FATMOUSE said:

Oh, gosh - agendas were certainly just as important or more important IMHO. As 'bad' as people thought Wildlings were, Defenders of the Realm (is that the Doomed draw one?) was way worse, and I know I won Worlds based on the Knights agenda as far back as 2006.

It was a huge reset. No more than when they originally announced rotation, however (Westy rotating out). That lost just as many folks, then it recovered, and then it went to LCG which was huge as well I agree.

I think it is a testement to the game it could survive both of those, when Star Wars (or LoTR) didn't have either and still died out even with a MUCH bigger licenced fanboy base.

Think about it, aGoT as a game (CCG, LCG, whatever - the rules are the same, as is the publisher) has outlived Star Wars (actually, two or three of these, one by Wizards plus Young Jedi and one more), LoTR (X2 versions plus FFG's co-op coming), Marvel Comics (X3 versions), D&D, and a host of other huge licenced games. Only Magic and L5R really can say the same (I have heard of others with different publishers, and large breaks in printings). Maybe no/low licenced games have an advantage?

~They even beat out fellow fantasy writer Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time CCG for goodness sake!

Don't forget that we've also now outlasted Vampire: The Eternal Struggle, which was the other Deckmaster game that Richard Garfield designed back in the day. White Wolf just pulled the plug on it last year, and it had been going since a year or two after Magic.

rings said:

I know it was needlessly complicated and the number of dice still give me nightmares but I loved Wheel of Time... It was actually a much better game when I wrote a program to roll my dice for me and track the results.

I've played way to many card games... I think I'm up to about 60 or so now that I've played and invested in multiple booster box purchases. I started out with Magic and loved it but soon after I found Star Wars and it was downhill from there.

I had given up on them though do to the cost a couple years ago when I was browsing some games I used to love and I saw that Game of Thrones had moved to a fixed distribution. That was enough to drag me back in and drag my gaming group in with me, It also got us started playing Cthulhu again and we play Warhammer and now LotR too. I really wish the Living Card Game format had come around sooner, I think alot of my favorite games might have lasted longer in this format than in the CCG format.

Doomtown for instance?

There are people in this world that I would probably kill to have that game back.

This was an awesome show. and makes me even more excited to make the trip all the way from OKC, OK to the regional events. I can't wait to meet everyone @ MEtaGames. Usually I only make the trip up there for Warmachine events.

See you all later.

Kennon said:

Uh oh, if Kennon ever gets his Doomtown wish, I better make sure my life insurance policy is in order.

Dobbler said:

Oh, Kennon - as if I did love you already?!? I *heart* Doomtown. Weren't you supposed to bring a deck sometime? I have a couple lying around somewhere...

About 1/2 of the mechanics were GREAT, about 1/2 of them kind of sucked. But the playing poker to make a shootout was so much fun. It was an even more swingy game than aGoT

@Dobbler- And thank goodness you named me as beneficiary. I'll conveniently have money to buy all the cards I want!

@Rings- Haha, yes, I think I was supposed to bring a deck. I know I've talked it up enough that I'm supposed to bring one to show John down here as well. This probably needs fixed pretty soon.

A friend of mine introduced me to it, like he has a few games. His logic was that I'd provide him with a fresh look at the game (I tend just try to build decks that do stupid things.), and I became hopelessly addicted... and I wish I still had my Doomtown stuff Kennon, I loved that game .

Oh, I remember exactly how I got into the game.

I had a group of friends who had been playing a while and they would get together and play from time to time. At one point I was there when they were playing and I was sitting there bored since everyone was doing something that I knew nothing about. I had never played a CCG of any type before. One of my friends had just started playing as well and had just built a Martell deck that he wanted to try so I got to borrow his normal Baratheon deck to try the game. I played his baratheon deck which was a rather rough joust deck (this was just after A Tourney of Swords had come out). He only had two Storms End Tourney Grounds and no Davos or Lightbringer or things like that but there was still Margery's Favor so as you might guess I managed to win quite easily, twice in a row in fact, eventhough I didn't understand the game very well and had no clue what I was doing. This got me hooked right away and another friend who mainly played Stark gave me all of his Greyjoy cards and the very next day I went and bought a few boosters as well and started going through all the Greyjoy cards. I remember the first rare card I got was The Knight who served me well in many decks to come and the rest is history.

I haven't played the game for real since House of Thorns pretty much. Our meta here disintegrated with people graduating from university and moving away etc. We are still a couple of people who get together from time to time and play with out old CCG cards but that's about it.