MME Featured Website: Red 84′s Hangar

Written by My Middle-earth (MME) member theViking.

Greetings again sons and daughters of the free peoples of Narnia and lands beyond!

Today, we bring to you an interview with someone who should be well known to many members, Josh Radke, co-founder of Grail Quest Books. While Josh is certainly known in this capacity, what may be less well known is that he is also a long-time game. It is gaming that provides the material for his blog, Red 84’s Hangar.

Viking: Reviewing your blog, you obviously love and have a great deal of knowledge about trading card gaming. How did you get started in that?

Josh: Charlie (one of my best friends who may as well be my brother at this point) brought over a couple of decks of Decipher’s Star Wars Customizable Card Game and we started playing. This was just after Christmas 1995 I believe. I had never heard of a trading card game before that.

Viking: Do you get involved in other kinds of gaming such as table-top?

Josh: Oh yes. I love all kinds of table-top gaming–from Trivial Pursuit to the strategy games. I have a copy of the out-of-print Star Wars: The Queen’s Gambit, which has to be one of the coolest-looking strategy games I’ve ever seen. I’ve also heard it’s 5-star quality but I haven’t been able to try it out yet! It’s a 3-dimensional game and players have to control all three arenas of The Battle of Naboo at the same time–space, ground, and the Jedi duel.

I also do video gaming–console and PC; a little RPGing, although not much–mostly from a lack of having a group who will play Star Wars or LOTR; and just a smattering of miniatures–I have zero budget or time for that (I prefer the metal ones that have to be painted but I don’t mind the plastic ones).

Viking: Is there a particular game that you favor over others?

Josh: In terms of type? No. Each game type is awesome in its own context.

In terms of trading card games? The Star Wars CCG will always be my favorite. I enjoyed their Lord of the Rings TCG very much as well. I haven’t gotten a chance to play the Fantasy Flight version but I can tell that I will like it very much; it may give Decipher’s LOTR TCG a run. But no game will ever top Star Wars CCG, alone for all the memories that are attached to being a player, a tournament director, and product champion (or “marketing/promotions volunteer”)

Viking: You mentioned in your post about the LOTR games that different people tend to identify with the different cultures in the games? For those of us without much gaming experience, how does a trading card game represent different cultures?

Josh: Well, for instance, a player who prefers to gain an advantage over their opponent will naturally like archery–which means the Elf culture. If you like to pound your opponent into submission with swords or brute strength then Gondor or Dwarves are likely the cultures a player will want to focus on. Rohan is a pretty unique culture to play with the horses; it’s kind of a hybrid of Gondor and Elves. If you like to annoy your opponent then Hobbits are the culture to go to, lol. And Gandalf is a culture unto himself with all kinds of the spells and game-changing effects.

The latter two cultures (especially Gandalf) can’t really be used exclusively. Meaning Gandalf/Hobbits need to be paired up with one of the other four cultures or with each other (it should be noted that the Ents are in the Gandalf culture, and that is really the only scenario where only Gandalf and Hobbit cultures in a deck would work).

On the Shadow side it is mostly about what you want to do to the player. If you want to “kill and corrupt the Ring-bearer” then Nazgûl and Easterlings are the best way to go; if you just want to kill everyone you see then Uruk-hai, Moria orcs, and the Haradrim are your cultures; if you want an “advanced player” culture with more nuanced gameplay options that are hard to prepare for (e.g. taking control of sites for some neat effects; or “threats”) then Dunlendings or Sauron orcs are the way to go (and can be brutally dominating if a player can figure out a good balance of strategy).”.

The Gollum culture (which includes Shelob) is a lot like the Gandalf and Hobbit cultures in that you can’t build a deck with just that character–he needs to be part of a bigger plan. Most players pair him with Nazgûl or Sauron. I would also classify this culture as an ”advanced player” culture. It’s also the only one to have both a Free Peoples side (Sméagol) and a Shadow side (Gollum), which makes things interesting if you meet a player using the other half.

Viking: Is there a particular culture that you favor over others?

Josh: I’m also exclusively Gondor on the FP side, although I do enjoy “Last Alliance” decks (a deck using equal parts Gondor and Elf). I’ve never used the Dwarf (sorry John DiBartolo!) or Rohan cultures, nor Ents.

On the Shadow side I’m a bit more open though I tend to go for the Nazgûl, or a mix of Nazgûl/Easterlings or Nazgûl/Sauron. I’ve never used either the Dunland or Sméagol/Gollum cultures (sorry Tyler!).

Viking: You’ve mentioned elsewhere that you have been very involved with the Wars game put out by Decipher. And also that this game has a specific storyline that has been developing over time. How does one structre a trading card game such that the players are able to follow a specific story?

Josh: Ah! I see you are tapping into my secret desire of always wanting to be a game developer!

Um.. you don’t, really. It’s okay to have an overarching environment that adds game elements as it goes along but trading card games are not really conducive to linear storytelling.

For instance, the “Cloud City” expansion introduced capturing and bounty hunting; “Dagobah” introduced Jedi Testing; “A New Hope” introduced the Death Star; Coruscant introduced the effect of politics. The Objective card type, which came out in the “Special Edition” expansion, is what moved the Star Wars CCG the closest to ”storytelling” in-game, but the most effective (and most-used) Objectives were those that were focused on setting up a game environment (like Hidden Base) rather than a storyline (like Rescue the Princess). WARS never had Objectives. It was mostly a wide-open game of faction warfare between the five groups (three human, two alien) and I think that’s how it worked best.

Viking: You’ve already taken the Wars story and started publishing novels based on it through Grail Quest Books. Are there any other properties you are trying to license?

Josh: Yes! There is a major sci-fantasy license we have had our eye on for a couple years now, but it was a film/TV/book license before it was a gaming license. The franchise owners know we are interested and they welcome that interest and want to work with us. But we need to get the licensing fee together, and that’s no small amount given the popularity of the license. Hopefully GQB can secure that sometime before the year is out, especially because we know there are folks here at Middle-earth Network that would be very excited…

Viking: Finally, are there any plans to move in the other direction; taking some of your original properties such as Savus and turning them into a trading card or table-top game?

Josh: Oh yes. I have the privilege of knowing some of the smartest gamers in my circle of family and professionals. We probably would do a table-top game before a trading card game because of costs, and because I’m not sure where the trading card game market really is (or will be); the industry is pretty different than when I was active in it some six years ago.

And there you have it folks. A little insight into the intricacies of trading card gaming from writer, publisher and gamer, Josh Radke. We hope you enjoyed it and stay tuned for the next featured website right on the Middle-Earth Network!

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