What is it?
So, Hasbro have released a card game for Transformers! If you know me, you know I love both Transformers and card games, so this is the perfect product for me. I figured I'd give my opinions of this game and even how to play (since the rules are a bit hidden on the website).
The game's cards are split into two different kinds, battle cards and character cards. The battle cards (the smaller ones) are placed into a deck of at least 40 cards, and have illustrations from various Transformers comics (so far only from the IDW era). The character cards (the oversized ones) use the same artwork as those used in the Transformers: Legends online card game (at least so far anyway).
The boosters are about twice the size of a normal pack of cards (a Cardfight Vanguard card is given for size comparison above). Inside the packs are two pieces of cardboard, to keep the character cards from bending so easily, and a packet of seven battle cards
In the battle card packet you get four Common cards, two Uncommons, and one Rare. In Wave One, there are 30 Rare cards, 27 Uncommons, and 24 Common cards to collect. Since you can get a total of 30 packs in one booster box it is therefore possible to get one of every battle card in a single box, albeit with loads of commons going spare.
The characters cards however are another story altogether! In Wave One, there are two Super Rare cards, ten Rares, sixteen Uncommon, and twelve Commons, making a total of forty cards, meaning you need at least two boxes to get the complete set....HOWEVER! The Super Rare cards are available in approximately one in every THREE boxes...so....they'll be fun to get!
For me, after 18 booster packs I got a good variety of battle cards, with only a couple of repeated Rares, but my selection of Character cards are a bit more muddled up. I have six Commons, with 2 of those being duplicates, eight Uncommons, with no duplicates, and four Rare, with one duplicate
As well as Wave One, there is also a starter set with four unique character cards, and a selection of battle cards from Wave One. There is also a packet of promotional cards from conventions like Gencon 2018 and hopefully more in the near future. There hasn't been any news of future releases yet, but hopefully there will be soon.
How to play?
If you want some quick guides for how to play, here's a link to the official "how to play" video series, which includes a link to the game rules: Rules here!
I'll give a brief summary of it here, and give some tips and tricks for building your deck/team, which aren't really gone into in the videos linked above.
First off, when you build your battle card deck, you need to use at least 40 cards, and you may have up to 3 copies of any card (regardless of image). Whilst there isn't an upper limit, you should probably keep your deck to as close to 40 cards as possible, so you have a better chance of getting the cards you want.
Your team of Transformers on the opening field, made from the Character cards can also be made of any number of cards, so long as the combined total of stars on the bottom of the alternate mode image do not exceed 25 (ie, you can have two 12 Star characters, or five 5 Star characters on your team). You can either use a lot of low star characters, meaning you get more attacks and effects in total, but have weaker cards, or have fewer characters, but are much more powerful.
When you build your deck/team, take a look at the effects and abilities of the cards to see if you can build any decent strategies, and to make sure you don't get too many dud-cards. Also, keep a track of the colours in the corner, and try to get a good variety of blue, orange and white, so you can get extra attack power and the such during the game itself.
When you build the deck, you should use some card sleeves (standard size, like you would use for MTG or Pokemon) and a deck box to keep the cards together. You are able to get deck boxes for oversized cards, but you could just keep the characters inside a folder, book, or even one of those containers you get with MTG Commander decks (My one, seen below has been decorated with stickers from the Signature Publishing magazine :D)
The game play is very simple, you begin the game with all of your characters alternate mode up and draw the top three cards from your deck for your opening hand. Each turn the player draws the top card of their deck, and can transform one of their untapped characters. You may also play one of each type of card (Action or Upgrade) during that turn. Each character may have only three upgrades active, and only one of each type attached (Armour, Utility or Weapon) at a time, if you play another one, then the earlier one gets scrapped (sent to the discard pile)
The player who goes first may not play any battle cards on their first turn, and the second player may only play one, after that, all other turns are played as described earlier.
The goal of the game is to scrap all of your opponent's characters. The main process to do this is to attack them. To attack, you tap one of your characters and target an opponent's character (if they have a tapped card, then you must attack them first) When you attack, the attacking player reveals the top two cards in their deck, and if there are any orange symbols in the corner, then you add that many symbols to the attacker's power, the defending player does the same, but is going for the blue symbols to add to their defence. If either player reveals a white symbol then you can reveal two more cards, but only once per attack (ie, if you reveal two whites in your attack, then you still only get two more cards, not four). The cards revealed are then sent to the scrap pile.
If the attacker's power is higher than the defender's defence, then the difference is applied to the defender's health (you can keep track of it with counters or dice). One they have used up all their health, they are scrapped and sent to the discard pile.
Unlike with most games, if you use up your deck, you simply shuffle the scrap pile and put it back in the deck zone, meaning that mill-decks are not a thing in this game.
My Thoughts?
Honestly? I love this game (so far). I've only seen cards being sold online so far, here in the UK, but hopefully I'll be able to get some brick and mortar stores selling this soon. This game kind of reminds me of Cradfight Vanguard (my favourite current card game) but also, since it was made by Wizards of the Coast, has a feel of MTG or Pokemon to it as well.
The gameplay is simple, but also has room for a lot of strategy, without it currently having a meta game or any broken mechanics (to my knowledge). Let's hope it stays a fun game, and that future waves get released before long, so we can have some variety in our matches!
If you see me at any events (like TFNation 2019) and want a game, just find me and I'll be happy to play anyone.
Let me know any future updates you'd like to see from this game. Personally, I want some themed sets to be released (like a Lost Light theme), some non-G1 sets (perhaps to help promote upcoming series/movies?) and perhaps a way to bring in combiners (maybe have all five team members being low stars, but they get a power boost if they're all on the field. Perhaps their alternate modes could make up parts of a shared image of their combined form?)
