Duelyst Forums

New Player Query

#1

I love card games, and digital card games eliminate the largest issues with physical card games, that of carrying around plenty of cards and having extras that nobody wants.

I used to play and enjoy Hearthstone, until their unfortunate decision to stop supporting all their cards in their ranked format. As someone who has played many card and collectible games…I was experienced enough to see it for what it was, a refusal to put in the work to balance their game. I’ve seen many, many games suffer and eventually die off because of this decision, so, rather than watch, I left Hearthstone.

Since then, I’ve been looking for a card game of some type that I could play again, but unfortunately, the games I have found are either making the same mistake, or are so small, that finding matches can easily take upwards of twenty minutes.

So my question here is…Will I have to worry that Duelyst will stop supporting all their cards in ranked? Do they do this already? I’m more than willing to support the game monetarily, as long as Duelyst is more than willing to balance their entire game, rather than a small subset. I hate nothing more than collecting things, and then being told that the things I collected are no longer allowed for competitive use.

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#2

New to card games, I take it? Splitting into formats is an inevitable point all ccgs/tcgs reach. At some point, there will be ‘too many cards’. So they split it up into Legacy and Current formats to make everyone’s life easier. It’s safe to assume down the line eventually Duelyst will take the same path.

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#3

I’ve heard such excuses before. However, there ARE card and collectible games that manage to balance their entire game just fine. It’s not an impossible task, simply a difficult one.

Can I trust Duelyst to try to balance their game or not?

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#4

Cards are regularly balanced through patches that happen usually midway through the month and at the end of the month. So basically 2 patches per month. Card changes don’t always happen and when they do happen its only a small amount of cards that are changed. But you can disenchant for full spirit value for about a week after the changes are made.

#5

I also think formats are a bullshit and just a bad excuse to justify poor balancing. About will duelyst have them? We don’t know as the game is still fairly young and only had one expansion (second one coming this month). I am pretty hopeful however considering how there’s no blatant powercreep in the game and how CPG isn’t scared to actively balance the cards.

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#6

Sadly enough, it’s often inevitable to put formats into card games.

The other way would be removing existing cards…
Nerf a lot of slightly better cards…
Flatten the personality of factions…

Nope, better formats than this. If i want to play chess i play chess

#7

The other way would be to balance all the cards. It’s been done before, it can be done here. It’s not inevitable, it’s just easier.

The other way is called NOT making anything OP, adding interesting mechanics, and keeping up on your game. Hearthstone COULD have done exactly this, but they took the easy way out instead.

Worth noting, that not only is formats lazy, but having a “modern” format, or however you call it, is also a cheap way to get extra money, as you’ve invalidated the old cards and new cards have to be obtained somehow. It forcibly incentivizes buying new cards more often.

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#8

I hope that the formatting doesn’t happen, but I am pretty sure that it will. It is just the way that most card games work. I had already quit playing HS a couple months before they had announced the formatting, but that made sure that I wasn’t ever going to start up again. I like playing gimmick decks and those often need extremely specific cards to fufill roles. Removing older cards will completely cripple or even paralyze some of these ideas. Most of these ideas are suboptimal to begin with and removing the pillars they are built on will make them completely unplayable.

For instance the Blistering Skorn changes. I agree that the card was a bit on the strong side, but I have a Control Vaath list that needed some 3 drops badly. If I don’t get my early removal spells I often have no plays for the first 2 turns and I end up overdrawing. Skorn was okay to be cost increased, but it hurt my deck far more than it hurt any others.

Even if they do decide to go with the Formatting thing, I think that we will all grumble and complain but keep playing anyway. There was an uproar when HS announced the changes, but I think the game is still strong as ever. With Duelysts generous income generation it isn’t as bad to start building up new collections.

I noticed a lot of Thumping Wave hate lately, and Formatting would mean the removal of it after a few expansions. But then we would also lose cards that everyone likes, such as Sunforge Lancer(major improvement for Healyonar), Allomancer, Sphere of Darkness, Moloki Huntress(Only thing making Grow decks playable), Frostburn, Zho(including all other BPets), Crescent Spear, etc…

#9

I don’t mind balance changes, even if they ruin a deck I enjoy.

I do mind being told X card is no longer allowed, not because of balance, but because the game makers decided to invalidate that card entirely, rather than balance it.

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#10

It is literally impossible to balance everything, short of actually banning cards completely.

#11

im not afraid of them doing the same things hearthstone did, im afraid thei do it the same way, hearthstone realeases an expansion every 6 months, this kills the f2p player that wants to stay free 2 play and keep up with having all card, i had all the 3 first expansions of hearthstone, i had most of the card they released but once they started doing more and more it became nearly impossible for me to keep up with the amount of time it took to have most of the cards from the expansion and being able to learn those cards and keep up with the meta. there is a point in wich i need to play a card to learn how to counter it, and this kind of overflowing amount of expansions kind of kills my type of playstile

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#12

It is at no point impossible. Never has been, never will be. It’s just hard.

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#13

Different formats don’t necessarily mean that the developer wasn’t able to balance his cards. Different formats are also there to create different meta-games. The bigger the card pool, the higher the power level of the decks (and by that also the quicker the games). And that’s nothing that you can circumvent just by balancing cards properly. You can’t add cards without increasing the strength of the possible decks.

So far Duelyst’s card pool is small enough for them to be able to balance everything as a whole instead of creating formats. We’ll see how that changes in the future. For now, join the fun. It’s one of the f2p friendliest games available

#14

That is untrue. You can add cards that do new things, rather than adding cards that are just more power. It’s been done, it can BE done.

#15

I think you’re wrong on this one. Decks don’t necessarily get stronger because new cards that are individually stronger are printed. Decks also get stronger because new cards that yield new synergies with existing cards are printed. I’d argue that you could do nothing but print completely balanced cards and still end up increasing the overall power level of the possible decks just because of synergistic effects.

Which game has expanded on its card pool without increasing the overall strength of what’s possible with said card pool?

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#16

By my oppinion of one month playing guy, Duelyst is a right choice. I came here from HS too, because its changing meta was too expensive for player like me, who dont give money for packs and everything else. In Duelyst it is better. Orbs has better drop rate of legendary and epics, you get better rewards in the en of the month, you can hit rank 5 with deck that costs 900 Spirit. At least try it and you will see it is good! :slight_smile: :smile_cat:

#17

Rotating cards out is necessary in the long run to keep the game fresh.

Take a certain mana cost. There is currently a best-in-slot card for that cost. In order to make a card from a new expansion replace that card as the new best-in-slot this new card must be better. If it is not better people will just continue to play the old card that they already have in their collection. So with each expansion cards will have to become powerful which inevitably will lead to power creep, which also essentially makes older cards unplayable over time.

In my opinion the least bad solution is actually to force the rotation of cards with a current and a legacy format like HS has done.

#18

If X is BIS for that mana slot…Then you add cards with different mechanics and synergies, NOT cards that are flat better. Common mistake.

Also, BIS is rarely possible if you’re balancing the game. At no point should any card be the best to put in X mana slot for every deck in the game. If there IS a card doing that (Do we all remember Doctor Boom, in HS?) Then it needs to be nerfed, not rotated out.

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#19

I am also opposed to formats. Of course, I might change my mind in 10 years.
But right now I am really opposed to it.

I think there’s a good chance they’ll try very hard to not require formats.
As for guarantees, I think there are none.

Of course, if they split the formats over the same game content and such, it may not be all that bad…
2 ladders, 2 guantlets, etc. I can be king of ‘old’ and a noob in ‘new’. Could be okay actually.

But, I am hoping for no formats :slight_smile:

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#20

Even if the old card and the new card will have different mechanics one of them will be stronger in a certain type of deck, one of them will be the new BIS for that deck and see play while the other one will not be played. Having two cards that are exactly the same power level is practically impossible in a game with stats based on integer values.

For example take the beloved Makantor Warbeast which is Magmar’s BIS for 6 mana. Suggest a new card that has exactly the same power level.