Given my current interest in card games, I’ve been trying to find a good card game that isn’t a CCG (collectible card game) like Magic: The Gathering or World of Warcraft TCG. What interests me most about both games, aside from the game mechanics, is the deck-building part of the game. Deckbuilding is a sort of meta-game, and I seem to enjoy that phase a lot.
Unfortunately, both MtG and WoW TCG are somewhat prohibitive to me since keeping up with the meta-game evolutions and having good cards/decks (where the really interesting stuff are) costs quite a bit of money. Perhaps there is a card game out there where the deck-building meta-game is in use but it is not a CCG (hence, it has a relatively reasonable price for access to all strategic options).
I ran into “Blue Moon” as a result. Quite a few card games were mentioned, but Blue Moon was a consistent candidate. The game is 1 vs 1, and given that it’s been around for some years now, additional cards are available in several precon (pre-constructed) decks/sets. It is considered as an “expandable card game” since the new precon decks released after the first two effectively are releases of new card sets. There precons, however, are already complete sets in themselves. Ergo, when a new precon is available, if you buy the new precon, you get all the cards for the new set (the precon IS the complete set). No rares, no incomplete cards.
As for the deck-building, there are rules for mixing cards from other sets to create a custom deck. My scanning of the rules seem to indicate that you can’t just mix and match all cards, you’ll have to have a base set and then exchange some cards in the base set as limited by the rules. Perhaps this is a game balance technique. Since I don’t understand the rules yet, I cannot comment on how flexible or restrictive this is to deck-building.
Unfortunately, there are some caveats for me. Currently, the game only supports 1 vs 1. Also, I have a problem with players. The game is not easily available (unlike MtG and WoW TCG), and although I did find a store that sells the base set (which contains the Hoax and Vulca set/precon), I’m not sure there are any players around. Even if I don’t have to collect rare cards, complete sets of the game won’t matter if I can’t play them. And for now, I don’t have access to interested players.
Aside from the 1 vs 1 issue, the players issue is a locale problem. Places nearer to hobby shops that have the game might have a bit of a following for the game, so opponents might actually be feasible for you. Also, if you have friends who are willing to play, then good for you.
Given this issue, I decided to postpone purchase of the game until I can get access to players. In the meantime, I will be reading the rules and inspecting the cards. If I find the game so intriguing, I might just go ahead and get it already, and probably try to force someone to play against me in the process. 
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