Can a card game be AT?

Hearts has absolutely no theme, therefore is definitely not AmeriTrash.

i don't think hearts counts as AT. just because there is screwage doesn't cut it. I mean, chess has direct conflict between two players using pieces representing armies, but I wouldn't count as AT.

Played wrasslin once, but don't remember much from it.

Guerrilla uses cards to represent generals, soldiers, locations you have to fight over, as well as special attacks and things. definetely AT like a CCG. direct conflict, steeped in theme, and several layers of depth. There's the rebel and government faction..but each player has a stake in those factions. your victory is affected by the rebel/government fight but you have to support both sides.

Any game you can play with a standard deck of cards is not an AT game. That is a card game in the absolute sense of the word. They have no theme, no narrative. It's like dominoes, dominoes are not AT.

I think we need an AmeriTrash Manifesto, where people like Barney can go to brush up on the defining characteristics of AmeriTrash games, AmeriTrash players and AmeriTrash publishers.

See I still dunno. When I think of AT a part of me always thinks of big sprawling table candy. I don't really have any argument other than a visceral reaction to not want to think of a purely card game as AT. Great, thematic, conflicts, luck; sure. But AT...

I think the aesthetic is a part of the deal for me.

Well, Guerrilla has an atrocities counter. That's eye candy right there.

I guess we should all shut the fuck up about Cosmic Encounter then, seeing as how this is an Ameritrash site and all.

Shellhead wrote:

I think we need an AmeriTrash Manifesto, where people like Barney can go to brush up on the defining characteristics of AmeriTrash games, AmeriTrash players and AmeriTrash publishers.

I've given up on Barney ... I reckon he lives in a parallel dimension where Ameritrash has a totally different meaning - probably nothing at all to do with games but a certain shape and colour - and he just pops in to post in this forum 'cos he coincidentally plays boardgames (and he's lonely as it's a very skinny dimension and you can only talk to people either side of you as long as can elongate your jaws like a snake).

Shellhead wrote:

I think we need an AmeriTrash Manifesto, where people like Barney can go to brush up on the defining characteristics of AmeriTrash games, AmeriTrash players and AmeriTrash publishers.

I forget which Supreme Court justice said it, but it's like his definition of pornography: "I know it when I see it."

metalface13 wrote:

Shellhead wrote:

I think we need an AmeriTrash Manifesto, where people like Barney can go to brush up on the defining characteristics of AmeriTrash games, AmeriTrash players and AmeriTrash publishers.

I forget which Supreme Court justice said it, but it's like his definition of pornography: "I know it when I see it."

Justice Potter Stewart in Jacobellis v. Ohio.

I shall not today attempt further to define the kinds of material I understand to be embraced within that shorthand description ["hard-core pornography"]; and perhaps I could never succeed in intelligibly doing so. But I know it when I see it, and the motion picture involved in this case is not that.

Matt, others: maybe a good test of "ATness" is whether or not someone who really digs CAYLUS likes it. I can't imagine a lot of CAYLUS players (Kingput excluded, I know, I know) lining up for a rousing round of NETRUNNER.

mjl1783 wrote:

I guess we should all shut the fuck up about Cosmic Encounter then, seeing as how this is an Ameritrash site and all.

Exactly. CE could easily have been designed using only cards.
Marvel heroes could have as well.

Since when the have card games not been able to be ameritrash? Lost Cities has always been considered a euro after all.

lol, southernman knows about my dimension/a! It's like The Little Prince.

Hey you guy ATrashers would be proud of me. My best friend calls me from Newfoundland where he's on tour with his band and says he's sitting down to a 5-player game of risk but none of them remember the rules. So he's like, 'do you remember how to play?' and even though I haven't played in well over a decade, I remembered every detail, like how many armies you start each turn with, etc. It was awesome.

And then I felt retarded.

Y'know, cuz it's risk.



anyway, I think you"re quite right that I desperately need to read an AT manifesto cuz I'll admit I don't think I fully grasp what AT is. Dice, randomness, the ability to remove another player from the game, lots of interactiveness, lots of figures? AT publishers... I know nothing of this other than maybe they make games with lots of figures....and dice....that don't sell well outside of North America.

But I don't know AT players? FALSE. I know that they seem to get upset when I talk about the boardgames I love.


hey. btw I got an offer today to become a STAFF writer for a boardgame website called BoardGameBeast. Cool huh? I'd get paid in boardgames or something. They ship them to my house for free and ask me to play it and then write up a a review on it and then months later write up a strategy hints article on it. Sounds fun.

btw that baby in the banner ad is frickin' adorable when he's all upset and fussy. Then he's not cute anymore when he's happy. If that was my baby, I'd porpoisely not change his diaper just so he'd have that upset face all the time that's so cute.

PARENTING!

Family Business, Jyhad, Dungeoneer, heck I'd even consider Saboteur all as AT card games. Hearts is one of my favorite normal card games, but it has no theme so it's just a card game. So yes, AT can be in card game only form.

Black Barney wrote:

My best friend calls me from Newfoundland where he's on tour with his band and says he's sitting down to a 5-player game of risk but none of them remember the rules. So he's like, 'do you remember how to play?' and even though I haven't played in well over a decade, I remembered every detail, like how many armies you start each turn with, etc. It was awesome.

This earned you some AT street cred, man.

And then I felt retarded.

Y'know, cuz it's risk.

But this made you lose it all. There's nothing retarded about playing Risk.

Someday you will learn, Barney. Someday.

Huh, I thought the defining characteristic of AT was narrative. Didn't Shellhead link to an article at BGG about how AT = narrative, Euro = elegant/clever rules, and wargame = accurate simulation? (Kind of like the GNS theory of RPGs?) Maybe I'm thinking of somebody else.

Anyway I think card games can be AT. It's a little harder because so many of the things that contribute to narrative get taken away in the next shuffle -- you don't have this constant thing (like a board) to look at as it ebbs and flows. Or a lot of pretty pieces to feel proud of and then scream NOOOOOO! as they die horribly.

Jyhad is absolutely AT. The Decipher LOTR CCG is AT too; even though there's the weirdness of two Fellowships racing each other to Mordor, it still creates story and when your characters bite it or sacrifice themselves for the ringbearer, you feel it a little.

Hearts, absolutely not. Magic ... maybe. There's not really enough identification with anything. Didn't they come out with an expansion where you actually chose a character for your mage, and each one had a slightly different power? That would've helped.

Saboteur is one of my 10s but it's borderline. The reshuffling of role cards hurts the narrative (but helps the game).

Lifeboat (from the Battlestations guy) is also AT; you have a character and alliances shift over time.

UFS (the Street Fighter RPG) I'd also say is AT, again due to your character and his/her fighting style.