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WARS TCG Presentation

The big invitation-only WARS TCG "sneak preview" presentation was held this morning at DecipherCon. By 10:30 AM, the waiting lines for the presentation stretched from the entrance clear down the hall and around the corner. Shortly after 11:00 AM, the doors were opened and the audience streamed in.

Several hundred eager audience members were welcomed by Master of Ceremonies Mark Tuttle and Decipher CEO Warren Holland. And then the lights were dimmed and the video presentation began. Image after spectacular image filled the two large projection screens, showing off samples of the artwork developed for the five factions, interspersed with narration by Warren Holland, Tim Ellington, and Michael Stackpole describing the development of the backstory and the trading card game, and the characteristics of the factions.

An extensive Q&A session followed the video, with questions directed to a panel consisting of Warren Holland, special guests John Howe and Michael Stackpole, Senior Game Designer Tom Lischke, WARS TCG art project manager Ed Gartin, and VP (Sales & Marketing) Scott Gaeta. Questions ranged from details of expected gameplay, to marketing's plans to attract new players, to the intricacies of coordinating the work of dozens of illustrators, to how long it took Stackpole to write the short story attendees received copies of today (only about three days!).

Finally, the Q&A drew to a close, and volunteers stationed around the auditorium began to distribute presentation kits to the attendees. The kit included a set of the demo decks being used on the booth (with rules sheet), a WARS T-shirt in one of the five faction colors, and a short story by Michael Stackpole set in the WARS universe. The T-shirt, Mark Tuttle announced, was to be their "ticket" into the first ever WARS TCG tournament, to be held at 4:00 PM using the demo decks provided – with a $1,000 cash prize to be awarded to the top player. (You can download a PDF version of those decks to see and try them out yourself!) Oh, and one more surprise: attendees were instructed to open their demo deck packs and look through them for a "silver" WARS ticket. Each of the eight lucky "finders" was presented with an uncut sheet of the demo deck cards, autographed by Stackpole, Howe, and Holland. And then there was the single "gold" ticket, which netted Mike Binon, in addition to an uncut sheet, a complete set of Incursion (the premier release of WARS TCG) upon release, and the opportunity to have his image used on a card in a future set.

With that, the audience departed, newly clad in their WARS T-shirts and eager to try out their decks in preparation for a shot at that $1,000 tournament prize.

Related link:
More Saturday Photos
Demo decks and rules

Kathy McCracken
Web Writer

August 21, 2004