Frustrated: Trying to Arena farm with Pestal...

[Friedrich Psitalon]

So after reviewing a few threads, I've been trying to do some Arena farming with a Pestal deck. Took some pretty extensive effort as I'm relatively new to the game, so I read enough about it that made me think that it ought to be a fairly decent money-making, possibly card-farming engine.

As follows:

by Friedrich Psitalon

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7t6 7t6 7t6 7t6 7t6 7t6 7t8 7ta 7ta 7tb 7td 7td 7um 7um 7um 7um 7um 7um 7um 7um 7um 7um 808 808 80i 80i 80i 80i 81q 81q 8pu

...and I was under the impression that I'd do fairly well, sometimes winning as many as two platinum in a row if I got lucky, maybe even spitting distance of that third win, who knows.

I'm well aware that no deck is a panacea and the environment evolves constantly, but I was not expecting to get my ass well, truly, and soundly kicked over and over in Platinum, and more often than not in Gold. Is there a tweak here I'm missing? A conceptual leap I've not made? Is there some trick to playing one of these other than "Get Pests out, Fractal as fast as you can" and am I right in thinking the moment I see Quantum Pillars coming down, I may as well just throw up my hands?

I'm not a dumb individual, and I get why this deck should work, but I'm getting soundly trashed. What am I missing? Or am I just on a bad luck streak? Should I go back to Silver until I've played a whole bunch of games, because I'm missing some deeper strategy point with the deck?

Help appreciated from a thoroughly frustrated newer guy.

[pikachufan2164]

A significant part of Pestal's power comes from its ability to Fractal Vampires for massive healing. The point of initially using one Fractal on Pests is to slow the opponent down enough for a Fractal of Vampires to dominate the opponent in terms of damage output and healing.

Something a little more like this will increase your consistency in terms of drawing your Fractals and Vampires:

by pikachufan2164

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[agentflare]

A significant part of Pestal's power comes from its ability to Fractal Vampires for massive healing. The point of initially using one Fractal on Pests is to slow the opponent down enough for a Fractal of Vampires to dominate the opponent in terms of damage output and healing.

QFE. Fractal vamps to win.

[Contrary]

I know nothing of the upped environment, but for unupped Pestal (Devtal to us) the Devourers/Pests are as much for quanta production as quanta drain. I get the impression you believe that the Vampires are a finishing move, but really they are as important to the strategy as the eponymous Devourers/Pests. From my limited experience I find that it doesn't matter if you don't lock them down, as long as you slow them down (as Pestal will do, even to Rainbows) the Vampires will be more than able to heal back any damage you might be receiving.

[Rember]

I've never liked pestal for arena myself after trying 5 or so variants. Perhaps give

the shutdown

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6qq 6qq 6qq 6qq 6qq 6qq 6u3 6u3 6u3 6u3 6u3 6u3 6u8 74f 74f 74f 77j 77j 7dm 7dm 7gs 7n5 7q5 7t6 7t6 7t6 7td 80i 80i 80ior

psnpestal

by Rember

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6u3 6u3 6u3 6u3 6u3 6u3 6u8 6u8 6u9 6ve 6ve 6ve 6ve 6ve 6ve 77j 77j 7dm 7gq 7t6 7t6 7t6 7t6 7t6 7t6 7td 7td 80i 80i 80i 8pu

a try.


As for your deck it seems like you have too many quanta sources. While aether pillars may help speed up your first fractal quite a bit it's too risky for my liking since when I tried it half the time I'd get no dark quanta in my opening hand (I tried 10 pends 2 aether pillars). Also I'd consider 5 fractals to be the minimum for a reliable draw.

by Rember

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7t6 7t6 7t6 7t6 7t6 7t6 7t8 7t9 7t9 7ta 7ta 7td 7td 7um 7um 7um 7um 7um 7um 7um 7um 7um 7um 7um 7um 80i 80i 80i 80i 80i 8pu

Is probably what I'd use if I were to revisit pestal. Feel free to swap Dusk for whatever (Dagger, Vamp, another Fractal, etc).

[forrestugly]

I've never liked pestal for arena myself after trying 5 or so variants. Perhaps give

the shutdown

Code: [Select]

6qq 6qq 6qq 6qq 6qq 6qq 6u3 6u3 6u3 6u3 6u3 6u3 6u8 74f 74f 74f 77j 77j 7dm 7dm 7gs 7n5 7q5 7t6 7t6 7t6 7td 80i 80i 80ior a try.

just tried that one (not fully upgraded) on silver and it keeps losing a lot too, u get a lot bad draws,
like 3 fractal and some quantum towers and than u can wait till u hit some creature while desperatly hoping for some novas to get your quanta for fractal
earthquakes and explosions are sometimes pretty useless too when the opponent plays 4 supernovas and u got nothing to destroy
i cant play it fast enough too shut down the opponent
my only not upgraded cards are the fractals, devourers and earthquakes

edit: oh and basicly when your vampire is one of the last cards you are doomed, because thats the only damage dealing creature, adding an eclipse works though

[Rember]

Trying fully upped decks unupped tends to not work. It was tested vs platinum arena a while ago and did fairly well. None of these fit my playstyle but they're all viable if you want to use pests.

e: This was the actual deck tested at 46% winrate vs plat at the time. I just copied the one from the archive

[Colossus]

am I right in thinking the moment I see Quantum Pillars coming down, I may as well just throw up my hands?

Umm, why throw your hands up at this?


Proof that Platinum can be taken out too:


Now, on to your deck and questions.

I'm personally not a fan of the SNpestal either. I used an actual pestal version. ( Thanks Pika )

I do lose to gold/platinum, but my rates are higher with this deck over others that I've used too. It's just luck of which decks you fight, a lot of rushes are near impossible due to Pestal not being a rush type deck.

[forrestugly]

Trying fully upped decks unupped tends to not work. It was tested vs platinum arena a while ago and did fairly well. None of these fit my playstyle but they're all viable if you want to use pests.

e: This was the actual deck tested at 46% winrate vs plat at the time. I just copied the one from the archive

since i added an eclipse and an additional hourglass to make chances bigger to draw one early i works pretty well gonna start upgrading soon

[TribalTrouble]

Trying fully upped decks unupped tends to not work. It was tested vs platinum arena a while ago and did fairly well. None of these fit my playstyle but they're all viable if you want to use pests.

e: This was the actual deck tested at 46% winrate vs plat at the time. I just copied the one from the archive

since i added an eclipse and an additional hourglass to make chances bigger to draw one early i works pretty well gonna start upgrading soon

Consider using http://www.elementsthegame.com/trainer/ from now on to test decks in the future. You can give the FG some decks you know are/have been used in platinum or gold to test it out and find out what you think of it. For accurate results keep Quanta at x0