A Collectable Card GameDavid Lam

Stanford SPLASH! November 3, 2012

History of Magic: the Gathering

• Founded by Richard Garfield, a math professor, back in 1993.

• First expansion had 295 cards. • Nearly twenty years later, over

10,000 cards!

General Rules of Magic• There are five colors of Magic.• – Black: Decay, Death, Amorality, Selfishness

• Creature kill spells, powerful cards with drawbacks, discard

– Green: Life, Nature, Harmony, Instinct• Large creatures, trample effects, evasion

– Red: Fury, Chaos, Expression, Freedom• Aggressive creatures, random cards, direct damage

– White: Protection, Order, Harmony, Perfection• Balance, combat superiority, protection

– Blue: Deceit, Intellect, Opportunist, Understanding• Counterspells, drawing cards, control effects

General Rules of Magic: Continued

• Game starts with:– 20 Life– 7 Cards in your hand (if you have more at the end

of your turn, you have to discard down to 7)• If you don’t like your hand, you can mulligan (shuffle

your old hand back into your deck and draw one less)

• You can play one land a turn.• You draw a card when it’s your turn unless

you’re going first and it’s your first turn.• You lose when you can’t draw a card from

your deck or when you don’t have any life left.

Magic Cards!

Creature Cards: Aven Squire

•Mana Cost: 1W•Type: Creature•Subtype: Bird Soldier•Power: 1•Toughness: 1•Special Abilities:• Flying• Exalted

•Flavor Text

Creature Cards: Bond Beetle

•Mana Cost: G•Type: Creature•Subtype: Insect•Power: 0•Toughness: 1•Special Abilities:• When it enters the

battlefield, put a +1/+1 counter on target creature.• What’s a +1/+1

counter?•Flavor Text

Creature Cards: Duty-Bound Dead

•Mana Cost: B•Type: Creature•Subtype: Skeleton•Power: 0•Toughness: 2•Special Abilities:• Exalted• Regenerate

Rules about creatures

• Can only play on your turn, during the main phase (more on this later).

• Has something called summoning sickness:– Can’t tap it unless you’ve controlled it since

the beginning of your turn.• Can’t use tap abilities• Can‘t attack

• Otherwise, abilities can be used at any time if you can pay the cost!

Enchantments: Volcanic Strength

•Mana Cost: 1R•Type: Enchantment•Subtype: Aura•Enchant Creature•Effect

Rules about enchantments

• Can only play on your turn, during the main phase (more on this later).

• If it’s an aura, you have to “equip” it on a creature.

Sorceries: Captain’s Call•Mana Cost: 3W•Type: Sorcery•Effect• What’s a token?• Kind of like a creature,

but you don’t cast it. • You need a

token/marker to signify that it’s there.

Rules about sorceries

• Can only play on your turn, during the main phase (more on this later).

• After the ability resolves, it goes into the graveyard.

Instants: Essence Scatter

•Mana Cost: 1U•Type: Instant•Effect• What does it mean to

counter spells?

Rules about instants

• Can play any time (even on the opponent’s turn!)

• After the ability resolves, it goes into the graveyard.

Lands: Plains

•Type: Basic Land•Subtype: Plains•Effect• Add one white mana to

your mana pool.

Rules about lands

• Can only play on your turn, during the main phase (more on this later).

• Can only play one a turn. • Tap (turn sideways) to get mana from

it.

Break Time!

• I’ve been chatting for a long time, so let’s take a break!

• Try to find one of each card:– Creature– Enchantment– Sorcery– Instant– Land

Casting spells!

Casting spells!

The Playzone

Library/DeckHand Battlefie

ldGraveyard

Gameplay• Untap • Draw• Main Phase 1• Combat (!!!)– Declare Attackers– Declare Blockers– Damage Dealt

• Main Phase 2• End Phase

Combat

To attack, tap the creature during combat

Combat

Tapped creatures can’t block.

Combat: No Blockers

When a creature isn’t blocked, the player loses life equal to the amount of damage.

RAWR!

Player 1:2016

Combat: 1 Aven Squire Blocks

Combat: 3 Aven Squire Block

Play time!

• Go make a deck!– 60 cards. I suggest grabbing 22 lands that match

the color of the deck you’re making.– Get a good mix of cheap and expensive cards!– Have creatures!– Pick a “cool” color that you like and think fits you.– Have a max of 4 of each card, except basic lands.

• Remember to be nice! Everyone is learning how to play. – Grab pens and paper to write down your life on

the table.

Thoughts? Questions?

• Answer questions you may still have.• See what you all want me to review.• What do you guys want to learn now?– The full version of a turn.– All the different types of cards. – The other parts of the gamezone. – Decision Trees– Statistics and Deck Construction

Gameplay: Take II• Untap • Upkeep• Draw• Main Phase 1• Combat

– Precombat– Declare Attackers– Declare Blockers– Damage Dealt

• Main Phase 2• End Phase

– Discard

Even More Cards!

Types of CardsPermanents

(stay on battlefield)

• Lands• Creatures• Enchantments• Artifacts• Planeswalkers

Non-permanents (go to graveyard)

• Instants• Sorceries

The Playzone: Revisited

Library/DeckHand Battlefie

ldGraveyard

Removed from Game

The Stack• Before spells you cast resolve, they

go onto the stack. – Think about it as an dogpile: whoever

gets on top last gets off first (or resolves first).

– Really useful way to understand what’s happening with spells that counter or spells that are done in response to something.

The Stack: Example 1

The Stack: Example 2

Decision Trees• Probably figured out that you should

have done something earlier or held onto a really good card. – How can we figure that out? – Let’s learn a few lessons.

Lesson 1: Element of Surprise

Lesson 2: Beware the Combat Trick!

Lesson 3: Sooner isn’t Always Better

• If we play it in the first main phase, he’ll be forced to attack.

• What if we played him the second main phase?

Lesson 4: Watch Your Resources

• Resist urge to kill cards immediately.

• What if they play something worse?

Easy Statistics• Why do we

suggest making 60 card decks?–Make 60 card decks

because you want your best cards in the deck.• While 100 card

decks are cool, a 1/60 chance of finding that card you really need to win is much better

than a 1/100 chance.

• Why do we suggest 22 lands?– Long story short,

on average:• Turn 1: 2.57 lands.• Turn 2: 2.93 lands.• Turn 3: 3.30 lands• Turn 4: 3.67 lands• Turn 5: 4.03 lands

Easy Statistics: The Curve

So Why Should I Care?

• Remember when I said that you want a good mix of expensive and cheap creatures?– You want your curve to be good so you can

play spells every turn.– Every turn you CAN’T use your mana is a

turn wasted. –Make sure once you have a lot of mana, you

can play spells.

• Be aware of curve when making decks!

In Closing

• Art- Pictures of Awesome Cards• Storyline- Magic has a really good storyline

and flavor text that puts it in a different world.• Gameplay- It’s fun!– You can be competitive– Or you can be creative

• Friends- I hope you all made lots of friends.• Lots of education (math)- not just a game.• Creative process- tons of cards to do

whatever you want.

Acknowledgements

• ChannelFireball- They donated the pens, notepads, and most importantly, the cards!– Please send a thank-you to

sales@channelfireball.com.

• SPLASH!- They make this happen every year.

• Wizards of the Coast for making a great game.

• Everyone around you for being awesome!