One of Altered’s strengths is that its world allows it to draw from and reimagine various cultural, fictional, and mythological touchstones. As I read through the cards and characters from Beyond the Gates, I realized I was unfamiliar with quite a few pronunciations, so I figured I’d compile the results from my investigation in case anyone else wanted to start where I left off. These are my best attempts and not an official pronunciation guide. I used a Discord post by Lokinox as a starting point, with a couple of additional pronunciations generously confirmed by Yoshi (narrative designer) himself. Please let me know if you see anything you believe is incorrect! ...

Today’s the day I’ve been waiting for since January! It’s been seven months since the Altered Kickstarter launched, and it felt amazing to finally hold the pledge rewards in my hands. ...

Score Summary Description 1 Very weak Severely understatted with abilities that will rarely be realized. 2 Weak Slightly understatted with abilities that usually won’t compensate. No stronger than an average common. 3 Solid On-rate stats, or understatted but its ability often compensates. Also includes cards with high ceilings but excessive requirements. Distinctly stronger than an average common, but no stronger than an average rare. 4 Strong Above-rate stats, or having abilities that push it well above-rate when its conditions are met. Distinctly stronger than an average rare. 5 Very strong Well above-rate stats and/or having abilities that can sometimes result in a large swing. A card that is a 5 but not a 6 is held back either by not offering more than just stats, or by having a slightly awkward cost or requirement. 6 Exceptional Will reliably swing a game in its favor. These often feature rare abilities (e.g. removal, ramp, card advantage), repeatable triggers, or heavy synergy with a certain hero’s gameplan. 7 Incredible Can singlehandedly win games when it is played. Some possess universally strong and grossly undercosted disruption effects. Others abuse a combination of generated abilities or an interaction with another card or hero. Each rating assumes the unique is put in the deck that best supports it. I consider how it will perform on average in that deck, not necessarily the best-case scenario. ...

When I’m introducing someone to Altered, I try to get as quickly as possible to the heart of what made Altered so compelling to me in the first place. I’ve settled on three main aspects of the game that I can cover in just a sentence or two each (though I have more to say in case someone is interested). This post is an attempt to flesh out my “Altered sales pitch”, so to speak. It’s intended as a script, not the pitch itself, but it might also be worth reading for someone who’s considering getting into Altered themselves. ...

I opened another display today that ended up being a great one all-around. It had an above-average seven uniques, including a strong Red for Afanas & Senka, a stunning alt-art Shenlong in foil, and a Gulrang & Tocsin 2023 promo (not pictured since I’m leaving it unscanned for now). The only thing it was missing is Lyra uniques! I’ve looked over cards from the set more closely since my last writeup, so hopefully that helps with my evaluation of uniques: ...

My local game store started selling their shipment of Altered today, so I splurged and picked up one more Kickstarter display while I was there. When I got to the second pack and flipped the cards around, I knew what was happening the moment I spotted the first unique. Equinox really delivered on making opening a golden booster a special experience. As someone who loves trying to figure out each card’s potential, getting to do that ten times in a row for cards no one has ever seen before was an absolute thrill. ...

Today I got to crack my first ever Altered booster display! This was an order from a retailer; I’m still waiting for my Kickstarter order, Gamegenic accessories and all. Some thoughts after opening the box: I found opening a unique to be the most fun booster pack experience I’ve had across any card game I’ve played. On the other hand, unique-less packs are less exciting than the average pack from another TCG. I’m okay with this tradeoff. Scanning cards using the app was very fast. I appreciate that it displays the total number of cards scanned so you can verify that you haven’t missed any. Foils look excellent. The foil and non-foil features are customized for each card, and I didn’t notice any curling whatsoever. I’ve heard that boxes tend to have a high concentration of uniques from one particular faction due to pack collation. My experience supports this. Moreso than in other card games, opening uniques made me want to build decks where they will shine. It’s less like opening a chase rare and more like opening a bomb in a limited environment. How can you leverage an advantage only you have? Uniques Without further ado, here are the uniques I opened and my initial impressions of them: ...