Another highlight of Gen Con Indy was Decipher's massive prelaunch of the Wars TCG, based on the engine created about 10 years ago for the Star Wars CCG. Up unitl recently, it had been called The Mumon Rift Wars, but a last-minute change droped "The Mumon Rift" from the title and replaced it (in the game's logo at least) with the names of the world's 5 factions: Earther, Gongen, Maverick, Shi, and Quay. (Click here for the official Wars TCG site.)
I got to sit in on the big presentation Saturday morning, where Decipher gave out decks, T-shirts, a Michael Stackpole short story, and hosted a panel including Stackpole, Quay species designer John Howe, CEO Warren Holland, and Decipherians Ed Garten, Scott Gaetta, and Tom Lischke.
The biggest announcement of the event was the Wars tournament scheduled for that afternoon. 205 players showed up (breaking Decipher's record for their largest tournament ever). Decks were limited to 40 cards and could only contain up to 4 copies of the same card. "Where did the cards come from," you ask? Players were allowed to use as many sets of demo decks as they could get their hands to build decks with.
Having not read all of the demo cards carefully, I overlooked the obvious Rifleman-Sidearm combo and the relatively powerful Earther-Maverick deck archetype altogether. I still managed to go 4-1 in the first 5 rounds and then dropped after losing the 6th. (I had no chance at top 4, so why bother?) I relied more on my suprisingly still-fresh Star Wars CCG skills than my deck's (lack of) strengths to win two of those games by the slimmest margins.
For the completists out there, here's my decklist:
Starting Cards (1)
1 Alnak Station/Captured Base
Location (7)
7 Ganymede/Maverick Camp
Unit (26)
2 Asktatru Claw Beast
4 Balkatana Inciter
3 Converted Type III
4 Maverick War Wagon
4 Quay Life Ship
2 The Gambler
2 The Rifleman
2 "Two-Way" Berson
3 Winged Skull Aviatrix
Interrupt (2)
2 Up the Sleeve
Asset (4)
4 Natural Talent
If you want to see what I'm talking about, you can download the Wars TCG demo decks here. Enjoy!
Briefly, the game uses nothing but the cards. Lose your deck, lose the game. Locations are laid out in a line; your units go on your side, mine on mine. To pay for cards, every turn you get to "activate" a certain number of cards (move them to a separate pile facedown). Use them (it's actually called "use") to pay for other cards by moving them to another pile (the used pile).
What really sets the mechanic apart from other games is what happens at the end of the turn. You draw cards from your active pile; you can draw one, none, all, or any number in between. It gives players an incredible amount of control over the course of the game. They can draw none, adding to their available resources for the next turn, or draw all for a bigger hand. Most importantly, they can decide as they draw, allowing for tactical changes on the fly. You can play even some cards between drawing cards and on your opponent's turn, making a huge active pile rarely a bad thing.
The only balancing factor that prevents you from activating your deck is drawing destiny. If you don't have a card on top of you deck, you can't draw destiny. Destiny is important.
Hope that helped.
I think I get it, but I want to be sure...
How does the combo work for Rifleman/Sidearm? This is the second place I have heard of that so it must be one of the better strategies from the beta decks.
I see two potential combos:
1) The Rifleman ability to destroy each of your opponents units comboed with the Sidearm adding one to Attrition, thus allowing you to potentially manipulate the number to 21. (However since there is so much left to chance with the destiny draw I think that is probably not it.)
2) The Rifleman's high Tactics coupled with the Sidearm adding destiny plus tactics which pretty much smokes any unit, even with a zero draw.
I have a feeling it is the second combo you are reffering to, but wanted to be sure I am not missing something. I am still a bit rusty having not played the old SWCCG in over 3 years.
Sidearm is the key, really. It hits if destiny plus the bearer's tactics is greater than the target's defense (7+D>Defense in the case of The Rifleman). The Rifleman automatically hits anything (not just characters, but vehicles too) with a defense of 6 or less. If you put your faith in your deck, you can probably nudge your odds to make 3/4 of your deck 3 or better. But you don't need to. There are several cards that let you set up or replace your destiny (especially for the Mavericks, which Rifleman is one of). Putting a 6 destiny on top of your deck is easy (even if it's unnecessarily high). In short, it's easy to build an Earth-Maverick deck that takes advantage of Rifleman-Sidearm.
The Rifleman's game text is more a matter of goosing your total power and your destiny draw to equal 21. That takes a lot more skill and thought than just indiscriminately blasting away with the Sidearm.