Cactus Game Design Message Boards

Hey,

Orange brigade needs... help. It'd be nice to play a solid orange defense that didn't need the help of magicians.

I feel like the way we have designed Orange makes it very hard to balance in all of the variety of ways it might be used.  Giving it the cards to make it competitive in a conventional Type 1 defense would probably make it too good as a Type 2 defense or in a defensive heavy Type 1 deck.  Orange also has a little of the Silver design philosophy built into it where it's almost intended not to be used by itself but rather in tandem with a human brigade/theme that it can support well.

I think we need more roman reprints, like four squads, roman jailer, the other non gray emperors and Nero.

When we are considering what old cards to reprint we primarily consider if the card is in the wrong brigade and is the card really bad (i.e. virtually unplayable).  A card like Nero is very unlikely to be reprinted because it is in the right brigade and has a useful ability.

3. Cards with "or" abilities - I think that cards should potentially have "or" abilities as this would provide so many more options in gameplay.

The drawback to "or" abilities is that they become really long abilities really fast.  In the last few years (when abilities were written over the artwork) signifiant effort was made to keep abilities short so as not to cover too much of the artwork.  The new card design has moved the ability off of the artwork, but I suspect we'll continue to use similar guidelines for ability length because there still isn't an abundance of space in which to write out a long ability.

4. Off-the-wall abilities - Introduce cards that really turn the game on its head, like Seven Wicked Spirits and Stalks of Flax. These cards will throw a wrench in whatever setup your opponent had going.

While it doesn't surprise me in the least that you want more of these sorts of cards they aren't necessarily good for the game.  Players generally don't gravitate towards them because they don't fit a nitch within most decks.  They also tend to be very difficult to word perfectly which often leads to lots of ruling questions, broken combos and/or errata when players do turn their attention toward them.  They do serve a beneficial role in the game when they are done right, but it is VERY hard to get them right.

I'd like to see more defensive TD as well.  Not 1 for 1s, like Ancient Evil or A Look Back.  EEs more hardy that could make their way into decks, even if they aren't battlewinners.

This is a line we have to tread very, very carefully.  We want games to end within the time limit with the heroes ultimately being sucessful.  We also want players to include enough defense to avoid games turning into dual solitaire race to five which is what happens when there are no blocks.  Because a lot of top players are inclined towards playing a heavy offense we have to make defensive cards more powerful to incentivise players to use them.  But if we make them too powerful a deck with a decent sized defense (not necessarily a turtle) ends up timing out/making the heroes not sucessful.  Teritory destruction that is too efficient runs the risk of pushing more games than we want into the "wrong side ends up winning" category.

Tschow,

Tim "Sir Nobody" Maly

Hey,

Despite the game possibly being in the healthiest state we've seen in a while, what do think the game needs right now? What card types, themes or special abilities need to be helped or weakened?

Players need a response to underdeck.  Few protect abilities are broad enough to include underdeck and once you've been hit by one the only thing you can do is draw until you get it back (a shuffle to get it off the bottom of the deck helps and a search ability could theoretically be used to get it back but nazareth makes both of those options much less likely).  I find this particularly problematic in that underdeck hurts speed decks a lot less than non-speed decks because a speed deck will deck out faster meaning they'll redraw the card sooner while a slower deck may very well never see the card again the rest of the game.  Obviously an ability that protects from underdeck (hopefully not that specific) would work.  Other more creative options would include an ability that let you draw from the bottom of your deck instead of the top or an ability that topdecked the bottom X cards of your deck.

I'd like to see more counters to territory class enhancements.  In particular reprints of Covenant with Noah and Unsucessfull that "negate and discard the last good/evil enhancement played or any good/evil enhancement in play."

Drawing and in particular CBN drawing is still particularly ubiquitous and lacks good counters.  An ability that "reduces the number of cards drawn by all draw abilities by 2" would be an interesting new approach to the issue.

I used a Herod's/Gray defense at Nationals.  There are a couple specific cards that those themes would benefit from:

Herod's could use a character that makes withdraw abilities CBN.  It would probably need a condition to keep it from being too powerful.
Grey could use a interrupt/negate that isn't horrible.  (Although an Unsuccessful reprint would probably be enough to fit that bill.)

Tschow,

Tim "Sir Nobody" Maly

I disagree that underdecking is an issue, the only CBN/I underdecker is Scattered. the rest are all interruptable. With top players the only reason they would play this negateable battle winner is the guarantee that it can hit who they want to hit with it.

Think Joseph protected from underdecking??

Vain Philosohpy is CBN and Sorrow of Mary is basically CBN, as only CWD stops it.

I was under the impression we were talking about cards that target characters.

And there are already plenty of ways to protect your hand for opponents.

I think we need more cards with "regardless" in them, like "regardless of protection." We did that with immunity, now it's protection's turn. 

I like the women's booster deck.  I would like to see it expanded and build up. Just so that some of the women character could pack more of a punch compared to say someone like Nero or Pharaoh.  Jezebel and Delilah both are nasty women from the bible.  Mary (mother of Jesus) and her cousin Elizabeth should have some sort of special ability.  Of course there is the lineage of women for the line of Christ.  Rehab, Tamar, Ruth, etc they should be able to band together and create a good banding ability that could stand up to a band of male characters that are banded together.  Or a card with a lamb icon that will band them together.   Lineage of Christ.  I'm sure all this has been thought of before now.   I am very new to the game and  still learning my cards.

Quote from: TheHobbit on August 17, 2013, 11:48:24 AM

In type 2 errata The Long Day and call it quits.

Would categorizing The Long Day as a Side Battle/New Battle card so that you could only create one extra battle with it per turn be enough?

Yes that works. Or you just errata the warriors to read like the Kings instead of the other way around which it is now. To clarify the Kings allows you to make an additional rescue but was change to read like the Warriors which allows you to make another rescue.

As for hand control it be nice if you could make cards that are a blanket protect like Simon the Zealot. If you need to balance the card feel free let it protect from either discard or underdeck.

Well if another set with rarity comes out, I would suggest it would be a good idea to make the more complex cards the higher rarities, that way when a new player opens several packs they won't get overwhelmed with complexity.

I also think that Redemption may need to cut back on complexity, I'm not saying that there shouldn't be any, but making most of the cards do multiple things and/or use difficult abilities won't be good for the game as a whole.

The other thing I think would be good is more thematic sets. I am not suggesting making a set like Prophets or Kings where the theme is primarily one brigade nowadays, but rather make a theme that can encompass every brigade. Disciples was a good set, but since all the disciples were purple (save one also being red) the set wasn't all about the disciples, although it was a well done set all things considered.

The ideas that I was working on:
Spiritual Warfare - A set based on prayers and sins, both are placed on heroes and Prayers augment heroes (or rescue attempts) while the enhancement is on a hero in territory and sins impede rescue attempts or heroes.

Judgements and Mercies - a set based on Judgements: Powerful field nukes and Remnants: characters that enter battle after the entire side is removed.

I'm sure there are tons of set themes that would allow for relatively even distribution of brigades while still staying with the theme of the set.

I think that the game needs more hand protection since there are now many cards that target hands.

Quote from: Nameless on September 08, 2013, 09:50:43 AM

I think that the game needs more hand protection since there are now many cards that target hands.

Specifically from under/topdecking and look (since naz protects from shuffle, and 4-d coin protects from discard) imo.

Hand targeting is a good defense strategy. Leave it alone people.

Quote from: Red on September 08, 2013, 11:38:05 AM

Hand targeting is a good defense strategy. Leave it alone people.

The most common hand targeting at Nats was I am Holy removing people's defense so that the offense could walk in for free LSs.  That certainly isn't a "defense strategy".

Just as common, if not more so (since some people probably didn't realize how good I am Holy is), is look at hand, which is also a very offensive ability that targets hand.

The game is currently at a sweetspot compared to the past few years. You can basically play almost anything(being a good player) and win at least 60% of your games. Diversity is at a fairly high level and that should be promoted by making well balanced cards and not trying to make a million silver bullets to hand control, Judges, Disciples, and everything else.