Alchemy

Background

The year is 2104. Magic is seeping into our universe. Alchemists roam the Earth battling one another.

Elements

The four elements are taken from classical philosophy.

      Air
       |
Fire ----- Water
       |
     Earth

Resources

Symbols and colors for resources follow the alchemical symbols.

Element	Symbol	Color
Air	🜁	Yellow
Fire	🜂	Red
Water	🜄	Blue
Earth	🜃	Green

Tokens

There is a token for each element:

• Fire - Inflict 1 damage
• Water - Prevent 2 damage or gain 2 life
• Earth - Gain 🜁, 🜂, 🜄 or 🜃.
• Air - Draw 1 card

The 5th element is sprit. You start the game with 10 spirit tokens. For each elemental in your deck, you start with 1 token of their type. If you take a damage, you lose a token of your choice. If you end a phase with 0 tokens, you lose.

Abilities

• Flying - Can only be blocked by other flying creatures.
• Formation - Creatures with formation can combine into a single creature.
• Ranged - If a creature would destroy another creature without ranged comabat, its opponent deals no damage in combat as it is destroyed at range.
• Swimming - Creatures with swimming cannot attack unless the defending player controls a water resource.
• Overflow - Damage beyond defender's defense overflows.

Properties of Elements

Cards within particular elements play to a particular theme. Each element has a distinct character with paths to a victory unique to it. Card design and art are unique for each element.

The overall genre is cyberpunk, though air is technology focused with it being more of a side thought in the other elements. Fire and water focus heavily on magic. Earth focuses on the natural world.

• Air
  • Philosphy - Technology, Ephemeral
  • Style - Transmetropolitan, Shadowrun, Steampunk, Snowcrash, The Rocketeer, Johnny Neumonic, Max Headroom, Hackers, Battletech, Robotech, Voltron, Spectre
  • Power
    • Knowledge - Draw Cards. Benefits from hand size. Shuffle and Search. Deck->Play/Hand/Discard
    • Time - Add / Skip Turns. Add / Skip Phases. Tap.
    • Copy and Steal
    • Buff creature
  • Win - Weird things happening with turns and phases. Killed by buffed creatures or drawing too many cards.
• Fire
  • Philosphy - Entropy and Anger
  • Style - J. M. W. Turner, Blade Runner, Film Noir, Dune (David Lynch), Art Deco
  • Power
    • Damage
    • Discard from hand
    • Destroy cards in play
  • Win - Direct damage and dragons, crippled by no cards in hand or in play.
• Water
  • Philosphy - Calm, Patience
  • Style - Tron, 20000 Leagues, Heavy Metal, Wizards, Gor, Airbrushed Fantasy, 80s Homebrew RPG
  • Power
    • Defense
    • Prevent Damage and Destruction
    • Counterspell
    • Slow Things Down
  • Win - Crushed by whales that won't die, unable to damage player as their life total climbs.
• Earth
  • Philosphy - Nature, Persistent
  • Style - 1930s, Buck Rogers, pulp Sci Fi, Amazing Stories, National Park Posters, Smokey the Bear
  • Power
    • Resources
    • Regrowth - Discard->Play/Hand/Deck. Untap.
    • Traps for card draw
  • Win - Crushed by expensive megafauna that keep coming back from the dead.