Why are Magic cards still so butt fucking ugly to look at? From the art to the frame and border styles

Why are Magic cards still so butt fucking ugly to look at? From the art to the frame and border styles.

Look at pic related. A lot more sleek looking, and provides an opportunity to appreciate the detailed art more.

Dear god those borders are repulsive

>Artifact - Sword

What's even the point of this subtype?

I think your fake cards and drama threads can fish out more results.

le bait image

Also the Wrath subtype on Damnation, the lightning subtype on Lightning strike, and worst of all, the fucking BEAST subtype on the Enchantment-Aura known as Feral invocation
Also there's the asinine method of denoting mana costs, and the retarded labeling of EVERYTHING. Also making Instant a subtype of sorcery... no wait, it's also flash. What Mongoloid designed this?

These are awful.

1. Casting costs more difficult to read
2. Unnecessary icon in top-left of info box. What is "Normal" supposed to be? Why is Lightning Strike now a Sorcery with the Instant symbol? Those are different types of card.
3. Black border fade-in on all images makes them appear darker, and also somewhat unfinished.
4. Why do we need an extra symbol in the top left to denote card type? We have that elsewhere.
5. Infobox reduced in width, resulting in more lines of text or smaller type. We don't need to be told what is or is not a permanent, and P/T can be put in the bottom right where there isn't likely to be text.
6. Placing "Permanent" on the artifact, enchantment, land and so-forth seems to imply that all permanents are clearly labeled. Then the creatures don't have that indicator, which would imply they aren't permanent.

2/10, awful design

As far as I can tell, "Normal" means that it's not an instant speed sorcery (AKA an instant) an equipment, aura, legendary, or any type of land
So planeswalkers, most enchantments and artifacts, all sorceries and a shitload of creatures are "normal".
It's fucking meaningless

I am wondering though, wouldn't placing the mana cost in the upper left corner make more sense considering how most people hold cards?

Why are you not aware of what your spells cost?
Absent everything else, card type is most important anyway, which IS on the left.

This would require moving the text to the right of the mana cost, which would look weird.

>Sorcery - Lightning

That is so god damn hilariously awful I still haven't stopped laughing from it. Fuck off OP these borders are terrible.

(you)

Buty why not both? Manacost Left still allows for the start of the name be visible and card type is further down and can still be left anyways. Hell, even the experimental border cards had it left. It feels like they only put it upper right because regular playing cards put their suit in that general vicinity.

These look like trash and a straight downgrade from actual Magic cards in terms of clarity. However, do tell what software you used to make them, I'm looking for a way to design cards for a homemade card game that's better than manual photoshop.

This thread is proof that people who think JTCGs have aesthetically well-designed cards shouldn't be allowed to design cards.

I do kind of like the slapping of random subtypes on everything (Artifact - Sword, Sorcery - Wrath, Instant - Lightning, Enchantment - Beast etc). That's like the one idea here that's potentially good and might lead to some interesting designs in the future (like a creature that's immune to damage from Lightning sources, but not from other red spells).

Evolution of card designs just because

And honestly, the current frame art doen't look bad at all. Everything is crisp and clear

It seems like a good idea But imagine having that for one set
Then another
And another
And another
And another
And another
You know the term "Parasitic mechanic?" Imagine a world where sets could either be flavorful and filled to the brim with them, or have no flavor and be absent. That's the world your idea inhabits

The 5/6/7th edition era frame is still the most aesthetic of all.

This was shared by a guy on Reddit a long long time ago.

Those aren't really fair comparisons though, since it doesnt' show the full border for each card. Borders on newer cards are something like, half the size of on older ones, which means the art and text boxes are a good deal bigger. even with all that wasted space at the bottom

Colorshifted best frame.

It could be interesting design space, but just slapping a random subtype on everything like OP is doing is retarded. What's the point of giving lightning strike the subtype Lightning? Or that aura the subtype of Beast? Subtypes are supposed to add something mechanically and have some kind of thematic cohesion, what makes Lightning Strike a Lightning spell besides having lightning in the art? Are all burn spells lightning spells too now? OP had a halfway decent idea and implemented it horribly.

It's basically turning everything into tribal. You know, the card type they soft axed after two blocks and Entirely axed it after four, the third where it wasn't used once and fourth on like, 5 cards from the last set in the block?

>what makes Lightning Strike a Lightning spell besides having lightning in the art?

Precisely that, also having lighting in the name.

>Are all burn spells lightning spells too now?

No, just ones that have lightning in the art or name. Incinerate would be of course be "Instant - Fire".

So what's the point? The point would simply be creating an additional distinction between the cards that other cards can check for. That's the exact same role creature types serve (and most creature types have no mechanics associated with them, in fact when the game began, only three creature types had any relevance whatsoever). We're already doing this, have been doing this the whole time the game has existed, but for some reason it has been limited to creatures only when there's really no reason to have that limitation. We could simply give every single card that exists a subtype.

The problem with Tribal was that it was clumsily jury-rigged over the existing rules with an additional "fake" supertype, when they should have instead just altered the rules themselves to allow for noncreature things to have a creature subtype if they want that. It's not like this game has physical rulebooks anymore that would have to be reprinted.

Yes, and WotC has acknowledged it since at least Future Sight. That was also the reason the futureshifted frame placed the mana costs to the left under the name -- because if they were to make a major update to the frame now that is something they would try to do.

Yes but why? What mechanical purpose does it serve? What's the difference between an Instant-Fire and an Instant-Lightning from a design perspective? If there is no difference why are you putting it in the game? It just complicates things for no real gain. Creature types are a holdover from earlier in Magics history, they didn't really know what they were doing, and they've been trying to bring some thematic cohesion to different creature types for a while.

>What mechanical purpose does it serve?
Not him, but the mechanical gain would obviously be that you could print that cared specifically about certain subtypes of spells. "Whenever you cast a Fire spell" and so on.

>Yes but why? What mechanical purpose does it serve? What's the difference between an Instant-Fire and an Instant-Lightning from a design perspective?

Dude. I told you. It's the exact same thing as creature types. They're a thing for other cards to check for. Nothing more, nothing less.

It's literally the exact same thing as creature types. There is no inherent difference at all between a 2/2 Goblin and a 2/2 Vampire, but other cards will care about which one you have. That's plenty.

>Creature types are a holdover from earlier in Magics history, they didn't really know what they were doing

Oh get fucked already you stupid tasteless piece of shit.

Tribal shit is always popular, though I doubt it's worth it on noncreatures. I mean, stuff caring about Auras, Equipment, or land types, sure.

These are loosely based on things Maro has said he either would like to change in the game or, in hindsight and with a time machine, would have made sure were implemented from the beginning.

What I like about them
>Placement of the mana cost
>Useage of the black bar for P&T and loyalty abilities

Things I'm meh about
>The card type symbols to the left of the name
>The generic mana symbol
>Writing the number of mana needed to the side of the symbols
>Spell types

What I dislike about them
>Keeping the black bar to the left for card types that don't need it
>The symbols to the left of the type line
>The sword and beast subtypes

My issue is this - Permanents aren't Permanents unless they're on the battlefield.

I don't see the need for permanent / nonpermanent on cards.

Making everything tribal is not just a card layout issue, it's a massive rules change.

Making cards instant via a side icon, adding "basic" as a symbol because you're stuck for what to do with lands, and adding in enchantment types like "aura" via those little symbols instead of in the same box as the spell type enchantment is silly.

We have Flash already.

You are, frankly, mixing attempts to redesign card layout with attempts to redesign magic's card mechanics.

Start a thread for one or the other, because people who dislike elements of either will be unhappy and you'll get less good feedback.

This, are we gonna rewrite the mtg rules to all references to "instant" mean only "instant sorcery" on previously printed cards, because if I mixed cards with this design OP proposes we'd have "counter target instant" work on anything with flash now, because it's an instant sorcery or an instant enchantment, not an instant or a sorcery with flash.

I mean fuck, the mtg difference between sorcery with flash and instant is technically relevant and dumb as it is, you're reducing design space as much as you're widening it if you do this.

>Whenever equipped creature deals damage to a player
Yes, let's make Fire and Ice even better, that will surely go well.

>I don't see the need for permanent / nonpermanent on cards.
I agree, which is why I said I didn't like that the black bar still exists on non-creature non-planeswalker cards. The guy who originally made these seems to have not even considered the possibility that not all card types need it as his reasoning for why it was there was something along the lines of "the utility on creatures and planeswalkers is just too good to not use."

>Making everything tribal is not just a card layout issue, it's a massive rules change.
Yes. It's one of the things Maro has said can't be implemented at this point in the game's lifespan but that he would try to convinve Garfield to implement if he had a time machine.

>Making cards instant via a side icon
>We have Flash already.
The idea is to make instant a supertype and remove flash altogether. I like it in theory, but I think the game might be a little too old now to handle such a change.

>adding "basic" as a symbol
I believe he was trying to communicate all supertypes via symbols, but it gets cluttered really easily, really fast.

>symbols instead of in the same box as the spell type enchantment is silly.
Agreed.

>mixing attempts to redesign card layout with attempts to redesign magic's card mechanics.
I agree with this sentiment as well. I think if one wanted to redesign MtG's frames, one would be better advised to do only that rather than trying to showhorn in several rules changes as well; many of which would, frankly, be nearly impossible to implement now that the game's 25 years old.

Good one dudeski.

All that unused space at the left

ew.

While I laud the return of the futureshifted "card type" marks, and I could probably get used to to the mana symbol change eventually, that huge black bar where the P/T goes is an eyesore and noticably worse than what we currently have. It's wasted space on most cards.


The most damning thing is it's all too clean and sterile. We need something in line with the old borders, something cracked and weathered and rusted, a return to the feeling of freshly-unearthed arcana rather than generic Korean MMO magitek.

Its a damn good thing im a lefty then.

It's probably one of the main reasons they didn't end up going with that design in 8th.

They make for quite a collectible these days though.

The lands as aesthetic as fuck, but it didn't work so well on non-land cards.

>rather than generic Korean MMO magitek.

But that's what makes a card game look good.

Even Maro has said that if he could, he would add those kinds of subtypes to non-creature spells.
That said, apparently he still has ptsd from the creature type update, and because of that they aren't planning on updating old cards like that again, which means it is unlikely that they would add it in to new cards either.

Planar Chaos frames are still my favorite.

I hold cards the other way around and it's a pain in the ass

That looks absolutely atrocious.

You could do 99% of those cards in html/css with a DB connection of your choice. It would be a good chunk of work upfront, but once you got it going it's very easy to change the cards and you can even automate the entire process.

We'll we've sorted the border style of the mtg replacement out.

Those borders are much worse than the current dogshit that gets used.

Original borders have no problems.

>Symbols going up into the art
>Symbols for power/toughness
>Power/toughness on the left side for some damn reason
>Symbols for things such as Legendary or if it's an instant/has flash or attaches or is basic/nonbasic
>mixing creature types with noncreatures (there is a REASON they don't do this and needed to have Tribal, and that's because noncreature subtypes tend to actually have rules attached - but if you just slap creature types everywhere then shit is a lot harder to police. Is that a Beast enchantment type or a Beast creature type? Can I turn Niv into a Lightning Sword, and if so, why can't I turn him into a Forest Plains?)
>Pointless space used for noncreature permanents/nonpermanents when the latter will only be sorceries in this system (and makes creatures appear to be non-permanents for targeting restrictions)
>'normal' symbol instead of just not having anything there
>order of symbols backwards because ???
>ugly as fuck in general
I don't mind the proliferation of flavorful subtypes. I don't mind Instant as a supertype.
The rest is stupid and idiotic

The asymmetrical border is SHIT. I understand adding the holographic piece but compare the bottom left and bottom right corners. The border is also different thicknesses on the left and right. This was designed by a retard.

Seconding this. They really need to go back to their fantasy-art roots with the cards, these modern frames are so gross by comparison.

As much as I love them, original borders DID have visibility issues, which is why they changed them in the first place.
Plus it would've been harder to do all the neat little frame shenanigans they've done over the past while since then with the old frames.

>visibility issues
How tho?

I still consider the 7th edition cards to be the original border. They cleaned up the coloring and made them extremely readable.

Beta cards can be extremely hard to read but it's only because they're way too dark. It's not the border's fault.

It's cool that you spend some time doing these crappy alters, but you need to give it a rest. You post this shit every day. Nobody really likes it and you are not going to get noticed by WotC. Just quit.

Out of curiosity, what do people think is a good card frame? Wixoss does pretty well (setting aside how most card arts violate the frame in some way, to the point there may as well not be a frame). The most important point are left-aligned: level and power. Also, each ability has a coloured symbol at its start to indicate whether it's and ETB ability, an activated ability, or is triggered or continuous. The border around the art has a small flourish at its points that is different for each colour.

>Power/toughness on the left side for some damn reason
Pretty much every modern tcg has figured out that most people are right-handed, and present the most important information along the left side so it's more accessible while looking over the cards in your hand.

Everything else you mentioned is spot on, though.

There, I fixed your shitty alter OP

Generic mana isn't colorless mana

Fair point, I just wasn't a fan of the symbol he chose for generic mana

Better, but I still think it needs something like the future sight curve to integrate the cost into the border a bit better; it's still pretty intrusive. The only real problem with the future sight frames was too much blank space at the bottom of the card.

Future sight border has an issue in that it basically limits mana costs to no more than 6 symbols worth

Literally only Progenitus cares.

Wixoss does it pretty well. The symbols denoting ETB or constant or activated or triggered abilities are a cool idea, and there isn't generally any clutter.

The bad part about Wixoss is the color symbols are bland, and when the frame colors are changed by fouls or covered by fuckhuge pictures, it's a little harder to distinguish colors at a glance. Magic's distinct skull, tree, sun, fireball, and teardrop stand out even when their colors are altered, or when in gold cards. I think Wixoss cards have their art bleed into text boxes a little more than they should too, but that's just a personal preference.

Arcade rocks!

Good taste.

>Out of curiosity, what do people think is a good card frame?
Honestly Magic is fine, all the information is easily legible and it makes sense to read. They're a bit plain looking but they work well which is important for game pieces you need to read quickly and at all different orientations.

Looks cleaner.
I don't like it.

Red looking like it was made of rock was better than what we got.

wew

o

7th style should come back with a more minimal and less invasive frame and special cards should have full art.
It would be the top.

This.

To be honest, I could get behind ditching Instant as a type and just making Sorceries with Flash.

That looks busy and chaotic, no harmony at all. It's shit.

Those borders are not an improvement.

And Magic cards look kind of ugly because they developed their aesthetic in the early 90s.

And while the look is a bit dated, people don't really hate it enough enough to be worth the skub if they redesigned the cards to be, say, pic related. It's become iconic, and we all just kind of accept it.

>Out of curiosity, what do people think is a good card frame?

Magic's is completely fine. That Wixoss looks pretty nice, though, but busting out of the frame should be reserved for "special" cards, imo.

The main issue with Magic's look is just that's it's kind of plain and not particularly flashy, but it's also 100% functional, not ugly enough to be a problem, and some people prefer the plain look to (personally, I like full-card art, though)

Would you like to see this layout used regularly for special cards?

>fucking bezier curves
>not even circles or ellipsoids
Literally just make the border straight.

Is there a template of that.

He just designed it based off comments MaRo made about what he'd do if he could redesign magic from the ground up.

Is this a cropped image? The top border is actually symmetrical, right?

It's not a retarded "L" shape up there, right?

Someone please tell me I'm blind and the card is symmetrical.

Nigga u blind.

Actually it goes to 13 when you count the completely legitimate slots behind the rules box.

I like this one better.

Not a fan of that shadow along the left edge of the art.

>That card is almost back to the original look
I hope that's the joke
Do a creature now

Incorrect, it's what makes it look garbage and forgettable. MtG's dusty, ancient, low-tech aesthetic made it unique in a sea of imitators. All one needs to do to see how far the aesthetic has fallen is compare the front of a modern card to the back.

The "evolution" of flavor text.

>all old flavor text is good
>all new flavor text is bad
>cherrypicking

AHHHHHHHHHHH

THEY FUCKED IT UP

WHY the FRuG would you have some shitty fucking transparent bubble border & not just a fucking STRAIGHT BORDER GODDAMN

trash

the only one that looks remotely good is the mountain. Only because the art allows the border to be slightly less retarded looking.

Fucking trash

SECOND FRAME IS PURE SEX MY DICK HOLY SHIT

Unused space, cuts off art on top of it. Pretty trash.

This is just fucking horrible.

How do you manage to fuck up even harder

Don't clutter my art you fucking troglodytes

Art is too soft to support an opaque border. Looks dumb.

Maybe, there is no need for the line between header and rules text though. In fact it pisses me off the more I look at it.

Overdesigned trash thats only passable on spoopy cards. Trash font too.

He is generalizing, but it is still generally true. If only because they are running out of new lines.

I think maro wanted that as well but it was too late to start doing it

This looks really really nice.

This looks like Lil' Timmy's First Magic Clone, available on some flash game site. It's the sort of game that has maybe 75 cards in it, then never gets updated, so a perfect strategy is quickly figured out, except there's no multiplayer because the guy who made it didn't understand netcode so he just made an 8 mission 'campaign' against a painfully stupid AI that can peek at your hand because, again, the loosely termed dev didn't bother to learn it right.

>instant sorcery - lightning

i think the best thing would be some of the spatial improvements of the 4th frame with the colours and texture of the second one.

That is one of the only things the only things those designs gets right about what Maro has said though. If he had to start over he would make Instant a supertype with the same meaning as Flash, so you'd have Instant Sorceries and Instant Creatures and so on.

If they've honestly hit the point where a player cannot distinguish between a permanent and a spell, its time to get the cross.

The 2nd one is so good, Jesus

Then we would have an Instant noodle creature for the un-sets.

A card can't be both an instant and a creature at the same time under the current rules. Un-sets do a lot of weird things but they don't violate such fundamental rules.