I Designed the Core of My TCG… and It Broke Everything (Spellpatch #4)

In today’s Spellpatch dev diary, I’m finally revealing the first two Garden cards; the core mechanic that defines how my indie trading card game actually works. Gardens are your resources, your board structure, and your loss condition all at once, and designing them turned out to be way trickier than I expected.

I break down the early design challenges (and some surprising playtest problems), and why Gardens became the heart of Spellpatch’s pacing and strategy.

Alongside the Garden reveal, I’m also showcasing two new Level 1 cards:

Bloomling — a calm, drifting flower spirit for the Floral starter deck

Mandible Surge — a satisfying early-game burst for the Insect starter deck

If you’re into TCG design, indie game development, or just like seeing these new cards come to life, I hope you enjoy this one 💚

⏱️ Chapters
0:00 - 0:46 - Intro
0:46 - 1:38 - How do Garden cards function?
1:38 - 2:44 - The challenge of designing them
2:44 - 4:07 - The progress so far (and problems)
4:07 - 6:09 - Revealing the new cards!!
6:09 - 7:01 - Outro

🔮 What is Spellpatch?
Spellpatch is a cozy, whimsical TCG where players cultivate magical gardens using familiars, seasonal spells, and powerful invocations. I’m designing everything from scratch — mechanics, art, worldbuilding — and documenting the journey in this devlog series.