Aloyzo's Arsenal Discussion Thread

I think that while faithfulness to the 'feeling' of 'classics' is a big part of Card Hunter's aesthetic, it's not the only factor in its design. After all, Chainmail didn't have move cards or orc assassins in suits with briefcases.

Wizards are unlikely to get any major class-specific damage reduction or healing because one of the key tensions in Card Hunter is figuring out what combination of classes to bring to a fight. Priests already get tremendous amounts of healing and some of the best damage reduction in the game. Warriors get good damage reduction as well (but fewer ways to share it with others). There are a few class-independent toys that provide both (the healing cards mentioned above, as well as cards like Forcefield). If we gave every class similar amounts of every tool, there'd be no gameplay-based reason to use one over the other. That could be ok in some games, but Card Hunter's deckbuilding mechanics—as well as its encounter design—are based on the idea that you have to make some decisions about which tools you want in your toolkit.

Of course, we could give wizards one staff with 1x greater heal and it wouldn't completely upend the game. So surely we could give them a heal card here or there, or a mana shield card here or there (though again there's no gameplay concept of mana in this game so the top-down design might be a bit tricky there). But I don't think it would add much to the gameplay. Requiring priests for good healing is a fun and interesting part of Card Hunter in my opinion.

There's a lot of stuff we could add to the game just to have it in the game. We only have 3 races, after all—you could make the argument that because early D&D had more than 3 races, we should have more than 3 as well. A common request that we're unlikely to do is archers. How are archers different, gameplay wise, from lightning wizards in our game? Two somewhat easy tests exist for whether or not an idea is a good addition to Card Hunter:

1. is it distinct from what's already in Card Hunter
2. does it avoid muddying the existing class/race/slot distinctions that make deckbuilding interesting/challenging

Not everything that we add to the game is a perfect 100% on both counts, but that's a basic rubric, and it serves us pretty well.

 

I agree with Flax. In light of this discussion I've returned to my Berserker, Ranger, Rogue deck. These ideas don't need to be added to cardhunter, they're already in cardhunter.
The Berserker is just a dwarf warrior with all the frenzy I can put on him. The Ranger is merely a priest with Unholy Wellspring to boost the damage of his ranged spells, including but not limited to: Radiation Bomb, Destructive Purge, Misguided Heal, Entangling Roots, and Open Wound. The rogue is an elf priest with two Sneaky Bloodsuck cards on him and elvish trickery.
We already have so much capability within the game. Toughened Hide Strips is yet another way for wizards to heal.
If you have card ideas for a wizard to heal, by all means submit them on the card ideas thread or wait until the next time Flax does an Aloyzo's Arsenal as he just did. We appreciate your input.

 

For what it's worth, my reply was meant to be helpful. "Here's how to put some healing on your wizard" (and in fact you can get Investigate on three different Robes for squishier wizards, contrasted with zero on Heavy Armors and Divine Armors -- therefore, there is something to say about that orange card and wizards).

I just hit Like on those posts responding re: mana because Card Hunter has no real concept of it. I don't know if you've ever looked through the developer's notes when this game was still being created, but even Magic: The Gathering people were consulted; whereas in many magical combat games (including M:TG), you need Magic Points (or "mana" as I saw it getting called years later) as a resource to execute powers big and small, Card Hunter relies only on cards as the resource to execute -- limited otherwise by power tokens via items.

I'm trying to recall if I've ever played or seen a game where your non-clerical magic-using class heals life via magic absorption. I mean, EarthBound has PSI Magnet which absorbs PSI Points from enemies to claim as your own PSI (and the derivative Super Smash Bros. uses PK Magnet to absorb energy attacks from enemies to claim as your own health percentage), but otherwise...

Yeah, I only recall games where wizards/mages/sorcererers/psychickids/Hylians/etc. have separate health and magic meters, and sometimes magic can be used to restore health (Zelda II, Final Fantasy if you want to pretend white mages aren't cleric classes ha ha ha, I guess Skyrim that I've watched my sister play some although its whole point seems to be that you can homebrew your "class" however you like,) but "usually" and "wizards recover hitpoints from damage they deal" are completely foreign next to each other in my experience.

I've never heard of vampirism nor lycanthropy being associated with a wizard's spell set (unless maybe the Harry Potter series counts? ~shrug~). I'd say CH totally got priests right for being able to choose to go holy or unholy (despite how easily you can mix the two without in-game divine repercussions, but whatever) -- and for an unholy priest to be associated with vampirism? $:^ ] Beautiful.

I can't say I speak for everyone, but I hope I've shed some light. I don't know what fictional universe wizards are "usually" associated with things you mentioned in this and other posts, but I've never even heard of it as a convention, let alone something that would translate to CH well (other than mmayybe throwing an Absorbing Block on a staff or arcane skill -- or of course "crafting" a new card (see! I'm learning some about newer RPGs!) from Shimmering Aura and Holy Armor/Sacred Shroud). Oh, and fwiw, of the various pen-and-paper RPGs I've played, D&D oddly isn't one of them -- and nonetheless, I'm really hard pressed to call its latest, modern version "classic." $;^ J (I did play a couple AD&D games on DOS, though, heheheh. Many years later, I even got to try them again with color -- and VGA at that! That was so awesome!)

Thank you for this thinking (and nostalgia!) exercise if nothing else. $:^ ] And suddenly, it hits me, this probably should've been its own thread in the Feedback and Suggestions subforum. Any moderator care to move the last several posts? $:^ }

Now! Back to our regularly scheduled wait for Aloyzo to decide what insanity he'll craft this month!​

 

Hey folks, sorry for the long silence. This contest really was a lot more work than previous iterations, which I hope is okay because I expressed before and during that it would be more convoluted & that I would need more time. Simultaneously, @CT5 and I are doubling down on our work on our new digital CCG, which has a public beta launching A WEEK FROM TODAY. We're super excited (&stressed!) about it.

In the meantime, I've got a shortlist of about 3-4 cards I am considering adding to the game based on the strength of design and also testing. Unfortunately there were a lot of entries that had cool ideas but didn't make it past the contest's first clarification (that we're not coding new card components). I realize this can be a big bummer — CH isn't as modular as some of you hoped based on your entries — and that's part of why this was an experiment. That said, there are some really cool and workable cards, and one in particular that I am leaning toward that isn't immensely flashy but IS super solid & smartly designed.

I will try to hurry up a bit on the itemization and hopefully we can release it soon.

No doubt some of you are bummed that we didn't have a Halloween AA this year, as that's typically the most fun expression of the contest. I'll try to make up for it in the December contest.

 

Yes, it's completely understandable, considering it's new cards, and not just items. Heck, technically, if one AA item takes a month, then even 3 spawned from a new card could take 3 months. I mean, that's not really applicable, but it still means the work is more than doubled.

Looking forward to it, in patience.

 

Yes, the delay is more than understandable.
Don't worry Flax; I don't think there are people upset about that.

 

Not too worried but I wanted to give an update & communicate better Thanks for the understanding, folks, more soon™!

 

The real question for Flax...

You thought this would be a less-intensive way to go about introducing a new card than your first experiment (community voting and discussion). Do you believe this was indeed easier, or did you oopsie? Lol.

 

Where do we find out more info about this game? I'm assuming it's not Void Bastards...

 

https://forums.cardhunter.com/threads/flax-ct5s-new-ccg-blindoak-prow-is-in-public-beta.11993/

 

We can help about it.

 

How about another Aloyzo's contest for itemizing one of the shortlisted cards?

 

That's a great idea that I should have had a month ago. At this point I have some items already and will be committing everything in a matter of days. Sorry I've been so slammed, folks.

 

So....no contest?

 

No, I'll be opening a contest in early December. Stay tuned

 

Which year?

 

Relax, Flaxative has 2 more days to keep his word. A very long time, actually.

 

Sorry guys, I was trying to get AA 26 wrapped up first but we hit a hitch. Trying to resolve that ASAP but I'm going to open AA 27 contest in the meantime since the clock's ticking