Clockwork Wings: Comments

Actively seeking suggestions for steampunk mechanics. If you have any suggestions for how one could mechanically represent some steampunk concept on a Magic card, please add a comment to the cardset with your thoughts. Feel free to check out my current ideas for artifact mechanics and for coloured cards first.

Future Sight's Steamflogger Boss says "Other Rigger creatures you control get +1/+0. If a Rigger you control would assemble a contraption, it assembles two contraptions instead."

However there are no current 'contraptions' (even though it is an artifact type) and 'assemble' is undefined.

I suggest something along the lines of:

> GenericSignet
>
> Artifact - Contraption
> : Add to your mana pool.

and

> IcierManipulator
>
> Artifact - Contraption
> : Untap target artifact.

> Steamy Flogger
>
> Creature - Goblin Rigger Artificer
> ,: Assemble a contraption. (Attach target contraption you control to target artifact you control. The attached artifact is a contraption in addition to its other types and has the abilities of each contraption attached to it.)

So if you attached IcierManipulator to GenericSignet you get a contraption that has:

­: Add to your mana pool.
­: Untap target artifact.

That's just an idea though. If you like it let me know.

Thanks for the comment! I've been definitely considering what to do with Contraptions. The biggest problem is that Steamflogger Boss's ability is a replacement effect, so "Assemble" can't be targeted for the Boss's ability to make sense. I did have an idea that it could be a nontargeted version of what you describe:

­, : Assemble a Contraption from two artifacts you control. (Attach them together. The Contraption is a single artifact with the total abilities, types, power and toughness of all component artifacts.)

The normal solution to Contraptions is to have them be tokens: Assemble - When ~ ETBs, put a Contraption artifact token onto the battlefield with "At the beginning of your upkeep, sacrifice this artifact unless you pay ." Sacrifice a Contraption: Tap target creature.

The version I think I prefer, though, is this:

Assemble - , : Search your library for up to one Contraption card and put it onto the battlefield.

I think we're onto something. But how exactly are we defining a Contraption and the Assemble mechanic? My thinking of contraptions was that it would basically be equipment for artifacts in the form of other artifacts. So, a bunch of different artifacts could become one huge machine, or contraption in this case. In short, contraption is equipment, and assemble is equip - to an extent.

I also see that you've got this electrical, steam, radiation, thing going on. Is it like snow mana from Ice Age/Coldsnap?

Wording: I think Steam Flogger Boss could be given errata, or we could work around it. Steam Flogger Boss aside here is my take on it.

Assemble (Attach target artifact you control to target Contraption you control. The Contraption has all abilities and types, and combined power, toughness, and converted mana cost of each artifact attached to it.)

I don't think there's any point making Contraptions if you don't make them work with Steamflogger Boss. Steamflogger Boss is the reason and inspiration for Contraptions; what's the point in giving him errata? His wording is actually quite difficult to make something sensible work with, but that's the challenge; I can't see any point making something that "almost" works with Steamflogger Boss. Other people are welcome to, but it's all-or-nothing for me with Contraptions.

As for plugging artifacts together like equipment: heh. That's another of my ideas, heading for the same kind of feel, but with a different mechanical approach. The equipment-for-artifacts is a fun idea - I was going to call it Bolt-On, but my wife suggested the much better name Connector. The question is, what do you make them do? Almost all Equipment either modify power and toughness, or interact with combat in some other way. Fortifications were a great idea for one card (Darksteel Garrison), but they have the same problem if you try to make twenty of them: what do they do? I actually do have a plan for how to make Connectors relevant and present in enough quantities in the set, but I'd be curious to receive your thoughts, since our ideas have rather paralleled each other so far :)

And the different power types are like five more colours of mana, yes, except they go in your power pool. This would let me do things like make the power pool empty at different times than the mana pool, or behave differently in other ways, but I probably want to make it behave similarly to the mana pool to increase intuitive comprehensibility. It's basically five more mana types, to let the players plug lots of different artifacts together to transfer power between them and assemble random fun machines made of several artifacts to do something random.... a bit like what a contraption might be ;)

Steamflogger Boss is a challenge. Hmm, I'll have to think on it some more. Connector doesn't sound too bad. Could you give an example?

Some thoughts on the power types: Why not make each power type correspond with two enemy colors?

­: Steam, i.e. Steam Vents, Izzet Boilerworks

­: Radiation, i.e. Irradiation

­: Chemical, i.e. Evolution Vat

­: Electrical, i.e. Lightning Helix, Intimidation Bolt.

­: Torque

Not too sure about torque being . And if not as Radiation, then certainly , my thinking was that Green likes to grow, and Black likes making things sick. And as for Chemical being it just feels right to me. :D Anyway, I think your power types have potential, and flavor-wise, are pretty cool. How will one keep track of them? WIll they disappear like mana at the end of phases/turns? Or would they be accumulated i.e. 'they don't empty from your power pool'?

I had indeed planned that the power types would be each associated with two colours. Steam and Electrical are obvious. My correspondence beyond there would be Chemical , Radiation (including beams of light as well as Irradiate), and Torque as kinda left-over, though they are the two "untap" colours which helps with the "spinning" feel for Torque.

I could do things like make the power pool empty at different times than the mana pool, or behave differently in other ways. My current plan is that it'll behave similarly to the mana pool to increase intuitive comprehensibility. Alternatively, I could have it that when something gives you power, you need to spend it immediately - the very next ability you activate - to increase the feeling of these machines being connected together: if you let that steam or light-beam escape, it won't still be there an hour later to power the second half of your Doom Assembly.

Um, sorry if I suggested something you'd already though of, I don't mean to sound redundant. I should probably read the detail pages. :D

So it will be something like:

­: Add {Steam}{Steam}{Steam} to your power pool. Spend this only on the next spell you cast or the next ability you activate.

Right?

Nah, I only added the details pages after your last comments :) (And to type square brackets in comments, at the moment you have to escape them with backslashes: \[.)

I was thinking I could make power work like you describe, but it’d be implicit in the definition of power (so probably in reminder text on all the commons and uncommons). I'm not sure the flavour benefit is worth the fiddliness, though.

Do you think it'd be too confusing using the word "power" for [Steam], [Electrical] etc, when "power" already has a Magic meaning for a creature's attack strength? (Cf the two Magic uses of the word "counter", and the recent terminology change of "battlefield" and "cast" to avoid the duplication of the word "play".)

Interesting. I hadn't actually noticed the overlap until you just mentioned it, which implies it isn't confusing.

OTOH, you could always pick another synonym. Energy pool, perhaps?

I was going to suggest Energy & Energy Pool, myself but I was beaten to it.

Mmm, energy is a good plan.

Hm. Actually, I tried writing a few cards referring to "radiation energy" and "your energy pool" and so on, and I don't like it. It sounds too much like it could be talking about magical, mystical energy, rather than alchemical/technological energy. So I think I'll stick with power for the moment.

I'd just be a little dubious about adding another 5 different types of resource to the game (I add 3SCWU to my pools...). Also, it's rather a parasitic mechanic.

Re parasitism, that is a big concern. But you'll note that the large majority (75%ish) of cards which use power can still be used even if you have no other cards, usually because of activation costs of the form "[Torque] or ". This is very deliberate for precisely this reason.

As for 5 more different resources... yeah, that was GreenOpal's problem with it too. But generally, in how many games do you ever pass priority with unspent mana? Fewer than 1%, I'd reckon. Power types should be similar - at least that's my aim.

I agree with Alex. If you could only cast/activate with power it would be very parasitic but by providing alternate costs he has avoided this pitfall. Also, there is precedent for adding new resource types - look at Snow Mana and that is much more parasitic given that most snow mana activation costs don't have a choice for alternate costing.

Ooh, steampunk. Comments as of current state in multiverse.

I really love the flavour. It really captures steampunk.

Connectors are great. Whether they'll be comprehensible will need testing, but I think the basic idea is great for giving the feel of assembling a complex THING, without being too unmanageable or unmagiclike.

Hierarchy is cool. I feel like it might not be that different to "if you have 3 other creatures at all", but it feels right, and gives you a good reason to play small creatures.

Not sure about collaborate: simple and straightforward, but maybe too straifghtforward? EDIT: On reflection it probably plays well (cf. exalted), it just makes several collaborate creatures feel a bit samey, but that may not be bad.

Quirky, intermittent artefacts: I agree this is excellent flavour.

Power pool: I agree it's risky to introduce lots more resources, but also I agree the idea seems pretty balanced. I think it will definitely need updating, but I think the basic idea is (to my surprise) very sound. I agree with the large risk of memory problems, but also I think that your strategy of having the resources be comparatively rare solves it fine without the need for more complicated rules. If you've only one or two sources of power, then you won't be trying to juggle so many you'll forget: you typically will use them immediately anyway. I agree having some way of having them less linear is good, but also that the alternate costs fix make it much, much better.

I like all the energy flavours except for torque: I like the idea of torque, but I'm not positive it works as U/G.

I mostly like the mechanic/flavour/creature types for the colours.

I think Steamflogger Boss may be screwed. I thought from the moment I saw it that the joke was entertaining, but that "assemble a contraption" was something that was unlikely to ever have a meaning in magic rules, and our difficulties here, and Aaron Forsythe's admission that they didn't have anything in mind, seem to bear that somewhat out.

I want to include it somehow and agree that it's a welcome challenge, but I think we likely to end up having to compromise somehow...

Suggested constraints for contraptions:

• I'm happy to errata Steamflogger Boss a little bit so long as all the nouns stay in place. I'm not sure this helps, though.
• Contraptions must typically be assembled by other permanents (probably creatures, probably riggers)
• Contraption must be a subtype of artefact (can this be errata'd?)
• Assembling a contraption should be something good to do multiple times.
• Contraptions should fit the flavour of contraptions. (eg. combining two artefacts into one fits the flavour EXCELLENTLY. being a 1/1 creature with no abilities fits it much less)
• The idea of connectors is so cool for this set it probably wants to be the underlying mechanic for contraptions.

--

I will also keep any steampunk mechanics that occur to me in mind and send them on to you :)

EDIT: Hm. Perhaps if riggers tend to do non-repeatable it makes Boss relevant. Although, it still leaves the question of why it says "if a rigger would assemble a contraption" rather than "if you would assemble a contraption". It sounds more like dealing damage than doing anything to cards. (I don't think a creature with "T: exile target creature" can be described as "if a creature exiles another creature" can it?) It seems to imply lots of creatures can assemble equipment, but riggers are especially good at it. But if all cards that assemble equipment say so, it seems unfair only riggers get the bonus; it feels like it should be like equipment, where any creature can use equipment, but kor do it better. But what does assembling a contraption mean if anyone can do it? Should there be cards that say "1. Artefact -- Contraption. Assemble -- Tap a creature: exile two artefacts, ~ gains all the abilities of both of them?" maybe that would work but I still don't like it.

But if you can live without that, you could imagine:

Creature -- Goblin Rigger. Nibelung Steamflogger. 3R. 2/2. When ~ comes into play, you may exile two non-creature artefacts and assemble a contraption artefact token which has all the abilities of both.

Tribal Sorcery -- Rigger. Crazed tinkering. 1U. Exile two non-creature artefacts and assemble a contraption artefact token which has all the abilities of both.

Given that, as Alex stated are the two untap colours AND that is one of the tapping colours; Torque kinda makes sense as generated by the tap-untap-tap-untap-tap-etc.

Random thoughts on power pool and connectors from the decks we played last night:

The alternate "steam or 2U" and creatures with "steam: blah" abilities felt good. It seemed to successfully make power feel like it was very useful to have, without feeling cheated if you didn't have it.

I definitely liked the "power: get other power and blah" abilities, it felt very "hey, I assembled a contraption and it worked".

I commented before on how I got seventeen different infinite combos at once, but I think it was actually due to the specific coincidence of getting the torque-producing signet and the torque-to-untap-plus-steam connector in my opening hand. I'd assumed both were part of a cycle, but actually I think the untap one is the only card which untaps signets, so it may not be as general a problem as we feared.

I was going to suggest deciding which combinations to allow (eg. allowing infinite power production without the five-combo loop, but making sure it can only be sunk in ways which are useful but not gamewinning; or making sure all of the gamewinning sinks have an extra cost, even if only a small one; or having good sinks but restricting the potential infinite combos; or some combination). However, it may be that it was just that one combination that was prone to going infinite and if you tweak the Heat-Compression Centrifuge so it's not both an untap and part of the feedback cycle you may find that you don't have any two-card problems, and maybe not even any three or four card problems.

But as I said before, it was very fun to play with even when we weren't sure what we were doing, and much less confusing than I'd feared: the connectors were somewhat hard to evaluate in abstract, but despite our fears, I thought they were pretty easy to see what to do with when you played them.

The first game, Vitenka ended up with one or two "Tap: blah" artifacts, and a whole lot of "when connected artifact is tapped, tap this and blah" connectors, and chained them all together, but it felt unfortunate it didn't really seem to make any difference whether the connectors went on the other connectors or on the artifact. And OK, it's simpler if the chain isn't too complicated, but I wasn't sure if that was just coincidence or something to look at.

I hadn't paid much attention to the trolls before, but I liked them when I played with them. I'd worried a deck of defence would be too non-interactive, but it wasn't (except by coincidence in deckbuilding). I'm curious how good they would be with rolling stones, since they're designed to have good stats and abilities, although I don't think you need to worry especially as (a) the colours are different and (b) they're not in any format together, so if they're too good, people can just not play them together.

My notes from first playtest:

• The Connectors and Power decks felt somewhat noninteractive. Try to make the connectors and power cards do things that interact with opponents more, such as tapping their creatures, rather than things that only interact with your own stuff.
• Every deck needs 4 artifact removal. Every deck should expect those it's facing to have 4 artifact removal. The decks need more utility generally (I already knew this).
• Other cards I want: a reach troll. A 2-drop pilot.

Jack: Yeah, I fear Heat-Compression Centrifuge is definitely problematic. More discussion on that one on its own page. The only other card that can untap other artifacts is Temporal Stutterer, which is also one to keep a close eye on, but its expense means it's probably okay.

I'm very glad the power cards plugging into each other felt good when it worked without feeling wrong when it didn't.

I had realised that several connectors in a chain don't really care whether they're attached to the source or each other. I agree this is somewhat of a pity, but it doesn't really interfere with gameplay. I'd like to find solutions if there are any elegant ones, but I don't like (say) ruling that each artifact can only have one connector.

­Rolling Stones actually only works on Walls. Wakestone Gargoyle or Warmonger's Chariot could be quite effective, but by that point, you've spent enough mana that it's fine.

So... even I managed an infinite combo with your connector deck. But it was fun.

The "Big pile of connectors" was kinda annoying though, I had artifacts equipped with three artifacts, each equipped with an artifact or two... it got more confusing than a village idiot. Not sure what to suggest there.

"Try to make the connectors and power cards do things that interact with opponents more, such as tapping their creatures"

Seems like a good plan.

"I’d like to find solutions if there are any elegant ones, but I don’t like (say) ruling that each artifact can only have one connector."

Yeah. I'm not sure how far to go with it, because on the one hand it felt a little silly with seven artifacts all connected up, but on the other hand, I think it would have been harder to represent visually if it was vital to connect them in some other order and maintain tapped states separately. I think (pure guess) the rules are probably fine, it was just that there are many "when connected artifact becomes tapped, tap this" connectors and Vitenka drew all of them at once.

If you wanted to tweak things, you could consider variants like: Add connector effects which scale in effect or cost with the converted mana cost of the artifact? Have some one-shot untap effects, or other "enhance this effect" effects? Have connectors not themselves tap to grant a "when artifact taps" effect?

I was trying to think of a connector which would enhance equipment (or artifact creatures), but your comment about designing interesting fortifications and connectors being difficult was apt. The only variants I could come up with were explicitly increasing P/T bonuses, explicitly duplicating the equipment, or giving it an cheaper/instant re-equip ability.

"Rolling Stones actually only works on Walls"

Oh, good point.

People were hoping for a troll that could ping creatures. I'm cautious of making one of those for fear it could be too effective at stalling. What I might make is a green troll that can ping flyers, following in the footsteps of Matsu-Tribe Sniper etc. I'm hoping that that along with Bladetrap Recluse would provide enough ping to satisfy players without letting the trolls just dominate.

The pilots and hierarchy cards in the Pilots deck left qqzm saying "I can't believe I'm hoping to topdeck an Ornithopter!" Which sounds like just the right kind of inversion of expectations :)

"I don’t like (say) ruling that each artifact can only have one connector."

And yet this seems to be the most elegant solution. Modify Connect to read "Attach this to target unconnected artifact you control".

That has the downside that it's harder if you want to reorder your connectors (say, you have one that triggers on tapping but doesn't tap itself, so you want to put it at the end of the chain); but it also opens up design space for, eg, artifacts and connectors that expliticly allow doubling up (although the wording would have to be careful, since Connect targets...)

Random thought; you could have "Connect M (M: Attach this to target artifact you control. Attach each other connector attached to that artifact to this". That way Connectors "slot in" to the middle of existing chains.

Alex: Good point on trolls. I agree a flyer sniper would be a good choice. Another possibility would be a one-shot "target creature untaps and attacks" ability if there isn't one already, to increase the number of ways the trolls interact with opposing creatures.

Jack: Just created Wingpiercer Recluse and Troll Warlord, which hit both your suggestions along with a Rolling-Stones-type effect.

Chris: Very interesting suggestion. The big stroke against is is that it's different to how Equip and Fortify work. I'm trying to make the mechanics as intuitive as possible, and so I've got the power pool behaving just like the mana pool, and connect behaving just like equip and fortify; my design instincts say that otherwise people will misplay them all over the place. Nonetheless, I'll give it some thought.

I would like to point out that connect can't attach something to itself, so it would only be a slight functional change if the ability said "another target artifact you control."

Did a pass looking at the CMCs of active cards. White had too many 3-drops and not enough 4-drops, so I moved MW02 Decorated Skycolonel to 4 mana. Blue has no 4-drop creatures and 5 3-drop creatures, so one or two of them need to grow a bit. Red has 3 2-drop creatures, 5 3-drop creatures and only 1 4-drop, so I need to space out the red 3-drops. Green on the other hand has 1 1-drop creature, 6 2-drop creatures and 2 3-drop creatures, so I need to space out the green 2-drops.

In artifacts things look pretty good, but I don't yet have any 3-mana artifact creatures with power 2, so I'll make some of them when filling the remaining artifact creature slots.

Working towards doing a draft soon.

Mechanics that are currently very good: Hierarchy, Pilots / artifact flyers, Deathtrap.

Mechanics that are fine, good enough to keep for the moment: Collaborate, Trolls / defender

Mechanics that may be reexamined or cut if they don't work well in the draft: Backstab, power, connectors

Potential mechanics to introduce if I do cut power or connectors: Charge counters, contraptions

I did a Pointing pass on the set, now the skeleton is virtually complete. Obviously these are just one person's views of how good each card would be in limited.

While acknowledging that you can't perform arithmetic on pointing values directly, I thought the average for each colour would be interesting. That came out at:

| White|Blue |Black|Red|Green|Artifacts| ---|---------|-------|------|------|------|-----| Common | 1.89 | 1.86 | 2.14 | 1.86 | 1.93 | 1.61 C+U | 1.80 | 1.84 | 2.06 | 1.84 | 1.94 | 1.75 All | 2.03 | 2.00 | 2.28 | 1.93 | 2.06 | 1.86

So I seriously need to take down black's power level. I knew Deathtrap was good, but I hadn't realised how crazily solid and deep the colour was, especially at common.

Otherwise the colours seem pretty balanced; close enough to try drafting, anyway.

I was surprised to see how low the artifacts are compared to the colours; there are certainly plenty of playable artifacts, but I guess there are quite a few not-so-great ones as well, particularly most of the connectors. I'm not entirely happy with the situation of connectors, but otherwise I think the artifacts in the set are fine.

An idea that occurred to me for the connectors is as follows. Most Magic cards' names are nouns: artifacts, creatures and lands most obviously, but enchantments and auras and equipment as well. Many sorceries and instants' names are verbs - things like Negate, Erase, Wrap in Vigor, Rise from the Grave and so on - although there are also a number of sorcs/insts with nouns for names too.

I was musing that one fun thing to do with connectors would be to give them names that are adjectives. So rather than a Cogniccelerator with an Autonomy Processor and an Oscillation Sharpener, you'd have an (((Autonomous))), (((Razor-Oscillatory))) Cogniccelerator. (The same trick could in principle be applied to Auras, but hasn't been so far.)

The counterindicatory fear is that this would end up sounding a bit too silly. What do people think?

(You could also argue I'm putting the cart before the horse here, of course. I probably need to make Connectors play well first, before I make them named in an interesting way. I think this idea presupposes that I somehow managed to achieve that, otherwise I'll have to just cut the idea entirely.)

It's only now that I've managed to start looking at the other sets here on Multiverse, and I must say - wow, good job. Professionally done, the cardlist excites me, etc etc. Haha. How much playtesting has been done with this set?

Yay, thank you. That is good to hear.

I've not done as much playtesting as I'd like with the set, actually. I built a bunch of theme decks to be played against each other, made a bunch of changes based on the results, updated the theme decks and repeated the process.

I've been meaning to print some boosters out for a draft for months now. I keep not getting around to it, due to working on Multiverse features or the board game which I created and have been playtesting for a little while now.

So it's quite possible that some major aspects of the set still aren't actually good at all. In particular, although the Connectors seem a lot of fun conceptually, the initial playtest indications are that they might not be much fun in-game; they're either useless or non-interactive.