M13 Bits and Pieces (2)

Once we've had a chance to playtest the commons with terrain/lair, we'll decide whether to move forward with it or not. When we do, we need to have more organized discussion about the archetypes and subthemes we want present and at what frequency.

Enemy Colors
It's great that terrain is focused on allied color pairs because that's an important lesson new players need to learn. We've had discussions about how to design so that players are encouraged to run two-color allied decks over three-color decks (without prohibiting the shard option), but we haven't talked much about enemy color pairs. This is usually an option and we need to consider it. Will those pairs simply have to do without terrain cards; look to splash the common ally (GwU); get their own terrain pairs at a higher rarity; or get no support at all?

Top-Down Design
Turns out it's really easy to design top-down cards in a vacuum but considerably trickier in the context of a set. We have a lot of very specific roles to fill (common white flier with first strike, for instance) and it's very easy to start designing bottom-up. There's nothing wrong with bottom-up design and there's always some in every set, but we need to maximize our flavor and resonance to keep up the same pace modern core sets have established. I'm as guilty of this as anyone, if not moreso. Where we're at now is fine but we need to hit this note harder before we're done.

Sub-Themes
When we discuss what subthemes we want to explore in and across each color, the biggest thing we need to check ourselves on is keeping them subtle. We can't go overboard on our themes our the core set will lose its universal appeal. It doesn't take many cards to establish a sub-theme and we're already pushing terrain pretty hard with 10 commons (compared with 5 scry cards across rarities in 2011 and 10 bloodthirst cards in 2012 total). For a prime example of a minimalist sub-theme, 2013 has a one-card griffin theme in Griffin Rider. (There are other griffins, but they would've been there anyhow; only card actually cares about griffins.)

It's great to have little linear hints like that throughout the set to give players a small push in one direction, but we don't want to spell things out or force hands and we do want the core set to feel open so that players are encourages to take many different types of cards.

Other Requirement for a Color
We created a (loose) skeleton for each color based on the last three years but that only covers one set of parameters we need to design to. We also need to make sure each of the major fantasy races gets significant shelf space and that a few of the slightly offbeat Magic races make a showing as well (but not too much). We need a range of bombs, good cards, playable cards, context-sensitive cards and terrible cards. We need a reasonable curve, making sure everything doesn't cost 3 or have WW in its mana cost. We need cards that fit various themes, we need cards that support different archetypes and we need cards that just stand on their own.

That's a lot to juggle. Gives you some perspective: When you see something that could've been done better in a real set, chances are good that change would've made two other things worse.

Comparison
As helpful as it's been to me to see my white commons in a deck and shuffle it up to see how some hands play out, it's not like that's a context anyone is terribly familiar with it. "That deck is looking good!" "Compared to what?" So I did the same thing for M12 and put together a deck with two of each white common to see how they look and play side by side. You can see for yourself: Here's my latest M13 white commons deck. Here's the M12 white commons deck. (These links take you to the main Wizard's Familiar page. Click the 'Enter' button to see the deck).

A few things I notice. My deck is too good. That is, the power level of my cards seems a bit higher overall than in the real deck. There are a lot of close analogues—not an accident—like Stormfront Pegasus and Leonin Skyhunter, but there are some significant differences too: Gideon's Lawkeeper is much better for a defensive control strategy where Sunblessed Tactician can only shine in an aggro/tempo strategy. My deck has more Power than the other (25 vs 20 "off" and 26 vs 23 "on"). I don't know if it's too much, but it's definitely something to watch out for. My pile seems to have fewer bad or conditional cards; that's an issue.

Do you detect any other interesting differences?

Terrain's Name and the Set's Subtitle
Chah suggested in yesterday's thread [Land] Turf and [Land] Lair. I'm pretty fond of both of those, leaning a bit toward 'lair' on account of the awesomeness of "Swamp Lair," "Mountain Lair" (and despite the lameness of "Plains Lair.") That also sets us up to use 'lair' in our set's subtitle, which just can't be wrong. Hoping for more feedback and suggestions before I make something official.

Random Thoughts We Needn't Worry About... Yet
The Core Set has become the place to release updates to the rules, new terminology and evergreen keywords. There's very much no need for this, but it is an option to consider. At the top of my list would be ditching the spell fizzle rule and re-working regeneration. That said, we're probably best off doing nothing like this since it's not something we can really announce and propagate.

Wouldn't it be cool if one could draft the core set in combination with the set before it, the set after it or both? That may not be possible to accomplish in a satisfactory way and if it is, it wouldn't be easy. But wouldn't it be cool? Not in place of triple-core draft, but as another option. Just sayin'.