Tales of Naomi Revision 1.6!!

WOO! A lot of work this week and we're just getting started, baby!!!

Alright, don't mind my manic spell (or should I say, Manic Surge) while I write this devlog. There's a lot to cover! Let's begin,

Card Design Updates

Alright, let's talk about what's new about Tales of Naomi card designs. Originally, the white background behind an image was meant to be a tear in the page of the story, revealing the image of the card. However, I got some feedback about the plain white background not quite living up to that. So, I made adjustments to make the rip feel like it's revealing a page, so it looks a hell of a lot better now!

Additionally, I've changed how stats appear on Character and Armor cards to make them more clear. Originally, Characters and Armors shared the same "+" before their stats. However, this led to some confusion about whether the Characters could be added to other Characters or something else entirely. As such, Characters now do NOT have this "+" to make it clear that these are base stats. Armors retain the "+" to indicate that you are adding on to the base stats of a Character. No more confusion there!

Finally, I've decided to color code certain keywords on effect texts on cards, to correspond with the color coding of the different card types. Characters in blue, Items in green, Armors in red and Zones in purple. That way, it's easier at a glance to determine what kinds of cards the effect well... affects.

Below is a before and after.

Before the Change

After the Change

I... just realized those numbers in the bottom right are off centered. AAAAAAAAAAAGFOUIFROAIHFAOIHAFIWO

Okay anyways, we'll fix that at a later date.

Balancing Updates

Got some much needed playtesting done and I discovered some obviously broken things that should be adjusted. Some examples include:

• Blue Stardust having no clear limit, therefore in certain situations causing complete blowout wins. Blue Stardust has now been changed to allow only ONE use per turn. No, item recursion won't allow you to use it again in the same turn.
• Cookies & Cream Hero is now a 3 Ink Cost card. The effect was pretty strong to execute on turn 2, so I made that adjustment to make it only possible by turn 3, where at least one attacker should be set up.
• Many effects that search the top X cards of your Tome now move remaining cards to the bottom rather than the top. The ability to manipulate which cards you got next turned out to be too powerful and contributed to extreme wins.
• Hustler's Gambit was WAY too punishing as a Zone. Originally, when you rolled an odd number, you would discard a page. If you got super unlucky, there was no chance of recovery, especially if your opponent got lucky and kept getting an extra card draw! I have changed the odd numbered effect to cause the Storyteller to lose 1 Suspense instead.
• I reduced the benefit that the Zone owner gets for Community Garden. Originally, the owner got 3 Ephemeral Ink when playing Characters, but this could lead to significant snowballing, not different from Blue Stardust. As such, I have reduced the effect to 2 Ephemeral Ink for the Zone owner to continue the philosophy of allowing Zones to apply pressure to get them replaced ASAP, while avoiding crazy burst.
• Puppo now has an effect. Previously the only card in the game to not have an effect, I've decided to add a super benefit if you have all 4 Puppos in your deck in play. All Puppo type characters will get +2 Might and +2 Resolve- get in there!

I forgot one more thing! I have made another rules revision- Reciting Characters can now BLOCK! This means that there will be no more windows of vulnerability for aggro decks to swoop in and take massive chunks of damage before Player 2 can set up!

Final Thoughts

As I continue working on Tales of Naomi, I hope that adding Tabletop Simulator files will bring in more interest, as originally the game was limited to physical, in-person games. Now with this file created, you can play Takes of Naomi with friends around the world!! I hope to see you all in the Ever-Told soon!