TCG Design: Combat - Part 2 - The Big 3 TCGs

magic the gathering's combat system has a problem with stalls and while card effects and overall game balancing can largely mitigate this problem it's obviously great if you can design a system that doesn't have this flaw in the first place so with that in mind it's worth taking a quick look at the rest of the big three tcgs to see if any of them have problems with board stalls if they don't what are their combat systems doing differently and are there any flaws in these systems that magic might have managed to avoid Pokemon has each player field one active Pokemon that can attack once at the end of each of their turns each attack has its own damage value and each Pokemon has HP that indicates how much damage it will take to defeat it this system does a few things well for one there is no disincentive to attacking each player is going to be attacking as often as possible until the game is over the system doesn't really have a structural problem generating board stalls the system is also fairly simple and easy to understand with only one active Pokemon on each side of the board at any given time it's fairly easy to keep track of the board State it's also fairly easy to teach to new players and it does a really good job capturing the Dynamics and flavor of the Pokemon video games one form of the system does have though is that because the exchange of damage is so structured if one player takes a strong lead it can be very difficult to catch back up in Magic the Gathering it's very possible to stabilize that one life while your opponent still has 20 and still manage to turn the game around and win this is much more difficult to do in a more regulated combat system like Pokemon overall though I think that Pokemon's combat system is very good it keeps gameplay progressing at a steady pace and is just a huge flavor win for the game for Yu-Gi-Oh in some ways its system is even simpler than Pokemons each monster can attack once per turn they choose their attack Target and then the biggest number wins if your opponent has no monsters on their field then you can attack them directly the biggest diversions from Magic is that in Magic the defender chooses your attack Target while in Yu-Gi-Oh that choice is made by the attacker which means that being an attacker is a much more advantageous position than being on defense and as a result stalls tend to happen much more infrequently while Yugioh does do a good job avoiding stalls its combat system does have a few flaws of its own well I could complain about how granular its power values are a bigger issue is that targeted attacks makes it extremely difficult to build a board in Yu-Gi-Oh that will last for more than one turn there is nowhere for smaller utility monsters to hide on the field so only the strongest cards are going to be able to stay in play for more than a single turn there's also an issue with the implementation of defense mode High defense monsters can actually create stalls fairly easily since they don't have the power to attack over the opponent's monsters but they still present a sizable wall which will stop the opponent from attacking Yugioh would probably be a stronger game overall if it just removed defense points entirely and apparently that's something that the designers have at least considered overall though while Yu-Gi-Oh is a very simple system I still think it's quite solid and it basically does everything that a combat system needs to do without adding a whole lot of extra complication next up is dual Masters and it's particularly interesting because it's heavily based on Magic the Gathering just with the benefit of years of experience seeing what has and hasn't worked in Magic's game systems and potentially what has and hasn't worked in some of Magic's competitors the game makes several changes to Magic's combat system and most of these changes are worth entire videos on their own but the biggest and most impactful difference is the creatures in dual Masters are unable to block opposing attacks at all without a specific keyword moving blocking from a game mechanic to a keyword mechanic available only on a very limited subset of creatures is a very blunt solution to make sure that the board doesn't stall but it does work combat and Duel Masters is quick and impactful but it still presents plenty of strategic choices and different paths to Victory all of these games mentioned so far have two factors that are helping them avoid stalls their base rules are not punishing players for attacking and they're minimizing how much equal boards are going to lead to a state where neither player is able to take any action to move the game forward there is one final tool that games can use to avoid stalls that I do want to touch on briefly and that is natural pressure this can be seen in games like Vanguard and or Troth although the mechanics differ both the Vanguard and the rig are attackers that cannot be removed they are guaranteed to attack each turn of the game this creates an embedded source of pressure within the rules of the game itself that players must actively manage over gameplay in situations where a player's resources are largely depleted and they're not able to take any meaningful game actions this pressure is going to end the game on its own for magic players trying to understand the impact this has is likely best understood by imagining that each game begins with a sulfuric vortex in play well any magic players that have played against sulfuric Vortex especially with a control deck they may imagine that control can't possibly exist as a strategy in these games but control is still absolutely a part of the meta of these games and quite an important part the difference is in control matchups natural pressure is the difference between getting locked out and losing quickly or getting locked out and then waiting turn after turn for the opponent to finally draw a wincon magic players will no doubt also be familiar with situations where the control player holds an impenetrable wall of removal and counter magic but the game keeps going for dozens of turns while both players wait for the control player to actually win experienced players are going to know well enough to concede in these situations but for newer players who don't have that same game awareness this is an utterly miserable way to lose and it's one that games can avoid fairly easily when they're creating their base rules having played games with and without natural pressure it's not a necessary element to include in the game but it can go a long way towards regulating the pace of the game and help set a solid tempo of play that will avoid stalls as much as possible designing the base rules of a trading card game is a bit like putting a satellite into orbit you can have a bunch of thrusters maneuver it around in different directions but ultimately you are still going to need to know which way gravity is pulling you problems in a game's core rules don't necessarily translate into a flaw in the game magic is still a good game overall installs are generally an infrequent problem in most formats however core rules are exerting a gravitational pull towards a certain play pattern and if that play pattern is undesirable like stahls and Magic the Gathering the game is going to need to actively move against it with their card effects and overall game balancing it's worth noting that in the case of magic Yu-Gi-Oh and Pokemon these flaws in their combat systems are reinforced by other game systems that are pulling gameplay in a similar Direction magic has a very slow card economy making it more difficult for players to proactively pull away from stall situations Pokemon's prize life system and its resource system that discards the energy off of defeated Pokemon further reinforces the advantage of the leading player and Yu-Gi-Oh's once per turn normal Sun limit makes it even more difficult to establish and maintain board presence these games are still functioning just fine despite this but all of these flaws have been actively addressed over the life of the game with the careful selection and balance of card effects and general game balancing it's possible that some flaws in a game's base rules can even be advantageous since they open up design space for card effects to fix the flaw in a variety of different ways for the moment I'll just say that it's probably better to have a strong base role system that minimizes undesirable play patterns rather than having to constantly put out fires with card effects over the life of the game if you're designing a game hopefully this helps you consider what play patterns your combat systems are pulling towards and if you just enjoy playing games hopefully this helps you appreciate the mix and balance of effects that a game chooses to include best of luck finding a good Pace in your games and have a fantastic day

Channel: tcgAcademia

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Length: 8min 16sec (496 seconds)

Published: Sun Mar 12 2023