Harry Potter Trading Card Game

Harry Potter Trading Card Game

Harry Potter Trading Card Game's card back design
Designer(s)	Paul Peterson Skaff Elias Mike Elliott
Publisher(s)	Wizards of the Coast
Players	2
Playing time	~ 20 minutes
Random chance	Some
Skill(s) required	Card playing Arithmetic Reading Logic

The Harry Potter Trading Card Game is an out-of-print collectible card game based in the magical world of J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter novels. Created by Wizards of the Coast in August 2001, the game was designed to compete with the Yu-Gi-Oh!, Pokémon and Magic: The Gathering card games. Its release was timed to coincide with the theatrical premiere of the first film in the series. The game was praised for the way it immersed children in the Harry Potter universe. At one point the game was the second best selling toy in the United States; however, the game is now out of print.

The game is for two players, each with 60-card decks (with the addition of a starting Character; see below). The aim is to force the opposite player to run out of cards from their deck first. When cards do "damage" to a player, cards from the deck are placed into the discard pile. Each player begins with a hand of seven cards, and draws a card before each of their turns.

There are eight different types of cards in the Harry Potter Trading Card Game.

There are five Lesson types in the game, each applying to different cards. There is no limit on the Lesson cards in a player's deck: a player may have as many different types as they prefer.

Some cards have keywords in addition to their card type. These keywords allow other cards to refer to a specific type of card. The "Wizard" or "Witch" designation on Character cards is an example of a keyword, as is the "Healing" designation on some other cards. Other common keywords include designations representing each of the four Hogwarts houses: Gryffindor, Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff, and Slytherin.

Some cards (including all Characters) have the keyword "Unique", which indicates that only one of them can be in play at a time (for either player). The only exception is if both players have the same starting Character.