Magic: The Gathering has been around since 1993, making it the first collectible card game ever created. This article explores how it’s cards got progressively stronger over the years, in a process known as powercreep. I also look at some interesting scientific literature about the ‘strength’ of cards in CCG’s.
A lot of cards have been designed and printed since the original 295 from Alpha; 29164 mechanicaly unique cards, spread across 86290 printings with 40846 unique artworks to be exact. To keep the designs interesting for players, inevitably new cards will come out that are strictly better in some capacity than older cards, a phenomenon known as ‘power creep’.