I had built a couple of hoards following those initial rules, but I wanted to expand Hoard play to something more than just fighting of a large number of creatures. Also, I like challenges. So I looked for a way to make these decks more challenging and maintain the difficulty level as more players join in.
Some changes in the rules I have are:
- Instead of each player contributing 20 life, the initial player starts with 60 life and it is decreased as more players join in.
- Some creatures of the hoard don't attack. They
serve as defenders (i.e. in the mill deck), or specialists (
vampire hexmage).
- The hoard can draw cards that are played next turn, or
exile cards from its library to play that same turn.
- Hoard decks can
regenerate their libraries by gaining life.
- The hoard can cast cards with "X" in its mana cost.
- Token cards aren't always creatures (i.e. Shocks in "
Five-Alarm Fire")
- Tokens aren't always 60% of the hoard deck. In fact, "Suffering Your Sins" has no tokens in the hoard.