Community Card Construction - Making a level 4 Nightmare Creature

[Moonglow]

I don't have this concept down much - I'm not even sure why itd be useful, so might be a limitation rather than a power (like slow). But I was interested in the idea of a slow fade, like the Cheshire cat, or a turn to smoke style dracula etc.  So for some element of the turn, the Nightmare isn't fully there, but it hasn't left either. 

It probably makes more sense as a reverse invisible, normally the Nightmare is tangible, when it moves (using the proposed teleport to sleeping creature) it becomes intangible, flip the ready marker to track this - leave the Nightmare where it is for the remainder of this turn.  During the upkeep phase move the Nightmare to a zone with a sleeping creature.  If there are no sleeping creatures during the upkeep phase the dreamlink is broken and the Nightmare stays in its current zone and takes 1 direct damage.

It might be adding complexity for little advantage or value, but I sort of liked the idea.  I also thought it would drive the people arguing about playing cards in the upkeep phase bonkers if a creature could move during the upkeep phase

It would give the opponent plenty to worry about, as if there are multiple creatures asleep, you don't know what to defend until the next upkeep and the move has resolved.  On the flip side, its still in range and may be vulnerable, but its intangible now so may be harder to hit.  It would make the ready marker teleport less powerful as the Nightmare isn't instantly safe, but still pretty strong against many attacks.  I think the health would need buffing a little so the attacker needs to weight up trying to kill it outright with a strong attack, and the Nightmare fleeing in intangible form, or playing a less strong ethereal attack that can't be dodged but less likely to kill outright.

A variant was to play a token at the proposed destination, until the upkeep phase and the movement resolves the creature is in both zones and can target (and be targeted) accordingly.

[jhaelen]

But why would a dark undead creature have nightmares? I don't think we need to design this specific creature to solve the psychic gap. It doesn't feel like a nightmare should counter a psychic immunity creature.

Oh, I agree to this so much!
Why do we try to fill a gap for a specific Mage? Isn't it obvious now when we choose the nightmare that it should have some psychic effect? I think we fool ourselves if don't do this thematically. We had the option to do something else, but nightmare it is.

That's par for the course....The Warlock has a thousand creatures and the FM 3 with none being really useful. With that said, I am done here, have fun with this thematic but not very useable (i.e. playable for FM) creature.

Yeah, well, that's the problem when you start with the "fluff" although you want to have a certain kind of "crunch", IOW: If the goal of this creature is to fill a currently existing "design hole" by having a certain kind of game mechanics or stats, you should have started by defining it's purpose/role.

At least that's what the D&D designers did when they started working on follow-ups to their monster manuals.

If you want to keep the Nightmare fluff despite that, how about the following:
Give it an attack that will transport itself and the attacked creature into a "nightmare realm" and a second (Force?) attack that it can only use while in that "nightmare realm" and only against the creature it affected with its forst attack.

I'd imagine that this first attack should work similar to [mwcard=MW1I01]Banish[/mwcard].

To return, the affected creature would either have to kill the Nightmare creature or ... something.

What I'm not sure about is the power level of such an attack. would this really be appropriate for a level 4 creature?

[Sailor Vulcan]

I think it's clear now that we can either fill a niche for the forcemaster or make a nightmare creature. Not both. Otherwise it's really stretching things. A force-nightmare doesn't make sense. Dreams are never telekinetic. Also, let's not confuse nightmares with grim reapers. That cantrip idea? That's not a nightmare. A nightmare creature should be mind/dark. If we want to change our minds about the subtype, I don't think it's too late to do that.

Now that I think of it, one potential way to make a fun nightmare is by giving a creature "sleepwalk". While the creature is sleeping, the nightmare can taunt it to attack a creature other than itself in the same zone. The sleeping creature will think it's attacking the nightmare but it's actually attacking one of its allies.

This might work better as a mind/dark nightmare incantation whose effect ends when the creature wakes up or the round ends. That way it's more distinct from mind control.

[Moonglow]

I think it's clear now that we can either fill a niche for the forcemaster or make a nightmare creature. Not both. Otherwise it's really stretching things. A force-nightmare doesn't make sense. Dreams are never telekinetic.

just picking one idea out at a time, why couldn't a mind/dark creature fill a niche for the Forcemaster?  The Forcemaster is trained in the mind school.  The invisible stalker is a mind school spell with a force type.  I don't know if we need to make the FM a one trick pony.

I understood the gap we were trying to fill was a strong secondary creature that would compliment the FM nicely against different builds, particularly swarm.

That cantrip idea? That's not a nightmare. A nightmare creature should be mind/dark.

I don't think these ideas are exclusive.  I hadn't really been thinking about the school aspect, just running with the flavour.  I'd agree that the creature we're describing (most of us) should be mind/dark.

Cantrip itself doesn't make the creature a nightmare, no more than it makes Galvitar a nightmare (although it sort of does).  Its the idea of a creature you destroy/wake up from that keeps coming back... something vague and ethereal (not as a game term) that is difficult to erase from your mind/game entirely.  Cantrip does this nicely. 

I do think your 'Friends to foes' incantation is cool too.  It would be sweet to be able to reveal it as they declare attack, or just before resolving damage...the enemy you saw before your eyes was really.... nooooooooo.....

[Ganpot]

just picking one idea out at a time, why couldn't a mind/dark creature fill a niche for the Forcemaster?  The Forcemaster is trained in the mind school.  The invisible stalker is a mind school spell with a force type.  I don't know if we need to make the FM a one trick pony.

I understood the gap we were trying to fill was a strong secondary creature that would compliment the FM nicely against different builds, particularly swarm.

I think what Vulcan was trying to point out is that the two major weaknesses of the Forcemaster are a lack of any decent creatures, and psychic-immunity.  It is absolutely possible for a dark/mind nightmare creature to be a decent creature choice for the Forcemaster, but it is VERY awkward to try to design one which doesn't rely at all on psychic abilities or attacks due to its theme.  Nightmares are traditionally thought of as purely mental phenomenon.  To be honest, force creatures sound like they would fit much better under mind/war or mind/nature than mind/dark.  But, people voted for a mind/dark nightmare creature, so now the community has to try to design one while still helping out the Forcemaster. 

Mentioning swarm builds did actually give me an idea, though.  We could design a creature which scales off of the number of surrounding enemies. 

Name: Nightmare Phantasm
Cost: 16
Level: 3 mind & 1 dark
Armor: 0 (incorporeal)
Health: 8
Attacks: quick action, 3 dice, ethereal / full action, 3 dice, sweeping, ethereal
Abilities: incorporeal / non-living / at the beginning of its activation, this creature may pick a zone bordering its zone and push all creatures from that zone into its zone.  For each enemy creature in its zone, this creature gains health +2, melee +1, and reconstruct +1. 

It should still get wrecked by ethereal or strong single monsters, but I could totally see that making players wary against blindly swarming against a Forcemaster.  At the very least, it should force some scattering and tactical positioning from such builds. 

[Moonglow]

I don't really get your reply, mind is fine for the forcemaster, the invisibile stalker is mind school.  I'm not sure what other school force is referring to, I understood it was a subtype, like animal, demon etc.

So Mind/Dark gives the creature a lot of flexibility that doesnt have to rely on psychic only. Basically an invisible stalker that throws out curses like bees poo honey would be a mind/dark creature that fits the bill...

This isnt a comment on your concept, just the concern that we can't address the Forcemaster gap with a nightmare themed mind/dark creature.

[Ganpot]

I don't really get your reply, mind is fine for the forcemaster, the invisibile stalker is mind school.  I'm not sure what other school force is referring to, I understood it was a subtype, like animal, demon etc.

So Mind/Dark gives the creature a lot of flexibility that doesnt have to rely on psychic only. Basically an invisible stalker that throws out curses like bees poo honey would be a mind/dark creature that fits the bill...

Force and Psychic are both sub-types of the Mind school (similar to how acid and hydro are 2 sub-types of the Water minor school).  The problem is that a lot of creatures possess Psychic Immunity, which makes all Psychic type attacks and spells useless against them.  For example, the [mwcard=FWC12]Psylok[/mwcard] creature can't affect Psychic Immune creatures because its only attack has the Psychic sub-type.  That creature represents a full 33% of the Mind school's current creature pool.  Therefore, some people want a creature for the Forcemaster that isn't countered by Psychic Immunity. 

The problem is that Mage Wars tends to follow theme extremely well.  In general, everything does exactly what you'd expect it to do.  Why can the [mwcard=MW1C26]Necropian Vampiress[/mwcard] fly during its activation?  Because a lot of vampire myths claim vampires are capable of limited flight.  Why does [mwcard=MW1C29]Redclaw, Alpha Male[/mwcard] buff up surrounding wolves?  Because wolves usually travel in packs, and the designers wanted players to mirror that through gameplay.  There are a ton of examples of this stuff. 

So what do most people think of when they imagine a nightmare creature?  I'd bet they usually think of psychic abilities.  Take Freddy Krueger from A Nightmare on Elm Street: he can usually only injure/kill people in their dreams, and only because he's feeding off their emotions.  If, hypothetically, he was tasked with killing a robot in one of his movies, do you think he'd be very effective at it? 

That basically describes the situation.  Some people want the creature to be useful and fill a niche for the Forcemaster, but it's difficult for that to happen while the card still stays true to its theme. 

[Moonglow]

But this is a mind + dark creature... I mean ... hmm not sure if I'm getting the analogy quite right here, but baseball bats are so ubiquitously represented for violence that if you saw someone swinging one in a dark alley you wouldn't only think they're after some late night ball... that doesn't mean baseball bats cant be used for games.

Anyway, if the card art showed a nightmare/dark horse shooting dark lightening from its eyes, I think people would get the idea, or ghost horse teeth to nads +5 dice and all male creatures in the zone are stunned when it happens - a little bit psychic and a little dark. 

I agree that we wan't something thematically consistent, but its two schools, so why just focus on one element?

[Sailor Vulcan]

I am skeptical that the forcemaster is really in such dire need of creatures. She works really well even without many options for creatures, and psychic immunity can be overcome by either using force hold (if you plan to win earlier in the game), essence drain (if you want a longer game), or simply put enough attack dice on enemy Mage or defensive things on yourself that you can afford to ignore the big nonliving creature. She already has excellent anti-swarm tech.

As for the creatures she already has, thought spores will do amazing with blur or the enchants from academy. Invisible stalker costs 15 mana is 7 life and is incorporeal. It takes 3 arcane zaps to kill it on average or two pillars of light on average). This might be fixable with card support. I'm not sure how to solve this without errata to the stalker. Thinking a low cost conjuration similar to raincloud would be nice.

As for psylok, I do not yet see a viable way to use them.

[Moonglow]

Was it dire need or something that seemed a fun idea 7 pages and 2 posts back?

[exid]

I am skeptical that the forcemaster is really in such dire need of creatures. She works really well even without many options for creatures, and psychic immunity can be overcome by either using force hold (if you plan to win earlier in the game), essence drain (if you want a longer game), or simply put enough attack dice on enemy Mage or defensive things on yourself that you can afford to ignore the big nonliving creature. She already has excellent anti-swarm tech.

agreed!
if the fm had a creature-way in addition to all her non-creature ways, we would have create a new wisard problem...

and about the to nightmare styles, the problem is that we voted in another post and the nightmare won... but... I voted clearly for a psychic-nightmare, others seem to have voted for a force-nightmare, an now we should vote again!

[Sailor Vulcan]

I am skeptical that the forcemaster is really in such dire need of creatures. She works really well even without many options for creatures, and psychic immunity can be overcome by either using force hold (if you plan to win earlier in the game), essence drain (if you want a longer game), or simply put enough attack dice on enemy Mage or defensive things on yourself that you can afford to ignore the big nonliving creature. She already has excellent anti-swarm tech.

agreed!
if the fm had a creature-way in addition to all her non-creature ways, we would have create a new wisard problem...

and about the to nightmare styles, the problem is that we voted in another post and the nightmare won... but... I voted clearly for a psychic-nightmare, others seem to have voted for a force-nightmare, an now we should vote again!

LOL. That might be a good idea. Maybe we should have discussed the card as a whole before deciding the specifics of each part one at a time...

[Wildhorn]

Ability -> Sweet Dreams: Mana cost X, Range 0-2, Put a Sleep condition marker on target. Mana cost is Target Level + 3 mana.
Attack-> Tainted Nightmares: Range 0-2, 0 damage dice, effect die 7+: Tainted

When you make the above attack, add 6 to the effect die if the target has a Sleep condition marker.

This is a very interesting and a really cool mechanic, however much like the argument against Psychic Immunity, the same creatures in question also have Poison Immunity.

So what? There need to be a counter to it.

[Wildhorn]

I think it's clear now that we can either fill a niche for the forcemaster or make a nightmare creature. Not both. Otherwise it's really stretching things. A force-nightmare doesn't make sense. Dreams are never telekinetic. Also, let's not confuse nightmares with grim reapers. That cantrip idea? That's not a nightmare. A nightmare creature should be mind/dark. If we want to change our minds about the subtype, I don't think it's too late to do that.

Now that I think of it, one potential way to make a fun nightmare is by giving a creature "sleepwalk". While the creature is sleeping, the nightmare can taunt it to attack a creature other than itself in the same zone. The sleeping creature will think it's attacking the nightmare but it's actually attacking one of its allies.

This might work better as a mind/dark nightmare incantation whose effect ends when the creature wakes up or the round ends. That way it's more distinct from mind control.

I want to disagree about that Cantrip is not a nightmare... It would be named "Recuring Nightmare"

[Sailor Vulcan]

I think it's clear now that we can either fill a niche for the forcemaster or make a nightmare creature. Not both. Otherwise it's really stretching things. A force-nightmare doesn't make sense. Dreams are never telekinetic. Also, let's not confuse nightmares with grim reapers. That cantrip idea? That's not a nightmare. A nightmare creature should be mind/dark. If we want to change our minds about the subtype, I don't think it's too late to do that.

Now that I think of it, one potential way to make a fun nightmare is by giving a creature "sleepwalk". While the creature is sleeping, the nightmare can taunt it to attack a creature other than itself in the same zone. The sleeping creature will think it's attacking the nightmare but it's actually attacking one of its allies.

This might work better as a mind/dark nightmare incantation whose effect ends when the creature wakes up or the round ends. That way it's more distinct from mind control.

I want to disagree about that Cantrip is not a nightmare... It would be named "Recuring Nightmare"

That might work. I stand corrected. Recurring nightmares are either bad omens or say something significant about what the person who keeps having them is thinking/feeling. So dark and mind right there. Maybe it gives a fear effect like helm of fear does for the warlock. Make the fear effect be like a daze, but on a 9+ effect roll, instead of 7+, cancels attacks made against it if effect die rolls below the threshold number, and does not affect defenses. If there are no sleeping creatures in play, he's destroyed. That means that if the enemy summons no nonmage creatures, he's pretty useless, but non-mage living creatures when they awaken will have to get past a daze roll and a fear roll to attack the recurring nightmare. The nightmare should have low life to compensate for this. I'm thinking 7 life incorporeal, like the stalker. His fear effect should make it harder to attack him, and if there's some sort of terrain spell or a moving zone exclusive that gives an AoE that helps the stalker, such a spell would probably help him too.

I'm thinking either a moving terrain or a moving zone exclusive conjuration with an AoE like Raincloud would help. The funny thing is, raincloud does give him acid -2 and flame -2 and allows him to have his burn conditions removed. He even gets the regenerate 1 trait but it doesn't do anything because he's nonliving and therefore can't heal. I think if there was a way to protect him from light attacks or lightning attacks, that would be great. Really all that you would need is to protect him from lightning somehow. As for light, that can be taken care of by using an agony or something else that lowers attack power, since ranged light attacks usually aren't that powerful, and the forcemaster has plenty of good ways to take care of creatures with light attacks.