The Rage Trading Card Game is based on Werewolf: The Apocalypse. It converts the setting of the roleplaying game into a collectable card game.
History
Rage: Apocalypse
Rage was originally published by White Wolf Game Studio in 1995. It had five sets, Limited/Unlimited (sometimes called Basic, or the base set), Umbra, Wyrm, War of the Amazon, and Legacy of the Tribes. The first three sets can still be found on eBay for reasonable prices.
Rage was released during the original CCG glut as every game company tried to make something to rival Magic: The Gathering. The newly created CCG market was flooded with over a hundred different games in a year. The market simply could not absorb that many games at once. Most companies printed too many cards for their games so that "limited editions" were still readily available at discount prices a year or more later.
Rage suffered from overprinting of its first three sets, Limited/Unlimited, Umbra, and Wyrm. White Wolf then overcompensated in the other direction and printed War of the Amazon exactly to preorders with little to no overrun. As most stores were now accustomed to Rage being readily available with no need to preorder, this created a massive shortfall. Amazon boxes quickly rocketed from the original street value of $42 to $100 and up.
Legacy of the Tribes finally hit a happy medium between not printing too much or too little, but by then the CCG market was in a downward spiral with dozens of games folding. A combination of overprinting, market downturn, and internal restructuring at White Wolf led to them dissolving their entire card division. Rage and Arcadia: The Wyld Hunt (based on Changeling: The Dreaming) were discontinued with the elimination of the card division.
Rage: Tribal War
Rage was then sold to Five Rings Publishing Group, who completely redesigned the game, keeping only the setting and the card backs the same. While this introduced new players to the game, it also alienated many old players as the original cards were completely incompatable with the new rules. They had been lead to believe there would be 90% compatability between the old cards and the new game. There was 0% compatability.
Five Rings Publishing was then bought by Wizards of the Coast. Wizards was then in turn bought out by Hasbro.
Most of the CCGs that Hasbro acquired in its takeover were discontinued, including both Vampire: The Eternal Struggle (VTES) and Rage. White Wolf began publishing Vampire: The Eternal Struggle again.
Rage sat in limbo while a company called Azrael Productions tried to acquire the license to publish BOTH versions of Rage. The deal ultimately fell through but the two games both got a slight name change during that time. The first incarnation came to be known as Rage: Apocalypse. The second version came to be known as Rage: Tribal War. Azrael also started playtesting cards for both games.
When the deal with Azrael fell through, they waived rights to the cards that had been in development, returning intellectual rights to the playtesters. This left the playtesters free to produce fan made sets once it was cleared with White Wolf. All the fan made cards are fully illustrated and legal for use in tournaments.
Present Day
As of January 2012, Rage: Apocalypse now has ten fan made sets: the New England block (Intermezzo, Periphery, Gauntlet, and Coda); a set of 'fixed' older cards Rage's Least Wanted; and the majority of the Ahadi block (War Council, Rainmakers, Rainfall, Sahel, Hellcats and Ambush at the Apophis Pipeline). Additional sets in the Ahadi block are in development.
Rage: Tribal War has two finished sets: Web of Deceit and Christmas Present '04. A third set called "Something Old, Something New" is currently in limbo. It may or may not ever be produced, but has not yet been declared officially "dead".
In addition to the fan made cards, Rage has enjoyed new life as an online game. CCG Workshop developed an online player called the Gatling Engine to play CCGs online. Rage was one of the early games adapted to the player. After CCG Workshop shut down, it was made available on Lackey CCG. White Wolf later licensed CCG Workshop to produce an online version of Vampire: The Eternal Struggle. Arcadia: The Wyld Hunt has also been licensed to CCG Workshop to develop an online version.
External Links
River VonOffical Rage homepage. All ten fan-made Rage sets are available for download, for free, in PDF format.- The above site has move to this location
- Forums Active discussions about online play, playtesting and strategy.
- LackeyCCG Play Rage online
- Rageinfo Rage mailing list
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Rage Official Expansion Sets | |
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White Wolf/Upper Deck |
Basic (1995) (Limited · Unlimited) · Umbra (1995) · Wyrm (1995) · War of the Amazon (1996) · Legacy of the Tribes (1996) |
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Rage Across Las Vegas: Phase 1 (1998) · Phase 2 (1998) · Phase 3 (1998) · Phase 4 (1998) · Phase 5 (1998) · Phase 6 (1998) · Equinox (1999) | |
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Miscellaneous Cards: |
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Azrael Productions Fan Expansion Sets | |
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Apocalypse Fan Sets: |
New England Block: Intermezzo (2003) · Periphery (2004) · Gauntlet (2004) · Coda (2005) |
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Tribal War Fan Sets: |
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