Disney Lorcana rules are designed to be accessible to new and old TCG players

Since the first tickets for Disney Lorcana shared last September, Disney fans and hardcore gamers alike had only one question on their minds: what are the rules of the game and how do they differ from established franchises like Magic the Gathering And The Pokémon trading card game? Well it turns out this magical little game is hard to keep track of and those rules were leaked a little early on Monday. But perhaps the most important part of these rules – their context and intent – has been missing.

Earlier this month, Polygon sat down with Disney Lorcana Co-designer Ryan Miller to find out all about the hottest new Disney collectible. What we have discovered is a product designed with a surprisingly light touch. In fact, the rules fit front and back pretty well a single sheet of paper. But don’t confuse this brevity with simplicity.

“What we wanted was something that was accessible. And I like the term accessible because it doesn’t mean easy,” Miller said. “It generally has concepts and things that are easy to grasp for people who have never played this type of game before – and that was confirmed in our early playtests.”

In Disney LorcanaPlayers take on the role of Illumineers, powerful individuals who use a unique resource called ink to bring versions of classic Disney characters and items to life on the tabletop. Each player comes to this table with a unique deck of cards from their collection or a pre-made starter deck they bought at the store. The goal is to collect “lore,” a type of magical macguffin that represents life or hit points in similar games. Lore is gathered by sending characters on quests, and the first player to accumulate 20 lore points wins the game.

In order to bring these classic Disney characters to life, you must first generate an ink pool – the primary resource for doing so Disney Lorcana used to power the action in the game. True to what Miller said, the process is accessible – generate ink to create characters, which you then send on quests to collect lore – but it’s not that simple. And getting the resource system just right, Miller said, was one of the hardest parts of designing Disney Lorcana first of all.

ink

In the two most popular trading card games magic And Pokemon, cards and their abilities cannot be played arbitrarily. They have costs that must first be paid in resources. These resources are represented in both games by their own special cards – land cards that generate mana magicand Energy cards attached to creatures in Pokemon.

However, in order to put land or energy into play, you must first draw those cards from your deck into your hand. In the case of magicyou may need several different ones species of resources – different types of land, each providing different colors of mana – to play the different cards in your deck. This can make the first few opening rounds challenging as players assess each other and make tentative moves onto the table with few resources in play.

Miller and his co-designer Steve Warner spent six months coming up with a different solution and finally settled on something unique.

First of all practically every card in it Disney Lorcana could be used to generate the Ink resource, at a rate of one per turn. That solved the problem of not having enough resources in the early rounds fairly easily. Then they started removing that ink ability from some of the more powerful cards, reducing its usefulness in one way and improving it in another. Today, many of the cards in the game cannot be turned into ink, but it’s up to the players to decide whether or not to include them in their custom decks.

“It allows for a really interesting balancing change that we can make,” Miller said, “because if you remove the ink from a card and say that card doesn’t give you ink, it really changes your rating when you upgrade your deck.” assemble . It really needs to justify itself now because I can’t use it as ink. […] I think the more experienced trading card players will find this really interesting.”

As written, Disney Lorcana‘s ink system shifts resource generation away from chance and instead makes resource generation a choice – a choice based on experience and skill – that players can make for themselves, both during gameplay and when building their own decks. To further increase the complexity, any cards that are converted to ink cannot be used for any other function later in the game. That makes it a really bad idea to melt down your stronger cards to create ink – unless it’s necessary to avoid being backed into a corner.

“[I’ve] I have to decide which of these cards is the least useful for me in this game,” Miller said, “and I’m going to decide that by looking at them [other cards on the] Table. It’s the best decision because I feel like I’m using my skills as a player now. I can see what they’re playing, they’re doing this strategy. […] So I’m going to go ahead and color this in [high-value card]. I feel good about this decision: I feel like I’ve used my skills.”

Another important benefit of ink design that Miller enjoys is that it expands the variability, which he cites. By giving each card multiple functions in this 60-card deck – used as ink, used to collect lore, or used for some other unique action – the variance in each deck is further increased. And it is this variance that should matter Disney Lorcana so much fun playing and collecting – and experimenting, even if it means losing a hard-fought game.

“The reason I want to add variance is because variance gives hope,” Miller said. Without this extra variance, players who lose the race against 20 lore could have a higher chance keep going losing the race over time. Higher variance gives players more things to do and more cards to play in order to bridge this gap. It’s not a blue bowl Mario Kart definitely, but it adds more drama to any game.

“Without deviation,” Miller continued, “there can be no hope.”

Songs

With the ink system in place, Miller said, many of the other elements of the game design began to crystallize during repeated playtests. Among them were the three card types that will be available at launch: Characters, Items, and Actions.

Characters called Shimmers in the universe of Disney Lorcana, sourced from the vault filled with Disney’s back catalog of classic animated films, and given unique, themed powers to play at the table. Items, such as Ariel’s Dinglehopper from The little mermaid, jumping from the edges of the movie scripts to take on important roles like healing other damaged characters. Meanwhile, iconic actions, like Maleficent breathing green fire while ending up in the shape of a dragon sleeping Beautywere a natural next step in the development of the game.

But a subtype of cards called “Song” stands out. The songs draw from Disney’s vast catalog of cultural touchstones that are also potent catchy tunes. Each song can be played by any player for its ink cost. But songs can also be sung by individual characters played at the table, allowing players to use their ink for other tasks. Mechanically, they’re another way to add variance Disney Lorcana.

As an example, Miller points to a map called One Jump Ahead, named after Disney’s song of the same name Aladdin. Players can pay two ink to play one jump ahead themselves, which allows them to draw a card from their hand and instantly turn it into ink – putting them one jump, or one ink so to speak, ahead of the next turn. Alternatively, players can choose any character they control that is worth two or less Ink to sing this song instead, turning their action that turn into an opportunity to generate more Ink essentially for free. But that choice – exercising the character instead of using it to generate lore – is a trade-off that could have further ramifications later.

community

Ultimately, time will tell if players are as excited about these clever design choices as the Ravensburger team. The rules themselves are intentionally skeletal, Miller said, and much of the core of the game resides within the hundreds of cards included in the first of many sets — the vast majority of which have yet to be revealed.

But the real magic of Disney Lorcana can only happen if fans are ready to play it when the final game hits retail stores this summer. Mueller is confident. The source of his optimism? It goes back to those catchy tunes.

“One of the things that struck us,” Miller said, “is that at least you’re going to sing the song [first] line of it. So like “Leap in front of the bread line!” […] It’s almost like it’s a rule of the game because so often it happens that people sing the song while they’re playing it.”

Miller, an Army veteran with a beautiful baritone singing voice, said he particularly enjoys singing “Let it go!” while chasing away the gleams of his opponents with Elsa’s powerful song.

“Imagine a room full of people and you overhear people singing snippets of Disney songs,” Miller continued, a huge grin spreading across his face as he shuffled and bridged a deck of pre-production cards. “It’s just wonderful!”

Disney Lorcana will be available for the first time at this year’s Gen Con and shortly thereafter in hobby stores starting August 18 – followed by 12 weeks of organized community play. Fans can find it at major retailers starting September 1st ShopDisney.com.