Crossovers are back! This time Otter jumps on the pod to explain the board game Spirit Island to Tim. Despite being an area-control cooperative game, it has a ton of cool rules to adapt over into Magic. These Crossover eps are a great way to get the best tidbits from another game while also brainstorming tons of new Magic ideas!
Check out a few of the Spirits (main characters) to get a quick idea of the choices in the game:
Vital Strength of the Earth: https://spiritislandwiki.com/index.php?title=Vital_Strength_of_the_Earth#tab=null
Shroud of Silent Mist: https://spiritislandwiki.com/index.php?title=Shroud_of_Silent_Mist
Ocean’s Hungry Grasp: https://spiritislandwiki.com/index.php?title=Ocean%27s_Hungry_Grasp
Scryfall gallery of cards mentioned
Topics and Tidbits
- taking a dive for portal packs
- design crossover ep! explain a game to Tim (and the listeners) and adapt it to Magic
- solving the “alpha gamer” / “quarterbacking” problem in co-op where one player orchestrates the others
- some games (hanabi, the crew) do so by each player missing some of the picture
- “the gang” is a coop game where you’re playing poker cooperatively and trying to make the most money
- team draft format idea… ways to communicate mid-draft via mechanics
- allowed vs disallowed communication in games
- hydra/minotaur horde decks
- solving quarterbacking just by making the player characters more complicated
- high asymmetry is extra cool but maybe also extra hard to play against
- should magic’s colors be more asymmetrical?
- mechanics where buy-able cards are available on the board
- replaying cards as a central mechanic
- a choice of “beginning of turn” actions… do you really need to draw? untap?
- limited by both mana and by a number of cards played per turn
- rectangle theory
- turn flexibility also opens up teamwork strategy… I’ll cover while you ramp
- plastic vs wooden pieces for thematic difference
- short suspend cards
- tim’s noted disgust of sagas
- cranking contraptions with your friends
- oppressive on board removal
- not just vs an ai, but versus a predictable AI
- into the breach
- AI targets the same thing multiple turns in a row
- AI declares it will target something later, giving you time to shield up
- town vs city vs village vs settlement
- explosive losing conditions that accelerate
- how to bring in new win/lose conditions vs AI
- TMNT co-op magic
- cube vs AI?
- if I can cast Negate every 2 to 4 turns…
- half predictable half unknown AI patterns
- another key aspect to co-op design: choice of difficulty levels
- like Magic, every rule in the game is tampered with by some faction or card
- diving into specific spirits
- “elementals” floated by spells that other effects can catch, sorta like creature types
- devotion kicker
- drafting face up for co-op
- drafting “with” the AI… anything you don’t take, they get to play
- fear is good
- fogs with face damage
- drafting cards that remove other draft picks
- self-exiling spells
- any undrafted cards go to the AI
- number 11 on BoardGameGeek
- custom Spirit Island cards!
- shoutouts to urbis protector and madcap skills