Cactus Game Design Message Boards

Hmmm.  Either you thought I was talking about Captured Ark, or else you typed DoN instead of AotL.

Or else the depth of your strategy is way too deep for me to comprehend. 

Ha! I read Captured Ark, even though that's not what it said. I do have Ark of the Covenant in one deck I use, but it's a very abnormal deck. I can't recall the last time I saw an opponent use it.

Twice Afflicted DEFINITELY wins my vote for worst art in the set.

And don't forget there were a couple of new spears released, which makes him deadly vs. Heroes of */5 or less.

Enhancements disarded to the toss ability must come from hand.

The current default conditions for Toss in the REG do not permit any WC enhancement from being tossed.  This causes a problem, though, because a WC enhancement is played when it enters battle.  So Spearman forces the enhancement to be tossed, but it can't because of a conflicting game rule.

Is this one of those times when a special ability overrides a game rule?  Do good WC enhancements in battle before FS enters get tossed upon FS entering/activating?  What about cards played pre-block (essentially the same thing) - does the instead in effect negate/cancel the enhancement's ability?

Aren't weapons played twice?  I seem to remember that weapons are considered played outside of battle, then also considered played as they enter battle.

Quote from: Professoralstad on May 17, 2013, 10:27:55 AM

And don't forget there were a couple of new spears released, which makes him deadly vs. Heroes of */5 or less.

Quote from: REG

Enhancements disarded to the toss ability must come from hand.

The current default conditions for Toss in the REG do not permit any WC enhancement from being tossed.  This causes a problem, though, because a WC enhancement is played when it enters battle.  So Spearman forces the enhancement to be tossed, but it can't because of a conflicting game rule.

Is this one of those times when a special ability overrides a game rule?  Do good WC enhancements in battle before FS enters get tossed upon FS entering/activating?  What about cards played pre-block (essentially the same thing) - does the instead in effect negate/cancel the enhancement's ability?

What you posted is simply the Default Condition--the default condition for all enhancements is that they are played from hand, but WC enhancements override the default as they always have.

Insteads only work if they're in play when the thing they instead happens. Therefore, if a Hero is wielding a weapon then FS can't toss that weapon because the condition (being played) was met before FS's instead was activated. It's like activating RBD after the opponent already played Mayhem. They don't retroactively reveal/discard the cards drawn.

This I agree with.

Aren't weapons played twice?  I seem to remember that weapons are considered played outside of battle, then also considered played as they enter battle.

That used to be the case, but it was changed awhile ago:

-You play an enhancement by attempting to activate its special ability (or numbers in battle)
-You play a character or multicolor site by putting it in your territory or your side of the battle.
-You play any other card type by putting it face up on the playing surface from hand, deck, or discard pile due to your special ability or game action, except when you discard a card from hand.

heres something i just realized, is there some reason there arent any sites or artifacts in the new starters?

its also simpler without weapons and territory class enhancements but those are in there in spades

its also simpler without weapons and territory class enhancements but those are in there in spades

What's easier to explain, that an emblem means you can play an enhancement out of battle (or that the one puzzle piece goes with the other puzzle piece) or the nuances of how artifacts work? Sites I'm neutral too, though if you have sites, you have to build in site access too.

I agree that it is good that the starter decks are simple, but aren't we just pushing the complexity problem back a step? Yes, I agree that it is far easier to learn a game while you are playing than have to learn a bunch of stuff before you start, but we could just be pushing the problem back a step.

Here is what I'm concerned could happen:
A person sees some starter decks (or someone introduces them to the game and teaches with this super simple cards) and they have a good time. Then once they decide they want to start modifying decks they are hit with 3 new card types they've never seen before (5 if you count covenants and curses as separate from enhancements and artifacts), multi alignment cards, complex abilities and a fairly difficult rules system to figure out (I've been playing this game for something like 8 years, I am a very experienced gamer (when it comes to games in general), I try to keep up with rulings and I am a rules lawyer)  and essentially give up at the game.

Whereas, what happens with things like G and H deck, you give it to someone, and they have NO IDEA what's going on, and they give up right then. Starter decks SHOULD be more simple than the rest of the game - as long they still provide an interesting experience, of course. Artifacts and sites aren't too tough to figure out the basics of, and they'll be in the rulebook for new players to learn about. Concepts like ignore, immune, interrupt the battle, and cannot be prevented (all of which are in G&H but not I&J) are the type to make people give up on the game before they even start, but someone with a few games under their belt should have an easier time.

As long as they don't discover Tartaros.

a good expansion that both is fun, useful, relatively inexpensive ...and has controlled complexity (well worded cards and ...putting the more complex cards at higher rarities

This is a really interesting idea that I've never thought about before.  I like the plan of making cards more rare in a booster pack based more on the complexity of the card rather than the power of the card.  Thanks for stirring this thought.

Quote from: ChristianSoldier on May 21, 2013, 02:46:23 AM

a good expansion that both is fun, useful, relatively inexpensive ...and has controlled complexity (well worded cards and ...putting the more complex cards at higher rarities

This is a really interesting idea that I've never thought about before.  I like the plan of making cards more rare in a booster pack based more on the complexity of the card rather than the power of the card.  Thanks for stirring this thought.

Here's a good explanation why:
You have two target audiences you have to think about (it is a bit more complicated than that, but bear with me) The experienced players that know the game, that are either competitive or at the very least should have a good understanding of the game and how cards work, they also tend to have access to most of the cards in the game. You also have the inexperienced players that generally don't have a good understanding of the game yet, they tend to also have less cards.

The experienced players may get annoyed at things like rarity, but they will generally have access to much more rares than the new player (I'm talking absolute number, not relative number) and the inexperienced players will have mostly commons and building mostly from common cards.

If you put the powerful cards at the higher rarities the experienced players will have access to them, because they'll front the money, and the inexperienced players won't have a very good access to them, since they tend to buy fewer cards and get what they need from trading or good packs. This furthers the power difference between the experienced and inexperienced players, this can also lead to the inexperienced players getting frustrated by not only having to deal with strange concepts and getting beaten by these rare and powerful cards.

Now if instead you put the complex cards at higher rarities you get a very different picture. Newer players will have a much easier access to powerful cards, since there isn't a rarity difference for power (a powerful card could just as easily be a common as an Ultra Rare) however the more complex cards, the ones that inexperienced players will have more difficulty understanding will come up less when they are starting (they might have some, but most of their cards will still be simpler commons).

This allows both the new players having their simple cards, while the older players (in time being players not necessarily actual age) will have their cool yet weird cards that may take a specialized deck that won't be immediately obvious as a good deck to a new player. Of course all of this requires rarity to use, and since we haven't had rarity since the Priests, it may not have much of an impact on the game.