Harry Potter Trading Card Game

The Harry Potter Trading Card Game is an out of print collectible card game published by Wizards of the Coast, based on J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter novels. It was released in August 2001 to coincide with the theatrical premiere of the first Harry Potter film. Two players each build a 60 card deck and try to force the opponent to run out of cards to draw, echoing the deck depletion win condition used in several trading card games of the era. Players start with a seven card hand and draw one card at the start of each turn. Progress in a game is driven by a Power system built around Lesson cards, which players use to pay for other cards, alongside eight card types: Lessons, Spells, Creatures, Characters, Adventures, Items, Matches and Locations, each contributing a different tactical option to a deck. The game competed directly with Pokemon, Yu-Gi-Oh! and Magic: The Gathering in the children's and young adult card game market, and at its commercial peak it ranked as the second best selling toy in the United States before Wizards of the Coast discontinued the line.