Flavour text a bit lacking?

**TOPSECRET** · 02-06-2012, 09:51 PM

Just wondering, but is there anyone else who finds it a bit ... lacking?

I mean, with MTG I find it piques my interest in the actual universe that the cards are set in and it, well, makes for nice flavour. I mean take for example my Indomitable Archangel, it says:

"Every sword drawn to defend is an angelic blade, guided to justice by an angelic hand." - Auriok proverb

Now something like that I find interesting, and inspires me to learn more about what the Auriok actually are. On the other hand, you have Shadow Era (I mean I love the game, but still) with say, the Plasma Behemoth

which just says:

"Wow, that thing is biiiig."

Now that doesn't make me curious or even remotely interested in the card at all. I'm not sure if it's just because the lore around SE hasn't really been built much, but I just generally find the flavour text uninspiring, and frankly, quite dull. There's nothing wrong with humourous flavour (MTG does this too, take Foul Imp for example), but .... yeah, I'm rambling.

Opinions?

**Nizaris** · 02-06-2012, 09:55 PM

Lore is just fine, I enjoy my fair share. However, if lore is what I'm craving, I would play an RPG, not a TCG. To me humor is just fine for a card game.

**TOPSECRET** · 02-06-2012, 10:22 PM

I'm not on about an entire paragraph of text, just something which sparks my imagination and piques my interest. Reading how something is "biiiig" or "[that's] no worm" is just ... dull.

**Ringel** · 02-07-2012, 12:10 AM

We've had some fierce debates about the topic in the past. I'm with you, I like lore in flavor text, but keep in mind, even magic cards have plenty of generic flavor text as well. Not all of them have lore.

**Ekoz** · 02-07-2012, 12:20 AM

Yeah, but you have to agree with him/her. Little quips that are probably dick jokes don't pass for flavor text.

For example, instead of "Wow, that thing is biiiig"; "Nobody likes to see a giant, so be glad this one burns out your eyes." or "Of course someone hears a tree being felled in the forest! Something had to knock it down."

Or "That's no worm..."; "To the worms, even the harshest desert is hospitable." or "Decades of scourging sands have warped his hide. What chance does your blade have?"

Instead...we have things that aren't funny, nor important, nor interesting, nor at the very least seem like flavor text at all.

Even if it doesn't include lore, you can still have creative flavours, that at least give the idea of a history or a social prescence. Soul Seeker

's flavour is great, but it can be better if it says who THEY are. Seriously, who the hell are they? For that reason, Blake

's flavour text is amazing. Wrath and Voice? Both great, if you can attribute the quotes to someone. Then it gives those cards a name to attribute, and those figures have a prescence to them. You can tell Person A is a chaotic mage, whereas B is either little bit sadistic, or really sarcastic. But even then, you don't NEED names, because the flavours catch attention and hold interest.

**Spectrl** · 02-07-2012, 12:34 AM

Originally Posted by Ekoz

"Nobody likes to see a giant, so be glad this one burns out your eyes."

+1 xD

**rhonsus** · 02-07-2012, 07:37 AM

I too would like to see a bit more evolution in the flavour text. In 1.3 they are working on the flavour text in the test server. Some of the new cards have some pretty good flavour text. I wouldn't mind seeing some more work like that. On a side note, how do I do a link to the cards like Ekoz did with Blake

and SoulSeeker?

**Ekoz** · 02-07-2012, 06:26 PM

just type the card name, or in some cases, a more condensed version. kinda like what you just did with Blake

.

**Anima Immortalis** · 02-07-2012, 06:40 PM

Well, i agree that the flavour text is kinda dull and doesn't make a good advert for the lore and background of the story, but i suspect that with the emergence of the first stories surrounding the world of Shadow Era and the fact that we now have an official design team member that will attend this specific task, this will be a thing of the past.