A Brief Introduction to Noncreatures

Today isn't going to be a very long post, but I thought I'd take some time to talk about how I designed the first couple noncreatures of the set. But before I get to that, though, I'd like to discuss the card I showed off at my university's Magic club meeting the other night. Allow me to introduce Arcanine:

Arcanine sort of works like a Trumpet Blast with legs. Just by himself he's hitting for 7, but he can be a total game-ender if you have a couple decent-sized creatures already on-board. The members of my club all thought he'd see Constructed play if he was officially released, which I was happy to hear because that was my intention. And with that we move on to an artifact.

Voltorb was initially going to be an artifact creature, but I couldn't decide on a good number for power and toughness. Its most powerful effect in Pokemon is Self-Destruct, and it seemed odd to make a creature that was useless unless it died. There certainly are creatures in Magic where this is the case, but Voltorb doesn't even feel like a creature; it's almost entirely utility. With that in mind, I decided to run with Self-Destruct and just turn that effect into an artifact. It still retained Voltorb's name and image, though, mainly because a name like Self-Destruct sounds too much like an instant or sorcery. Speaking of which...

 

Tackle is the first of many instants and sorceries that are based on Pokemon Moves. Some I will skip due to being too far from Magic's color pie or simply being stronger or weaker versions of the same Move. I'll also be reprinting certain cards that either bear resemblance or match the name exactly of the Move in question. I won't give any away today, but I'm sure you can guess at least a couple. But one thing I will say is that I won't be designing any new cards with the same name as a card that already exists with that name. A good example of a Move that couldn't be in the set due to this decision is Agility. While it is a well-designed card, I won't bring back Flanking just for the sake of one reprint.

Tackle | Artwork by Jessie Lam

As you might have noticed, the artwork I selected for Tackle isn't related to Pokemon; it bears much more resemblance to a typical Magic card. I won't be doing this for all the Moves, but when I can't find an image that is specifically showing the Move in question, I'll be using pictures that represent the concept with a Magic kind of style. My vision of Kanto during the time of this set is just like any other Plane in the Multiverse. It has all the classic fantasy elements you might expect from Magic. The only difference is that the creatures are based on Pokemon. I'll go into more detail about this once I write out the story of the set, but hopefully this should give you a good idea of the direction I'll be taking it.

That's all for today. As I said in a previous post, I'm now done with all the set's creatures, so it's possible that the focus of the blog will be shifted to noncreatures for a little while until the rest of the set is complete. We'll see what happens. Until next time.