Flight Cancelled... or at the very least delayed...

Someone gave me the moniker "Mr. MND" a while back. Heh, I wish that was true, but it's not... not really anyways. I'm just the most public face for anything MND related, well, online anyways. Some days if I wonder if that's a good thing.

Perhaps you've noticed that I've put Exodus Flight on a permanent hiatus, and have iced everything else after that. Perhaps not. Not a lot of people would care anyways... and not a lot of people know what Exodus Flight is anyways. I have mentioned what it is many times elsewhere, so I won't repeat it here again. Suffice to say, this is just a quick explaination as to why I have decided to do this and I'll lay it down in a simple numbered format.

1) I'm running out of artwork. Not many people realise it, but I have had to beg and plead and borrow most of the artwork for the custom cards, and where there is none, I had to create my own for them. That takes time and energy and I'm beginning to wonder if my time and energy would be better spent elsewhere.

2) I'm losing interest in the game. It's a bit ironic that the custom cards and the online tournaments that's suppose to kindle interest for everyone else is making me lose interest in the game. There is just no surprise for me anymore. I'm don't look forward to any custom card because by the time they are playable, I would probably have spent more time than everyone else combined on those cards. Likewise, since I'm organising the online tournaments, I can't join in the fun. So I lose out on both counts.

3) Time is precious. Perhaps my time can be spent elsewhere doing things I want instead of trying to keep everyone else happy.

4) The game is dead... and interest is waning despite (or because?) of my involvement in trying to keep the game alive. The number of online monthly tournament games for instance has declined from over 30 at the height of things just a few months ago to less than 10 recently.

5) The game may be revived in a few months time... which would probably make all the custom cards irrelevant... or worse, they could send a not so polite letter requesting the shut down of all custom cards. Either way, the custom cards would be as good as gone.

I'm tired, and perhaps a little bit of the game as well. Several incidents recently about the custom cards have been disheartening. Also, I've also put up with almost 2 years of negative comments regarding the custom cards - I think there comes a point when I don't think I want to take anymore of it just to make my life easier (and that would be bad for the custom cards since constructive negative critique is often the best form of help for the custom cards). The negative reactions and the lack of positive encouragement indicates to me that I should probably do something I would like to do for a change.

And as to the future of MND? Well, as I said a few years ago... the game is still there, there's still a whole library of cards, both custom and official. As long as someone plays it, it will still be kept alive, if only just. Then there's always the hope that the new animated series will rocket the game into popularity once more.

Tall Grasses Covered In Mud

It looks like I played games with most of the active players in this month's tournament so far. There is one game that I know of which has not been posted to the tournament results up to this point. So, not counting that game, it was interesting to note that a majority of the players shared the same number of points for their games played. This means that they've all lost two games and won one each. This quickly told me that there is a little circle of wins and losses to go around. For me, I don't know quite why, that is exciting.

Well, last night, CapAp was online at the same time I was. I was just browsing the results of the tournament so far to see who had played or not and how their games had gone. As I think about it, I guess part of why I found the roundabout of wins and losses interesting is because it meant that all my opponents' had at least one win and that excited me. Strange? Maybe. I don't think there's anything wrong with getting excited over their victories.

Anyways, back onto the subject of CapAp and I being online at the same time. CapAp and I played a game. It seems that CapAp might like the honor of designing Weave for Twilight War and was practicing with the region so that they might prove to Novelty a worthiness to do the job. I won't deny that I was tempted for a moment to run one of my own Weave decks. Weave is a region I had trouble playing at first and vexed me so, although I was good enough at other regions to defeat most of my Weave opponents. Strange, now that I think about it, I spent so much effort into learning to play some form of Weave that I sort of missed Kybar's Teeth which was released in the same expansion.

Okay. I am getting off the subject again.

Well, CapAp and I played a game. CapAp went with Weave, of course. They went first with Keru. A very promising Weave magi from Traitor's Reach and part of why I hope that perhaps the game might actually make that rumored rebirth. Keru started drawing cards and dumping Junjertrugs into the discard pile. I had chosen to go with Bograth, not my Grahnna-Pyder deck but one I have had on gatlingEngine for a little while. Eryss got lucky with another of my Fog Hyren in the opening hand. I skipped playing out the N'kala and played the Poison Baloo Root, both Fog Hyren, and Gremble. That was a massive turn of card draw. I would've loved to had Eryss go down in defeat right then. CapAp would end up taking out the Poison Baloo Root, a good choice, and using Weave Powder to get Gia's Tome. On my second turn, I drew more cards and attacked to better setup Eryss to go away. With a third Fog Hyren in hand so early into the game, I went ahead and drew some more. CapAp would end up taking out Eryss after a few turns. This was good for me. By this time, I had a hand full of cards, including Deadwood Staff and two Swamp Hyren. This was a perfect setup going into Olabra. We are talking massive swarm in one turn. Crushing Stench took out the Drowl that had been beating my stuff up and placed the first Swamp Hyren. From there, I played creature after creature until I had eight Bograth creatures in play and used the Deadwood Staff to play the second Swamp Hyren for free. With two N'kalas and a Ruid in play, Olabra would see some impressive energy gains as well. CapAp crushed the Jile and I almost forgot Olabra's own effect. I use her mostly for starting energy and those two key starting cards (Jile and Moss Pendant). After they had drawn two cards, they confessed that they forgot to play Rayje's Belt and lock down the Moss Pendant. I had Vard Stampede in hand, so it really didn't matter though I didn't say so. A better choice would've been Vitalize off of the Jile, but they never did play that belt before the game ended. I guess they continued to forget. Olabra would steam right over Keru once it came back to me. M'lady Iyori used her power and played out all her energy in creatures, including two Baby Furoks. Olabra would steam right over this as well. CapAp played Spirit of the Weave. I responded jokingly that it was a mean thing to do, to prevent me from attacking. The reply was appropriate about how it wasn't mean after what I had just done. I had to laugh. Good humor makes for a good game. CapAp would reveal Marella Savant as the last magi. With a good number of Junjertrug in play and no ability to attack them first, I chose to spend the twenty energy Olabra had at this point (Ruid and two N'kala can add up quickly on top of her energize). Olabra would toss out two more Jile, another Ruid, a Muck Vinoc, and a few other creatures. A Moss Pendant and Muck Vinoc later, at least one Junjertrug went away. With The Hunt, Marella would take out six Bograth creatures with her attacking Junjertrugs. CapAp then stated that it looked like they would lose. I agreed. I had a number of creatures survive too, most of them good sized and probably representing an excess of thirty energy. It was a good game and not because I won, but because CapAp was a great sportsman.

Frigid Clash

If my game yesterday with godofchaos was good, then perhaps my game today with freigabe was even better. If nothing else, it was a little bit faster.

This time, I actually went first. Getting both an Ice Lens and Yaromant in those random five cards seemed like mana from heaven. That is, until freigabe flipped over Fray who started with a Yaromant. They even got an extra one in the starting hand. Two to one Yaromant didn't seem like good odds, and it showed. Balachron didn't last long against Fray. Shattershards was key to keeping Fray from netting a bunch of cards as well with a copy of Ice Lens. So, I enjoyed my card draw while I could. Odavast would then try and battle for all he was worth against Fray. Having my second Ice Lens in hand would help immensely. I am not sure he could've pulled things around without it. By the time he finally he got past Fray with his pesky, partially invulnerable creatures, I was feeling good about things. I had a small swarm going with an Ice Arboll used to make it a little better. To my surprise, freigabe flipped over Odavast as their second magi as well. Ouch! That wasn't even the really sweet part of the deal. They had several creature and an Ice Arboll as well. Their Zyavu was quite large from Ice Arboll and the Mombak, so I would use the Aegris I had in play to get that while Thin Ice and an attack by my own Zyavu in play would take the Mombak. The third creature I had before had been eliminated already by freigabe on the turn they flipped over their Odavast. Two Odavast. Both wanting to keep things frozen to toughen the battle. Oh what a thrill! I was loving it so much that I forgot to pay attention to many details at that point. It was a very good game. A very good battle. In the end, the Odavast I controlled managed to sweep past Odavast. The turn before he got the other Odavast, I managed to pull off another Ice Arboll. After defeating Odavast, I tossed down a couple more creatures, including another Aegris. Freigabe flipped over Laranel and then declared “gg.” And, a very good game it was. My heart is still racing as I write this from the shear excitement. These are the sort of games that can give me a thrill.

It must be the sort of rush that has inspired me finally to “import” my Cald deck from the Orothe Season of the Magi-Nation League. That Cald deck scared me just to play it, since nearly creatureless is not my style. Currently, only readers of this blog will even know I have such a deck. I am not even sure when I will get the courage to play that deck once again.

Icicles Collide

Saturday night I managed to get in another tournament game. I think I was online originally to take more notes for writing that Naroom 101 I have started despite my personal fears. By the time the game was done, I had long forgotten why I was online in the first place.

I wish I could convey to you how intense the game was.

Godofchaos started with Halsted. With Crystallize in hand, this would prove a powerful start against my deck which is built with much attacking in mind. Halsted would tear into Balachron. Then it was Odavast who would feel the constant pressure. With Tomorrow's Jewel in play, godofchaos was tearing through their deck for just the right cards. I would end being very grateful for the Furok Protectors when they showed up. With Halsted's high energize rate, that extra energy would be very helpful. Godofchaos was running a solid number of creatures as well. Keeping my creatures as frozen as possible would be very important. Turn after turn that Halsted should've been able to beat Odavast, he would still be standing because of it. My wife looked over my shoulder in the middle of the game and I told her that I was getting thrashed good. Ice Lens would be my friend. Despite Halsted's penalty, I still used my Warrior's Boots and Ice Lens, the only relics in my deck. So, although I didn't have Tomorrow's Jewel sifting through my cards, a nice Ice Lens allowed to build some hand advantage. This would help me take advantage of Odavast's effect, even allowing me to refreeze things with Whiteout when all my arctic creatures had been eliminated already. By the time Odavast escaped the threat Halsted held over him, he was beginning to gain some steam. Laranel would face him next. While her Furok Protector was healthy thanks to Odavast's energize of seven, Odavast pushed the initiative he had gained. Instead paying penalties to her effects, I had Warriors Boots to push the offensive even more. By the time Laranel went, Velouria wasn't much of an issue. Although Odavast never gave Velouria a good chance to use her power, he also rarely had any energy left on him at this point. While in the end I managed to win, it was a very good game. In the mid-game, if you had asked me who was winning, I would've told you godofchaos. They did say after it was done that Odavast's effect was what made things so tough for them. While I was trying to optimize his effect on the offensive, it also provided a great defense that kept me going when godofchaos wanted to finish Odavast's creatures off.

Novelty's MND Custom Expansions... the design philosophy behind the cards

It's coming up to the 2nd anniversary of the day when I decided "Hey, let's make a custom card expansion for MND". Well, custom cards were nothing new for the game, people have been making them since the beginning of the game... but an entire expansion... complete with art... now that was definately something new... at least for MND.

After all, I had known and even worked with some of the following people who have made custom cards for other games. Some of these include

• Bruce Mason, one of the designers for Precedence's Babylon 5 prior to the demise of Precedence. After Precedence went under, Bruce continued to create custom expansions based on the ideas in progress from his work for Precedence. He has since then made the fan made sets Anla'shok and The Vorlons with some help from the online community and a third expansion - The Dying Races - being in the works.
• Jsson Roosevelt, together with his childhood friend Shane Saunders, created a whole universe of cards for Wildstorms. A few of my card ideas was transformed into custom cards for that game.
• Tomi Nieminen, part of Doomtrooper Finland, who have created and are still creating custom expansions for Doomtrooper. Some of their custom cards are hosted on the official site of the creator of the game.
• HC O'Neill, one of the troika of people who rules on Rage. They are currently working on their fourth custom expansion.
  

I remember those perilous days in the beginning with the flame wars over at Insiider and half of almost everyone claiming their right to free speech by denouncing the expansion, while the other half was zealously backing the concept of custom cards, if not the expansion then in progress. Those days are long gone of course. The game is dead... well, almost dead... there are still pockets of survivors who play regularly offline (and I've got to give a shout to Dave and his Springfield players) and online (especially those European players who could never find anyone to play except online).

Before I ramble on about multitudes of unconnected things, I best get to the point of this article/post/blog/whatever - what are the major guidelines and design philosophy behind the custom expansions. To make it easy on the memory, I've decided to keep it to three items and that they'll all start with the letter P (so pardon me for the horrible shoehorning).

1. Power Escalation Potential
Power Escalation is always a problem in a CCG where cards do not rotate out, or otherwise retired. Cards in an expansion has to be incrementally more powerful (read attractive) so that players will use them. Over time, the increment in power levels with each new expansion adds up until such a time when the first few expansions become underused because they are too weak. This issue was one faced by Mike Liesik, the last designer at Interactive Imaginations for the game, and was already evident after the release of Voice of the Storms.

Hence the custom cards that I with the help of the gEngine faithful are making are governed by the rule that the power escalation cannot be too much more than what already is available in the game, although there are some exceptions¹. I have been disparaged for making cards less powerful during playtesting of each expansion, and that's because of the wish to not increase the power levels too much. Also, a power card can make the design of future cards even more difficult. The existance of the creature cards Mist Hyren and Cawh, for example forced the text of Wawek's card to ensure that those creatures cannot be abused with Scyalla. The Core spell Entomb, as another example, forces each custom spell created to be checked that it is not broken when used with a Core magi.

What are the alternatives to power escalation? How can we make new cards, keep the power level about constant, yet make the cards attractive to the players to want to use them? The solution has been to move "sideways" instead of "up and up".

There are many themes, concepts and gameplay mechanics that have not been explored and instead of making existing themes and decktypes more powerful, the custom expansions that we have been working on tries to explore those other concepts. How can we increase the usefulness of Perpetual Motion... or Jungle Stalkers... or Shifty... or Arctic? Design of useful cards for these little used mechanics is one of the ways of going "sideways".

The other way of going "sideways" for MND in particular is to focus on the creature themes. For example, the Forest theme was introduced to Naroom with the first custom expansion, and in the design of the latest expansion, I had to remind the card designer to design the card for that decktype. Likewise, creature types such as Korrits, Kintors and Stuff has been expanded and reinfoced. Every custom expansion also has a Xyx creature, following the precedence set by the official expansions.

2. Player Interest

I work on the principle that if at least one card in an expansion catches the eye of a player such that they go "That is a great card!" than I would call the expansion a success. There are many different types of players out there and there is no way an expansion can please every player with every custom card created. Each player would have their individual likes and dislikes and each expansion seeks to have at least one card designed for that (type of) player in the expansion.

Someone recently posted (and I paraphrase) "I like cards 1, 3, 4 and 6, don't like 2 and 7, neutral about 5" to which another person replied (and again I paraphrase) "but cards 2 and 7 would be so useful in my deck". This only illustrates that what is one person's pleasure may be another's poison and special care is taken when designing the custom cards to ensure that there is, hopefully, something for everyone.

A large CCG manufacturing company likes to think that there are three basic types of players (although each type is not unique, i.e. some players have 2 of the 3 types, and some of the rarer players are a combination of all 3 types).

The first type is termed "Timmy". These are the player who like power cards - big creatures, big spells, big numbers. These are the players who would look at All High King Korg with his 26 starting energy and love the card just for that one stat alone. To them, each game is about playing (or to be able to play) those large cards.

The second type of player is termed "Johnny". The Johnny-types are the types who love to win by exotic ways. Combos are the mainstay of their game, the harder it is to pull off the combo the better. They get the satisfaction of winning with a combo. Sometimes, even if they don't win, as long as they are able to pull off that elusive combo, they are happy with the game.

The third type of player is the "Spike" type, probably named after a skinny Vampire on TV. These are the types who will win whatever the cost. They may copy decks off the internet, or abuse power cards or broken combos. It doesn't matter how they win, as long as they win every game they play, casual or otherwise.

3. Playing Experience

The final guideline behind the creation of the custom cards is to enhance the playing experience and renew interest in the game. There are a number of things that decreases playing experience - not being able to drow or play a card during your turn every turn... infinite energy combos... instakills. These are termed Negative Play Experience (shorted to NPE) by most CCG players and is to be avoided at all costs.

Although the custom cards toys with denial mechanics - for example: restricting energize, discarding cards, restricting draw - each of these cards are designed such that there are answers to the card in question, be it built into the card itself as a weakness, or in the form of another card.²

One little looked way of increasing the playing experience is to enhance the uniqueness of each region. It is well known, that Orothe is the Relic region and KT has the big creatures. Some of these have been expanded, and new ones have been created. Weave is gradually getting the ability to manipulate the discard pile, Arderial has its Telepathy elements enforced and Paradwyn is beginning to get more adept at manipulating creature's starting energy. To ensure that each ability is unique, some form of regional enforcement is hardwired into the card such that it gets pretty much useless outside of its intended region, and thus creating the uniqueness for the desired region.

Conclusion

One further thing that doesn't fit in the 3 categories above is the fact that each custom card created must have some sort of art, preferable in the same style as the existing cards. This is often the most difficult part of the card design - to draw/get the correct artwork (and permission to use the artwork) for any custom card. Often times, whenever someone demands that I should make this or that card, I retort with the reply "Get me the art first". Creating the text might be easy... creating the artwork is often beyond the ability of most people.

This is a sneaky way of making sure that the guest custom card designers have a better picture of what needs to go into the custom cards that they are responsible for. Hopefully they will now understand the reasons why I vetoed some of their card designs. This is also meant to be an invaluable resource not only to those who are currently helping with the design of the custom cards, but also to the wannabes.

Most everyone would think that making custom cards is and easy thing, and I would have to agree. However, the creation of custom cards as part of an expansion is a completely different story, and I have to say that even after a few hundred cards, I still find the process difficult, but as someone said when I first started " go write a million cards first". In other words practice makes perfect.

Footnotes:
¹ Power escalation (for the custom expansions) is slightly more in weaker regions and weaker decktypes to ensure that they catch up to the power-regions and to level the playing field.
² Hence the increase in spell and relic discards with each custom expansion, not just a mechanic in and of itself, but to ensure that there are "answers" available.

Links:
This is the blog version of the article, most of the links are on the right.

Custom Expansions:
The following lists the custom expansions which have at least some work carried out on them.

Expansion Name	Expansion Type & Number of cards	Design Status
Elder's Legacy	Custom Expansion 50 cards	Custom Tournament Legal
Shadowsfall Promo	Custom Promo Expansion 12 cards	Custom Tournament Legal
Tainted Glimpses	Custom Expansion 100 cards + 3 Promos	Playtesting
Keeper's Quest Promo	Custom Promo Expansion 4 cards	Playtesting
Twilight War	Custom Expansion 100 cards + 4? Promos	Under Design
Double Jeopardy	Custom Promo Expansion 8 cards	Under Design
Exodus Flight	Custom Expansion 150 cards	Collecting Images
Cure	Custom Promo Expansion at least 4 cards	Collecting Images
Ancient Enemy	Custom Expansion 100 cards	Collecting Images
Fallen Hour	Custom Expansion 150? cards	Collecting Images

Washing Away Forests

I was on this Thursday evening recording card information to just possibly create a Naroom 101 for the Custom Card Forums. I have a very long way to go yet. So far, I've only just started writing in the card texts.

Anyways, while I was online, Birdie21 dropped in and we played another game. I haven't played my Orlon's Ring deck in a while, so I decided to take it for a spin. Birdie21 started first with Tryn. Tryn started off with some fairly impressive energy gains, including some from Orwin's Ring. Aula Mindseeker responded with a fairly lucky draw of Tidal Wave. Ten energy later, two big nasty Naroom creatures were gone and the field was fresh. Aula then began the usual mad card draw. She would actually hold out a few turns. Having drawn both copies of Orlon's Ring with her power early on, I placed one out so she would gain five energy per turn instead of just her pitiful energize of four. She even would field a Karak Necklace and Hubdra's Cube to steal the Orwin's Ring and deny Naroom purity energy gains. Tryn ended up taking out Mindseeker by using an Energy Band and her power on a Balamant. In addition to attacking and eliminating my only creature in play, the power Hunt took out Aula's energy. Quilla came out in force. I had drawn like nuts with Aula. Five Orothe relics wide, including Orlon's Ring. Hubdra's Cube stole the Energy Band to trigger both the Karak Necklace and Karak Band. With twelve energy gained per turn, Quilla gained steam fast. She took out Tryn. Getting stronger with each turn, Quilla then eliminated Pruitt, followed by T'dek. In the end, Quilla had six Orothe relics in play, all the width in relics that deck has. Oh, it was so nice to play against Naroom. I don't think I get to do that very often lately. It feels like I am the one playing Naroom when it does get played.

Birdie21 did offer to play again after that. However, my wife had been anxiously calling for me to come help her. Turned out that there was a spot in a console game she couldn't get past without another player in the game to assist.

Twins Retreat

This Wednesday afternoon, I was on gatling Engine and managed to get in a little fun game with birdie21. Perhaps I should feel bad for choosing the deck I did to play against them. At least I did not use the Grahnna deck again. Instead, I used one of my last tournament decks from when Magi-Nation was still played a bit in Utah. My Underneath, messed up, burrow deck.

Birdie21 started first with the Dark Twins. For their starting cards, they pulled Morag's 'Gift' and a creature. Myka started off with my usual five random cards. The first few turns saw two Akkar in play verses a regular supply of Core creatures. Since Birdie21 played the gift spell early on, it was quite common for several turns in a row that each of us would gain an extra four energy or so. The incredibly invulnerable Akkars triggered for being outnumbered by Core creatures, and the twins gaining whenever I played a creature. A single copy of Turn was a regular fear for Myka. Several turns passed without the twins stealing away any creatures. It was surprising when the twins left an Trogovo in play, once while they had enough energy to discard towards its weakness. This did crimp Myka's energize rate though it certainly helped that the deck was built with an energize of four and five in mind. By this time, it was getting hard for me to eliminate my own creatures. Strag's Claws were helping the Underneath creatures tear into the Core defenses. Before Myka finally beat her way through the twins, a Nightmare Hyren used its power on my surviving Akkar. While the tossing and turning was annoying, Myka finally got the twins and rid herself of the Trogovo. I had plenty of cards to choose from at this point. Pruitt flipped over and tossed down The Tomes of the Great Library. With a little research, she Vaporized my four relics in play. Fortunately for me, this was the point in the game where my Digging Goggles finally showed up. On my next turn, I crushed one of Pruitt's creatures and then attacked. This left Pruitt in desperate straights with no creatures in play. I wasn't doing much better, but it was enough. Pruitt played Dark Portents and gained a little energy for the effort. Discarding Granas from my deck hardly mattered at this point, and Myka swung around with her surviving Kier on my last turn to end the game. Birdie21 said that they were getting a bad draw there with all their creatures and not much else. I wonder if they did have a copy or two of the Turns I was fearing frequently in that game, usually when it would've done me the most damage.

Rocks Beating Water

Today I got in a fun game with Tessei. Despite the fact that the declared they would be playing Kybar's Teeth, I went with my Storm of Fishes deck. That particular deck is stronger the more spells my opponent has and weaker the more creatures they use. I was hoping that they would be running something somewhere in the middle.

Tessei went first with Kazm. Cleansing was pulled as their only starter. I am not sure why. The only thing they did with it later was to discard it to the Vopok to conduct an attack. Aula, Mindseeker was my first magi. When she used Hand of the Sky to look at Tessei's hand, I sort of knew things were bad. The only spell in their hand after their first turn was Cleansing and no relics. Creatures! Ouch! Kazm would take out Aula in short order. Voice of the Storm followed suit. I was tempted to actually use Cataclysm with Niffer. It would leave me short on energy, but things were looking bad for me. However, it was early into the game and the only relic Tessei had revealed so far was a Warrior's Boots Kazm used to wipe out Voice of the Storm in one turn. It would turn out that Kazm had another copy of the boots to use in store for me. It would take two turns, the first leaving Niffer with no creatures and only one energy at the end of the turn. We didn't actually finish out Kazm's final turn. Unless Tessei just toyed with Niffer, she was doomed. A good game. A good loss.

The Frozen Moonlands

Today, after my game with Birdie21, I managed to get in my first game for the January tournament. CapAp signed up and we played against each other. After conferring with the rules, we found that a Nar magi and an arctic card are required to be in our decks for this tournament. Both of us met the minimum requirement for our decks.

CapAp went first with Ust. Hailstorm Pendant would slowly destroy me. Combined with her powerful defensive effect against my first attack on the magi each turn, Ust would destroy Balachron. It didn't happen all at once. Although, that first turn with Furok Protector was just plain fun. CapAp took the furok with the first shot using the pendant. Their Zyavu was sacrificed to remove energy from my magi and one of my creatures. Balachron did get Ice Lens in play to increase my card draw for a few turns. At the same time, CapAp had Tomorrow's Jewel in play to make sure they had what they needed to destroy my forces. Odavast was grateful that Balachron had netted a few extra cards. This allowed him to place out a small swarm that CapAp began to destroy once again. Ust was getting attacked frequently and CapAp would frequently discard two cards to kill the first creature like the effect allowed. It seemed like a long terrible struggle to stay alive, then both copies of Warrior's Boots were drawn. The first one was used to place out something just big enough to make sure that Ust went down to the swarm I had in play. When CapAp played Spirit of Nar, it actually didn't matter to me. There wasn't much I could play at that point anyways. Koza was the next challenge for Odavast to face. Since Odavast had a good number of creatures in play when he beat Ust, another Warrior's Boots later and Koza was on the rocks. It was a swift battle between Odavast and Koza lasting no more than just a few turns. When Halsted flipped and used two copies of Crystallize, it looked like Odavast was in for a long haul. It was when CapAp tossed down a Zyavu as well that suddenly things looked better for me. It has been so long since I played Nar that I had forgotten that my deck currently uses Ice Rupture. Plus, I almost missed that it was in my hand. That was the same spell CapAp had used on me early into the game. Discarding one of my Crystallized creatures, Halsted made a very short appearance and Odavast managed to salvage a game I was afraid that I was losing but I just hadn't given up yet.

Grahnna's Dominion

I logged into gEngine to make some notes to myself in preparation for play testing of Twilight War. I figured to test all the Naroom cards designed I needed to build at least three to four different decks.

One centered around Forest Hyren-Flying Hinko. This would get me Tryn's Flute and Lumber Hyren.

Another deck built around Flood of Energy could probably test Keelie, Forest Well, Lumber Hyren (again), and Curious Fird.

I would have to build a third deck to test Summon. This spell is so different from what is the norm for Naroom that I would have to build a deck just to test it. It could be as simple as another version of one of the other test decks but with Summon added in so it is easier to isolate whether the spell has problems or not.

While I was online, I managed to get in a game with birdie21. I opted to go with my Grahnna deck again. Baa tossed down and drew like mad. It was almost a repeat opening of the last time, except I had Pyder in my hand within the first couple turns. Ealaya tossed out well with a few jungle stalkers, including a Bagala Hunter. On my next turn, I used the Slarnath to draw another card and then the Ooze Arboll's power. My surviving three creatures then pounded themselves into oblivion against the Paradwyn stalkers. Baa followed this by playing out all her energy in a couple more creatures and her effect. Birdie21 took out Baa on their next turn. Now, it was time for Grahnna. A practically perfect Grahnna opening. Pyder was followed by Swamp Hyren. Then, I tossed down virtually free three energy creatures or smaller. It was at least nine creatures wide on the swarm. Ealaya would fall in short order, followed by Culla and Ardonia. My two Treepsh proved useful when Birdie21 tried to crush the first Jile I managed to get into play. Although the Treepsh was actually bigger than the Jile, saving the Jile so my critters began to energize was killer. Spirit Drain at the end made sure Ardonia had no energy to keep the Jungle Eebit hanging around. And, yes, that left Grahnna with no energy too, since my magi only had two energy to use for the spell (Swamp Hyren reduced the cost from three to two).

Unless otherwise requested, I think I will be retiring that deck for a while. That was a bit of an overkill.

Claustrophobia

It was nice to get another game of Magi-Nation today. I still haven't gotten in any of my tournament games for January. Instead, I played a newer player. They made a few mistakes on timing of playing creatures and attacks, but some practice should clear that up.

TechsMechs is a promising Underneath player. They ran a Tunnel Hyren deck with Strag's Ring burrowing that precious hyren. Oh, how I was missing my favorite Giant Carillions! I was running a Naroom deck without even one in there for this game.... Tryn held up against Myka for a long time. I was frequently dumping my entire hand into the turn. It was almost surprising that Yaki and Pruitt had anything to toss down like they did when Myka finally gained some steam. The first Tunnel Hyren met its demise at the hands of Tryn. A simple Relic Stalker took out the ring. I just had to wait a turn and take my punishment in the meantime until Tryn swung her creatures around and pushed a momentary offensive. Tryn kept the pressure on as long as she could. When a second Strag's Ring and a second Tunnel Hyren appeared, her fate was essentially sealed. It was a matter of time. If only a Relic Stalker had shown up to pave open the way to the Tunnel Hyren again. Tunneler's Boots and Digging Goggles gave the burrowed swarm plenty of energy growth and the offensive ability needed. Myka was getting to the point that she would have about twenty energy on her at the end of turn, and a good number of creatures totally somewhere around twenty-five energy or so. Maybe less. Maybe more. Either way, I was amazed to toss out all of Yaki's energy in creatures and spells. This is often risky against Underneath with the potential threat of Ormagons. However, I hadn't seen one yet and it was the only hope my Naroom deck had of making a comeback. It wasn't to be. TechsMechs didn't waste time and had all their creatures attack eliminating Yaki in a single turn. Pruitt would follow suit, although she managed to hold out for two turns. Way to go Pruitt!!!

They did comment that the cannot build this deck with their actual cards. Apparently they only have a few Cald and Naroom cards and not enough even to build a deck. As it is, not even I could build the deck they used on gEngine. Although I have a box full of Magi-Nation cards, I don't have any Tunnel Hyrens. If I were to build such a deck, it too would need to be a virtual deck on gEngine. For now, I will stick to my own burrow deck that doesn't have even one hyren.... May TechsMechs have more fun yet. It would be nice to play again someday.

Baa Baa Grahnna

I should've written this a week ago. Logging in over the holidays didn't seem like the best time to catch a game. Everyone would be busy with their own holiday events. So, I was pleasantly surprised that after entering in my current Bograth deck into gEngine that I managed to get in a game with the deck.

My own collection of Magi-Nation cards is somewhat limited. So when I converted my Paradwyn deck to match the restricted deck I had built on gEngine, I had to butcher my Bograth deck to get the three Fog Hyren. Not a terrible thing, except my Bograth deck really needed at least one to start with Eryss. This forced me to consider doing something a little different. Having seen some Grahnna decks on gEngine, I chose to build my own version without any Fog Hyrens. I've played with the physical deck once with my wife.

Punksnotdead and I played a game Tuesday. They started off with Delia and the Vellup swarm. Not even trying to match the madness of Delia, Baa just went for mad card draw. My deck was chuck full of creatures, so although I started with only the Slarnath she still tossed down four creatures that first turn. Between her effect and the Slarnath, Baa was doing great. I didn't plan for her to last. When Delia defeated Baa, I had one Swamp Hyren but none of my Pyders. I went ahead and tossed down big with Grahnna. Between the effect, the savings from Swamp Hyren, and all three Ooze Arboll, it was a very big move. A simple Cataclysm could've been devastating, but I was in the mood to gamble. My wife was anxious to get out the door and run some errands. Punksnotdead replied that they didn't think Cataclysm was in their deck. They ran everything they had into my Swamp Hyren. A very interesting choice. How often have I had opponents against my normal Bograth decks wait three or four turns before they chose to try and eliminate the Swamp Hyren? All too often. Frequently, it was too late. The Swamp Hyren would've usually done its job several times over. Unfortunately for the Arderian Adept, Delia failed to get the Swamp Hyren even after dumping every creature she had into it. With a massive swarm in play, Grahnna was in a position to plow over the adept with energy to spare. Punksnotdead conceded the game, although the Swamp Hyren was destroyed before the game was done. Got it with a Shockwave. From what I had seen, it was a fairly good adept deck and I said so. Sure, it got taken to the cleaners that game, but that doesn't make it a bad deck. Punksnotdead did reveal that their final magi used a trick to get the adept back. That would've been interesting if only they had those missing cards to pull off the trick in hand when the adept's defeat was sure.