Quest Mode

[gohongohon]

Sorry i figured it all out.

So far i have only been playing Very Hard Mode and one thing I'm finding out is the decks are too hard. I understand it is very hard but they just have to much of an advantage because there decks are streamed lined. We get less cards to work with and we have to win 4 or lose 4 and i think that is far to much for playing with it. One option i was thinking is why do we play best out of 3 if there is no side boarding? I mean the way a human character sideboards is just know who we are playing and bring in the best cards for it. As for this shop i think maybe a shop would be best but you cant have the value of the card be what it is worth in the game because then one could build a great deck just by say getting a mox and selling for say 200 and buy whatever you need for a great deck so I'm not sure if that is a great idea. Also i think 15 cards pack are a great idea. Also i notice that when i do quest mode that red cards are normal low and i understand that packs are sometimes like that but it seem like the only color. I also dont see that much red removal i would add more red removal even if they are not exciting i mean that is why people run red because there creatures are not very good (atleast not in this game) Maybe add more shock's and hammers.

Im not sure but in our first pool are lands included in the opening pool for quest mode because if so that is taking way to many playable's for very hard mode. So how about something like this. 1R 1U 1C land for very hard mode and say Hard mode is 1R 2U 2C Normal mode 2R 2U 3C and Easy 3R 2U 2C but this would be like opening like a land booster. SO you get your Cards for Quest mode and then you get a land pack for that mode also. Because really on very hard mode and i see say 2-3 or my rares are lands i cant play with that because that land fixing is not worth say a bomb rare (outside of Library of Alex).

[DennisBergkamp]

Welcome to the forums!
Yes, we're still very much in the process of balancing Quest mode... then again, Very Hard should be really challenging, even though we should probably increase the card pool a bit.
Selling cards at the shop could maybe be only at half price, I wouldn't sell a Mox though if I'd get one
I haven't played Very Hard yet (not that masochistic), so I don't know how difficult it is.
I'll try and code maybe some more red removal cards one of these days (I've been adding mostly creatures lately, bad for the balance in quest mode ), or I could possibly add some algorithm which balances creatures / non-creature spells so there will be a higher chance of getting red removal.

[gohongohon]

Well lucky for you you have found a S&M freak (lol just a little humor) But yeah really with the new pool i have not found a decent deck to play in very hard mode. Im not asking much but 3 color decks in very hard mode is very rear and playing 4 color deck with very little fixing vs decks with perfect land base and perfect removal equals not a very far game. Really to keep a pool in very hard you need atleast 2-4 pieces of removal and really it almost makes you play black because it seems to have a lot of removal. Ohh not sure if it is a bug but Library of Alex is at uncommon and that is the best card you can hope for in quest mode. Atleast in my option really the only other card i would want to see in all or magic over that is Sol Ring which is not in the game.

[Chris H.]

We are glad that you found our forum and we look forward to your participation.

As Dennis stated, we are still very much in the process of balancing Quest mode. Gando has done some work creating a play balanced set of rarity files which should help to improve the card pool for the human player. There is also a set of original rarity files which can be used by people who want to have access to every card.

Gando, Rares and myself have created a number of decks for the computer to use against us. These decks may need some adjustment during this development process. We are still at a very early stage of development.

I have only played at the easiest level and I have chosen to play with the original rarity set. There is some differences seen in my various card pools. I recently went with a three color deck and stayed with it to the end. I won five out of five matches.

[gohongohon]

Well i have been playing magic for over 10 years and have ton of exp. Is there anything i can do to help you on the very hard mode like what stats would you like stuff like that. Im not sure if you have tried or talked about it but you are missing something in your steps and it is an important one. The step is after attackers are decleared and before blockers are decleared so we can flash blockers in and stuff like that. Like i said if there is anything i can help with just let me know. If it helps any im a high rated limited expert (this is draft and sealed) so if i can help i will

[Chris H.]

Well i have been playing magic for over 10 years and have ton of exp. Is there anything i can do to help you on the very hard mode like what stats would you like stuff like that. Im not sure if you have tried or talked about it but you are missing something in your steps and it is an important one. The step is after attackers are decleared and before blockers are decleared so we can flash blockers in and stuff like that. Like i said if there is anything i can help with just let me know. If it helps any im a high rated limited expert (this is draft and sealed) so if i can help i will

The development team on this forum can always use new members.

If you have any experience with programming in java, then I'm sure that the coders could use some help in this area.

With your experience in draft and sealed you may be able to help with the creation and balancing of decks that the computer AI can effectually use. We can use help in this area as we improve the quest mode.

A good place to start for anyone new to this forum would be to read some of the messages on this forum and on Rares blog site. This will help to introduce you to the other people and will make you familiar with the history of this game.

[gohongohon]

well i can tell you that the easiest way to make a deck very hard to play against and easy to play with is the land base. So if you wanted to make the modes different without changing the decks for every mode then i would just mess with the land base. I would make all the very hard mode decks all duel land out and i would make all the easy decks with just basic lands. Sadly I'm not a programmer so i can not help you there but i can build decks if you want and i could make the decks scale with every mode if you want.

"Easy" Basic Green White Agro Deck

26 Creatures:
4 Plated Sliver
4 Elvish Archers
4 Elvish Warrior
4 Muscle Sliver
4 Wild Mongrel
4 Sinew Sliver
2 Avian Changeling

10 Spells:
4 Elvish Fury
4 Giant Growth
2 Oblivion Ring

24 Lands:
12 Forest
12 Plains

Im not sure how well they will play this deck but i think it is a very good agro deck but i put flaws in on it if you dont draw a lot of slivers you will tend to lose to big bodies and if they have a lot of removal you can pick and choose want to do to crush it. Also there is no card advantage and really it is playing to many lands so it could get land flooded and it does not have a lot of removal. But it is also a deck you cant sleep on because really if it drops slivers first 3-4 turns you could be in a lot of trouble.

"Medium" G/W Agro

24 Creatures:
4 Savannah Lions
4 Plated Sliver
4 Muscle Sliver
4 Wild Mongrel
4 Sinew Sliver
4 Avian Changeling

14 Spells:
4 Elvish Fury
4 Giant Growth
4 Oblivion Ring
2 Glorious Anthem

22 Lands:
4 Treetop Villagers
8 Forest
10 Plains

For this deck i added more sliver types and added a great 1 drop in Loins to make the deck faster i also lowered the double green cost as it could lead to bad things. I added Manlands because they are hard to kill with board sweepers up the removal count and added a great 3 drop for the deck in anthem

"Hard" G/W/r Agro

24 Creatures:
4 Savannah Lions
4 Akrasan Squire
4 Muscle Sliver
4 Wild Mongrel
4 Sinew Sliver
4 Isamaru, Hound of Konda

14 Spells:
2 Lightning Helix
4 Giant Growth
4 Oblivion Ring
4 Glorious Anthem

22 Lands:
4 Treetop Villagers
6 Forest
6 Plains
4 Scared Foundry
2 Stomping Grounds

Here we are moving away form the slivers and starting to add even more 1 drops we also added Helix because it is just a great weapon and we changed the land base to support that but not all the way. We uped the Anthems for a little more late game. But really if this deck gets to the late game it really should not have much of a chance but we gave it a little on with the helix

"Very Hard" G/W/r (or Zoo) Agro

28 Creatures:
4 Savannah Lions
4 Akrasan Squire
4 Kird Ape
4 Wild Mongrel
4 Wild Nacatl
4 Isamaru, Hound of Konda
4 Sigiled Paladin

10 Spells:
4 Lightning Helix
4 Tribal Flames
2 Oblivion Ring
4 Chars

18 Lands:
4 Taiga
4 Savannah
2 Plateau
4 Scared Foundry
4 Stomping Grounds

Now i have droped all the slivers and this deck is just plan scary. it has great reach in the burn. Really low Curve soild mana base (though there is only 18 lands but really only need 2 lands to play most of the deck) The thing is in quest mode there is a really good chance this deck is way to good for it. If we do decks like this though we can keep all the pools the same because the decks just get harder and you are going to need more cards.

lol that took a long time tell me what you think and im sure i can come up with every kinda deck in this kinda mode. Also we could go with the idea that the higher lvl you get the harder your opp's are and i could put maybe lvls with all of them just up to you let me know what you would like me to do.

[GandoTheBard]

We do have a decks subforum where we are posting Quest deck candidates...feel free to drop these there along with the exported .deck files.

[Chris H.]

Wow, your deck designing skills are way above my own. We need to get you and Gando together to discuss these types of issues.

You should visit this thread on the decks forum and read some of the messages. You will see that we are still in an early stage of development.

http://www.slightlymagic.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=48&t=975

If you can find the time, you should place a file named "Edit" into your Forge folder and a menu will become available in the Quest Deck Editor. This will allow you to see the cards included for each of the computer's AI decks for quest mode.

You will also be able to create new AI decks and will be able to edit the existing AI decks. Rares, Gando and myself found it easiest to create/edit decks in the main Deck Editor and we then would import them into the Quest via the Quest Deck Editor menu. Try it out, it can be a lot of fun.

[gohongohon]

sorry i dont understand what you mean with the .deck files i just came up with them have not built them. But really the idea of my decks only work if we are going to do a lvling system or doing decks for only one mode if so i just need to know the system then i can turn out some decks and give them cool names and stuff like that. But i kinda like the idea that say lvl 0 players play the easy decks because like i said my very hard deck is only going to get a challenge from well built deck so say when you get to say world champion you can play this deck.

[Chris H.]

sorry i dont understand what you mean with the .deck files i just came up with them have not built them. But really the idea of my decks only work if we are going to do a lvling system or doing decks for only one mode if so i just need to know the system then i can turn out some decks and give them cool names and stuff like that. But i kinda like the idea that say lvl 0 players play the easy decks because like i said my very hard deck is only going to get a challenge from well built deck so say when you get to say world champion you can play this deck.

I am sorry that I failed to explain myself.

The Quest mode has a button that you can click on that takes you to a Deck Editor. The Deck Editor allows you to construct and edit the deck that you use against the computer while questing.

When you enter the Deck Editor there is a pull down menu named "Deck". This menu gives you a selection of choices: Open, New, Rename, Save, Copy, Import, Export, Delete, and Exit. These options work with the deck that you have created for yourself.

Place a file named "Edit" in your Forge directory. This file can be any useless file. The Forge game looks for a file named "Edit" in your Forge directory.

If the game finds this file a second hidden menu named "AI Deck" will appear next to the "Deck" pull down menu. The menu named "AI Deck" will give you similar options for creating and editing decks that the computer will use against you in quest mode.

Try this and have fun exploring the AI decks.

[gohongohon]

Does not seem to work i just made a file (txt.) called edit and not seeing it?

[Chris H.]

Does not seem to work i just made a file (txt.) called edit and not seeing it?

The file must be named "Edit" without the .txt extension.

I just zipped my edit file and I will attach it to this message. Click on the download link named "edit.zip", download this file and then un-zip the file. Place this file in the root directory of the Forge game. It must be in the same directory as the run-forge.jar JAR file program.

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[mtgrares]

gohongohon,
Usually MTG Forge is too easy, so I might have made "very hard", impossible, or at least not very fun to play. Personally I just used easy since I like getting new cards. Also you can continue to play more games once you get to level 10, you don't have to stop if you like your deck.

[GandoTheBard]

gohongohon,
Usually MTG Forge is too easy, so I might have made "very hard", impossible, or at least not very fun to play. Personally I just used easy since I like getting new cards. Also you can continue to play more games once you get to level 10, you don't have to stop if you like your deck.

Unfortunately this isnt so. Your deck will not work past match win 11.