Monday, December 31, 2012

So you want a stronger deck?

THEN LEVEL YOUR SKILLS!

One of the most absurd things to me is people who complain about how weak their decks are and they never level the skills on their cards. A player will spend a hundred HP on a new final form card that increases their deck from 80k to 82k but they won't increase their lead card to skill 10 which would be an 8k bonus on an 80k deck. 

Especially now with the changes to skills its more important than ever to level the skills on your cards since leveling them also increases the chance to activate. Most high level fights are decided on who gets more or better procs than the opponent, not by a 2k difference in card quality.

Here's simple example. Five skill 10 Nightmares, an outdated card vs lets say five skill 1 Dragonewt. (For this example we're going to ignore the fact that the chance to proc 2 is reduced since they are the same card, just like I'm ignoring the fact that you would normally use two Trow wings with either of these)

Nightmares go from a 75k base to 92k if one procs. 

Dragonewts go from  87k base to 93k if one procs. 

Nightmares go from a 75k base to 109k if two proc.

Dragonewts go from 87k base to 99k if two proc.

Now, you can argue that Dragonewt only has an 8% buff and that's doing it. So lets play pretend. Lets pretend Dragonewt has a 13% buff like Nightmare. 

Dragonewts go from 87k base to 98k if one procs. 

Dragonewts go from 87k base to 109k if two proc.

So, Dragonewt would manage to tie up to Nightmare. A Nightmare deck that would have 12k less base stats and the best it could do is tie up with Nightmare at higher skill levels.

So remember, next time you're looking at spending your HP on that next level of card, take a look at your deck and the skill level of your cards. Chances are, increasing your cards to skill 10 will increase your deck power a lot more than just getting better cards.

27 comments:

  1. Thank you sir people seem to forget that skills matter. I'm running a deck that hits for 127k right now and have a minotaur in my wing spot until my demonic knight is built. I won't replace my skill 8 nightmare untill my 6-11 jabberwocky is built and skilled up to 5 atleast.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Lucarda - Looking for a little help. I am the Defense Leader for a rising order but would like some advice on how to improve my deck. I am God Realm and currently running 3 x Aspsaras (Skl 6,5,and 4) with 2 x Ninetails (Skl 2). All cards are 4-7s. Long story short, I pulled some good cards and now have 1000HP to spend to improve my defense. I was looking at Sleipnirs, but they are just so expensive right now. I am not against selling/trading any/all of my cards to improve.
    Thanks for all your time and hard work. I recommend this blog to everyone else in my order and all of my fellows

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. with 1000hp you can buy a ff Sleipnir with a decent skill easily. Like Lucarda said, if you skill up your Apsaras to 10 that will make a huge difference.

      Delete
    2. So you would recommend spending the 550HP (skl 3) to 840HP (skl 10) for a 4-7 Sleipnir and then the remaining on skilling up the 3 Apsaras to Skl 10? Would I keep one of the Ninetails? I can find 6-11 Apsaras with skl 10 for 165HP in the Bazaar. With the prices being so low now on the Apsaras would it be more cost-effective just to purchase (and upgrade from 4-7 to 6-11)them or to buy skilled feeders/rares/etc... to increase the skill myself?

      Delete
    3. I would say selling one of your apsaras and go for sleipnir. Three apsaras are way too much and decreases ur chance of 3 proc. Sleipnir is way better in thia situation i think. Ninetail is a decent wing tho. I won't suggest throwing her away.

      Delete
    4. Most of the time 2 Cards will proc, Sleipner 3 Apsara and 1 Ninetails will have pretty much the same result as Sleipner 2 Apsara, 2 Ninetails proc wise.

      Just focus on skilling up the deck. Higher skills offer a lot more power.




      Delete
    5. Lucarda,
      Do you think that Slepnir is worth the HP in my scenario? Also, do you think it is more cost effective to buy Skill 10 Apsaras in the Bazaar and then sell of my exisiting ones or to buy enhancing cards? I've never had much luck skilling them up... If I did the Slepnir with 2 SKill 10 Apsaras any recommendation on the wings?

      Delete
  3. Yeah. I was gonna ask sth for my def leader. He is currently using andromeda sleipnir apsara apsara Xuanwu as his deck and hes aiming for another card now. We are thinking about having qilin then wind god. Any suggestions Lucarda?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. His only option with a deck like that is to go more andromedas if he wants to stay god realm. Otherwise, hello lancelot/arthur.

      Delete
    2. No good moving into qilins? He just pulled one out.

      Delete
  4. Hi, I know there are a lot of requests for help, but as everyone commenting on this site seems to know their stuff, I was hoping for some advice. I'm just starting to break into some good cards and the HR region. Whilst I have many rares and a few high rare (even a Nightmare) the only fully evolved/enhanced cards I have are bucanner, berserker, astolfo, holy knight, high dancer, gladiator, high witch. I wondered what you thought of the cards I use and any thoughts on what you go for next :) (also atm I have around 25HP does anyone know a decent way to get more? Tried selling feeders but no-one seems to buy them :(

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. What you would want to do HP wise is look for cards that are pretty sought after in their phase one form that aren't enhanced, buy them, enhance them, sell them for 5HP + another one of the card. You can repeat this process and get 5-10 HP a day if you have a feeder account.

      The problem with selling feeders anymore is almost everybody has a feeder account so unless you have a buyer in your order, you're out of luck there.

      Delete
    2. Just to clarify, is a feeder account someone having another phone and using that account to get feeders simply so they don't have to invest in stamina? Are there any cards you could recommend worth enhancing and then selling? and what did you make of the cards I already have? :) thanks

      Delete
    3. Feeder is a second stamina account yep.

      Cards I would recommend...Hatter was working well for a bit. Look for one with a good buff that has very few to none up that are enhanced, it fluctuates. Only use ones that are good sellers though (Ones with good buffs like Boost Realm Attack, Boost Realm Defense, Boost 2 Realm Attack, etc.)

      It's tough for me to judge rares anymore. I guess I would say that you should have a second Holy Knight defensively and a Holy Lancer leader. Offensively, man realm has it rough in rares. Generally I like using a lead card like High Shaman, couple ninjas, and High Gunner since it has over 13k attack.

      Delete
    4. It's interesting to note that High Gunner with just its attack stat outperforms High Ninja with a level 3 skill proc. High Shaman and 4x High Gunner would be quite effective (and brutal against man), without having to depend on skill proc chances. Alternatively you could try 2x Frost Knight if they're still available, which helps against demons.

      Delete
    5. Yeah, I'm pretty out of touch with Rares anymore since pretty much all of mine just get used in enhancing other cards.

      Delete
  5. For now your cards suck. You might be able to get 2-3 HP each out of them if your lucky, but HR's are so cheap now you can make decent cards for cheap. You can build an 80K deck for about 80 HP right now. The key at this point is to get a good center card. What I mean is the card you put in your lineup first when you set you deck. that cards skill goes off every time so you want is to be "Big boost to realm specific" type skill. I'm assuming you're Man realm based on your current cards, if that's the case try to get some Clay Maidens (about 8-9 HP each right now) or Master Archers (7-9 HP right now) and the do a 4-6 evo on them. That will give you a solid center card that will boost your deck up to 20+ % once you skill it up. After that I went for crap skill big base point wing cards. Those are cheap (1-2HP each for the base) You can get old event cards with final form stats 18K plus for 8-10 hp. Once you get going a little bit you'll see how it works. Just be thankful your coming in a such a generous time for new players. Think about it like this. When I started playing in September an 85K deck would have cost you almost 1000 HP. Now it's less than 100.

    Most of the guys around here remember it like it was yesterday and all of us lost our ass on our cards.

    One thing good players do is trade cards. What Luc is talking about is amplified if you can make 4-6 cards quickly, like a few hours. You can identify places where the ff 4-6 is worth double or triple the cost of the cards to build it and flip them quickly. You almost always need a feeder account to do this because of the bazaar tickets and raw feeder cards, but for 700K rupies and 12 baazar tickets you can make 20-30-50 hp in a few hours.

    In your position

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Out of curiosity (and amazement that you can build 4-6's in a few hours) do you grind on quest 2.2 to enhance and evolve that quickly? If so, do you evolve the skeleton/warrior and angel to their HN FF before feeding them?

      Just amazed at how quickly some people seem to be able to make 4-6's

      I have a main account with 140 Stamina and a Feeder account with 350 and it takes me two days to make a 4-6

      Delete
    2. Generally speaking people accumulate the feeders before they make a purchase. The reason being the market shifts so quickly that you want to be able to do it that day. So you would gather and evo the feeders from 2-2 and once you have two accounts full of them you would purchase the cards. You don't do it daily normally unless you have like 6 feeders, which is way too hardcore for me.

      Delete
    3. I have one main with 200 sta (too high, but I didn't know better when I started and haven't figured out how to unfellow people and move stats) and one alt with 600 sta. For time I load up with 2-2 level feeders evo them to HNs until my main is maxed with them. 65 then I buy the base cards of the ff I want. After that I don't evo anything i go through and get 2-2 level base cards and feed them as is. it's more pricy, but its faster and you actually get slightly more enhancement out of an unevoed card per feeder.

      The first card goes quick because you have all those evoed HNs in stock. I don't use any of the stock angel queens everyone has laying around until the end. When you're out of evoed HNs it then takes about 100-130 cards per maxed card. I can farm about 150-170 per cw. So it costs about 5 cw and about 700K rupies (net-you do bring in some even on level 2-2, just not nearly enough to offset the cost. This can be easily offset by selling one crap rare card for 400K on bazaar before or after or from the stockpile on your main which should be huge from all these events.) Then its just a matter of the grind to actually do it. I don't use archangels since you almost can never get 2HP of value out of a used one.

      Today for instance you could flip a set of Asparas (10HP each) for 70-80 HP, especially if you get luckly and use your stockpiled event skilled HNs evoed to rares on the FF enhancement and you get lucky with a couple sk level ups. Then you might be looking at 85. You net about 35-40 HP on this in just a few hours.

      Don't get me wrong I'm not rocking some 1000+ HP account because of this. I mean realistically most people don't have a steady 3 hours to go through this process. It is sort of a pain, but I try to do it a few times per month and always keep at least 60 HP minimum liquid on hand at all times in case I see a great opportunity. In most case the better base cards you can buy the more worthwhile it is to go through. for instance a Pan today will cost you around 50 HP for the past, but are selling around 100. Net 45 HP in the deal.

      Finally for the gusto-if the days following the event prices drop on say Sephirot due to the Crystaline Eve release. You could buy those up and sit on them. They are currently 60 HP if you got 4 of them at 45-50 HP each and flipped them in a week that's a sure win. Remember though with SRs everything is more costly and slower. Bazaar tickets kill you on those and the enhancements cost more because of extra levels.

      The key to all of this is seeing the difference in price between cost of base cards and FF Market Price.

      One last thing. Watch the market on reward day. The reward cards will be selling for half price the day they come out. Cite Crystaline Lily for as low as 5 HP on release day. I bought 8 of them, never touched them and sold them 2 weeks later for 13 each.

      Delete
  6. My defense deck is my offense deck. So should I spend my HP on skilling up my cards or build up my defense? My deck is sk5 nightmare, sk4 demonic knight, sk1 sutekh,and two trows as wings. All 4-7. I'm not a def leader or anything but I feel like I should have a pretty good def deck. What should I do?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I would skill up first. The key to a good defense is having a dominating offense.

      Delete
  7. I'll be honest about this. I don't give a rip about my def Deck. Two reasons. Say you've got an all HR evoed to SR Offensive deck. Your at about 80-85 base attack. If you just use those cards in your def deck you're at 70K + Def. Throw just 1 def boost card in there and now your boosting to 90K. That's enough to fend off suckers (which I think is the goal). Think about the investment it would take to build a deck capable of handling even a moderately good off deck vs. the reward you get for being able to do so. Most level 80-90 players, which are common, are hitting for 130K with their boosts. Then how often do you get attacked. I only get attacked maybe 5 times a day, half suckers. So I'm really only gaining 3 successful defends per day at the cost of loads of HP. There are no events in which you actually gain from having a good def. Even in holy wars, unless your a straight def leader with a bunch of qilins, you're going down.

    In short, FFFFF your Def. Improve your offense. You will gain in the end.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It's not wrong. I still laugh though at those orders during HW that have 10 defense players. Nothing more fun than them being worth 100% of their point value the entire time.

      Delete
  8. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  9. i would like to help my friend with the game any tips i can share with him he has a defence of 114 any good cards he can put to make it stronger?either man,god,or demon defence would be helpfull.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Hey lucarda, are you going to update the section for starting out at all? there are massive changes such as unlimited stamina to level 20, the 3 day cadet battle ranking, and SR cards (
    crap, but not bad starting out). If you don't want to I can maybe write it up and email it to you to post since I just started a second main a month ago.

    ReplyDelete