Hello there!
The title isn't even accurate anymore as I am currently building on the 2.1 version of my set. Set you ask, yes set, a rarity based draft format of ~ 250 individual cards. It's basically my own version ofMondern Masters. I'll post the introduction of Chris' Set-Thread because I'm too lazy to write those things down myself. My situation should be about the same except some of the number's might have changed. Here is the List!
UB Faeries, still good.
RB Aristocrats
RG Stuff that interacts with lands(rather unfocused)
GW +/+ Counters n' Pants
BW Ghost Dad
GB Compost/Morbid
UG Faeries wearing Pants
UR Cheap Spells/Arcane Mill
RW Most Heroic Aura Aggro
Apart from that there are some subthemes and build around cards:
The title isn't even accurate anymore as I am currently building on the 2.1 version of my set. Set you ask, yes set, a rarity based draft format of ~ 250 individual cards. It's basically my own version of
Based loosely on the set design of Modern and Vintage Masters (color-pair archetypes and modal-archetype card choices), I started building cubes in frantic attempts to recreate the "Masters draft feel". After several marginal cube iterations, there was only one clear way (in my demented mind) to create the experience that I desired: build a fantasy set.
I knew the workload to build a fantasy set was beyond reasonable, but the true depth of mind and manual labor didn't make itself apparent until later into the design process. (And by then, I had already reached the point of no return.) Initially, I broke down some of my favorite draft format archetypes (self-mill in ISD; all VMA archetypes, but especially goblins) and then the formats by removal/evasion/creature-to-spell ratios among common and uncommon rarities to set up mathematical guidelines for my set and archetypes. (Much to my surprise, only about 45 percent of common and uncommon cards are creatures; maybe that's why conventional drafts often feel like they have so much dreck.)
(...)
To recreate the set feel, beyond grouping cards by fantasy rarity levels, I looked into developing print runs. (If you don't know much about print runs, I highly recommend this article by Laura Mills:http://magic.tcgplayer.com/db/article.asp?ID=6995) Print runs allow for certain cards to appear more frequently paired with other unique cards (i.e., one positioning of Treasure Mage, a 4-card uncommon-slot inclusion, is with Triskelion and Etherium-Horn Sorcerer 2-3 slots away in either direction), as well as creating different chances of a particular rarity of card appearing in a set of packs (as seen above). Lastly, print runs help to balance color distribution within boosters through simple pattern management (using WUBRG for common1 and WBGUR for common2 to guarantee no more than 3 of any particular color of common and at least 1 of each). The print run design has been the most difficult part of this project, and I hope to slowly start tweaking them after 5 or 10 drafts.
Issues with Version 1.0
As the title suggests this isn't the first time I am trying to get this thing going. I had some issues with the first version and therefore stopped working on it for quite some time until I got motivated again and build the whole thing again with different themes and ideas in mind. There were a number of issues I had with the original version:
- Too many playables: This might be the biggest issue of such projects, only inserting good or at least playable cards into the set creates the issue of people having to cut ~6-10 cards from their deck that are perfectly fine and in their (two) colors. This makes deckbuilding harder than I would want it to be(the last time my more inexperienced drafters were just tossing me all their cards and asked me to build the deck for them). It also makes reading signals much harder which again ends up in feel bads.
- Strong mono colored decks: This has to do with the first point but also with the in color balance, colors(esp. Blue) had enough inbuild synergy that players didn't need to go into other colors to have a strong balanced deck, I was trying to change that a bit in the new version but at the same time I don't want to cut down on fun cards. Does anyone have an idea on how to tackle this issue?
- Way too many flyers. Also the combat interaction's between creatures weren't really where I wanted them. I guess that has to do with my somewhat schizophrenic design as I want some of the retail limited feel but with stronger cards.
- Some rares being too impactful. Cards like Whip of Erebos have since been cut, but I feel like that is still something to look out for. I feel like especially cards that aren't easily answered and come down somewhat early are problematic.
- Reliability vs. Diversity. Some people were annoyed because they felt that they weren't seeing some of the commons as reliably as they wanted/needed. On the other hand diversity which leads to replayability is a huge thing I want to encourage as I am putting quite some time into this project.
Goals
- Create a limited environment that profits from the possibilities that printruns and rarity levels create. (the ability to somewhat enable tribal, and more niche archetypes)
- Archetype diversity (I want tempo decks to be a thing [aggressive and disruptive decks that attack on multiple levels(read: interact with bouncelands)])
- Intersections between archetypes or in other words, drafting specific archetypes shouldn't feel too much like on rails.
- Format depth and cool interactions.
- The combat step shoudl matter.
- A good balance between removal and answers(who would've guessed that!?)
The Set-Up
The whole thing consists of 252 different cards distributed in four different rarity levels:
- 60 individual Common 1, 6 in each pack
- 48 individual Common 2, 4 in each pack (I might mess with the c2 in the future)
- 80 individual Uncommon, 4 in each pack
- 60 individual Rares, 1 in each pack
As for lands I'm using a mixture of Bouncelands(at uncommon) and KTK gain lands(at both c1 and c2) plus a "lonely" Terramorphic Expanse at c2. I added much more lands than the last time as I am hoping they would deal with the issues 1) and 2) in providing both fixing and non-spell picks.
The Themes
I tried
to provide every guild with a theme and added some cross color shenanigans to provide some depth and give people more space to experiment with. The themes I wanted to include are the following:
UB Faeries, still good.
RB Aristocrats
RG Stuff that interacts with lands(rather unfocused)
GW +/+ Counters n' Pants
BW Ghost Dad
GB Compost/Morbid
UG Faeries wearing Pants
UR Cheap Spells/Arcane Mill
RW Most Heroic Aura Aggro
Apart from that there are some subthemes and build around cards:
I need your help!
The whole thing is still under construction and nothing is really set in stone. I'm unsure about some things. I need your ideas on the following:
- Ways to tackle the issues I described above
- The big overlap between RB and GB making those decks too strong. I was toying with the idea to make the RB theme more like Big Red (Control) but I don't really have an image of how that could look like
- Rarities are pretty hard to balance, I don't want too many strong cards in lower rarities(c1 or c2), removal might need to be more rare
- Inbalance of archetypes/colors, cards that are simply too high a powerlevel
- Suggestions of cards that I could've missed, especially fun rares