It's in the Cards

I'm in a weird 'cards' phase at the moment. I've been on a miniature painting hiatus so I've had time to wander around the net and check out a number of games that's been mentioned at the recent Gencon and various gaming sites. The following games are card games that piqued my interest recently but aren't necessarily in the same category or genre that you'd assume card games would be in.

It first started with me jumping back into an old college favorite and the grandaddy of all collectible games: Magic: the Gathering card game. I finally picked up the set of intro packs in the new 2010 core set for light, quick, casual multiplayer games. I haven't played this game since '95 so it's nice to see that the game hasn't changed much. This was the first game that quickly taught me the harsh lessons of a collectible game. Just after a year and a half, 2 expansions later, and one college drop-out friend less, I was done buying.

Funny enough, years later when my friends and I started playing Mechwarrior, the collectible miniature game, they didn't want to hear about the evil cycle collectible games have.

This next game I heard a lot of good things. One of the top 5 games of 2008 from what I gathered. And all this time I assumed it was a board game. Dominion, in fact, is card game. Some 500 cards to be exact, all in one box. More importantly, it's not a collectible card game but instead has expansions like any other board game. I'll have to find a way to pick this one up.

The next card game is an abstract version of a typical miniature game, but without the minis. War of Edadh is a collectible card wargame with armies and troops and terrain. It's not at all like Battlegrounds where the cards are units and played out like miniature games on a table with dice. WoE is more abstract than that which involves card drafting and card management and without- as far as I know- dice. Currently, I am more intrigued on how to play this game than I am wanting to pick it up at the moment.

The last game is quite the opposite of War of Edadh. Malifaux by Wyrd, more famous for their minis, is a miniature game without dice. The game instead uses decks of cards to determine outcomes such as combat and magic in the game. Very different from every other mini game out there as dice are practically a must in the genre. This is another game that I'm just curious to try out now than to pick up. Although getting into the game is quite affordable ($60 for the book and a faction box), for me, I'm just tapped out for miniature games.