Yeah, why would a company bother with a design or development team when you can just copy MTG? Some of those examples in the document are very blatant ripoffs. I guess it is hard to be original when many of the mechanics are similar, just renamed.
Also, Lol @ spectral lotus turning into a black tiger... clearly it's not combining spectral tiger and black lotus.
As a lawyer and a Magic player, I pity the poor souls who will eventually have to explain these game mechanics to a judge.
As another Lawyer, I pity them even more if/when they have to explain it to a jury filled with Grandmas. A judge at least has the technical acumen to navigate complex rules (in theory). Grandma can't even figure out how to turn on her computer.
Do you think Hex's lawyers will be able to challenge enough of the potentially gaming-aware jurors to get 12 Grandmas into the jury box? Or is this a case where anyone who might be aware of computer & card gaming in general would be disqualified for potential bias?
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Do you think Hex's lawyers will be able to challenge enough of the potentially gaming-aware jurors to get 12 Grandmas into the jury box? Or is this a case where anyone who might be aware of computer & card gaming in general would be disqualified for potential bias?
Knoweldge of Magic, or how to play the game, is unlikely to be enough to get dismissed for cause. It's likely to get you removed via a peremptory challenge from one of the parties. Playing Mgic (or Hex) actively could be sufficient to get booted for cause since you may be biased, but that depends a lot on the level you play at.
Playing at home with friends, if you say that you won't be biased by that (and remember statements during voir dire are under oath) you're likely to be fine. A player on the pro-tour (Magic), or a kickstarter backer (Hex) would be likely to get dismissed for cause.
Peremptory challenges are when one side or the other asks for a juror to be dismissed without stating a reason, and can be made for *any* reason, or no reason at all, provided there is no discriminatory reason. AKA, They can make a challenge because they just don't like you, or because your a law student (that happened to me while I was still in school), but if the judge finds that the challenge was because the juror was black (example) than its a no go.
Realistically, when you consider the number of magic players and the available jury pool you'll be lucky if you have someone who has more than a passing familiarity with the game selected, and then person will be peremptory challenged by Hex's Lawyers. What you'll be left with is a group of non-gamers, and potential one or two people with experience gaming.
I haven't been following the case, but I'd ask for a bench trial (no jury, judge takes the jury's role) regardless of which side I was on if I thought that the law actually supported my case. But, keep in mind, I practice in patent prosecution and my litigation experience is limited to legal research to support other attorney's litigation.
(Standard caveat: not legal advice, if you take legal advice from a forum its your own fault, blah, blah, blah :))
Edit: Side note, I thin HEX may actually want some gaming aware jurors, depending on their strategy. If they want to argue that these aspects are functional, and aren't creative elements (and thus not subject to copyright), it may actually be in their best interest to have gaming aware jurors who understand the concept that "draw 2 cards" isn't a creative expression of magic, but is rather a function common to many games.
The simple "Draw 2 cards" is indeed not copyrighted by Magic, but look further at it. Yu-Gi-Oh! has a card called Pot of Greed, which states that you draw 2 cards. Pokemon has the same with Bill. Yet both are functionally completely different from Divination, because they don't require any other resources, and work with other interactions - you can cast as many Pot of Greeds as you like during your turn (As long as you have any left in your hand), and you may only cast one Bill each turn. From what I can see from Hex, they copied dang near EVERYTHING, from power/toughness ratios to keywords, including mana costs that are quite close to the various "inspirations" - their draw 2 cards card costs 3 and seems to be in their version of Blue. If I understand the way Hex cards appear right, Oracle Song costs 2 + 1 blue to draw 2 cards and is a basic action which seems equivalent to a sorcery - which is EXACTLY Divination.
Now it wouldn't be too bad if you had one or two cards like this, but almost that entire gallery seems to be ripped from top to bottom from the Magic cards, thus granting Wizards a proper case. And this is from someone who never seen Hex cards before.
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My Commander decks:
Chandra, Torch of Defiance - Oops! All Chandras.
Prime Speaker Zegana - Draw for Power.
Pir & Toothy - Counterpalooza.
Arcades, the Strategist - Another Brick in the Wall.
Zacama, Primal Calamity - Calamity of Double Mana.
Edgar Markov - Vampires Don't Die.
Child of Alara - Dreamcrusher.
The simple "Draw 2 cards" is indeed not copyrighted by Magic, but look further at it. Yu-Gi-Oh! has a card called Pot of Greed, which states that you draw 2 cards. Pokemon has the same with Bill. Yet both are functionally completely different from Divination, because they don't require any other resources, and work with other interactions - you can cast as many Pot of Greeds as you like during your turn (As long as you have any left in your hand), and you may only cast one Bill each turn. From what I can see from Hex, they copied dang near EVERYTHING, from power/toughness ratios to keywords, including mana costs that are quite close to the various "inspirations" - their draw 2 cards card costs 3 and seems to be in their version of Blue. If I understand the way Hex cards appear right, Oracle Song costs 2 + 1 blue to draw 2 cards and is a basic action which seems equivalent to a sorcery - which is EXACTLY Divination.
Now it wouldn't be too bad if you had one or two cards like this, but almost that entire gallery seems to be ripped from top to bottom from the Magic cards, thus granting Wizards a proper case. And this is from someone who never seen Hex cards before.
Oracle Song requires 3 mana and you must have atleast 1 blue mana source played. It's more or less Divination. Is that necessarily a problem though? Sometimes a certain text on a card at a particular mana cost is completely balanced. Wizards certainly doesn't seem to be up in arms about Hearthstone having Arcane Intellect in their Mage class (closest class to blue in Magic) which is 3 mana draw two cards or Hunter and Priest with Arcane Shot/Holy Smite which are both essentially Shock.
You have to look at the whole thing as a package, cards like Murder, Divination, Shock and so on are very common to games and are cost properly. It's not really possible to do them different, so unless you want to give Wizards a patent on specific abilities at specific mana costs I don't see how you can hold these cards against Hex. On the other hand, if you look at the entire game overall it's very obvious that they simply copied Magic. Any individual thing is fine, or even any group of 20 or 30 things. But when the entire game is literally Magic plus a couple of digital alterations, that's when you start getting into trouble. The game isn't sufficiently different.
This is an interesting case. From what I know of IP, you can only copyright expressions and not ideas. Thus, it is legal to "clone" games as long as you don't incorporate the specific copyrighted expressions. As an example, Scrabulous was a clone of Scrabble that ran into Copyright issues and then recovered by changing their name to Wordscraper and disallowing game boards that look like the board for Scrabble. The game itself cannot be copyrighted, only the name and the design of the board.
I thought civil litigation trials didn't use a jury.
Both parties can waive their right to a jury trial, but the 7th amendment guarantees you a trial by jury in civil cases if the amount exceeds $20.
In Suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise re-examined in any Court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law
I hope Hex wins for a few reasons. One is that WotC is incompetent as a large company in several capacities (like hey, magic online), and the other is that it would only benefit magic players/consumers to have an additional competing card game *cue imaginary scenario where people stop going to the LGS because hex killed magic*
The simple "Draw 2 cards" is indeed not copyrighted by Magic, but look further at it. Yu-Gi-Oh! has a card called Pot of Greed, which states that you draw 2 cards. Pokemon has the same with Bill. Yet both are functionally completely different from Divination, because they don't require any other resources, and work with other interactions - you can cast as many Pot of Greeds as you like during your turn (As long as you have any left in your hand), and you may only cast one Bill each turn. From what I can see from Hex, they copied dang near EVERYTHING, from power/toughness ratios to keywords, including mana costs that are quite close to the various "inspirations" - their draw 2 cards card costs 3 and seems to be in their version of Blue. If I understand the way Hex cards appear right, Oracle Song costs 2 + 1 blue to draw 2 cards and is a basic action which seems equivalent to a sorcery - which is EXACTLY Divination.
Now it wouldn't be too bad if you had one or two cards like this, but almost that entire gallery seems to be ripped from top to bottom from the Magic cards, thus granting Wizards a proper case. And this is from someone who never seen Hex cards before.
Oracle Song requires 3 mana and you must have atleast 1 blue mana source played. It's more or less Divination. Is that necessarily a problem though? Sometimes a certain text on a card at a particular mana cost is completely balanced. Wizards certainly doesn't seem to be up in arms about Hearthstone having Arcane Intellect in their Mage class (closest class to blue in Magic) which is 3 mana draw two cards or Hunter and Priest with Arcane Shot/Holy Smite which are both essentially Shock.
You have to look at the whole thing as a package, cards like Murder, Divination, Shock and so on are very common to games and are cost properly. It's not really possible to do them different, so unless you want to give Wizards a patent on specific abilities at specific mana costs I don't see how you can hold these cards against Hex. On the other hand, if you look at the entire game overall it's very obvious that they simply copied Magic. Any individual thing is fine, or even any group of 20 or 30 things. But when the entire game is literally Magic plus a couple of digital alterations, that's when you start getting into trouble. The game isn't sufficiently different.
I used Oracle Song as the main example given that it was used in the post I answered. One difference with Hearthstone is that Hearthstone has a far different resource management system. This makes Hearthstone's Arcane Intellect much different from Magic's Divination or Yu-Gi-Oh!'s Pot of Greed. As you go on to state yourself from that point on, there are so many cards that are exact the same that it stops being a coincidence/matter of balancing and becomes a pure ripoff.
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My Commander decks:
Chandra, Torch of Defiance - Oops! All Chandras.
Prime Speaker Zegana - Draw for Power.
Pir & Toothy - Counterpalooza.
Arcades, the Strategist - Another Brick in the Wall.
Zacama, Primal Calamity - Calamity of Double Mana.
Edgar Markov - Vampires Don't Die.
Child of Alara - Dreamcrusher.
So, after reading this, if you have a game with a resource system and have cards which cost things you're going to get sued? Because of course, if you have cards and draw etc, it's going to end up similar
So, after reading this, if you have a game with a resource system and have cards which cost things you're going to get sued? Because of course, if you have cards and draw etc, it's going to end up similar
Not quite. Look at Hearthstone, which also has a resource system, and cards that cost things. But the game differs enough from Magic to be called it's own entity.
Hex, however, appears to have 5 colors, costs that are paid in mana of any color + specific colored mana, the exact same abilities but worded slightly difference (Flying -> Flight, Trample -> Crush), and a LOT of cards that are EXACTLY the same as Magic. Furthermore, they seem to have Creatures (Troop), Sorceries (Basic Action), Instants (Quick Action), Enchantments (Constant) and Artifacts (Same name, but that's forgivable). They also use the same Species - Job description that Magic does (Human Warrior - Shroomkin Mutant).
There's "basing yourself upon" a different cardgame. Hex literally copy-pasted Magic, slathered a few different words on it and called it a day. Hearthstone, Yu-Gi-Oh!, Pokemon TCG and Magic are all (online) TCG's that fall in the same catagory, but are different enough from one another to ensure they don't really copy one another.
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My Commander decks:
Chandra, Torch of Defiance - Oops! All Chandras.
Prime Speaker Zegana - Draw for Power.
Pir & Toothy - Counterpalooza.
Arcades, the Strategist - Another Brick in the Wall.
Zacama, Primal Calamity - Calamity of Double Mana.
Edgar Markov - Vampires Don't Die.
Child of Alara - Dreamcrusher.
So, after reading this, if you have a game with a resource system and have cards which cost things you're going to get sued? Because of course, if you have cards and draw etc, it's going to end up similar
Not quite. Look at Hearthstone, which also has a resource system, and cards that cost things. But the game differs enough from Magic to be called it's own entity.
Hex, however, appears to have 5 colors, costs that are paid in mana of any color + specific colored mana, the exact same abilities but worded slightly difference (Flying -> Flight, Trample -> Crush), and a LOT of cards that are EXACTLY the same as Magic. Furthermore, they seem to have Creatures (Troop), Sorceries (Basic Action), Instants (Quick Action), Enchantments (Constant) and Artifacts (Same name, but that's forgivable). They also use the same Species - Job description that Magic does (Human Warrior - Shroomkin Mutant).
There's "basing yourself upon" a different cardgame. Hex literally copy-pasted Magic, slathered a few different words on it and called it a day. Hearthstone, Yu-Gi-Oh!, Pokemon TCG and Magic are all (online) TCG's that fall in the same catagory, but are different enough from one another to ensure they don't really copy one another.
Ok, fair enough, just seeing magic so gun ho to sue kinda worries me, in my spare time I've been doodling ideas for a card game, though I doubt I would ever make it, fearing being used would definitely stop me
So, after reading this, if you have a game with a resource system and have cards which cost things you're going to get sued? Because of course, if you have cards and draw etc, it's going to end up similar
Not quite. Look at Hearthstone, which also has a resource system, and cards that cost things. But the game differs enough from Magic to be called it's own entity.
Hex, however, appears to have 5 colors, costs that are paid in mana of any color + specific colored mana, the exact same abilities but worded slightly difference (Flying -> Flight, Trample -> Crush), and a LOT of cards that are EXACTLY the same as Magic. Furthermore, they seem to have Creatures (Troop), Sorceries (Basic Action), Instants (Quick Action), Enchantments (Constant) and Artifacts (Same name, but that's forgivable). They also use the same Species - Job description that Magic does (Human Warrior - Shroomkin Mutant).
There's "basing yourself upon" a different cardgame. Hex literally copy-pasted Magic, slathered a few different words on it and called it a day. Hearthstone, Yu-Gi-Oh!, Pokemon TCG and Magic are all (online) TCG's that fall in the same catagory, but are different enough from one another to ensure they don't really copy one another.
The resource system is actually different than magic despite looking similar at a glance. Hex's system is designed that if you have 1 Ruby (Red) and 4 of any other color(s), you can still cast 5 red spells (if they all only cost 1 red). Putting down a shard (land) of a specific color essentially "unlocks" the use of cards needed to use that many shards. If a card is, say 4 mana with 2 Blood (Black), you would've needed to put down at least two Blood shards at some point, even though you can pay its 4 mana cost with any color.
You can almost consider it as though every single card in the game is colorless with a clause of "you may only cast this spell if you own at least X many shard of Y color". It doesn't matter what colors you actually use to pay for it with.
In any case, the real root of the argument is whether this is actual infringement of copyright, especially since the patent on MTG's mechanics have expired. There's a clearcut case of copyright infringementif hex just took one of MTG's art and used it as their own. But you can't copyright mechanics like flying, trample, etc.
WoTC's main argument relies on the more nebulous "trade dress]" argument in that the game's similarities are so close that people would confuse Hex with Magic. I think that WoTC would actually have a fair argument at this very point in time. However, as you delve deeper into the game, it makes the argument harder to make when hex has things like socketed cards, cards that level up and transform multiple times, PvE specific cards and mechanics (raids, dungeons, etc), cards that insert cards into people's decks, equipment that is specific and unique to every card.
Eitherway, i don't think that this legal battle is good for anyone.
So, after reading this, if you have a game with a resource system and have cards which cost things you're going to get sued? Because of course, if you have cards and draw etc, it's going to end up similar
Not quite. Look at Hearthstone, which also has a resource system, and cards that cost things. But the game differs enough from Magic to be called it's own entity.
Hex, however, appears to have 5 colors, costs that are paid in mana of any color + specific colored mana, the exact same abilities but worded slightly difference (Flying -> Flight, Trample -> Crush), and a LOT of cards that are EXACTLY the same as Magic. Furthermore, they seem to have Creatures (Troop), Sorceries (Basic Action), Instants (Quick Action), Enchantments (Constant) and Artifacts (Same name, but that's forgivable). They also use the same Species - Job description that Magic does (Human Warrior - Shroomkin Mutant).
There's "basing yourself upon" a different cardgame. Hex literally copy-pasted Magic, slathered a few different words on it and called it a day. Hearthstone, Yu-Gi-Oh!, Pokemon TCG and Magic are all (online) TCG's that fall in the same catagory, but are different enough from one another to ensure they don't really copy one another.
The resource system is actually different than magic despite looking similar at a glance. Hex's system is designed that if you have 1 Ruby (Red) and 4 of any other color(s), you can still cast 5 red spells (if they all only cost 1 red). Putting down a shard (land) of a specific color essentially "unlocks" the use of cards needed to use that many shards. If a card is, say 4 mana with 2 Blood (Black), you would've needed to put down at least two Blood shards at some point, even though you can pay its 4 mana cost with any color.
You can almost consider it as though every single card in the game is colorless with a clause of "you may only cast this spell if you own at least X many shard of Y color". It doesn't matter what colors you actually use to pay for it with.
In any case, the real root of the argument is whether this is actual infringement of copyright, especially since the patent on MTG's mechanics have expired. There's a clearcut case of copyright infringementif hex just took one of MTG's art and used it as their own. But you can't copyright mechanics like flying, trample, etc.
WoTC's main argument relies on the more nebulous "trade dress]" argument in that the game's similarities are so close that people would confuse Hex with Magic. I think that WoTC would actually have a fair argument at this very point in time. However, as you delve deeper into the game, it makes the argument harder to make when hex has things like socketed cards, cards that level up and transform multiple times, PvE specific cards and mechanics (raids, dungeons, etc), cards that insert cards into people's decks, equipment that is specific and unique to every card.
Eitherway, i don't think that this legal battle is good for anyone.
I think it could be good for Magic in the sense that it shows that they will attack those who make such blatant rip-offs. This isn't a different game with a few similarities, it is the same game slightly re-skinned with a few tweaks (and the tweaks aren't even creative, they are simply derivatives of other online products that can be applied in the TCG space). Win or lose, Magic is saying "we can and will sue for this so think twice".
If Magic were a big company doing this abusively to suppress competition I would take issue. But realistically that isn't the case. They don't go after the games that draw a few elements from Magic but have significant unique game play that makes the game "not Magic" (i.e. countless other TCG's). But this case really is one where they were blatantly copied.
Hex is extremely, blatantly similar to Magic. It's really a shame too, because CZE has shown in the past that they're capable of creating a solid TCG with similar, yet not identical, rules to those of Magic - the WoW TCG.
Looking at a quick breakdown:
Life - Magic has 20, Hex has 20, WoW has you pick a hero that gives you (usually) between 25 and 30
Hand - 7 all around, this is pretty standard
Factions - Magic has 5, Hex has 5 (and they very closely mirror Magic's), WoW has something like 8 classes (to determine your non-creatures and some specific creatures) and 3 factions (Horde/Alliance/Neutral) to determine your creatures, and the specific combination is determined by your choice of hero
Resources - Magic has land cards, Hex has a mechanic that is functionally almost identical to land cards. WoW has three types of resources - any card played face down as a "land", "Quests" that function as lands and can be turned face down along with a condition/cost to get an effect (usually some kind of card draw or filtering), and "Locations" that function as lands and may have additional abilities.
Combat - Magic and Hex have identical combat systems. WoW declares each creature as an attacker individually, chooses the target of the attack directly and can attack creatures, and only certain creatures can block (and they tap to do so). The Hero can also engage in combat if he is granted an attack statistic from an enchantment or artifact, which allows him to damage creatures attacking him or attack himself.
Card Types - Magic and Hex have identical card types. WoW has creature-equivalents; abilities, which can function as instants, sorceries, enchantments, and/or auras depending which keywords they utilize; and equipment which function kind of like artifacts except they take up specific slots on your hero, so you can't have two helms at once. Weapons allow a hero to engage in combat in exchange for paying their "strike cost" and tapping them. Armor allows the hero to block damage dealt to them by tapping them in combat.
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Wizards has provided 107 examples of Copyright Infringement by Hex/Cryptozoic
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/2042983/wawdce-200735-1.pdf
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I will be curious to see if this evidence continues to draw out this lawsuit.
Supposedly the amended complaint has one of the Hex developers MTG tournament history and many developers MTGO user names.
Also, Lol @ spectral lotus turning into a black tiger... clearly it's not combining spectral tiger and black lotus.
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Retired Legacy: Merfolk, Goblins, Jund, Delver, Reanimator
As another Lawyer, I pity them even more if/when they have to explain it to a jury filled with Grandmas. A judge at least has the technical acumen to navigate complex rules (in theory). Grandma can't even figure out how to turn on her computer.
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Knoweldge of Magic, or how to play the game, is unlikely to be enough to get dismissed for cause. It's likely to get you removed via a peremptory challenge from one of the parties. Playing Mgic (or Hex) actively could be sufficient to get booted for cause since you may be biased, but that depends a lot on the level you play at.
Playing at home with friends, if you say that you won't be biased by that (and remember statements during voir dire are under oath) you're likely to be fine. A player on the pro-tour (Magic), or a kickstarter backer (Hex) would be likely to get dismissed for cause.
Peremptory challenges are when one side or the other asks for a juror to be dismissed without stating a reason, and can be made for *any* reason, or no reason at all, provided there is no discriminatory reason. AKA, They can make a challenge because they just don't like you, or because your a law student (that happened to me while I was still in school), but if the judge finds that the challenge was because the juror was black (example) than its a no go.
Realistically, when you consider the number of magic players and the available jury pool you'll be lucky if you have someone who has more than a passing familiarity with the game selected, and then person will be peremptory challenged by Hex's Lawyers. What you'll be left with is a group of non-gamers, and potential one or two people with experience gaming.
I haven't been following the case, but I'd ask for a bench trial (no jury, judge takes the jury's role) regardless of which side I was on if I thought that the law actually supported my case. But, keep in mind, I practice in patent prosecution and my litigation experience is limited to legal research to support other attorney's litigation.
(Standard caveat: not legal advice, if you take legal advice from a forum its your own fault, blah, blah, blah :))
Edit: Side note, I thin HEX may actually want some gaming aware jurors, depending on their strategy. If they want to argue that these aspects are functional, and aren't creative elements (and thus not subject to copyright), it may actually be in their best interest to have gaming aware jurors who understand the concept that "draw 2 cards" isn't a creative expression of magic, but is rather a function common to many games.
Now it wouldn't be too bad if you had one or two cards like this, but almost that entire gallery seems to be ripped from top to bottom from the Magic cards, thus granting Wizards a proper case. And this is from someone who never seen Hex cards before.
Chandra, Torch of Defiance - Oops! All Chandras.
Prime Speaker Zegana - Draw for Power.
Pir & Toothy - Counterpalooza.
Arcades, the Strategist - Another Brick in the Wall.
Zacama, Primal Calamity - Calamity of Double Mana.
Edgar Markov - Vampires Don't Die.
Child of Alara - Dreamcrusher.
Oracle Song requires 3 mana and you must have atleast 1 blue mana source played. It's more or less Divination. Is that necessarily a problem though? Sometimes a certain text on a card at a particular mana cost is completely balanced. Wizards certainly doesn't seem to be up in arms about Hearthstone having Arcane Intellect in their Mage class (closest class to blue in Magic) which is 3 mana draw two cards or Hunter and Priest with Arcane Shot/Holy Smite which are both essentially Shock.
You have to look at the whole thing as a package, cards like Murder, Divination, Shock and so on are very common to games and are cost properly. It's not really possible to do them different, so unless you want to give Wizards a patent on specific abilities at specific mana costs I don't see how you can hold these cards against Hex. On the other hand, if you look at the entire game overall it's very obvious that they simply copied Magic. Any individual thing is fine, or even any group of 20 or 30 things. But when the entire game is literally Magic plus a couple of digital alterations, that's when you start getting into trouble. The game isn't sufficiently different.
Both parties can waive their right to a jury trial, but the 7th amendment guarantees you a trial by jury in civil cases if the amount exceeds $20.
In Suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise re-examined in any Court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law
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I used Oracle Song as the main example given that it was used in the post I answered. One difference with Hearthstone is that Hearthstone has a far different resource management system. This makes Hearthstone's Arcane Intellect much different from Magic's Divination or Yu-Gi-Oh!'s Pot of Greed. As you go on to state yourself from that point on, there are so many cards that are exact the same that it stops being a coincidence/matter of balancing and becomes a pure ripoff.
Chandra, Torch of Defiance - Oops! All Chandras.
Prime Speaker Zegana - Draw for Power.
Pir & Toothy - Counterpalooza.
Arcades, the Strategist - Another Brick in the Wall.
Zacama, Primal Calamity - Calamity of Double Mana.
Edgar Markov - Vampires Don't Die.
Child of Alara - Dreamcrusher.
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Not quite. Look at Hearthstone, which also has a resource system, and cards that cost things. But the game differs enough from Magic to be called it's own entity.
Hex, however, appears to have 5 colors, costs that are paid in mana of any color + specific colored mana, the exact same abilities but worded slightly difference (Flying -> Flight, Trample -> Crush), and a LOT of cards that are EXACTLY the same as Magic. Furthermore, they seem to have Creatures (Troop), Sorceries (Basic Action), Instants (Quick Action), Enchantments (Constant) and Artifacts (Same name, but that's forgivable). They also use the same Species - Job description that Magic does (Human Warrior - Shroomkin Mutant).
There's "basing yourself upon" a different cardgame. Hex literally copy-pasted Magic, slathered a few different words on it and called it a day. Hearthstone, Yu-Gi-Oh!, Pokemon TCG and Magic are all (online) TCG's that fall in the same catagory, but are different enough from one another to ensure they don't really copy one another.
Chandra, Torch of Defiance - Oops! All Chandras.
Prime Speaker Zegana - Draw for Power.
Pir & Toothy - Counterpalooza.
Arcades, the Strategist - Another Brick in the Wall.
Zacama, Primal Calamity - Calamity of Double Mana.
Edgar Markov - Vampires Don't Die.
Child of Alara - Dreamcrusher.
Ok, fair enough, just seeing magic so gun ho to sue kinda worries me, in my spare time I've been doodling ideas for a card game, though I doubt I would ever make it, fearing being used would definitely stop me
The resource system is actually different than magic despite looking similar at a glance. Hex's system is designed that if you have 1 Ruby (Red) and 4 of any other color(s), you can still cast 5 red spells (if they all only cost 1 red). Putting down a shard (land) of a specific color essentially "unlocks" the use of cards needed to use that many shards. If a card is, say 4 mana with 2 Blood (Black), you would've needed to put down at least two Blood shards at some point, even though you can pay its 4 mana cost with any color.
You can almost consider it as though every single card in the game is colorless with a clause of "you may only cast this spell if you own at least X many shard of Y color". It doesn't matter what colors you actually use to pay for it with.
In any case, the real root of the argument is whether this is actual infringement of copyright, especially since the patent on MTG's mechanics have expired. There's a clearcut case of copyright infringementif hex just took one of MTG's art and used it as their own. But you can't copyright mechanics like flying, trample, etc.
WoTC's main argument relies on the more nebulous "trade dress]" argument in that the game's similarities are so close that people would confuse Hex with Magic. I think that WoTC would actually have a fair argument at this very point in time. However, as you delve deeper into the game, it makes the argument harder to make when hex has things like socketed cards, cards that level up and transform multiple times, PvE specific cards and mechanics (raids, dungeons, etc), cards that insert cards into people's decks, equipment that is specific and unique to every card.
Eitherway, i don't think that this legal battle is good for anyone.
I think it could be good for Magic in the sense that it shows that they will attack those who make such blatant rip-offs. This isn't a different game with a few similarities, it is the same game slightly re-skinned with a few tweaks (and the tweaks aren't even creative, they are simply derivatives of other online products that can be applied in the TCG space). Win or lose, Magic is saying "we can and will sue for this so think twice".
If Magic were a big company doing this abusively to suppress competition I would take issue. But realistically that isn't the case. They don't go after the games that draw a few elements from Magic but have significant unique game play that makes the game "not Magic" (i.e. countless other TCG's). But this case really is one where they were blatantly copied.
Looking at a quick breakdown:
Life - Magic has 20, Hex has 20, WoW has you pick a hero that gives you (usually) between 25 and 30
Hand - 7 all around, this is pretty standard
Factions - Magic has 5, Hex has 5 (and they very closely mirror Magic's), WoW has something like 8 classes (to determine your non-creatures and some specific creatures) and 3 factions (Horde/Alliance/Neutral) to determine your creatures, and the specific combination is determined by your choice of hero
Resources - Magic has land cards, Hex has a mechanic that is functionally almost identical to land cards. WoW has three types of resources - any card played face down as a "land", "Quests" that function as lands and can be turned face down along with a condition/cost to get an effect (usually some kind of card draw or filtering), and "Locations" that function as lands and may have additional abilities.
Combat - Magic and Hex have identical combat systems. WoW declares each creature as an attacker individually, chooses the target of the attack directly and can attack creatures, and only certain creatures can block (and they tap to do so). The Hero can also engage in combat if he is granted an attack statistic from an enchantment or artifact, which allows him to damage creatures attacking him or attack himself.
Card Types - Magic and Hex have identical card types. WoW has creature-equivalents; abilities, which can function as instants, sorceries, enchantments, and/or auras depending which keywords they utilize; and equipment which function kind of like artifacts except they take up specific slots on your hero, so you can't have two helms at once. Weapons allow a hero to engage in combat in exchange for paying their "strike cost" and tapping them. Armor allows the hero to block damage dealt to them by tapping them in combat.
Currently Playing:
Legacy: Something U/W Controlish
EDH Cube
Hypercube! A New EDH Deck Every Week(ish)!