Card Games and Evolution 2006
Evolution 2006 went even smoother than any of our past tournaments. There were of course lots of great matches, which maybe I'll get to talking about in a later post.
For me, though, the highlight was finally playtesting in public the Street Fighter card game I've worked on for months. You can see from the pic that it was popular, and people even played money matches in it.
The game uses a modified poker deck (so you can play poker with the same cards, too). Each deck represents one character, and there is no deckbuilding or card trading. This is a stand-alone card game not a tcg. It's not a tcg. It's not a tcg. That gets lost on a few people so I figure it's best to say it three times. The game is designed to test exactly two skills: 1) yomi (the ability to read the opponent's mind) and 2) appraisal/valuation (the ability to judge the relative value of pieces in the game). I figured nothing else was important so I threw out everything else to keep it simple.
Oh and by the way, the game is based on paper, rock, scissors. After years of looking at how paper, rock, scissors worked and didn't work in various games (and writing articles about it...), this is me trying to demonstrate how to do it right. My tagline is "it's the best game of paper, rock, scissors that nature will allow."
Now, what's very unfortunate is that there are already two other Street Fighter card games out there. One is by Score and distributed by exculsively by Blockbuster, and--surprise--it doesn't sell well (isn't Blockbuster obsolete by now?). The other SF card game is published by Sabertooth games as part of the Universal Fighting System. You can play Soul Calibur 3 cards, Street Fighter cards, and Penny Arcade cards together. That one manages to sell well, which is quite a hindrance to me. Check out this bad card from this bad game.
IF YOU ARE SKIMMING, NOTE THAT THIS IS TOALLY NOT MY CARD GAME, thanks.
What really gets me is that Sabertooth has created a terrible, terrible game. It's clunky, bad at capturing the license, inelegent, and has lots of terrible art. I don't even know where to start with this "Yoga Short Kick" card. To be fair, it also has some great art by Udon, but much of it is copy and pasted from their comics. Anyway, this game is offensive to me as a game designer and Street Fighter player. It's kind of a toss up between the Sabertooth game and SF Hyper Fighting on 360 when it comes to what is damaging the Street Fighter brand name most these days. sigh.
I will most likely move forward with a my own characters in an online version of my card game, and have the Street Fighter (and Virtua Fighter!) characters ready once (if) I can make the business deals with Capcom and Sega. 
In other card game news, details of the World of Warcraft TCG are out. I've followed them closely and I can't even tell you how impressed I am. I tried for literally *years* to make a card game as complex as Magic: The Gathering, yet better and different (my SF card game is not part of that; it's way simpler). Anyway, what I did come up with on that front looks disturbingly similar to what the WoW TCG is...except they did it better than me. They were a little more clever here and there and really made it come together. Simple and good resource system, good combat system, and good hero system. I will say that this game is so far the ONLY trading card game that has the potential to be better than Magic: The Gathering, in my opinion. Note that I'm not even talking about the Warcraft license, just the game mechanics themselves. Oh, and it also happens to have great art and great card layout.
I'm not surprised to find out that Brian Kibler is one of the leads on the project. I read his articles and tourament reports for years. Brian, I still remember when you beat Jon Finkel at Pro Tour 2000 with an Armadillo Cloaked Rith for the win. They called you "the dragonmaster" back then. My hat is off to you guys at Upper Deck right now, more than to any other game developer out there. Coming up with a trading card game on par with MTG is about the tallest order you could have, and I think you guys did it.
I wonder if I could release a card game through Upper Deck with similar rules but with a different license. Hmm...
--Sirlin
August 28th, 2006 at 4:58 pm
It always seemed to be the trouble with making home-made TCGs is playtesting. It’s really hard to output enough material and get it on enough cards to test stuff. God forbid you have to change some things layout wise. Hacking apprentice and shit works -OK- I guess. Either way it seems like everyone always ponders a rule set, but when it comes to the nitty gritty it’s hard to test to see if it really works.
As for your Street Fighter card game, i’m really curious to see how that plays. I’m not surprised people put money on it as it seems fighting game players love betting on everything (matches, poker…… Straight up RPS). It’s funny how a supposedly random game like RPS tends to favor skilled Fighting Game Players. While the Risk/Reward is equal for all choices, they still manage to pull out prediction.
August 28th, 2006 at 11:09 pm
RPS is only predictable with humans because we don’t PERCIEVE the Risk/Reward as being equal for all choices. There’s some sort of internal mapping that goes on, correlating each of the elements with something else in our brains… either feelings like aggression or passiveness, or or memories, or whatever. Humans can hardly think of ANYTHING without simultaneously thinking about a bunch of other things that they hang onto the first thing. By weighting these other things, you can predict another person fairly well.
August 28th, 2006 at 11:35 pm
Kayin said:
“It always seemed to be the trouble with making home-made TCGs is playtesting.”
I did write three sentences in a row saying “it’s not a tcg.” An online version before mass printing cards would help balance it.
Also, note that equal payoff RPS is not a good game, as I wrote an entire article about. The payoffs should be unequal and it should require some valuation skills to even know what the relative value of the payoffs are.
–Sirlin
August 29th, 2006 at 4:25 am
I wasn’t planning on picking up the WoW TCG, having read interviews and thinking it mostly appealed to fans of the MMO. I think I’ll pick up a starter pack now, though.
August 29th, 2006 at 4:41 am
I miss this game far more than I expected I would. You’ve found Renocrew’s favored narcotic, good sir.
August 29th, 2006 at 5:44 am
Interesting…Didn’t know you were into TCG’s…
Sadly, when I was in the stage of my life where I cared about TCG play, I only bothered with Pokemon. This was back before the Gym Leader sets came out, and I did do pretty well in my local DCI back then. Sadly, my Christian family wasn’t fond of the idea of me playing MTG, being fairly young there was nothing I could do.
All the same, good luck with that venture. I’d like to see the way your game functions, and an online version (with minimal monetary investment I hope) would be cool to at least give a shot.
August 29th, 2006 at 6:13 am
Is there an online version for testing? This is the kind of thing I’m interested in, but not to the point of spending money.
I do feel that a stand alone game is way better than a TCG. I’m a Munchkin player, and unlike MTG, I’m the only one who’s had to make the $100 dollar investment.
August 29th, 2006 at 9:15 am
Rather play my DS Lite or PSP no offence.
August 29th, 2006 at 9:38 am
What if he makes a DS or PSP game out of it? (even though I doubt it, sicne it’s all about the mind games)
August 29th, 2006 at 9:43 am
I totally want to play this and would like to know more.
August 29th, 2006 at 10:45 am
This sounds really interesting actually. Never been into TCGs, so since this isn’t one I might find it a little more appealing. Any ideas on when you will share some more info with us?
August 29th, 2006 at 10:52 am
[…] Sirlin has announced a physical card game that we have been working on. It had its first public play test at this year’s Evolution Fighting Game Championships in Las Vegas. My involvement with this game began at GDC 2005 where I meet David Sirlin for the first time. He gave me an impromptu design test; requiring me to solve one of the game’s design problems on the spot. It turns out that I have a knack for problem solving, and so, I passed the test and was later hired by Sirlin to work on his team at Backbone. We’ve been working on this card game off and on in our spare time since then. The project has recently been picking up steam as we iterate on the design and balance of the game, and layout of the cards. The experience has been surprisingly gratifying, not quite instant, but close; it’s nice when designers are able to make significant changes to a game without the assistance of a programmer. Once the game is closer completion I would like to share some of the ways in which the game has evolved. Check the link to find out more! […]
August 29th, 2006 at 8:03 pm
Greetings Silrin,
While this isn’t all that relevant to Evolution 2006, it does have some relevance to card games in general, and I thought you might be interested in checking it out (assuming you haven’t already).
The folks over at ArenaNet (ie. the development team that made Guild Wars) are trying out a version of ‘sealed play’ with their Guild Wars franchise. It’s a rather interesting, seeing how Guild Wars bares many similarities to Magic: The Gathering. I won’t worry about going into detail about it here, but if you’d like to check it out further here are several links that may be of interest to you:
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· Sealed Play for Guild Wars – The Basics: http://www.guildwars.com/competitive/articles/sealedplay/
· Guild Wars 5K Arena at Gen Con [Sealed Play] (you’ll find reports of the event on the frame to the right): http://www.guildwars.com/gencon2006/
· Guild Wars 10K Arena at PAX [Sealed Play] (you’ll find reports of the event on the frame to the right): http://www.guildwars.com/pax2006/
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Other random links that lead to Guild Wars sealed play related articles and the like:
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· Player (non-ArenaNet) report on early version of Sealed Play: http://clamatius.blogspot.com/2006/03/guild-wars-factions-prerelease-party_10.html#links
· Player (non-ArenaNet) Created Sealed Play Generator: http://sof-guild.com/index.php?Page=cards
· A player (non-ArenaNet) report on PAX2006 Sealed Play: http://clamatius.blogspot.com/2006/08/guild-wars-sealed-at-pax.html
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Regards,
Griffith
August 29th, 2006 at 8:12 pm
Err, I guess Wordpress didn’t like transferring that formatting. Oh well, it still gets the message accross. Sorry if the post turned out looking a bit messed up, though.
- Griffith
August 29th, 2006 at 11:46 pm
Sealed deck is really only needed when the bs surrounding a game stops you from playing it normally, in my opinion. You can’t just get any card you want in magic or any skill you want in Guild Wars. It takes money or time to do it, so sealed deck gives you a dose right away.
Some will argue that sealed deck formats are good at skill testing, which is a better arguement than the Guild Wars press release that says it’s fun because it doesn’t test skill much, ha. I do admit that a format like that is skill-testing, but I could never get around the idea that it’s my bootleg strat deck vs yours. I don’t want to play a creature-heavy deck with a little bit of removal vs your creature heavy deck with a little bit of removal. I want to play a carefully crafted Zangief deck vs your carefully crafted Dhalsim deck, or whatever. I guess I’m way outside the market for sealed deck.
My SF game and future customizeable card game will feature this idea: just let people play the real game. Take away all the barriers of $300 for a constructed deck or hours upon hours of playing to get skills.
While the Guild Wars thing is very interesting and I appreciate the link, they would do much better to get my business if they put out a press release saying “Guild Wars UI completely overhauled to be prettier and more functional.” :(
–Sirlin
August 30th, 2006 at 1:14 am
Sealed deck tests a different type of skill - being creative within narrow boundaries. Although is has more randomness it also is a strong test of how you can adapt to a variety of situations.
Actually sealed deck is kind of sucky, but draft is excellent. Draft introduces a lot of skills that are not needed in either sealed or constructed, and unlike sealed you have some control over your card pool.
It has nothing to do with BS. It’s just a different experience. Draft is more like poker or backgammon whereas constructed is like Chess. (And sealed is like craps or something)
—
So when are you going to publish the rules of your game and such?
August 30th, 2006 at 12:28 pm
Sirlin, I was referring to your attempt to make them as referenced in your discussion of the WoW CCG, not your Street Fighter game you showed at E3. Sorry for not being more clear.
August 30th, 2006 at 12:59 pm
James: I’m with you that sealed deck (and draft even moreso) are skill testing. I just really am not a fan of those formats and they only ever seem to exist in games that have barriers to you playing the full game in the first place.
Kayin: oh, you meant my actual tcg, sorry. Yes I totally agree that you need tons of playtesting to have any chance at a good tcg and yes that makes “home-made” tcgs very hard to do. I have no secret solution to that. I’m also not even close to the point where I need testers on it, so I have a while.
Everyone else: I am working towards an online version of the SF card game, still looking for developers. I’ll release more info on the game in the future, but not quite yet.
–Sirlin
August 30th, 2006 at 2:15 pm
(in response to Sirlin, comment #15…)
I’m very much with you when you say “sealed deck is really only needed when the bs surrounding a game stops you from playing it normally”. I think you have a major design flaw on your hands if you have to resort to a sealed deck style of play (for anything other then testing purposes), and in the case of Guild Wars, this is very much the case and the reason why trying to do too many things with a game at once can be a bad thing (i.e. trying to satisfy those who, for whatever reason, want to spend hours upon hours ‘grinding’ for something while ALSO trying to satisfy those who would rather have everything available to them so that the game is as fair, accessible, and suitable for competition).
Instead of creating silly barriers that prevent players from reaching the ‘real game’, why not spend that time making the ‘real game’ accessible AND enjoyable (as possible) to ALL types of players? I can understand that some players associate a feeling of accomplishment with repeatedly ‘jumping through hoops’ and ‘smashing through barriers’ to reach a particular objective, but if a game was designed to be deep enough in the first place, why would these barriers even need to exist? They’d only be in the way of the ‘real’ fun, and instead of getting that feeling of accomplishment infrequently, you’d get it all the time. Of course, you do have to consider that there are different types of games that test different types of skills, but I digress.
Overall, I think you’re right on the mark with you card game (especially the “just let people play the real game” part), and I very much look forward to seeing how it turns out. :)
Oh and one last thing: I wouldn’t ever look to Guild Wars as a competitive ‘PvP’ game, even if the UI was completely overhauled to be prettier and more functional. As a (non-competitive, “go out and fight monsters”) MMO RPG-type game it’s not ‘too’ bad (bar the excessive instancing), but it doesn’t measure up to games such as WoW (despite how many things ArenaNet rehashed from WoW).
While you have to give Guild Wars credit for doing ‘some’ things right (namely the streaming technology, no monthly fee, and the [albeit limited] accessibility options offered to PvP players), the game tries far too hard to force you to play with other players at all times (you are treated like an ugly step child for being an introvert, unless of course you consider playing with a number of sub par, NPC characters that you have little to no control over, or spending hours social networking to be ‘fun’), and is bogged down with too many ‘hoops’ and ‘barriers’ to jump through (for a competative game, at least) , a lack of polish, and poor design decisions that leave you feeling like they could have done things better, and that you’d be better off taking your business to WoW (or, if it ever comes to pass, a similar game that manages to stack up to WoW) and making Blizzard rich instead.
I wish you luck with your card game.
Regards,
Griffith
August 30th, 2006 at 6:50 pm
Sirlin: I assume that your game only works 1v1? In general I tend to prefer games that work for a larger or arbitary number of people nowadays (in general one 4 player game of magic is better than two 1v1s amongst friends… tournaments are of course a different story but I don’t do those anymore). Of course, that depends on how long games take to get done.
Warcraft tcg seems to be 1v1 or n v raid deck so it’s also not particularly interesting to me. (On a side note to this, I play EVE Online, and they did a TCG (out in a few months or something) recently as well. I’m not convinced of it’s worth yet either…)
Well, as some one who’s tried to home-brew many card games in the past, I’m interested to see how these all turn out.
August 30th, 2006 at 11:33 pm
Zacrias, the game is designed for 1on1, but I’m also right now working on a 2on2 ruleset. Does that satisfy you or are you looking for something else? N-player free-for-all would be hard to make work with this game, and almost all ffa games are kind of bad at high level play anyway. They tend to be a test of who you can make an alliance with outside the game.
This is actually the #1 most asked question of me in random e-mails these days. “I play X ffa game and people have out of game alliances so I can’t win. Is that a valid tactic that I should do, or are the other players cheating and should be banned.” Unfortunately, that’s just the nature of ffa. Team games or 1on1 solve this, so I always advise sticking to those. FFA is perfectly fine for casual play, though.
I’m rambling, so Zacrias does 2on2 satisfy you, or no?
–Sirlin
August 31st, 2006 at 3:38 am
interesting.
i’ve been wondering about that “can there be a non 1v1 or team-v-team game that does not dissolve into an alliance-making contest?”
i’ve never played that famous german board game “settlers of catan” but upon hearing that it was an excellent 3-player strategy game (can anyone think of another?!) i became curious how it pulled that off and read up a bit.
it seems that in this game, player interaction is very limited. they all seek to achieve one goal, but have limited ability to hinder each other.
based on this, i have decided to posit the theory that the only FFA games that work are “race-type” games where each player moves independently toward a goal, and the first one there wins, with inter-player influence minimal in order to maximize fairness.
this mechanic sounds a little boring though. i think that you can’t maximize “fun” in a game because imo schadenfreude is a vital part of the enjoyment of most games.
do i really want to play a competitive game where i can’t ruin the other players’ days?!
i hold out some small hope for improvement in this area of gaming:
maybe there could be a clever game designed specifically to be a FFA game with appropriate mechanics. such a game would probably have to somehow formalize cooperative action in order to allow for treatment of it in the game mechanics.
for example, the game could be designed so that people might gain some benefit by comboing their attacks together in a pigpile type attack all directed at one player. you might say wtf, that is exactly what we’re seeking to avoid — but the advantage in encouraging this kind of behavior is that by formalizing the idea of the gangbang, you can include mechanics designed to counteract it.
such counteracting mechanics would be the critical cleverness in the design. i few off-the-cuff ideas would include:
- a possibility of boomeranging the entire gangbang pigpile back upon all contributors, thus allowing a swing in power directly in proportion to the size of the gang-up.
- a possibility of backstabbing people who “trust” you by mingling their attacks with yours.
i dunno, those are half-assed, but my point is that catan’s solution is to prohibit alliances altogether, but i think a much more interesting solution would be to invite alliances into the game and include a proper risk/reward structure around it.
i think it’s a difficult and important problem in gaming — one that might be inherently unsolvable, because when it comes down to brass tacks, how can 1 be equal to 2?
in my experience, only by dividing by zero.
August 31st, 2006 at 7:37 am
One game I can think of that has great FFA gameplay is Zelda: Four Swords Adventure for GC. (I’m getting way out of TCG/Card game territory here, but lets just go along for now.) It can be considered a “race-type” (or maybe collection type) gameplay idea, where the goal is to make it to the end with the most rupees. The catch is that in this game, you’re required to work together and co-operate to make it past sections and to the end of the level (not to mention to kill the boss at the end of each level). Each action in the game is rewarded some level of loot - defeating enemies drops a few rupees, using a key to open a door rewards 100 rupees, bosses drop huge amounts of rupees of varying sizes which players can scramble for etc. But allowing you to do stupid things like picking up other players and throwing them off ledges just so you can be the first one to get the key to get to the door and earn that extra 100 rupees is just pure fun. Its dirty, but it is totally fun.
I guess you could say that the game has a lot of similarities to old school beat em ups, or more so games like Gauntlet. You all have a single goal of helping each other get to the end and defeat all the enemies. But In Z:FSA, it seems to take a backseat somewhat, and makes you focus on how you can back stab the other players and get more rupees. Having a voting system at the end where you can vote for/against the best/worst players in the round to reward/penalize rupees from players is another good idea from the game.
I think a FFA game needs to offer some way to force players to work together in certain instances but not necessarily encourage them to make alliances. Although this is important for things like Survivor or the aforementioned FFA TCG, it almost seems to be the only way to go with FFA. Surely there are other avenues.
Shame that nearly no one was able to get into FSA because of its high hardware requirement (4 GBAs, 4 link cables, 1 GC and room to house 4 people staring into TV, not to mention 4 people who are willing to play this game in the first place…).
I’m not sure if any of this will help with FFA card games, but its idea at least…
August 31st, 2006 at 8:35 am
2v2 is great. Basically, having different options for playing is good - I think a lot more people can be persuaded to play in team games than 1v1s in general. Perhaps it’s just that my general playgroup isn’t overall that competitive, but getting them interested by a more casual (as team is nearly always viewed) mode of play is often a better way to introduce a game than straight 1v1. If it works at high level too, even better. (Uh, I think I’m coming across a bit confused here…)
Yes, FFA is random in all games I’ve played, I’ve heard vague stories about the Babylon 5 game having good multiplayer but never played it myself. However, I don’t see why it can’t be done properly (maybe I’m just stubborn). FFA with a less major goal than total victory is often a lot better (see the 5 player MTG format for vague details: Players sit in a star shape. To win you have to knock out the two players you’re sitting opposite, you can only attack those two players (insert various other targeting rules here). Though perhaps this has already broken the meaning of ‘FFA’.)
Mostly non-interactive race win condition is basically a cop out. Anyone can work out their own strategy in isolation given enough time, it doesn’t make for an interesting game after they do.
Ok, ideas: Firstly, you could have some kind of concept of manouvering, with the built in limitation that (for example) only two people could attack any one person at once. Problem: you have to keep track of this somehow. (…I’m now left thinking of some kind of hybrid minatues-card game based around a hex or square based board… >_>
August 31st, 2006 at 8:46 am
Oops, wrote too much and got cut off. I think. If not and I’m repeating myself, apologies in advance (insert typing at 3am excuse here! Anyway, all the best ideas happen at 3am).
Manouvering seems like the best idea, as long as you have some kind of counters to it and so on, but this is probably too much of a game change as opposed to ‘multiplayer variation’.
Likewise move effects: Instead of having moves/spells/whatever that do one thing to one other thing, make it so they have more versitility, or even forced versitility maybe. Probably doesn’t work properly unless you make the game multiplayer only though.
You definitely want victory by other than last man standing though. First to n kills or damage or whatever is a lot better. Instead of people acting all defensive they should be hunting opponents they think are weak to their strategy (and maybe fighting over getting the killing blow, but kill stealing can encourage defensive play…). Encouraging defensive play and combos that kill all opponents simultaneously/in the same turn are the worst aspect of FFA in my experience. And of course, MTG gives you millions of tools for both.
August 31st, 2006 at 4:01 pm
One thing not addressed about sealed formats in TCGs is how it eliminates the metagame aspect of it (which has both its flaws and its benefits). Although constructed formats are fun, a misjudge in the metagame can cause you to lose in a situation where you normally would win a lot. An example of this is during a Standard Constructed tournament before the Fifth Dawn set came out. I attended expecting a lot of affinity based decks (arguably the strongest deck in the format at the time), and thus created my deck and my sideboard accordingly. Supringsly though, I did not play a single affinity deck the entire day. Although I do agree that metagaming is a necessary skill in constructed TCG play, it should not hinder ones play.
Sealed eliminates this problem by creating an environment where many different deck types are allowed to flourish (as opposed to several constructed formats where too often one or two deck types are far more prominant than others). However, sealed is not without its flaws either. Although the probability of pulling a terrible pool is realtively low, it sucks to lose even though you made “the best deck” you could with the cards you had available. Team Sealed play severely downgrades this chance. For those who don’t know, a team sealed tournament is one where teams (of usually three) pull enough cards to make a sealed deck for each person, and then make it. This tends to more difficult than making a normal sealed deck though, since you are trying to make three decks of relatively equal power. Anyway, that’s my little rant on limited play versus constructed play.
Also, for others interested in TCG, you might want to look at versus. The premise of the card game revolves around the dc and marvel universes (though supposedly a hellboy expansion is coming out some time next year). I’ve only recently started playing, but I find that the game is refreshingly different, while at the same time both the limited play and constructed play require quite a bit of skill. Although it feels at the moment to have less truly crucial plays when compared to Magic (I haven’t seen nearly as many make or break plays in versus as compared to MTG), I certainly feel that the prowess one needs to have at deck building in versus it right up there with Magic.
September 1st, 2006 at 1:13 am
Wow this is all a bit overwhelming to me! I have nevered played any card games other than the standard ones used with the original poker deck, but now I am tempted to try one of them out. Judging by what has been mentioned, the simple design yet perhaps difficult to master outlook of the streetfighter card game seems like a good place to start. Just my 2 cents but if something like sealed deck has to be used to create a blanced environment, then the game design and balance itself is off the hook or the designer intentionally added uber things to please the casual player. People who occasionaly see stuff like to feel powerful, or know that they have some all powerful trck up their sleeve that the opponent cant stop no matter what.
This all looks very interesting, I plan on giving it a shot! =D
September 1st, 2006 at 2:48 am
>Sealed deck is really only needed when the bs surrounding a game stops you from playing it normally, in my opinion.
I disagree, and here’s why. CCGs and similar games (e.g. GW) with a pre-game build component actually have 2 separate areas of skill - build construction and actual play.
Limited formats like draft and sealed test both areas. Constructed often only tests one - it’s not that uncommon for strong MtG constructed players to not be great at deck construction.
>I do admit that a format like that is skill-testing, but I could never get around the idea that it’s my bootleg strat deck vs yours. I don’t want to play a creature-heavy deck with a little bit of removal vs your creature heavy deck with a little bit of removal.
I think that’s a valid complaint - it really comes down to just not liking the flavour. It does depend a lot on the game. If creatures are the way to win then that may be the strongest plan in constructed as well as limited. I’ve certainly seen creature-light draft decks in MtG that have done very well in high rating tournaments, although clearly creatures are the default strategy.
On FFA games, I agree completely. There’s a reason there aren’t many competitive games where the rules are FFA - in fact, I can only think of poker offhand. Note that you can’t form alliances in poker and that’s probably why it works there - and contrary to ricefrog’s point there’s a bunch of player interaction.
September 1st, 2006 at 3:21 am
Yeah, I started thinking of the example of poker after posting. Poker’s funny because it both does and does not have player interaction.
Poker is like two games in one — the card game, and the betting game. In the betting game, the game is 100% interactive. ALL moves are between players. But the card game is 100% non-interactive - or “race-type”, where each player gets their own cards and they see who did the best.
So maybe poker could lead to some FFA mechanic inspiration — by splitting the game into TWO games, one interactive and the other race-type, we can allow for fair FFA.
The other mechanic I thought of for FFA mode is “hot potato.” In a hot potato mechanic, there’s some kind of “stack” of danger, and you can add to the stack and/or pass the stack to another player, and whoever ends up with the stack in front of them and unable to play it off eats the penalty.
The hot potato mechanic might be such that a player can’t arbitrarily choose where the potato goes, but rather has limited options (or none!) to pass the buck, and if it lands on a so-called ally, well that’s better than landing on ME.
Another mechanic that could work well in FFA is inverse slippery slope. If massive attacks doubled as massive (but highly dangerous) fuel for a counterattack, it might balance the gangbang resource problem.
September 1st, 2006 at 3:51 am
I admit I’m not that experienced at TCG-like games, but the UFS system got my attention due to the announcement it’ll soon be adding SNK characters to your roster - an option I really hope would still work well with your system, considering the many different gameplay systems in SNK games that inspired things like the grooves in the CvS games.
I wonder if you could expand on the UFS system’s problems and hint at how your system is meant to succed at the things UFS tries and apparently fails at. I only read about it roughly, but I found there were too many numbers - and perhaps cards too - to keep track of to perform any single move) and while the “elements” thing seemed like it could be a clever way to expand a character’s arsenal (fire-based characters from different licenses being able to share a skill? neat), those elements didn’t always seem to be adequately attributed - or conceived, considering the game’s theme. The attack height thing seemed to help keep things withing the game’s theme though.
As for a system allowing for more than 2 players, there’s always the option of forming teams (CFE, KoF…), and if the number of players isn’t even, maybe some aspect of the game (like some attack height element such as UFS’s, or some sort of Evade/Invencibility/Autoguard feature/value) could allow the attack delivered from one player to the other to be deflected towards a 3rd player (using something like player order for this would be preferable to seating positions - players who’d know each other well would be more likely to use this againt a token new guy, and there are ways to randomize player order) - this could allow for a battle royale-like game, depending on how the typical 1-on-1 game is set up.
So, yeah, don’t discard the possibility of an SNK license if you don’t get an SF or VF one =D
September 1st, 2006 at 6:02 am
My card game now supports 2v2, though that mode needs more testing.
There’s not much use in comparing it to UFS as it would be like comparing poker to MTG. UFS is a complicated game that isn’t even good compared to my very simple game that cuts right to the heart of yomi and valuation skills. My goal was to have as little game text as possible on the cards (currently only on your character card and 4 copies of one other card in the deck). UFS has a bunch of text about foundations and momentum and other such jargon. I looked at the Ochio Throw card and saw that it “does half damage even if blocked.” Uh…ok. Ochio Throw in my game rocks your face off.
If you want a simple game that’s still pretty good, my card game is a good choice, I think. If you want a complicated card game that is all about building and playing decks that suit your exact playstyle, then Magic: the Gathering and now WoW TCG are what you should be looking at. I don’t see who at all would be looking at UFS though.
There have been great comments on FFA games above, thanks everyone. Something to think about.
–Sirlin
September 1st, 2006 at 10:49 am
The problem with many FFA card games is that by being agressive you paint a big target on your back.
In poker if you are doing well people are actually *less* likely to mess with you because you have a stack that can break them. In a tournament if you get out to an early lead you can abuse that.
In a game like MTG there is an active disincentive to be aggressive. If you tap attackers you leave yourself open. If you tap mana for spells you have no mana left for defense. If you hurt one other player then every other player can hurt you.
What MTG FFA needs is an incentive to attack, rather than a disincentive.
Another important point is that poker is zero sum. If you break someone you get their chips. In a MTG FFA games if you hit your opponent for 5 damage you don’t benefit any more than any of the other players! That is a VERY critical point. Why attack someone when someone else attacking them does the same thing and is safer.
In a multiplayer game it’s not enough for the defender to lose something, the attacker also has to win something to make attacking a good choice.
Imagine MTG:FFA where each time you deal damage to an opponent you draw that many cards, or get that much mana, or that much life, or something like that. (Hopefully better balanced) Suddenly you have a much more active game.
September 5th, 2006 at 10:46 pm
“In a multiplayer game it’s not enough for the defender to lose something, the attacker also has to win something to make attacking a good choice.”
You may be interested in a game called Vampire: The Eternal Struggle. It’s a multiplayer CCG with some pretty cool mechanics that make it work nicely:
Any time a player bleeds (attacks) successfully, they gain “the edge” (a token), taking it from anyone else who controls it, or gaining control of it if no one controls it. The edge can be spent for one vote in any political referendum called within the structure of the game. If you still have the edge at the start of your next turn, you may gain one pool (life). Thus, there’s always some incentive to attack.
Additionally, any time your prey (the person seated to your left) is killed (no matter how or by whom), you gain a Victory Point and six pool (life), and then you’re trying to kill the next player on your left. In addition to the attack incentive, this also reduces the incentive to gang up on other players, since at the end of the game, the player with the most Victory Points is the winner (you also gain one Victory Point if you are the last person left alive, or if you manage to successfully withdraw from the game).
Alliances are still viable, but crumble as people are removed from the game. Attacking is important, but playing *too* aggressively gets you killed (potentially by both your prey, who’s trying to defend himself, and your predator, who’s trying to earn VPs and pool, and even someone across the table who’s afraid your deck will stomp him after you’re through with your first prey). The six pool you gain when you kill your prey often makes it worth tapping out to do so, even though you’re leaving yourself open to attack yourself.
It’s not quite a free-for-all game, but it’s hella fun.
-John
September 11th, 2006 at 12:08 am
For a while recently WotC made a CCG called Hecatomb, it was mostly just a Magic variant with a silly gimmick but it was built from the ground up as a FFA multiplayer game and had one interesting idea. Instead of bbeing last man standing, the game was a race to 20 “souls” you would start the game with five of these and gain one each turn, successful attacks would steal them from other players. In this wayit was a race game buut was still mainly about direct, negative player interaction.
September 22nd, 2006 at 1:33 am
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September 22nd, 2006 at 2:22 am
I’m curious about the massive kudos for WoW TCG while the VS System TCG has had many of the same concepts for years now.
WoW is much like a VS System and MTG mix in my opinion.
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December 22nd, 2006 at 2:15 am
In reply to Evan (comment 36):
The problem with the VS. system is that it features several “uber” combos. The same decks are played every tournament. People can say all they want that the game has good mechanics and variety with good balance. The truth is, when a system is dominated consistently by only a few decks (out of, say, hundreds), that’s a bad game. In L5R (Legend of the Five Rings), for example, there is always a few game-breaking decks that everyone band-wagons. However, over time, these decks change as cards are errated or new cards come out that either counter them or make make them otherwise useless. No such “game-fixing” exists in the VS. system. The same decks have dominated the environment for two years.
In reply to everything else:
I’ve not played WOW TCG; however, from what I’ve heard and read it seems to be a very good game with great mechanics and balance. I might have to check it out. Unfortunately I’m currently phasing out of TCGs in general, due in large part to the fact that I have to keep buying cards to keep up with the environment.
I am, however, working on a TCG myself. My problem with this is that I think in complex terms, and I know that for any game to be successful it needs to be simple. Of course, with all the stuff I dealt with in L5R (the game I play now), I want to be careful not to make the mistakes they did. The problems they had were: 1) At first the game was horribly unbalanced with many game breaking combos; however, on the other hand, the game was enormously fun and competitive (and popular). 2) The game designers balanced the power of uber combos and infinite combos; however, the game still suffered from an inbalance in factions with little or no RPS counters. 3) The game designers attempted to balance the factions with an arbitrary RPS system; however, the system favors certain factions while others are at a disadvantage. 4) The features designed for certain factions were better executed by other factions. 5) The obvious and bitter enemy of all TCGs: the game lacked enough playtesting to prevent the abuse of certain cards.
July 28th, 2007 at 11:07 pm
I have developed a large 288 card ccg. It uses totally new mechanics and I have the rules and all card ROUGH drafts done. The problem is that I done have a good “looking” card. The mechanics are there, the card stats are good…. but I need a card template.
Can ya point me in a direction for finding card templates, or is anyone interested in making card templates. My e-mail for responses is redknight100@yahoo.com
August 18th, 2007 at 7:40 pm
Sirlin, are you able to post anymore details on the format of this card game at the moment? From what I’ve read so far, I get the idea that you will have a number of character cards with a larger number of “other” cards.