Yes, I am going to do a weekly blog! I should be clear up front, that the likelihood of actually getting this done each week is pretty slim. But what the hell… I’m going to give it a try. The funny thing is I have actually been stuck for the last week, trying to figure out what to put in this first update. I have a pretty decent sized list of stuff I would like to cover, but none of it felt right for the first one of these.

So, let’s use this initial post to establish why I’m doing this in the first place and talk about the types of things you will see here. The “why” is pretty easy: you have a reasonable number of places to learn about our stuff, whether it’s about Cryptozoic or HEX, but those vehicles are a bit more general. I wanted a place to discuss the work we do in a bit more detail and also give my personal take on them. Additionally, we’re lucky to have so many cool things going on with Cryptozoic, and often the little things don’t merit a lot of attention but it would nice to be able to share them with everyone.

As to what you’re going to see here, it will be a mixed bag of HEX, Cryptozoic, and stuff going on with me personally. There is so much back story to just about every decision we make that it would be nice, on occasion, to discuss WHY we did something. A few examples of topics I might include in future updates are the art of HEX and our take on what is and isn’t appropriate (this is actually a pretty complex issue that we have discussed internally at length), developments on upcoming board games like Epic Spell Wars 2, and an update on the Apprentice Program and why we did it.

Today, let’s talk about the mercenaries in HEX.

The original plan for HEX actually didn’t include the mercenary concept. As Kevin Jordan was designing our class system and how the player champions would work, he came to the conclusion that a simpler, linear path might be a good execution of something with a bit more of a build around. As we discussed his concept we decided that creating a character from scratch and building a robust leveling system was just too important to the elements that make HEX an MMO, so we hunkered down and figured out how to make it work.

A couple of weeks went by and it was still nagging at me that Kevin’s concept for the linear champions was actually really cool, and it dawned on me that we could do both! We would just introduce a new system, thus the mercenary feature was born.

What I really love about mercenaries is the idea of a linear and dramatic build around. I have said it over and over, HEX’s secret weapon is player-driven creativity. It really is a sandbox TCG, and mercenaries add a really interesting wrinkle to the idea of deck building. The standard “build it yourself” champion requires a wide array of choices and cannot refer to hyper-specific parts of the game, as it would be WAY too limiting for general deck construction.

Let’s take Zoltog as an example. We created a mercenary version of this legendary orc, and Zoltog’s build around for an orc deck is very cool. But we would never put something as specific as an “orcs only” design into the general warrior class abilities, as it would restrain your options to maximize the card pool and find interesting new deck concepts.

Once we started designing these mercenaries, everyone got REALLY excited. The opportunity to tell little stories about these guys using fun top-down design is very compelling, and giving a hand hold to some cool build around for deck construction is also pretty neat.

I am now deeply in love with the mercenary concept, and we have a bunch built for different parts of the game. Mercenaries became the piece of unique gameplay I felt we could use promotionally, and not really damage the overall design of HEX. I thought it could be a cool chase item we could use for conventions or promotions, something not totally necessary as a player, but a fun little perk you get for having attended an event.

Anyone familiar with how that announcement went over can attest to the passionate response the community had about exclusive mercenaries. I’ll give you a hint… it wasn’t positive, and really for one reason. I intended to make the mercenary untradeable. I thought this was a way to make them more special and rare, so when you got one, it would be a big deal.

I will admit that I subscribe to the logic that sometimes a little pain is necessary to the make the pleasure as great as possible. As a look inside the process, you should know that the exclusive mercenaries concept was also wildly unpopular with the rest of the team (I was standing alone on this one). But I stuck to my guns and announced they were untradeable, with the compromise on convention exclusives that we would add them as drops in the treasure chest during the days of the event.

The community was mildly okay with that decision and ready to move on, so that’s what we did… move on.

Well, as I have been working on the loot tables and designing the drops for the treasure chests (a task I have taken on), it has become clear to me that I was wrong. First of all, having seen other games do exactly what I am talking about and getting a clear barometer of how it made me feel, I can say without a doubt: it sucks. Secondly, I want all levels of rarity on the various drops in the game, and some stuff should be VERY rare. When you make an untradeable mercenary VERY RARE, it’s going to make EVERYONE unhappy.

It’s one thing to chase a rare item in general (auction house, etc.) it’s another to run a dungeon endlessly trying to get it to actually drop. I can tell you from experience, it’s not fun.

So there it is, I was wrong, and we WILL make mercenaries tradable. And really, in terms of storytelling, doesn’t that make sense? They ARE mercenaries.

Thanks for reading my blog, I am also other places, such as Facebook and Twitter: @coryhudsonjones

BONUS SNEAK PEAK…

A mercenary!

This is Captain Galway, he is a rare drop from a certain dungeon centering on the Kraken… and gold!

As you can see, there is a pretty complete build in the ol’ Captain. I can think of some fun control decks this mercenary would be great in.

Captain Galway

Unlock at level 5:

Set Sail!

[5] >>> Create The Dark Water and put it into play.

Unlock at level 10:

Man of the People

[(2)] >>> Permanently increase the crew of The Dark Water by 1 and gain 1 health. (The Dark Water’s crew is increased whether it is in play or not.)

Unlock at level 15:

Ready the Cannons!

[2] >>> Reload The Dark Water’s [ONE-SHOT] power.

Unlock at level 20:

The Captain Goes Down With the Ship

Damage that would be dealt to The Dark Water is dealt to you instead.

By coryhudsonjones - Feb 5, 2014