Quest Mode: Guide to Formats, Worlds, and everything

[friarsol]

When you're at the stage you meet "hard" opponent, nearly every of them has a P9 , i could swear i had a battle with one that fielded 2 of them.

And it hurts a very lot when an AI gets them while you don't

He's a dumb AI, you are a human. Those decks are tuned to provide a challenge.

[Chris H.]

When you're at the stage you meet "hard" opponent, nearly every of them has a P9 , i could swear i had a battle with one that fielded 2 of them.

And it hurts a very lot when an AI gets them while you don't

 
Try playing for ante when you start meeting the hard oponents and you should be able to wim a few of those power nine cards for yourself.

[Fizanko]

When you're at the stage you meet "hard" opponent, nearly every of them has a P9 , i could swear i had a battle with one that fielded 2 of them.

And it hurts a very lot when an AI gets them while you don't

He's a dumb AI, you are a human. Those decks are tuned to provide a challenge.

Oh, it wasn't a criticism, to me it make sense that "hard" AI is hard. And in a card game in which luck play a part (as even with a powerful deck you're still subject to which random order the card of your library will come) the AI can then provide a big challenge as it's relying on that luck factor, allowing it to sometime get lucky and have an amazing streak of good card with some synergy between them that will annihilate the player.

Fortunately even them having a P9 or more does not always give them free win, as i edited my quest preferences when i started it so those hard AI only appear much later, by the time they appeared i have then be able to earn 2000+ card that are now in my stockpile, making me able to build very interesting and varied decks that can take on them.

Well, taking on several of them but not all, as some of the AI still can deploy insane cards that you can't do anything against and can destroy your powerful decks in less than 5 turns if luck favour them.

But still so much fun.

[Stampedo]

I haven't modified the quest preferences (yet), at this point getting credits and new cards is much slower.
My deck is far from being solid enough to compete with a "dumb AI" using completely broken cards, it removes a lot of the fun to me.

But yeah you're right, I could edit the preferences in order to fight these opponents much later.

[Fizanko]

Yes, to be honest when i tried the quest mode for the 1st time with the default setting i couldn't enjoy it, you have only weak cards in your stock, and so can build only weak decks for a too long time.

And because of that you're going to lose a lot at first, leading into too much money lost, while your few wins are only giving you few money.

So it will make for an even longer grinding to hope to get some better card or "fantasy advantages" to even the field with those AI using overpowered and very strong decks.

I only started to enjoy it when i discovered that before creating a new quest you could edit the preferences for it.

So i can only recommend you to start a new quest with modified preferences, you'll enjoy it then a lot more.

It does not remove the challenge at all, as some of the AI decks are really overpowered but what it will do is allowing you to actually build much better decks without having to grind a thousand of battle before fighting with a small chance to win against overpowered AI decks.
And you'll be able to get some more "fantasy" very expensive advantage to even the field a bit more.

Here's my current quest preferences if it can help :




To me it's a lot more fun like that.

[friarsol]

Generally when I start a new quest I do handful of things to make my deck play smoother, which is important especially in the early going when you may not have a lot of bombs:

1) Look through your pool and build a 40 card deck. (We consider Quest a limited environment, don't penalize yourself with a 60 card deck with 10 useless cards). Usually this is going to be 3 colors, but if you can pull off 2 with enough oomph behind it, even better. You should be customizing your deck around what you received, just like in sealed deck.
2) Sell basically everything else. While I understand not everyone wants to do this, you can make a good amount of money early just by selling off-color cards, and junk that would never make the cut. Sure if you want to build around a certain card later in the quest hold onto it, but this isn't a time to feel soft about pricey cards.
3) Turn on ante. Personally, it may suck losing cards, but it's a great way to gain rarer cards that you can't seem to find in the card shop, or are too pricey if they do show up there.
4) Buy some early fantasy advantages. Two in particular that I get no matter what quest I start is at least a level 2 plant, and a pet that fits my deck. Not only can you get a few swings in early, it can slow down your opponent tremendously. Making a match you would be overpowered in, one where you have enough time to stabilize.


We put the quest preferences there so people can tweak things to their own balancing. People certainly have different skill levels and different ideas of what they consider fun, so if you think you are lacking something out of the quest, go in tinker the numbers and try again.

[Fizanko]

The ante is something i completely overlooked so far in my 150 battles, i'll have to give a try to this now that i'm in the middle of the "hard" AI battles with the hope i can get my hand on one of the insane ones they have at that point of their game.

[Fizanko]

after trying, i can't find how to do an ante.
Pre-battle i see no option, and after pressing Start i see the ante panel, but there's no button, even dragging a card there does nothing ?

What is the normal procedure then ?

[friarsol]

after trying, i can't find how to do an ante.
Pre-battle i see no option, and after pressing Start i see the ante panel, but there's no button, even dragging a card there does nothing ?

What is the normal procedure then ?

It's in the normal preferences, as a global Forge setting.

[Fizanko]

Ah so it was there i see it now, thank you

[timmermac]

@fizanko: If you're looking for more range for preferences tweaking, quest.preferences is editable via text editor for a greater range of values than what the in-game editing function will permit.

Code: Select all

BOOSTER_COMMONS=11
BOOSTER_UNCOMMONS=3
BOOSTER_RARES=1
BOOSTER_FORMAT=Legacy (format)
PENALTY_LOSS=150000
CURRENT_QUEST=Heavies.dat
CURRENT_DECK=Heavies
REWARDS_BASE=25000
REWARDS_UNDEFEATED=250000
REWARDS_WINS_MULTIPLIER=0.625
REWARDS_POISON=50000
REWARDS_MILLED=40000
REWARDS_ALTERNATIVE=100000
REWARDS_MULLIGAN0=500000
REWARDS_TURN15=5000
REWARDS_TURN10=50000
REWARDS_TURN5=250000
REWARDS_TURN1=1500000
STARTING_BASIC_LANDS=20
STARTING_SNOW_LANDS=5
STARTING_POOL_COLOR_BIAS=6
STARTING_COMMONS_EASY=25
STARTING_COMMONS_MEDIUM=25
STARTING_COMMONS_HARD=25
STARTING_COMMONS_EXPERT=25
STARTING_UNCOMMONS_EASY=25
STARTING_UNCOMMONS_MEDIUM=25
STARTING_UNCOMMONS_HARD=25
STARTING_UNCOMMONS_EXPERT=25
STARTING_RARES_EASY=50
STARTING_RARES_MEDIUM=50
STARTING_RARES_HARD=50
STARTING_RARES_EXPERT=50
STARTING_CREDITS_EASY=999999999
STARTING_CREDITS_MEDIUM=999999999
STARTING_CREDITS_HARD=999999999
STARTING_CREDITS_EXPERT=999999999
WINS_BOOSTER_EASY=1
WINS_BOOSTER_MEDIUM=1
WINS_BOOSTER_HARD=1
WINS_BOOSTER_EXPERT=1
WINS_RANKUP_EASY=40
WINS_RANKUP_MEDIUM=40
WINS_RANKUP_HARD=40
WINS_RANKUP_EXPERT=40
WINS_MEDIUMAI_EASY=160
WINS_MEDIUMAI_MEDIUM=160
WINS_MEDIUMAI_HARD=160
WINS_MEDIUMAI_EXPERT=160
WINS_HARDAI_EASY=240
WINS_HARDAI_MEDIUM=240
WINS_HARDAI_HARD=240
WINS_HARDAI_EXPERT=240
WINS_EXPERTAI_EASY=320
WINS_EXPERTAI_MEDIUM=320
WINS_EXPERTAI_HARD=320
WINS_EXPERTAI_EXPERT=320
SHOP_MAX_PACKS=100
SHOP_SINGLES_COMMON=0
SHOP_SINGLES_UNCOMMON=0
SHOP_SINGLES_RARE=0
SHOP_WINS_FOR_ADDITIONAL_PACK=30
SHOP_STARTING_PACKS=1


As an example, this is what my preferences are currently set at. The credit value is the maximum allowed to start with, but it is possible to obtain more than that in the course of playing. Right now, I'm playing a quest where I want the only cards I get to be obtained through post-match rewards and pack purchases.

[Fizanko]

thanks, i didn't think about looking for the quest preferences saved file.

[Fizanko]

After winning a battle, as it has been a long time i didn't looked into the quest spell shop , and as i spared 2500 credits from many wins, i decided to look into it.

And to my surprise while checking the artifact category, what do i see in the middle of the available one : Mox Emerald , a P9 !

Wow, i thought it was lucky day as this would be excellent on one of my quest decks, the green themed one, so i decided to look at the price



Why are you so cruel dear developers ?

[timmermac]

And this is why I assign starting credits the value 999999999.

[Fizanko]

Looks like today joke is on me with Forge

I decided to play with antes to see if i could get some good cards from the "hard" AI overpowered decks, first round, the game convenientely decide to ante what is one of the best card of my deck, Rubblebelt Raiders ...

this card alone (well not alone of course, i meant playing this card) won me several matches.
Oh well, what kind of marvel the AI is anting ... a .. forest.

Really ? sigh, let's give this guy a test.
He plays an island and ... Mox Sapphire

Huh ? that already is going very very bad, a P9 on the first turn.

Let's get going, a few turns later ... Time Walk.
You got to be kidding me.

Of course i lost that round (and that nice card) as it was then a matter of turn the AI with then much more land/mana and creatures on the field would destroy what was left of my lives, while despite i had 26 lands (despite recommandation is usually 24) ! in my 60 cards deck i was mana deprived since the beginning with only 2 lands.

Really when you don't have luck on your side, you're in a world of hurt when you're fighting the Hard AI.
I guess i'll turn ante off, as losing one of my best card like that is not really making me happier.

Especially as i didn't purchased the fantasy advantage that put your lost ante cards into the spell shop, completely forgot about this, not my day today