Monday, March 30, 2015

Gone But Not Forgotten: World of Warcraft Trading Card Game

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. 


No comments:

Post a Comment