Once upon a time in the land of
Azaroth...
Many years ago, I starting playing a
game on my computer called 'WarCraft'. Little did I know then that it
was the beginning of one of the biggest phenomena of my generation.
After the original WarCraft, there was WarCraft 2, then WarCraft 2:
Tide of Darkness, and finally WarCraft 3. As EverQuest started to
fade, the guys over at Blizzard put the final nail in that coffin
with their own MMORPG: World of WarCraft. It took our world by storm.
They had ads with William Shatner and Mr. T. It was everywhere. I'm
sure you've heard of it.
Since nerd hobbies have expanded and
crossed medias, Blizzard first partnered with Upper Deck to create a
Trading Card Game. After a few years, Blizzard partnered with
Cyptozoic and the game improved drastically.
The basics:
Like many card games these days, the
WoW TCG relied on resources, spells, and 'monsters' cards in play.
Unlike Magic, there were no 'colors' of mana or cards. Instead,
resources were 'Quests', 'Locations', and here's the best part, any
card played face-down in the resource row. Quests were used like Land
in magic, except you could pay a cost listed on them and gain
something, usually health or a card draw, making them more useful
than face-down cards. Locations were similar to Quests, except you
didn't turn them face-down when you used their abilities. Another
change between most other CCGs and WoW was the use of the Hero card.
Your Hero would determine your Faction (Alliance, Horde, and later,
Monster), your class, race, and health. Each Hero had Health that
varied by class, race, and etc. In addition, your Hero had a power
that would require 'flipping' the card. Some powers were
one-time-only while others were continuous once you flipped your
Hero; in the last few Blocks they released Heroes that had powers on
both the front and back of the Hero card.
The other major differences between
Magic and WoW is that in combat, you picked who fought who, and they
didn't heal between fights. If your Ally took damage one turn, it
would carry over in to the next one.
In general, if you've played Magic, you
know how to play this game. However, for me, the differences made the
game.
Card types:
Hero -
While we've covered the basics of this
card, there's a bit more to it. As mentioned, your Hero picks Faction
and Class. But, there's several different Heroes of each class and
faction. Let's save you want to make a Horde Hunter deck. There's
several different Heroes you can use, including Sylvanas. Either as a
High Elf or as an Undead. Hero cards are double sided, making them
easy to find if they get mixed in to your play deck. Some Heroes have
a 'one time flip' power, where you pay the cost(s), flip your Hero,
and do whatever you got. Other Heroes have a 'constant' power. Pay
the cost, flip the Hero and you get an 'always on' ability, something
like “All Allies you control have Stealth”. In the later
expansions, they released some very powerful Heroes that have both
front AND back side abilities.
Equipment -
Unlike Artifacts in Magic, only your
Hero uses equipment, and equipment is limited by your Hero's class,
and there's slots for items, too. Armor could stop some damage and
weapons would let your Hero deal some damage in combat... If you pay
the weapon's strike cost (which can be as low as 0). Your Hero can
carry both melee and long range weapons, shields, armor, helmets, and
all sorts of Trinkets.
Abilities -
These are your 'spells' if you will.
Most abilities are based off of your class but some can be used by
several or all classes. Abilities can be the game-changers for many
decks. Abilities are usually based on class abilities in the MMORPG
but not always.
Allies -
By far, most of the damage dealt in the
game comes from Allies. When you bring an Ally in to play, they join
your 'party'. Some Allies have special abilities that activate when
you bring them in to play, others have abilities that activate when
they leave play and others provide synergy between all of our allies
of same type. In the last few blocks, they made great synergy for
Murlocks, Demons, Night Elves, Tauren, Orcs, and Humans.
Quests and Locations -
Quests are by far the most common
resource included in decks. Since you can only include four copies of
each Quest in your deck, you'll see two, three, or even four Quests
with different names but all have the same ability. Locations are
rare, and as I said before, they don't flip when you activate their
powers, but they usually require you 'exhaust' (read: tap) them, so
you'll only be able to use them once per turn. Some require building
up a bunch of counters before they're worth anything beyond a normal
resource.
Master Hero -
One of the rarest types of cards, but
one of the most power, Master Heroes are real game changers. First of
all, they have a high cost, usually around 10 or so. They replace
your Hero card, so you lose whatever abilities they had, but you gain
some supremely powerful ones in exchange. They also have absurdly
high health, so they'll keep you in the game longer. If you include a
Master Hero in your deck, you want to make sure you can get it out
right when you need it, so keep that in mind when building your deck.
Raids:
Like the MMORPG, the game came out with
Raid Decks. Inspired by the Raids in the game, you could battle some
of the biggest villains in the game. Unlike normal games, Raid decks
required (at least) three players, all playing their decks
cooperatively again the Raid deck. That right there is one of the
things I love about Raids, being able to play with my friends, not
always against them.
Let me make one thing clear right now:
Raid Decks are HARD. Even on the 'easy' setting, I've seen some of
the most vicious decks get gutted by Raid Decks. Unless all of the
decks are balanced for a Raid, they'll start dropping like flies. To
help you out, the older Raid Decks included Hero cards you could use
to make a special deck just for the Raid. These Heroes are usually
very powerful, so they're banned from normal play. Some of the Raids
included full decks to be played against the Raid.
Most Raids work like this: The players
sit down and take their turns in order, just like normal. When the
Raid Deck's 'turn' comes around, someone flips the top card of the
deck over and does the actions listed there, plus whatever actions
are listed on the Raid Deck's Hero card. This is usually targeting
and attacking one of the players, placing token Allies, and placing
counters on things. Notice that Raid Decks don't use resources or a
graveyard. They're an 'auto-pilot' deck designed to run themselves.
There is at least one Raid Deck that runs like a normal deck, but
that's the exception rather than the rule.
When I play a Raid, I usually like to
have five people involved. One person manages the Raid Deck, while
the others play their normal decks. I find four decks also balances
better for playing, as you can have two casters (one healer, one
combat) and two melee types (usually one long-range and one close
range) working together. It also fits the classic adventuring party
troupe.
Lastly, the person running the Raid was
suppose to go out and by 'Treasure Packs' which were
extra-special-amazing booster packs that included foil cards. But,
since they were more expensive than regular booster packs, I've
almost never seen it done. Now that the game is out of production,
you might be able to find boxes of them for cheap.
So there you have it. The WoWTCG was
fun and it's a shame to see it go the way of so many other great
games.
