Hello there.
As some of you may remember, I started a custom set some 7 years ago (oh wow). Well, that set is only mostly dead. A project I've been occasionally working on for a while now is creating a custom sealed cube using most of the original designs. Since I'm apparently back, I figured I might as well show it off.
Sealed cube is the only way I still play the TCG. It's based on the cube idea used in Magic the Gathering. You essentially make yourself a big ol' box of cards curated to create interesting gameplay. In Magic you'd normally draft these cards (make boosters, each player picks a card and passes the booster to the next player), but drafting is a lot harder to do well in Pokémon. The alternative is to basically do the prerelease thing and give every player a pile of cards and have them make decks out of them.
I currently have four of these cubes, divided by era (Base–Neo, e-series, EX era, and EX–HGSS). Each of these contain somewhere between 1000 and 2000 cards. To start playing, each player randomly takes a set number of these cards (usually 150, but 180 for the last cube) and makes a 60-card deck using those cards and basic Energies. (I might make a post about these cubes and what's in them if I find the time.)
The goal now is to create such a cube using only custom cards.
The current design consists of 378 unique cards, for a total of 1260 cards. This allows the cube to be neatly divided into 7 piles of 180 cards (or basically, it can be used by 6 people without guaranteeing that at least one player will have a specific card).
Here's a link to the current list.
(The files are quite big, I can run a resize-program and upload those as well if it's a problem.)
Around 57% of the cards are actually done, roughly 95% are planned out and just need some refinements and art.
Some notes:
The original intent for the set—and the main reason it was never finished—had me or friends of mine creating all the art. I moved away from that in order to actually get this thing finished somewhere in this century. I don't have the time or mental energy to go through and contact every artist to ask for permission, so to make sure I don't run afoul of any creator's wishes, I've blanked out all the art I couldn't find clear permission for (and which isn't owned by Creatures Inc.). I guess you can always look up the artist to see what the art looks like.
I tried to make rarity actually matter by having rarity determine how many of a specific card are included. There are 4 copies of every common, 3 of every unique, 2 of every rare and 1 of every ultra rare. I've also added a new rarity (ubiquitous), designated with a –. Each ubiquitous card is included 16 times, to almost guarantee that someone will have at least one. These are the important roll players such as Switch and important Special Energies.
Not every card is wholly unique, I've included some nods to interesting existing cards as well as some reprints of cards which just play well in general. I've got a lot of experience thanks to these other cubes, so I know what does and doesn't create good gameplay.
The cards use custom blanks which are obviously inspired by the e-series, but the power level of the cube is designed to be a bit higher than that. Somewhere around EX FireRed & LeafGreen, excluding the ex'es. The power level of the trainers is a generally bit higher to increase consistency. The power level should also be flatter than most sets, since every card is supposed to be viable.
There's a high focus on synergies and mini-combos, in the hopes that every new play session leads to interesting new decks. The Pokémon within evolution lines are also designed to play well together to help coherence.
The cube uses the rules of the EX era: attacks on the first turn, but no draw or Supporters, 20 damage confusion with easy retreats, 1 retreat/turn.
Only Gen 1 and 2 Pokémon are included, including some beta Pokémon which didn't make the cut. For those, I'm mostly using the names suggested by Nob Ogasawara—the original Pokémon translator.
I don't have the time to add individual notes and explanations for each card like I did with the old set, but might highlight some cards at some point if I find the time. I guess you can check out the original thread for some explanations.
If you want to use the templates for yourself, here's a link to the documents I actually use (.pxd, Pixelmator documents), and here's a link to Photoshop conversions which might work, I don't know.
So yeah, that's it. Enjoy?
