You Make the Set 5

[Thomas David Baker]

We are doing this in our Multiverse app:

http://mv.bluebones.net/

(Old shared Google spreadsheet for this is here:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0Ag7TtjWsLhYkdHBBUHF4RG... )

Channel Fireball just did Top 8 Mechanics:

* Retrace

* Dredge

* Landfall (not for attacking like Steppe Lynx - Grazing Gladehart and Roil Elemental style)

* Scry

* Flashback

* Kicker

* Flying

* Cycling

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SiNNg5aj-xo

I wonder if we could use that, or some of that, as the basis of You Make the Set 5.  I know that some of you were keen on Landfall.

Not sure when we would play it out but some time in late May probably?

[Kieran Symington]

He's really cool, but I guess he is a bit awkward to play against. If we lose him and the Soul Lord we'd have our four rares left!

[Simon O'Keeffe]

Blue

Uncommon - I'd be happy to lose Inspirationist here. As much as Spellslinging Augur is kind of average in blue decks, he is great in other colours, and doesn't have flying, which is rare for our U creatures!

Black

Uncommon - Cut Subversion Priest and ? Even worse problem here than White with almost everything being creatures, although I guess Ghastcaller is kind of a spell, but Vituperation is kind of a creature!

Rare - Vile Mimic could go, doesn't have any real synergy in the set, and isn't even that powerful for a rare

Red

Common - I retired Saboteur. I guess the red Cyclops could go, but he is a good link for the R/G aggro deck. Other options would be the Ritual or one of the aggro spells (Anxiety/Double)

Uncommon - Bleurgh, my six: EMPTY THE LIBRARIES, GOBLIN ARCHER, MIND BROKEN MAGE, BURN THE LIBRARIES, LOOTER ELDER, RANSACK THE SHELVES

Rare - I vote to cut Burn the Incumbent too

[Kieran Symington]

I guess if we go up to one more uncommon for each colour we won't have so many problems (except deciding on which colourless uncommon to keep!). Perhaps Relic and Candle could share the one slot (one of each) or even move one up to rare since they're more useful than most of the rares!

[Simon O'Keeffe]

Apart from Soulstoke Engine all our rare colourless cards are a bit average. Maybe take the mana cost of the sac to draw off Candle and put it at rare? Or make its casting cost 1?

Mana fixing seems more important to have at uncommon.

Kieran Symington said:

I guess if we go up to one more uncommon for each colour we won't have so many problems (except deciding on which colourless uncommon to keep!). Perhaps Relic and Candle could share the one slot (one of each) or even move one up to rare since they're more useful than most of the rares!

[Simon O'Keeffe]

Green

Uncommons - So many 3 drops. Some of them are going to have to go or be altered to fit different casting costs. Unfortunately these are mostly the best ones! Cards I definitely think have a place: NATURAL INSTINCT, CENTAUR NULLIFIER.

After that I think arguments can be made for most. Having a foresight permanent seems required, and I think we might have enough anti-flying at common to drop Funnel Web Spider. This means we would want portent on another green uncommon, perhaps Bearback Rider (having one flash Portent card in the set would be cool)

[Kieran Symington]

Agree with moving the Candle to rare and cutting both mana costs by 1. It makes it by miles the best Portent enabler, which is totally fine at rare.

Might need to cut some 3-drops or change their mana costs. I guess the spider could easily go and Rider could gain Portent. The Nullifier could change a bit as well.

[Simon O'Keeffe]

Okay so I had plenty of time on Saturday night while watching Murray v Bagdhatis, so I transcribed pretty much all of our set into MSE. Then I went on a hunt for images. I probably have around 60% done. Cyclope Archers do not exist! Depending on how collaborative we want the art design to be too, I can either put the current file somewhere for others to download, or I can continue on to try and hit 100% art coverage. I'm happy either way.

Hopefully we can get the final slots decided this week, and finish the art shortly after, then we will be ready to announce our pre-release.

[Paul Hodgson]

What's the plan for building boosters & drafting? Are we just having 1 of each card, or are we doing proper print runs, collation etc?

[Kieran Symington]

Happy to let Simon do all the art - it leaves something to be a surprise for me at the pre-release.

The final card distributions will include multiples of the uncommons and rares. I guess for the first one it would be nice to make them 'proper' boosters with the right distributions even though it won't be possible in the future.

For the final cuts, we could just all go in and like/dislike the cards that need deciding on. The cards with the most likes (less dislikes) go through!

[Paul Hodgson]

I wonder if we could print off cards in boosters and number them so that we can put the boosters back together again? Bit like the stamps that they put on cards at high REL drafts?

[Kieran Symington]

But then you'd always get the same card distributions! Would be just as easy to split them up by rarity I'd have thought - it's just kind of a hassle to do it once they're all mixed up!

[Paul Hodgson]

you could mix & match common & uncommon blocks of cards - for example, all C1 & U1 in first draft, then C1 & U2 in second?

Main point is that in normal sets the distribution isn't random, as that makes drafts wonky - although I guess we'll always have a set pool of cards to draft from?