Combat Mechanics

Instead of a player having life totals, have each player controlling 3 or 4 planets or some other representative 'areas'. Instead of throwing all your creatures at one target and their creatures standing in the way, you can choose who attacks where. This idea is derived from the legend of the 5 rings ccg which utilizes a similar card/location mechanic.

Speaking from my experience with both TCGs and board games I see one big problem here. You are trying to set a constraint on time which, in my opinion, is a variable restraint that comes as a result not as a design plan. When Richard Garfield went into designing Magic, robo-rally, or any other game I highly doubt that "time played" came into discussion until well after he finished designing what he saw as a fun, exciting game! Even now, the R&D team for Magic actually REMOVE the restriction while play-testing. They give infinite life, infinite mana, and infinite hand sizes so that they can playtest the interactions between mechanics without worrying about variable constraints on that reaction. An unfun game I always see as coming from sacrificing interaction for less important variables (such as time).

This brings me to the aspects that you've adjusted. To "save time" you've removed the parts of the game that force thought, complexity, and well... fun! One of the most intriguing and exciting parts of games like magic are things like strikeback. It adds a layer of complexity to the attack phase AND allows you as the designer to have more design space! By worrying about the time constraint you want, you removed one of your best aspects of any battle game! More people playing magic complain about combo and counterspells because it reduces interaction between players and stops the evolution of the game. A combo deck will do nothing "take the hits" and then win in one turn with nothing to stop it. A counterspell stops something new from affecting the game and allowing new interactions of cards to happen.

You should think hard about whether or not your game is not fun because of the length or because there isn't enough excitement in the game to warrant the length! If a game is fun, exciting, and engaging then people will WANT to spend more time playing it! Many times if a game is fun to me I lose track of the time I spent playing the game and focus more on what I can do next that would overcome my opponent or make the game more interesting for everyone playing! If you are thinking too hard about the time frame you are not thinking from the angle of a player, and you need to do that as well as design.

All I can say is design the FUN of the game first THEN worry about time, number of players, age group, and the like. Those can all be adjusted by adjusting the minute details such as your life total. If you want a game to last only about 15 minutes then AFTER the fun and mechanics are installed, then tweak life in the playtesting. Give each player infinite life (seems counter intuitive I know) and keep track of exactly how long it takes each game for the first player to lose 10,15,20,25, and 30 life. Do this a couple dozen times and you'll begin to see a pattern of when and where the sweet spot is for life. Add another player and do it all over again to see if it's a constant or if it changes how long the game plays with more people. Some games even end faster with more players! (fluxx comes to mind!)

Now as far as the details, think about the logic of the setting. Most magic cards that are hated are hated for their storyline malfunctions. You're a ship in space! If you attacked a ship, why wouldn't it shoot back?? Or even if it's ground fighting of the different species on the planets, no one is just going to roll over and take the pop-shots hoping they don't die! 12 mice won't kill a cat without the cat taking some of them out! maybe change how the strikeback occurs. Instead of just dealing the damage right back, maybe it fatigues the attacker making the next attack on it twice as powerful. That way there is still a drawback for attacking all willynilly.

Also I love the idea of having planets for life! Maybe each planet has a different "life" total of it's own and also an ability that changes how the player plays! One planet could be alot of life, but no ability while another one could have very little life but allow you to attack twice with each creature! Then when you lose the planet you lose the ability on that card! It will evolve the game the long it goes on and will allow the length of the game to be less stressful or unfun because things will constantly change. I find most games that get boring in later turns get boring not because of length but because this 20th turn is identical to the 19 that came before and you're just going through the motions.

just make the game fun and the time won't seem to be a problem. If it still is then rethink the small details before removing the fun

for your last question I recommend looking into the "mana" mechanics of Battle Spirits card game. It is almost identical to what you discribed and has an interesting way of tracking and utilizing those things.

I was thinking about this too and what he could do is have each card have a "turn" level. That way cards don't become obsolete if they aren't played on the right turn. Maybe that turn one card is better to be held on to until turn 4 when it becomes twice as powerful when you play it! he would need to develop some way to keep track as to when one thing or another was played of course, but it'll help solve the restriction/dead cards problem!

I don't speak fluent Russian, but the spam bot is probably saying no. Finding a developer is usually a long pilgrimage. You have to really commit to your project to see it through. I don’t think developers ignore newcomers by default. But a sound knowledge of the business, or at least showing some increasing eagerness to learn it could prove your commitment. Remember, developing games is no touch-and-go activity for a developer, so in my opinion it shouldn’t look as it is to you (hopefully it isn’t). Maybe if you enter a contest (and win) the game will draw the necessary attention. But this is most probably not what you should be thinking about now. Completing (really, really, really completing) a game design (including lots, lots, lots of playtest) is far, far, far more demanding that what it looks like at the beginning, when that bright idea dazzles you.

Mind about all this later. Keep working!