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[popsofctown]

Are you opposed to the flavor of summoning monsters and battling, or the mechanics of it?  I've always thought a steampunk themed game would be a nice change of pace, but I think using permanent objects with numerical stats to battle is a discovery of an optimal game design rather than an arbitrary selection of structure.

[Ozle]

You can test out my politic themed card game if you like?

You are fighting over influence and votes rather than monsters.

Its not a collectable card game though, more of a build your deck out ofoptions game.

If i had kniwn of things such as deckbuilding, drafting, shufflebuilding and themlike when i was 13 it would be a lot better! (damn you game designers, you should have got published quicker!)

[Kirian]

Are you opposed to the flavor of summoning monsters and battling, or the mechanics of it?  I've always thought a steampunk themed game would be a nice change of pace, but I think using permanent objects with numerical stats to battle is a discovery of an optimal game design rather than an arbitrary selection of structure.

For me at least, it's a matter of oversaturation of mechanic rather than oversaturation of theme.  Online I've seen ones that summon various army units, or various spaceships and space stations; sometimes only ones directly across from one another can attack, etc., but it's all the same basic mechanic.  I think that "optimal mechanic" may be correct, but I really think it's a local maximum, and no one has really tried to find a different local maximum.

Well, except Donald, who was then copied near the same local maximum by Ascension, Thunderstone, etc.  But I'm positive there are other local maxima for deckbuilding games out there.

[popsofctown]

So would you consider Eredan it's own local maximum?  In Eredan you start with 3 "creatures" that deal damage with eachother, you can't summon new ones.  You just buff them as they fight to make yours stronger.  You don't use mana either, you just cast 2 cards you think are most helpful in each situation.

[Kirian]

So would you consider Eredan it's own local maximum?  In Eredan you start with 3 "creatures" that deal damage with eachother, you can't summon new ones.  You just buff them as they fight to make yours stronger.  You don't use mana either, you just cast 2 cards you think are most helpful in each situation.

That is definitely different, yes.  The gameplay no longer has to do with summoning.  I'd have to try it out to get a feel for it though.

[popsofctown]

So would you consider Eredan it's own local maximum?  In Eredan you start with 3 "creatures" that deal damage with eachother, you can't summon new ones.  You just buff them as they fight to make yours stronger.  You don't use mana either, you just cast 2 cards you think are most helpful in each situation.

That is definitely different, yes.  The gameplay no longer has to do with summoning.  I'd have to try it out to get a feel for it though.

Oh it's a terrible game.  That was just for the sake of discussion

[ddubois]

Ooo man, I had long forgotten all about elementsthegame.com.  I had a ton of upgraded cards there.  I sort of hit a plateau and got bored with the game though.  The card pool was just too small to have the kind of depth I wanted; there were really only about 3 viable deck archetypes that could handle the god quests (or whatever they were called) and some of those automatically conceded half the matchups on turn 1.  The PvP scene was a little more diverse but not enthralling.  Much of the game experience came flowed out of the inherently superficial feedback loop that grinding for new cards provides.

Looks the most recent deck I had been using was a Cremation/Supernova rush deck?

One thing I really appreciated about that game system was the ease with which one could transfer around deck lists.  You could just import/export the codes, ala "6u1 6u2 6u3 6u3 6u3 6u3 6u3 6u3 71a 74a 74a 77g 7ah 7dp 7dp 7dp 7dp 7dp 7dp 7dq 7dq 7dq 7dq 7ds 7ds 7jv 809 809 80h 80h 8pj", and the forum software was such that when you dumped in that code with the appropriate forum tag, the relevant card images would be presented.  Very small, simple detail, but it made my life so much easier than the incessant typing of "4x Fireblast 4x Incincerate 4x Ball Lightning..." ad nauseam as I would be forced to do when I was discussing M:tG decklists on various forums.

Have they added much in the last couple years?  From looking at http://elementsthegame.wikia.com/wiki/Mark_of_Fire it looks like they haven't added anything?  I guess I'll check it out again and see.

[Qvist]

I haven't played since a while ddubois. Since the last time I played, they seemed to change some card images, added Shards for each mark and I didn't know Golem, Singularity, Seraph and Psion.

[popsofctown]

Anyone heard of/played tactics arena online?
Does it still live?

[ddubois]

Well, I played Elements the Game some more, and man, it is just terrible.  It's sadly very enjoyable early, because grinding for cards and building decks is just plain fun, no matter what, but it's been done elsewhere and universally better.

1) The user interface is fatally flawed in that it allows a user no means to read the effect of spells your opponent has cast / no grave yard to inspect / no log file to peruse.  You're just expected to know every card by picture...
2) ... which isn't as hard as it sounds, since there are so few of them.  Two years have gone by, and he's added only a couple colored spells to each mana category.  It's nigh impossible to make a card game with the depth of a Go or a Chess; card games need expansions, even one as well designed as Dominion did.  He did add a bunch of colorless cards, which I'll get to later.
3) The templating on the card really makes it clear that guy has no clue about game design.  It's like he's learned nothing from the 100's of TCGs/LCGs/DBGs that have come before him.  H'es got things keyworded when only one card does that effect, the keywords are defined nowhere, and the words chosen are often ones only a thesaurus would love: Accretion, Mitosis, etc.
4) The designer has added a bunch of un-purchasable grossly-overpowered colorless cards.  You can't truly make competitive decks if you do not own these cards, but the only way to acquire them to to grind the AI-controlled "defense" decks of players who have them.  You have to hope you get lucky to beat them despite your inferior deck, then get lucky on the "slot machine"-esque spin afterward you earned that you will be awarded one.  That's it -- there's no trading with other players, and surprisingly, no micro-payment system to acquire them either.  They are banned in the unofficial PVP events, because they are inconceivably stupid cards.  Many of them even act contrary to a user's expectations.  They're templated after earlier "artifact" cards, but act like spells or creatures in the games rules.  "Why can't I Shatter that?  Oh, it's a creature!?  Wtf?"

I've since remembered why I quit the game originally, and the programmer has made the game much worse after I left.

[Drab Emordnilap]

I would venture that Mitosis is not a word beloved by thesauri either.

[ddubois]

Now, for a game I can't recommend enough: Spectromancer.  This game is awesome.  It's card-like, in that your starting tableau of available spells to cast are a drawn from a larger pool of spells that exist in the game and your opponent's starting spells are drawn from the remainder of the deck you were not dealt (the latter being very important to take into account for strategic reasons).  But you don't draw or discard after that.  The play of the game is similar to MtG, with summoning creatures, casting spells to the face, etc., except that the battlefield is slotted, i.e. broken up into 5 battlefields that do not interact unless a cardspell says otherwise.

It supports all of AI, hotseat, and online play, on both iOS and PC.  The AI routinely kicks my ass on the Archmage difficulty.  I can reach near 50% with some mage types, but seem to be batting under 25% with others.  This is despite my hundreds of plays and my years of competitive high-caliber card game experience.

[Kuildeous]

the keywords are defined nowhere, and the words chosen are often ones only a thesaurus would love: Accretion, Mitosis, etc.

Although, I wish more games would use thesaurus words. I like vocabulary accretion. *grin*

I can thank World of Darkness for letting me know of wonderful words like alacrity, puissance, and verisimilitude. For the flaws that game had, they at least acknowledge that you grew up with a library nearby and had every opportunity to go visit it.

Though, that doesn't soften the other complaints you had. In fact, I have a hard time justifying "mitosis" as a keyword in a game, though I admit I haven't played it.

[Captain_Frisk]

Well, I played Elements the Game some more, and man, it is just terrible.  It's sadly very enjoyable early, because grinding for cards and building decks is just plain fun, no matter what, but it's been done elsewhere and universally better.

1) The user interface is fatally flawed in that it allows a user no means to read the effect of spells your opponent has cast / no grave yard to inspect / no log file to peruse.  You're just expected to know every card by picture...
2) ... which isn't as hard as it sounds, since there are so few of them.  Two years have gone by, and he's added only a couple colored spells to each mana category.  It's nigh impossible to make a card game with the depth of a Go or a Chess; card games need expansions, even one as well designed as Dominion did.  He did add a bunch of colorless cards, which I'll get to later.
3) The templating on the card really makes it clear that guy has no clue about game design.  It's like he's learned nothing from the 100's of TCGs/LCGs/DBGs that have come before him.  H'es got things keyworded when only one card does that effect, the keywords are defined nowhere, and the words chosen are often ones only a thesaurus would love: Accretion, Mitosis, etc.
4) The designer has added a bunch of un-purchasable grossly-overpowered colorless cards.  You can't truly make competitive decks if you do not own these cards, but the only way to acquire them to to grind the AI-controlled "defense" decks of players who have them.  You have to hope you get lucky to beat them despite your inferior deck, then get lucky on the "slot machine"-esque spin afterward you earned that you will be awarded one.  That's it -- there's no trading with other players, and surprisingly, no micro-payment system to acquire them either.  They are banned in the unofficial PVP events, because they are inconceivably stupid cards.  Many of them even act contrary to a user's expectations.  They're templated after earlier "artifact" cards, but act like spells or creatures in the games rules.  "Why can't I Shatter that?  Oh, it's a creature!?  Wtf?"

I've since remembered why I quit the game originally, and the programmer has made the game much worse after I left.

+1 - I remember having good time until I saw the grind necessary to really get the good stuff.