Mox with || function

[msgameandcake]

We have a few different Mox summon mechanics in play right now, but it seems like a rather notable potential summon mechanic is missing.

Mage Pupil is extremely weak, but can be summoned (or, technically, kept around after summoning) with any Mox at all. Super easy to get in, little reward for doing so. For upcoming comparison, this qualifies as Blue || Green || Orange.

We have a variety of units with a single, specific Mox requirement. The majority of the Magic cards function this way, and their power levels have the highest range, though ultimately they tend to still be on the weaker end of things within the greater context of the game.

Then we have the three Masters: Master Bleene, Master Goranj, and Master Orlu who require two simultaneous Mox to be in play to be summoned, Blue && Green, Green && Orange, and Orange && Blue respectively, with the Masters all representing the strongest individual units within the Magic deck style.

What if the Masters had something of a counterpart, using an || (read: or) function rather than an && function. Blue || Green, Green || Orange, Orange || Blue. A little stronger than a Mage Pupil, but still a little weaker than average. Or perhaps they'd be of average power level, but classified as Rare to note that these cards in particular are worth building a deck around. Perhaps they function sub-optimally if only one of their gem types are in play, gaining extra potency when powered by both, with the fact that one can play these cards at all early on with the potential to achieve their maximum power later being their primary draws.

Oh also, relatedly, while Mage Pupil is Green || Blue || Orange, we technically don't have a Green && Blue && Orange card. It would probably be an Urayuli type card, massive stats and/or broken ability with the most intense cost requirement feasible.

The Mage deck is widely regarded as the most awkward to use, so adding in some more versatility with the options provided would be neat. Granted, I don't really think any of this will come to pass in any official capacity. I don't see Act II getting expanded upon, the only section of the game where this playstyle really exists, and if we ever get a full official Magnificus game mode it likely won't be for a long time. I'm just spitballing some ideas here for discussion and maybe mod inspiration as I am aware that Magnificus playthroughs are under development in an unofficial capacity.

[StayPuftMM]

In my experience, the magic mechanic only becomes viable once you get the cards that supply two gems at once. It doesn't work well at all before that. Any game mode that focused on it would need to take measures to make the early game work better (I mean early game as in when the player first starts their "run" and is building their deck). I think your idea of cards that require only one of two options, and potentially gets more powerful if it has both, is good.
There are a bunch of variables that can be tweaked outside of the cards too though. The game itself suggests not making a deck that uses all three mox colors, so a hypothetical "magnificus mode" that gives purely random cards would mean the player either ignores 1/3 of the options they're given or they try to make a 3 color deck that has gem awkwardness that persists through the entire run with a lot of dead cards that they need specific other cards to do anything.
The gem mechanic has to strike a very careful balance since if gems are too easily destroyed then you have the situation you often get in the deletion act where you lose your one gem and you're spending multiple turns drawing to try to get the one gem that lets you do anything, but if it's too easy to keep gems alive then the mechanic loses its meaning. Part of the reason that gems work in P03's section is that there are five lanes. It's much easier to keep a gem alive when enemies are split between more lanes. You also lose less by dedicating a lane to a gem that doesn't do anything on its own when there are more lanes.

Some potential ideas that would address these issues but have their own share of drawbacks:
-A 'side lane' where only a basic (single color) gem can be placed and it cannot attack. There is no opposing space for this lane, so it cannot be attacked or destroyed without specific card abilities or boss gimmicks. Really high chance of this making the gimmick too easy, and it also results in every draw from your side deck that gives another copy of the gem you put there being a dead draw.
-Starting hand mechanic where your first drawn side deck card MUST match one of your three drawn main deck cards. I think this one's a pretty obvious addition.
-Your starting deck is mono-colored and your first few card adding nodes can NOT be of that color. The map either randomly chooses the second color for you or you explicitly choose what it is. Cards that are unplayable without the third color do NOT appear throughout the whole run. This forces the player to make a two-color deck.
-A card upgrade node on the map that removes mox requirements on a card you choose. Common early in the run but doesn't appear as much later. Magnificus' gimmick in his boss fight and his item in Kaycee's mod both involve erasing glyphs, so this is pretty on-theme. Probably best if the node removes only one mox requirement on a card that requires multiple ones or also removes all other glyphs on a card.
-The "blows up if its mox is destroyed" cards are potentially too swingy when it comes to risk/reward. This depends on a lot of other factors, but it might need to be a gimmick that only appears on enemy cards. I think that "can't attack without X color" has a lot of potential for card design. You can have cards that need a color and turn off if you lose that color temporarily or you can do weird things like a card that doesn't require any mox and can be put down as a blocker, but can also attack if you fulfill its two or three color requirement.

[msgameandcake]

When considering the broader state of the Magic deck and a potential full Magnificus mode driven by it, I think it is also important to keep in mind that progression is already quite fundamentally different between the Blood-based and Energy-based styles that we've seen thus far. Both styles involve building a deck and modifying/upgrading cards in various ways, but the specific methods of progression across the world maps and what kinds of upgrades are available differ greatly. I know that right now most Magnificus modes are mainly just taking a Leshy playthrough and giving you Magic cards instead of Beast cards to use, but under a theoretical full Magnificus mode we'd likely see a whole new map setup, just like how Grimmora also had HER own full chess motif for level progression.

In particular, my mind is drawn to how Magnificus's Tower is quite different from any of the other Scribes' locations. Leshy and Grimmora were mostly just a singular room to explore, while P03 had a factory that, technically, allowed more freedom in getting to choose between fighting either of his followers first (discounting the Dredger, who doesn't have a real fight at all but must be fought after the Smelter). He also had more complex puzzles to explore his factory's rooms whatsoever.

Magnificus has an entirely linear progression through four separate rooms, each with notable puzzle solving elements, and with each of the first three rooms focused on a single Mox color. In a similar vein to how P03's world replicates the original Inscryption world with thematically appropriate robot cards only found in their respective areas, perhaps going through a full Magnificus mode would involve climbing his tower, with each floor providing only cards that use that floor's relevant color. You could have a randomly chosen Green, Orange, or Blue Starter Deck (or perhaps you'd actively choose your Starting Color), and the first floor of the tower would be equally random/chosen, ensuring that if you start with a Green deck, the first floor is the Green floor, for example. This gives a consistent foundation to start from, but also inherently specializes the kinds of cards you'd have available to you, and also likely limit you from ever getting more advanced two-color cost cards until your second floor, where you'd start to consider how much you might want to sacrifice color consistency for a wider range of ability types and a higher peak power level.

Within this framework, I envision getting to opt out of any card gains/modifications like in P03's mode, as well as getting to choose what colors your 10-or-so Mox side deck would consist of. I also envision that the dual-color Mox wouldn't be randomly drawn cards, but instead would be Upgrades to single side-deck Mox at a time, applying a permanent Green, Orange, or Blue to it, at which point you could flip the second color between the two other options. Perhaps one could get the option to not necessarily remove the color cost from a mox, but to change the color cost around, so if you saw a really cool Blue card that you'd really want the ability of, but were otherwise running an entirely Orange deck, you could potentially shift it to a more appropriate color. These chances would be quite limited of course, as enhancing deck consistency like that would be a pretty major deal.