[Proposed Tweak] Thieving Magpie

[Captain Jack]

Alright, this card has already been the center of discussion once with no ultimate decision. The attention on this card has a reason; It is a RARE card but it is not behaving like one. Therefore we are looking for ways to improve it.

We have thought of another ability (Card ability, it could be used to other cards as well in the future) that would make this card interesting.
Although we have not thought of how to name this ability yet, it would work like this:

-If player is active within past 10 days, card has a 90% fail chance.

Alongside with this ability, we will give the option to the owner to select the card he wants to steal (Stealing other Magpies will be impossible).

This way, it can be a good card to steal specific cards from inactive players. In the same time, using it on an active player it will be near useless as it will has a self 90% fail chance (The roleplay is as follows: The target player sees the magpies and prevents it from stealing!) plus any potential extra defenses the active player might have (countercurse,mindbar) plus the chance or retalation (as there is no undercover for this card. roleplay exlanation is that the target player can potentially follow the magpies and see who is their master).

Let me know of your thoughts.

[Captain Blue]

I think you should create another voodoo card increasing the chances the success of magpie or increasing the chance of you getting a good (rare) card.

Also it would be good if this voodoo has undercover ability. The same fame range or maybe shorter as the one in pirate tales.

[Admiral blackpants]

I like this idea. 90% fail chance on an active player. There are quite a few magpies out there a.nd they rarely get used. With this new proposal maybe they would be put to good use.

[M0nkeydluffy]

what happens when there arent much go0d cards the magpie can steal anymore? Will ths card be like tidal wave in the end? Lots of plunder in the beginning. .but loses its usefulness in the long run. .i still wish it remains random with a 70% chance of success and be undercover with 70% chance of evading detection. .

[Achillies]

Since this car is suppose to be rare I like the idea that caster has option what to steal. With it being rare I would think 70% fail should stay and as long as player has not been active for 10 days magpie would stay under cover. Now if player has been active less than ten days victim should be given chance to stop magpie or magpie or magpie is visible to victim giving victim chance to retaliate. Just for giggles if victim is or has been active within 24 hours magpie has 50% chance to jump ship into victims vodoo inventory????????

[Random pandah]

i would rather just sell my magpies before this happen then have another useless card clog up my inventory

[Black sparrow]

what happens when there arent much go0d cards the magpie can steal anymore? Will ths card be like tidal wave in the end? Lots of plunder in the beginning. .but loses its usefulness in the long run. .i still wish it remains random with a 70% chance of success and be undercover with 70% chance of evading detection. .

=There should always be enough targets; you find the inactive player, you cast a crystal ball and you send your Magpie to steal his Master Craftmanship card perhaps ?

-You can always sell it to another player.

-Myself I have used magpies only a couple of times then I stopped (waiting for the better affects as this discussion is going on for some time now). Right now it offers a 1/3 chance to return a rare card which is not that bad imo. Even some uncommon cards are very nice. Perhaps adding undercover as it is, it will make things interesting but it will still keep it as one of the least important rare cards.

-If the proposed tweak progresses, I can see it becoming better than Duplicate in card value and one of the best rare cards in the game.

So the final decision is relative to how strong you want to make it.

[M0nkeydluffy]

what happens when there arent much go0d cards the magpie can steal anymore? Will ths card be like tidal wave in the end? Lots of plunder in the beginning. .but loses its usefulness in the long run. .i still wish it remains random with a 70% chance of success and be undercover with 70% chance of evading detection. .

=There should always be enough targets; you find the inactive player, you cast a crystal ball and you send your Magpie to steal his Master Craftmanship card perhaps ?

-You can always sell it to another player.

-Myself I have used magpies only a couple of times then I stopped (waiting for the better affects as this discussion is going on for some time now). Right now it offers a 1/3 chance to return a rare card which is not that bad imo. Even some uncommon cards are very nice. Perhaps adding undercover as it is, it will make things interesting but it will still keep it as one of the least important rare cards.

-If the proposed tweak progresses, I can see it becoming better than Duplicate in card value and one of the best rare cards in the game.

So the final decision is relative to how strong you want to make it.

up to u guys. .i got 2 dozen of these. .my only concern is its msg we are sending to the inactives. .anyways its a win win 4me

[Xepshunall]

I mean no harm to those that cannot or will not (OK maybe a little to the the will not) play at least once every 9 days but I must say that this seems a practical enough approach to the popularity crisis of the Thieving Magpie card. Now if some of the other rares could be re-worked, I wouldn't feel like selling them for a single credit each.

[Captain Jack]

Not all rare cards are meant to be super powered. The main issue with magpie is that is also targets the common cards.

So another idea is to make it target only uncommon/rare cards (and select one at random). This sounds like a reasonable upgrade to this card and it will be easy to implement.

What do you think of this ?