Trading Card Game Mechanics EVERYONE Uses | TCG R&D

[@Will_Forge]

12:20 I think the reason that turn based combat feels so natural is that it makes combat play out more like a conversation.

[@ShardTCG]

I think you're right. Because when you remove emersion from the game, all we are really doing is just having a conversation. I like this!

[@Will_Forge]

@@ShardTCG yes, and in conversation we naturally take turns or it just gets confusing. Except for every now and then when we have sort of cultural rules how to interrupt without coming across as rude, which is similar to instants in Magic and trap cards in Yugioh. It all kind of makes sense that it's like war or combat as a form of conversation which has rules to keep it consistent and to determine a clear winner all as a game.

[@williamgoddard-i7r]

Hey I'm creating a tcg using braille. I've helped the mtg creative team on several fronts but your channel is most informative. Don't want to say anything bad about other tcgs but it will be the best one ever watch for pandy

[@ShardTCG]

Good luck and thanks!

[@residentgrey]

How do you physically make this work? Cards need sleeves to stay around. Making them out of a material that does not need sleeves could be necessary. And how would you stack them? Would the Braille bits need to be inset? Having some sort of digital interface as well could be necessary.

[@alexbiersner3350]

A card game using braille is innovative to the max, I hope you find a way to make it work

[@residentgrey]

@@alexbiersner3350 I talked to a friend about engraving Brailled on to pens the other day. A TCG with that at least for titles and listing the lookup code for it could be possible, with the latter being the most possible.

[@p3rditious638]

4:41 Power creep is a massive issue in YuGiOh. It used to be that a 2000 attack monster would be a normal 5 or 6 star monster. Now they're 4 or even 3 star effect monsters, that also play into specific archetypes that can boost them higher to ridiculous levels. They kind of keep older cards relevant by basing archetypes around familiar cards, like gravekeepers or toons, for example, but those decks usually never last in the meta, and hobby decks just aren't hugely popular outside of friend groups.

[@ShardTCG]

I have noticed this. It is upsetting as yugioh used to be our favourite game to play back in its day.

[@p3rditious638]

@@ShardTCG Same deal here. I grew up on YuGiOh, even used it in my teaching, but the "meta" of the game has gone to OTK, or 3 round matches. Yugi's quote of "my grandpa's deck has no bad cards" has never been less true these days

[@MikaGrimGal]

Powercreep is a problem I'm really afraid of in my own TCG (DevilGun CCG), as I don't currently have any sort of resource system. I think Yugioh is the most egregious example, but it's nice to hear a positive opinion on power creep. Your channel has gotten me hooked on reading old MTG design blogs for inspiration for my own game, and I love your videos. Keep up the great work!

[@ShardTCG]

Thank you! If you find a good design blog, point me in the right direction.

[@Brendanlikesthis]

I think the negative aspects of power creep only exist due to laziness. Using the Infinity + Sword as an example, a simple requirement in some way for the older/weaker version ensures those old cards are still used. i.e., the Infinity +5 Sword may require discarding the Infinity +3 Sword first to use. In this way, you are experiencing the Infinity Sword grow in strength, rather than outright be replaced with a shinier version.

[@GrapeCheckerBoard]

In that instance there’s the possibility that no one will bother to run the infinity+5 sword since it will be too inconsistent to be worth the effect. You need to have both an infinity+5 sword and an infinity+3 sword in your hand to use the infinity+5 sword. That said, there’s something to be said for giving a stronger card a higher cost. You just to playtest how cost and effect balance.

[@dracomalfoy6886]

@@GrapeCheckerBoard you could have another card to search for the infinity+5 sword if you have infinity+3 in your hand or already placed, then, the probailities of getting it are higher

[@petersmythe6462]

Idea for a combatant cooldown system that could be implemented in physical media: 1. Order cards right to left on the battlefield in a single line, with one side being the current card. 2. There are delay counters which are placed on cards to measure the number of seconds/years/whatever they are after the previous card. Not the total delay. Just relative to the previous card. 2. If the cards are nominally simultaneous, the first one always gets priority. This simplifies delay calculation and gives a reason to want to go first, but you could also do the opposite thing and have the most recently played card get priority, taking all of the delay counters, to make it more like conventional spell speed where an instant can preempt another instant. 3. To insert a card into the queue, move it until it skips over as many delay counters as it can without exceeding its cooldown. Then move delay counters from the next thing in the queue to that card until the number of total counters on it and all previous cards is equal to its delay. 4. When a card reaches the front of the queue, remove its delay counters and it takes its turn and does it's effect before getting sent back into the queue. 5. After a card is played or an effect activated but before anything else occurs, the other player is allowed to respond, although they do not have to. If they refuse to respond, the first player may chain off their own card.

[@ProfessorWaifu]

Power Creep is definitely NOT necessary, variety is necessary. MtG actually has power cycles, not continuous power creep.

[@JandenHale]

I agree. You can keep a game new and interesting without needing power creep.

[@petersmythe6462]

The reason power creep exists is because you design new cards not to match the power level of the average card that exists in previous sets but rather the average card that sees play, but there will always be some unpredictability in the power of the new cards and some of them will be stronger than you expect them to be.

[@ShardTCG]

This is true. There are some card combinations that become so deadly from a seemingly innocent effect when it stands alone.

[@p3rditious638]

1:53 deck cloggers can be a massive unintentional problem. I've found it in my TCGs, and so in my new game I've tried mitigating it in an unconventional way. Draw 2 cards for turn instead of 1, and adding cards to the bottom of your deck to play extra cards. (You only play 1 card a turn in my current project)

[@residentgrey]

I have wanted to make one for play within another game, like the ones in Final Fantasy 8 or 9, for years, and have spent time the past few years learning how these games work and the thought in to them. I wonder what you have.

[@theaspiringnatural1307]

Flawed tcg is one such game that uses initiative in terms of creature action/combat.

[@ShardTCG]

Hmmmm... how do you incorporate initiative into Flawed TCG exactly? This sounds interesting.

[@younasdar5572]

22:30 Strategy shmategy is from one of, I think the first, silver border set. Silver border sets are not regularly tournament legal and contain only the most serious of cards such as "knight of the hokey pokey", "city of a**"(think I'm not allowed to write that here), and "the cheese stands alone". When it comes to land destruction, it was more common in the good ol'days, I think it shouldn't have been removed as it was supposed to be the counterplay of red (rarely also black) to greens ability to fetch a massive amount of land from the deck quickly. And with random effects I think they should give the player a random *benefit*, as no one will intentionally play a card (especially not one costing many resources) which has the possibility of hurting them so it would just lead to the cards never being put into serious decks.

[@ShardTCG]

Thanks for this. I think resource destruction is a dangerous path to take. As far as I would be comfortable going would be to disable a land for a turn. But it depends on the format of the TCG itself, of course.

[@younasdar5572]

@@ShardTCG Excessive resource ramp is also not very safe for the health of the game. I think that needs to be kept in check, and short of destroying resources you are left with stax-y methods which in my humble opinion do almost nothing since the ramp deck will be able to pay extra resources for their spells, while the normal deck can't. On the other hand if you have a spell that can destroy x of my lands, or what I would prefer allow me to keep x lands and destroy the rest, if my deck is low costed I only really need 1-2 lands to be back in the game while the ramp deck will need to start its entire game plan over. But if you have ramp without resource denial, be that destruction or stax, then you have a deck that can basically just cast creature's to big to deal with and can immediately continue doing that after a boardwipe (since they still have the lands to cast them). I guess another possibility is to have ramp in the form of creatures or other permanents that generate resources which die in a board wipe, leaving you the lands, but MTG decided to use land ramp.

[@rlwarner777]

I don't have a problem with land destruction. A long time ago, I used an affinity for artifacts deck that didn't use as many lands as you would normally need, but it couterplayed land destruction with Darksteel Citadel, an indistructible land and Crucible of Worlds, a card that allows you to play lands from the graveyard.

[@pookstir]

22:33 this card is from something called an “Un-set” which are Magic sets that are filled with joke cards which aren’t legal in any official formats. The cards are indicated by a silver border or if they are from the most recent Un-set, they have an acorn stamp instead. As a result of them not being legal in any formats, they can have unbalanced abilities in addition to being able to do silly things that wouldn’t be good for actually being used in a normal game.

[@EastToWestTCG]

I'm currently developing a Turn Based Combat TCG. I designed a Speed Stat that would determine turn order and how often you attack. Very much like what you stated, I quickly realized how much it complicates the game and board state. Also, without a computer, it leaves a lot of room for human error, resulting in massive mistakes potentially being made. I opted for a dedicated turn order instead.

[@ПетрАлександров-и7б]

BTW ScreenPlay (a new Steam CCG) is using a combatants cooldown system

[@ShardTCG]

That sounds great. If you're going to make a digital card game, then you should push for things that are difficult to do in traditional card games just like this.

[@Lycanite]

Wow that Strategy card is crazy, at least both players suffer for it. For power creep I think if a card is more synergistic and bolsters a play style people are enjoying then it can be good so long as it doesn't go too far, it is more powerful but because of what is already there, constant straight stat increase or replacement cards are very uninteresting though. Power creep could also be looked on as fixing cards that are actually under-powered as well, so long as that slippery slope isn't umm 'slidden'.

[@JamesJP]

Yeah, straight stat increases aren't a good way of doing it. There is a nuance to power creep through potent effects or a combination of cards. I wouldn't consider blatant stat upgrades as "power creep" because it doesn't "creep" it's too obvious for players to notice.

[@residentgrey]

It is an UN-card too. MTG has some sets that are all not legal for tournaments by default but have a lot freer reins on what can be done. The concept has enabled them to develop novel mechanics.

[@younasdar5572]

07:40 Well you can, if power creep is approaching undesirable levels, introduce rotation where only a yearly rereleased (possibly with 1 or 2 swapped cards) core set of cards and the newest X sets are legal in your primary tournament format and have lower tier events where the old cards are allowed which will make them viable for longer there. Also while I'm not sure yet if it is good enough the flesh and blood model also exists where a hero, or deckmaster or commander or whatever you call it, "rotates out" if they win to many tournaments (in a given timeframe) which will also guarantee to obsolete the best deck and allow you to make a equally powerful or even weaker replacement - especially if you tie some number of the strongest cards to the hero you play. Having a non rotating side format and the benefits apply here ofc as well.

[@ShardTCG]

You're right, I should have brought up set rotation. I personally don't like set rotation because it feels as though there is an expiry date on my cards. The lower tier events using them is a help, though. But what I really love is when you have this underpowered beaten down card that suddenly becomes great again when a new set releases, that combos with that old rejected card that no one cared about anymore. It's almost like the ugly duckling story.

[@younasdar5572]

@@ShardTCG I currently only play eternal formats, and flesh and blood but I don't play decks there which are good enough to rotate, but when I played rotating formats I really didn't even care what the cards art or theme was but purely about if they were competitive. Now playing eternal formats I like how the main format rotating keeps my favorite decks viable, and of course how some card that was fine in the environment of 5 years ago might make a new deck very powerful in those formats. So from my experience you do get both, but of course that depends on your way of looking at the equivalent of the standard format.

[@paultapping9510]

​@ShardTCG I can understand feeling like that, but most games that have rotation also develop some sort of Eternal format pretty naturally when it is in place, which seems like a fair compromise. The central game can be better curated, while not making older cards obsolete.

[@paultapping9510]

I tend to think it is often possible to seperate out complexity creep, which I do feel is inevitable if a game runs for any length of time, from power creep, which doesn't have to occur. I'm a big fan of the levers Fantasy Flight (and latterly Null Signal Games) gave themselves in Netrunner with it's Influence and Most Wanted List system. These days with the complete ubiquity of apps and phones I think errata and rebalancing are a lot more feasible even in casual play.

[@ShardTCG]

I have since thought of it as "speed creep" instead of "power creep." Games just evolve to run faster and faster, and the quickest deck to get to full power tends to win. Complexity creep makes a lot of sense. If I understand it right, the players will win in fewer turns, but those turns will take longer as there are more moving parts in play to comprehend. I'm guessing this is how the pokemon TCG has an advantage. With its 1v1 format, the complexity creep isn't as effective. Though some cards can influence play from the bench, but not too many in my experience.

[@petersmythe6462]

"You shouldn't be able to play a simple card and just wipe the field." Yu-Gi-Oh currently allowing 3 copies of Raigeki post-2022 despite it previously being banned be like "well yes, but actually no."

[@ShardTCG]

😂

[@lordxtheth2634]

14:31 First strike? Double strike?

[@Obivan2024]

Thank you for this awesome video!

[@ShardTCG]

Thank you for this awesome support!

[@rlwarner777]

A combatant cool down system could only ever work in digital.

[@ShardTCG]

The problem is that now it feels like a challenge 🤣

[@petersmythe6462]

The fact that Yu-Gi-Oh added a FREE opponent board wipe in the form of Raigeki, banned it for years, and it's now at 3 copies but sees only moderate amounts of tournament play suggesting it isn't even overpowered by the standards of that game, is kind of hilarious. Like, you done power crept and negated away a card that should never have existed.

[@ShardTCG]

Every TCG has their own environment. YuGiOh has a very extreme environment after all of these years. I can't even imagine how they will up the power curve even more in the future.

[@JustinTuthill]

Runs a TCG channel, keeps saying he doesn't know what something means

[@ShardTCG]

I don't know what you mean...