Card Game History to Present (yes, still here)

Card games still play a major role in my life, despite seeing the potential downside to collecting cards. Recently, I have been watching card box breaks (opening a whole box of cards) and either reaping the profit or regretting the loss.

To be exact, I started thinking about a particular set, which I have had a joy of playing and remembering back in 2010: Disgaea. As a fan of the franchise (I’ve beaten Rhapsody: A Musical Adventure, La Pucelle Tactics, Disgaea: Hour of Darkness, Phantom Brave, Makai Kingdom, Disgaea 2: Cursed Memories, Soul Nomad and the World Eaters, Disgaea 3: Absence of Justice, Disgaea 4: An Unforgotten Promise, Disgaea D2, and Disgaea 5: Alliance of Vengeance), I am very excited for the upcoming set: Disgaea Ver. E. The set comes with a mix of cards from the original Disgaea set, but also includes Disgaea 4 and Disgaea D2. No word on Disgaea 5 becoming a set as of yet. This being the case, I decided to buy 4 booster boxes, 2 trial decks, and 1 meister set.

Now, why would I even bother to buy this if I had no one to play with, you might ask. Well, I am a fan of Disgaea, but never really bought into getting a handheld to play the ports. I loved Disgaea and their spin-off games and by association, I fell in love with Weiss Schwarz. I may just end up looking at them and collecting them, without the intent to actually play. Yes, some people do this with card games.

In the off chance that I want to play, I will also have enough to build a fairly structured deck. I will be getting 90 packs of cards at 8 cards each, plus the 50 cards that come in the trial decks each. Doing the math, it comes up to 820 cards. Of which, I probably will get repeats. I hope I get some of the nicer cards. As of this point, I am hoping for a signed Desco, but I won’t hold my breath, as I know that pulling a specific signed card has a very low chance and pulling a signed at all is a low chance. Since this will be the Ver. E of Disgaea, I imagine it will get the same treatment as Fairy Tail Ver. E, where boxes have 2 foils in each box, instead of the 1. This means, I will have roughly 10 chances (the meister set has 2 foils also) to get the card I want.

Since I caved, I will likely be doing a series of videos online when I open them. Things I am considering are: Pack Wars (I watched TCG Player’s attempt and I noticed that they were not playing correctly) Profit or Loss (I watched DeriumCCGs videos on MTG and Pokemon and really liked them) Draft (Drafting in this format could be fun and I may design a way to ensure that it works correctly, since there is mention of this format around as far as I know) Sealed (Again, not much of a format other than Pack Wars)

I will be doing these on my Youtube Channel: More Than Pichu’s Gaming about June 24 - July 4.

How could a game be stacked against me, you might ask. Here’s how: All the games that I have played usually follow the standard, “This is how it was intended” route of play. Equal contribution between players and the one that is luckier and plays better wins- think chess meets a slot machine. Sometimes, this is not the case and the design and player make things tipped into their favor way too much.

In DBZ/GT this happened when I was facing a Dr. Myuu deck. The deck relied on several things, but the way it was set up, it did not allow me, the opposing player to even get a turn. This means, I was left with the option to look at a total of 9 cards to defend myself. At the time, the Shadow Dragon Saga of GT was not out yet and the only way to stop my opponent was a Trunks Energy Sphere. That’s 3/75 chance, so in this case 1/8 chance with those 9 cards. Well, I got one, but my opponent also had one ready because he filtered his deck to get what he wanted. Sadly to say, he managed to get 14 allies out and used an Earth Spirit Bomb on me.

In Yu Yu Hakusho, it also happened to me at Worlds when I was playing against someone using a mill deck with Lost. Remember me saying that I had the largest deck at Worlds? Well, because of this, it took my opponent 2 turns to mill me out, but I was never allowed a turn. There was only 1 card that could have stopped my opponent and I was not running it: Solitaire. The card came out in the final set Alliance (which was promptly bought up by many players- so supply was really low). I owned no copies of the card and had sold the only copy I owned prior to the tournament because I was low on money. I was so impressed by my opponent and took some tips on how to win effectively.

This also happens in Magic, but to less of a degree.

So, how does this affect me? Well, my great loss at Yu Yu Hakusho Worlds in 2005 made me realize that a large deck doesn’t mean victory- it means less chance to draw cards you need. I changed my deck to represent a double-attack deck with all the perks of what I saw and adjusted it to a nearly perfect deck. I went on to Origins a mere 4 months later to win the Yu Yu Hakusho tournament there. I made changes to the deck afterwards because Ultimate Sacrifice and Pressure Point were definite weak points. I adjusted to reducing my opponent’s defense rather than always boosting my attack.

The problem lies that I hardly ever lose a card game any more. If I do, it is because the cards I am using are inferior to my opponents. Commons do not usually compare to rares or higher rarities. I’ve tried to use a cheap pauper EDH deck in Magic against decks that obviously have thousands of dollars poured into them. This makes my losing almost a guarantee in this situation. When I have somewhat equal terms of quality of cards, I usually win (roughly 8/10 times).

Okay, so I haven’t posted in a while and I want to make this clear: I have never played the Final Fantasy TCG, but wouldn’t mind trying it out. If anything, the cards look pretty.

So, apparently this game started out sometime in 2010 and it cleared my radar because I was interested in other card games at the time. There was never an attempt to localize it either to the U.S., which makes me a little sad.

The booster boxes are rare pickings and singles are somewhat harder to figure out. There is limited information about rarities and limited availability that makes purchasing or even getting into this game a nightmare.

Not all card games are created equal and of those that I played, Pokemon and Weiss Schwarz were the best balanced. The most unbalanced were Yu-Gi-Oh, Magic, and Yu Yu Hakusho. I love some of the games, but because they take players out of the scenario and there is barely a catch-up mechanic and often a turn 1 win condition, they are horrible. No one should take delight in what looks like the turn 1 win/loss. This means that anyone going first is likely to win in every situation. And before I get any hate for this, Yu-Gi-Oh doesn’t exactly have a turn 1 win/loss that works very well, but it severely lacks a catch-up mechanic.

These games should be about strategy and fairly close. Weiss Schwarz has the closest matches in card game history and it rarely ever becomes a “this player was on top from the beginning” attitude.

So, if you saw anything you liked, give it a shot.

As for me, I think I want to try out the Final Fantasy TCG next. I’m not sure if it will work out until I try it, which may be months or years from now.

Weiss Schwarz was on quite the run. It was releasing literally a set every month right from the get go, sometimes more. On the plus side, once you bought a deck, it usually stayed the same- so it could be a one-time purchase of your favorite anime/game. Even things like Shin-chan and Attack on Titan are now in the game. For a full list, visit here.

So, when I made my Sword Art Online deck, I avoided Silica entirely and decided that this would be a Kirito and Lisbeth deck only. I expect lots of hate for this but having Silica in the deck would mean I would have to sacrifice something in the deck design and money. Silica was not cheap when I was building this.

When the English version was announced, I decided that I would build an exact replica of my Japanese version.

So, how did it hold up? Well, I won about 90% of the time in casual games, somehow. I faced many decks because I decided to be the host for many AnimeIowa events (from 2011 to 2014 and still undecided about 2015).

When I participated in the Chicago regional for English in 2014, I did horrible luck. I was knocked out in round 3. What do you know, it failed. But why?

I changed absolutely nothing and played in the Japanese regional about a month later and unofficially got 2nd. Officially, I got a game loss due to my decklist not being fully filled in. I forgot to put quantities down for 2 cards. This pushed me down to 3rd. This was right after SAO II released and I had none of the cards from it and cared very little to getting them at this point. They wouldn’t make it in time and I didn’t have the funds to go to Nationals readily available. Maybe the loss was a blessing? I’m not sure.

On the plus side, it showed me that it was a matter of luck and not of skill if I lost in these instances. But having a card game loss based on luck happens in almost any card game- land locked, mana screwed, no bench, no energy, no blocks, not the right card combination, your opponent getting the right cards at the right time, etc. It happens. The best thing to do is accept it and move on or modify the deck until you are satisfied that it is the best it can be (or within your budget).

So, Weiß Schwarz, pronounced in English as Weiss Schwarz (as I usually refer to is as) is an anime and game card game originally made in Japan in 2009. I know this because I started playing the game in 2010.

I started with Haruhi Suzumiya and Fate/Stay Night trial decks and the only English trial deck at the time, Disgaea. I taught my friends in college and we played a little. After transferring to another college about a month later, I found that the game wasn’t very popular. I met only 1 person in the entire city of 83,000 people who played. They mainly used Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha decks. At the time I didn’t even know what Nanoha was. This was a big surprise because I was and still am a huge anime fan. So, I went an watched it and loved it. From there I bought Nanoha Strikers booster box and a Nanoha A’s Trial Deck. I was finally building interesting decks.

I later grabbed a Fate Hollow Ataraxia extra pack, a My-Hime/My-Otome/The Girl Who Leapt Through Space extra pack, a Shakugan no Shana Trial deck and booster box, a Melty Blood Trial deck and booster box, a Little Busters Trial deck, an Angel Beats and Kud Wafer Trial deck, a Fate/Zero trial deck, a Madoka Magica Trial Deck, and a Fairy Tale Trial deck. I had plenty of options at this point, but I wasn’t sure if I was invested enough in the game. I shoveled out hundreds of dollars for Magic singles, but the market for Weiss Schwarz singles was just not readily available to me.

In addition, I came into money problems in 2012 and sold most of my cards. I reclaimed Fairy Tale, but the rest were gone. At some point, I had both English and Japanese language cards for Trial decks. In one instance, I pulled a signed Homura Akemi from Madoka Magica in both English and Japanese. It was my first signed card and I have no idea which was pulled first between the two.

Today, I will be discussing 4 combos. 2 of these can be combined though.

Lets start with Craterhoof Behemoth and Wild Beastmaster. Assuming you have 2 creatures in addition to Wild Beastmaster on the field when you play Craterhoof Behemoth, all of your creatures get +4/+4 and trample until end of turn. Craterhoof Behemoth would be a 9/9 and assuming the tokens were 1/1s originally, all the others would be 5/5s. Now, with Wild Beastmaster, if you attack with her, all of your other creatures get +5/+5. So, Craterhoof would be a 14/14 and the tokens would become 10/10s, all with trample. This is just with 2 creatures plus the 2 that work well together. For every 1 creature you have on the field that’s another +2/+2 to Craterhoof and those creatures. That means each creature output is 3, assuming it has 1 power initially. Imagine a field with 5 or more creatures...Craterhoof would be a 20/20. Scary.

Lure mechanics were seen as boring and uneventful to game until EDH. If you have a hard hitting creature base or even Phage, you can get in the hit(s) to destroy your opponent. Laugh it up until a 30/30 Omnath hits you because you had to block a creature with a lure mechanic.

Bloodchief Ascension and Mindcrank create an endless loop whenever a player either takes damage or places a card in their graveyard. It just has to be “charged.” I have played Bloodchief Ascension on turn 1 in a 5 player EDH game and by the time turn 3 rolled around, it was charged. I played Mindcrank and no one could get rid of either. One player even tried to play Genesis Wave to get rid of it...too bad he would have at least 1 card enter the graveyard before anything could do anything about the situation.

The last combo I will mention is with Mindshrieker. A little spirit bird that was overlooked. This hellion of a creature can either mill your opponent and/or pump itself to deal lethal damage. Now, imagine having the ability to use Mindshrieker’s ability for 1 mana. It can be done with Training Grounds, a card previously mentioned in a previous post. This means you can attack and if no blockers are declared mill either your opponent or yourself. I’ve done this and milled Emraku, the Aeons Torn and an 8 converted mana cost card for 2 mana. Mindshrieker became a 24/24 and was not blocked. The most I’ve done with Mindshrieker in a single turn is over 30 damage on turn 3. Blinkmoth Infusion is also useful if you can’t afford and/or find Emakul. It’s way cheaper and is only 1 converted mana cost cheaper to cast.

This is a little weird for a combo and rather bad, but not as bad as Torpor Orb. This combo pumps creatures, deals direct damage, and creates tokens that get bigger and bigger. Add in something like Craterhoof Behemoth, and you have an issue.

So, how this works is you’ll need both Gutter Grime, Mikaeus, and creature sac engine. It doesn’t matter which one. Both have flying and potential to kill your opponent. So, if you only have Kitchen Finks, it’s not the end of the world. This combo is incredibly good against multiple people because you can deal direct damage with Muderous Redcap and swing with your sac engine, but be weary of this. Every time you sacrifice a creature, you get a counter on Gutter Grime, that then puts out a token with equal power and toughness to the number of counters on Gutter Grime. Basically: 1: I sac Kitchen Finks, Gutter Grime gets a counter, place a 1/1 Ooze Token onto the battlefield, Kitchen Finks returns due to Persist. 2: Sac Kitchen Finks again, Gutter Grime gets another counter, place a 2/2 Ooze Token onto the battlefield, Kitchen Finks returns due to Undying. 3: Sac Kitchen Finks a third time, Gutter Grime gets a counter, place a 3/3 Ooze Token onto the battlefield, Kitchen Finks returns due to Persist again. Eventually: 30: Sac Kitchen Finks again, Gutter Grime gets another counter, place a 30/30 Ooze Token onto the battlefield, Kitchen Finks returns due to Undying again.

So, this is a little bit of an odd combo I used once, when Leveler was worth about $0.50 each.

This is sort of tricky combo set. Mainly because you need to be running at least Blue and Black for this to work. The idea for this comes from Torpor Orb. The concept is to cheat/play in the cards asap. Then, instant speed destroy Torpor Orb. So, when your creature dies, it goes to your opponent. Since Phage’s ability would activate, your opponent would lose. Or in the case of Leveler, exile their entire library. Both of these cards are amazing on their own, but are hard to deal with if you kill them, they end up on their opponent’s side of the field activating their when entering the battlefield abilities. Endless Whispers allows for this combo to exist.

This is just a continuation of what was said yesterday.

Gilder Bairn, the creature I was so infatuated with earlier has gone from being a measly $0.50 uncommon to more than $3 because of how useful it is. When looking at this combo, one might think that Gilder Bairn is vulnerable to all sorts of damage and the like. This is where you are right in a sense, but remember that you only need Turn 3 to play him. This means, Turns 1 and 2 are open. You could be fortunate enough to get a Leyline of Vitality, making its toughness 4. You may have already slowed your opponent with Boomerang.

Needless to say, you will want to play the Training Grounds and Paradise Mantle the turn after you play Gilder Bairn unless you have Darksteel Reactor in hand.

Boomerang is suggested because it can target land. Banefire is also suggested because it cannot be countered if you pay more than 5 mana for X. The perfect colors for this deck must contain Blue and Red. Though, Green has Leyline of Vitality and Leyline of Lifeforce (creature spells cannot be countered).

This combo also works in EDH, but because the deck is so big, the chances of getting this 4 card combo is unlikely. I have only done so once in EDH and because it was multiplayer when I used the Darksteel Reactor, I won on turn 4. I was running 5 colors and it went like so:

Turn 1: Forest, Wild Growth Turn 2: Island, Gilder Bairn Turn 3: Island, Darksteel Reactor Turn 4: Darksteel Reactor got a counter, Training Grounds, Paradise Mantle and Equipped it for 1 mana. (2 mana available still). Tapped Gilder Bairn for 1 Green mana. Untapped Gilder Bairn for 1 Green mana and doubled the counters on Darksteel Reactor (2 counters), repeat until I had 32 counters (1x2=2, 2x2=4, 4x2=8, 8x2=16, 16x2=32). It’s actually easier than it sounds.

So, Rise of the Eldrazi came out and I attended the Pre-release event. I went with Red because it had the most acceleration for Eldrazi. Brood Birthing gave me a major advantage and I quickly played Hand of Emrakul and Ulamog’s Crusher, and at one point, Kozilek, the Butcher of Truths. I ended up winning that Pre-release. Draft was another story- the mono-blue deck won, which was one my college friend’s decks.

From this escapade, I learned about EDH or Commander. I chose Omnath, the Locus of Mana as my general and went on to build the best deck I could imagine. Of course I was always missing some key cards, but I had all the Eldrazi at my disposal and lots of acceleration. Literally, Turn 2-3 for Omnath. He’s not a threat when he comes out and I don’t swing with him. If played turn 3, and I played Doubling Cube turn 2 and Vernal Bloom turn 4, on turn 5, my mana output could be as high as 16, if I had played Wild Growth turn 1, otherwise, 14. From there, turn 6 is as high as 38 or 34. About then, Genesis Wave would be played for 31-35 for X. Chances are that it’ll be a lot of permanents that will help me destroy my opponent. Also, I would not have to sacrifice anything and I might even draw up Preator’s Council or Woodland Guidance to recover Genesis Wave for another go.

Magic: The Gathering has always been looming the background of my card playing experience, but it was always shrouded in mystery. So many sets, nothing to base it on that I knew of and fairly complex.

A cousin of mine gave me his collection in hopes that I would give it a shot and I did, but unfortunately, I had to deal with my cards not being standard legal (unglued cards and cards from older sets). So, I borrowed a deck and was beat very effortlessly. I even went through the hell of lock-down (which takes the fun out of any game).

When I finally returned to Magic, it was through some friends from high school. I learned the basics and the current set of the time was Shadowmoor and leading into Eventide. I really liked the hybrid mana and the ease of the game. My favorite cards of the time were Gilder Bairn and Helix Pinnacle, and how I wished they could be used together. Big Furry Monster was always a hint at what the biggest creature was in the game and I still didn’t understand what tokens were (a representation of something in the game, but not a card or part of a deck). I played with friends and they wanted me to only buy packs of cards so I could contribute to the group’s card pool. I quickly realized because I was so late to the game, I had nearly no way of beating them. This continued for about 6 months and I stopped playing the game because I was about to enter college and thought no one played. The Alara block released and the hybrid mana cost disappeared with it and multi-color cards was the main inclusion. Planeswalkers also were added and since they were so few and far in-between, it alienated me. I got rid of all my cards.

About 6 months into college, I found that some of my friends played Magic. I bought some cards, initially starting with what I knew (Shadowmoor and Eventide), then moving to M10 because it was simplifying the game and took out mana burn, which greatly upset my previous friends from high school. Zendikar block was a blast, but I avoided Worldwake. I’ll continue onto the next set next time.

What bothered me most was that Standard was not everything ever printed and it kept the game going in a rotational sense. Legacy, Vintage, Extended, and Standard. My friends from high school played Legacy. My friends from college played Vintage and Standard. No one I knew played Extended.

These are the games that I saw over the years. Some I played once or twice, and others I saw being played, while others I only saw the cards.

Megaman was introduced to me by a friend and he purchased boxes of the game via me at a heavily discounted price. We played a few times and we realized that Roll was overpowered, she never lost no matter who was using her. I have not played since.

Fullmetal Alchemist was introduced to me at Origins 2005. I played a demo deck and hated how it played. I never saw it again. A game by Score.

Duel Masters was introduced to me by another friend- the one who always beat me at Yu-Gi-Oh and Digimon. I never won, not even once and it was never close. I think he was really trying to get me into the game, but with all that I was already playing, I didn’t have room, the patience, or the funds.

The Digimon game I had cards for and no idea where they came from. Never played though and never saw anyone play. A game by Bandai (yeah, the same company that ruined the first Digimon game and released Naruto)

Bleach, like Digimon, I never played, but had a few cards for it. Again, never played and never saw anyone play it. A game by Score.

Epic Battles looked cool when it first came out. Mortal Kombat vs Street Fighter- the thing fans wanted for years, but this is just a card game. The game was exclusively sold at Blockbuster video stores (a now bankrupt company) for the first set. I attended Origins in 2006, where there was supposed to be a Epic Battles Tournament, but no one showed up. Plenty of people showed up for DBZ, YYH, and Inuyasha. It was seen as a dead card game after that event. As you might have guessed, it was a game by Score. I never got the opportunity to see the game played, much less out of the package.

Case Closed... I saw a demo of the game at Origins 2005, but it was pretty crappy and I never saw it again. Like most of the other games, Score released it.

.Hack//Enemy is another story because it was released by Bandai (Digimon and Naruto). The game came out too late and too slowly for people to care. I heard about the game after it had already died. Not a single soul I have talked to has played this game, not even diehard .Hack// fans.

When I actually invested in a deck, I went to a Dark Riku Aggro deck.

It made the deck compressed better with the elimination of Friend cards.

Long story short, I left the game under the same circumstances as other card games. I entered college and sold all of my cards only to find out that people were somewhat interested in the game.

So, I picked up Kingdom Hearts TCG after years of playing the video games. I really loved the games and learned that the game was fairly balanced. Not so surprising, it was made by a Japanese company and translated into English. Apparently, the translations stopped and only a few sets were released in the U.S.

I started with the base set and learned to play. Like many other card games, I played with my younger sister because there was a lack of players. I know it sounds like a broken record, but where were all the players of these games? I had no idea.

I played for about 2-3 sets, much like that of Naruto. I was a bit more invested in this game though...