for any reason - balance, templating.
As this is just a test there will be only two duels, i. e. up to four players may sign up.
A few weeks ago the Arcane Institute for Research received information about the locatins of several powerful artifacts of ancient times. Immediately they send out a group of their most gifted wizards to retrieve the items. But unfortunately the trinkets were guarded to good and the spellcasters were repelled. No matter what spell they recalled, the Meddling Mages of the other side were prepared for them.
The wizard council realized that they needed a new kind of spellcaster - a kind of mage that you can't prepare for, that casts spells that didn't even exist until they thought of it: Spellcrafters.
The game works fairly simple. You explore a dungeon and face challenges in the form of creatures or spells prepared by the defenders ofthe dungeon. To solve the situations you get a bit of mana and a number of cards you can play - except the cards are absolute blank and you design them as you play them to fit your situation.
There are two restrictions:
(1) A spellcrafter is a proud being, to proud to simply use an existing design. All spells you use have to be new.
(2) Spellcrafting is a delicate process and not always predictable. To make sure all designs are fairly costed and have a correct wording, I will revise all submitted spells before they resolve. I try to make no changes unless necessary.
Depending on the creativity, effectiveness and overall quality of your designed spells your abilities will develop. At first you won't be able to play expensive or complex spells or many of them. And not every spell type will be known to you from the start. But after a while the only limits will be the boundaries of your imagination.
How to start:
First things first. You are a talented magical entity, but you lack the physical body to explore a stronghold full of enemies ad traps. Hence every spellcrafter has a champion, a familiar or an avatar in the form of a legendary creature that acts on its behalf. This champion will follow rules similar to those of a EDH General (i.e. if your champion gets destroyed, you can replay him/her/it).
When you want to join the game, your first task is to design a legendary creature card to be your avatar. You won't be restricted by mana cost or abilities for those designs, but keep in mind that you might need to replay your only creature down the road and the power needed to summon it, might be missed later.
Choose wisely, because this creature will represent you from now on!
Username: Dungeon Crawler
What is it they hope to achieve? Slay a monstrous creature? Find an ancient treasure or the ingredient to a miraculous medicine? Search for a new home? Do they even have a common goal or each their own agenda?
All this I do not know. All this is up to you... and so is their success.
Mana Pool, Life Total, Cards in Hand:
Each of the three protagonists is assigned a mana pool of six mana. For these first steps you can draw mana of any color from this mana pool, but once the characters are created their mana symbol will be more well-defined.
Each of them also starts with a life total of 10 and four cards in hand. These resources can be replenished over the course of the adventure. A protagonist is at risk both of being destroyed as a permanent and of being depleted of its life total. Beware!
Other zones than the hand and battlefield are black boxes. Cards may be drawn from the unknown library and die and go to the graveyard. But there they currently cannot interacted with. If a character has special interest in interacting with a zone (e. g. an ogre necromancer) then this may change at my discretion immediately after character creation.
Step 1: Character Creation:
The first step of the game is the creation of the three main protagonists. Anyone can design a card representing a character. There is just one restriction: The submitted character must have converted mana cost between 1 and 3 (inclusive).
For each character include also the following three pieces of information (as brief as you want):
Background: Where are they from? What have they been doing? Do you have a name?
Appearance: Stature, size, sound of voice, fur color, number of eyes etc.
Goal: What are you hoping to find in this place far from home and civilization.
The story will start with the chosen protagonists getting played from hand as one of the four initial cards paid with from the initial resources available.
Three best designs will be accepted.
Step 2: Travel Preparations
What good is a character in the wild without something to keep them alive. A piece of armor? A magic blessing? Or just exquisite training and a special heritage? Maybe they have an animal companion?
As soon as three characters are submitted additional cards may be designed to aide them on their adventure. Each such card can only use the resources left over after character creation. Any individual submitted card also must have converted mana cost between 1 and 3 (inclusive).
After the protagonists are played their support cards are played from their respective resources. You may suggest a protagonist to receive a certain blessing, but circumstances may force changes e. g. if a character is not chosen as protagonist.
No character will receive more than two preparations.
Step 3: I Wanna Go Places
While the protagonists venture into the wild they might come across places they do not know. Maybe no one has laid eyes on that place in decades. Or maybe they just followed a path to that one cave everyone talks about.
Choose the first location!
The location is once again a card design of your choice representing a place. There is no mana available to support it. It cannot cost mana to play.
It will be in the game once the first two steps have been completed. It must fit as a location in the wilds of Quercus.
Only one design might make it in this category, but there might be a chance for runner-ups.
All These Steps...
Anyone can design up to one card for each of the three steps/challenges, but please state clearly which challenge a particular design is for. Multiple designs by a single player may make it in, but I will weigh towards including designs from different players for tiebreakers and close calls.
You may choose to play favorites with your cards and give one of them extra weighed. It will be factored in though I won't make promises.
Note also that untouched by the number of designs I state I will accept at this point, you can submit more of them than the specified threshold unless stated otherwise e. g. more than three characters can be proposed even though only three will make it in right now.
I Like Your Way of Thinking
Someone else designed a card you really like and you think should win? Good, because then you can give them your vote of confidence. Anyone can give their seal of approval to any number of other designs.
I'm a harsh, cruel and maybe a little arbitrary god when I distribute points towards the designs. But if you band together you may sway me with your votes as each of them will be counted as an additional point for a player.
Please, be sure to make clear whether your approval should count as a point. I suggest a bold Favored Designs: *foo*, *bar* using the card names. Remember: You favor individual designs, not players.
The Enemy Is Watching
Lastly... You might be tempted to make heavy investments into expensive spells and characters in these first steps. But you know not everything that lies ahead, not everyone who might be watching.
The Most Important Thing
Have Fun!
Maybe this time we'll make it to 200 posts...
In this game you will design creature cards to send them onto challenges. All creatures will work together and form adventuring parties so no one has to face the dangers alone. Success and failure in the challenges will shape your future encounters.
Rules:
Example Card Formating:
Creature — Illusion Warrior
~ is unblockable.
"There are as many pillows of illusion as flakes in a snow-storm. We wake from one dream into another dream."
—Ralph Waldo Emerson, "Illusions"
2/2
Tips:
The Recruitment Process:
I'll wait for about a day or two or until there are between about six or ten submissions. The submissions will be evaluated and assigned rarities and according penalties for their parties. Conversely well-done designs might bestow a small bonus upon its team.
In exceptional cases I might reject a submission. I'll expect that only to happen when I can't determine what a card is meant to do (e. g. because of bad grammar) or it won't work well for logistical reasons (e. g. Un-card mechanics, excessive coin-flipping).
The submitted creatures will be equally and randomly distributed among to two adventuring parties.
The Encounter:
The challenges will be assigned to the newly formed parties. Each challenge will consist of a game in which I will play both sides to the best of my abilities. The adventurers side will start "in hand" with a few basic lands at their disposal (number and type dependent on party composition). The challenge side will have predefined resources stated for each round.
Note: The party gets at least four lands and at least one land per party member. The best composition is determined at the beginning of the encounter.
Only additionally drawn cards are discarded during cleanup.
Penalties may influence parameters of both sides.
Players will have numerical values for library size that can be depleted so a victory by alternative win conditions is possible though the sides won't attempt to draw cards during their respective draw phase unless they are at 0 cards. Unless otherwise stated the challenge side will have a library of 20 cards.
Cards otherwise drawn will be taken from a small random library made up of 50% basic lands and 50% basic spells (Death Ward, Unsummon, Raise Dead, Shock, Battlegrowth).
The adventurers are start players unless otherwise stated.
Aftermath:
Depending on outcome of the battles some adventurers may die and others may live. Among the surviving ones the most distinguished ones might earn themselves the title of team leader for the next round of challenges and go out questing again in the next round.
Balance:
Common
Uncommon
Rare
Mythic Rare
3
5
7
9
<=10
11-15
16-20
21-25
26-30
31-35
36-40
>40
Life/Library
12/30
10/25
9/24
8/20
7/18
6/15
5/12
4/10
Life/Basic Land
+0/+0
+1/+0
+2/+0
+3/+0
+3/+1
+4/+1
+5/+1
+5/+2
Round 1 Challenges:
The following four encounters will be split equally among the two parties. They have to face both encounters in the randomly determined order. The parties will be able to regroup (game state including life is reset and not "continuous").
Traveling the mountainside you run into two surprised Gray Ogres (2/2, vanilla; on the battlefield, tapped). You need to dispatch them quickly in case there are more around! (Opponent draws a Mountain and a Gray Ogre each turn.)
In the deepest woods you encounter a Giant Spider (2/4, reach; it and one Forest on the battlefield). You have to fight it in unfamiliar ground and need to be cautious to not go into its trap (three Forest and two Arachnus Web in hand).
You travel through a vast and murky wetland (five Swamps on the battlefield) as you notice the sound of leathery wings approaching (three Vampire Bats (0/1, flying, ":symb:: +1/+0. Twice per turn.") and three Dakmor Bats (1/1, flying) in hand).
The coastal path seemed safe until you met with three marauding Merfolk of the Pearl Trident (1/1, vanilla; them and four Islands on the battlefield). Their mysterious ally watches from the shadows (Clone in hand).
Backup Heroes: Samite Healer and White Knight
Action Enforcement Rule: If five turns pass without the adventurers attacking or casting a spell, then they are considered retreating from the stalemate; living in shame for abandoning their quest.
I hope no one's unhappy about me burrowing quite a lot. I think the game idea deserves more exposure.
And now: Have fun!
I once again try to make the concept of a custom card game - this time I want to emphasize the RPG elements more.
Each player will be represented by a creature permanent of his/her own choice (restrictions, see below) and will have access to a small hand of cards - as the player advances the most likely thing to increase is the hand size. At first the hand is restricted to two cards - which in this game will also mean once you designed those two cards you are restricted to them until you free up your spell slots by an obligatory rest.
Roleplaying shall be the main way to navigate through this game with card creation will mostly happen in the inevitable conflicts. But since I plan to allow spells also to be used outside combat, card creation may happen at any place (need a ladder? summon one!).
At all times you will be provided with an amount of mana that increases as you advance through levels, which will regenerate slowly if it is depleted for spells.
How to Get Started:
If you feel like trying this out, you will want to start with designing yourself. You should be a common/uncommon creature with a mana cost of 2C, CC, CD, 2H, HH, HC or 3.
You will not be legendary - and if fitting the place you may meet other characters with the same "cardname". Nevertheless you will want to add a flavor description for yourself including a name. As you advance you will be able to develop yourself.
Don't consider yourself restricted to magical classes - as long as you are sentient, you are fine. Just keep in mind that I will expect your spell designs to make flavorwise sense, e. g. if you are a Soldier, call your damage instant "Guided Strike" rather than "Fireball Spell".
Feel free to be a Kithkin, but not assume you are from Lorwyn (but maybe the Lorwyn-like part of this world a few weeks travel away ;)). Otherwise I won't impose restrictions.
In addition to this your starting stats will be:
Money: 100 Lifes: 3 Hand: 2 Library: 1
(your mana pool will be given to you in reaction to your character creation - it will be based on your designs mana cost - hybrid might be tricky ^^)
You do not need to decide immediately, what is in your hand and library.
Once you are done, you can decide where to go. You start in Tellis (s. b.) and can explore the place and the surroundings. There are notes to point you towards preset quests (check out the "Rumors"), but if you want to go freeform, feel free.
Oh, and you decide whether you want to go solo or form a party.
The Setting:
To not step onto anyone's toe this is a place in a generic custom fantasy world. It will be the typical middle-european tolkienesque setting. But you are free to assume that the wrold is just as diverse or even more diverse than earth/dominaria considering cultures, settings, races.
The starting point will be the town of Tellis:
The highest ranked noble and ruler of the region is Sir Miro Watherton, who is close to the white mages of the Pentarchy.
Tellis is not far from the coast in the west, where the Merfolk dwell around rocky islands called the Barriers – ships can pass through that barrier only at nearby Fellport. North of Tellis lie the Tarpeak Mountains, east of it the vast Greywood.
Tellis was founded by humans and is mostly populated by them. Elves, Goblins and Ratfolk are known to live in the region, but often not directly in the town except for Northest (s. b.).
Close to Tellis or within it, miscelanous places can be found:
The Dragon's Head is a bar where always members are to be found.
More infamously they also created lightning cockroaches which destroyed large amounts of crop.
The Northest Inn is known to be cheap if you do not bother the diversity.
- Since a while repeatedly reports can be heard about elves attacking travellers on the route through Greywood.
- A travelling adventurer returned from a journey into the mountains with valuable goods last week - he wouldn't tell anyone about it, but people speculate about a treasure hoard.
- The townsfolk is afraid to wander southwards to Stickcreek Valley apparently a bog wratih haunts the place.
- Someone broke into the house of Sir Sunilec apparently stealing not a thing, but his wife has fallen sick of a mysterious illness.
- A two-headed springjack was born on Ademar's farm. Truely the end must be near!
Players (current max: 8):Gerrard's Mom (Renly) *Horseshoe Crab
Rimeshade *Arcane School
Mr. Quidam *Horseshoe Crab
emkorial *Horseshoe CrabDoom Lich *Arcane School
DeusofCalamity *Horseshoe Crab
void_nothing *Horseshoe Crab
Socrates *???
...
Pendle *Horseshoe Crab
due to the popularity of [Dueling Grounds] among testers I decided to open it up for everyone interested. My experience with an earlier game tought me though that some things are better outsourced, so while I personally am going to moderate only two duels at a time, I see no reason to not have other people fill my role to open this to a wider audience.
This thread is for organisational purposes only: Mods and players finding each other and feedback considering the rules (which are in no way clearly outlined yet).
I may also keep track of games in this post if it seems helpful.
I use a format nicknamed Type I (though I'm also thinking about adding more refined formats). Other moderators may try to improve upon the idea (or dislike aspects like the revealed cards in the starting hand), if you are planning to do so, please let your players know beforehand (in your signups would be best).
In this game two players will play against each other using custom cards they create while playing.
First five hand cards will be designed and revealed to the opponent, then the remaining two hand cards are designed as well as the top three cards of the library.
Subsequently whenever the top card of the library is drawn, but not yet designed five more designs are submitted. The cards in the library are always submitted in order from top to down.
Whenever unknown cards are revealed or searched new design are necessary.
All designs are reviewed by the moderator of the game and changed if necessary at his or her discretion.
To sign up, just post here and be sure to put as the very first line whether you want to moderate a game or play or both (so anyone can find the information quickly).
Well, let us see what happens.
Please, start the title of PMs pertaining to your game with [Game 2] for easy identification. Thanks.
The rules are as before:
First five hand cards will be designed and revealed to the opponent, then the remaining two hand cards are designed as well as the top three cards of the library.
Subsequently whenever the top card of the library is drawn, but not yet designed five more designs are submitted. The cards in the library are submitted in order from top to down.
Whenever unknown cards are revealed or searched new design are necessary.
All designs are reviewed and changed if necessary.
Go for it!
some of you may recall me, may even have entered the dungeon. You will not go there again - at least not yet. But you may help pave the way.
In this game two players will play against each other using custom cards they create while playing.
Each player who wants to sign up just needs to post in the thread and provide three example cards. Those cards will be considered to be in their starting hand in their next game.
After the signups are closed the players will be chosing the rest of their starting hand as well as the top three cards of their library and send those to me via PM. Then they will be assigned to an opponent.
Naturally I reserve myself the right to change any custom card submitted for any reason - balance, templating.
As this is just a test there will be only two duels, i. e. up to four players may sign up.
Go for it!
A few weeks ago the Arcane Institute for Research received information about the locatins of several powerful artifacts of ancient times. Immediately they send out a group of their most gifted wizards to retrieve the items. But unfortunately the trinkets were guarded to good and the spellcasters were repelled. No matter what spell they recalled, the Meddling Mages of the other side were prepared for them.
The wizard council realized that they needed a new kind of spellcaster - a kind of mage that you can't prepare for, that casts spells that didn't even exist until they thought of it: Spellcrafters.
The game works fairly simple. You explore a dungeon and face challenges in the form of creatures or spells prepared by the defenders ofthe dungeon. To solve the situations you get a bit of mana and a number of cards you can play - except the cards are absolute blank and you design them as you play them to fit your situation.
There are two restrictions:
(1) A spellcrafter is a proud being, to proud to simply use an existing design. All spells you use have to be new.
(2) Spellcrafting is a delicate process and not always predictable. To make sure all designs are fairly costed and have a correct wording, I will revise all submitted spells before they resolve. I try to make no changes unless necessary.
Depending on the creativity, effectiveness and overall quality of your designed spells your abilities will develop. At first you won't be able to play expensive or complex spells or many of them. And not every spell type will be known to you from the start. But after a while the only limits will be the boundaries of your imagination.
How to start:
First things first. You are a talented magical entity, but you lack the physical body to explore a stronghold full of enemies ad traps. Hence every spellcrafter has a champion, a familiar or an avatar in the form of a legendary creature that acts on its behalf. This champion will follow rules similar to those of a EDH General (i.e. if your champion gets destroyed, you can replay him/her/it).
When you want to join the game, your first task is to design a legendary creature card to be your avatar. You won't be restricted by mana cost or abilities for those designs, but keep in mind that you might need to replay your only creature down the road and the power needed to summon it, might be missed later.
Choose wisely, because this creature will represent you from now on!
In the post with your champion also choose one of the six relics you want to retrieve: Celestial Prism, Jade Statue, Rod of Ruin, Disrupting Scepter, Jayemdae Tome or Conservator.
Post those two things simply in this thread, and I will continue to post the first scene and further information.
I leave it to every player to decide for him- or herself in how much roleplay everyone wants to engage. No rules for that!
Have fun!