an mtg format

The Star Magic MtG format always seemed to me to be underexplored.

rules for star magic

Treachery Magic, a Mafia-inspired variant that hits some of what I'm looking for here

Mostly I like how it plays with:

• roleplaying (to a certain extent), with each player representing a color
• a variable number of possible winners

These could both be taken further. A roleplay-y variant might involve:

• Red winning iff they accumulate enough victory points, with the ways to gain that always being randomly drawn for the turn
• Green winning iff they spit out creatures and land faster than the board as a whole spits out artifacts and enchantments
• Blue winning in a manner similar to Red, but with its conditions constant and known in advance
• White winning if RGU all win
• Black winning if RGU all lose

I'd probably give B the means to give others victory points secretly.

Letting W win only if all of RGU win, or B win only if none of them do, means that getting the math of "everyone has an equal chance of winning" becomes impossible, but I quite like the absoluteness of it - it forces W to care even about its redeemable enemies and B to be a rotten bastard even to its friends.

Since none of these victory conditions have to do with life going down to zero, you might have to start tearing out the actual rules and assumptions of MtG until you've basically gotten an entirely new game with new cards loosely inspired by Magic. That seems perfectly fine by me.

links to wander to

locrian's worldbuilding links

games by hexandcounter