Spent some gold today on 3 packs, pulled this lovely elfy ooze from it! Glad you had this guide up because I'm going to see what I can build around her as well and you bet I'm going to cherry pick your ideas.
I feel like this is testing the waters for Arena for back-filling the historic slot to be closer to table top. I'm like you though, I want to concentrate on cards with more than one format.
Sure, if you build one or two top competetive decks, you can achieve it (but still only one or two).
But if you want to explore the game and play wacky decks, you cannot do it, because the cards are extremely expensive and also you will meet only very competetive decks as people mostly do not have resources to put together fun ones.
So yes, if you play netdecks only and it suits you, MTGA is fine, if you want to explore the game deeper, you cannot.
In paper magic you can get the "bad" cards extremely cheap, in MTGA a very bad mythic costs you the same as the very best.
This is true about crafting 'fun' cards. They are the same expense as a tier 1 card. However the same is true for HS. My experience so far is that budget decks are easy to put together. You can get a lot of mileage out of common and uncommon cards, and I'm overrun with white and silver wild cards. Gold and epic are another thing entirely, and as I said I have been annoyed ever since old school magic that the needed lands for top tier are always rare.
It does have a crafting system. There's no DE system but you earn wildcards either from packs or slowly from opening packs. I've spent about 30$ total on the game since I started playing a few months ago and have some pretty competitive decks.
Down points for the game are the expensive land cards, which are needed for top tier decks but aren't terribly exciting to spend your craft budget on.
Up points for the fact that crafting a card lets me use it in countless decks. If I made a priest card in HS I can only play it in priest decks. This makes my cards feel like they are a little more valuable.
All in all the whole system feels a lot less predatory than the paper version since you never have to get into bidding wars for cards. The gold system is fairly quick to build up packs and if you invest in a mastery pass you get a good flow of rewards for continued play.
My last down point is in the short time I was playing the ban system can really destroy decks. For instance my mono-black sac deck was really ripped apart by the ban of the Cauldron Familiar. It's still playable but I crafted a pretty good amount of cards for that deck and was refunded very little.
HS is more economical if you are completionist but you can cheaply play MTG too. Especially if you jump in during a new expansion and buy a mastery pass, great value. If you complete the mastery levels and watch the shop you should never need to spend that much cash again to have enough gems to purchase the pass for the next season.
Sort of wish I didn't craft a few pieces for my blue/green draw token deck two days ago. That growth spiral ban hit it hard :P Not going to argue it wasn't needed, but I don't like the surprise bans.
I'm looking forward to the rotation a lot. I have been careful with my crafting and packs to really only invest in future standard cards. I started playing in Ikoria and realized that the rotation wasn't too far off. I like to feel like I get the most out of my investment. Soon I will be crafting standard cards with no restrictions!
Oooo, was trying to figure out what you could do with jumpstart cards! Generals is cool. I got the devil that causes players random draws and discards. That could be fun.
Spent some gold today on 3 packs, pulled this lovely elfy ooze from it! Glad you had this guide up because I'm going to see what I can build around her as well and you bet I'm going to cherry pick your ideas.
I feel like this is testing the waters for Arena for back-filling the historic slot to be closer to table top. I'm like you though, I want to concentrate on cards with more than one format.
Needs moar promo codes! <_<
Cool looking art though.
This is true about crafting 'fun' cards. They are the same expense as a tier 1 card. However the same is true for HS. My experience so far is that budget decks are easy to put together. You can get a lot of mileage out of common and uncommon cards, and I'm overrun with white and silver wild cards. Gold and epic are another thing entirely, and as I said I have been annoyed ever since old school magic that the needed lands for top tier are always rare.
It does have a crafting system. There's no DE system but you earn wildcards either from packs or slowly from opening packs. I've spent about 30$ total on the game since I started playing a few months ago and have some pretty competitive decks.
Down points for the game are the expensive land cards, which are needed for top tier decks but aren't terribly exciting to spend your craft budget on.
Up points for the fact that crafting a card lets me use it in countless decks. If I made a priest card in HS I can only play it in priest decks. This makes my cards feel like they are a little more valuable.
All in all the whole system feels a lot less predatory than the paper version since you never have to get into bidding wars for cards. The gold system is fairly quick to build up packs and if you invest in a mastery pass you get a good flow of rewards for continued play.
My last down point is in the short time I was playing the ban system can really destroy decks. For instance my mono-black sac deck was really ripped apart by the ban of the Cauldron Familiar. It's still playable but I crafted a pretty good amount of cards for that deck and was refunded very little.
HS is more economical if you are completionist but you can cheaply play MTG too. Especially if you jump in during a new expansion and buy a mastery pass, great value. If you complete the mastery levels and watch the shop you should never need to spend that much cash again to have enough gems to purchase the pass for the next season.
Sort of wish I didn't craft a few pieces for my blue/green draw token deck two days ago. That growth spiral ban hit it hard :P Not going to argue it wasn't needed, but I don't like the surprise bans.
I'm looking forward to the rotation a lot. I have been careful with my crafting and packs to really only invest in future standard cards. I started playing in Ikoria and realized that the rotation wasn't too far off. I like to feel like I get the most out of my investment. Soon I will be crafting standard cards with no restrictions!
Witches and trees was a fun combo deck!
I proclaim warrior/paladin the most hideous color class combo.
It's adorable!
SNIPE! Listen, fool! You've fallen right into my trap!
Which might be the point. Low cost AoE would make this absolutely insane. In the meantime have fun with explosive trap.
Art is just out of theme entirely for Shaman. I feel like this got very deep in design before they swapped it from Mage to Shaman.
Warlock/Priest: 5 mana. Destroy all Protesters and Remove Freedoms from Hong Kong. Silence Remaining Minions.
Oooo, was trying to figure out what you could do with jumpstart cards! Generals is cool. I got the devil that causes players random draws and discards. That could be fun.
There has been very few art purchases I've made so far but I'll probably save up for a week to get these. They are pretty.
What do you do with the cards you earn when you win?
Good deal to pick up some gems, even if you are planning to just sit on them until you have a reason to spend them. All the extras are a nice bonus.
Don't know the history of Arena too well but there are a lot of play modes. I wonder if things like Brawl started out as a limited time event.