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Calgary25990 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/ZhFyklU.png) Rawr
So I guess we named the game... kind of. Like everything, it's subject to change. But this will be the placeholder for now. Action Points were changed to Mana, which is a good change, because Action Points sounded really dumb.
* The Game
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/DnESzCf.jpg) An example card
Mana is a game with drinking, for 2-6 players. After struggling between a "Drinking Game" and a "Game with Drinking", I've decided it's better to go down this path. It might reach less people, but it will be much more interesting designing a game with a little bit more depth.
Players control 1 of 12 Heroes, using Mana and Drinks to transform people, animals, and resources into powerful Minions, Equipment, Spells and Battlefields. Drinks are not a game resource, they are Drinks you are required to take to play cards.
Each Hero has unique Abilities that will (hopefully) push players to play with differing styles. For example, the Ranger gains an extra Mana per turn, allowing her to play the early game very quickly and compound that advantage by levelling up earlier than other players.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/xWqwxMV.jpg) All art by Coagulation. I did nothing :_(. Actually I drew some stuff for Coagulation to reference, and it's probably the biggest "LOL" reaction I've gotten from him since we started working together :_(
* Lore
I hate reading and I don't enjoy lore. When I was a kid, I never really played with action figures and made stories up about them. Instead I usually made up games or played board games, even by myself. But lore is important to a lot of people. Many people were drawn to Starcraft because of the story, not because of the gameplay. I see posts on Reddit about crazy theories tying champions together in League of Legends. That made me realize this game needed to some back story, no matter how small.
After our first phone conversation, Coagulation mentioned it would be much easier for him if he knew who all these Heroes were, and what they were doing, why everyone was fighting, etc. Being a project manager at my real job, I know when busy, talented people (Coag) ask for support from useless, untalented people (unnamed), you give them what they need. Fast forward a few days, and this beauty was born. I won't tell you who drew it. Names were censored to protect the innocent.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/0M5sgXO.png) Yes, this caused the "LOL". 
One thing led to another and our basic story has been fleshed out. We are flexible enough that we seem to rename / add / cut about 50% of whatever we are working on that day, but the basic backbone always remains there.
After finishing the basic story, Coagulation brought up a great point: Some Minions seem like they could relate to a few of the Heroes, but many of the Heroes seem like they don't have anyone in this fight at all... For example, where is the Pirate's army?
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/o6kZwJv.jpg) The lonely Pirate
This caused us to completely revisit every Minion. I ensured we had a balance of good and evil Minions, humanoids and monsters, and made sure every Hero had a reasonable piece of the fight. I think the game is heading in a fantastic direction at this point.
* Progress
I think we've gotten a lot done this last week:
- We mapped out the story and assigned the "good side" vs "bad side"
- We gave every Hero a 3-6 sentence backstory and determined their alignment (lawful good vs chaotic evil, etc.)
- Coagulation finalized a preliminary card design. This was a lot of work for Coagulation. Special shoutout to him for me driving him insane with endless revisions.
- We revamped all the Minions, determining their origin, allegiance, and leader.
- I cut the instructions from 12 pages to 7. This was a lot of tweaking. I'm pretty happy with them now.
- I feel like Coag has some sort of slave labour drawing camp. It's like Chinese gold farming but for drawing card art. It's the only explanation...
- I finally got my card sleeves and a set of reusable cards.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/IV3I6I9.jpg) Hooray! Beer spilling for everybody! Also pictured - the 5 decks of playing cards in between 42 pages of paper I had to painstakingly cut out with scissors. Thanks Breaking Bad for making it fun.
* Book Learnin'
I was really enjoying the Rules of Play book that was recommended... but that kind of slowed down. The book moved from a useful (to me) phase where it introduced new ways of thinking and comparing, to a history and etymology lesson for several chapters. I endured it for as long as I could but eventually started skipping pages. I'm on Unit 2, page 160. I read about 15 pages every day at lunch, hoping for that one nugget of information that's going to really change the way we're designing... but I haven't found it yet.
It continues to be a fun project and I have no idea where it will go. At the end of the day, worst case scenario, I'll have a deck of cards and a game that I made with an awesome TL member. Ain't nothin' wrong with that.
I'll leave you with my favourite card art so far, the Summoner:
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/rebdoyL.png) Thanks for reading.
 
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I love Coagulation's art style, haven't seen anything quite like it before. Although I have to say the Ranger looks kind of overweight from the belly down :D
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This art is AWESOME~
Can't wait to see it printed.
I'll hire you next xD
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Coag's art is disgustingly good. I like that you are fleshing out the game, the lore really is a great thing to get worked in just to, as you say, make it all feel a little more 'real'
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I'm liking the new name! Great to hear of more progress.
On March 26 2013 13:44 Jasarn wrote:
I love Coagulation's art style, haven't seen anything quite like it before. Although I have to say the Ranger looks kind of overweight from the belly down :D
Disagree (then again, I like curves).
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Just tell me not all the female characters are going to be half naked. PLEASE.
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Yay for art by Coag! There really is clearly something fishy (perhaps super-human?) going on behind the scenes with that guy... the rate at which he was able to dish out awesome art for the Omniverse comic and the creature threads was ridiculous!
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Very nice card art, though I'm not super sold on the card design itself. It seems a little muted and fuzzy, especially given the darkness of the individual card artworks. Especially if you're expecting your players to be tipsy, you want the cards to have really sharp, clear distinctions between areas so the eye snaps nicely to what it's looking for. With the greyscale shadowy look you have going now I'm not sure how well that's going to play out.
I like the feel of the card, but it needs... something. One thing I will say I really like is the way the card art stretches below the text box, I haven't seen that before and I think it will look sick, but again you need to be really careful that you don't end up with cards that look fuzzy from a distance or through beer goggles.
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Awesome.
Not a fan of board games, but the planning behind it is so great
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This looks awesome, I thought the "ranger" picture was the PoTM from WC3 at first.
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coag is really good O.o I'll buy the shit out of this, just to support TL though  . I wonder how much planning happens to facilitate playing the game compared to these aesthetic plans; of course that will probably happen later when the art design and background is set up.
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I *really* love the art and I like the darkness, but might consider lighter tones for a fun drinking game... well, I guess the good side could be it.
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On March 26 2013 23:52 docvoc wrote:coag is really good O.o I'll buy the shit out of this, just to support TL though . I wonder how much planning happens to facilitate playing the game compared to these aesthetic plans; of course that will probably happen later when the art design and background is set up.
this is a good point. I remember I bought a game where the preparation was soo boring me and the ppl i was playing with just quit. Make the preperation to be as little as possible. Also, I think another goal should be to make it ez to lurn but hard to master (most fun games are good because they show this quality).
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Coag is awesome!
Pregnant undead archer chick!
Chill rocks!
Summoner kicks ass!
:D:D:D
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Other than a few strange points (tiger teeth, lower body of ranger, summoner's head) the art looks great. I would like to see how the 'good' characters turn out as well.
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On March 27 2013 02:59 DCLXVI wrote:
Other than a few strange points (tiger teeth, lower body of ranger, summoner's head) the art looks great. I would like to see how the 'good' characters turn out as well.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/a2qQUTH.png)
+ Show Spoiler +whats wrong with the summoners head?
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Dislike the ranger since I believe you are losing too many good details (that blood, those arrows) when using it on the generic-card frame. Of course depending on how much text there's going to be - or if you plan to use the generic card template for heroes (suggestion: dont^^, but you probably have to revisit some other chars like the pirate))
In all the other images you have a good split between upper part (lots of details) and lower part (less details).
Apart from that - good work.
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Great name change!!!! Love the nectar of the gods part. Kick ass stuff. Looks like it's gona be sweet.
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Oh SHIT!
Looks like this huge project has turned out AMAZINGLY well :OO the cards are so sexy and yeah, that name change and what have you is great. I love your paint map as well hehehe. Great job ^^
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keep up the good work
love how its turning out
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now I wanna see chill's drawings
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Been enjoying seeing this thing move along. Cool to see serious progress being made!
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Skip the semantics talk of Rules of Play! Go the chapter that sounds to be most useful to you. If you're confused by some terminology, then go look it up in the book. You don't have to read it all first.
Loving the progress. Still reading the rest of the content you wrote!
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On March 26 2013 13:44 Jasarn wrote:
I love Coagulation's art style, haven't seen anything quite like it before. Although I have to say the Ranger looks kind of overweight from the belly down :D
Don't hate because she has breeders hips!
Game looks pretty cool, really interested to see where this goes!
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I am going to play the shit out of this game. Gimme some Chill.
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Calgary25990 Posts
On March 27 2013 11:53 Render wrote:
I am going to play the shit out of this game. Gimme some Chill.
I'm going as fast as I can!
It's funny that now that we've solved the glaring mistakes, it shows which previously subtle problems are now also glaring mistakes. So it's a slow, iterative process. Tweak, test, tweak, test. I have some friends coming over on Thursday and I'm sure this is the best revision yet, so we'll see how it goes
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I cant even tell the difference.
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On March 27 2013 12:06 Chill wrote:Show nested quote +On March 27 2013 11:53 Render wrote:
I am going to play the shit out of this game. Gimme some Chill. I'm going as fast as I can! It's funny that now that we've solved the glaring mistakes, it shows which previously subtle problems are now also glaring mistakes. So it's a slow, iterative process. Tweak, test, tweak, test. I have some friends coming over on Thursday and I'm sure this is the best revision yet, so we'll see how it goes
I'd be happy to play test if you get to a point where you'd like that. I have a group of friends I play magic with who would probably think this was awesome. If not, I'll wait until release
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On March 26 2013 13:44 Jasarn wrote:
I love Coagulation's art style, haven't seen anything quite like it before. Although I have to say the Ranger looks kind of overweight from the belly down :D
yeah man she really does have quite the belly
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Couldn't you have given the Ranger big boobs?
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On March 26 2013 13:29 Chill wrote:
Mana is a game with drinking, for 2-6 players. After struggling between a "Drinking Game" and a "Game with Drinking", I've decided it's better to go down this path. It might reach less people, but it will be much more interesting designing a game with a little bit more depth. in the end, it will be the players choice which one they'll call it. right?
I like your artwork. you've got nice style.
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Calgary25990 Posts
It's not the words, each one has a completely different design and feel. A drinking game is fast, loud, and shallow. A game with drinking is longer, more difficult and deeper. They also target different groups of people.
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This is turning out to be even more kickass than I imagined. Who needs Magic the Gathering when you have MANA: NECTAR OF THE GODS?
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On March 27 2013 03:29 Coagulation wrote:Show nested quote +On March 27 2013 02:59 DCLXVI wrote:
Other than a few strange points (tiger teeth, lower body of ranger, summoner's head) the art looks great. I would like to see how the 'good' characters turn out as well. + Show Spoiler +whats wrong with the summoners head?
He looks like an alien to me, no hair/helmet, just a weird head. I'm not sure if that is what you are going for, but I find it a bit strange.
That other one is a space marine/knight angel? Now that is an unusual blend. He still has a dark face which makes question his 'goodness', but the eyes make that sort of cool. Do you plan on fixing up the helmet to match the rest, or is that just light obscuring it (the lack of definition to the bottom part)?
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I will eventually go over and do more detail on all the cards when they are put together and in the final stage. The helmet on the summoner/paladin will be fixed up then.
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Cards won't need detail.
I think the art elsewhere will.
You two are awesome.
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Great to see this is happening! I would've offered to contribute artwork, but around the time of the original post I was mad busy with thesis work coag's got a good style for a fantasy theme, going great :D
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Coag is a very talented young man!
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On March 29 2013 02:41 Coagulation wrote:
I will eventually go over and do more detail on all the cards when they are put together and in the final stage. The helmet on the summoner/paladin will be fixed up then.
Sorry to complain again 
I just realized all your images are 96 DPI. We use/require 300DPI for everything print related (cover, inside illustrations, isbn codes^^, ...), though I have no idea how it would look on cards.
I dont know if you talked with Chill about it - he should know the requirements. Or if you can easily change DPI depending on the reqs. You're the graphic guy ;P
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if he's not trying to topple the junta of the mafia subforum, he's drawing amazing art
this is a really interesting project overall
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On March 29 2013 19:24 Zocat wrote:Show nested quote +On March 29 2013 02:41 Coagulation wrote:
I will eventually go over and do more detail on all the cards when they are put together and in the final stage. The helmet on the summoner/paladin will be fixed up then. Sorry to complain again I just realized all your images are 96 DPI. We use/require 300DPI for everything print related (cover, inside illustrations, isbn codes^^, ...), though I have no idea how it would look on cards. I dont know if you talked with Chill about it - he should know the requirements. Or if you can easily change DPI depending on the reqs. You're the graphic guy ;P
they are 96 dpi because the image hosting sites convert them to that when uploading the file maybe.
All the final proofs are in 300dpi.
I just looked and they are at 299 dpi. No idea why im missing 1 dpi lol.
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are you not concerned that the dark art style will conflict with it being a 'game with drinking' ? playing late night in a perhaps poorly lit room (maybe i just go to all the wrong parties) will be impossible if you cant read the cards, especially if you are intoxicated.
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EPT![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/IFwBf08.jpg)
