Forge

What is MTG Forge?

MTG Forge is an implementation of Magic the Gathering that lets you play against a computer AI opponent using the all rules of a real game. You can construct decks for you and the computer to play with, currently about 4865 cards are available. You can also play in a sealed deck format against the computer. This program only lets you play against the computer, you cannot play against another human player over the Internet.

The latest version can always be found at http://mtgrares.blogspot.com

What is Magic: The Gathering?

The first collectable card game invented in 1994. Their website is www.wizards.com/magic Each player starts with 20 life points and the goal is to reduce your opponents life points to 0. The official rulebook can be downloaded at http://wizards.com/magic/rules/MTG9EDRulebook_EN.pdf

How to run MTG Forge?

First, unzip all of the files into the same directory. To run the game, double click on the file named "run-forge.jar" or from the command line type “java -jar run-forge.jar” If you don’t seem to have Java installed, you can download the Java Runtime Library (JRE) from www.java.com/getjava

What if double-clicking doesn’t work?

Sometimes in Windows when you double-clicked on the jar file another program opens it, and the jar file doesn’t run. One solution in Windows XP is to right-click on the jar file and select “Properties” which is at the bottom of the menu. Now press the “Change” button and try to find something like “Java 2(TM) Platform Standard Edition” and close the window by pressing “OK”

What are MTG Forge requirements?

This program requires at least Java 1.4 to be installed and has only been tested on Windows XP. Users have said that it works fine on Linux and Mac OS X. Several versions of Forge have required Java 1.6. As time passes, it will become more difficult for the developers to maintain compatibility with earlier versions of Java. This program works best with a screen resolution of 1024 by 768 or better.

What phases does MTG Forge have?

MTG Forge only has a few phases, during your turn there is main 1, main 2, declare attackers, after declare blockers, and combat damage. During the computer’s turn you can only play spells and abilities after declaring blockers, combat damage, and during the computer’s end of turn if you click on menu option. (And when I say “combat damage”, that means that combat damage is already assigned and on the stack.)

Who wrote this program?

Well just me, Forge. You can e-mail me at mtgrares at yahoo com. You can support this program by sending me e-mail of the things that you like and don’t like. I would like to make the program easier to use. And as always, tell your friends about this program, I like to see it how many times it has been downloaded.

Where do I file bug reports?

You can file bug reports on the Collectible Card Games Headquarters Forums located at

http://www.slightlymagic.net/forum/viewforum.php?f=26

I want to help development. How do I get started?

MTG Forge is written in Java, so of course knowledge in that language is very helpful. However, our experience has shown that adding cards is also possible for programming starters.

A development environment such as Eclipse is beneficial, as it helps writing, compiling and testing your changes.

There are essentially two ways of obtaining the source code of forge: Either ask in the forums or, if you plan to contribute code regularly or want to stay at the to of new developments, get access to our SVN repository.

API for Card Data Objects in Forge