Hecatomb

I found a fun new trading card game. It's as you very well know called Hecatomb. In Malaysia, I only know of three places that stock this very very very new card game: Comics Corner Subang Jaya, Comics Corner Damansara Jaya and I think Comics Corner Bangsar Shopping Centre. Three places. It's so obscure, that you have to ask the shopkeeper to unbury it for you. It's a new game from Wizards of the Coast. The base set was released in August, and the expansion is coming in October. Oh, the joys of a new TCG. Now, to describe what the game is about. The theme of the game is very simple and alluring. You are an endbringer - and you want to end the world. If it's all about ending the world, then how can there be more than one player? That's also very simple. You have to do it before they do. You accomplish the end of the world but claiming 20 souls to your name (or your god's name, whichever pleases you). Since the end of the world is inevitable, you gain 1 soul every turn.

The game while remarkably similar to Magic, plays quite differently. You can use any card for mana - you play these cards in the "mana zone". This usually means all the dead cards in your hand. How convenient. ;) There are four kinds of colours or dooms. Corruption (gray), Deceit (blue), Destruction (red) and Greed (green).

Now, of course, you must be wondering how you can get more souls. The best way to get souls is, of course, to grab them from other endbringers. You use something like this:

And yes, it's a stack of three cards. It's called an abomination (no big surprise). I have the actual cards, but I think photoshopping the cards for demonstration is better. you play smaller stuff called minions over each other to create one huge abomination to do your bidding. You attack other Endbringers with this to steal (or reap) their souls. The more minions in the abomination, the more souls you reap. Of course, your opponents abominations will try to stop you.

Sound interesting yet? We also have fates (or spells), and combat fates and combat minions to keep surprise in the game. If you are interested, you could start by buying a starter. I also suggest getting another 4 boosters packs with it. I know it sounds pretty hefty, but with one starter and 4 boosters, you get 92 cards, of which there are roughly 23 cards of each doom to build your deck from. With 92 cards, you can build a far more coherent 2-doom deck. Trust me, it'll be a lot better than fooling around with a single starter. And you can build a second deck to play with a friend. (Trust me, you also need a second deck to play. Few people know of this game, and even fewer will be willing to shell out the initial costs, so you'll be stuck playing solitaire unless you actually have a second deck to lend people.)

I'll end this right here, and then maybe I'll continue to mystify you with how fun making abominations are. Or, maybe not. ;)

Chapter 00 - 3: Prologue Part 3

Fortunately for the TRi and GMTi, they have made few enemies in their deep space exploration efforts. However, this is more of result of intelligent life being scarce rather than Terran prudence. They have made a few allies other than those through the Arlt Alliance as well as some enemies. Following advice from the Arlt Alliance, the two Terran corporations have refrained from involving themselves in any underdeveloped planets. Apparently, history has proven that interference will only cause disaster for the race being artificially advanced. The TRi and GMTi hiring has seen little diversity in terms of race. This is actually because few races in the Arlt Alliance would consider working outside their own races' companies, and even fewer would consider working with a corporation that isn't part of the Alliance. In that sense, the TRi and GMTi are full of normal humans, not taking into account the Gifted. The majority of the Terran race speaks either English or Standard Mandarin, which were adopted as the two main languages of the Exodus parties. This proved to be a peculiar advantage in trade.

The Arlt Alliance had developed a translation technology which it had no qualms in sharing. This made it easy to accomodate the two simple 'dialects' which Terrans spoke into the Alliance language database for translation in their device. Some races also favoured trade with Terrans because there was no need to learn an obscene amount of dialects just to trade among the multiple trade stations and complexes scattered across Terran territory. Some races simple preferred not using a translation device for the fear of it producing the wrong words in the wrong context - although such errors are generally tolerated most of the time.

Within this relatively new and growing race, some of the Gifted had begun to execute a plan covertly among themselves. And within this plan, there were a few people who had yet to learn what role they had to play.

Casual Decks

What actually defines a casual deck? For one, a casual deck shouldn't be based on any form of tournament deck. Of course, it's not entirely impossible that a casual player would stumble upon a supremely powerful archetype during deckbuilding. Is a casual deck necessarily cheap? No. In fact, I might have probably built physically one of the most expensive casual decks to date. It's difficult to pinpoint what kind of deck is actually casual any more, but I believe that there are only few very clear rules: 1. Isn't based on a successful deck archetype. - To me, this means anything at the current time and before that. Actually, casual decks could still be based on deck archetypes, and still not be too competitive to be fun.

2. Wins in the most interesting or fun way possible. - Some casual decks have normal ways of winning, but certain combinations of cards (like in preconstructed decks) can lead to some really fun and close matches. Some casual decks just try a fun way of winning - Mycosynth Affinity, Spiritcraft, Panoptic Mirror, some obscure combo.... and so on. Competitive wins are generally unstoppable to casual decks, with some exceptions, of course.

3. Should have a net worth of below USD100 if possible. :D - Well, it has to be capped somehow. I don't think it's correct to call any deck running 4 Wrath of God, 4 Umezawa's Jitte and 4 Cranial Extraction anywhere close to being casual.

4. Can adapt easily to a multiplayer environment. - This is one of the few things people keep forgetting out of casual. Most casual decks are designed to handle both variations of player environments with ease. Hah. Some casual decks don't - making this rule a gray spot, but most casual decks should have no problem - meaning that the deck you play doesn't trade off resources too quickly for gains.

There are many forms of casual decks, and some of them even go up to become supreme rogue decks at tournaments after some tweaking. Of course, I believe that most casual decks are actually also peasant decks.