The impossibility of a balanced Collectable Card Game.

[Lago PARANOIA]

Okay, so the ideal situation for RPG design is so that a character who is essentially randomly created (because players have lots of wild and wacky ideas for their characters and some just aren't good at min-maxxing) will have just as much input into creating a story appropriate for the game as a character who is min-maxxed. The trick is doing this while still having meaningful choices and differences.

Of course, for a card game you don't want this goal. If any combination of cards is viable then there isn't much point. The card game essentially becomes completely random. So you do want some combinations to be better than others.

But on the other hand, if you go too far in that direction you get a game like Yu-Gi-Oh! where there are only about 3-4 viable deck archetypes at any given time, rendering the dozens other useless. It makes the game dull.

So what's the optimal level of balance between these two extremes, you think?

[MGuy]

When you say optimal balance between what kind of scale are you going by? As far as I know YuGiOh, MAGIC, and Naruto (so I hear) all suffer fromt he problem you described barring card restriction and regulations. Has any card game ever been more moderate with its approach?

[RandomCasualty2]

Because there are just too many variables and you're always adding to the game, you'll never get it precisely balanced (nor is that really a goal), basically the ideal is pretty much what they do with M:tG, where you constantly change the game by cycling in and out new cards. While eventually the best deck of any block will be found, it really doesn't matter because you continually have to adapt.

The main concept pretty much should be producing crap faster than people can accurately analyze it all, so as to leave lots of room for people to think up new decks. Pretty much the idea is to avoid stagnation and constantly force people to adapt to ever changing lists of options.

[Jacob_Orlove]

RPGs are not a competitive sport. Tennis is "balanced" even though plenty of people could never win a game against a pro player, but using Tennis as a component of an RPG (as your resolution mechanic, for example) would be awful. Ditto for Magic, Chess, Fencing, or whatever else. Don't try to copy those games unless you want to play competitive RPG tournaments.

Which I've done, level 1 D&D arena matches were amusing. But then you get psychic Warblades making their save against Color Spray by taking 15 on Moment of Perfect Mind, or Druids with Greenbound Summoning hiding while a plant-hippogriff dive bombs their foe. You end up with pretty decent "balance" because people metagame for the strongest opposition and almost everyone has a strong, but not guaranteed, kill. And everyone has a ton of consumable magic items, those are the only kind worth spending your limited funds on (1 charge wands are pretty good).

But for a cooperative storytelling game, that's garbage. Figure out what kind of characters you want to have in your game and give players the tools to make those characters. You get meaningful choices and differences by letting players choose what their characters will be good at, not by giving hidden options to make super bad (or super good) characters.

[tzor]

I think you need to look at a game like chess. Although it doesn’t sound like a CCG since everyone starts off with the same pieces at the start, the strategy for playing chess can be significantly different. At some fundamental level one might be able to rate the strategies of various opening move philosophies but for the average player those differences are dwarfed by their own imperfections. Add to this the nature that a CCG should be designed so that even the best planned strategy should be on occasion (due to the bad luck of the drawn cards) difficult to perfectly implement and the basic requirements for the general balancing of the CCG comes into play.

Over time a CCG game gets unbalanced because people often confuse something different with something that is simply more powerful. Power creep is actually good for a CCG in the short term; it requires people to buy new cards because their old cards are now worth SHIT, but it ruins any sense of balance in the game.

[souran]

The problem iwth a CCG is the collectable part.

In order for something to be collectable there must be a rarity order. Either that or your game is only "collectable" in the way alunimum cans are - for the intrinsic value of the material they are made of.

now if a game has a rarity order, then presumablly the cards of higher rarity will, in general, strech the game rules more or be more synergistic with other cards.

Certiantly, not every rare card needs to be this way, however, if MOST rare cards are not this way then their is a disconnect between game value and collection value. If that is the case the card actually has two theoretical values of worth and its real worth is totally dependant on whose asking to get it right now.

This also doesn't nesseccarily work in reverse, a common card can be very good. Nobody will object to that, what it will mean, though is that good strength common cards will appear in more decks than average strength common cards.

Anyway, assuming that you actually intend for card rarity to have a game value and not just a collection value, then you encounter the basic problem with CCGs.

The amount of power a particular player can muster is DIRECTLY proportional to the amount of real world wealth spent on the cardgame. While this is fucking AWESOME for sales its terrible for anything anybody would call a game.

There will, of course, be people who prove exception to this rule. However, be careful in your analysis of weather somebody has actually spent less.

If player Brain has spent $1000 on game parts but his individual gaming decks/markers have an average value $150 dollars while player Bobby has only spent $300 dollars but his normal deck is worth $225 dollars then it is actually Bobby who has spent more to accomplish his ends.

So if your asking how to balance a CCG the first thing to do is take the first C out of it. Otherwise imbalance is part of the game for life.

[RandomCasualty2]

Also, you have to consider that balance in a game like that isn't so much about every card/deck being equal. Chess is balanced even though each piece isn't equal. It's about everyone having equal access to every piece. In a CCG, it's actually balanced pretty much by definition since everyone could potentially use the same cards. There are imbalances when some people can't afford the cards, but that's about it. Otherwise competitive balance is assured, since two people can play the ultimate deck at the same time.

What you're really worried about for CCGs is if the game is interesting and deep. You want lots of deck types that are competitive and not just have one uberdeck that everyone plays. That's really your only concern.

[Manxome]

Chess is balanced even though each piece isn't equal. It's about everyone having equal access to every piece. In a CCG, it's actually balanced pretty much by definition since everyone could potentially use the same cards.

Yeah, everyone agrees that D&D is perfectly balanced because every player has equal access to every class. In fact, it's more balanced than chess, because in chess white has an unfair advantage (first move) that black can't possibly replicate. That's why there are a lot more discussions about how to balance chess than about how to balance D&D.


People try to make RPG classes that all play differently but are equally powerful; if that's a sensible goal, then so is trying to make a customizable card game where different decks play differently but are equally powerful. As in most things, perfection is rather impractical, but there are degrees of success. And if one is a matter of "balance," then so is the other.

The conventional marketing model of CCGs is antithetical to making a deep and balanced game, because it works by tempting people to spend more money by offering them mechanical advantage. And since publishers like to make money, that's likely to continue as long as players continue to tolerate it.

If you decide (for whatever reason) to prioritize game balance over profit, you can sell non-randomized cards, give everyone exactly the cards they want (or at least predictable packages) in unlimited supply for a consistent price, and balance the cards so that different people will buy different styles of decks that can all compete with each other (more or less). You'd even get useful balancing information based on sales. I'd even predict you'd still have people that buy a large variety of cards so they can play different styles or just for the satisfaction of having them. Whether you still choose to call that a CCG or not is another question.

And that's starting to move vaguely in the direction of Dominion, actually.

[Jacob_Orlove]

If you decide (for whatever reason) to prioritize game balance over profit, you can sell non-randomized cards, give everyone exactly the cards they want (or at least predictable packages) in unlimited supply for a consistent price, and balance the cards so that different people will buy different styles of decks that can all compete with each other (more or less). You'd even get useful balancing information based on sales. I'd even predict you'd still have people that buy a large variety of cards so they can play different styles or just for the satisfaction of having them. Whether you still choose to call that a CCG or not is another question.

You could also give people their choice of starting cards for free, and offer the rest as free prizes. Once players had enough cards to build a deck, any extra cards should give them more options but not more power.

Check out http://www.kongregate.com/games/Kongregate/kongai

Your deck consists of three characters, each of whom can have up to one item. Admittedly, some characters work better with specific items, so you can get a minor power boost even after you have six cards for your starting deck. But for the most part, more cards won't let you build a more powerful deck.

[RandomCasualty2]

Yeah, everyone agrees that D&D is perfectly balanced because every player has equal access to every class. In fact, it's more balanced than chess, because in chess white has an unfair advantage (first move) that black can't possibly replicate. That's why there are a lot more discussions about how to balance chess than about how to balance D&D.

Well, no.

See the balance of an RPG is different goal wise than a competitive game. The idea of an RPG isn't so much that people are going to pick the most powerful character built. The idea is that people are going to model their favorite heroes (and build new ones). The balance of the game is making Legolas as equally useful as Merlin. In fact, in an RPG, optimally there are no real bad PC choices at all, because all of your character types should be viable. That means that any PC option you include in the game should be a viable one.

In a competitive game, you don't worry so much about having bad choices. It's no big deal if Aladdin's Ring happens to be a shitty card and nobody plays it. The idea that you have bad choices is okay, because part of being good at the game is avoiding making bad choices. The goal of a player in a competitive game is to discover the best strategy and find a way to implement it. You really don't care if there's a nonviable option, only that there's no overwhelmingly awesome options that make it so everyone plays the same way, which leads to a boring game.

This is basically completely contrary to an RPG, where the job of the game designer is to find a way to effectively implement character concepts. It's pretty much the exact opposite design process, one that is much harder because you have to work backwards from the end point, as opposed to letting the players do the work for you.

In Magic, you leave it to the player to decide if a millstone concept is viable as a deck. Maybe it is or maybe it isn't depending on the rules you wrote, but you as a designer aren't a failure either way. In an RPG you pretty much decide from the get go that people should be able to play a swashbuckler, and if swashbuckler isn't viable, then you've done a bad job as a game designer.

[Starmaker]

If you decide (for whatever reason) to prioritize game balance over profit, you can sell non-randomized cards, give everyone exactly the cards they want (or at least predictable packages) in unlimited supply for a consistent price, and balance the cards so that different people will buy different styles of decks that can all compete with each other (more or less).

Fantasy Flight does this. They call it "Living Card Games". Cards are sold in fixed monthly installments, and, what's important, these get reprinted once they're sold out. In A Game of Thrones and Call of Cthulhu LCGs the so-called Legacy products are legal (the collectible cards from before the format was changed), Warhammer Invasion started as a LCG.

[souran]

If you decide (for whatever reason) to prioritize game balance over profit, you can sell non-randomized cards, give everyone exactly the cards they want (or at least predictable packages) in unlimited supply for a consistent price, and balance the cards so that different people will buy different styles of decks that can all compete with each other (more or less).

Fantasy Flight does this. They call it "Living Card Games". Cards are sold in fixed monthly installments, and, what's important, these get reprinted once they're sold out. In A Game of Thrones and Call of Cthulhu LCGs the so-called Legacy products are legal (the collectible cards from before the format was changed), Warhammer Invasion started as a LCG.

As a further note, the "Living Card Games" are NOT collectable. That is the problem with thre first C in CCG. Flux is a cardgame with expansion packs. It is NOT collectable. Flux CARDS have NO VALUE individually or even collectectevly beyond the printed MSRP at initial sale.

Look, I actually like the living card games more than the collectiable card games for the reasons mentioned above.

However, and I know this is being very rigid about this, you cannot have a COLLECTABLE card game without the randamization and rarity properties of cards because if people can buy whatever cards they want and market price from the manufacturer then their cannot be a secondary market for the cards. If there is no secondary market then it is NOT collectable.

If this is still not clear think of baseball cards. They are collectable. Will fleer or topflight sell you a pack and tell you what 10 players your getting? No. Now, they will sell you the entire years run of cards, but it actually costs enough to put it out of the price range of most collectors.
Because of this they have an after market value to other collectors. THAT is what makes baseball cards collectable.

[tzor]

There are three aspects to the problem of collectable card games and they are all separate issues.

The first issue is internal balance. It doesn’t mean that all cards have to be equal (that would be a dull game) but that deployment costs for more powerful cards have to offset the more powerful nature. In the early years of MtG I remember a lot of arguments between “weak” decks with lots of low level monsters with fast deployment and “strong” decks with lots of high level monsters with slow deployment.

The second issue is deck balance. If you can’t internally balance all cards so that costs and benefits are equal you can assign point values so that you can balance the overall deck so that the two decks are balanced. I seem to recall a little of that in the early years of MtG as well, although not as much. The early years of putting up a random card in your deck as an ante had an interesting way of balancing things.

The third issue is the collectable nature. Collectability is an odd thing; consider dollar bills. All dollar bills are technically “balanced” to other dollar bills. But dollar bills with special sequence numbers (eg 12344321) are worth more. This is true when you have non power contributing factors (like the artist who decorates the card) along with the power contributing factors in a specific card.

[Username17]

However, and I know this is being very rigid about this, you cannot have a COLLECTABLE card game without the randamization and rarity properties of cards because if people can buy whatever cards they want and market price from the manufacturer then their cannot be a secondary market for the cards. If there is no secondary market then it is NOT collectable.

You don't need different rarities. Those little Star Trek badges they put in Rice Crispies were collectible, and were all equally rare. They didn't even have a large print run.

Frankly, Rare and Uncommon cards were never a good idea, because they encourage the mode of thinking that certain printed cards are worthless. What they should have done is institute a 1 card limit and set the set size to 1100 or so. And then certain common themes like Scrybb Sprites could have several distinct basically interchangeable cards. Then you can make a straight face argument that none of the cards are worthless and people still have to buy several thousand cards to have a reasonable chance of a complete set.

That's the basic Baseball Card model, and it works great.

-Username17

[Manxome]

Yeah, everyone agrees that D&D is perfectly balanced because every player has equal access to every class. In fact, it's more balanced than chess, because in chess white has an unfair advantage (first move) that black can't possibly replicate. That's why there are a lot more discussions about how to balance chess than about how to balance D&D.

Well, no.

See the balance of an RPG is different goal wise than a competitive game. The idea of an RPG isn't so much that people are going to pick the most powerful character built. The idea is that people are going to model their favorite heroes (and build new ones). The balance of the game is making Legolas as equally useful as Merlin. In fact, in an RPG, optimally there are no real bad PC choices at all, because all of your character types should be viable. That means that any PC option you include in the game should be a viable one.

In a competitive game, you don't worry so much about having bad choices. It's no big deal if Aladdin's Ring happens to be a shitty card and nobody plays it. The idea that you have bad choices is okay, because part of being good at the game is avoiding making bad choices. The goal of a player in a competitive game is to discover the best strategy and find a way to implement it. You really don't care if there's a nonviable option, only that there's no overwhelmingly awesome options that make it so everyone plays the same way, which leads to a boring game.

This is basically completely contrary to an RPG, where the job of the game designer is to find a way to effectively implement character concepts. It's pretty much the exact opposite design process, one that is much harder because you have to work backwards from the end point, as opposed to letting the players do the work for you.

In Magic, you leave it to the player to decide if a millstone concept is viable as a deck. Maybe it is or maybe it isn't depending on the rules you wrote, but you as a designer aren't a failure either way. In an RPG you pretty much decide from the get go that people should be able to play a swashbuckler, and if swashbuckler isn't viable, then you've done a bad job as a game designer.

*facepalm*

Yeah, competitive games like Street Fighter and StarCraft don't have any problems if a particular character, unit, or race is massively inferior to others and taking it guarantees that you lose. No one complains about that or considers it bad design, because it's a competitive game, which means that having deceptive, sucky options presented as viable is suddenly totally OK for no clear reason.


I'll admit there's no widely accepted definition of game balance, but your version is apparently in a totally different dimension from mainstream usage of that term.

[RandomCasualty2]

Yeah, competitive games like Street Fighter and StarCraft don't have any problems if a particular character, unit, or race is massively inferior to others and taking it guarantees that you lose. No one complains about that or considers it bad design, because it's a competitive game, which means that having deceptive, sucky options presented as viable is suddenly totally OK for no clear reason.

In Starcraft, there are shit units. The protoss scout for instance is almost never used, as is the dark archon, the terran ghost and the zerg infested terran. It doesn't overall impact the balance of the game. People just don't use those units. And Starcraft is considered one of the best balanced RTS out there. It has its share of shit units.

Now, if so many of your units suck that there's one strategy, such as Command & Conquer where tanks are god and every game is a tank massing fest, is a terrible game simply because there's no depth to the strategy. It's the reason that having a weak race is a bad idea, because it means that you lose a lot of variety.