Card Creation Forum Rules - READ THESE!

[Bram]

Unfortunately, we need a set of strict rules to reduce our own workload, increase readability and fun for our visitors, and uphold the card quality we're used to. These rules are outlined here. Everyone who posts in this forum (which means our prolific card-creating fulltime members of old as well as the newly accepted basic members) should follow -and read- them. As always, ignorance of the rules is not an excuse.

1. Only one card per thread. Cycles are an exception, but don't do these too often since they annoy me.

2. Please try to state some relevance. Why are you making this card? What place does it have in the game? Please note: not all cards have to be tournament level, but there's always a reason for their creation nevertheless, if even merely flavor.

3. After comments, please edit the original post to include a current wording of the card in bold so us mods know which ones to add. Leave the original cards wording intact so we can see its evolution.

4. Once you feel a card is done and worthy of addition to the master thread, you initiate a 24 h. clock. You initiate the clock by posting a new reply in which you state the 24h. clock has started. This gives our visitors 24h. to respond to the thread again if they have any remarks or oppose the card's addition for some reason. This exisists to ensure that most everyone agrees with the card we're adding.

5. No card creator is allowed to initiate the 24h. clock until three days have passed since posting the card, unless the card in question obviously has no power level, flavor, or rules problems. This rule exists to prevent cards from 'slipping through the cracks' and giving most members a chance to look at it (yes, we're actually sensitive to the fact that not everyone can or wants to log in every single day :p).

6. Once the 24h. clock has passed, you must PM Ephraim and state whether you want us to add it to the master thread or merely close it. Include a link to the card in your PM or it will not be added. We reserve the right to close any thread or oppose its addition to the master thread.

5. Do not post anything other than cards up for review in this thread. Any questions can be directed to Ephraim, Jacob, or Matt via Private Messages (PM).

6. BY POSTING A CARD IDEA IN THIS FORUM, YOU GIVE UP ALL LEGAL CLAIMS TO THAT CARD IDEA. YOU IMPLICITLY STATE THAT WIZARDS OF THE COAST IS FREE TO USE YOUR IDEA AS THEY SEE FIT (FOR EXAMPLE AS AN ACTUAL CARD) AND/OR ALTER IT WITHOUT INFORMING YOU, PAYING YOU, CREDITING THE IDEA TO YOUR NAME OR HAVING ANY OTHER SORT OF LEGAL OBLIGATION TO YOU. Clear?

7. When you're submitting your cards, they should look exactly like this:

Corpse Splicer
1BB
Creature -- Zombie Wizard
2/1
BB, T: Exchange target creature an opponent controls for target creature card in that player's graveyard. Play this only when you could play a sorcery.
The undead's birthcry drowned out the wailing of its dying donor.

[/color]

Surely, we've undertaken a huge task in the creation of a full set of Magic cards, here at The Mana Drain. However, we are not alone in our endeavour. Mark Rosewater, Magic's lead designer, has written two articles on the topic from which we can benefit. Many of MaRo's articles are good to read, if you're looking to develop a feel for the nuances of card design. However, the following two links are the closest thing to a textbook that we have. In these articles, MaRo highlights common mistakes made by new card designers and offers excellent tips for improving the quality of one's cards.

Link to: Design 101: Common Rookie Mistakes

Link to: Design 102: How To Design (Part Two)

[Matt]

In an effort to make the Master List load faster, we split it up by color into different threads. But that was cluttered, so we removed a lot of the stickies that were up here.

So from now on, use this thread for any questions you have about the forum. Please don't use the old Q&A thread.

[Jacob Orlove]

We should keep this around now that the master list got broken up:

How To Add Cards To The Master Thread[/u]

1. In cycles, ONE line goes between cards in a cycle (and between the beginning/end line). This makes the cycle look more coherent.

2. TWO lines go between everything else (including between seperate cycles). This makes the cycle thread look much less cluttered.

3. Quotations are written as such:

"Blah blah." -Name, Source Work
"Perchance to dream..." -William Shakespeare, Hamlet

Note the exact capitalization, punctuation, and spacing.

4. Proverbs/sayings don't use quotations:

A man must eat his own foot -Italian proverb

5a. Costs for keyword abilities [like morph, kicker, flashback, cycling, fading, buyback, and equip] don't use colons:

Equip 4
Morph 2R
Buyback 1UU

5b. When these costs have nonmana components, they use a double-hyphen:

Kicker -- sacrifice two lands

Note that in the example above, 'sacrifice' is not capitalized.

6. The parts of a card are listed in this order:

Name
Cost
Card Type -- Creature Type
P/T
Text box
Flavor text

with the flavor text in italics.

7. Subtypes use a double-hyphen, supertypes use a space and no hyphens:

Basic Land -- Swamp
Legendary Artifact
Creature -- Dryad

8. Multiple non-keyworded abilities and effects go on seperate lines, though keyworded abilities may share a line. Keywords aren't normally capitalized. A line that lists keywords doesn't end with a period:

Flying, first strike
When Matt is blocked by George Bush, Matt gets +1/+1.
When Matt leaves play, all players gain four life.

[Jacob Orlove]

A small change: while I will still be posting feedback for cards and answering any PM'd questions you may have, please do not send close thread requests to me. I've been letting Matt make all the changes for a ridiculously long time now, so it might as well be official.

Also, Matt adds cards in batches, so you may have to wait some time before a finished card is added to the master list. Once the 24 hour clock has expired with no issues raised, and you have PM'd Matt to let him know that the thread is done, that thread no longer counts towards your limit. You can start a new one right away.

[combo_dude]

Does this mean we should only PM Matt with close requests rather than Matt and Bram? I know it says both above, but the implication is that it's only Matt.

[Bram]

In practice, it IS only Matt.

I tend to go over the PM's I get (which are currently just a fraction of the cards that are actually added) in batches, much like Matt. It is however very rare that he misses any. Still, can't hurt to send me the PM as well as a sort of safeguard.

As a sidenote: you probably haven't seen much of me in here the past few months, do to me finalizing my graduation research. In two weeks or so (quite possibly EXACTLY two weeks, even) I'll have successfully presented and defended my thesis after which I'll have a lot more time to rejoin the fun. Expect an updated version of the Card Creation Set Apprentice Patch around that time as well!.

[Puschkin]

I just wanted to point out that the rules do not include any limit on the number of active threads one can have. I guess that rule got lost when you merged all the old stickies. And what happened to all those beautiful mockups!?

[Bram]

Actually we intended it that way. We figured it would be self-regulating. Noone will make 300 cards at the same times. Less rules = more fun. And since Matt does virtually all of the work nowadays, it should be his call.

Teh beatiful mockups are still on my HDD (and even online), and I'll link to them again some time in the future.

[Puschkin]

If there is no limit, explain this line:

Once the 24 hour clock has expired with no issues raised, and you have PM'd Matt to let him know that the thread is done, that thread no longer counts towards your limit.

[Matt]

There IS a limit, but it's less of an actual quantity and more along the lines of "whatever seems reasonable."

[Matt]

Does this mean we should only PM Matt with close requests rather than Matt and Bram? I know it says both above, but the implication is that it's only Matt.

As of about a month ago, it's all Ephraim now. Just thought I'd post it here to make it plain.