History SoYouWantTo / MakeACollectibleCardGame

* CharacterDevelopment: ''SW:CCG'', ''ST:CCG (2E)'', ''[=L5R=]'' and even ''Magic'' have all done this: release multiple versions of a character (a Planeswalker in ''Magic'''s case) which have different skills and are suited for different purposes. Typically the way this is done is to have a rule that you may only have one card of that character's ''name'' in play at a time, but then give each version sort of subtitle ([[http://www.trekcc.org/2e/index.php?cardID=2359 James T. Kirk, Highly-Decorated Captain]] vs [[http://www.trekcc.org/2e/index.php?cardID=27 James T. Kirk, Living Legend]], at complete random). In most games you may replace an in-play version with a different one, possibly at reduced deployment costs, but what happens to the first version ([[PermanentlyMissableContent lost for good? Back to hand?) depends from game to game (note also in this case that the "one in play at a time" rule is indicated by the dot before the name--''ST:CCG'' allows multiples of RedShirt-level cards). ''Pokémon'' also built this into play by allowing you to evolve your mons, but that's a different mechanic.

So what do we do? Keep the new rules ''on individual cards''. Many ''Magic'' cards actually break the game's rules ("[[IntangibleMan 'Shadow']]? This creature can't be blocked in certain cases?"). And Rule Zero of ''Magic'' is, "If a card ever says it can break the rules, the card is right." But the end result is that the cards ''carry new rules with them''. To aid this, cards meant for beginners will often have reminder text on them, explaining how they break the rules and what that means. This is still NewRulesAsThePlotDemands, but in a much more modular fashion. ''Magic'' also tends to keep real rule-breakers to rare or at least uncommon, limiting new players' exposure to them. But the point we're trying to make is to leave yourself space for new rules on ''cards'', not in the rulebook. Ideally the rulebook should never have to change from the day of first printing to the day your game is finally canceled. (That's obviously impossible, but less impossible than you think.)

** Something cool ''SW:CCG'' and ''[=L5R=]'' have done is build the dice into their cards. Almost every card has a "Destiny" value (''Star Wars'') or "Focus" value (''[=L5R=]''), and during any circumstances where skill, chance and circumstance should help decide the outcome of an event ({{Sword Fight}}s, aiming torpedoes at the Death Star, contests of wills), each player drew the top card of their deck and added the value to whatever totals they were already counting. ''Star Wars'' took this an extra step and made a card's Destiny value roughly ''inverse'' to its PowerLevels. UnderdogsNeverLose in that galaxy far, far away, because TheForce is with them; by enforcing this trope, Decipher not only added flavor but helped newer players (with weaker cards) compete against people who had sunk more money into their decks.

* Some card games require you to have a certain specific card before you can play: ''[=L5R=]'' requires you to have a "Stronghold" card, for instance, representing your chosen Clan. If you're going to do this, then for the love of god, ''make the required card Common.'' Hell, make them ''more''-than-common the way Lands are in ''M:tG'', or print them on the back of the deck box (''[=L5R=]''). This does not preclude you from printing actual-card versions of the card, or from printing more-powerful rare versions; it's simply to say that if one specific card is going to be necessary, then you had ''better'' make it easy for players to get their hands on. The opposite--having ''only'' rare versions of the required card--is called FakeDifficulty. It will reduce your revenue to zero, [[KickTheSonOfABitch and you will deserve it]].

[[http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Archive.aspx?author=Mark%20Rosewater Mark Rosewater]] writes one of the most comprehensive design columns on the Internet; game designers and would-be game designers from every genre and medium tune in every Monday to see his brilliance. And, since he's one of the lead designers of ''Magic'', much of his advice is tailored to this genre. In particular, his articles "[[http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/mm/174 Ten Things Every Game Needs]]," [[http://www.wizards.com/magic/magazine/article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/mm/28 Magic Design Seminar: Looking Within]] and [[http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/mm/218 When Cards Go Bad (Revisited)]] are so on-point that we could have just copy-pasted them here instead of all the original research we've done. But that would be plagiarism. AndThatsTerrible.

Another nice advantage about starting your own Intellectual Property is the ability to avoid CCGImportanceDissonance, something that both the ''[=LotR=]'' CCG and the ''Middle-Earth'' CCG before it fell serious prey to. Not only do you not have to create filler cards out of Extra Of The Week #13, you aren't ''bound'' to that model by the franchise's existing story. Most stories have these things called MainCharacters who appear in almost every instalment of the series; these cards will be--are required by the FanDumb to be--the most powerful cards in the game. If "Third Orc From The Left" is able to take on Frodo and win, fans will scream that the game is ruined... even though the same thing results if you let Frodo hand out {{Curb Stomp Battle}}s (which would not only make him a GameBreaker but is CanonDefilement!). This is where that whole VariablePlayerGoals thing can come in handy. Frodo does not and has never had the combat chops to win a MultiMookMelee[[note]]Fun fact: according to Wiki/TheOtherWiki, Frodo was a MartialPacifist and never actually killed a sentient creature in his life[[/note]], but he is also the Ring-bearer and is gifted with some level of IncorruptiblePurePureness. Give him extra resistance to the Ring's temptation mechanic and suddenly he doesn't look so useless.

So the reason to adapt an existing franchise is also simple: it already ''has'' a story, known characters, emotional connections to and from the player. If you see a card for "Bob the Clueless Troper", you may see a muscular middle age man with BadassMustache and know a little bit about his personality (MachoCamp) from the card art , but you don't necessarily know anything about him beyond that. If you see a card of "UsefulNotes/JosefStalin" though, you have knowledge about him that predates the arrival of the card, and you know what it means if you manage to get UsefulNotes/VladimirLenin in play alongside him, or what might happen if he has to fight against your opponent's UsefulNotes/AdolfHitler card. Even better, you might be ''excited'' for the chance to pit him against the card of someone he never faced in-person, like UsefulNotes/BarackObama or UsefulNotes/OsamaBinLaden. Oh, and as an added bonus, you can [[TeasingCreator withhold popular cards]] for later expansions. Players will whine and gripe and complain... but if you tell them that the long-awaited UsefulNotes/TheodoreRoosevelt card is finally seeing release in the next expansion, they ''will'' line up and they ''will'' shell out their money.

* The player. In most [=CCGs=], the player is a non-entity who only kind of interacts with in-game entities. The Planeswalkers of ''Magic: the Gathering'', for example, can be attacked but cannot defend themselves; in ''Pokemon'' you don't even fight your opponent directly, but instead his mons. Likewise, the ''Star Wars'', ''Star Trek'', ''Lord of the Rings'', ''Game of Thrones'', ''Babylon 5'', ''Wheel of Time'' and ''Wing Commander'' card games don't feature any entity corresponding to the player at all; victory is determined by other means, often ScoringPoints. Just about the only exception is ''HearthstoneHeroesOfWarcraft'', where you choose a character class and that class is then represented as an in-game entity. He or she can not only be attacked, but--if equipped with Weapon cards--can attack as well. The logistics of incorporating the player into the game ''as'' an in-game entity are confusing, but it's a design space that hasn't much been explored.

* GeoEffects. ''Magic'' and ''Pokemon'' do not feature any sort of terrain; duels just take place in some vacuum somewhere. In comparison, the ''Star Trek'' and ''Star Wars'' card games both involved geography--you had to travel back and forth between different locations to accomplish varous goals. These games, not coincidentally, required ''much'' more physical space to play, and additional rules to govern movement. Having said that, TropesAreNotBad: additional rules means additional LoopholeAbuse, and let's face it: LoopholeAbuse is one of the foundations of strategy. (TacticalRockPaperScissors consists of nothing but!)

* CrackIsCheaper. TropesAreTools, including this one. First off, the more cards the consumers buy, the more you can afford to create follow-up product, thus resulting in more income; exploit this node, and you're all set. Second, the day players start shelling out ridiculous amounts of cash for individual power cards -- the day players ''like'' your game so much that they are willing to blow extra money on it -- is the day your game has actually succeeded. [=CCG=]s have RevenueEnhancingDevices built into them. Exploiting this sounds dirty, but you need to do it anyway.

Another helpful weapon in this arena is "flavor," which has to do with how memorable the card's design is and whether it taps into some form of shorthand. In other words? '''''Tropes'''''. TropesAreTools and you should use them ''unabashedly'' in designing individual cards. If it say that a card called "[[ShockAndAwe Lightning Bolt]]" does three damage to whatever it hits, that makes perfect sense. Likewise, if the rules tell you that a monster with "Flying" can't be intercepted by creatures without it, you nod and go with it because of ''course'' a lion can't stop an eagle. Look for this kind of resonance. Use it to communicate concepts. Design cards around it. Be shamelessly {{troperiffic}}, because it will make individual cards easier to understand.

Well, really, ''MagicTheGathering''. The only game that ever got close in terms of gameplay was the ''TabletopGame/StarWarsCustomizableCardGame''. ''TabletopGame/{{Pokemon}}'' and ''TabletopGame/YuGiOh'' have their adherents, but they may not provide the ''gameplay'' inspiration you need.

!!Legal Pitfalls
Creator/WizardsOfTheCoast has issued a patent on the idea of turning a card ninety degrees to show that it has somehow been temporarily expended. ''A Cardgame of Thrones'' has gotten around this somehow, possibly because Fantasy Flight Games pays a royalty to Wizards; ''[=L5R=]'' uses "bowing" because Wizards used to publish that game. If ''you'' try to put a "tapping" mechanic in your game, Wizards can sue you, and they are a bit more likely to win than you are.

* Most [=CCGs=] are adaptations of existing franchises, for reasons that will be discussed in the next section. The only exceptions are ''Magic'', ''TabletopGame/LegendOfTheFiveRings'' (the RPG came after the CCG), ''TabletopGame/YuGiOh'' (which itself is, by WordOfGod, a ''Magic'' ripoff) and... Well, that's about it, at least where ''popular'' franchises are concerned. (I mean, have you ''heard'' of ''TabletopGame/MagiNation''?) Decipher Inc came up with three ''very'' good adaptations--''[=LotR=]'', ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' (eventually expanding to all the rest of the franchise save the [[Film/StarTrek 2009 pre-boot]]) and the ''TabletopGame/StarWarsCustomizableCardGame''--but not a single one of them is in print today. And nobody needs to talk about ''Pokemon'' cards. The point is that [=CCGs=] are not exempt from TheProblemWithLicensedGames. The rebuttal is that creating your own Intellectual Property is just as challenging or more so... but again, we'll talk about that further down.

So you want to make a CollectibleCardGame, eh? Well, good luck. [=CCGs=] have long been stereotyped as being "nerdy" or "kiddy" games in public mind. Breaking past this stereotype is going to be difficult, and designing a game that ''deserves'' to will be harder still.

The "magic word" in designing CCG is ''Play''. Don't just play your favorite CCG--in fact, put it aside for at least a month. Instead, go to the bookstore or local gaming shop or comic book store and ''try new TabletopGames''. Play ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons'', or watch people doing ''TabletopGame/{{Warhammer 40000}}''. Watch Creator/WilWheaton's show ''WebVideo/{{Tabletop}}'' on Creator/GeekAndSundry. Compare TabletopGame/{{Chess}} to ''TabletopGame/{{Risk}}'', ''TabletopGame/{{Monopoly}}'' with ''TabletopGame/SettlersOfCatan'', ''TabletopGame/{{Munchkin}}'' with ''TabletopGame/ApplesToApples''. If you're going to create a new game, you need to know what pre-existing games are already doing, so that you can avoid the things you don't like and steal the things you do. Plus, you'll have ''fun''--and isn't that the point of gaming?

* CrackIsCheaper. TropesAreTools, including this one. First off, the more cards the consumers buy, the more you can afford to create follow-up product, thus resulting in more income; exploit this node, and you're all set. Second, the day players start shelling out ridiculous amounts of cash for individual power cards--the day players ''like'' your game so much that they are willing to blow extra money on it--is the day your game has actually succeeded. [=CCG=]s have RevenueEnhancingDevices built into them. Exploiting this sounds dirty, but you need to do it anyway.

* ExpansionPack: This is the main trope that keeps your consumers playing. For one, it provides novelty and variation. They prevent the game from being monotony, keeping your fanbase intact. Second, people like new stuff--this is a scientifically-proven part of human nature. A game that constantly releases new stuff has a powerful and addicting quality.
* ComplacentGamingSyndrome: Expansion packs, and to a lesser extent banlists and rotating formats (if you choose to have them), will also help prevent your game from becoming static. Witness the phenomenon of the "[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solved_game solved game]]" - games in which the correct choices, the ones that ''always'' result in a win or at least a forced draw, have already been identified. While [=CCGs=] are typically a bit too complex to truly "solve," there will always be {{Game Breaker}}s that essentially serve the same purpose: choosing not to play them is suicidal because make it that much easier to win. The first answer is the ObviousRulePatch, where you simply ban that card from (supervised) play... but once one is gone, another takes its place as strategies shift and decks are redesigned, and if you keep banning ''those'' then eventually the game simply isn't as ''fun'' anymore because there are only three cards still legal for play. So the better answer is, Don't just remove the old ones. ''Add new ones.'' And then do the cycle all over again, yeah, but frankly that's your lot in life, now that you've decided to build a CCG: monitoring as many matches as you can and taking statistics on which cards have a higher-than-normal win rate. Have fun.
* AwesomeButImpractical. It is important to have deployment limitations, slowing the game down and preventing players from putting really powerful things in play right at the start. Only one card game didn't do so: First Edition ''Star Trek: The Collectable Card Game''. It was a disaster. Under normal circumstances you could only play one Ship or Character per turn, meaning that some RedShirt was worth the same as the ''[[CoolStarship Enterprise]]'' herself; and the Event card "RedAlert," which let you play any number of cards per turn, became a GameBreaker of ludicrous proportion. The second edition of the game put a resource system into play, which was a lot more sensible.

** Card maximums. Originally ''Magic'' didn't have a limit on how many of Card [X] you could have in a deck. So people would go in with decks consisting solely of like 20 Swamps and then a ZergRush of [[http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=77 Plague Rats]], which could get out of hand really quickly. Nowadays, ''Magic'' decks can only have 4 or less copies of a single card (sorting by name) unless that card is a basic land, and almost every other CCG out there has ''some'' limitation on multiples. (Some games do it by marking the individual cards themselves if they can't be multiplied; under such circumstances you ''can'' have infinite [This] or infinite [That], but those cards tend to be really, really weak anyhow, and you wouldn't play a lot of them except for the lulz.) This means you can't load your deck down with whatever card it revolves around. It also slows the game down: if you can only have four copies of your central card, you have only a 1-in-15 chance of ''drawing'' it.

** FactionCalculus. One of the fun things about a CCG is building out a strategy which (you hope) will win you the game, and then testing it against someone else's. But people also bond with their favorite factions, philosophies and characters. Having factions also builds into your [[MoneyDearBoy profit margins]], because (unless you've gone with the LCG model) every time player opens a new pack, at least 50% of the cards in it are useless to his current deck. ''You want more than one side.''
** Choices Vs. Options. First, we acknowledge that we are [[http://www.wizards.com/magic/magazine/article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/mm/49 ripping off MaRo]], so read the article in his words if you'd prefer. But there is a difference between "Options"--"You can have both A and B"--and Choices--"You can only have A ''or'' B, pick one." ''You want Choices instead of Options.'' Not only should this shape the design of individual cards, but the entire deck-building aspect ''of'' card games is about Choices: there are so many cards available that you simply ''cannot'' create a deck that uses all of them. FactionCalculus adds to this by further striating the available strategies, which is another reason why it's good. But the point is this: you want Choices because those provide limitations. And the entire ''heart'' of gaming is about finding ways to overcome limitations. That's why we have [[MinMaxing Min-Maxers]]; that's why we have {{Munchkin}}s; that's why we have StopHavingFunGuys. Say what you want about their attitudes, but ''they want to overcome the game'', because that's what gaming ''is''. So don't give them Options. Give them Choices. Make it that much harder--and that much more fun.

* Most [=CCGs=] are adaptations of existing franchises, for reasons that will be discussed in the next section. The only exceptions are ''Magic'', ''TabletopGame/LegendOfTheFiveRings'' (the RPG came after the CCG), ''TabletopGame/YuGiOh'' (which itself is, by WordOfGod, a ''Magic'' ripoff) and... Well, that's about it, at least where ''popular'' franchises are concerned. (I mean, have you ''heard'' of MagiNation?) Decipher Inc came up with three ''very'' good adaptations--''[=LotR=]'', ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' (eventually expanding to all the rest of the franchise save the [[Film/StarTrek 2009 pre-boot]]) and the ''TabletopGame/StarWarsCustomizableCardGame''--but not a single one of them is in print today. And nobody needs to talk about ''Pokemon'' cards. The point is that [=CCGs=] are not exempt from TheProblemWithLicensedGames. The rebuttal is that creating your own Intellectual Property is just as challenging or more so... but again, we'll talk about that further down.

* Most [=CCGs=] are adaptations of existing franchises, for reasons that will be discussed in the next section. The only exceptions are ''Magic'', ''TabletopGame/LegendOfTheFiveRings'' (the RPG came after the CCG), ''TabletopGame/YuGiOh'' (which itself is, by WordOfGod, a ''Magic'' ripoff) and... Well, that's about it, at least where ''popular'' franchises are concerned. (I mean, have you ''heard'' of MagiNation?) Decipher Inc came up with three ''very'' good adaptations--''[=LotR=]'', ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' (eventually expanding to all the rest of the franchise save the [[Film/StarTrek 2009 pre-boot]]) and the ''StarWarsCustomizableCardGame''--but not a single one of them is in print today. And nobody needs to talk about ''Pokemon'' cards. The point is that [=CCGs=] are not exempt from TheProblemWithLicensedGames. The rebuttal is that creating your own Intellectual Property is just as challenging or more so... but again, we'll talk about that further down.

Well, really, ''MagicTheGathering''. The only game that ever got close in terms of gameplay was the ''StarWarsCustomizableCardGame''. ''TabletopGame/{{Pokemon}}'' and ''TabletopGame/YuGiOh'' have their adherents, but they may not provide the ''gameplay'' inspiration you need.

WizardsOfTheCoast has issued a patent on the idea of turning a card ninety degrees to show that it has somehow been temporarily expended. ''A Cardgame of Thrones'' has gotten around this somehow, possibly because Fantasy Flight Games pays a royalty to Wizards; ''[=L5R=]'' uses "bowing" because Wizards used to publish that game. If ''you'' try to put a "tapping" mechanic in your game, Wizards can sue you, and they are a bit more likely to win than you are.

''TabletopGame/{{Hecatomb}}'' was a card game with few, but devoted adherents, designed by WizardsOfTheCoast. It had a number of similarities to Magic, but primarily diverged in two ways: first, players played maniacal villains who sought to destroy worlds to enhance their own power; second, up to five monsters could be combined into a larger "abomination," which augmented one monster with the powers and strength of the others. Because of this mechanic, the cards were five-sided and plastic so that clear edges could show the abilities of the monsters below. While innovative and fairly novel, this made cards a good deal more expensive to produce, and it was a somewhat common occurrence to open a pack and find one or more cards which were cracked and unplayable.