This week’s vote was ridiculously close. With the two front-runners separated only by a handful of votes, Nyssa Raatko emerged victorious over David Cain—which means that the daughter of Ra’s will be the next new face on the roster for the League of Assassins.
Current Card:
For those who are interested, here are the results:
Nyssa Raatko – 43.6%
David Cain – 42.7%
Shrike – 9.9%
Ra’s al Ghul – 3.8%
It’s really quite a surprising result. There were a few people in-house who predicted a landslide for Ra’s (mostly because he was the only recognizable name on the vote), but it’s clear that the players out there want to see a new face on the team—a character that won’t interfere with uniqueness.
This week’s tutorial will give you a little insight into a different aspect of Vs. design: the art design process. Once we decide to feature a character or scene within a set, we turn to our creative content team to write the art description for that particular card. It is important to note that there’s no fixed way to approach an art description, and much of the time, it is context-driven. Before we get into too much detail, here is an example of an art description for a famous card:
Action Piece
Setting: A desert area around sunset.
Action: An enraged Hulk is battling Abomination. Hulk is about to smash his fists down on the reeling Abomination. Hulk's mouth is agape, as if he were screaming, "Hulk smash!" Rubble should be flying everywhere. This is the traditional Green Hulk.
Focus: Hulk getting angry.
Color Focus: The green skin of the Hulk.
Keywords: Enraged. Angry. Primal.
Reference: [Insert comic here that has a good reference picture]
As you might have worked out, this is an example description for Savage Beatdown. The normal version of Savage Beatdown does not encompass the entire art. You’d need to win a Pro Circuit to see the art in its full glory:
All of these elements are given to the artists so they can capture the intended mood and focus of the card. We like to give the artists as much room to be creative as possible, but it’s important that we have art that also speaks to the flavor and mechanics of the card itself.
When writing art descriptions for character cards, it is even more important to capture the flavor of the character. More iconic poses guarantee a certain amount of familiarity. However, if we’re dealing with a character that is frequently featured (such as Batman or the Joker), highlighting certain aspects of that character may be more suitable so that the various images of the character don’t end up looking the same. We’re trying to portray the character in as natural a situation as possible so that the artist, and ultimately the viewer, can see a story that goes well beyond the cards.
It’s time to add this knowledge and your creativity to our fan card. Now that we know that Nyssa is the character, we are going to accept art description submissions from you, the fans! All you need to do is write a description for her using the format I have shown above, and then send your entries to fancardcrossover@gmail.com. We will choose the five best submissions and put them up for a vote next week. If your description is the one we end up using, we will send you four foil copies of the card when it is printed! So get those creative juices flowing, and we’ll meet back next week.
Until next time, good gaming!
TBS