So I had an idea for a chaotic and social format. Keep in mind I have never tried this, so any feedback would be great. To start, buy a Deck Builder's Toolkit or gather around 200 cards. Seperate any basic lands from the pile first. Then, put in a basic land every 2 spells (or non-basic lands). I'd think you'd need about a third of the cards to be basic lands,80 basic lands out of 200 cards. Then put the entire pile of cards in one stack, like a pile. This is the deck. Gather 2 or 3 friends if you are using about 200 cards in the deck. During the game, gameplay is like any multiplayer match, except everyone draws from the same deck (The "Tower)". Also, every turn happens at once, except after every player has drawed, taken any upkeep costs, and untapped, a "Trade" phase happens, where every player puts as many cards from their hand as they want in the middle, then for each card he/she put in the middle, takes a card out of the middle. Really, trade phase can go any way as long as you can exchange cards with other players. Then, each phase goes around the table clockwise until the collective turn is over, and the next turn starts.
You might consider the Danger Room variant, discussed a few threads below this one, as that uses a tower, but lands are separate. Trading among players... sounds too time consuming to be worthwhile.
Shared decks and graveyards is a fun variant, but you really need to build the tower, rather than using a random mix of cards, if only for possible shenanigans.
Cheers!
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
If in the area, check out Gamers N Geeks and Mini War Games in Mobile, Alabama and Underhill's Games in Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio.
The big box of random cards thing can be a lot of fun too, however, in that type of scenario it helps if lands are not random. When we play Big Box (which is basically the same thing as tower except lands) we have 2 decks a giant deck of cards and a giant deck of lands. Each draw you choose which pile you want to draw from. Same with mill. Tutors are banned because our deck is like 4000 cards but land fetch is allowed and the land deck is only like 300 cards.
Shared decks and graveyards is a fun variant, but you really need to build the tower, rather than using a random mix of cards, if only for possible shenanigans.
Cheers!
Krichaiushii on PucaTrade.