Getting into a new trading card game like Magic: The Gathering or Pokémon, even as an expert in another one, is a difficult transition to make. If anything, moving from one game where you're an expert to another with a completely different rule set is harder than learning the game with no prior knowledge. This is where the starter pack comes in.

Starter packs for trading card games should offer a comprehensive guide to getting you up to speed with a new game. The card types, the board state, the mechanics, how to win, and everything in between. If, when you're done with a starter pack, you don't feel like you could move straight on to playing a casual game against another player, there's a strong case to be made that it's failed to do its job.

With more high-level trading card games around than ever before, I'm going to take a look at seven starter packs to see which one does its job the best.

Easily the worst starter set for a TCG right now is the Yu-Gi-Oh two-player starter set. This product is simply too basic, and if two complete newbies sat down to play their first game of Yu-Gi-Oh, they'd spend a lot of time consulting search engines to figure out whether they're playing right and how to resolve certain cards and actions.

This list will only contain official starter packs, kits, or boxes. No isolated starter decks will be included, and each game will feature only one product, using the most basic beginner's introduction as the representation.

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