I'm at level 16 and I'm finding it very frustrating that it is so difficult to streamline my decks. The monsters have very small, stream-lined decks and very large hand-sizes which allow them to dish out very reliable high damage while various power token and item slot restrictions bloat the player decks with a lot of crap (or very situational) cards. There are 3 dominant techniques all of which I find very boring to employ: 1 - rely heavily on card-drawing cards - you can really churn through your deck if you stack as many of these as possible - this greatly increases the chance of getting your damage cards or that one card you need to make something happen on a given turn. 2 - repeatedly pass until you have the pefect hand to engage the enemy (not always an option but very powerful against certain foes). 3 - restart the mission until you get the perfect opening hand. I find all of these methods tedious. I'd really like some more deck streamlining options - like the removal the "racial" skill slot or allowing another class skill to be placed in that slot... or perhaps making all racial skills not require a power token of any kind. I'm starting to get so sick of the feeling that my hand draws are clunky and full of garbage while the monsters have such slick and reliable decks - to the point that I regret putting money into this game.
Your post makes me think of this adage: one man's trash is another man's treasure. I'm sure you can find some new and interesting ways to use your weaker cards so that they are not wasted. Not every hand can be a royale flush. A player must simply do the best they can with the cards they've been dealt. In my opinion, the fact that I can't make ever card in my deck be powerful is a good thing for the game. Contrary to what you've said, I think it actually encourages interesting strategies and a great deal of variety. And it especially adds a lot of strategy to the deck-building side of the game. If it was possible to just remove all the weak cards from a deck, then there would be no need to ever use or even think about using any weak cards other in the very early levels of the campaign. The game would be dramatically reduced to just a handful of powerful cards which get used on every round of every match. Don't you agree?
The problem is the extreme predicability (and power) of the monster decks vs the cluttered player decks - too often within one or two turns on a hard map, the outcome is a forgone conclusion. Without changing the player's side, if the monster side was similarly cluttered with crap then the player may have incentive to play out several bad hands. The way it is now, it is pretty obvious when a player is doomed and gambits aren't worth playing out. I keep a ton of extra gear on hand and tweak my deck after a defeat to prey on the monster weaknesses, but on tough maps, eventually it just comes down to playing the same match over and over until the first few hands play out in my favor - and thats just not fun. If decks could be stream-line JUST A BIT MORE, then it would more about strategy and adjusting your deck for certain maps, rather than replaying until you get several decent draws in a row. Alternatively the monster decks could be a bit more bloated with garbage like the player decks, like I mentioned earlier. If only the monsters had to follow the same deck building constraints... Overall my point is that as the maps increase in difficulty it makes the player rely more on replays and luck, rather than actually fully rewarding careful deck construction (with the exception of card-drawing cheesiness). I'd rather play a game more focused on the latter rather than the former, don't you agree?
I can see what you're saying in theory but I disagree with you. I've never found monster decks that powerful. Certainly, some monsters like goblin hulks can be really intimidating when you first face them, but they don't have tons of moves, so you can strafe around them. Other powerful monsters can be warded off with blocks and such. The game isn't all about deck construction. Its about party construction and tactics.
I don't agree. Why don't you post which 'hard maps' you are having trouble with and your current build so the community can give actual feedback/help ? (You can use the F1 console and type partybbcode to export your currently equipped items to clipboard and then just paste them here).
Well, I don't know what to tell you. I've not had that experience of having to rely on luck and replays; and I'm no longer even sure what your criticism is. At first I thought you were just saying that you wanted to be able to shorten your deck and thus have a smaller deck with a high density of strong cards. But now you are say you'd be content if the monsters' decks were cluttered with weaker cards. Are you simply saying that the game is too difficult?
There's a problem with some items that caused this phenomenon, especially items with big variance. Let's say for example, a weapon with 2x 17 dmg, 2x 6 dmg, 2x 2 dmg cards. Getting the 2 17 on opening hand can be considered a royal flush and win you the map easily. However, most of the time you only get measly 2 or 6 dmg. Using too many of such items create the illusion that you need a royal flush of opening hand to win the map, or else get destroyed. It build the illusion that luck and RNG takes too much out of the game. The problem is, that deck full of that item is made for RNG. Big variance means go big or go home. You don't need that to win big if the goal is simply to win. I can assure you that winning the game does not requires royal flush hand type of luck. 17 dmg is too overkill for most things. Increasing the reliability of the deck will remove this illusion and reliance on luck. Instead of using that item described below, an item with 6x 7 dmg card will fits the purpose better. Surely in average it deal less damage, but you can always count on how many dmg you can output given a number of cards you draw. Same concept applies on other items as well, if anyone feels like the game rely too much on luck, try seeing if your build is in fact demanding luck from you ?
What you've said pretty much sums up all I ever wanted to say in PvP thread... impressive! I wish I would be able to write like this
This is a key point - your enemies' predictable decks mean that they have weaknesses as well as strengths, and you have to take advantage of those.
I was expecting the game to remain more-or-less casual even through advancement into higher levels, which I see as an error now. At my stage in the game, at least 1/3 of all the cards in even a good item are either very low damage (3-), or situational cards (an exception to this is possibly the class skill slot cards). For deck construction overall this is exacerbated by the race skill slot - which, while having some useful cards, ultimately just bloats the deck with non-essential, situational actions. I'm just utterly frustrated when I examine the deck of say, a lowly "goblin shredder"; there is no waste there. They have a lot of anti-missile, so engaging at range is difficult - they have a lot of reliable armour pen damage (nothing below 5 dmg - which is what really makes me envious) at range 2, and they have decent movement not to mention they come in big groups the better to box you in - not to mention the larger hand size. They don't really have any weaknesses - only a slight susceptibility to non-pen, 2 range melee type attacks as they have no melee block or armour. Anyway - my "suggestion" to card hunter remains the same; either allow for more stream-lined deck building or make the monsters have the same deck constraints as the players - I simply hate the disparity between the sleek monster decks and the player decks.
I understand your feelings. It seems there is an unfair advantage for the monsters. On the other hand, you have a large unfair advantage of your own against the monsters; your intelligence. They can never match that. You can make devious plays and change your equipment until you find a combination of cards the hordes in a particular adventure are pretty much powerless against. The lean monster decks make it possible for the players to have some fun against a not superintelligent AI. Without it you could just murder the monsters quite easily and that would get boring fast. If you want easier matches against the AI, you can create custom scenarios and play those. Unfortunately the campaign does not have a difficulty setting. Maybe you could ask for one if you find the going too rough for your taste. I think that if the monsters didn't have some advantage, they would offer very little challenge to a human player. The single player campaign is designed as puzzles to be solved. You try the map and see if you can succeed with your current equipment. If not, you need to change the equipment. You will not succeed with the weapons, armor and other stuff that does not take into account the strengths and the weaknesses of the enemies. These are different for every monster category. The further you play in the campaign, the more you need to fit your equipment to the adventure. You absolutely cannot win some adventures without suitable cards. They don't need to be the best cards ever, but they need to specifically counter the stuff the monsters are trying to do to you.
Well put, Jarmo. In most RPGs, you settle on a "build" for a character or a team that suits your play style; from then on, you accumulate equipment that is better for that build. In Card Hunter, one aspect that is perhaps not emphasized enough during the tutorial is that while there are some well-rounded or "all purpose" builds, you really need to go back to your keep and rearrange your equipment and even your entire characters fairly frequently. I can't think of a party I'd be super happy taking into a goblin fort, an ooze cave, and a demon portal without stopping to at least swap out equipment. Realistically, I'd prefer to take an extra wizard into the demon portal and swap that slot out for an extra fighter for the goblin fort. A good portion of this game is really meant to be played in the Keep.
Very true. I just realized how big a part of the game playing with your paper dolls actually is. I spent ten minutes preparing for a level 16 adventure in the woods. That calls for specific damage type output and avoiding others as useless. I know I'd flounder and flop if I didn't do this. Let's see how it goes now...
Shredders run out of cards a lot in my experience. I don't mean they have no cards, but they lack offence - you don't have to fret about them too much after initial contact.
The woods mission got tough the moment some foes were introduced that were immune to the only melee damage type I brought along. I just managed to squeak a win without restarts, often with just one adventurer left alive at stage end. The last, 4th stage of the adventure saw a grand finish of my dwarf priest tangling alone with two trees. It was a long game of hide-and-seek but he finally felled them. If I had restarted and re-equipped knowing what was coming it would have been pretty easy going. Just would've needed to change a few weapons and arcane items. I think this illustrates well the importance of adjusting the tools to the adventure at hand. When you don't, very hard, when you do it well, almost a walk in the park.
