Rare Cards: Do They Need to Exist?

[zanzarino]

The idea of the T50 was to have a set of well designed decks that change every week. For a little while T50 decks have been the highest level in elements (months ago).

Players however decided to use it to create "farm decks" and distribute the rare cards as much as possible. I do understand the intent of being helpful and generous, but at the same time this practice actually eliminated "rare" cards from elements.

I know most players sound frustrated when cards are rare, they want them and they ask everyone how to get those, ending up writing in the forum about "how impossible" is to have a certain card (does not happen anymore, it did a few months ago). But I do believe all the frustration is worth the moment when you finally get a rare card that almost nobody else have... also called "wow effect".

Right now winning a rare card is mostly a "finally, was waiting for it" then a "wow". I am aware of that and I intend to change it. I knew about this problem and I have been working on a solution for a while (even before this post appeared)

I soon will be adding new cards that have a new (higher) level of rarity and cannot be a reward from T50 decks. The new water alchemy card (Nymph's tears) is probably going to be one of those and it will replace the "arctic octopus" as the water rare card; the octopus is going to be for sale at the bazaar.

I am still thinking for a name for those cards: maybe "legendary".

Winning a legendary card is going to be purely luck-based, they will randomly appear in the slots, even for lvl1, in very rare occasions, something like a "jackpot". It has to be luck-based because I want it to be unexpected, not something you "farm", it has to have a "wow-effect" and only a very few players will have those cards. Legendary cards do not add new game mechanics that would be available to a few elected, they will make common game mechanics available in a different way.

If a card is extremely rare, a predefined deck configuration (find deck on the forum, buy cards, farm rares, done) is not possible and a more varied deck population is possible.

[coinich]

So wait, its somewhat of a combo of Bob's and my ideas combined?  Sounds pretty neat to me.

[Essence]

I'd like to point out that any time you have a chance of getting something -- no matter how slim the chance -- there will be players who grind until they have the maximum available amount of them.  Everquest learned this lesson by creating ever-more-long-and-painful quests designed to make items 'rare', with the result that millions of college kids stayed up 48 hours straight waiting for a quest mob to spawn so they could pounce it and get the quest element that would eventually get them the item.

If legendary cards seriously show up in all levels of play, I will personally write a macro that will autoclick through a basic  stompy deck and ace Level3 AIs while I'm sleeping, in the bathroom, and while I'm working on my other computer, and I'll ace the legends in a month or two.



In my personal opinion, if you want legendary cards to be legendary, you need to have special events like tournaments and False God contests a la the Chriskang Trainer, and give them out as prizes for achievements.  Give them out in sets of three so that people will actually work a deck around them and be able to do so consistently, and then program them to only be winnable in PVP slots and nowhere else.  No legendary farms, but there will still be the chance for the cards to make it into other player's collections.  Perhaps even do a legendary card for each element, and then cycle through the elements doing a special event once each week, so that after three months, the same cards come back around and can be won by another player.

Of course, that requires someone attentive and able to run such events to do so, but I'd wager you could find someone from the community (a la Chris) who would be happy to do something like that.

Summary:
Only by making them completely ungrindable are legendary cards ever going to be anything other than a longer grind, no matter how rare they are.

[yeehaw]

Thanks zanzarino for keeping us updated about your intentions. Would like to make a point that hopefully the legendaries will not be so good that they are "must-have" that forces everyone to grind for 6 of the each legendary.

Additional Suggestion: Maybe a card that is like "free switch to X element"

[Bloodshadow]

I do NOT think that the Alchemy card for Water should be a rare. In my opinion, the Alchemy cards is supposed to be a "set", just like the dragons. Having one of them to be rare will make the set incomplete, which I do NOT want.

And I don't think those "legendary" cards are a good idea. If you really want powerful, ungrindable cards, then make some cards that can only be won from the extremely difficult Level 7 AI. I don't think tournaments are good for this; I want those legendary cards, and Level 7 AI, to be non-temporary. I want them to be available all the time. I think that there should be 12 new Level 7 "Demigods" that each hold one legendary card, or something. Those would be similar to Chriskang's False God Challenge, except that they will always be available, instead of only temporary.

Lastly, you can look at the following Kongregate thread. Me and my friends have been planning a set of Legendary cards called Avatars, Relics, and Taboos, which are ultra-powerful creatures, permanents, and spells. They can only be won from those Level 7 Demigods.
http://www.kongregate.com/forums/22-elements/topics/50610-ideas-for-elements-ccg-destructive-criticism-will-be-ignored (http://www.kongregate.com/forums/22-elements/topics/50610-ideas-for-elements-ccg-destructive-criticism-will-be-ignored)

[bobcamel]

Or there could be a set of challenges, like beating a specific enemy, and this'd reward a special card and be as hard as just finding a strategy and playing through well can be.

Just making a random chance after every match is about as exciting as finding two saltysticks glued together, and you don't feel like you did something hard to achieve it, just boring.

[Essence]

Just like to toss in that I agree with Bloodshadow about the Alchemy set.  There shouldn't be one or two rare cards and the rest normal; they should all be normal.

[Kamietsu]

I like Zanz idea, which gives every single player in the game a fair and equal chance to obtain the Nymph's Tears. When I saw the card I thought it would be available from the bazaar because it didn't seem, to me, like a super powerful card. But it's effect and what it could do seemed very good. Just because Zanz calls it legendary doesn't mean it's super powerful. If you check out the cards in development, or what Zanz said, these aren't some all powerful card, they are cards that let you use an alchemy ability in a new way.

Essence: That's how sets work, or should always work. All 493 pokemon cards aren't all normal to obtain. Many of them are rare. That goes with ANY card game. Most of them should be easy enough to get but you have to work hard to get that final piece to complete the set.

[bobcamel]

So I'd rather work hard, like going to a shop like miles away to buy a card, than just go to a local shop and buy out all the something packs until I get this one card by luck. Rare cards should have a tough but SURE way of getting them, not some one armed bandit.

[Bloodshadow]

Yes. There should be a SURE, but difficult, way to obtain those legendary cards.

[Cisco]

I think Zanz idea is great. Essence has one point though and that is the one with makin a macro. It be best not to have these cards in the first 3 levels to prevent something like that. Adding theme as prizes for tournaments and FG Challenges like Chris has is another way to spread them. This would also End the small debate about Zanz wasting his time making special tourney cards.

[Justsoneguy]

Well I hate jackpots.  Sucks when you aren't the one winning them.

In the spirit of this thread, I put up a squid, miracle, SoG deck.