Doomtrooper : Mutant Chronicles The CCG

Doomtrooper! So after the summer of 1994 when I got the Mutant Chronicles game I still looked at it but moved on the Magic The Gathering. Just after Christmas there was a new magazine at the local book store about M:TG called SCRYE (Issue #4 to be exact) and inside was incredible, it had pictures of Mutant Chronicles, there was a new game based on it, it was just released but I had not seen it anywhere in my small local area. The pictures were amazing, new Imperial people, Sunset Strikers, cool! but more then this flyer on the back page was a 5 page spread with all the rules and a full list of cards.

With cool stats so you compare your favorites characters and some big revelations. What there is a new faction the Brotherhood! It has some cool Magic with different styles called The Art. There's even a Cardinal! Imperial caused all of this with a plant Nero they went to, say it ain't so. And the rules felt they matched, actions, promotion points, different citadels, I know Algeroth who are these other names, 4 new apostles. I need a starter and some Necropaks (booster packs)! I don't think it was until 6 months later a few starters came to our local store, Wilkies, which was a regional chain of maybe 5-6 stores that's pretty well defunct. So they would split up starter deck and booster boxes and only send 2 starters and 6 boosters to each store. I only got to see the starters and Inquisition the first expansion sold there. So take a look, and think of how amazing it would be to see this when you never had the internet news like it is today. But the early internet is a whole topic for another day.

Magic: The Gathering and the CCG Excitement

 When I was into D&D and Heroquest there was/is a magazine that came out at the local bookstore called Games Magazine that is still being published. It had a variety of puzzle games, the 3d image that was crazy in the mid 90's and a few reviews. Somewhere in there must have been an ad for what I believe is Toad and Trolls that would send you a free catalog. Some how I ended up with a catalog at the time and among the games for sale there was a fascinating one described called Magic: The Gathering.

Shortly after the game showed up at my local game store and i was able to get one deck of revised edition but they were quickly sold out. The other game store in the local mall also got packs so I got a 2nd deck weeks later and maybe a booster or two and they were sold out. I loved the deck boxes as they looked like magic books. Here are the two decks I still have (but not all the cards that came in them). I remember getting two Nightmare cards and thinking they were common but they turned out to be rare. I also ended up with one of the fabled dual lands which are now $1000.. and once I got out of magic early on I traded it for $15-20 store credit to get a couple of wyvern decks. It's one of those things you kick yourself over now, but who knew then. After a number of months Fallen Empires finally came out for $2 a pack and everywhere had them, and I mean everywhere. You still couldn't get a revised pack. The sports card shots were now Magic shops and dabbled a tiny bit in other CCGs until Pokemon came around but I was in University by this point. 

The Magic novel Arena came up and I gobbled it up. I picked up Scrye #4 and was amazed at all the new games coming out. I grabbed the odd pack of 4th edition and by Ice age I had moved on to other games. I wish I would have dug into Ice Age more but there was so little M:TG that you could by in stores other then Fallen Empires and with limited funds I found other games like Spellfire and Doomtrooper to fill the void. And countless others along the way. So that was my CCG Start!