The Ultimate Quest Mode Thread

[AlexFolland]

I have been playing quest mode a lot recently and I finally decided to unlock new sets. I had a ton of credits, so I unlocked a bunch at once, until Beta showed up alongside 3 other sets. I then unlocked something else that wasn't Beta (Modern Masters) since I didn't have quite enough money for Beta, and the "Unlock Sets" button disappeared. Is there something I'm missing here? Do I need to have a higher level to unlock a larger number of unlockable sets, or is this a bug? According to the Bazaar screen, I am level 39. If it is not a bug, it's a poor design decision, in my opinion, because things that appeared to be available to me suddenly weren't and there was no explanation.

Edit: I think I found the relevant value in the Quest Preferences, which is "Wins per Set Unlock". After changing it from 20 to 10, the "Unlock Sets" button came back. I am glad I figured it out. I just wish the UI's placement of the relevant information here was a bit more intuitive.

[Fizanko]

Got another one on my Zendikar quest.


First time i have a Jace, the Mind Sculptor surviving long enough to get 12 in loyalty, especially with those hard AI as opponents.

the decks i've been building (i'm just testing, it's not yet up to what i want, so many good blue card in zendikar, i'm not completely decided on many of them)

Sky Mentor | Open

1 Domestication|ROE
2 Explorer's Scope|ZEN
1 Goliath Sphinx|WWK
2 Gomazoa|ZEN
1 Halimar Depths|WWK
4 Hedron Crab|ZEN
1 Ior Ruin Expedition|ZEN
4 Island|ROE|2
4 Island|ROE|3
4 Island|ROE|4
4 Island|ZEN|5
2 Island|ZEN|6
4 Island|ZEN|8
1 Jace, the Mind Sculptor|WWK
2 Kraken Hatchling|ZEN
1 Lorthos, the Tidemaker|ZEN
3 Narcolepsy|ROE
1 Paralyzing Grasp|ZEN
1 Quest for Ula's Temple|WWK
2 Renegade Doppelganger|ROE
3 Roil Elemental|ZEN
1 Soaring Seacliff|ZEN
1 Sphinx of Jwar Isle|ZEN
1 Sphinx of Lost Truths|ZEN
1 Sphinx of Magosi|ROE
1 Spreading Seas|ZEN
1 Thada Adel, Acquisitor|WWK
3 Vapor Snare|WWK
3 Voyager Drake|WWK

The fun part is that during this round, the AI had a Jace, the Mind Sculptor deployed too, fortunately i got it a turn or two earlier and could break his game a couple of turn before he would

[Fizanko]

Finally got that Sarkhan one on my Zendikar quest


Here's the deck i built with that planeswalker in my quest :

Draconic Cult | Open

2 Agadeem Occultist|WWK
2 Akoum Refuge|ZEN
2 Bala Ged Thief|ZEN
2 Bojuka Brigand|WWK
2 Brink of Disaster|WWK
1 Burst Lightning|ZEN
1 Comet Storm|WWK
1 Corrupted Zendikon|WWK
1 Crusher Zendikon|WWK
2 Death Cultist|ROE
2 Dragonmaster Outcast|WWK
2 Explorer's Scope|ZEN
1 Hellkite Charger|ZEN
1 Highland Berserker|ZEN
1 Kargan Dragonlord|ROE
1 Kazuul Warlord|ZEN
1 Kazuul, Tyrant of the Cliffs|WWK
2 Lavaclaw Reaches|WWK
2 Lord of Shatterskull Pass|ROE
1 Marsh Casualties|ZEN
1 Mire's Toll+|WWK
1 Mordant Dragon|WWK
2 Mountain|ROE|3
4 Mountain|ZEN|7
4 Mountain|ZEN|8
2 Nimana Sell-Sword|ZEN
1 Quest for Pure Flame|ZEN
1 Quest for the Gravelord|ZEN
1 Sarkhan the Mad|ROE
4 Swamp|ZEN|6
2 Swamp|ZEN|7
4 Swamp|ZEN|8
2 Tuktuk the Explorer|ROE
1 Zektar Shrine Expedition|ZEN

Rather powerful planeswalker.

[Megabiquette]

Hi everyone, I started playing Forge yesterday. I started in quest mode with the medium difficulty level.
So I played like 1 day and a half and now I'm level 6-7 and the AI decks are insanely difficult to play against. My 40 cards deck is still a sealed pool with some good cards in it but certainly not good enough to fight those decks.
Any advices on this? Am I supposed to build a competitive constructed deck ? Good cards are really hard to find in shops and winning boosters only provide worthless vintage cards.
Thanks for any help!

[Fizanko]

I guess you started the quest in "Main World".

What you can do if you can get any good card to build your decks in Main World is to play in another world by just now click on the "Travel" button and go to another.

The rewards will be less varied (as other worlds are dedicaced to specific sets/blocks, in opposition to Main World that has nearly every cards available in the whole history of MtG) but then you'll have more chances then to get the other world stronger cards more often in reward/spellshops

[Megabiquette]

Thanks for your answer. I'm thinking about creating a new quest game with only modern cards. Is that a good idea or would I lose too much power level against the AI? Also, it would be great idea to be able to restraint the format of the AI decks.

[friarsol]

Thanks for your answer. I'm thinking about creating a new quest game with only modern cards. Is that a good idea or would I lose too much power level against the AI?

Quest mode is many things to different people. I suggest you try it many different ways. Explore the items in the Bazaar, explore ante, tinker with quest preferences and reward pools.

[Fizanko]

You're not losing much in term of potential power if you setup only Modern , the modern format has still many very strong cards in the many sets it's using

Modern at the time | Open

Eighth Edition
Mirrodin
Darksteel
Fifth Dawn
Champions of Kamigawa
Betrayers of Kamigawa
Saviors of Kamigawa
Ninth Edition
Ravnica: City of Guilds
Guildpact
Dissension
Coldsnap
Time Spiral
Planar Chaos
Future Sight
Tenth Edition
Lorwyn
Morningtide
Shadowmoor
Eventide
Shards of Alara
Conflux
Alara Reborn
Magic 2010
Zendikar
Worldwake
Rise of the Eldrazi
Magic 2011
Scars of Mirrodin
Mirrodin Besieged
New Phyrexia
Magic 2012
Innistrad
Dark Ascension
Avacyn Restored
Magic 2013
Return to Ravnica
Gatecrash
Dragon's Maze
Magic 2014
Theros
Born of the Gods
Journey into Nyx
Magic 2015
Khans of Tarkir

But take note that in "Main World" many hard opponents decks are making use of vintage cards, like those "power nine" that aren't legal in modern (so you're not going to get any if you set your preferences to modern).

But hopefully you'll get your hands with good enough cards by the time you'll reach there.

[HarlequinCasts]

You're not losing much in term of potential power if you setup only Modern , the modern format has still many very strong cards in the many sets it's using

Modern at the time | Open

Eighth Edition
Mirrodin
Darksteel
Fifth Dawn
Champions of Kamigawa
Betrayers of Kamigawa
Saviors of Kamigawa
Ninth Edition
Ravnica: City of Guilds
Guildpact
Dissension
Coldsnap
Time Spiral
Planar Chaos
Future Sight
Tenth Edition
Lorwyn
Morningtide
Shadowmoor
Eventide
Shards of Alara
Conflux
Alara Reborn
Magic 2010
Zendikar
Worldwake
Rise of the Eldrazi
Magic 2011
Scars of Mirrodin
Mirrodin Besieged
New Phyrexia
Magic 2012
Innistrad
Dark Ascension
Avacyn Restored
Magic 2013
Return to Ravnica
Gatecrash
Dragon's Maze
Magic 2014
Theros
Born of the Gods
Journey into Nyx
Magic 2015
Khans of Tarkir

But take note that in "Main World" many hard opponents decks are making use of vintage cards, like those "power nine" that aren't legal in modern (so you're not going to get any if you set your preferences to modern).

But hopefully you'll get your hands with good enough cards by the time you'll reach there.

Ah I guess this explains it for me. I started out questing in the main world, did really well, and then went off to some of the more recent sets like zendikar. When I came back to the main world, all my opponents were hard difficulty and basically playing full on vintage decks.

I can't help but feel like from a player experience point of view this is needlessly difficult and its easy to trap yourself by leveling too fast if you start with a decent pool. Playing duels in the main world is basically suicide for me now but I guess I get cards doing it :/

[phenox1707]

So yeah, in follow up to HarlequinCasts' question and comments, how would you Forge veterans suggest someone go from pretty much only knowing standard decks to being able to long term play quest mode? If I make a pool of Vintage/Legacy cards, how do I make a cohesive deck if I don't know what's good really? Or, I guess a better question is how do I know what a good deck to shoot for is? I can make a deck out of a pool of cards but I have no clue what to expect once the AI gets ramped up a bit.

[mastroego]

I've started more than a year ago not knowing even "standard" decks.
The only way to learn about cards and decks is by patience and actual play.

Quest difficulty, especially in the main world, will increase quite fast: your average card quality won't be able to keep pace at first.
So, either you are very, very good at creating effective decks with average cards, or you'll need to even the odds a bit by buying pets, plants, the free mulligan and so on from the bazaar.

At some point the difficulty will peak and from there it can only get better as long as you acquire more cards, which will get easier with better prices, the ability to buy Fatpacks and now even more affordable booster boxes.

In my "main" quest I have by now several blocks at 100% and more than 30,000 cards, after about 2800 matches. I keep playing this quest as a way to "collect" the history of magic, building decks from ever an increasing card pool.
Once in a while I try and start a new quest to get more comfortable with a specific block or subset of cards, in order to learn new tricks and improve/expand the other decks. Of course scouting the Internet for decks popular in a specific time helps too (right now I'm doing a Theros quest).

[Fizanko]

If you're playing a "Main World" quest (and not another world specific quest as the problem isn't really hitting other worlds) and you don't find interesting to play vs opponent with decks filled with lots of vintage cards, a possible solution is to increase a very lot the amount of wins you need to have against medium difficulty before the game switch to hard opponent.

This way you'll be able to keep playing the format you prefer without the full on vintage of the "main world" hard opponents.

To do so , change the settings from there :


Unfortunately the max value is hardcoded to 100 (and if you play Forge a lot, 100 wins can come faster than one think ) so to work the settings the way you really want, you'll have to edit the file named quest.preferences (you can open it with any text editor , even notepad)
that is located in
C:\Users\<yourusername>\AppData\Local\Forge\preferences\
or
C:\Users\<yourusername>\Application Data\Roaming\Forge\preferences\
or
C:\Documents and Settings\<yourusername>\Application Data\Forge\preferences\
depending on your OS
<your home directory>/Library/Application Support/Forge/preferences/
for OSX

The values you can change are :
WINS_HARDAI_EASY=...
WINS_HARDAI_MEDIUM=...
WINS_HARDAI_HARD=...
WINS_HARDAI_EXPERT=...
WINS_EXPERTAI_EASY=...
WINS_EXPERTAI_MEDIUM=...
WINS_EXPERTAI_HARD=...
WINS_EXPERTAI_EXPERT=...

the advantage is that there's no hardcoded limit to 100, so you can input very high values if you wish to push back the appearance of main world vintage-friendly hard opponents (or make the value so high you'll never face them) .

But a problem is that the settings apply for every world, not only main world, and as i mentionned the full-on vintage P9 etc... is only really a "main world" situation, other worlds have hard AI decks that are mostly filled with strong card of the corresponding world

A better solution in my opinion would come from the code side, i mean when you reach the required amount of win value , instead of switching to hard/very hard opponent, you would have some kind of "ascension" button (the same way there's an unlock button to unlock other sets) that when pressed would switch the opponent to hard.

This way you would only really switch to hard when you think your decks are ready (or if you just want) or could just play medium AI forever if you'd like to.
I think that would be the best solution as everybody would win then and it wouldn't impact other worlds like changing to high settings would

[Megabiquette]

Another question, on the forums, some people mentionned being on worlds I don't see in the travel menu (Theros, for example). How to get those worlds?

[Fizanko]

Theros can be downloaded there :
viewtopic.php?f=48&t=9457&start=105#p153680

Someone else made some challenges for the Theros world :
viewtopic.php?f=48&t=9457&start=135#p162405

[Megabiquette]

Thanks! Also, maybe not the right topic but how can I see other side of Innistrad's flip cards?
Is there a user guide somewhere that answers that kind of questions?