MTG Style DnD campaign?
The Blind Eternities forum
Posted on July 1, 2021, 1:55 p.m. by Daveslab2022
A few years after I got into magic, about 2010 or so, my friend and I had an idea for an mtg board game. He’s recently started filming tutorial videos and actually trying to turn this into something people play. It’s really neat because all you need is a deck of cards. Your lands that you play end up forming the board. If that sounds like something you’d want to learn about, let me know.
Anyways, his tutorial video made me want to design an mtg style DnD campaign. I literally just thought this up maybe 5 minutes before I wrote this out, so it’s not fleshed out at all. I just wanted some community input, especially with the new DND inspired set releasing soon.
My only idea so far are giving point values to cards so you can build your initial deck and buy new spells to use.
I was thinking no planeswalker cards would be allowed, and that they could be recruited as you play through the campaign and can summon them after that, maybe? Same thing for legendary creatures, except maybe they are sold and found in dungeons as summon scrolls.
I’m also not sure how the combat would play out. Should every combat encounter play like a real game of mtg? If so, they would probably play like a giant 2 headed dragon match, except for bosses which would play like archenemy games.
I’m sure this post is a little all over the place and maybe incoherent at times but I just wanted something tangible to refer back to and get feedback on.
July 1, 2021 2:57 p.m.
Daveslab2022 says... #4
What you have is a more fleshed out idea of what I was going for. I love your idea for skill checks. I hadn’t even starting thinking about that as I had no idea where to start, but I think your idea or something incredibly similar would work perfectly.
I agree about building a cube, where you only have certain cards that can be used for character creation, and unlocking new cards as well. I was thinking things like artifacts and stuff would go directly into the deck, just because they would be equipping the creatures and not something you equip yourself, so it should go into the deck of spells you cast, in my opinion.
I’m not sure what would have as an ability, but I do think that when you choose your class, instead of picking a name like “warrior” or “rogue,” you instead pick a color combination (could be as many as you want but then your skill checks get worse, while your library gets better. Then your ability is based off the colors you chose. I can’t imagine anybody would realistically build a 3-5 color deck, so probably finding a suitable ability and cards that that “class” could use would really only be necessary for the single colors, and guilds. Maybe the wedges/shards but unlikely.
July 1, 2021 3:04 p.m.
Daveslab2022 says... #5
Instead of having specific cards for each class, I was thinking of giving points based on level, starting at 60 points and you spend the points to build your deck. You can use any of the cards that fit your color combination. For character creation, every card is worth 1 point. So you can build a 40 card deck, 20 lands, and still have some points left over to buy stuff later. Certain cards you can buy will have more points and you have to keep track of your max points for your deck. Say, 1d4 points/level or something.
July 1, 2021 3:08 p.m.
Daveslab2022 says... #6
This also makes it so that when multiple party members can use a card that’s found in a dungeon, you have to weigh who gets which reward to add to their deck based on how many points the new card is worth, and how many points that person is already using in their deck.
July 1, 2021 3:09 p.m.
The point buy is an interesting idea. I like it. I agree on artifacts and equipment and stuff being a regular part of the deck.
Some people (me) would probably try to at least splash a third color, but I wouldn't expect a 4-5 color deck for this.
I'll try to drum up some interest and give each system a couple of test runs. I'm not sure when that might be, since life is kind of getting in the way right now, but yours has a lot of good points.
July 1, 2021 3:21 p.m.
What kind of abilities are you thinking about for the color combinations? And if you go, say, , do you get a unique ability or a combination of the and abilities?
July 1, 2021 3:46 p.m.
FormOverFunction says... #9
I loved the building aspect of the shandalar mtg game. i hAD together a ton of notes on how to turn a Trivial Pursuit board into an mtg board game (since it has six colors on the board, wubrg and one for colorless/non-basics/etc) Maybe that could help? I’d check out the shandalar game too.
July 1, 2021 3:51 p.m.
Daveslab2022 says... #10
The more I think about it the more I like the idea of maybe a signature spell for each player that would be their “ability.” So say Dovin's Veto for an Azorious party member. Whenever an opponent tries to cast a spell outside of combat they could use their signature spell or something like that.
Is shandalar still playable? I’ve heard things about it but never played it myself.
July 1, 2021 4:59 p.m.
FormOverFunction Huh. I didn't know anything about that. I'm also curious if it's playable.
And how did your Trivial Pursuit game work?
July 1, 2021 7:16 p.m.
jethstriker says... #12
The part where you stated using lands as the board made me remember a casual variant the official site published a long time ago.
July 1, 2021 10:43 p.m.
I had another thought for the skill checks. If a revealed card name thematically matches the skill or challenge, that gives an extra +1 to your check.
For example, if you try an Insight check and reveal Telepathy , you get +1 to your check.
I don't know if this should stack--if you reveal both Ram Through and Brute Force on a Strength check to smash a door, do you get +2?
This flavor bonus would also be pretty ad hoc, since Ram Through might not help you lift something heavy.
legendofa says... #2
I've been thinking about this recently. Here's what I've come up with so far.
Build a cube, picking 30 thematic cards for each class. The cards should be fairly low-power, to represent low-level characters. To "create a character", each player chooses a class, gets 10 random cards from their class card pool, then the rest of the cards are shuffled together and drafted normally.
Combat is based on things like Archenemy, the Theros Hero's Path decks, Horde Magic, and that sort of thing. PvP is a straight Bo1, if you want to include that. Archenemy cards can be used with a pre-built EDH deck or tournament-competitive deck or something for the big villains.
Skills are checked by shuffling the deck, revealing the top three cards, and counting the number of colored mana symbols. 1-2 is an easy check, 3 is moderate, 4-5 is difficult, and 6+ is very difficult.
: Heal, Diplomacy, Insight
: Insight, Arcana, Stealth
: Stealth, Bluff, Intimidate
: Intimidate, ???, Strength (not a D&D skill, but a common ability check)
: Strength, Nature, Heal
So to make a DC 4 Heal check, shuffle your deck, reveal the top three cards, and count the number of green and white mana symbols. If you get 4 or more, you pass.
Leveling up, treasure, and allies are represented by a side deck with rarer and more powerful cards, equipment, maybe planeswalkers, which is drafted from after a combat or skill challenge. More difficult encounters = more cards drafted.
Since this is basically a cube with extra stuff, the initial monetary investment is as big or small as you want. There's also a good amount of variance and replayability (I think. I haven't live-tested this).
Any thoughts here? Does this seem like a workable idea? What should 's unique skill be?
July 1, 2021 2:55 p.m.