What are the best CCGs?

[Vagiel]

Damn, This looks amazing! I am going to have a thorough read of this tomorrow but just looking at the artwork I am sold.

 

[thesheeep]

Honestly I know magic it's a fun game with some interaction but it has nothing on the most complex games out now.

To be fair, though, if MtG was the most complex game out there... nobody would play it.
You can easily make a game so complex only few people would even be interested in playing it.
MtG does the trick of being comparably easy to get into, and then opening up so much and offering so much variance (if you play outside of meta, anyway).
Talking about that, I still have to make that sheep-based deck...

One often finds opportunities to outplay opponents in a Magic match, but this is secondary to

a) the paper-rock-scissors balance between aggro, midrange and control and
b) the huge luck element in Magic due to mana screw

So playing Arena for the past few months, typically I win 30%-40% of my matches due to my opponent getting mana screwed (not getting the right colors or missing land drops), and I get about 25-40% of my losses due to mana screw (mana screw or extreme mana flooded, with the same deck).

about 60% of my wins and losses are due to match ups (playing an aggro deck, it's an uphill battle against black control for example, or against rdw if my opponent draws a fistful of burn).

So I suppose that leaves between 10% and 20% where I'm winning because I make the correct plays against the opponent or trick my opponent to play poorly.

That is only MtG Arena, though.
As everybody knows - and every fanboy denies - the shuffler there is rigged. Or if not rigged, it is at the very least broken and not comparable to how real, physical cards are shuffled.
I simply never encountered mana screws/floods as often in paper MtG as I (and my opponents) do in Arena. It's very annoying, and made even more so by officials and fanboys pretending it not to be the case.

This effect is also increased by playing Bo1 instead of Bo3. Bo1 actually brings quite a few problems, but I, too, prefer to play it, as I find it more interesting than playing 2-3 matches in a row against the same opponent with the same (slightly adjusted) deck.

 

[Jason Liang]

Some thoughts on Animation Throwdown ~

Having played this for almost two months, I think the distinguishing feature of this game, which directly reverses Synapticon's previous CCGs (i.e. Tyrant Unleashed) is that basically overflow damage always tramples to the face. So in Magic terms all creatures have trample (or in Yugi-oh terms, creatures are always in attack mode). This has a couple of interesting cascading effects on the game-

- it makes life points and life totals extremely important
- it makes effects that increase attack (the Cheer skill), permanently increase attack (the Crazed skill), decrease attack (the Cripple skill), or negate attack increases (the Hijack skill) extremely important
- it makes direct damage (the Punch skill) basically always to the face
- ironically, it makes having creatures with a big ass really important too
- it makes the matches quite short

It makes the game dumber but I am intrigued by the effect this has on making life totals matter. Often in Magic you can get your opponent down to 1-2 life and still it's impossible for you to win. Permanent trample (and a lack of fog effects) means you always have enough reach.

 

[Alex_Steel]

I will also mention Legend of the Five Rings. I was playing the old one for many years, which was amazing. Now I am playing the new one, which I find even better I think (and it's a LCG now, so no card hunting).
It's quite complex, with a lot of depth and flavor. It also has an accompanying storyline, which is a cool bonus.

 

[anvi]

I watched a video guide and it seems soooo complex, but I will stick with it. Seems like an awful lot to learn but a good pay off.

 

[Vagiel]

I watched a video guide and it seems soooo complex, but I will stick with it. Seems like an awful lot to learn but a good pay off.

Unfortunately it is very complex to start without someone to show you the ropes. Fortunately you have codex bros for that.

 

[spectre]

anvi
The game has plenty of bidding mechanics (I'm counting putting fate on characters as bidding too) which are hard to get a feel of unless you play with someone, watch how they bid, make a few extreme bids yourself and see how it turns out.
The other hurdle is to understand how the various ring conflicts can affect the board state.
Sometimes the cards themselves will steer you in the right direction, they did a decent job in reflecting the fluff in the mechanics, so it should come together naturally if you read up on a clan and larp it. If it says Lion Clan are fiersome fighters but honorable, stay honorable, bid low with your honor, get into fights, focus on the rings of Air and Fire and you should have a good time playing.

I think there were a bunch of official print to play pdfs for the coreset if you want to stay physical; whatever you do, taking the plunge and having a few test games should give you a better idea how it all comes together than all the yewetube vids out there.

 

[Gregz]

I was wrong, I spoke too soon about Eternal.

It turns out there's a more complex meta here than Hearthstone has, and it's not as pozzed with P2W as Hearthstone.

I only had to put in $10 to kickstart my deck about a month ago, since then I've been grinding and it's been pretty fun, as I'm gradually improving my collection and building new decks.

 

[Jason Liang]

I been playing Age of Rivals. It's basically a two-player highlander card draft game, cards are paid for and played as you draft them. Small card poll but some interesting cards. You collect cards but have only a few options to customize your deck (you can choose 3 cards, depending on your avatar, which will always appear in the draft. Otherwise your draft pool is the 70 card basic pool plus whatever cards you've unlocked from random boosters or earned science points). It's ok, probably good to play 1-2 matches every couple of days.

 

[anvi]

I was wrong, I spoke too soon about Eternal.

It turns out there's a more complex meta here than Hearthstone has, and it's not as pozzed with P2W as Hearthstone.

I only had to put in $10 to kickstart my deck about a month ago, since then I've been grinding and it's been pretty fun, as I'm gradually improving my collection and building new decks.

Have you come up against that OP deck yet which brings out several big flying creatures all in one go?

 

[Gregz]

I was wrong, I spoke too soon about Eternal.

It turns out there's a more complex meta here than Hearthstone has, and it's not as pozzed with P2W as Hearthstone.

I only had to put in $10 to kickstart my deck about a month ago, since then I've been grinding and it's been pretty fun, as I'm gradually improving my collection and building new decks.

Have you come up against that OP deck yet which brings out several big flying creatures all in one go?

Not that I can recall. Don't get me wrong there are many many decks packed with legendaries that I couldn't touch with what I'm using now, but you really only see those at the masters level of ranked play, and the reward structure doesn't punish you too badly for stopping at diamond.

 

[Mangoose]

A couple more games that (I think) noone mentioned:

Horus Heresy: Legions - HS clone in a WH40K setting

Been playing this casually - for a 40k fan (especially those interested in the fluff/story), I definitely recommend. For the general CCG player... I have no idea because I've never really played them before. It has essentially no pay2win elements. All the cards you can get from free "crates" or daily mission crates or the like.. Including legendaries. And then, if you pull a dupe (or more than you're allowed to have of one card) you get a different type of in-game currency which can be used to buy specific cards that rotate. Altogether there is no point in paying unless you want to get cards faster.

Here's my referral link: https://horuslegions.page.link/v5zBCXZ4NZ2bHjQU7

TBH my favorite CCG is Yu-Gi-Oh because you have slots to slap into face-down trap or magic cards. Which means you can bluff, which makes it moderately more interesting than counterspells from hand.

There's actually Yu-Gi-Oh Duel Links on Steam and pretty decent. I'm just too lazy to play it. And I am 40k fanboy.

The following is what Yu-Gi-Oh would be like in the 41st millennium:

And here's a match against Tzeentch :lol:

 

[Doktor Best]

So i am getting a bit into Legends of Runeterra right now and well its good.

It is really F2P friendly and good for a quick round on the smartphone. The game is borrowing a lot of MTG elements like active blocking, spell speed, keywords like elusive(flying) quick attack (first strike) etc. It has a guaranteed mana curve (you even get to keep up to 3 unspent mana for spells). It has different regions which you can mix and match freely just like in MTG. Balance seems fine so far without any powercreep for "expensive" decks in sight. All archetypes are viable. It has champion cards as "synergy nucleus" that need to do certain things in order to level up so you build your deck around achieving this while also maintaining a consistent gameplan if you happen to not draw into them early on.

There is almost no RNG when it comes to obtaining cards. You get shards which you can use to craft cards and wild cards which you can also use to craft cards of a certain rarity. You earn exp to fill your weekly vault which nets you a free champion card and an expedition(draft) ticket even with very moderate play (i am talking 2-3 short play sessions per week)

 

[NoSoup4you]

Is this the de facto official place to talk about CCGs? I play way more of them these days than video games, and my favorites are Shadowfist and VTES. I'd just like to know how to go about it before expounding at length about them. I could do a thread where I go through and write up a big post for each non-mainstream CCG I've played - quite a few to varying degrees - but I don't know how it would be received.

 

[anvi]

Is this the de facto official place to talk about CCGs? I play way more of them these days than video games, and my favorites are Shadowfist and VTES. I'd just like to know how to go about it before expounding at length about them. I could do a thread where I go through and write up a big post for each non-mainstream CCG I've played - quite a few to varying degrees - but I don't know how it would be received.

Type it! I've never heard of them. Have you played MTG / Arena? A comparison to something would be good.

 

[NoSoup4you]

Yup, I've played Arena, getting to mythic ranking with a draw 2 Scions/Irencrag Pyromancer deck a few months ago. In general, I have a disdain for Magic, as a lot of games end up being basically predetermined due to the big decks+low built-in draw. Plus it's just frustrating that the lesser game with more money always outlasts the competition.

 

[Jason Liang]

Is this the de facto official place to talk about CCGs? I play way more of them these days than video games, and my favorites are Shadowfist and VTES. I'd just like to know how to go about it before expounding at length about them. I could do a thread where I go through and write up a big post for each non-mainstream CCG I've played - quite a few to varying degrees - but I don't know how it would be received.

Oh where do you play VtES? I am in Atlanta, and afaik it is dead here, I have not heard from Tatus in a long time.

Ian Lee also plays VtES and Shadowfist (probably two of his favorite games?), and he writes about both games often on his blog here https://iclee.wordpress.com/

 

[NoSoup4you]

Minneapolis. We probably have like 10 VTES players at various times. I know Ian too, he's in the Shadowfist discord server. Both games get played online a fair bit, though it was more hopping during early COVID... Good times.

 

[anvi]

Yup, I've played Arena, getting to mythic ranking with a draw 2 Scions/Irencrag Pyromancer deck a few months ago. In general, I have a disdain for Magic, as a lot of games end up being basically predetermined due to the big decks+low built-in draw. Plus it's just frustrating that the lesser game with more money always outlasts the competition.

Yep MTG is both awesome and stupid. Can you play those games you talk about on PC?

 

[NoSoup4you]

We're using Lackey, which is a generic non-rules-enforcing program. I have some gameplay videos up: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/977142410

 

[Silentstorm]

Never played a TCG, but am considering playing one, any recs for a beginner, i guess MTG is the obvious choice since i hear nightmare stories of YGO and 1 turn kills, apparently the new Digimon TCG is also way way better than anyone had any right to expect it to be but it doesn't have a digital form, same goes for Force Of Will, Flesh and Blood and Dragon Ball Super.

Also, holy crap, there are a ton of physical TCG's and digital ones too, looking around the market is bigger than expected, and they are already announcing more TCG's for both physical and digital forms, but i am going just for digital, i live in a kinda rural place with no tabletop gaming shops and never even heard of MTG groups here or anyone who plays TCG's where i live, can't think of any shop that even sells cards here, so i am looking more at MTG:Arena and Shadowverse, i guess Elder Scrolls Legends and Gwent are also worth looking at?

 

[Jason Liang]

Never played a TCG, but am considering playing one, any recs for a beginner, i guess MTG is the obvious choice since i hear nightmare stories of YGO and 1 turn kills, apparently the new Digimon TCG is also way way better than anyone had any right to expect it to be but it doesn't have a digital form, same goes for Force Of Will, Flesh and Blood and Dragon Ball Super.

Also, holy crap, there are a ton of physical TCG's and digital ones too, looking around the market is bigger than expected, and they are already announcing more TCG's for both physical and digital forms, but i am going just for digital, i live in a kinda rural place with no tabletop gaming shops and never even heard of MTG groups here or anyone who plays TCG's where i live, can't think of any shop that even sells cards here, so i am looking more at MTG:Arena and Shadowverse, i guess Elder Scrolls Legends and Gwent are also worth looking at?

YGO Duel Links is actually really well done. Although it might be intimidating to jump into pvp on that if you have no experience with the game. Playing one of the Nintendo DS Yugioh games (my favorite is WC2008, but 2009 Stardust Acceleration and 2010 Reverse of Arcadia are also good games to jump in) on emulator for a few days could help. There are plenty of powerful OTK (1 turn kill) archetypes in Duel Links, but any consistent FTK (first turn kill) strategies are policed heavily. You almost never feel like you didn't get to play your hand.

A lot of pnp games have online versions that people use. For example, Netrunner has jinteki https://www.jinteki.net/ . If you don't mind a smaller community, Netrunner and VtES are the best ccgs ever designed and well worth getting into.

The problem with Arena is that it magnifies MTG's land screw problem. You'll eventually realize that 60-70% of your matches are determined by either you or your opponent getting land or color screwed. For some reason, the digital client makes this even more common than paper. However, this is a pretty good time to start Arena since standard rotation is approaching. Also, Arena has a reputation for being beginner-friendly. A lot of Arena streamers started playing ccgs through Arena.

All and all, any of the four (mtg, yugioh, netrunner and vtes) are worth learning. However, compared to the other 3, mtg is a 2nd rate ccg experience.

Me playing Duel Links pvp:


As you can see, most matches have plenty of back and forth interaction.

 

[[UCHIHA]XxDarkSasuke420xX]

all of the online ones have been ruined by sweaty tryhard netdeckers who literally only care about "winning" and "epic esports" which causes 99% of cards to be unplayable

I guess if you have IRL friends and want to get together to play MTG with a random box of cards it can be fun for a short time but honestly only loser manchildren would rather play a fucking child's card game over going to the beach/bar/concert/etc..

 

[spectre]

I's say you're pretty much stuck with digital. Unfortunately, this takes some enjoyment out of card games, because while doing away with hanging out with sweaty neckbeards is its own reward, banter is irreplaceable.
If you manage to find a good group, you can play pretty much anything on Tabletop Simulator (the cost of admission being only the current price tag on TS, as well as the mic). This gives you as close an experience to tabletop as possible.
The trick is to find people who are more or less on your level, being the new guy in a playgroup of veterans has its perks, but there are very few games in which vets have fun playing with new guys, unless it's that uncommon specimen that
enjoys teaching newcomers.

There's plenty of shit available, so look what sort of themes you like and pick your poison accordingly, although for me past a certain point the game's aesthetics become irrelevant and it's mostly down to the rules, gameplay and strategies. I barely stop to look at the cards.

 

[NoSoup4you]

With Mythgard newly dead, there's not really anything interesting left in the online CCG realm... Just endless generic dudebashers. They're all fun for a few months, and then become increasingly solved as you get better at them, until you realize you really weren't allowed to use creativity from the beginning. The rapid speed of iteration from playing online 1000 times a day exacerbates this problem that 1v1 CCGs naturally have. I can't exactly recommend my favorite games either though (Shadowfist, Vampire), just because our communities are too small to reliably play whenever you want.

If you want something interesting that's actually decently supported, Doomtown will be launching a new core set soon, along with an official online client. In the meantime, a fair amount of people play online using OCTGN.