Regardless of the medium – whether game design, writing, painting, musical composition, screenwriting, what have you – one of the primary factors that sets apart a great work from a good work is an unflinching dedication to the concept of unity. In a great work, every component supports the whole, the whole gives a home to every component, and we as observers are consequently helpless as it pulls us towards its center. In a great work, we are presented with a fully realized world with its own laws of physics in which nothing defies them. It’s what makes every moment of the work feel right and why it’s effortless to take in. When a piece is littered with disparate elements, it’s a constant reminder that what we are witnessing is artifice. In the rare piece that lacks any of them, it feels like a force of nature.
There has been a lot of attention paid in the last few years of discussions over cube design to concepts such as intended gameplay experience and focused mechanical environments. Mechanic focused cubes have become more and more the rule than the exception. Considering the formless mass that was cube in its inception, this is a huge step forward. Similarly, it’s much more commonplace now to consider the fun output of a cube. Cards are far more frequently considered under the lens of “does this create an enjoyable experience?” than they used to be as well. I think the topic of fun has far more depth left to plumb, but to be considering it more frequently is to the benefit of all; ultimately you’ll be asking 7-8 other humans to participate in your crafted experience, so you should take some responsibility for their emotional state in that time. But while I think these are valuable concepts, I think it’s also important to see them as tools to use when approaching the grander topic. It can be a folly to become proficient with a tool to only then focus on it: the hammer finds the nail but doesn’t build the house, to reframe the old nail adage. Mechanics and fun are fundamental to games, but they’ll only take you so far. So what then do you do with these tools?
Any creative work is about something. I don’t mean this in a sort of moralistic or didactic way – it’s possible that what the work is about is nonsense or some kind of inhuman subject – but there is some kind of binding agent deep in the core of the work. For reference, many of the classical creative arts didn’t really consider self-expression the way we do in the twenty-first century until about two-hundred years ago. But even then, even without the creator’s voice subconsciously working its way into your mind, there is a distilled essence to the work under all the artifice. An artist who understands that essence and embraces it will create a fundamentally true creation that reinforces itself throughout. An artist who misunderstands or is unaware of that essence will create a work that tears itself apart. It follows then, that as game and cube design is itself a creative work, it is crucial that the heart of a cube be understood to reach a higher level of design.
What is your cube about? Do you know? How well do you know it? These are not easy questions to answer, and it’s quite easy to answer them incorrectly. But until you can answer them, the efficacy of any updates, changes, and iterations you make will be drastically diminished. There seems to be a common notion that the editing and design process of a cube list will revolve around power balancing and archetype support. Like most concepts, these are important elements to consider, but unless they’re serving a greater purpose, they will lead to more or less random and disparate results. They are in effect plastic surgery, when what is most needed is open heart.
So how do you get to this point of understanding? It’s a destination with likely an infinite number of paths there, and you’ll never reach there without beginning the journey. Many times the essence of a work can only be understood once some of the creative work has begun. Similarly, the essence of work will reveal itself to those who spend the most time with it. The more time you spend looking at cards in isolation, cards side by side, cards in unorganized piles, cards in randomized packs, the more likely you are to see that thing that’s special behind it all. This is all to say that you may not know what the core is when you begin a project, but you should be aware that there is one, and likely there was one before you even started. Like any other creative projects, Magic can often illuminate for us what has been there all along.
All that sounds nice, but how do you *actually* do it? Philosophizing is all well and good, but what are some concrete steps you can use to answer these questions? As I see it, if you can answer the three following questions thoroughly, you’re on the right track. These are not intended to be dogmatic in nature, nor are they necessarily the method I use to approach this challenge, but I think they’re useful in the journey.
1 - What is the thesis statement or your cube?
If you spend enough time talking about any kind of academic or artistic subject, you’ll inevitably return to English 101. The concept of the thesis is fundamental to any kind of organized thought; without it, you’re just flailing information wildly to no end. So what’s the thesis or your cube? It’s likely something about the game of Magic. Here are some possibilities:
“Magic is a game about solving puzzles with a distinct series of actions”
“Magic is a game about outwitting your opponent in a test of the mind.”
“Magic is a game about laughter and sharing a warm moment with a friend.”
“Magic is a game about creating an evocative world that the players inhabit when they play it.”
But it doesn’t have to be about the game itself, it can be about anything you can imagine. Here are some more global possibilities:
“The only moment in life is now. The past and future are just figments.”
“The world is uncontrollable chaos, and the best we can do is prepare ourselves for it before the journey.”
“In the end, the only real test is the test of endurance.”
The thesis will serve as the borders of your design efforts. It should be in the back of your mind with every change you make and every card you consider. This doesn’t need to be some grand moral or statement on humanity (though it undeniably will be) it can be a simple cursory statement. But it should be a singular statement; you won’t be served by multiplicity here. Clarity and precision will reward you. Consider this to be the cognitive center of your design. In a truly rational sense, this is what every design decision will link back to in one way or another.
2 - What emotion do you want your players to feel when playing your cube?
Magic is a game with a rigorous mathematical system that governs it, but it’s also a game that’s played by human beings, many of whom are passionate actors. As such, it’s important to intentionally craft the emotional content of your work. Find a word that you think accurately describes the desired emotion the cube evokes. Then, find a way to make this emotion serve your thesis. It’s most likely that you’ll find success by structuring this relationship so that the emotion serves the thesis, though it’s possible to intentionally create dissonance here if you so choose. The dissonant approach will be considerably more difficult and should likely be used when you’ve become more familiar with the concepts.
You’ll be served by consulting the thesaurus here. The more advanced word you can use to label this emotion, the more inspiring it will be to find the specific subsection of cards and mechanics you’ll need to create it. Saying you’d like your players to have fun when playing your cube is far too vague. Saying you’d like your players to be lively when playing sparks some more precise inspiration. Saying you want your players to feel ecstatic when playing serves as an almost definitive inspiration. Use this as an opportunity to dig out those old SAT/GRE vocabulary prep cards if you have any lying around. We could always stand to have a more vigorous vocabulary.
3 - What do you envision the average gameplay pattern to be?
Finally, we can talk about the game. There is no artistic medium that can escape what it is, and as Magic is a game, it must express itself in the form of gameplay patterns. Magic’s strength is its almost endless variety of gameplay patterns, but most given formats have some kind of generic unifying pattern that they reduce down to. It is a mistake (to me) to try to include the entirety of what the game can do into a single environment. Like with your thesis, clarity and precision in predicting your average gameplay pattern will yield many rewards here.
How many turns are there in a game? How many tempo swings? How many creatures are on the average board? How much stack interaction will there be? Will a deck care more about cards in it or more about cards in the opponent’s? How are players likely to win? How important is detailed sequencing? How many actions are taken in a single turn? There’s an almost endless series of questions you can ask yourself with respect to gameplay pattern, and while you don’t need to answer a hundred of them, it would be helpful to answer ten to twenty. The goal here isn’t to predict the actual events on any single given game – or to exclude outliers from the average gameplay pattern – but to give you some kind of target you can aim for when considering game mechanics.
Because the end goal is unity, it must always be considered how these play patterns reinforce both the thesis and emotional desire of your cube. Ultimately gameplay pattern – and the cards that create it -- is your only tool to achieve the other two concepts.
The process of answering these may take some time, and can be done while you’re in the middle of the creative process, so don’t fret over coming up blank to start. Your answers may even change as you continue the design process. Think of your cube as a sculpture you’re unearthing, of which you’re continually learning the nature of it, rather than something that you’re creating from nothing. But once you have some even decent answers to these questions, the design process will become much easier. With each given card you can ask yourself, “does it fit this system?” rather than “will it be good?” or “will it be fun?” If it doesn’t fit the system, get rid of it. It will only detract from the whole of the piece. There will be another time and place in which you can use that card. Then, if you can honestly answer yes to that first question 540 times, you have a cube with a level of structural integrity you could never reach by only answering the second two.
Great piece, with some challenging questions and concepts.
Would you consider writing up an example of your process of applying this? I'm thinking of Ryan Overturf's piece on building a Brothers' War twobert, and how helpful it was reading through his steps and thought process.
Obviously this approach isn't conducive to exhaustive documentation of every decision, but even just a window into a real example would be enlightening.