Designing Master Yi for Path of Champions: Designating Card Roles
Having followers that can play towards the champion fantasy is essential. Let's take a look at why some cards were settled on and their roles. 1/16
INITIAL DRAFT - This is our initial mapping of the cards that would go into the deck. Their roles were fairly loose since we just wanted to test the waters and see what type of playstyle would stick. 2/16
WUJU STYLE - A cheap burst spell that serves as a flexible combat tool. It has the ability to create winning attack scenarios while also allowing for positive trades. The safety offered by Meditate allows punishments to be more forgiving. 3/16
DISCIPLE OF DORAN - It’s a fairly cheap unit that is able to create a spell that discounts other spells. It serves as a “permanent” unit while also being able to generate a card that supports Flow. 4/16
VASTAYAN DISCIPLE - A cheap unit that would be able to turn into a spell and support Flow package. It felt a little awkward to lose a unit to hand during an early swing, but its ability to trigger Flow and draw a card was too good to give up. 5/16
SHADOW ASSASSIN - An elusive card draw that would serve as easy access to the Nexus. But, it ended up being too high a cost for the amount of effort needed to keep it alive when it was already consuming a lot of mana and not directly contributing to Flow. 6/16
EYE OF THE DRAGON - The main reason was because it had Flow that would create Lifesteal units. Perfect for stalling out the game until Master Yi is drawn. But, having Lifesteal in the base deck made it too consistent at preserving max Nexus health. 7/16
SOUL SWORD - This was included because it was supported by Flow and that it thematically fit with Yi. However, with no Equipment support and Flow only giving it cost reduction made the card feel like it would break the “flow” of combat and steal mana from spells and units. 8/16
SONIC WAVE - It served as a cheap double spell that could proc Flow. But, when star powers and stickers came into the equation, its effectiveness fell off sharply. Generating two fleeting spells with the same cost and one being strictly better than the other made it awkward. 9/16
CONCUSSIVE PALM - A combat trick that would be able to interact with the opponent’s board. But, in a deck full of burst spells, a fast spell felt clunky. 10/16
FINAL DECKLIST - After a ton of playtests and iterations, these were the cards that we settled on. Each card filled a fairly unique role while also allowing for drafting to be open-ended. 11/16
SWOLE SQUIRREL - The problem came up that having only Master Yi as a win condition made it hard to keep the deck strategy open-ended. Swole Squirrel’s ability to scale made it an interesting candidate, though it requires keywords or 2-Star to close out games. 12/16
RIVERSHAPER - Having a fairly cheap unit that would pull at least one spell made this card fairly strong. Shifting the power towards a unit that draws spells helped create more flexible gameplans. 13/16
DEEP MEDITATION - During playtests, we found that running out of steam was a common problem. Deep Meditation was supported by Flow, able to trigger Flow, and had the ability to keep the chain of Flow moving once it started. 14/16
RUSH - Rush allowed for combat to be a bit more dynamic by giving Quick Attack to any regular followers. Compared to the other spells in the deck, it has a straightforward effect, lowering the amount of outcomes that the Player will need to keep track of. 15/16
WINDSINGER - The purpose of this is to be a removal tool. Having it be such a high cost did make it a little awkward to use, but it’s an extremely flexible card. It would be able to serve as a blocker, removal, and Flow trigger. 16/16