Card wording / templating

alextfish
alextfish Posts: 192
edited June 2016 in MtGPQ General Discussion
So it's well known that paper Magic are very precise about the wording of their cards. "Sacrifice a creature", "Destroy a creature", "Target creature is destroyed" and "target creature dies" are all different effects in paper Magic. However, MTGPQ rather blurs the line between these kind of things.

There are lots of wording inconsistencies between MTGPQ's cards. See Turn Against "Gain control of target creature [..] It gains haste." versus Act of Treason "Target [..] creature is controlled by you and gains Haste." (Bold and capital letters sic.) Awaken puts the capital letter on Haste but not the bold.
Chandra's Fury "Deal 4 damage to your opponent and 1 damage to all of your opponent's creatures" versus Chandra's Ignition "Deals 6 damage to each creature your opponent controls on the battlefield" versus Rolling Thunder "Deal 2 damage to your opponent and each of his creatures".
Exquisite Firecraft "Deal 6 damage to the target creature or Planeswalker" (capital P) versus Stonefury "Deal 5 damage to target creature or planeswalker" (lowercase).

There are some obvious typos - Rolling Thunder "his his creatures", Exquisite Firecraft "damage to the target creature". There are some grammatical errors - Calculated Dismissal and friends "drained of it's mana", Disperse "to it's owner's hand".

And so on. Those are just what I spotted on a first glance at the blue and red spells!

Now I know these things probably don't bother most users, but they certainly bother me. I do wish I'd open Exquisite Firecraft one of these days, but I'm also kinda glad I don't have it because that extra "the" would really irritate me every time I drew it.

Therefore, I'd like to make an offer. May I please proofread every card text for you and send you standardised wording? It'd make the game much nicer.

Comments

  • ThatRandomGuy
    ThatRandomGuy Posts: 13
    I think my favourite is Stratus Walk vs. Angelic Gift. Exact same effect, completely different templating.
  • ShawnP1
    ShawnP1 Posts: 128 Tile Toppler
    I think this is a good idea; a licensed product should have proper grammar and spelling.
  • VladG0015
    VladG0015 Posts: 48
    Check out Zada! His ability says "all your creatures get +6/+6" but in reality and in dev's design its "your other creatures get ..."
  • Hibernum_JC
    Hibernum_JC Posts: 318 Mover and Shaker
    Just as a FYI, it's in my task list to to a thorough pass on card text - I agree it's a necessary thing. The problem is finding the time to do it, honestly, as there are many, MANY other things that need get done.
  • Ethyde
    Ethyde Posts: 31
    Hibernum_JC wrote:
    Just as a FYI, it's in my task list to to a thorough pass on card text - I agree it's a necessary thing. The problem is finding the time to do it, honestly, as there are many, MANY other things that need get done.

    Hi,

    A good and simple solution, if it's possible, would be to make it "Open Source", share it on Github (or any VCS) and let the community do the job icon_e_wink.gif
  • WINGSPANTT
    WINGSPANTT Posts: 6
    I've played Magic for 20 years and would do it for Free or if you're feeling generous, a few fat packs.
  • alextfish
    alextfish Posts: 192
    I appreciate it's the kind of thing that'd be low down the normal devs' task list. Which is why I offered to do it myself. As a 15-year veteran of MtG rules theory and templating forums, the owner of a custom MtG card creation website, and someone who's been a Rules Advisor and intimately familiar with the MtG Comp Rules for many years, as well as having done professional proofreading, I would be happy to do this work as a service to the MTGPQ game, as Wingspan said for nothing or for a few crystals / fat packs.
  • Hibernum_JC
    Hibernum_JC Posts: 318 Mover and Shaker
    Ethyde wrote:
    Hibernum_JC wrote:
    Just as a FYI, it's in my task list to to a thorough pass on card text - I agree it's a necessary thing. The problem is finding the time to do it, honestly, as there are many, MANY other things that need get done.

    Hi,

    A good and simple solution, if it's possible, would be to make it "Open Source", share it on Github (or any VCS) and let the community do the job icon_e_wink.gif

    Unfortunately it's not this simple. There is a lot of stuff that goes into this, not to mention approvals through various channels, that we can't just make the document open source and let players edit it.

    And I know some of you guys would do it for free (or very cheap, heh) but as far as I understand there are also legal issues which would prevent us from accepting this type of work.

    I'm not the one who makes the decision, so I can't really say yes or no, anyway. All I know is that it's in my task list, and I hope to be able to tackle it sooner than later.
  • buffbeardo
    buffbeardo Posts: 154
    Thanks Hibernum_JC for the response! You are doing a great job! It seems you are a captain with few crew so I appreciate your efforts. Overworked and underpaid is the American way for most of us.

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