Drawing from three Decks: Invoke !

You come up with some of the most interesting Realization when you are playtesting.. It also helps that when you are playtesting that you have people that who are willing to make suggestions. So this other week we were playtesting the old paper version of Invoke (still called spellslinger at the time) and one of the major things we noted was that we kept having turns where we had absolutely no actions. For a game, this is a major problem.. I can understand having one round where you have no actions at all..But 4 in a row.. It became very clear to me there was something very wrong with the game.. So my good buddy Mike who is also a game designer (Check back to this blog because I will feature his games here) suggests that we change it from one deck system to a three deck system.. The idea was having all the actions in one deck.. All the objects and creatures in a second deck and the third would be all the cards that would modify an existing spell.. At first, I did not like the idea because I was too attached to my own concepts but after some thinking I figured not only was it a good idea but in true Mike form.. Brilliant. So here is how the three deck system works now.. .

Each Player at the beginning of their turn (and only at the beginning of their turn) draws up to seven cards. They may draw as much as three cards from any of the three decks. I have named the decks after magical skills in legends.

The Three Decks 

Thaumaturgy : The act of doing something... this deck is going to have your actions.. Moving left, moving right.. Sling (The card that makes fireballs... but I'm thining of a new name for that card) and the all important Sheild card.. This deck is what you draw from if you want to DO something..

Apportation : The act of summoning something.. This is your objects.. This will most likely be an element as in earth, air, fire & water (there are other elements in the mix for later expansions). There will also be objects like wands, Books, and rings (From expansions) and if you are really lucky there may even be a creature to help you in your quest to win the game. This deck you will draw from if you need ammo or for a spell you have yet to cast

Alteration: This deck allows you to modify or target something . So this where you draw when you have a spell but you would like to have a little more control or have some cool special effect added to it... say.. A fireball that can strike a wand or that burns the opponent for 3 turns.

So I wanted to test the three deck system.. I drew 9 hands.. Before it was possible to have as many as 4 hands where you had no actions possible... not even bad ideas. White of the three deck system all but one of the hands had at least one or two actions (not saying those actions were good ideas ....but at least they were an option) 

So what I learned was good ideas come from your best friends and don't get too attached to an idea! Don't be afraid to make some major changes during the play testing stage of a game.