If you end up restricting decks to just one type of nexus energy, everyone's either going to be fielding Master Ravenwood or Eternal Flame decks. Nothing else in the metagame can compare.

"Alliances". One main nexus, limiting the alliances according to enmities. Any nexus beyond your main gains power/energy at a delayed rate, and certain cards can't be used.

Maybe make the objective destroying constructs, similar to old weakenings.

If we go for power as a health counter, it won't be neccessary to have creatures on the field at all times. Just like battles in Lusternia, it'll be group against group. And just like in Lusternia, you may end up going to battle against the opponent without them fielding any defenders.

That doesn't mean that we can't field creatures that are expected to die immediately. We can have creatures that are supposed to bash a bit back and forth. Warriors can have high endurance and low attack power, and monks vice versa as an example.


That is a good idea. Honestly, I'm not too fond of the essence idea, but I think rainbow decks should theoretically be possible somehow.


This, too, is a good idea, but it still does hamper the "rainbow deck" as you'd still only have a limited amount of colours. But perhaps using this as a base, with Xenthos idea of co-op between two nexii, or acquiring a secondary nexus somehow to supplement. Malarious's idea of artifacts (assuming by "artifact" he means artifacts from M:tG as colourless "everyone can field them" cards, rather than "pay way too many credits to acquire this card") that can change your power setup, such as "Miakoda's Natural Mirror" allowing you to change energy into nature energy.

there should be cards called 'guildhop' and 'orghop' somehow

Yes as in MtG artys.

But should each org be "specialized" to a deck type? Lets say Mag is the big brute, Seren is the zerg, yada yada, or should all cities have their own versions?

How big do you want the initial launch to be? Thats the real question

While it would certainly be interesting to have each colour be better than the others at something in particular, I'm not sure if it is wise to place too heavy an emphasis on that in the beginning. If we do make it as such though, we should take a look at the orgs as they are and be inspired by them. Hallifax, for example, should specialize in defensive/healing effects. We should probably decide on what the colours should be, especially those in a potential launch before we decide what each colour should spec in anyway.

As for the size of the launch... big enough that you can buy a starter pack for each colour and begin playing, and still big enough that you'll want to buy several booster packs for building up your deck. Around 20 cards for each colour, depending on how many colours there are and how many colours you are expected to have in a deck? Many basic cards can be made by making "magnagoran loboshigaru" and "celestian loboshigaru" cards.

Malarious:


I think this idea is at least as old as the (now gone) topic on a lusternia rpg.

I'm still workin' on that! University is eating up alot of time, alongside other projects.

Well, after reading this topic I haven't been able to stop thinking about how to run a Lusternia TCG. I came up with a quick model of how I envision one. I'm going to start working on the basic Denizen cards as soon as I have time.

This one represents full Org v Org warfare and the conquest of one Org by another. It will play as a combination strategy/card game. Please take a look and let me know what you think.

The idea of the Aligned/Unaligned power is to force a level of specialization, since you are playing a single Org, but still allow room for allies of different colors.

Some basic ideas:
Warriors are built around using what amounts to Instakills; allowing them to destroy Denizens and Heroes who have sufficient Affliction Counters. This makes them the only basic Denizen that can slay Heroes, as well as makes them tank busters.

Mages/Druids are made for Arena Control. They all count double for purposes of determining control, and give you bonuses when you do control a territory.

Bards are offensive support and crowd control. They are the only basic Denizen that can AOE, and they are skilled at putting the opponent's Denizens/Heroes out of commission.

Guardians/Wiccans are defensive support. They have the unique ability to teleport your Denizens/Heroes to any Arena that you control, bypassing normal Arena relationships.

Monks are anti-Denizen cards. They can stack Affliction counters on cards very quickly, but have no kill method for Heroes.

All of these basic types have a different card per org and per tertiary, with the exact array of abilities varying somewhat.

That seems pretty similar to the setup I've been toying with on my own, instead that except of arenas to control, I used attack gates for close-combat, ranged-combat and aerial combat.

For Eth Seren/Glom, how about Hart's Monolith and Crow's Nest? Moon and Night are already represented in their own Upper Plane, so we could hand some glory to the other great spirits. I obviously also want an Ackleberry commune, but that can be added later.

As for themes, I'm thinking that Celest should be healing. Sure it overlaps a bit with defense/buffing, but primarily damage control, which reflects well on what they're trying to do in Lusternia itself, and in all the ways of healing that exist in Sacraments. Magnagora should certainly be offensive-minded. Lowering the amount of afflictions an opponent card can give, or increasing the amount of afflictions they receive.

For Gaudiguch, part of me wants a bit more erratic playstyle, with lots of cards that require a coinflip. I'm not too fond of a luck element, but it just feels appropriate. Preventing fielding of cards though, or making them be played on a different arena than you intended are good types of Gaudiguch cards. Hallifax should be defensive. They'll have a hard time invading a different plane, but it'll be hard to invade them.

Horde is always fun to play with. I sort of want to give that to Serenwilde, "Aid shall come from even the smallest" and all that. But at the same time, Speed doesn't "feel" right for Glomdoring. How about obfuscation of some sort? Cards that allow you to play other cards face down? That may be too much to begin with though, and there probably should be a Speed faction, and if not Jojobo, it may as well be Glomdoring,

I would say that Glomdoring is more the Swarm feel, actually, as Forests go.

Well, I've nothing against Glomdoring being the Swarm faction. But then where does that leave Serenwilde? Perhaps as a "jack of all trades" type faction?

I'm against a Jack-of-all-Trades faction. I like Obfuscation for Glom, but don't feel that it's enough to base a faction around. I may do some combination Swarm/Obfuscation for it. I really am not sure about Serenwilde, as their mechanics don't feel like they have a theme in game...

If I don't end up making Hallifax the Buildup faction (they get more powerful the longer they are in play), then I may make them defensive, but honestly Celeste is planned to be more damage control/defense as on now.

I like the Ethereal Seren/Glom names. I'm going to go with them.

There is a ton of healing in Celestian guilds is why I feel they're better off a healing flavour of defensive than a sheer "avoid damage" type of defensive. Unlike Aeonics which points and laughs at your feeble attempt at giving afflictions.

I still don't like Serenwilde as a Speed faction. I want that for Jojobo eventually... how about making them a Brute Force faction? Where Magnagora does things like lower constitution and toss out a lot of stun, Serenwilde can bring a big hammer, and if that doesn't work, bring bigger hammers. So they're very apt at dishing out damage, but have fewer options against enemies who can take the punishment.

That probably works.

Another though: Names for Hallifax/Gaudiguch Bards/Monks, pending actual release names. Releasing Halli/Gaudi without Bards or Monks would throw off game balance.

I'm not sure how important it is to have them correctly, as guessing what their eventual names will be is gonna be a waste of time and energy, so after a bit of word-salad- making.

Hallibards: Skysingers
Gaudibards: Streetperformers

Gaudimonks: Noratapo
Hallimonks: Shenyu

Because why not?

As good a guess as mine.

Also: Org Mages/Druids are done.

Lacking a guild should not unbalance anything, if it does your design is flawed. Its bad form to require every guild be present in every deck, if I omit monks I should be fine, thus Gaudi and Halli should have no faults, they will just have less variation.

I do not agree with the direction of the game, but it aint my design so its not my call.

P.S. Druid and Shadow Druid? Come on... they have names and those names are a ton better than "druid"

Cool. Mind if I take a stab at making Guardians/Wicca?

Also, think about including race into the equation as well. "Merian Telepath Aquamancer" suddenly opens up the option for making a "Mugwump Telepath Aquamancer" down the road.

Or have race be a modifier; by default it is the specialization race of the org with those stats, but you can use the race change card to modify the stats and abilities! (Reincarnation)

Blacktalon and Hartstone? Those don't really work as title nouns any more than Institute does.
You don't HAVE to have Monks or Bards, but all of the guild fill their own role, just as they do in game, and having less guilds does limit their options.
What don't you like about it? The style IS very different from Yu-gi-oh or MtG; it's closer to Legend of the Five Rings than anything, with a bit of Magi-Nation thrown in. It's a MUCH slower game, that requires longer term strategy, rather than a single instant win combo.
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Feel free; the only ability that I want them to all have for sure is the Active Ability to move a target friendly Denizen/Hero to any other controlled Arena, ignoring normal Arena movement, with Astrologers being able to teleport friendlies to Astral as well.

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I'm not sure if I want to do races.... my projection for a minimum initial release based on my rough plans is about 300-350 cards. Perhaps race is possible, but it seems to open up WAY to many options, at least for now. (Hell, there are already 125 Denizen cards alone! And there are five card types.)



Also: Themes have been finalized:
Celeste: Healing/Buffing
Magnagora: Damage/Debuffing
Hallifax: Defense
Gaudiguch: Disruption
Serenwilde: Disabling
Glomdoring: Instakills/Card Destruction (like Black in MtG)