Non-Magic CCG of the day...week..moment...whatever

As I said, I'm going to be doing these pieces periodically, I just didn't say how periodically....

So eventhough I did a review in the last couple days, I'm doing another one.

The game of the moment is: Vampire: The Eternal Struggle

 

The game was released in 1994, was originally called Jyhad, and was created and produced (at least intially by) Wizards of the Coast. This was Richard Garfield's follow up to Magic the Gathering. Now, I'm going out on a limb here when I say this, but this game was produced at the beginning of the CCG boom created by Magic, and I think this was an attempt at expanding Wizards of the Coast (as opposed to later productions, made to both flood the market and give Wizards ore control over their competition).

The Wikipedia article can be found here. Here are some of the highlights.

"Vampire: The Eternal Struggle, published as Jyhad in the first or "Limited" edition and often abbreviated as VTES, V:TES or V:tES, is a multiplayer collectible card game set in the World of Darkness. It is published by White Wolf, Inc."

"The game was designed in 1994 by Richard Garfield and initially published by Wizards of the Coast. As Garfield's first follow-up to his popular Magic: The Gathering collectible card game, he was eager to prove that the genre was "a form of game as potentially diverse as board games" In 1995 the game was renamed from Jyhad to Vampire: The Eternal Struggle to increase its appeal and distance itself from the Islamic term Jihad . After the 1996 Sabbat expansion, Wizards of the Coast abandoned the game, and in 2000 White Wolf took over development. It is thus one of the oldest collectible card games in existence."

"White Wolf announced that Vampire: The Eternal Struggle would cease production on the 10th of September, 2010."

"Richard Garfield noted that the experiences he had made with the Magic: The Gathering collectible card game had helped him to improve his design of the game. In an interview with Robert Goudie, Garfield particularly notes dedicated multi-player (3+) rules, a lack of "land cards", and a more rapid card drawing mechanism (cards normally being replaced instantly after being played)."

Interesting, and I think further proof that this game was different from Wizards later attempts at flooding and control. The article continues:

"What sets VTES apart from most other collectible card games is the strong group play element. In general a player will concentrate on the player to his immediate left, his prey, and a player who succeeds in ousting his prey receives a strong boost by gaining 6 additional pool. This boost of resources might possibly enable him to eventually "sweep the table" (gaining momentum with every kill) and oust every other player. Thus there is a tendency for players to help weaker ones to frustrate the stronger players' dominance. This ensures that most players stay in the game longer, instead of the playing field being reduced quickly to those with the best cards and the greatest skill."

"These conditions create a game where players are almost always interacting with the other players for both short- and long-term goals instead of simply waiting for their turns. VTES is a game of negotiation, skill, and deck-building. Deals and alliances, both for the moment or for the whole game, can play a big role. A whole classification of cards, political cards, are designed with this in mind. When a vote is called each player can cast votes, either by using votes granted from cards in play (typically from vampires with a 'title' such as Princes & Archbishops) or by playing cards from the hand."

Having played and still possessing some Vampire cards/decks, I can agree. The game has some advantages over Magic, but falls short of the Magic 2.0 experience Richard Garfield seemed to be aiming for. My overall review follows the last notation from the Wikipedia article, sets and expansions:


"Sets and expansions
White Wolf releases VTES cards in base sets, expansion sets and mini expansion sets. The main difference between these are the size of the set and the number of reprints.

• Base sets contain booster packs as well as a number of pre-constructed starter decks (ranging from 3 to 6). The starter decks contain 89 cards (with 77 library and 12 crypt cards) as well as a rule booklet. The booster packs contain 11 cards (in newer sets, often with 7 common, 3 vampire and 1 rare card, but refer to the table below). The base set should provide a new player with a number of cards to be able to build a wide variety of decks. A base set usually contains a high percentage of reprinted cards from earlier expansions.
• Expansion sets contain booster packs and may contain a number of pre-constructed starter decks. The distribution of cards in boosters and starters is similar to a base set. They feature also a particular theme. New players are usually not able to build a large number of different decks with only cards from this expansion's boosters due to the lack of basic cards provided either in the starters or in a base set. The number of reprints is low and usually restricted to the pre-constructed starter decks.
• Mini-Expansion sets contains only booster packs and the number of cards are restricted to 60 new cards (20 rare, 20 uncommon and 20 common cards).

All expansion sets from Dark Sovereigns expansion onward are identified by an expansion symbol printed in the upper right corner of cards. In newsgroups and on web pages character codes are used to identify each set, usually an abbreviation of the expansion's name."

Expansion Name	Type	Symbol	Code	Release Date	Total cards[s 1]	New cards[s 2]	Booster distribution
Jyhad	Base	(none)	Jyhad	16 August 1994	437	437	11C, 4V, 3U, 1R
Vampire: The Eternal Struggle	Base	(none)	VTES	15 September 1995	436	6	11C, 4V, 3U, 1R
Dark Sovereigns	Expansion	Gothic window	DS	15 December 1995	(173)	173	8C, 4V, 3U
Ancient Hearts	Expansion	Eye of Horus	AH	29 May 1996	(179)	179	6C, 4V, 2U/R
Sabbat	Expansion	Calligraphy S	Sabbat	28 October 1996	(410)	340	16C, 5V, 5U, 2R
Sabbat War	Base	Inverted spiked ankh	SW	31 October 2000	437 (300)	77	5C, 3V, 2U, 1R or 4C, 3V, 3U, 1R[s 3]
Final Nights	Expansion	Broken ankh	FN	11 June 2001	386 (162)	170	7C, 3V, 1R
Bloodlines	Expansion	Ankh on red blood spatter	BL	3 December 2001	(196)	196	7C, 3V, 1R
Camarilla Edition	Base	Ankh	CE	19 August 2002	547 (385)	115	5C, 3V, 2U, 1R
Anarchs	Expansion	Combined CE/SW Ankhs	Anarchs	19 May 2003	260 (132)	128	7C, 3V, 1R
Black Hand	Expansion	Handprint	BH	17 November 2003	286 (136)	145	7C, 3V, 1R
Gehenna	Expansion	Stylised Clock	Gehenna	17 May 2004	(150)	150	7C, 3V, 1R
Tenth Anniversary	Special	Foil "10"	Tenth	13 December 2004	190	10	--
Kindred Most Wanted	Expansion	Gun	KMW	21 February 2005	314 (150)	162	7C, 3V, 1R
Legacies of Blood	Expansion	Split ankh (black)	LoB	14 November 2005	461 (300)	236	7C, 3V, 1R
Nights of Reckoning	Mini expansion	Plus with circle	NoR	10 February 2006	(60+17)[s 4]	60	6C, 3V, 1R, 1X[s 4]
Third Edition	Base	Tri-snake biohazard	Third	4 September 2006	537 (390)	160	5C, 3V, 2U, 1R
Sword of Caine	Mini expansion	Bundle of swords	SoC	19 March 2007	(60)	60	7C, 3V, 1R
Lords of the Night	Expansion	Crown	LotN	26 September 2007	295 (150)	175	7C, 3V, 1R
Blood Shadowed Court	Special	Silver Ankh	BSC	16 April 2008	100	0	--
Twilight Rebellion	Mini expansion	Tri-snake on Red Star	TR	28 May 2008	(60)	60	7C, 3V, 1R
Keepers of Tradition	Base	Castle tower	KoT	19 November 2008	457 (398)	176	5C, 3V, 2U, 1R
Ebony Kingdom	Mini expansion	Split ankh (white)	EK	27 May 2009	(62)	60	4C, 3V, 1R, 3C[s 5]
Heirs to the Blood	Expansion	Three blood drops	HttB	3 February 2010[8]	TBA (168)	168	7C, 3V, 1R

You can see, the game had a long shelf life. Overall, I'd give the game a C+, and this is for a couple of reasons, but one in particular. Card Variety: B+. Gameplay: B-. And General Enjoyability: C-. I feel like the enjoyability of the game is somewhat limited, as is overall conprehesion, by the setting for the game. Most folks are unfamiliar with it. This limits the games mainstream appeal severely, which makes the games longevity surprising. Its not a bad game, but its not one I'd recommend to casual CCG collectors/players.

Cheers.

The Rant- Part 01

What is the big deal with Fetch lands? Why is they such good cards? The best mana curve comes from careful use of spells, not from Fetch lands....and here's a great example:



I'd take this card in a well built deck over a fetch land anyday, plus, this card is a common, and vastly less expensive.

Hearts of Darkness at Daily MTG

This article points out the greatest combo I think I have ever seen. Check out the article by clicking the link below. Hayden.

"Hello and welcome back to the Lab. Today I'm excited to dive into some juicy Mirrodin Besieged cards. It's a pastime I truly enjoy for all new sets. Someday when I'm rich and can fill my Olympic-sized swimming pool with Magic cards, I can actually literalize that statement. But it is a swimming pool, so they would all have to be Islands."



I have to give a sneak peak, here's the combo:

Anyway, the reason I'm riffing on praetors at all is because Praetor's Counsel left my jaw open and drooling ever since I read it in the Visual Spoiler. This spell can return your entire graveyard to your hand, an effect that seems preposterous until the maximum hand size rule kicks in at the end ... except Praetor's Council also offers unlimited hand size for the rest of the game. Fairly, it's quite expensive, but nothing a dedicated green deck can't handle.



However, while brainstorming for ideal combining cards with Praetor's Counsel, I came up with the idea of a mill deck, using spells to mill itself in preparation for a giant Praetor's Counsel. But that didn't work out as I'd hoped. So I went back to the drawing board and thought out of the box a bit.

Then I remembered Morality Shift.

A totally wonky card, Morality Shift straight up exchanges your library and your graveyard. Useful on various levels, it gains another dimension when you follow it up with Praetor's Counsel. After the dust settles, you'll have basically picked up your library and put it entirely in your hand.

 

This is a sick combo. I actually am surprised I didn't think of it....Praetor's Council was one of the cards from Mirrodin Besieged I figured was broken, and could be broken further. This combo is the kind of thing I would put into a mutliplayer deck, which would allow for more use of the combo, and a greater likelyhood of actually pulling it out. Cheers.

Underrated Card of the Week

Polar Kraken
When this card was originally printed, it was the largest creature in the game. As I recall, there were some who tried to use the card, but most dismissed it as more novelty then useful. When Ice Age fell of the grid, the card was forgotten. I am going to attempt to demonstrate that Polar Kraken, a card I do in fact use, is actually very useful.


First, some cards that work well with Polar Kraken:

              

The first two cards don't even require one to pay the cumulative upkeep. Flagstones of Trokair makes paying at least the first upkeep not even hurt. Now, usually after attacking with the Kraken once, you'll know whether or not your opponent can handle another hit. It they can't stop you, lose two lands the next round and finish them off. Brion Stoutarm, like Fling, can get you the most damage out of the Kraken for the least cost. Rupture probably should only be a last ditch effort, but a draw beats a loss in my book.


Now, the best way to use Polar Kraken is in a Reanimator deck. I built a three color Reanimator that uses Polar Kraken and gets results, though obviously the Kraken isn't the only beast in the deck. What I'm saying is don't write Polar Kraken off, its a decent card. Cheers.

Worst Decks ever Update

Worst Deck Ever Hall of Fame Update

I think that periodically, I'm going to talk about some of the worst decks I've ever built.

Today I have three examples.

The First, a Red/Blue version of my Varchild's War-Riders deck. I talked about this in my last post and I don't think it needs to be revisited. It was a horrible attempt at a deck that went 0-3 in its brief lifetime, two of those losses being in multiplayer.

The next two are Atog based decks.

The first is the Foratog deck.

  

The deck initially hinged on the Foratog alone, usually paired with the second card. If you have not realized yet, both the Red/Blue deck I mentioned first, and this deck came into being around the Mirage era.

Anyway, the Foratog deck had only one combo. Attack, sacrifice all forests, but float 4 mana, then play Natural Balance. I guess it wasn't the worst combo ever, since it usually got me 5 forests and forced everyone else to ditch some lands. But that was it, that was all the deck could do. Later I added one more combo:



The deck was crappy, but I actually played it for a long time. As I recall, the deck actually went 2-2 in head to head games, but 0-5 in multiplayer. One last thing though, the deck was part of one of a legendary moment in my magic career, which occured during a 5 player game. I had used my Foratog combo and consequently, had no lands. The next turn, one of the other players cast Balance. At first, everyone though that we'd just lose all our lands. In actuality, I had no lands, another player had no cards in his hand, and yet another player had no creatures! Luckily, one of the players realized this and counterspelled the balance.

The third and final Worst Deck Ever that I for some reason built, was the All Atog Deck. I honestly do not remember why I built that deck, which centered around the use of several different atogs, including the Legendary Atogatog.

  

  

  

  

The deck made use of artifact lands, draw and discard spells, and standing enchantments, like Seal of Doom. As you can guess, this deck was a miserable failure. The All Atog deck was spawned by the Foratog deck, that and the purchase of the Atogatog for $1. This deck never won a game, finishing 0-4, with all the losses being in mutliplayer. Initially, the only reason I took the deck apart was to use the artifact lands elsewhere. Later of course I had a what was I thinking moment, fortunately for me, the deck was already gone.

Those are the first three decks in my Worst Decks Ever Hall of Fame. There will be many more to come! Hopefully this will be a laugh....cheers, Hayden.

Varchild's War Riders!

Generally, you can find as many copies of Varchild's War Riders as you want, for around $1 apiece. Most people think its a crap card. I don't.



This is one of my all time favorite Magic cards, and I've played with it in a Red/Green deck, Red/White, Red/Blue and Red/Black. Pretty much any combo you can think of, I've done. MTG Salvations Magic the Gathering Wiki has an article about General Varchild, which can be found here.

I actually pulled three Varchild's War Riders from Alliances packs back in the day. I was a classic Magic Pauper at the time, and really only played Red and Green decks, so that was what I built.

Now, here are some of the cards I used:

  

 



Let us not forget cheap creature boosting (Giant Growth, Blood Lust), and other Fog variations (Spore Cloud, Fog, etc). To be honest, I don't remember exactly what was in this deck, it was a long time ago. I'm sure you get the gist of it though from the cards above. Ways to wipe out Survivor Tokens or protect against them and creature boosting. Later additions would include:

  

  

You get the idea. Lets look at the War Riders at the Meta level. Most people see the card as a good creature with a horrible drawback. But note, the Rampage ability allows the Riders to trample over any number of Survivor tokens. At the Meta level, the War Riders can make an ally: by giving a player tokens and the fighting someone else. The Riders are also fantastic at disrupting creatureless or creature limited decks. Furthermore, killing off the Riders is not a great option, as they can easily be brought back from the graveyard. Returning the Riders to someone's hand is about as useful as doing the same thing to a Tarmagoyf, as they can be easily recast. Best of all, countering the Riders is difficult, as they cast so cheap and require only one colored mana. In any event, I've toughted the benefits of the War Riders. I think they're great in multiplayer, because they shake things up and can make allies or turning on a common enemy easier. Now, on with the decks.

Red and White was my next attempt, using cards like:

  

  

Lets just say that White was one of the worse pairings. The deck still had most of the Red cards noted above, and still had the same disrupting effect in multiplayer, but wasn't quite as good as the Green pairing.

Next, I tried Black, which worked best of all:

  

  

  

There were other black cards, but these three were the game changers. Thanks to the Hissing Miasma, not only did people not attack me with the Survivor Tokens, they used them against the rest fo the players. And Sadistic Glee made the War Riders huge fast.

I'm not even going to talk about the Red/Blue attempt. It was a disaster, and the only reason I did it, was since I'd tried all the other color pairings. I figured I'd try the last one, whcih will forever be enshrined in my Worst Decks Ever Hall of Fame (WDE HoF).

Here are a few last suggestions for the War Riders:

  



There are others of course, this is just what came immediately to mind. To summize, if you get the chance, make a Varchild's War-Riders deck. Its fun above everything else. Cheers.

Non-Magic CCG of the day!

Hayden here, and this is the first of what I hope will be many pieces on some of the other CCGs out there.

Now let me note, not only have I played most of the CCGs I will be talking about in the coming days, I not only have played, I own many cards from. So when I talk of gameplay, I'm talking from experience.

Game of the Day: Star Trek CCG

The game was created and published by Decipher Inc (and was their big hit before the Star Wars CCG). The Wikipedia article on the game is informative:

"The Star Trek Customizable Card Game is a collectible card game based on the Star Trek universe. The name is commonly abbreviated as STCCG or ST:CCG. It was first introduced in 1994 by Decipher, Inc., under the name Star Trek: The Next Generation Customizable Card Game. The game now has two distinct editions, though both forms of the game have many common elements."

This two editions things is what is most interesting about the game, Wikipedia explains it as follows:

"Some of Decipher's concerns included the complexity and bloat that the game had built over seven years; there was no balanced 'cost' system for cards, causing stopgap and complex systems to be added to the game over time. As well, the game had embraced many different and not fully compatible ideas over time; this made for long, corrective rules documents and a steep learning curve for beginners. In addition, the number of cards types went from nine to over seventeen in just a couple of years, which made the game much more difficult to learn."

"At first, the game designers sought to introduce an entire new game based on Star Trek; it would be simpler and be targeted to beginners, while the original game still produced expansions, but on a slower schedule. This concept was abandoned when the sales figures showed that the original game could not continue on its own merits."

"The solution was to reinvent the original game along the basic lines, still allowing a depth of gameplay but avoiding complex rules and concepts. The standard card types and gameplay would remain, allowing some new cards to be used with the original cards, known as backward-compatible cards, or First Edition Compatible (abbreviated as 1EC) and attempting to satisfy longstanding fans of the original game. These cards are able to be used in First Edition gameplay, though some key words need to be changed to fit the First Edition's old rules and setup. Further information on how to use Second Edition cards in First Edition gameplay are listed in the First Edition Conversion Rules. Many cards central to the new form of the game can only conform to the new rules and setup. Second Edition, commonly abbreviated "2E", was launched in 2002, and came to a close with its final expansion in December, 2007.^"

"Because the game was essentially starting from scratch with the hindsight of seven years' work, the initial Second Edition set was able to progress quickly."

While I don't own any Star Trek cards, I have played, had friends who played, and am quite familiar with the game. Note: this game was printed at the beginning of the CCG boom, shortly after the sccess of Magic. Its a good game and a great CCG. It had one of the longest runs among CCGs. Though this is more likely a result of the popularity of the subject matter, in opposition to Magic, which had nothing really underlying the game to carry it.

Star Trek CCG is worth playing, and its long printing run even makes it worth buying, but the overall grade for the game is a B. In terms of Card Variety, A-, game play B-, and general enjoyability, B+.

Cheers.

PS: The First Edition of the game had 14 true expansions, and even more special releases. The Second Edition had 11 sets, and less special releases, but this testifies to the depth of the subject matter and viability of the games concept.

Time Warp: Summer Magic

Summer Magic, also known as Edgar was printed in the summer of '94 to fix the problems in the initial printing of Revised.

Here's what Wikipedia adds:

"The Summer Magic print run of Revised Edition were printed in the summer of 1994. This print run intended to fix some of the errors with Revised, including the washed out color. As it turned out, the Summer Magic run had problems of its own. The colors were considered too dark and the artist credited for Plateau stayed uncorrected as well as the artist credited for Serendib Efreet, although the Efreet had received its original color and art again. Also a famous new misprint occurred with the card Hurricane; the so-called "blue Hurricane" is one of the rarest and most sought after cards in the entirety of Magic because of its misprint with a blue border. On the secondary market it sells for thousands of dollars. The print run was recalled and destroyed, however about 40 booster boxes that were shipped to England and Tennessee survived. Statistically no more than 11 or 12 of each rare exists."

In other words, Summer Magic cards are really rare. In fact, I didn't even realize they existed until I stumbled over the Wikipedia article on Revised the other day. Naturally, this sent me scrambling through my collection of Revised cards in search of Summer Magic cards (the basic lands from which go for $80 each). Here's a sneak peak:



Cool eh? In any event, the article finishes:

This print run is known primarily for its extremely scarce and valuable cards and packs. Cards are distinguished by dark coloring and a 1994 copyright date displayed at the bottom, along with the artist credit. Booster packs look identical to normal Revised Edition packs, and as such, telling them apart can often be troublesome. No starter decks were made.

There are articles out there detail how to spot the difference, so if you think you have some of these cards, you'd better check. The rares are outrageous. The famous blue hurricane, goes for around $8000! Cheers.

Slinging Equipment with Stoneforge Mystic

Good Lux

Four Principles for Designing Mythics at ManaNation

The great Mythic Rare defender is back. Its like this is his full time job.

Hello, everyone, and welcome back to my miniseries on fungibility and how mythic rares have harmed the fungibility of Magic cards.



Ok ok, this piece is better then the last two. Being careful with what exactly becomes a Mythic is great, now if only he had said he was for eliminating them all together. Cheers, Hayden.

Titanless at TCG Player

Sanity Grinding: Titanless

Pauper Green Deck at Pure MTG

Pauper to the People- The Green Machine

Standard Elf Deck at BMoor's Garage

BMoor's Magic The Gathering Deck Garage "Standard Elf Deck"
February 11, 2011

Best Use of Oath of Druids...as if we didn't know

Using Oath of Druids Optimally