Need 6 & 7 before 8?
 

I am planning on purchasing the 8th Munchkin (HHWT) and was wondering if the 6th and 7th are required to have beforehand.

Re: Need 6 & 7 before 8?
 

You don't need either. 6 adds Dungeons and Portals, while 7 adds some extra-powerful cards designed with blending sets in mind. Neither will affect your Class/Race balance, so it's safe to skip them if you want. You will probably want all the other sets, though.

Re: Need 6 & 7 before 8?
 

Six and seven are kind of special cases.

Six is the Dungeon expansion, which adds a new mechanic to the game, but is pretty much totally self-contained and can be left out with no problems.

Seven is an expansion that is designed to facilitate mixing different sets together (or large numbers of expansions of one set). It can be skipped if you wish, but if you actually plan on using Munchkin 1-5 and 8 all in one game, it might be useful.

I'd also like to say, though I know there are those here that disagree with me, that I don't feel you NEED to get the expansions in order, regardless. The first expansion I got was 4, because I wanted steeds, then I got 5, then 3, then 2.

I never had any real problems playing with "missing" expansions. Sure, you got the occasional card that wasn't as useful, but given the number of things that are powered by discards, having an otherwise useless card isn't THAT bad. We didn't encounter any obvious balance issues, either. You can always tweak things a bit (removing race/class cards to balance the numbers, stuff like that) but I never did even that, and encountered no serious issues.

Re: Need 6 & 7 before 8?
 

If you're going to make a Super Deck, you may also want to pick up Monster Enhancers and Reloaded -- especially the latter, if you're going to be using HHWT.

Re: Need 6 & 7 before 8?
 

I got them in the order 8, all boosters, 5, 7, 6, then 2. My deck does lack steeds because I don't have 4 and I also am lacking 3, I did not get them in order because at shops around here Munchkin stuff is not easy to come by. I wish I would have though when I use friends decks that they got them all in order. Compared to several friends decks mine does feel off balance. 6 I wouldn't think would matter when you got it though since its so totally different.

Re: Need 6 & 7 before 8?
 

2-5 and 8 are "proper" expansions which add more classes and races, and cardtypes like Hirelings and Steeds, along with other cards, and altogether make all races and classes add up to 7 copies each.

6 is more of a "super booster" with 16 Door cards and 20 oversized Dungeon cards. It's also half the cost of a normal Expansion, as well.

7 doesn't add any classes or races, but acts to supplement everything by giving you cards like 1/3 Breed, Chimera, Ultra Munchkin, etc.

Marked For Death, Reloaded, and Monster Enhancers supplement the game; ME along with 7 completes the "Munchkin Blender Reprint"

Munchkin: Conan the Booster is a 15-card booster which effectively acts just like the first 3 boosters to supplement the deck, but adds a Conan flavor to the cards.

Waiting for Santa, Santa's Revenge, and Reindeer Games are variant packs which add a Winter Holiday flavor to the game. The Red and Green Jolly Jumbo D6s add cards onto this theme.

Fairy Dust and Munchkinomicon are standalone variants which have their own backs and their own specific rules (except for the Sparkly Good Fairy, who has a normal Munchkin back). Both are theoretically able to be play with any Munchkin version, without suffering from having "marked cards" like mixing 2 versions together (though Fairy Dust functions with the removing Curses, so it works best with Original/Fantasy Munchkin or Munchkin Cthulhu as no house ruling is needed therein)

Re: Need 6 & 7 before 8?
 

I'd recommend getting all the expansions in order, whenever you're able to, though you could wait on getting 6 & 7 later. They're special cases, as described by previous posters.

Munchkins 2 and 3 introduce new Races and a new Class, as well as containing extra copies of previous Race/Class cards, so it keeps everything even. Munchkin 4 also has more copies, and introduces Steeds & Hirelings. Munchkin 5 then has a new Class, extra Races, and more Steed & Hireling related cards. Munchkin 8 once again adds more Races and Steed & Hireling related cards. You should also get the Reloaded booster to go with 8, so you'll have a full set of 3 Race Enhancers and 3 Class Enhancers.

#5 is essentially a companion set to #4, and #8 is a companion set to both #4 and the Reloaded booster. It'll be a little weird to get any of them without the others, or to get them without owning #2 and #3 first. If that sounds good, then when you're ready, try out #6 and #7, and any other boosters you think sound tasty.

That's the way I see it. :)

Re: Need 6 & 7 before 8?
 

I currently have the classic set 1-4 and Im trying to get them pretty much in order. Im going to skip 7 because I dont really mix sets, though I do plan to get it later.

Re: Need 6 & 7 before 8?
 

You don't need to mix sets to play with M7. In fact, M1-4 is more than enough necessary cards to handle all the M7 Doors.