Today we interrupt your industrious Æmber-gathering to provide several very important details related to the KeyForge Master Vault. This information is of particular importance to players planning to enroll in competitive KeyForge organized play.

A Continuing Journey
A great deal of work has been done by Team Ghost Galaxy on the many complex facets that comprise KeyForge since we purchased KeyForge from Fantasy Flight Games in Summer ’22.

During the past year we have rebuilt (and substantially enhanced) the software tool that produces new KeyForge decks by using the Forgefire engine. In September ’22 we launched our first KeyForge crowdfunding campaign with Winds of Exchange, the first new KeyForge set in several years which is now shipping to backers. This January, we completed the work of transferring the KeyForge Master Vault (which stores KeyForge deck information and player registry) from Asmodee, and embarked on a substantial rollout of KeyForge Organized Play.

This work continues with a long-view in mind–and today we’re proud to announce several important features that we’ve been working on. You may recall earlier this year that we enabled Enhancements to be displayed on the Master Vault deck data. Today we launch several other important Master Vault features, detailed below.

Deck Ownership

The most innovative and amazing feature of KeyForge is surely the fact that every deck is completely unique in the world. This gives the game a host of advantages, but also presents challenges. In order to enjoy those advantages and tackle those challenges, we are today introducing the important concept of Deck Ownership in context of the Master Vault, KeyForge tournaments, and other services.

Starting today, when you scan a new deck on the KeyForge Master Vault you not only “discover” the deck, but you’ll be registered as the owner of that deck.

You are also able to rescan any previously scanned decks to claim ownership of those decks. It is recommend that players scan all their decks when able.

Wait, you mean I have to scan all my decks again?
Provided that you want to establish Master Vault Ownership of your decks, that is correct, we understand that many of you need to rescan a great number of decks to claim ownership. Keep in mind that as the FFG deck registry tracked only discovery, not possession, that this is a necessary step for the ownership concept.

More details on deck ownership may be found here.

Legacy Decks
All decks scanned by players prior to May 31st are found in their new Legacy Decks section on the KeyForge Master Vault, so all that previous data is intact.

Ownership Tournament Requirements
At official KeyForge tournament (starting with the upcoming Vault Tour), participants will need to either own the played deck(s), or the played deck(s) will need to be owned by one or more friends (see more on friends below). The Playstile tournament software we’ll be using, will check for ownership or friend connection for decks.

Ownership Advantages

Why go through the process of introducing Master Vault ownership?

Establishing ownership of a given deck allows Ghost Galaxy to solve certain challenges with respect to KeyForge and provide new services to players, such as:

Deck Copies
In the near future, Ghost Galaxy will allow deck owners to purchase custom-printed copies of their decks. These decks will feature a special border and text to indicate that they are copies. Deck copies will be allowed in official tournaments, provided the player has ownership of the original deck.

Deck copies can be important to players that have lost (or damaged) one or more cards of the original deck (which would otherwise would have left the deck unplayable in tournaments). Further, some players may not wish to play with an original, perhaps valuable, deck in tournaments. Making a deck copy gives such players an option to play with a copy instead.

Translated Copies
Many fun KeyForge decks are produced in a language different from your own. To better allow players to play foreign language decks, Ghost Galaxy will in the near future allow deck owners to purchase a custom-printed translated copy of a deck. For example, if you own an Italian deck, you would be able to purchase a translated copy in English of that deck.

Translated copies will feature a special border and text to indicating that they are translated copies. Translated copies will be allowed in tournaments, provided that the player has ownership of the original deck.

Foreign Language Decks in Tournaments
To resolve problems related to play of foreign language decks in tournaments, upon launch of the translated deck service only the local language and English decks will be allowed in official KeyForge tournaments (this detail will receive a more formal announcement in the future).

Theft Mitigation
We hope that introducing the concept of deck ownership will significantly discourage deck theft. Even if a deck would be stolen, the deck owner may purchase deck copies of the deck for use in tournaments (as deck ownership in the KeyForge Master Vault would not have transferred).

More to Come
In addition to the above benefits, deck ownership will allow Ghost Galaxy to provide other benefits and services to deck owners in the future, more to be announced later.

Master Vault deck ownership is subject to our Terms of Use.

Alliance Deck Builder

Today also sees the launch of a Master Vault tool allowing players to forge and store Alliance decks.

The Alliance feature allows users to choose three pods from up to three decks they own (or that their friends own). The tool allows users to name the Alliance deck and create notes on it. It will even allow users to select the desired token creature when selecting a Winds of Exchange Alliance. Go ahead and give it a try!

Digital Æmber

From the very first day of the KeyForge Master Vault, players have received “Æmber shards” for discovering decks. Ghost Galaxy will continue this tradition and have renamed “Æmber Shards” to simply “Æmber”.

As before, one Æmber will be granted for each “discovered” KeyForge deck (i.e. when a deck is registered for the first time in the Master Vault).

Friends

You may add another KeyForge Master Vault user as a friend to allow them to see your decks, play your decks in official tournaments, and to forge Alliance decks with your deck pods.

To share your deck with a friend, go to the “Friends” section and enter the friends’ user name in the primary field.

Event Keys

Official Ghost Galaxy events that feature cash prizes or act as qualifiers to cash prize tournaments (such as National Tournaments), will require the use of an Event Key by participants. Event Keys can be acquired in the Master Vault by spending 50 Æmber on your user profile page.

Upon registration at each official KeyForge tournament, one Event Key will be deducted from your Master Vault Account (you will need to have at least one Master Vault Event Key to register).

Why Introduce Event Keys?
Ghost Galaxy is spending substantial resources on our organized play (official tournaments) not least by offering a $150K prize pool to winners. These resources are intended for KeyForge customers.

That said, we understand that some players may not have the time or treasure to accumulate 50 Æmber for an Event Key. To that end, we have enabled the ability for players to purchase Æmber at a cost of $5 per 10 Æmber.

To kick off the ’23 season, we will be providing all Master Vault accounts a free Event Key, subject to the limitations of the callout below.

Winds of Exchange Deck Discovery

Thank you for continuing to support KeyForge! We hope that you’ll love these improvements to the Master Vault! We will continue to think of new ways to improve it and the experience you have with it.

We are sure that a number of questions will arise from these new options, so we plan to publish an FAQ in a few weeks.