First of love the channel and you have some very good ideas and thoughts about tcgs. I make weekly gameplay videos on sorcery, and wanted to address some of your thoughts about the yearly release. Its been a wonderful experience to have time to breath the cardboard and learn the cards. It allows you to form memories with individual cards and interactions. I cant disagree with your point if there is a week set waiting a year to have something come out to "fix" it is a concern but the devs and playtesters are very dedicated and love the game. I like to compare the gameplay to chess in the sense positioning is the hardest aspect to learn but the most powerful. Also to use chess as an example its been played for hundreds of years, not saying sorcery will be around in a 100 years but each game is so vastly different from game to game its wild. one game ill attack down the middle or another ill have to play defensively and a third is wild swings of advantage. so just in 3 games with the same decks you get 3 different experiences. another good comparison is MTG vintage cube, very powerful cards that swing the game around. Sometimes you get stomped by some one having a black lotus but sometimes you have the black lotus. There is a very active discord player base where you play the game without even buying a single card, but i can bet you'll be hooked once you have a few games under your belt.
I’m not sure if I will ever get an opportunity to actually play sorcery, but I’m definitely gonna start collecting. The cards look amazing and it looks very unique and fun to play.
Sorcery is a nice alternative to magic for me. I still play magic, but buy way less. Instead I collect sorcery. Like the hand painted art. Gameplay is also fun. not sure how I feel about the release schedule, sometimes i want just more :)
Great video! I play Sorcery a lot via the Discord. The gameplay is truly like no other. The game feels hard to grasp compared to all the other TCGs simply because there is the grid locations and the movement. Not only that, but there are so so so many different aspects to those locations and how they interact. Other TCGs just feel so simple when compared to it. (Not a put down on other games.) I know it feels hard to understand, but play one or two games and it will start to feel second nature if you have ever played MTG before. I never played any other TCG besides a few games of pokemon as a kid and a few games of MTG in 2015. Games can progress really fast once you learn it, like any other TCG, depending on the deck. I highly encourage you to try the game, as I think most people in love with pre-modern and old school will latch onto this game HARD, but even modern MTG players are coming on in droves. The 1 set a year allows more design time on gameplay and the hand painted art to be created. I, like many in the Sorcery community, Love the 1 set a year. There is no set meta yet and is incredibly diverse. The extra time really allows players to brew all kinds of decks. The breathing room is such a… breath of fresh air. Can’t wait for you to join the community! Take it easy!
one a year is a bit much, 2/year would be better to diversify the stuff you can do. Ive played since it started and I feel the pool is too stale to really shake it up. Also, with it being all collectors who whale everything up by the pallet in the Chicagoland area, there are not enough players imo.
I'd say a card game can work with longer times between releases, but if it wants to survive, it needs to have variety. A largely open meta is essential, as someone is more likely to keep going to tourneys and events when they both don't know what they'll run up against and also don't feel constrained to have to run only 1 of 2-4 proven top-tier archetypes. Otherwise, if everyone's bringing the same decks every time, fatigue sets in and the game is shelved, likely not to be picked up again anytime soon.
that's why you need many really really rare cards so people are forced to play different decks based on what they have. copying meta shouldn't even be possible in ideal scenario. making the deck is the game, anyone copying meta is not playing the game.
Thanks for the video and take from a market perspective. For me the one set a year is a feature, not a bug. Keeps my spending and the mental bandwith down.
I disagree that a longer span stops fatigue from setting in. I think it's a different type of fatigue almost apathy. I mean I've watched a couple places that are near me. Stop selling the product just because with the long span of time people who are excited in it got their fail and then stopped. Maybe they'll come back when the next set launches. That's fine but any product is left stuck on the shelves. Hype is a bit of a relevant factor in getting new players and you're asking stores to stock something that nobody's in a hurry to buy because well they got their fill and now they're waiting another year
I backed Sorcery on KS, nothing crazy, just two booster boxes. Went on to grab two more of the beta release and then grabbed six of Arthurian Legends. The new set is really cool, some awesomely fun and powerful cards. I think rules-wise the game has two tricky areas: 1. The resource system, which separates out the colour thresholds from the actual mana generation. I find it's easiest to track your per-turn mana with a die or tokens. Thresholds I just check the cards I have on play, but that could be tracked with dice too. 2. The above/below ground/water system, which is a bit of a hassle to track in the game as the rules are written. I tend to use tokens to track whether an in-play card is above or below, since physically sticking it under the site cards as a PITA. So yeah, the rules do have some QoL issues which are solvable. The gameplay is a ton of fun tho and the spatial nature of the game allows for some pretty hilarious interactions (My first test game saw an Avatar accidentally kill themselves using the Bull Demons of Adun 😂). As a Doomtown enjoyer, I appreciate the movement side of the game a lot :-)
I’ll be curious to see what you think after you play a few games. I tried Flesh and Blood when Uprising came out, enjoyed the game, but couldn’t keep up with all the sets. I decided to focus in on MTG Lord of the Rings which I also enjoy, but found the Collector packs were soon out of reach and the focus of the game kept moving from set to set similar to FAB. Sorcery has a release pace that is much more manageable for learning and playing. The Sorcerycon in Vegas was amazing with opportunity to visit with artists and diverse game play
Sorcery is fun and captures that feeling that early magic, but I wish they were pushing for more growth in the game. They are intentionally not trying to be like other tcgs with constant set releases and creating a treadmill, but it’s tough to get representation at a lgs when they don’t have that much going on in a given week. If they move to 2 main sets year that would go a long way to growing the game.
People will always race to solve the meta. That's just what they do. I think there are several lessons from flesh and blood that should be taken to Heart, despite the fact I think that the creators of either game dislike each other immensely and that is a stale meta or a very long time between products tends to kill hype
I'm 41 and even with running this shop for the last 3 years, my brain tells me "no" when it comes to learning anything new. Between running the shop, running a household, and just existing.....my poor brain just can't take anything else so I totally understand the "can't learn new card game" brain fog :D
One thing I've been looking at too is the amount of people joining the Reddit forum for sorcery because I tracked the one on flesh and blood and they get about 16 people a day just about every day. Sometimes more sometimes less, but I've noticed that the sorcery Forum has been overtaken by altered TCG a game which has been out a lot less time
Reddit is slowly dying, I think that is why. The official Discord is THE place to meet and chat. As well as the league channel. I’m on the reddit, but barely look at it
I backed the kickstarter. I bought boxes for Beta. I got boxes for Arthurian Legends and I'll be honest with you. The last set looked very nice from a box perspective but it was relatively uninteresting inside. I've heard also people complain about the size of the set being small and the number of uniques being a bit too high which degrades their value and I would honestly agree with that with the number of unique knights I got
@@MrRayRockstar I was just not impressed with the contents of the very flashy box. I really wanted sorcery to be good but the expansion was a disappointment for a year wait
@@andrewostman3135 I agree with you. I’m a serial collector of MTG from back in the day. (Not investing I have all the cards still) but find the current MTG sets uncollectible. I brought heaps of sorcery and completed a Beta set but after 10 AL boxes and still heaps of uniques to collect I’ve lost interest. The two LGS within 120km have zero players and the one which has Sorcery told me I’m the only one buying the boosters from them. Sorcery needs players and more sets to survive.
Sorcery has made it clear that the target market is to appeal to Magic players who were around during the early stages of the game. The average age being around 40+. Meaning they are developing and appealing to an established CCG player base that stick around for the long haul. As opposed to the Lorcana type games that want the early teens that will often feel they have aged out of the game after about 12 months or so. So this is one thing working in their favor to survive having a longer release window.
However it's a double-edged sword, because it also puts a hard limit on your potential audience - people's tastes don't change much with age these days, so Sorcery's chosen playerbase is gradually aging out of life with no one coming in to replace them. At the same time, the older end of its target market hitting retirement age could see them wanting a more regularly-released game than one set per year, potentially splitting the playerbase between retirees who have lots of time and middle-aged people who tend not to have much. Not to mention all the parents who might like Sorcery but find themselves playing Pokemon, MTG or Lorcana because that's what their kids play and their kids are their most accessible player options.
I am curious to see how the one set a year model of Sorcery will work out. I got some cards in a collection thrown in, they do look beautiful! Have you bought anything during black madness Frank?
it relies on unique gameplay unlike anything else. it's literally like a strategy board game rather than just card game. what does Meta zoo crap have to do with anything. nobody plays Pokemon, it's far closer to metazoo collection focus and nostalgia.
The game plays similar to magic but broadcast onto a chess board
First of love the channel and you have some very good ideas and thoughts about tcgs.
I make weekly gameplay videos on sorcery, and wanted to address some of your thoughts about the yearly release. Its been a wonderful experience to have time to breath the cardboard and learn the cards. It allows you to form memories with individual cards and interactions. I cant disagree with your point if there is a week set waiting a year to have something come out to "fix" it is a concern but the devs and playtesters are very dedicated and love the game. I like to compare the gameplay to chess in the sense positioning is the hardest aspect to learn but the most powerful. Also to use chess as an example its been played for hundreds of years, not saying sorcery will be around in a 100 years but each game is so vastly different from game to game its wild. one game ill attack down the middle or another ill have to play defensively and a third is wild swings of advantage. so just in 3 games with the same decks you get 3 different experiences. another good comparison is MTG vintage cube, very powerful cards that swing the game around. Sometimes you get stomped by some one having a black lotus but sometimes you have the black lotus.
There is a very active discord player base where you play the game without even buying a single card, but i can bet you'll be hooked once you have a few games under your belt.
Hey thanks for sharing - and welcome to the channel! I definitely see the wide variety in gameplay, which should help stave off fatigue.
I’m not sure if I will ever get an opportunity to actually play sorcery, but I’m definitely gonna start collecting. The cards look amazing and it looks very unique and fun to play.
Sorcery is a nice alternative to magic for me. I still play magic, but buy way less. Instead I collect sorcery. Like the hand painted art. Gameplay is also fun. not sure how I feel about the release schedule, sometimes i want just more :)
Great video! I play Sorcery a lot via the Discord.
The gameplay is truly like no other. The game feels hard to grasp compared to all the other TCGs simply because there is the grid locations and the movement. Not only that, but there are so so so many different aspects to those locations and how they interact. Other TCGs just feel so simple when compared to it. (Not a put down on other games.)
I know it feels hard to understand, but play one or two games and it will start to feel second nature if you have ever played MTG before. I never played any other TCG besides a few games of pokemon as a kid and a few games of MTG in 2015. Games can progress really fast once you learn it, like any other TCG, depending on the deck.
I highly encourage you to try the game, as I think most people in love with pre-modern and old school will latch onto this game HARD, but even modern MTG players are coming on in droves.
The 1 set a year allows more design time on gameplay and the hand painted art to be created.
I, like many in the Sorcery community, Love the 1 set a year. There is no set meta yet and is incredibly diverse. The extra time really allows players to brew all kinds of decks. The breathing room is such a… breath of fresh air.
Can’t wait for you to join the community! Take it easy!
☝️ this right here
You should try Doomtown Weird West edition if you like the area control aspect of Sorcery 😊
one a year is a bit much, 2/year would be better to diversify the stuff you can do. Ive played since it started and I feel the pool is too stale to really shake it up. Also, with it being all collectors who whale everything up by the pallet in the Chicagoland area, there are not enough players imo.
I'd say a card game can work with longer times between releases, but if it wants to survive, it needs to have variety. A largely open meta is essential, as someone is more likely to keep going to tourneys and events when they both don't know what they'll run up against and also don't feel constrained to have to run only 1 of 2-4 proven top-tier archetypes.
Otherwise, if everyone's bringing the same decks every time, fatigue sets in and the game is shelved, likely not to be picked up again anytime soon.
that's why you need many really really rare cards so people are forced to play different decks based on what they have. copying meta shouldn't even be possible in ideal scenario. making the deck is the game, anyone copying meta is not playing the game.
The Sorcery community is made up of 40% ex-mtg players, 40% ex-metazoo investors, 15% collectors and 5% new players.
Thanks for the video and take from a market perspective. For me the one set a year is a feature, not a bug. Keeps my spending and the mental bandwith down.
I disagree that a longer span stops fatigue from setting in. I think it's a different type of fatigue almost apathy. I mean I've watched a couple places that are near me. Stop selling the product just because with the long span of time people who are excited in it got their fail and then stopped. Maybe they'll come back when the next set launches. That's fine but any product is left stuck on the shelves. Hype is a bit of a relevant factor in getting new players and you're asking stores to stock something that nobody's in a hurry to buy because well they got their fill and now they're waiting another year
I backed Sorcery on KS, nothing crazy, just two booster boxes. Went on to grab two more of the beta release and then grabbed six of Arthurian Legends.
The new set is really cool, some awesomely fun and powerful cards.
I think rules-wise the game has two tricky areas:
1. The resource system, which separates out the colour thresholds from the actual mana generation. I find it's easiest to track your per-turn mana with a die or tokens. Thresholds I just check the cards I have on play, but that could be tracked with dice too.
2. The above/below ground/water system, which is a bit of a hassle to track in the game as the rules are written. I tend to use tokens to track whether an in-play card is above or below, since physically sticking it under the site cards as a PITA.
So yeah, the rules do have some QoL issues which are solvable.
The gameplay is a ton of fun tho and the spatial nature of the game allows for some pretty hilarious interactions (My first test game saw an Avatar accidentally kill themselves using the Bull Demons of Adun 😂).
As a Doomtown enjoyer, I appreciate the movement side of the game a lot :-)
I’ll be curious to see what you think after you play a few games. I tried Flesh and Blood when Uprising came out, enjoyed the game, but couldn’t keep up with all the sets. I decided to focus in on MTG Lord of the Rings which I also enjoy, but found the Collector packs were soon out of reach and the focus of the game kept moving from set to set similar to FAB. Sorcery has a release pace that is much more manageable for learning and playing. The Sorcerycon in Vegas was amazing with opportunity to visit with artists and diverse game play
Sorcery is fun and captures that feeling that early magic, but I wish they were pushing for more growth in the game. They are intentionally not trying to be like other tcgs with constant set releases and creating a treadmill, but it’s tough to get representation at a lgs when they don’t have that much going on in a given week. If they move to 2 main sets year that would go a long way to growing the game.
People will always race to solve the meta. That's just what they do. I think there are several lessons from flesh and blood that should be taken to Heart, despite the fact I think that the creators of either game dislike each other immensely and that is a stale meta or a very long time between products tends to kill hype
I'm 41 and even with running this shop for the last 3 years, my brain tells me "no" when it comes to learning anything new. Between running the shop, running a household, and just existing.....my poor brain just can't take anything else so I totally understand the "can't learn new card game" brain fog :D
One thing I've been looking at too is the amount of people joining the Reddit forum for sorcery because I tracked the one on flesh and blood and they get about 16 people a day just about every day. Sometimes more sometimes less, but I've noticed that the sorcery Forum has been overtaken by altered TCG a game which has been out a lot less time
Altered is the new hotness, yeah. I personally think it seems pretty ass but that's just me, I'm a grumpy old guy 😂
Reddit is slowly dying, I think that is why. The official Discord is THE place to meet and chat. As well as the league channel. I’m on the reddit, but barely look at it
@nibernator it's not the only metric, but if it is dying they are all dying together. I just look at new members to the respective channels.
@@AdamJorgensen it isn't that great. I was looking into it as a casual game on top of flesh and blood to play... It's okay, not great
I backed the kickstarter. I bought boxes for Beta. I got boxes for Arthurian Legends and I'll be honest with you. The last set looked very nice from a box perspective but it was relatively uninteresting inside. I've heard also people complain about the size of the set being small and the number of uniques being a bit too high which degrades their value and I would honestly agree with that with the number of unique knights I got
Weird that you thought AL was boring, I found it to be full of neat cards.
@AdamJorgensen it's almost like all players don't think the same.
@@MrRayRockstar I was just not impressed with the contents of the very flashy box. I really wanted sorcery to be good but the expansion was a disappointment for a year wait
@@andrewostman3135 I agree with you. I’m a serial collector of MTG from back in the day. (Not investing I have all the cards still) but find the current MTG sets uncollectible. I brought heaps of sorcery and completed a Beta set but after 10 AL boxes and still heaps of uniques to collect I’ve lost interest. The two LGS within 120km have zero players and the one which has Sorcery told me I’m the only one buying the boosters from them. Sorcery needs players and more sets to survive.
sorcery is a great actual board game unlike any other tcg
Sorcery has made it clear that the target market is to appeal to Magic players who were around during the early stages of the game. The average age being around 40+. Meaning they are developing and appealing to an established CCG player base that stick around for the long haul. As opposed to the Lorcana type games that want the early teens that will often feel they have aged out of the game after about 12 months or so. So this is one thing working in their favor to survive having a longer release window.
However it's a double-edged sword, because it also puts a hard limit on your potential audience - people's tastes don't change much with age these days, so Sorcery's chosen playerbase is gradually aging out of life with no one coming in to replace them. At the same time, the older end of its target market hitting retirement age could see them wanting a more regularly-released game than one set per year, potentially splitting the playerbase between retirees who have lots of time and middle-aged people who tend not to have much. Not to mention all the parents who might like Sorcery but find themselves playing Pokemon, MTG or Lorcana because that's what their kids play and their kids are their most accessible player options.
I pre-ordered the starter deck box but have yet to actually try the game out. Planning to bring it to my LGS sometime to try it out with some regulars
the game is fun as hell, the art/rarity labels absolutely rock, its the amount/lack of players that kills it around me in Chicagoland.
Yes
It's literally Yu-Gi-Oh! dungeon dice monsters with more cards
gL out there
I am curious to see how the one set a year model of Sorcery will work out. I got some cards in a collection thrown in, they do look beautiful!
Have you bought anything during black madness Frank?
The only thing I picked up was some Yugioh tins I wanted.
It reminds a lot of metazoo, relies on nostalgia and "special art"
But it is not a big IP like pokemon and wont survive if it is not being played
it relies on unique gameplay unlike anything else. it's literally like a strategy board game rather than just card game. what does Meta zoo crap have to do with anything. nobody plays Pokemon, it's far closer to metazoo collection focus and nostalgia.
@@im7254 Dont fool yourself, pokemon has poor gameplay but is cheap and has a nice OP system. Sorcery has a complex gameplay while being a casual game