The epic struggle for galactic dominance has found a new battleground, that of the tabletop duel between all-powerful wizards. In an incredible mash-up that draws from the fervent fandoms of the long-running Blizzard Entertainment franchise StarCraft and the longer-running Wizards of the Coast creation, Magic: The Gathering, redditor efofecks and his team have crafted customized decks that allow players to blend the border between the properties.

For the uninitiated, StarCraft is a real-time military strategy game with strong science fiction elements that sees players controlling one of three alien races–the insectoid Zerg, the fictional future human Terrans, and Protoss, the technologically advanced warrior race–to battle for control of the Koprulu sector of the Milky Way. The franchise has spawned numerous video games, a board game, and other collectibles, but the space-based battle had yet to be refined to a one-on-one battle of dueling cardholders.

That’s where Magic: The Gathering comes in. This trading card game sees each player dealing spells, artifacts, and creatures from their 60+ card decks to defeat their opponent. Now, the StarCraft-themed Duel Deck Set has married the two games together, and better yet, the creators have provided a printable PDF of their customized decks to players out there for the price of free.

The amount of time the team put into this customization is impressive. Special attention was paid to the strengths and weaknesses of each race, which were then applied when choosing cards in order to give each deck an overall approximation of three warring species. For example, the Zerg tend to overwhelm their opponents with huge swarms of relatively weak and sacrificial creatures, while the Protoss deck is based around fewer, more powerful creatures, and Terrans are highly adaptable, though potentially slow to set up at the outset.

There is a lot here to discover and enjoy for fans of both StarCraft and Magic: The Gathering when delving into these playtested decks, but the real feeling of nostalgia comes when you start a new campaign with a friend.

Here are their easy-to-follow steps to get started playing:

• Get the PDF
• Print, cut, and sleeve into some random jank commons.
• Get friend
• Play!

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HT: Kotaku

Images: reddit