What does it take to make a new format? Plus a request for testing
The Kitchen Table forum
Posted on Jan. 30, 2022, 1:09 p.m. by legendofa
Main question There's a recent thread about why Oathbreaker hasn't become a significant format, and every once in a while a thread comes along claiming to present a new format. A lot of the time, it's Commander with some extra rules, or Legacy but with a modified draw step, or something. (I'm not trying to bash the people who come up with these, I always enjoy reading them. But they do tend to start "It's like EDH but with the following changes:...") I'm also going to add Emperor as a format that hasn't really gotten off the ground. So what, in your mind, does it take to make a new format? Can this community create one?
Request for help Also, because I always have to push my own stuff, I humbly request playtesters for a system that uses M:tG cards as a D&D-style RPG. I developed the idea over the last couple years and haven't had an opportunity to actually try it.
Rules It's probably easiest and cheapest to make it a Cube variant (showing off what I said up there) for 4-6 people. Basically, all players draft the cube as normal, build decks as normal, and then start playing. One person is designated the Game Manager (GM).
Overview: As an RPG, it's more story-based than typical Magic games. Everyone except the GM forms a group. The GM describes a situation, and the group respond to it through skills (described below) or combat (typically Horde Magic, Archenemy, or one of the Theros Hero's Path or other event decks). Combat is typical Magic play, in the formats listed.
Skills: Skills are grouped by color, and try to match or exceed a difficulty set by the GM (and this is the part where I need help). Instead of rolling dice, you shuffle your deck and reveal the top five card, counting the number of mana symbols of the appropriate color. An easy difficulty would be 1-2, moderate is 3, and difficult is 4-5.
: Heal, Persuade, Insight
: Insight, Magic Knowledge, Stealth
: Stealth, Lie, Scare
: Scare, ???, Strength
: Strength, Nature Knowledge, Heal
Each color shares a skill with each ally, and has one unique skill (and I don't have any ideas for ).
Game Master: The GM's job is to describe the environment and the people in it. It helps if they have some pre-constructed thematic Horde Magic decks, like Zombies or a wildfire-based one. If using a self-piloting deck, like Horde Magic or an event deck, they are allowed and expected to use their Cube deck with the group. They can represent the Archenemy in an Archenemy fight (usually acting as the final boss), or they can select a volunteer to take that role. The story doesn't need to be too deep, but it should allow each deck to succeed through both skills and combat.
I developed this game style largely to take advantage of the Plane chase cards, Archenemy cards, and Hero's Path decks I have lying around, and I think it could be interesting as a simplified RPG using cards instead of dice. It just doesn't translate well to online play, and I haven't been able to get enough people and a cube together. If anyone has the resources and interest, could you please give it a shot and let me know?
TypicalTimmy says... #3
Okay, suppose the GM describes the scene:
- "After several daunting days of tracking Neils, Swift-Blade through the Canopy of Darkness, your party loses his trail. Upon the floor of a ravine you find a bit of smoke billowing out of what appears to be chimneys. Securing a path down the ravine is easily enough done, though climbing back up might pose an issue. It takes your party about three hours, the sun now caressing the horizon, as you approach the village. The stench of burnt lumber, wet ash, blood-soaked mud and carrion rot lingers within the air. You find that the gentle wisps of smoke were not emanating from chimneys, but rather structures of all kinds."
So, what happens next? Does the GM ask for an Insight Check of, say, 4 or greater and each player shuffles their library and reveals the top five cards - hopefully finding at least 4 pips of from among them to know what happened? It's pretty obvious what happened in this scenario; The village was run over by some sort of horrible tragedy, but what that tragedy actually was we yet do not know.
So what happens if no player is playing blue? They can find pips instead? Or if someone runs Azorius or Esper or Bant, finding a combination of and will suffice? Alternatively, what if one player finds and another player finds ? Does the party succeed as their total count is 5, which is 4 or greater for the CR - Challenge Rating?
And lastly, what happens if they succeed, or fail?
I think the easiest thing to do would be to take a good, hard look at the skills available across D&D and slot them in appropriately. For example, I basically play Pathfinder 1E exclusively, and we have a ton of Knowledge based skills. Knowledge: Religion, Knowledge: Dungeoneering, Knowledge: Nobility, etc. Religion and Nobility would obviously find home in but Dungeoneering would nicely fit into . Meanwhile, all Knowledge would be snug in . Meaning finding or would work for Knowledge: Dungeoneering, whereas or works for Knowledge: Religion.
Given that 5th Edition has like, less than a third (possibly even less than a quarter) of the total skills of Pathfinder 1E, you may find it much easier to slot everything in.
So let's assume that the CR mandates a Horde Magic deck. Does everybody shuffle up and now play a game of Magic until the Horde is defeated, at which point more story is "unlocked"?
This could be a Zombie attack, a Vampire attack, a Warrior attack, a Devil attack. It could even be Niles himself.
What if it is Tibalt? Would you rather run an Archenemy EDH deck with Valki, God of Lies Flip?
January 30, 2022 4:52 p.m.
Grubbernaut says... #4
A new format has to do something meaningfully different, while being understandable. For some comparisons; standard is unique in that its card pool is extremely limited and changed. Modern and legacy play very differently, despite the same mechanical deckbuilding restrictions, due to the extreme variance in their card pools. However, for the most part, pioneer is not "different enough" for it to truly catch on; it tried/tries to capture what old modern felt like, but can't pull through. And, of course, EDH is completely different in having more players and crazy deckbuilding mechanics.
Another example of "not different enough" is how Conquest compares to EDH. It's different, yes, but it's clearly competing with EDH. I think for a new format to have a chance at any kind of success (which, to be blunt, seems extremely unlikely with the popularity of EDH and modern, right now), it needs to offer something truly unique, but also accessible and understandable to a regular player.
The system you've described above sounds interesting, but way too complex to attract a wider audience. The target crowd would be people already experienced in both MtG and D&D, which is cool, but very limited.
January 30, 2022 5:37 p.m.
TypicalTimmy says... #5
If what I described above is close enough to how the game functions, then it's basically a mixture between Archenemy and Horde Magic - both of which I love, but with story elements thrown into the mix. Which does make it feel like D&D + MTG, but the concern is that these two systems often do not translate properly. While both in D&D and MTG you can hone in for a specific build, the difference comes in how you play.
MTG is often explained like Chess + Poker. You need to be able to evaluate strategy and execute ahead, while also knowing when to bluff and call and balance card percentages.
D&D is more about intuition and adjustments on the fly. It's about puzzle solving - How can I get out of this situation with the information I have available at hand right now?
For example, if in D&D you are stripped naked and put into an anti-magic cell, you can still manage to escape through roleplay and through inspection of your environments. Your DM may reveal that you have noticed a guard is asleep, another guard seems to casually "sneak a peak" at one of your members, another guard appears to be drunk and you have found that the cobblestone bricks that make up your cell are old and worn.
How do you escape? Luer the creepily flirtatious guard over and have the member of the party who he was inappropriately eyeing up open dialog, meanwhile slipping him or her a sharpened shard of brick. Have them attempt to seduce, then kill, the creepy guard.
Likewise, if you think your party member isn't up to this task (Perhaps he or she is a frail caster so melee isn't a good idea), you can try to flirt with the guard with your rogue or ranger.
Similarly, you can call over the drunk and try to intimidate him into a fight.
Or you can make a ton of noise to wake the sleeping guard, in hopes he becomes so angry that he comes over to try and shut you up.
Or you can try to Shawshank Redemption your way out of the situation and bore a hole through the worn cobblestone.
Or bribe the drunk guard with Elven wine when you escape, or the lustful guard with a harem.
Lots of options exist, which is where the roleplay elements stem from. But these elements lack in MTG when you sit down with a deck that you built and the goal is to piece together enough cards to win the game. There is no story there - only action and consequence.
So if you end up in a situation like the aforementioned prison scene, even if you reveal enough of the proper pips to succeed at the CR, I'm not sure how the constructed decks would translate appropriately into the individual scenes. They may work wonderfully for BBEG and Horde combat, but I don't think they would translate well into the rest of the game - which is about 95% of it.
January 30, 2022 5:58 p.m.
Grubbernaut basically spelled it out. A new format needs to offer a new experience that other formats do not. Hence why It's-Like-EDH-but-Different formats fail to catch on, because you can just do the same stuff in EDH that you can do in the new format, but without any weird restrictions or additional hoops to jump through.
EDH offers something new by allowing you to configure a deck in a completely different way, which in the end achieves a different style of gameplay from 60-card/4-of decks.
Pauper offers something new by selecting a unique card pool with immense variety to draw from. No other format uses the same card pool, and commons are generally low-powered cards. Thus the format was inherently already pretty balanced, and offered a new experience because of this.
Also, legendofa said something that I think got overlooked until now. "Can this community create one?" I believe the answer to this is Yes. TO has got a ton of creative individuals with a deep knowledge of the game, card interactions and play experience. All you'd have to do is ask yourselves, what else can we do with these pieces of cardboard that isn't being done already? What do people want, and can these cards provide that? And I don't mean what do people in general want, like, world peace or social acceptance. I mean, what are most people who attempt to promote a new format trying to achieve? A recurring theme I have seen in new formats is "budget". Oftentimes people will try to recreate Penny Dreadful IRL, for instance.
January 30, 2022 6:10 p.m.
legendofa, TypicalTimmy: Sorry to double-post on ya, but I once had a similar idea (and still do, technically), or maybe more of a compatible idea.
The idea was for an evolving series of games of Magic where you "evolve" through different formats as you play. Players would start off with "Pack Battle" sized-decks. (Pack Battle is where you open up a booster pack without looking at the cards, shuffle in 3 of each basic land, and play a "blind" game of Magic to 10 life points each.) So players would build a thirty card deck to start. Or perhaps a twenty card "jumpstart style" deck instead.
Meanwhile The DM/GM would pre-build a deck specifically designed to present the other players with story/threats/events. Instead of playing like normal, the DM could shuffle and reveal cards from the top of deck, and then they would construct some story based on those cards (but the DM, having built this deck themselves, would have some idea for what kind of adventure they were going to run).
Rather than play "full" games of Magic, players would play cards and go through phases as long as there are threats on the board (meaning the DM revealed a creature from the top of their deck). Otherwise, maybe the rest of the game is actually assigning values to cards and using them like "action points," as described in the OP.
But then, as the game progresses, players would "level up," and let's say for now that Level three is a 40 card deck, like in Limited formats. So maybe then lvl 4 is a full card deck. I guess the ultimate goal would have been to evolve into an EDH player? lol or something lol
January 30, 2022 6:42 p.m.
Skill could be: taunting (goading), seduction, -- charisma?, luck, instinct, speed. Old school DnD had "use magic item" which was a hilarious skill for non-magic-users to instinctually activate magic equipment - pretty skill.
January 30, 2022 7:11 p.m.
skills would also probably include anything pertaining to theft & larceny
January 30, 2022 7:14 p.m.
TypicalTimmy If two colors share a skill, then pips of each color count as successes. If you want to check Insight, and you show a Counterspell and a Vindicate, that's three successes: from Counterspell, from Vindicate, and the doesn't contribute. For more advanced rules, hybrid mana counts as one success, regardless of the colors. Also, as a possible optional rule, if a revealed card name makes sense for context of the check, that grants an additional success. For example, if you make a Strength check and show a Brute Force, that counts as +1 from and +1 for the thematic name.
Generally, I see it as an individual pass/fail. If the player wants to try to sneak in somewhere, the will likely either hold back or find another way in, similar to a stealthy rogue/tanky fighter dynamic. Maybe extra successes can be "donated" to another player to help them pass. I tried to streamline the skill system so that a) it didn't become overloaded and b) each color would be reasonably balanced, with individual strengths and weaknesses.
Events after a success or failure are basically as D&D: You sneak around the guard, or they catch you. You gain all the information you need for your research, or you gain partial information and need to find a way to get more.
Most of the game will probably be actual Magic play, and the skills have basically two main purposes. First, they connect the combats together to tell a simple story. Second, they could adjust the difficulty of a combat--a group failure may result in starting with lower life totals, or a strong success may cut the size of a Horde deck in half.
Grubbernaut Uniqueness is part of it, but there are formats like Pack Wars or Tower that use unique rules without gaining wide appeal. Do they just not satisfy any market need, for lack of a better term? As for my intended audience, my playgroup was (yes, past tense, sadly) willing and able to break out either D&D or Magic on any given night, so maybe I'm a bit spoiled that way. I see this mostly as a way to add some variety to a group's Magic night, not something that's going to be public access at a Pro Tour or whatever. Also, I haven't heard of Conquest--what's that one?
Gattison Your idea sounds interesting. It's kind of like a deckbuilding game as part of the regular game, if I'm understanding right? And would it be worth it to get the T/O community to help develop?
Gleeock Seduction would be an interesting choice. Maybe more like Charm than Seduce, make it a little broader in scope. I think theft/larceny would fall more to and , depending on circumstances.
January 31, 2022 12:01 a.m.
legendofa for theft & larceny I was thinking sortof along the line of luck/looting/pillaging type of vein. I it is a little nebulous but I think of the Curse of Opulence, Thieves' Auction sortof thing. That special chaotic something where you just "have it" when it comes to looting or you know how to flip things for a quick penny. Or when you ransack an opponent or property you just have that "it factor" where you just happen to find the right stuff... After all if Chunk was not at heart, he wouldn't have blundered his way into One-eyed Willy's treasure map :) (Goonies example)
January 31, 2022 10:39 a.m.
DragonWolf420 says... #12
Grubbernaut: how is pioneer not "different enough" than modern? the decks are all completely different.
February 1, 2022 1:48 p.m.
tonystark8 says... #13
Another arrangement needs to accomplish something definitively unique, while being justifiable. For certain correlations; standard is novel in that its card pool is amazingly restricted and changed. Present day and inheritance play in an unexpected way, notwithstanding the equivalent mechanical deckbuilding limitations, because of the outrageous change in their card pools. Notwithstanding, generally, trailblazer isn't "Adequately different" for it to genuinely get on; it attempted/attempts to catch what old current felt like, yet can't get through. What's more, obviously, EDH is totally divergent in having more players and insane deckbuilding mechanics. thanks
February 1, 2022 3:55 p.m.
Grubbernaut says... #14
DragonWolf420 It doesn't play differently enough. It's modern with less cards. Regardless, if we take the most popular 15 decks from goldfish, the only decks I see that aren't very obviously ported from modern or standard are Jeggy, maybe the mono B list, and the orzhov humans list (which is, at the end of the day, just another Lurrus deck).
I actually like pioneer, personally, but the fact that it didn't take off didn't come from nowhere. Most people (at least, who aren't playing EDH) left to return to modern and/or standard, which is what Pioneer is competing with. When you restrict a card pool, but don't restrict it tightly enough, it can feel bland. Pauper's restriction is more "unique," by comparison, and while it'll never compete with mainline formats, the restriction is what keeps it interesting; in pioneer, the restriction can feel like more of a hassle than a cool feature. It's basically modern, but two or three turns slower, with worse mana. Very similar to why Conquest isn't a thing versus EDH.
February 1, 2022 4:51 p.m.
DragonWolf420 says... #15
Grubbernaut um...tron? i'd say that alone makes the format different enough. the reason pioneer "didn't take off" isn't because it isn't different enough from modern. there were plenty of unnecessarily banned cards, plus the format was created right before the pandemic hit. you can even look it up on the pioneer wiki that the pandemic "gave the impression of a dead format".
February 2, 2022 midnight
Grubbernaut says... #16
I disagree. One different deck doesn't make for a sufficiently different format. But I know you like to argue.
February 2, 2022 9:22 a.m.
possibly add custom cards like "planes" from planechase, that are adventures you need to complete?
like you need to pass certain skill checks and complete certain goals,like doing a certain amount of damage to a player, or have a certain amount of cards in all graveyards.
July 15, 2023 11:25 p.m.
Jimmithee I have to admit, I haven't done anything with this idea in the last year and a half. The "adventure" idea is an interesting addition. My initial thought was that the story would be advanced through gameplay and group development, but the adventure cards would give some concrete goals.
TypicalTimmy says... #2
I'll read this more when I'm not on the road but I'm down for this. Sounds fun.
Also, shout-out to me. It's me. I'm the new Oathbreaker thread lololol
January 30, 2022 1:58 p.m.