Any tips for absolute beginner?

[LPMalakye]

I'd like to preface that besides Gen1 Pokemon from when I was a kid, I have never played a battle game using trading cards, I came across this game purely by accident in my recommended the other day. I was immediately hooked so hard that im looking into more TCG's but I have seen first hand how hard this one can be and was wondering if anyone has some advice for a new player to the genre?
Thanks for your responses

[Lavie]

Hi!

You have many guides for beginners on Youtube. I don't know witch is the best, but for example:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YdHxlG8AKv8&list=PLLZqXZAwfuGc7_FRNiGOI4OBFyy_ASzmv

And play play play... The game really need you to know the patterns of elites and boss.

Good luck!

P.S. After more then 1500 hours, I'm still losing most of my runs, but it's still really fun because I feel I'm learning new little things each run.

[Corlindale]

The most important advice is to train yourself not to think in terms of building a specific type of deck when you start a run. Instead, think about which cards that will improve your deck as it currently is.

Also, beginning players often make the mistake of avoiding energy relics because the drawbacks sound harsh, but it's important to remember that extra energy is extremely valuable, and that the negative effects of the relics can often be mitigated.

[Hundinger]

This is a great guide too:

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2673443183

Originally posted by Corlindale:

The most important advice is to train yourself not to think in terms of building a specific type of deck when you start a run. Instead, think about which cards that will improve your deck as it currently is.

Can't stress this enough.

[LHGreen]

Yeah, there's one thing you need to understand above all else: this isn't a TCG. It's a roguelike. The card thing is largely for flavor, although the creators were supposedly inspired and influenced by Netrunner. Anyway, this isn't a TCG, so don't play it like one. The kind of min-maxing, most-cards-are-crap strategies and mindsets that win tournaments there will get you killed here. And the things they tell you not to do there (like having a balanced deck rather than a hyper-focused one) are actually really good approaches here. If you've ever played draft or sealed formats in CCG's, this is more like that. Everything is upside-down, in a way, so forget what you learned from the Pokemon TCG. This works much differently. Good luck.

Originally posted by Hundinger:

This is a great guide too:

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2673443183

Lol, beat both mldb88 AND me to posting that.

[Zero]

compress your deck
compress your deck
compress your deck

[LPMalakye]

Wow! Thank you all for the advice ^^ Ill look through and read the guides you provided but I have a question about the compressing of decks. Everytime I come across a new card its like candy I keep hoarding them thinking Ill need it. So should I look up like loose builds because its RNG or stick to specific builds and try to survive while building it? Again thanks for all the advice it really helps.

This is the first time Ive played or seen a game like this and its so addicting lol

[Hundinger]

Originally posted by LPMalakye86:

Wow! So should I look up like loose builds because its RNG or stick to specific builds and try to survive while building it?

Never go into the game with a plan for a specific build. The guide I linked explains this very well. I often made and sometimes still make the mistake of grabbing a card that was great in a former run, but is very dependent on cards that synergize with them, hoping the synergizing cards would emerge. More often than not they don't. Early on it's advised to grab the best damage cards the rng offers you and then take cards on the basis of what you already have. Cards, that are very strong in the later game, can be dead weight early on, often due to their high cost or simply because they don't do a lot without supporting cards.

[LHGreen]

Originally posted by Zero:

compress your deck
compress your deck
compress your deck

Make it as efficient as possible, yes, but that doesn't mean it has to be outright small.

Originally posted by LPMalakye86:

Everytime I come across a new card its like candy I keep hoarding them thinking Ill need it.

Lol, I still do that, to some extent. And it does work. But you have to remember, especially at the beginning, to prioritize what your deck does need, NOW, over what it might need, later.

[Corlindale]

How to approach new cards will also vary depending on where you are in the game. Most starting cards are bad, so early on you want to pick a lot of fights and add better cards. But the better your deck becomes, the greater the risk that an added card will dilute your well-oiled machine instead of improving it. Ask yourself if any of the offered cards will improve your deck as it is. And if not, don't be afraid to skip.

Be particularly vary of picking a 'dangling combo piece' - ie. a card that only shines in a particular synergy which you do not have (and may never find!). That's almost as bad as adding a curse to your deck.

[LPMalakye]

Thanks guys ^^ Ill be looking at those guides now but I appreciate all the help. The biggest thing (obviously) is HP management. I've noticed I get really weak if I sleep instead of upgrade lol but Seriously thanks again. This game has been kicking my a**

[Corlindale]

Glad we can be of help! And don't stress out about your troubles, the game has a bit of a learning curve, but if you stick with it you will improve. I definitely made many, many mistakes starting out,haha. HP management can be tricky, but once you get more experience you will be better at judging when you genuinely need the heal or when you can safely upgrade.

[mldb88]

Lol finally a nice wholesome thread. Was getting tired of sounding like an ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ lmfao.

As a lot of people have already said, the biggest beginner's trap you can fall into is going into a run saying "I'm going to build an [X] deck" this run. I personally fell into it for a long time when I started (huge MTG background so I ended up playing it a lot like a TCG).

As for a few other tips:

-Don't be afraid of elites, especially in Act 1. The relics you get for killing them can provide a huge power boost for little risk. I usually shoot for 2 elites minimum in Act 1, but it depends on how the run is going.

-Plan ahead. This one will probably take some time and just come more with learning the game, but try to plan ahead for potential future encounters/elites/bosses. For example, if you see the Act 1 boss is going to be guardian and come across a flame shield, it might be a good defensive pick since Guardian does a lot of multi hits.

-Don't always feel like you have to be at full HP. HP management is probably one of the harder things to get down, but it'll get easier as you start to get a better idea of what each enemy is capable of. While I was still learning, I usually went with a general rule of leaning more towards upgrading if you're above 50% HP with 0-1 elites before your next rest spot in Act 1, and 60-70% for acts 2-3 (assuming you have a card worth upgrading). This isn't really a hard and fast ALWAYS DO THIS type of thing, just more of a way to ease yourself out of over-healing, and then adjusting on a case by case basis as you get more comfortable.

-Learn what the enemies can do. This is huge since it lets you plan ahead and know what cards that you can take now might help later (for example taking a pummel or sword boomerang before act 2 for birds if you don't have a lot of cards that his all or multiple enemies already). It's probably the biggest part of the game's difficulty early on.

-Treat every run as a learning experience. Go into each run more with the mindset of having fun and experimenting with card interactions/relics/just seeing how far you can get rather than "this is the run I'm gonna beat it". Not only does it make the game far less frustrating when things do go south, but it also promotes experimentation and trying strategies you might have been too afraid to try out otherwise (Exhume cards on Ironclad for example, or taking energy relics that have a downside and realizing there's ways to mitigate some of them).

-Don't focus too much on deck size. I hear a lot of people give the advice to trim your deck down super small, or as mentioned even in this thread, compress your deck. This honestly is more a matter of playstyle and specific to what your deck is trying to do than a hard and fast rule. I've had decks with 12 cards that were focused on cycling through and hitting my big damage threat over and over, I've also had 35 card decks that were more focused on being a bit of a toolbox answers for multiple situations with a few chunky damage cards to take out threats. I tend to go more thick (25+) is most of my runs, but there's no real "correct" answer when it comes to the ideal deck size. As a general rule I usually shoot between 15-35 unless I'm actively aiming for an infinite combo. Where this advice DOES kind of come in consistently though is regarding your starting strikes and defends. You'll want to trim as many of those as you reasonably can in a run. Whether to prioritize strikes or defends depends on the character and what your deck is looking like at a given moment. It's not essential to clear out ALL of them, and there are some cases you'll want to keep them around like for Perfected Strike if you grabbed one or two early, or if you got the strike dummy relic and need the little bit of extra damage.

If you want more in-depth stuff or live breakdowns of reasonings behind when to take what cards, check of Baalord on youtube. He explains a lot of what's going on in his head with the decision making and planning during his runs, and while a lot of it might be a bit advanced in terms of just having that massive amount of game knowledge he's drawing off of knowing what risks are worth it, it'll help with understanding the type of general mindset to approach deckbuilding with.

[Banzai]

Originally posted by LPMalakye86:

Thanks guys ^^ Ill be looking at those guides now but I appreciate all the help. The biggest thing (obviously) is HP management. I've noticed I get really weak if I sleep instead of upgrade lol but Seriously thanks again. This game has been kicking my a**

Lot of good advice above, but I would suggest that actually finding the combos and synergies is one of the joys of this game so maybe dont give yourself too many spoilers unless you really need them. Always watch out for cards that make other cards (and relics) better. Also you dont always have to take a card as a battle reward if it doesnt fit with your deck.

Good luck!

[LHGreen]

Lol, oh, also, just to make sure we don't have to go through this again, there IS information about interactions in the game that's sort of hidden, so they never mention it in the game. For example, any effects that specifically require a certain amount of damage or hp loss to trigger WON'T do so when that number is 0, regardless of whether or not it seems like it should due to the wording of the rule as it's written. Of course, many people would just assume this, and the ones who wouldn't are the kind of people who would test this and understand that, no matter what the result was, it was almost certainly a deliberate design choice on the part of the developers, so you'd think this wouldn't be enough of an issue to warrant mentioning. But you might be surprised at just how ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ stupid some people can be!

Other examples include: effects which create cards (like Dead Branch or Discovery) will NEVER create cards that heal. And the niche example that you can't "Exhume" an Exhume card.

Originally posted by Corlindale:

Most starting cards are bad,

I'd like to amend this by saying that the starting strikes and defends are bad. The non-strikes and defends you get are not only usually pretty decent or even good, but they're also unique, and the only way to get more of them is in the card duplicate or gremlin card match events.

Originally posted by Banzai:

I would suggest that actually finding the combos and synergies is one of the joys of this game so maybe dont give yourself too many spoilers unless you really need them.

Lol, not strictly necessary, but I like this advice.

[Cress]

The game can be very unforgiving and the learning curve is steep... it's like chess- easy to learn, impossible to master. Have fun while playing and expect to lose a lot while learning (especially when you begin climbing ascension levels). If/when you get frustrated or feel lost, check out Baalorlord on YT and your gameplay will improve, guaranteed or your money back!