Degenesis

A nightmare world sustained by a dream of an unknown being. Nothing is certain there, including the laws of physics. The world is filled with a variety of living creatures, some even trying to form civilisations.

The main theme of this world are fairytales and insanity, mixing into this fever dream, dreadful aesthetic.

Humans
While weak and frail, are crucial to the realm, because their madness is most pure of them all. They are also the most prone to discovery, risk and trying to form a civilization.

Nightmares
Nightmares are born of fear and so they lurk in places of dense fear to feast on it. And those are plenty in a land full of folklore. Nightmares also often choose to become Lady Madness's messengers and other kinds of servants, since madness makes fear that much more delightful.

Goblins
Goblins are fearless invaders from the outer unknown, who are an embodied desire to kill, so extreme they are willing to destroy themselves in the process. Every goblin is born quite different, they all look grotesquelly deformed, and they often augment themselves with cyborg parts, just to enhance the deadliness. Their every kill is also a birth of a new, unique goblin.

Faeries
Most of the time they occupy themselves obsessively worshipping forces of nature, gaining weird strength through their tribalistic rituals that actually appease the Universe. They are the closest among the living creatures to seeing the reality's true face.

Lady Madness
Lady Madness is a deific entity that has close to no power, but knows the absolute truth. Her goal is to take care of mortal desires, while having no framework of right or wrong, making it very dangerous if you don't know what you wish for (and you almost always don't). The insanity of the world keeps her alive, and she has a weird, complicated relation with every race. Humans usually ask her for favors, faeries worship her, nightmares live in a symbiosis and goblins are mostly indifferent, but those who aren't become especially devious.

Is also known as Dementia or Mistress Nausea, very rarely also called The Feeding Mother.

She's the reason why the color green is often considered a bad omen. Green eyed people often face hostility, seen as unholy children.

The Dreamer
The biggest force of the realm is The Dreamer, which is a god which's Degenesis is the dream of. That's why it follows the feverish logic and the world's shape makes no sense. Most living things have no idea about the Dreamer's existence, faeries worship him accidentally, mistaking him for the will of the cosmos, which he basically is, but they think that he is a collective of several higher beings.

Humans
The identity of humans is rather generic and they can be whatever, but their role is often to support other archetypes of the realm.

Sirens
Sirens are most often statted defensively (less attack than health), often have Regenerate and their abilities are Actives, sometimes Summons. The abilities themselves most often are about exhausting other units, dueling them, giving unblockable, returning them to hand and other types of manipulation. Some Sirens can be oriented around the Congregate keyword (see below).

Faeries
Faeries practically always have flying, most often are understatted, but have a passive effect that affects all other faeries, like "all other faeries have +1/+1" or "all other faeries have ". Basically they are supposed to function like Slivers in MTG. Some Faeries can be oriented around the Congregate keyword (see below).

Goblins
Goblins are supposed to embody reckless aggression. They are basically always aggressively statted (more attack than health), often have Agile and Overrun and ofter are overstatted accompanied by drawbacks for being used (like discarding cards). They also often benefit for killing enemy units or dealing damage to the opponent.

Nightmares
Nightmares of Degenesis are all about card manipulation. They most often are about milling or discarding cards, but other kinds of card manipulation are their thing too. Nightmares are quite vague both mechanically and visually, so you can go quite crazy with them, as long as it stays, well, crazy.

Congregate
Congregate is a keyword which's popularization is a side mission of the realm (main one being establishing or strenghtening the author's favourite archetypes). To Congregate X means to choose any amount of friendly units that meet the condition X (which can be empty), and they become exhausted. Then, an effects happens which's power is dependant on the number of congregated units. This mechanic is very similar to Covoke from MTG.

A few example Congregate abilities:

Active: Congregate Faeries. Create a Faerie with Flying and its stats equal to the congregated amount.

Active: Congregate Sirens. A unit with cost equal or lesser than the congregated number has Unblockable this turn.

(3) Congregate. You gain this much mana for this turn.

Summon: Congregate. Exhaust that many enemy units.

Everything Else
Cards of Degenesis don't really cling to any affinity. That's why for example there are Nightmares in both Spirit and Mind, but not in Strength - not because I'm stubborn that they should be that way, but because that's where they make most sense design wise (because Strength doesn't really do Mill). Often cards are considered flavor first, so you don't have to try hard and make a Spirit Nightmare at all cost for example.

For the tribes themselves, the ones above are not the only one allowed in the realm, only the ones I expect to show up every now and then. If there's a card that would fit dark fairytale/fever dream/insanity/freakshow aesthetic - there's a place for it in Degenesis.

The world in general
Very earthlike, but signs of civilisations are not as common, there are usually vast spaces inbetween settlements of any kind, filled with wild terrain, sometimes containing a ruin or two. The human architecture is inbetween medieval and the XVIII century trends, dependant on location and the non-linear history. The images are very welcome to use unorthodox perspective, like the fish eye lens for example.

Overally, the realm strives to mix dark fairytale and freakshow elements, but can also go a bit more abstract.

Humans
Humans of Degenesis are of all races, either wearing armor or fancy baroque to early industrial age clothes.

Sirens
Sirens are most often croenenbergian mixtures of human and fish parts, about human size. The human parts don't have to be human colors.

Faeries
Small, bug winged humanoid. Usual skin colors: peach, blue, light puple, more rarely green. Very rarely use clothes, usually cover their bodies with a thick layer of "warpaint" ornaments. Various sizes, but usually between a child's palm and an adult's palm.

Goblins
Very deformed and varied. What's in common: Vaguely humanoid shape, sharp, pointy yellowish teeth and a skin color between green and brown. Often asymetrically limbed, quite often eyeless. Most usually between 0.6 and 1.2 meters tall. Very eager for cyborg enhancements, either cybernetic or steampunk (they feel out of place because they are otherworldly invaders).

Nightmares
Nightmares are the most varied of the bunch. They have various different ways of getting born, and their form can be anything remotely unsettling to the sentient races of Degenesis, especially humans. Some can even be just immaterial concepts, like sleep paralysis - those are a nightmare equivalent of our plant life.

The Lore Book
"Degenesis - Of Struggle and Madness" is an ongoing creation, in which each chapter is a short story set in the world of Degenesis to further establish the world and its lore.

It can be found here.

Age 1 - The Great Maddening
An age focused on nightmares, Lady Madness, Mill and Discard. Ended with The Dreamer's awakening and the construction of Nightmare Engines by Descartes. Age 1 Cards (8/8):
 * Spiraling Madman
 * Altered Memory
 * Ill-Omened Carnival
 * Ominous Violinist
 * Wit's Unbirth
 * Petty Judge
 * Wall of Regrets
 * Nightmare Engine

Age 2 - Eyes Gaze Into The Future Foreseen
An age focused on exploring the world of Degenesis outside of the Nightmare niche. The goal of that is to avoid the Walnacht's problem of excessive compartmentalisation.  Age 2 Cards (7/8):
 * Night Mare
 * Shadowfish
 * Hatespawn
 * Vortex of Hatred
 * Spirit of Plenty
 * Loud Mouth
 * Corrupted Lands
 * (Legendary Spot)

Age 3 - Stories of Numbers
A pretty messy age, with general focus on getting self-exhaust going, while also inviting outside designs.  Age 3 Cards (4/8):
 * Overflowing Thoughts
 * Midknight Sleepwalker
 * Half-Reclaimed Shrine
 * Premature Animation