Cactus Game Design Message Boards
Redemption® Collectible Trading Card Game HQ => Redemption® Market => Topic started by: uthminister [BR] on April 28, 2015, 02:24:05 PM
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I would like your input on something I have been considering for a while. The idea stems from both seeing theme decks in other games and hearing the desire to have good starting points for new players wanting to try out a new theme or improve on one they have been playing. My goal is for this to be an easy and cost effective product that would include and single brigade of cards around a specific civilization/people group. My ultimate goal would be to offer at least two of these "Deck Builders" for each brigade that would include characters and enhancements along with support forts/arts for that theme. I want to keep it at 25 cards per "Deck Builder" and keep the singles price at around $30 and I would sell them for $20 a piece. The end result would be that a player could buy one pack to boost a theme they are already playing or they could buy 2 and make a deck with the additional purchase of a Lost Soul version of a "Deck Builder" pack that would include 7 commonly used special ability Lost Souls. My target on that would be a $9 singles price with a retail of $6. That would give new players a chance to have a pretty well constructed and simple deck for only $46 retail. So here is where I need you help. I have gone through the brigades and picked out the themes I see that are predominant. Please look these over and help me come up with the final two themes for each brigade. If I have missed something, please let me know and I will add it to the list. The brigade themes are:
Evil Brigade Themes:
Black -- Greek, Philistine, Canannite, Sadducee
Orange -- Demon (crossover)
Crimson -- Heretic, Babylonian
Brown -- Israelite, (Median-)Persian, Judean
Gold -- Egyptian, Jewish Kings
Gray -- Pharisee, Roman, Syrian
Pale Green -- Magicians (crossover), Assyrian
Good Brigade Themes:
Blue -- Genesis
Green -- Prophets
Red -- Warrior, Canannite
Gold -- Judge, Samaritan
Silver -- Angel
White -- NT Female, Daniel, Musician
Purple -- Disciples, Royalty
Teal -- Priests
Clay --
What would you add to the list and what would you exclude as the top two themes in each brigade?
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From a Noob's perspective (I've not looked at my cards in a while):
Black: Philistine and Sadducees
Orange: Demons (Magicians could be considered the second "theme" here)
Crimson: Babylonians, Heretics
Brown: Gates of Samaria deck, Persians
Gold: Egyptians, Herods
Gray: Pharisees, Romans
Pale Green: Assyrians, Magicians
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Actually, the article on Land of Redemption today (http://landofredemption.com/?p=801 (http://landofredemption.com/?p=801)) gives the full list of Brigades and Themes/Sub-Themes:
GOOD BRIGADES (Themes/Sub-Themes)
Blue (2) – Genesis Heroes, Job Heroes
Clay (6) – Corinth Church Heroes, Early Church Heroes, Jerusalem Church Heroes, Joppa Heroes,
Missionaries, Thessalonica Church Heroes
Gold (2) – Leaders of Israel (pre-kings), Luke and John Heroes
Green (2) – N.T. Prophets, O.T. Prophets
Purple (2) – Disciples, O.T. Royalty
Red (2) – Centurions, Warriors
Silver (3) – Angels, N.T. Angels, Warrior-Class Angels
Teal (4) – Priests, Solomon’s Temple Priests, Tabernacle Priests, Zerubbabel’s Temple Priests
White (4) – Daniel Heroes, Musicians, N.T. People Who Encountered Christ, Ruth Heroes
EVIL BRIGADES (Themes/Sub-Themes)
Black (4) – Canaanites, Greeks, Philistines, Saducees
Brown (2) – Persians, Rebellious Israelites and Judeans
Crimson (3) – Animals, Babylonians, Heretics
Gold (2) – Egyptians, Herods
Gray (4) – Evil Priests, Pharisees, Romans, Syrians
Orange (1) – Demons
Pale Green (3) – Absalom, Assyrians, Magicians
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Well will you look at that...God is good! So which two from each brigade would be best suited for what I am doing with this project?
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You're going to have a hard time making 25-card sets that focus on a single brigade for a lot of the themes. Judges and Prophets lose a lot of power if you take away their silver, for example, and part of what makes magicians good is their access with different characters to enhancements outside of pale green.
I do like the idea, though, and I think that you could still make decent packs from most of the above themes. I would recommend against Job, Absalom, and Animals as theme packs, though. The latter 2 I don't think are actually a cohesive theme (or at least they don't have a lot of support as a theme) and Job generally is a very lite offense with a heavy defense so I don't think the format of the packs would lend itself well to that theme.
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It will look something like this when it is finished...
(https://www.cactusforums.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi233.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fee268%2Futhminister%2FDeck%2520Builder%2520Example_1.jpg&hash=d6dd0a46ad46b603a11890b5bf1bf24e21eda8c6) (http://s233.photobucket.com/user/uthminister/media/Deck%20Builder%20Example_1.jpg.html)
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First of all, I really like the idea to make playing the strategies more accessible. There are people like my wife who may enjoy playing but can't stand deckbuilding or others that just don't have the time to build decks. Though for many deckbuilding is half the fun and point of games like this, I think it is a great idea to have products that people can just grab and start playing with.
Now I say this because I think what your goal is and who your target audience is will affect the choices here. For comparison other games intro/theme decks are in the $10 to $30 range so $46 is a little much to ask but that kind of depends on what your are getting in those groups. The MtG intro decks are $10 but mostly for beginners and not competitive where the event decks are $20 and decently playable (maybe near the I/J decks level?). You also need to compare what a player can already get from preexisting Redemption product. For Judges and Philistines, you can pretty much just buy the I/J starter and a couple tins for $40 and be set with your deck (not to mention the extra packs). What makes your option worth it?
It would be more work but could you aim for some cheaper "beginner" versions that are about $20 for the whole deck and then the $46 you suggested would be for a more competitive playable deck.
I know you want 2 options per brigade and a standard price for all of them but I'm not sure the card pool will support that. I would suggest starting with themes that are harder to assemble because they are more spread out like red warriors, priests, prophets, angels, Babylonians, pharisees, Assyrians. Don't do Ruth (which is almost entirely in the starter), Judges, Philistines to start with because there is not as much of a need there. At some point, theme decks like Battle by Numbers would be nice to offer. For some themes a 24 card pack should encompass the whole theme where for others like Genesis it will only be touching on it. So I could see how you could have a cheaper "beginner" version of Genesis and a more expensive competitive version of Genesis. In contrast there are not many cards for the Daniel theme and I'm not sure you even have a theme if you don't include the more expensive Daniel cards in there. I'm skeptical that you can have a Daniel theme pack and a roughly equivalent Zerubbabel Temple priest pack for the same price.
If you stick with 25 then two packs with a soul pack is 57 and not a legal deck. I think it might be better to do 24 card packs with the soul pack being 8 cards, 7 souls and 1 commonly used generic support card so you immediately have a legal 56 card deck. The generic support card could be a Dom, Holy Grail, Rain becomes Dust, Unholy Writ, site access site, Wall of Protection, etc.
I also think you should aim to have no overlap between packs. One of the potential attractive things about this idea is that you could take any 2 packs with a soul pack and have a legal deck.
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What if it were only 20 card packs (obviously I will adjust the price point a bit) and then the Lost Soul/Support pack could contain 10 cards including 7 lost souls and 3 generic but useful support cards? That would make a 50 card deck that a player could just play with or they could add up to 6 of their own cards and play with that slightly larger deck. So the Theme/Brigade decks would consist of 20 cards...perhaps 8 characters, 8 enhancements (covenants and curses), and 4 support cards like forts, artifacts, or sites or maybe 9/9/2 depending on what the theme called for. Thoughts on these numbers?
And my list I am going to try to make packs for is as follows (16 different packs for evil and 16 different packs for good):
Blue (2) – Sons of Jacob & other Genesis
Clay (2) – Jerusalem & Missionary
Gold (2) – Israelite (pre-kings), Luke/John
Green (2) – N.T. Prophets, O.T. Prophets
Purple (2) – Disciples, Royalty
Red (2) – Centurions, Warriors
Silver (1) – Angels
Teal (1) – Priests
White (2) – Musicians, N.T. Women
Black (4) – Canaanites, Greeks, Philistines, Saducees
Brown (2) – Persians, Israelites/Judeans (Gates of Samaria)
Crimson (2) – Babylonians, Heretics
Gold (2) – Egyptians, Herods
Gray (3) – Pharisees, Romans, Syrians
Orange (1) – Demons
Pale Green (2) – Assyrians, Magicians
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I made a deck called lock and load. It is all theme decks. The concept is that I have a set of staple cards (lost souls, doms, sites, forts, arts.) I think that's about 20 cards then I made good and evil theme decks like judges, musicians, angels, romans, Egyptians and so on. Each are I believe 18 card decks. What this allows me to do is take any good brigade and any evil brigade and add the staples in and I have a 56 card deck.
Example:
Staple 20 cards that include(7 lost souls, 7 doms, then sites forts and arts.
Good decks 18 card decks (which include good characters, enhancements, sites, forts. What ever helps that theme)
Red warriors
musicians
angels
judges
Evil decks 18 card decks (which include evil characters, enhancements, sites, forts. What ever helps that theme.)
Egyptian
Roman
demon
Magicians
I can mix and match the good and evil decks Red warriors and Egyptians, judges and romans and so on.
It makes it easy to teach people. Sorry if this sounds weird. I can explain it better when I have had some sleep.
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No, that sounds completely coherent. I am shooting for this to be something in those lines as well.
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Well cool, if you want to know my builds or have questions just message me or i can post it here
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When I get to those themes if I get hung up I will shoot you a message. Thanks!
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I LOVE this idea. I wouldn't mind getting one based on Genesis heroes, as I don't have many in my collection yet.
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Are you leaving room for dominants anywhere?
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gimme some of em philistines please? lol
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I was considering doing a dominant pack or including them in the Lost Soul pack mentioned above.
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I was considering doing a dominant pack or including them in the Lost Soul pack mentioned above.
I like this idea in general.
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Alright...so the good side is complete and I ended up with only 12 themes that were stout enough to stand alone:
Blue (1) – Patriarchs
Clay (2) – Deacons & Missionaries
Gold (2) – Judges & Believers
Green (1) – Prophets
Purple (2) – Disciples & Royalty
Red (1) – Warriors
Silver (1) – Angels
Teal (1) – Priests
White (1) – Women
It is now time to turn to the dark side...err...I mean work on the evil packs. :angel:
Oh, I almost forgot. I decided to do a Souls & Doms Deck Builder which will include 7 souls and 7 doms which will give a person buying the three packs (good/evil/souls&doms) a 54 card deck that is legal and ready to be played in Type-1 right out of the box (probably you will want to put some sleeves on that deck before playing too).
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Nice, looking good. What kind of souls and doms will be in that deck builder?
Side note: Congrats on becoming a redemption elder on the boards!
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The Soul/Dom pack has evolved a bit from what I envisioned it to be, namely making it 16 cards to get the deck being build with Deck Builders up to 56 cards. There are four different packs to choose from which consists of:
-7 souls
-5 dominants (SoG, AotL, GoyS, Dest, CM)
-3 sites (two single color sites and one Dragon Raid)
-1 fortress (Wall of Protection)
When going through souls, there were quite a few that were dependent on sites to work that instead of limiting the number of different Soul/Dom packs I would have I chose to use the site friendly souls as well. That of course necessitated adding a couple single color sites. That of course necessitated adding an access site. The 5 Dominants I chose were mainly because those were the ones I have at least 84 of. Finally a Wall of Pro because who wants your opponent stealing your characters and attacking you with them? All in all I am very happy with how it turned out.
...now it's time to start working on the evil Deck Builders.
UPDATE: Finalized the evil Deck Builders packs. They will be as follows...
Black (2) – Greeks & Philistines
Brown (1) – Royalty
Crimson (2) – Babylonians & Unbelievers
Gold (2) – Egyptians & Herods
Gray (2) – Pharisees & Romans
Orange (1) – Demons
Pale Green (2) – Assyrians & Magicians
All that needs to be done now is to figure out what my final price for these will be and open it up for sale. Stay tuned!
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hey guys check them out!! they're online!! woooo!! http://www.threelionsgaming.com/#!deal-of-the-week/c1cfo (http://www.threelionsgaming.com/#!deal-of-the-week/c1cfo)
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These Deck-Builders sets are AWESOME! Thanks so much for putting these together, Travis! They're really fun, extremely helpful for new T1 and all T2 players, and a great deal too - a big discount from buying all the cards individually!
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which dragon raid is included in each of the souls/doms packs? is it the warriors or the promos?
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The Warriors Dragon Raid is included in the Soul&Dom Deck Builders. When the Promo version gets more readily available I would love to switch over.
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Can you specify which versions of the cards are in the packs? Thanks!
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I can just say that the newest version of the card is typically the version used.
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yeah these are amazingly priced!! put together for convenience and discounted = win win with three lions!!
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I can just say that the newest version of the card is typically the version used.
Okay, thanks.
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Is Goliath, the promo, or limited, I'm thinking it's limited.
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Good point...I should have said that we used the newest version unless the newest version is over $10. We tried to keep these reasonably priced so they would be accessible for everyone.
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Yeah, that's one of the reasons I asked. Some version are better that the other, or more pricey. I think it would be beneficial if you listed the version of the card.