Hi, welcome to the forums. Let me counter a couple of your points to answer your main question. All of your points are actually interconnected.
First and foremost being the tiny rewards for playing bots. I know it's there to encourage people to PvP more, but the game does not set you up to initially play against other players, heck it barely sets you up to play the bots, and bots are easy.
Initially, yes, the rewards for beating AIs are very little. However, the good majority of electrum early in the game can come from grinding ai3. Every element can make a good mono or near mono very quickly in the game, allowing you to start beating them up by the time you've finished 10 games.
As time passes, you not only get electrum to augment your deck the way you want, but win cards from AI3 that you can attempt to build arena decks around, or sell for more electrum. You can also buy cards from various elements to have a better chance of making a successful arena deck.
I'm assuming you're nearing completion of 500 score, which you can get in less than an hour by grinding, and the reward for it is a rare weapon and the ability to fight False Gods. Three of these rare weapons are centerpieces of decks made to grind FGs - but all these decks need an amount of upgrades, and each upgrade costs 1500
.
A very daunting number, so how do you get it? By grind, grind, grinding. Once you have a deck that can profit against FGs, you get more upped cards, which sell for more than 1000
a piece and slightly improve an arena deck with everyone.
Basically, the only true goals in this game are to reach Level 80 in arena to to posses 6 un-upped and non-upped of all cards. In the two years and a half this game has existed, I can name two people who have done this off the top of my head.
But most importantly, Elements is a game, and games are meant to be enjoyed. Whether you find being able to make any deck you want, interacting with people, doing kooky things with your electrum count, etc. fun, Element has the potential to offer it.
Next is the pairing system for non-arena PvP, I'm not getting placed against new players, like would be expected from a system (because Elo's scoring system exists), I'm getting initially placed against people with 500+ games played? Really? This makes the 30 ante for PvP just not worth it. I can throw 30 away just by buying off type cards, which actually improve my ability to play, playing people with that much of an economic advantage means that I'm throwing money away that I could actually use. So I'm pretty much stuck just grinding the bots and their shit rewards so that PvP is a possibility rather than an automatic loss.
Once you have a viable PvP deck or two - which you can get quite quickly, possibly with only an hour more of gameplay than the time needed to reach the 500 score quest I mentioned before - you can start going into PvP1 and making a good electrum profit.
However, random PvP quickly becomes nearly worthless, except for fun, as your score gets higher. While it is a fun endeavor, it's no good for long-term profitability. So most players go back to grinding ai3, and FGs when you get to them, with only the occasional random PvP every now and then.
Our forum offers completely different kinds, and arguably different, kinds of PvP. From two themed tournaments every week, to two free-for-all league systems, and individual and team events, to the mighty duet of War and Trials, the forums provide engaging PvP.
(And while we're talking about the forums, we also have non-PvP and pseudo-PvP events, such as World of Elements, the upcoming Forum Brawl, and various competitions.)
The arena is worse. Automatically getting locked in 5 copies of "the oracle's" card means that new players have a 1 in 14 chance before entering a match of even being able to compete because they have 1 color their deck actually can support and getting 5 cards that are not that color means 5 card dead-weight, decreasing the odds to gain a useful card on a draw, and wasting space in their hand. I'm also aware it's to improve variety, but it's also an effective lockout for the "Newbie scrubs" to keep them from "tainting" the "pureness" of the arena.
Every day you spin a card from the oracle, you have the chance to assign different buffs to it, with Level 80 enabling you to give your deck FG credentials. This deck goes into one of the four leagues, depending on your level, and competes with 499 decks against players who fight Arena.
Every win gets you electrum, and your deck being deemed by players as fun and original gets a bit more, but it's really only a little bit of side cash you have the opportunity to get without grinding. Even so, having a deck reach the top ranks of Gold and Platinum stacks up quickly.
As I said, getting cards from all elements enables you to have a wider range of decks you can build in the arena. Many cards can be plopped into a rainbow and do reasonably well, and certain other decks, such as balanced monos and (sadly) firestalls usually succeed as well.
The oracle has another, more useful feature - it gives you a False God that you are guaranteed to fight next, as long as you don't close the tab for it. By knowing the FGs and how to counters them, each day you can build an Oracle Counter, for a higher chance at beating that FG.
Of course some FGs are harder to consistently counter, but others can become guaranteed EMs (elemental masteries), and many of these counters are decks that wouldn't be viable, or even usuable, in other places.
So yes, I would say this game is definitely worth playing. Maybe I'm a bit biased, as I've been here for a year and half and counting, and I'm generally easy to please.
I'm also a bit of a scatterbrain, so feel free to ask me to clarify my post and I'll be glad to. I hope you stay with the game for a while, it's always nice meeting new people to talk to. Chat is also a good place to ask questions, as long as the conversation hasn't derailed to something else
Have fun!
