General Forum

When I was a kid, we used to play games using our baseball cards. They typically involved things like getting a stack of cards and then each person tossed a card in the middle  and whichever card had the highest batting average (or some other stat) won and the person that played that card got to keep the other cards. 
This has always stayed in the back of my mind and over the last year or so, I've thought about coming up with a new game. This is inspired by two things:
1) the popularity of of other trading card games (Yu-gi-oh, Magic, etc)
2) trying to find a way to make common cards more interesting

I've been playing with ideas about how to make an actual 1 on 1 game which involves creating a starting line-up with 9 hitters (all playing a different field position), a starting pitcher, and a few alternates (bench & bullpen).
I actually came up with gameplay to do innings, but I've since forgotten it (so now I'll have to figure it out again).

Does anybody else have any games they play with cards? The hobby seems like it has a built in ready to go product to build a game around (and give those poor common cards a reason to live)

When we were little, my brother and I would occasionally prop our cards up against various objects in our bedroom, then take turns throwing checkers at them, trying to knock them down.  First one to knock the other side all down was the winner.  I'm not sure this is the sort of game you had in mind.

When I was in late elementry school and early junior high (now Middle School) I used to play a "flipping" game with one of my friends. I think we used to set up the playing field aka the floor by randomly placing 5-10 of our cards down. We might have used less maybe just a couple or none I don't recall exact details. Then we would take turns tossing cards onto "the field". The object was to toss the card onto another card that was on the field. If the card covered up at least 1/2 of the other card you got to keep both cards. I think there might have been a winner keeps going till he misses rule, not 100% on that I just think maybe we did because I ended up losing a whole heck of a lot of cards back then. 

My son and I "inherited" this game from my best friend (him and I used to play it when we were younger).

http://www.ebay.com/itm/VINTAGE-1976-COMPUTER-BASEBALL-FROM-EPOCH-For-Kmart-Works-PINBALL-/221771278452?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item33a2992874

My friend and I, back in 1990, opened 4 or 5 packs of cards, doled them out between us, and made line ups. And then played and kept track of who was "hitting" and "pitching". So, when my son and I got it a few years back, it still had the score sheets and cards in it from 1990! We added a draft to the start of each "season". We then started adding cards that were already beat up (as I obtained replacements for older Phillies cards that were beat up) because there were some positions we were light on. What winds up being remarkable, is how certain players actually wind up with really good stats, and others wind up with really bad stats, when the whole time it's either him or me actually playing the game. But, it's togther time, and that's all that really matters. :)

I cannot believe this does not exists in the States, or I am just not aware, but we played with cards that had pictures of real cars and their stats beneath like "engine capacity", "top speed" and such. Both players start with an equal number of cards in their deck and they have to call one of the stats from the card that is on the top of the deck. The player with the highest number in the respected stat wins the card. The winner can either put the cards aside or put them behind the last card in the deck. Both players take turns calling from the stats on the cards and Iit goes on until one or both players ran out of cards. I never tried it but it could be fun with basketball cards as there would be no Jolly Joker. Even a Jordan card could be beat with a decent forward or center. You just have to pick the stat to call wisely. Obviously the players do not see each others cards.

 In the late 60's and early 70's my cousin and I played a game we created where we'd set out a teams worth of players in their defensive alignment, and then we'd use a pencil as the bat and a wadded up piece of paper as the ball and play baseball.  Batted balls that ended up near a player card were outs while balls that fell outside the "range" of the players we were using were hits.  We needed a complete set of positions for each team to be able to play a team though, and for a couple months in the summer of '71 the most valuable card I owned was Mike Hegan because he was the only Milwaukee Brewers 1st basemen either of us had.  My cousin offered me a couple Willie May's and Hank Aaron's for it, but I wasn't going to part with it.

My cousin and I eventually went on to invent a dice based baseball game, and then we discovered Strat-O-Matic.

I've thought about creating a game using cards.  My idea is this:  You'd assemble a team of nine players, one for each position.  There would be a chart that would list a statistical category you'd reference on the cards.  Then, for each "inning" one of the players would roll three dice, a ten sider and two six siders.  The ten sider would tell you which player to reference (1=pitcher, 2=catcher, and so on) while the two dice would refer to the chart to determine which stat you'd look up.  Let's say you roll a 5 on the ten sider and a 1, 4 on the six sdiers.  The 5 means you look at your third baseman, while the 1,4 maybe means you look at their respective home runs.  Whoever has more gets their team a run.  Ties net neither team a run.  After nine innings whoever has the most runs wins.

I did something similar for hockey cards a few years back.  You'd asemble your team and then roll dice and refer to the cards to determine the success of shots, passes, etc.

 

 I was introduced to "Strat" in junior high.   Love at first site.   Loved keeping score and totally the stats.  All by hand back then.        As for games with cards, the simplest we played was the two person Match game.   One kid would flip, the other would have to either match or don't match depending what was called.

 

I had the 1970 Milton Bradley baseball card game as a kid in the 80s. Fun game, but the players were mostly before my time. With the discovery of soft sleeves, I eventually realized that I could put a current card in a sleeve with a game card behind it. So I had the face of a guy I knew, and flipped it over to see dice results from the back of Bill Freehan's card, as though it was all one card. Made the game a lot more fun. Wish I still had that game...

 What's funny is what got me back into collecting a couple years back was a baseball game called Dynasty League Baseball.  It's similar to Strat-O-Matic, but the player cards are single sided and are the same size as baseball cards.  The reason for that is so the player card can be placed in a penny sleeve along with that players baseball card so you can see what the players look like while you're rolling the dice.

BTW, to go off on a tangent, right now I'm replaying the 1957 Chicago White Sox season using Dynasty League, and after 86 games the ChiSox are a half game behind Mickey Mantle and the Yankees.