Boredom

Since Magic the Gathering is having a Great Designer Search, I though that just for the fun of it, I'd try following their challenges (I'm not entered in the contest or anything). I created these 10 cards based on the requirements from this week's challenge. I used the Magic Set Editor from Source Forge if you're wondering. I'm not much of a designer, so most of these cards are probably undercosted and some are probably broken.

The designers were given 10 slots to fill and 10 pieces of artwork. They could mix and match as they chose. Here are my ideas:



This slot was for a whit uncommon that is "an answer to all the token making in the environment. Be subtle." I'm not sure if this counts as subtle or as an answer to tokens, but when I saw this image I thought Flagbearer, and I think it kind of works.



This slot was for a white, rare, "Johnny-style enchantment." I think my selection matches the art, is within white's slice of the color pie, and is at least slightly Johnny flavored.



This slot was for a blue, common sorcery. "No card filtering or drawing. No bounce (aka returning cards to hand)." I'm not sure how well I did with the artwork, but I think the spell is kind of neat.



This one was for a rare "Timmy" creature. As with most of the actual submissions I read, this artwork screamed "Shapeshifter with a Clone type effect." I think my take on it is pretty cool, though maybe a bit broken



This slot was for an uncommon, black aura "you want to put on your own creatures." I think I did a fairly good job here.



This slot was for any black rare. I knew this guy was a zombie, so I put him here. I think the ability matches that art, but is way out of black's slice of the color pie. Oh well.



This slot was for a red common "Instant or sorcery. No direct damage or destruction (artifact or land)." I think I did a good job with matching the artwork to the ability and keeping it in the right area of the color pie, but I doubt it's a common.



This slot was for an uncommon red creature. "Want a build around me for draft (aka something that will encourage players to go down a path or paths he or she wouldn't normally had they not drafted this card early; examples of this type of card are Lightning Rift, Mark of Eviction and Momentary Blink)." I think this one encourage playing sacrificable artifacts and artifact destruction spells, so I guess it works.



This slot was a common green creature that costs four or more mana. I added Morph since it does have one of those morph spider thingies in it. I'm not sure that this would be printed as a common, though.



Green rare. Non-creature spell. Green's lacking in "wow" factor (aka something that will impress the player by how different it is). Trying to come up with an ability that matched an artifact apparently blowing up as it destroys a creature was hard. I decided that the creature had destroyed the artifact and is being killed in the explosion. I don't know if it works well or not.

Anyway, I hope you got a good laugh out of these. Seriously, feel free to offer constructive criticism, mockery, or whatever. If you want to steal these to enter in You Make the Card Four when it finally comes out, feel free. If MaRo, or some other WOTC employee, reads this and decides to steal it for their design files (perhaps because of a recent head injury), be my guest.

My next review should be up later tonight (after Doctor Who) or maybe some time tomorrow.

Slivers

I occasionally like to play the game Magic the Gathering, especially the online version. The latest Magic set, Time Spiral, goes on sale online tomorrow, and I thought that since I'm a bit behind on my reading, I'd review some cards from the set. Specifically my favorite little tribe: the Slivers. I'll pick one from each color and tell you what I think of it.

Don't get me wrong, I'm by no means a tourney level player. So just because I like a card doesn't mean it's a good card to use. Basically, I suck at Magic. Anyway, lets start with this:



I like this one a lot. Really, if your playing a sliver deck you're going to be using a lot of different colors, maybe even all five. This one will help you generate the mana you need.



This is my favorite blue sliver. Sure, If you don't have something to increase your slivers' toughness or to give them protection from blue, this guy will probably cause them to self destruct. Still, I can think of a quite a few neat little combos I could use this guy in. For instance, if you have this one a Sliver Queen, and the next guy I'll review (and something to give slivers haste) that's an instant win (unless your opponent can break the cycle anyway).



See, you tap a sliver to deal damage. Then while the ability's on the stack, sacrifice it for the BB. Then use the BB so Sliver Queen can pump out a new sliver and start over again. Just don't sacrifice Psionic Sliver or Basalt sliver this way.



I know this one is red and black, but I'm using him for my red slot anyway, because he makes an easy slivery way to give your slivers hast and pull off that combo I mentioned. I know it's not that great a combo, but like I said, I kind of suck at this game.



Putting any slivers that die back on top of your life deck is a good thing as far as I can see. Flying is nice too.

I love Slivers. All in all, I give them 5 yo-yos, just because I can.

Adventure Quest

Today, as I’m well ahead of schedule on my “update-once-a-week plan,” I’ve decided to write a quick review for the “other stuff I like.” In this case, an online game, and not even one you have to buy. That’s right, this is a free game.

The game is called Adventure Quest (I‘ve put a link in here, but if Google puts an AQ banner at the top of the page, please click there instead). AQ is a role playing game. You are an adventurer in the land of Lore, operating out of the town of Battleon. Your mission is to go out and kill the rampaging hoards of monsters. Sounds simple, doesn’t it?

Actually, the gameplay is pretty simple, but it’s addictive. You can spend hours a day fighting the weird monsters, doing quests, and just having fun. You can become a vampire, werewolf, or werepyre. You can train as a fighter, mage, ninja, rogue, dragon slayer, or vampire slayer (with more classes coming soon). You can take part in wars and special events. You can collect rare armors, weapons, spells, and pets. There is quite a lot to do.

Unfortunately, not everything in Adventure Quest is perfect. There is no PvP, and there never will be, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, since PvP often equals “experienced player kill newbies for fun.” Also, since the game is free, and server space costs an arm and a leg, there are only a limited number of free slots. New players can bypass this, because when you make a new account you get a certain number of free logins. Once those are used up, it can take hours to get in, unless you become a guardian.

Guardians are players who have paid a one-time donation (currently $14.95) to help support the game. In exchange, they can log on anytime. In addition, they can fully access the game. Guardians can fully level up in all classes (non-guardians can only go halfway). Guardians can get special temporary items to help them during battle. Guardians get special permanent items when the sign up, like the Ultra Guardian Plate and the Guardian Sword (which can be upgraded to the mighty Blade of Awe by collecting chests). All in all, guardianship is well worth the price if you like RPGs.

Besides the game, Adventure Quest also has very good forums. It has, what I have been told, are very nice RPG forums (I don’t use them much myself). The main forums are full of interesting people, like the thief Magicdog, the joking Grand Councilor Skyboy, or the deranged mod Vephoma. Just be sure to read the rules before posting, because quite a lot of people will jump down your throat if you spam, flame, ask questions in the GGD forum (hint: try the Questions and Answers forum instead), or complain about the server cap. Oh yeah, and never, ever, ask someone to make you a guardian.

I give Adventure Quest 4.5 yo-yos.



Note 10/06/06: I stopped playing this game several months ago. Also this page is by now hopelessly out of date about the games features. To the people who leave comments: I don't work for AQ or know anyone who does, so I can't help you with the game.