Magic the Gathering RPG

What special mechanics might you need?

>How does spellcasting work in the mtgverse?
>How do planeswalkers planeswalk?
>What could old walkers do that new walkers can't?
>Anything else that wouldn't obvious to MTG setting plebs?

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>I'd want a mechanic specific to the color identity of characters. particularly for spellcasters, but i'd like to to serve similarly to d&d alignment in its pervasiveness, without being quite as overbearing to actually care about.

spellcasting requires mana, but honestly i'd make this as handwaving as necessary. at worst, give characters a resource pool that increases once a turn and just say no one ever misses a land drop.

planeswalkers planeswalk by concentrating and just kinda doing it. debatably it requires mana, but mostly just a token amount of effort. you can't really do it while someone's actively punching your face in, but itherwise it just works. that said, I think a game where no players are walkers would be way more interesting than actually incorporating them

old walkers could, among other things, take other living beings across the planes with them, shapeshift at will and were practically omnipotent. urza was an artificer, full stop as a mortal. as a walker he did all the magical bullshit. all the newalkers have exactly the same scale of magic before and after the spark, that's half of why gideon is a punch-man walker.

there's a lot that wouldn't be obvious to the uninitiated, but just don't use a prexisting plane and i'd say less than 10% of it would actually be important. "depends on the setting" takes in a weird meaning since there are a lot of things in magic that aren't even consistent from one plane to another. there is a canon plane where everything is just scaled down by like a factor of 10.

>Requires mana.
>Tapping lands.
Hmm. Presumably they have to actually collect the mana from the land they're in.

Can they all channel any mana? What happens if you normally use white mana and you're somewhere there is none (like a shard of other colors)?

Does channeling mana mess with your personality?

Can new planeswalkers be stabbed to death like a normal creature?

How long does it take to planeswalk, and how do they know where they're going?

Bamp

Mana:
A planeswalker's motives, methods, and personality all help make their color identity. Mana and colors should not be hand waived. Both should be central mechanics of the game.

Planeswalkers don't gather/channel mana all the time. I think when the time calls for it (battle), they basically turn a mana switch on. Depending on their Primary Affinity stat for a certain color, they generate 1 or more of at least one color on turn one of combat. Add 1 to that pool each turn.

You could also have a Secondary Affinity stat that lets you roll a d6 for a secondary color. Each number corresponds to one of the five colors, except 6 which is whatever your secondary is as well. Let's say Black is your secondary color. A roll of 5 or 6 counts as black mana to add to your pool.

Maybe even declare one color as Enemy color. Then when you get that result, you also get the secondary color you want.

>How does spellcasting work in the mtgverse?
Unsure of this, from what cards I've seen with people casting magic it can be done with hand symbols, runes on the ground, or if your primary affiliation is black, a sacrifice of flesh or blood.
>How do planeswalkers planeswalk?
Probably by focusing on the plane they wish to move to, ghough I would wonder how they make it to new planes. I could see it being some sort of zen ritual or meditation where they have a vision and can see the planes surrounding the one which they currently reside, ala the star map in the padiwan temple
>What could old walkers do that new walkers can't?
Oldwalkers are practically gods, they could create life, bend matter to their will, and were able to oppose Yawgmoth's Phyrexia among other feats. Basically anything a neowalker can do, an oldwalker could probably do it better.
>Anything else that wouldn't obvious to MTG setting plebs?
I would start players as normal inhabitants of a plane, start by having each pick a color affinity in addition to the rest of their backstory theen have them roll for a random secondary. Don't immediately throw them into a planeswalker, create events thag ciuld ingite a spark. Try to use some of the less fleshed-out planeswalkers for more freedom, maybe your players encounter Venser testing his machine between its completion and him being dragged off to phyrexia or something.

Theres a gurps MTG bases on the novel fluff which seems pretty neat (on a phone don't have the link but it is ready to find on the Steve Jackson site).

They channel mana right before casting in the novels, they don't store it up in advance.

Anyone can use any mana, though it's a matter if you know any spells for it. If there's no mana of a color present, then no spells of that color.

Channeling mana requires an understanding of that particular color's philosophy, and the two are intertwined to the degree that it could twist personality. For example, White spells require a very orderly and disciplined mind, thus your average Red pyromancer whose spells are just fueled by raw and wild emotion wouldn't be able to just pick it up without learning some self control.

New planeswalkers can totally be stabbed normally. It's just really difficult.

Planeswalkers planeswalk instantly the first time their spark activates, but after that it usually requires a solid minute of focus. They travel by envisioning where they want to go, or they can also sort of jump randomly to find new places. If you're on one plane and want to be on another, you just picture the place you remember.

As far as lands go, you don't actually collect the mana. You form mana bonds, which can trancend planes for planeswalkers. You spend some time at an important site that produces mana, and then you can draw upon it at any time, though it usually takes time to gather large amounts.

If you're making an RPG, I'd put the focus on playing non-planeswalkers. Helps keep things more simple and in perspective. Planeswalkers typically have a lot more raw power to them due to being able to learn more spells from more planes and form mana bonds across multiple worlds.

Can planeswalkers teleport within a plane?

How accurate is it? How long does that take?

To do that, they basically have to planeswalk away, and then imagine the same plane, but a different location. They can't go somewhere else on a plane that they haven't seen before. It's still the sort of thing that would take a minute or two.

As far as accuracy goes, they can easily arrive at the same spot with no deviation with repeated walks.