Playing Magic: The Gathering as an RPG

We usually approach Magic as a strategic and tactical game with cool flavor, but
sometimes it's fun to let the game's underlying premise (that you are a wizard with
a collection of spells at your disposal) to run free.

Could we take that a step further and turn Magic into an RPG?

Setting

The first thing any RPG needs is some kind of setting. Magic, of course, has a rich
setting, but it kind of bounces all over the place and has a pretty rigid plot, so
it would be tough to make your characters important. I suggest you take any of the
plentiful fluff material from your favorite fantasy RPG and use that, or your
homebrew campaign world. With that in mind, we're going to make the PCs just
regular adventurers instead of Planeswalkers. True, they're all spell-flingers, but
we don't want them thinking too highly of themselves or jaunting across dimensions.

Character Creation

Each player then creates a character. You should keep things a little vague at this
point, concentrating on background story and a few personality traits. Your actual
skills and stats will be determined by your experiences as you play, although you
can shape them to some extent (I'll explain how shortly).

The most important player, as always, is the GM (we're like tiny gods). The GM
needs to own or have access to a fairly robust collection of Magic cards to make
this work. Fortunately, it doesn't need to be an expensive collection of Magic
cards. You can supplement your supply by purchasing bulk common and uncommon lots.
Don't worry about big money rares or out of print cards. Some of them could be cool
to use if you have them, but they're far from necessary.

To start things off, the GM gives each player three packs of cards. You could use
actual booster packs, but I recommend creating randomized piles of cards out of
commons with a few uncommons. That's because rarity is going to be used as an
abstract representation of power level, and you don't want these level one noobs to
accidentally crack a sweet mythic rare that makes them too good too soon. So give
them a pile of junk. Make sure some useful utility commons are in there: a Terror
or a Rampant Growth, maybe a Shock. Each player gets their 45 cards and builds a
40-card deck out of it. They get basic lands for free.

At this point, those decks will be pretty lame. But what are they going to fight
against? That's where the GM comes in. First, build a couple of decks for "random
encounters." Build a green and blue deck full of beasts and forest creatures plus
weird merfolk and elementals for wilderness travel. A dungeon deck packed with
undead and red burn spells that act as "traps" is needed, too. You might want to
craft a city themed deck full of humans, clerics, wizards and other urban dwellers.
You'll get a lot of mileage out of these base encounter decks, and you can easily
swap some cards in and out to keep them fresh and interesting. If you have a lot of
the pre-constructed decks lying around, don't forget to lean heavily on those as
well. There are Goblin, Merfolk, Kithkin and artifact decks, and a ton of others
that can stand in for a villainous mage when you don't have time to build a whole
new deck yourself.

Combat

So how does combat work? Let's say the party is traversing the forest and you want
to throw an encounter with some angry elves at them. The GM cracks out his pre-
built elf-themed deck, everyone shuffles up, and you play a single game (not a best
of three match). To keep the game balanced, use the Archenemy rules: all players
are allies, the GM is the opponent, and the GM gets some kind of free advantage
every turn. You could use the actual Archenemy schemes, or you could just come up
with some kind of static bonus the GM gets. He might get double mana out of his
lands, get a free token creature every upkeep, or draw an extra card. This might be
a better option in a lot ways because it allows the GM to tailor the advantage to
the power level of the party, and also relate it thematically to the specific
encounter.

Balance is going to be a huge issue, so the GM needs to weigh not only the power
level of the players' decks but also the number of players in the party. There's no
real way to put that into a formula, so it will take some testing and experience to
make each game fair and fun.

That's not to say the players should never lose, though. Make sure losing a game
has consequences, but those consequences should rarely be, "You're dead." It might
be a setback, a failure to find useful information, or the loss of a valuable bit
of treasure, but players shouldn't be severely punished for losing most games.
After all, anyone can get mana-screwed.

I do have two additional rules - cards that allow a player to gain life may be used
on allies even if the card would normally only be able to be used on the player who
cast it. Sunspring Expedition is one example. This allows some players to build
"healer" decks and take on the traditional cleric RPG role. Secondly, when a player
other than the GM goes to zero life, continue to track the negative life total.
That player is removed from the game, she discards her hand, she can't be attacked,
and she does not take turns. However, her permanents remain on the battlefield,
and both she and her permanents can still be targeted and otherwise affected. If an
ally causes her to gain enough life that she has one or more life points, she can
take her next turn in sequence.

Experience

The GM should assemble boxes of cards, each box containing cards of a certain
rarity (obviously, you won't have as many cards in the rare/mythic box, but that's
ok). To reward players for accomplishing something in the game, whether it's
winning a game, solving a puzzle or completing a quest, give them a number of
random draws from one of the boxes. This will let you scale XP to player level and
the value of the accomplishment. Drawing three commons may not earn them a decent
card, but over time they'll accumulate more cards of the colors they've chosen to
play, improving their decks. For bigger accomplishments, they can draw from the
rare box and get something really splashy.

Of course, RPG players also want to score treasure. Treasure cards should be handed
out specifically by the DM, not drawn randomly. Most of the time, you'll want to
give out artifacts, since it makes sense, but you could give out spells and
creatures as well. Justify it thematically by saying you've found a scroll that
allows you to cast that spell or summon that creature. You could even get some cool
foil cards to hand out for extra flashy treasure.

One thing to be careful of is player trading. Two players could easily swap all the
cards in their unused colors and end up with far better decks than they ought to
have early in a campaign. You can simply ban trading entirely, or limit it to one
card per gaming session.

At first, players will have multi-colored, unfocused decks. As they gain experience
and treasure, their decks will take shape, cutting some colors, building on
strengths and possibly even acquiring combos. The players can let role-playing
drive deck building - if they've decided their character is a nature-loving
religious adherent, the player might choose to build a green and white deck even if
better cards of other colors show up. Some players might prefer to let experience
drive character. If you find yourself getting a lot of good red cards, you build a
red deck and let your character develop an impulsive, rage-prone personality.

Skills and Stats

RPGs are about a lot more than combat, of course. What about diplomacy, stealth,
knowledge and other traits that are important in non-combat encounters? We'll use a
simple system tied to the five colors. Each color represents two traits, one
physical, one mental.

White: Endurance, Willpower.

Green: Strength, Wisdom.

Blue: Deception, Intellect.

Red: Speed, Intuition.

Black: Charisma, Greed.

Let's say the party has encountered that classic RPG trope, the iron portcullis.
The winch is on the other side, so they look to the strongest mage in the party.
The GM determines the difficulty of the challenge, from 1 to 5, with 5 being pretty
tough. The player attempting the challenge shuffles her deck and draws five cards,
discarding and redrawing any lands. Then she adds up the colored mana symbols of
the appropriate color, hoping to meet or exceed the difficulty of the challenge.
This is a strength challenge, and the GM has assigned it a difficulty of 3. She
draws a Craw Wurm and a Giant Growth among her five cards, so she passes the
challenge and lifts the portcullis.

Where logical, other players may be allowed to assist the primary player by drawing
a single card (replacing any lands) and adding any colored mana symbols of the
proper type. Obviously, if you have no green cards in your deck, you won't be much
help in this case.