u/QuadoraTCG

I am starting to make the art for my tcg, but I have no idea what to use for making the card design.
I am mainly working off of this from my phone (just cause I’m away from my PC a lot) so any help on what apps for IOS or Android would help.
Any ideas for ones that improve work load would help a lot.

Right now I have been play testing my game a lot.
The game has a deck life and gravemana system.(Before i get lots of comments about deck life systems, I have a post about it already).

Those systems that I have made work really well together and I have been enjoying the play-testing with other people. But I feel like the game is really missing something.

There is a cool objective for the player (reduce ur opponent’s deck to 0), cool mana system (exile cards from the discard pile for mana cost), which creates a fun feedback loop of play cards to play more cards.

But for secondary objectives on board I feel like it’s lacking. For example of what I mean for “secondary objectives” I mean Digimon/Pokemon has evolving, riftbound has movement and battlefields, yugioh has summon mechanics. Things that players do that are imbedded into the “board” of the games mechanics.

My game is like a fast paced MTG in terms of how’s cards act while on the board. With a single number for play cost and the attack stat being the same as the health stat.

With this being said the gameplay is fun just feels like it’s missing something.

I have play tested with
- adding “leader” cards that give deck stipulations and give additional effects to build to.
- adding evolving
- adding battlegrounds that change the rules of the game.

- What are some ways that people have come up with their own systems on board?
- Are there other specific TCGs that I should look at for inspiration?
- (if your ok sharing) a system that you think would work for my game?

Right now I’m deciding between 2 different draw systems. I can’t decide between the 2. I like each one for separate reasons and they change the core tempos of the game.

draw 1
- this is common and feels natural to most players within a tcg
- promotes a more methodical play style
- promotes having more impactful cards then just lots of small units

Draw till 5
- promotes playing all cards at once
- fast passed game
- promotes more smaller cards then individual cards
- loses slow methodical plays
- loses a lot of “card tempo” and “card advantage”

What are people’s opinion on these systems and what do people prefer?

There are many ways to playtest your game. Right now I am in a phase for my game where I am playtesting a lot. I was wondering what are ways that other people playtest there games and the process that the do it in. Aswell as what are key things you may pay attention to or ask players of your game.

For me I am playing a lot by myself and taking it to locals early to get other people’s feedback on things. Right now my method to play testing at locals is pretty vague: writing down people’s thoughts, times when the game seems unfun for a specific player, cards that are used un intentionally, etc.

(this may be different for everyone’s games)

For my tcg your health is tracked by the amount of cards within your deck. And your mana is tracked by the amount of cards within your graveyard.

I am now designing the system for this. I need advice on any “red flags” that might come of the system I have made and if you know how to mitigate it.

decklife system:

Your health is equal to the amount of cards within your deck, when you take damage from an opponents unit or spell, u exile the amount of damage from the top of the deck face up (skipping the grave). I have made it skip the grave to not punish the player for attacking too much by giving the opponent more mana to work with.

When you have 0 cards in deck, you only lose when you attempt to draw. When a card is exiled it is not a check for if you lose.

Grave Mana system:

For your first turn u will mill one card from the top of ur deck to allow for plays. To play a 1 cost unit, u have to exile 1 card from your grave and for a 2, cost two card, etc.

I’m hoping with a simple system like this I can more easily balance the game. But if there is anything that straight away seems to be an issue please let me know.

As the title says, yugioh, mtg and riftbound for example, all have varying degrees of importance on the lore for the game. I was wondering for my own tcg the level of importance it has to the game and how much others value it as a core part.

how detailed is the lore within the cards?

and

how do you convey your lore through the cards?

I have never made a TCG before and I have never made art before so I am learning to do everything as I go along. I have played lots of tcgs so I think that I have a good idea on how they work.

Quadora is played mainly in a 1v1 competitive format. As for the game loops: The mana system is tied to the health system. As to playing cards, you must exile the cost from your grave, and when you attack your opponent they exile cards from the top of there deck as the damage. The way you win is decking out the opponent.

Personally for me I don’t like dealing with all of the extra riffraff that comes with deck building (extra deck, points trackers, battlefields, etc) so I am trying to design the game where all you need is main deck and maybe a champion card. Life is kept track by how many cards are still in your deck, and mana is kept track by how many cards are in your graveyard. This keeps a streamline system with lots of breathing room for development.

I feel excited to start this journey and show my progress here. This is my first attempt at this so any help is greatly appreciated.

If there are videos people recommend or specific Redditor’s to go through there pages to help me get an idea that would be greatly appreciated too.