Collectible Card Game Headquarters

I don't know whether this topic is better places in Forge or Xmage forum so I'll post it at both places.


I was searching for the main differences between Forge and Xmage but finding documentation is quite hard actually. I seems they both provide an AI mode, deck manager, standalone use and also remote use (but still in dev for Forge). They also seem to be both actively devlepoed.

I am a Java developer.

I was searching for a solution:

- to play magic remotely with some friends
- to play magic against an AI
- to maintain decks and eventually find decks from Internet
- to host a server (either using Google Cloud Run or Compute Engine)

Could someone please tell me or link me to some resources to find the differences between both and their pros and cons ?

Do they use the same rule engine behind ?

Thanks everybody

As most people are in the "Xmage" camp or the "Forge" camp. I'm not sure you'll get a great compare and contrast.. Here's a doc that looks like its a bit out of date as far as Card Count and Release dates are concerned, but I'd guess the overall features are still pretty accurate
https://www.slightlymagic.net/wiki/List_of_MTG_Engines

Forge was designed as a single player experience, due to that the network play is mostly functional, but definitely a work in progress. It uses P2P for network play so there isn't really "lobby server". As far as I'm aware, Forge still has the most cards supported as we're only missing about 100 or so of 20k unique cards. I'd say quest mode, android version, and card coverage are probably our biggest "selling points". But that might be a better question for people who have tried both and prefer Forge.

We typically get a release out during prerelease weekend with most (if not all) of the new sets cards.

Both rules engines are written in Java. They are completely separate although obviously, we're both working on the same document (Magic Core Rules)


Feel free to jump into our discord if you want to ask us any more specific questions!
https://discord.gg/3v9JCVr