For a while my friends and I were really into Smash Up which tried hard to simulate the TCG feeling without everyone needing their own deck and boosters.

Basic premise of the game is your deck is comprised of two different factions, and you play minions to attempt to capture the locations in play. But then all of the cards have specific rules to add twists to things. It’s been a few years since I’ve actually played it. The one thing I do remember is that you’ll need to be ready to make judgements on how the rules work a lot.

And since it’s been out for like a decade or more now, it has a bunch of expansions. And it’s designed for up to 4 players, so it’s nice to have expansions so the number of faction combinations increases exponentially and it doesn’t feel like everyone is always playing the same strategy over and over.