Being pretty new to the whole scene Im curious as to how far the game can expand and grow while still be relatively accessible to new players. Obviously having a couple of books to go theres plenty of room to grow with content but in the case of new mechanics will they just keep adding thing until they decide to discontinue the game - did the CCG era become bloated with new mechanics just for the sake of trying to keep it fresh?

Nope - given rotation, the game always felt fresh and challenging.

@ Danigral - next tiem you see me, remind me to tell you the whole story. There had been an issue with melnick and ffg prior to the smoke break - which is why some peiople found the thing a little sketchy. But I don't want to relive the whole thing on the boards.

Stag Lord said:

Dammit Stag i want to know now too

Heh yeah, it certainly sounds interesting.

*shrug* Folks are looking back at it with some pretty rose tinted glasses, I think. The part that I got to see here on the forums showed a side of Melnick that shouldn't have been expressed under any circumstances.

He seemed like a good guy when I met him in person. Online, he was not.

Kennon said:

Well, the smoke break and the online thing are totally different, so not sure what rose we are talking about (although I agree he was way out of line).

We re-hashed the smoke break more in another thread (the one Melnick surfaced to post and then never replied to). Basically, they decided to take a draw in the final round since they were both guaranteed a top 4 seed. They decided to take a smoke break w/o telling anyone FFG-related (nor did they tell anyone offical about the tie they wanted to take). When they got back they had been dropped from the tourney (I am assuming, 1 loss wouldn't have put them both out of the Top 8). Dobbler then got in as the 7 or 8 seed I think (Mathlete was the 1), and ended up winning it.

This is 100% my memory of things a long time ago - it was my only tourney that I just totally scrubbed out, but was playing LoTR (Decipher one) and Spycraft competatively as well at that point and was trying to juggle top 16 of both of those.

Kennon said:

I was able to read a little history about the smoke break by searching the forums. It seems I'll have to ask some vets about Melnick the next time I see them. The only player to be banned from the forums...my imagination is running wild.

It boiled down to this. Melnick was being a huge **** on the forums and the developer at the time, Brian Wood, come on and told him to calm down and mind his manners. Melnick responded with "I'll kill your kids and **** your wife." Brian Wood responded with "You're banned! and if I ever see you I'll break you in half!" Melnick does seem to have gotten better though. So I'm hoping he can be a purely constructive force on the forums rather than the destructive force he used to be.

Staton said:

Jeez, yeah. I've never encountered anything like that on these boards. Glad he's grown from that experience... So he's still around? I'm interested in hearing more about Melnickian theory.

Unrelated, Rings, you t16ed a LOTR TCG event? I wonder if I was at it...

Staton said:

Haha! Wow. I'd forgotten about that.

He's a pretty big troll, but he's a very good player. He would routinely help out new or struggling players in the deck construction thread (including myself, at certain times). He also helped popularize the character-lite decktype for the CCG, which turned out to be very strong, and helped the game evolve the way it did.

I am a non-MTG board game player who tried to get into this for my first card game. I gave up when I noted the FAQs were much longer than the instructions. I just got confused by the whole thing. When, in the first post in this thread, I read, "This game is just completely top-notch, and as such we're creating a "Getting Started" page for it. This page helps new players break through the 'I'm new and overwhelmed' wall by allowing them to understand the background of the game, what they can expect from it, how it operates, and the best thing to buy to get started." I got very interested. However...

For me there is no value into knowing the history of the CCG, or details of cards that have come and gone--that's for the advanced. I just really need hand-holding, perhaps by some form of detailed video explanation like the great one Grunick (?) created for Arkham Horror. I actually sold my core set on Ebay about 6 months ago, and I'm actually considering getting it again. But oh those FAQs!

Actually there is a series of videos on youtube for this very reason. Check out the first one

It was the FFG videos that triggered my interest enough to purchase the game. Unfortunately I discovered the game was much more complex than was hinted at by the video. Not claiming deception, just it was a very simple overview.

Well yes, but unless you are going to a tournament to play (and maybe you are planning on it, but it didn't seem so from your post) then the FAQ doesn't matter. If its just you and your friends playing, then don't worry about the FAQ. If any weird rules questions pop up then ask here on the rules forums. If you ARE planning on trying to play this game competitively then you should know that the FAQ isn't really that complex. The major thing to remember are the different timing rules, and that is something you can get the gist of pretty quickly when playing.

The base rules for this game really aren't that difficult, it's just that you've caught the game so late in its life that there are more add-on mechanics then actual rules. "Yeah... so we'll have crests, that are like traits but not exactly... they're more like 'super-traits'"

I can try to help on here if you like..
~~~

Win condition: Claim 15 power. The moment you get this power, you win, even if your characters die.

Setup: (This is the beginning of the game and only happens once)

-Draw 7 cards.
-Play up to 5 gold worth of characters or locations.
-Draw back up to 7 cards.

Plot phase:
-Each player chooses a plot
-Each player reveals their chosen plot (this plot is put in your used pile, where it can not be used again until your 7th plot is revealed, which becomes the new first plot)
-The player with highest initiative (diamond) chooses who goes first
-If a plot has an effect that says "when revealed" it goes off (The first player chooses in what order)

Draw phase:
-Each player draws 2 cards

Marshalling phase:
-The first player gets gold tokens from the gold pool (gold on plot + gold cards in play)
-The first player spends their gold on characters, locations, and attachments from their hand. Keeping the rest.
-The second player follows suit.

Challenges phase:
-The first player initiates up to three challenges, one of each type. The effectiveness of each challenge is determined by the claim value of the plot card (the third number)
-The second player follows suit.

Dominance phase:
-The players with the highest STR total (characters + gold left over) gains 1 power.

Standing phase:
-All knelt cards in play stand.
-Play returns to the plot phase.

Taxation:
-All of the gold is returned to the gold pool.

How challenges work:
-Active player initiates a challenge against another player (military, intrigue or power)
-Active player kneels characters with the corresponding challenge icon to add those characters strength value to the challenge.
-Defending player follows suit.
-If the active player has more or equal strength committed, they win the challenge, and the defending player suffers the effect of the challenge, if the defending player didn't commit any strength, the active player also gets 1 power to their house.
(military: kill X characters, intrigue: discard X cards at random from their hand, power: move X power from their house to the active player. X is equal to the claim of the plot.)
-If the defending player has more strength than the active player, they don't have to suffer the effects.

This is pretty bare bones, but if you can learn this, you can add in the effects of keywords and timing of abilities later, when you don't have to deal with everything at once.
~~~

Thank you Staton and Rave for your replies. I will chew over Rave's checklist and see what I can do. Perhaps you can teach an old dog (man) new tricks (games.)

rings said:

The Old Man said: