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After trying out the Magic the Gathering; Arena beta last night I started thinking about which digital card games I prefer and how well they replicate physical card games.

Personally I prefer digital because there aren't many card gamers near where I live, so digital means I can actually play a game against someone whenever I pull out my phone.

I'd love to hear everyone else's opinions on the subject. With MTG:A, Heathstone, Elder Scrolls Legends & Gwent already out and Artifact due in November, plus smaller titles like Hand of Fate are there any that really stand out to you? Are you getting sick of all the card games being released? Do you prefer physical card games over digital?

I like Pokemon TCG Online. Every physical card pack comes with a code you can redeem for a digital card pack so you get the best of both words. You can collect the physical cards and build yourself binders and stuff, and go online to play against other people. The only downside is that the code doesn't give the exact same cards from the pack, so your digital collection won't be an exact reflection of the physical one.

i like that idea of giving you digital cards with the physical. I think Magic is trying something similar as well.

It's been a while since I collected Pokemon cards, although I did grab a few of the 20th anniversary packs when I was in Japan. Is the digital game the same rules as the physical, as I might look into it if it is

Recently have been playing Age of Sigmar: Champions.

It's not too bad, still some bugs though.

The cards for the physical game can be scanned, all of them. Once you have scanned cards from a pack, you register them to your game account, and then you can share them online for others to scan. Since the card is registered to you, you get accumulative rewards from other people scanning the cards.

The game itself is pretty simple. Set deck amounts: 4 Champions, 4 Blessings, 30 Units/Spells/Instants = 38 cards.

+1 for how Warhammer Champions handels the physical/digital divide. It's a quick pick up and play physical game and a standard digital one (about 15 minutes a game, 4 lanes to fight over, simplified rules). It's pretty fun, and the cards often focus on letting you build multiple deck styles with variantians on MtG's famous tribal mechanics.

The 'Augmented' part is where it truly shines. You can buy small boosters via the usual in-app store, earn similar boosters by playing the different factions and finishing quests, or you can go down to your local FLGS and pick up a nice big booster and scan the cards in.

MtG Online always had this problem in that it was really built to compete with the FLGS and had to tread a thin line to only take some of the FLGS's profits while maintaining enough that those same FLGS kept buying physcial cards. Warhammer AOS Champions solves this by making the physcial product a slightly better deal. There are more cards in the physical booster and a greater chance of getting something rare. The digital packs aren't as good, but the level of effort to get them is a few rounds of play in the app. The prebuilt decks sold in stores aren't even the same as those in the app and you can buy one of those for 15$ and get a bunch of cards to scan in - including new champions.

Outside the card scan mechanic it's a pretty good, heathstone-level game that isn't going to provide the depth of challenge of MtG but is going to let you while a smoke break taking on a massive ork horde or a bunch of prentious stormcasts. My only complaint is that not all the subfactions are represented yet and some tribal factions work well when splashed in a deck (risen, grots, demons) and others need the whole deck built around them (vampires, mordant ghouls, aleves).

I've played a lot of other digital card games. My quick thoughts:

1) Heathstone. It's like the 40k of digital card games. You'll always find an opponent, there's an always active meta, and while the gameplay isn't great - there's a huge community to plug into

2) Mtg Online (and it's successors) . MtG is a great game if you are home alone with an hour to kill, but it doesn't scale well to the small screen and playing at work is a quick path to running out your lunchtime. Not that you'll be able to afford lunch - the digital card prices are always horrific since it takes those 4 guys in you local meta that always buy the best cards at any price and multiples them by a factor of a hundred or more.

3) Cabal: Fun, but incredibly hard to figure out what the hell you are doing. I've never bothered with the multiplayer aspect as beating the AI is hard enough

4) Ascension: Ascension was built to be a quick paced deck builder and that translates perfectly into the digital realm. Games can be quick and the rules are pretty easy to understand. Paid content just ups the complexity, but doesn't offer anyone an advantage

5) Star Reams: Really just a refined Sci-fi version of Ascension with better art. See #4.

I used to play a bit of Magic, but I never was competitive and keeping up with the standard meta is more expensive than playing 40k! So while I'm trying to liquidate my MtG collection, I'm sticking to Hearthstone for my CCG needs. Those cards don't take up physical space, after all! Plus, Hearthstone is a lot of fun, especially the newest expansion!