I think Arena is fine. The main problems it has are all technical in nature, such as the game having latency issues that impact the actual play of the game. If someone lags out they can pass a turn or even forfeit going first when they depend on it. I was with Kevin over at Rogue deckbuilder last night and such a thing happened on stream.
To be frank, now that it is in open beta the game is basically released: They are just labeling it a beta due to the lack of stress testing in real world conditions. That is why they are giving out free packs and letting people play at the moment. I think that it is worth getting in right now while the arena codes are still good for the free packs.
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1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Yeah, Arena is fine as mediocre fine. It's not bad per se, not even the economy is that bad as well (I think paper MTG doesn't convert well for digital model, but I guess it's a different discussion). However, I think this is the problem. It stinks of just being OK. Like a student trying to get a passing grade just for formality reason.
Even the codes and freebies are given so half-assed and half-hearted.
As of the topic of new players. One thing Arena gets completely wrong is the lack of singleplayer content. Other card games, even *****ty predatory mobile ones, have singleplayer gameplay. Some very limited, others amazing as a campaign deserving of a proper strategy game. Arena doesn't even have a bad one. They could use this to give essential cards (I mean essential, not limited pick 7+ cards) to new players while teaching them the real basics of MTG (like card advantage, card evaluation, and so on, not that dumb stuff like blocking, attack, and so on). I'm surprised on how insightful Eternal's tutorial was. I believe Faeria had a very good tutorial system as well. If HS singleplayer had a better reward, it would be perfect (gameplay wise is indisputable).
Also, one thing MTG could beat their competition is lore. Singleplayer would present flavor and identity to new players immersing them in the world building of MTG. R&D spends lot of resources on this, so why not present this valuable asset to them? It would actually help with the old guard as well.
The problem that MtG settings have is that they are narrative driven and not about lore. Dominaria is the only place that has actual world building in it and that is because the setting existed before they went into the Weatherlight Saga. Ravnica has very minimal lore to it and is completely built around character arcs and stories. The same can be said of Ixalan and any number of other places. The reason for this is actually pretty simple: They want to move on from each plane to the next without people getting too sucked up in the previous plane, as the intent is to keep making new sets rapidly. Lore based settings are intended to endure. They are places that encourage exploration and speculation about the origins of certain places, items, peoples, and entire cultures. The story of MtG is character focused and cares little about the location other than as a backdrop. We're not supposed to have a deeply invested interest in the plane or place that is being visited beyond it being a stage for the characters to act out the story in.
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1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
There are more lore material out there besides what WotC show us actually and you give credit for. RPG material also expand on these. Ravnica has some amount of lore. After all it's the third revisit and they were written with different approaches during different eras. Mirrodin could also be portraited. You don't need that rich of a lore in a mobile/online card game. Still it's way better lore than most of the card games out there and this could be a selling point that is vastly underused.
Even if it's story focused on characters and planes are just placeholder stages, it's still miles better than the competition. Yet the competition sells their smudge of a setting way better than WotC with Arena.
We are talking about online card game after all. Not a full fledged RPG. Yet they could have a singleplayer campaign worthy of a RPG that could sell the setting to the public while expanding its branding. The material and resources are there.
The biggest problem with Arena trying to have PvE content made itself glaringly obvious to anyone who did the tutorial - for all of the rules awareness and ability of the system to keep the game working in PvP, PvE forces the game to rely on a script. Every draw was controlled, every action was controlled, and even Life totals and starting cards in hand had to be controlled just to make sure that the player can't accidentally kill themselves. Making PvE content that isn't equally as scripted just does not seem feasible on a logistical and technical level without some really impressive AI. I can't imagine it would be any more fulfilling than the tutorial, which was more useful to learn the controls of the game rather than the rules.
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Well HS has issues with AI as well, still it's a good experience. Eternal does have single player matches and it's more complex than HS and close to MTG. The AI is pretty basic, but it's serviceable. It doesn't need to be that scripted to be serviceable. They could just limited AI with portal like cards and give them a good quality of cards (or cards designed for AI only). They are already doing it anyway with exclusive Arena cards.
You can have good experience with strategy games even with bad AI or scripted AI. It doesn't need to be 100% MTG game either. They could have puzzle like experiences with only one or multiple solutions. Weekly puzzle challenges could be provided as PvE experience (and as a source of some reward).
The point isn't just teach the basics of the game and the interface. There are so much more you can learn about MTG that could be fulfilled by PvE. The tutorial in Arena is very basic and just there. It's serviceable for what is trying to do. Still it brushes off so many aspects of MTG rules, gameplay, and even interface. Puzzles with scenarios and complex board states could teach timing triggers and so much more complex stuff. No AI needed and could be 100% scripted.
You really don't need an impressive AI at all. Just good and inventive design.
The PC / console games for MTG had some "challenge" modes that offered little puzzles that required some special rules knowledge to complete.
Stuff like that would make a much better advanced tutorial and provide insight into the details of the rules and the game.
Its also totally scripted and can easily be expanded , maybe they could even let players build such magic "puzzles" on the fly in some kind of basic editor, so the community would just make more and more features themselves (just imagine having like 1000 Magic puzzles to solve).
Stuff like that would make up for a much better tutorial.
Right now a new player is just going to grind daily and get the preconstructed decks each day.
That will at least allow some basic decks, but building actual constructed decks out of these cards will require to win enough to keep playing in drafts and paid games (so as long as you get enough terrible opponents, you can quite nicely go "infinited" and keep playing, which quite rapidly grows the card pool).
However, if you get a capable opponent you will lose, and chances are you will just be unlucky, even if its just the horrific land randomizer.
As proof of this, take a look at Skybilz on Twitch. She's spent a total of $5 on the game (The welcome kit I mentioned) and she has a boros deck that looks incredibly flashy with 3 and 4 copies each of Lyra Dawnbringer, Shalai, Voice of Plenty, Aurelia, Exemplar of Justice as well as a History of Benalia and a Sacred Foundry. She has torn through competitive standard events with that list and is able to keep getting cards and packs and coins with it. Simply by investing what she had into one really good deck, and being really good with that deck. Feel free to check her VoDs or stream, she streams Arena most Wednesdays and Thursdays.
Do you happen to know if there's a deck list anywhere of the stuff she uses? As someone who loves Angels and is wanting to build an Angel deck, I'd like to see how it plays out in Arena if I can build something along those lines.
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She was made of November rain
Pleasure and pain
Scorpion stings
Pretty things
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—Michelle Schaper
So I after all tried it as F2P and I must say it's not bad.
I used the preconstructed white deck and played some dozen games. Even with this deck I managed to win twice (three times if I include one game when opponent suddenly disappeared - probably his/her connection problem).
Of course in this dozen games were several opponents like "Forest, Llanowar Elves, Forest, 2x Llanowar Elves, Gigantosaurus, Prodigious Growth", but I suppose this is to be expected.
As I am nearly exclusively a collector, yesterday I used the redeem code from Ral's planeswalker deck (is this still F2P btw?). It has slightly better results, and I even collect enough coins and was lucky to have Firemind's Research in my booster.
So, I will be strictly casual and, considering I haven't much time, I'll by playing only once/twice a week, just several games in ladder. That way I used to play DotP and it seems Arena is also quite nice for this approach.
(There is only problem with PC resource demanding which I address elsewhere.)
The biggest problem with Arena trying to have PvE content made itself glaringly obvious to anyone who did the tutorial - for all of the rules awareness and ability of the system to keep the game working in PvP, PvE forces the game to rely on a script. Every draw was controlled, every action was controlled, and even Life totals and starting cards in hand had to be controlled just to make sure that the player can't accidentally kill themselves. Making PvE content that isn't equally as scripted just does not seem feasible on a logistical and technical level without some really impressive AI. I can't imagine it would be any more fulfilling than the tutorial, which was more useful to learn the controls of the game rather than the rules.
But that was the tutorial, players accidentally killing themselves isn't a problem in regular PvE. And they made the AI work acceptably in Duels, so at least the basic framework is already made. Also, playing against a scripted opponent (or a random choice from several variants thereof, to keep some variation) isn't necessarily a bad thing either. It prevents easy, unskilled wins, which is important for PvE content.
One of the biggest issues I have is the deck based matchmaking. I underestimated how awful it would be in practice, since you werent roped into quick play as much in closed beta. It makes playing specific decks impossible due to how they match up with others. I had a undergrowth g/b deck I was working on. It wasnt great, but it paired up with exclusively ultra powerful g/b and u/b netdecks. Switched to a u/r dragons deck I was also messing around with - paired with other u/r decks and r/w decks exclusively. Switch to one of the starter mono decks, pair with only those. This is NOT a good experience and, in my situation, discourages any deck building. Why would I want to run my own decks when they match with powerful netdecks but I can play a crappy preconstructed starter deck and clear my quests that way? And if that's true, why do I even care about completing quests and collecting cards? Such an absolutely idiotic system for matchmaking.
As proof of this, take a look at Skybilz on Twitch. She's spent a total of $5 on the game (The welcome kit I mentioned) and she has a boros deck that looks incredibly flashy with 3 and 4 copies each of Lyra Dawnbringer, Shalai, Voice of Plenty, Aurelia, Exemplar of Justice as well as a History of Benalia and a Sacred Foundry. She has torn through competitive standard events with that list and is able to keep getting cards and packs and coins with it. Simply by investing what she had into one really good deck, and being really good with that deck. Feel free to check her VoDs or stream, she streams Arena most Wednesdays and Thursdays.
Do you happen to know if there's a deck list anywhere of the stuff she uses? As someone who loves Angels and is wanting to build an Angel deck, I'd like to see how it plays out in Arena if I can build something along those lines.
She hasn't posted a decklist anywhere, but as I said, she streams Arena two to three times a week, so you may be able to put it together by watching her VoDs.
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Ugh. I hate the terrible UI for this game. It just cost me a game because I tried to do a Vicious Offering on their Bristling Boar, kicking it by sacrificing a Saproling. But it just refused to target the Boar and just killed my Saproling for no reason whatsoever. That and the matchmaking are Blizzard-level garbage. It's getting harder to enjoy this game.
She hasn't posted a decklist anywhere, but as I said, she streams Arena two to three times a week, so you may be able to put it together by watching her VoDs.
I checked the videos and a few of the others running similar lists, so I have a better idea now. I may try to put something together along those lines. If I can get past my sheer frustration with this game's terrible UI and matchmaking.
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She was made of November rain
Pleasure and pain
Scorpion stings
Pretty things
and the flames of Phoenix wings
—Michelle Schaper
Ugh. I hate the terrible UI for this game. It just cost me a game because I tried to do a Vicious Offering on their Bristling Boar, kicking it by sacrificing a Saproling. But it just refused to target the Boar and just killed my Saproling for no reason whatsoever. That and the matchmaking are Blizzard-level garbage. It's getting harder to enjoy this game.
She hasn't posted a decklist anywhere, but as I said, she streams Arena two to three times a week, so you may be able to put it together by watching her VoDs.
I checked the videos and a few of the others running similar lists, so I have a better idea now. I may try to put something together along those lines. If I can get past my sheer frustration with this game's terrible UI and matchmaking.
Yeah, the UI is weird sometimes, you need to pay close attention to what you are doing or you might end up accidentally targeting your own guy with a kill spell. UI should be intuitive and this clearly fails in this regard. That said, if you are careful, it is just a nuisance. The matchmaking is imo a much bigger problem, fighting the same decks gets stale quickly, especially when some tend to get unfavorable matchups all the time. I don't understand why even make the matchmaking care about colors in the first place, the work put into this would be much better used somewhere else.
It's great if you want to pay cash. If you want to be F2P, then there's a LOT of variance, and if you're unlucky, you're going to be miserable. New sets every 3 months means that even as F2P, unless you're amazingly good, you're gong to fall behind and always be playing sub-par lists against the people who spent the money and have the wildcards and collections to build any deck day 1.
Working exactly like all the Beta players told them it would work: great for people who spend money, hostile to F2P players. Who would have guessed that?
As proof of this, take a look at Skybilz on Twitch. She's spent a total of $5 on the game (The welcome kit I mentioned) and she has a boros deck that looks incredibly flashy with 3 and 4 copies each of Lyra Dawnbringer, Shalai, Voice of Plenty, Aurelia, Exemplar of Justice as well as a History of Benalia and a Sacred Foundry. She has torn through competitive standard events with that list and is able to keep getting cards and packs and coins with it. Simply by investing what she had into one really good deck, and being really good with that deck. Feel free to check her VoDs or stream, she streams Arena most Wednesdays and Thursdays.
Do you happen to know if there's a deck list anywhere of the stuff she uses? As someone who loves Angels and is wanting to build an Angel deck, I'd like to see how it plays out in Arena if I can build something along those lines.
She hasn't posted a decklist anywhere, but as I said, she streams Arena two to three times a week, so you may be able to put it together by watching her VoDs.
Boros angels is quite popular now. It's really strong too taking first at the last SCG classic.
Boros Angels, RDW, GW tokens are the decks to beat now.
My experience with Arena is interesting.
I've been doing surprisingly well in limited and average around 80% of my gems back. There was a standard event I played as well with a UW aura deck that did really well netting me like 20 packs (lost to Boros Angels).
My only complain is the mana system, there is something seriously wrong with the shuffling with the amounts of flooding and screws I experienced (almost 20%).
It helps to choose decks that are only 1-2 colours since they are easier to build. Most players start RDW since all their rares can be used on cards instead of lands (everyone knows good land base is better than cards in multicolour decks). The red deck already has like 50-75% of the cards required for RDW.
Did I spend money? Yeah I spent around $30.00, but that's less than how much I spent on my UW aura paper deck too. I can now playtest it online. Note I only play limited or competitive standard in Arena (need sideboards), so I can now play FNM from home anytime on the competitive events and get good coin. Those events cost like 500-1000 gold, but you can net 100-1000 gold each time.
I swear, both the matchmaking and/or the shuffling seems dependent upon whether or not you spent money. But seriously, outside of Blizzard games (HotS, Overwatch, Starcraft), I've never seen such terrible matchmaking. F2P decks matched against top-tier Merfolk/Golgari/UW draw-go garbage. Though I feel I have gotten the $5 worth I spent on the welcome pack in Closed Beta out of the experience, it's quickly coming to a point where I can't recommend this game to anyone except as a way to just practice with priority and things to keep sharp. I certainly wouldn't invest much time or money into it right now, and would do much to recommend to potential new players not to, either.
The UI is among the worst I've ever encountered and actively harms the experience. The matchmaking is going to drive would-be new players away from the game in droves. As much as I like the idea of building up a collection and playing online with a large userbase, so far Arena just keeps disappointing more and more. I hate being negative about something like this, where I feel there is potential, but this game has some very glaring issues. A lot of this is going to make this game cater only to the hardcore and/or the whales, and I'd like to find a better place to voice my concerns to Wizards. Not that they'll listen, but somewhere we ought to be able to get the word out: the new player experience in this game is extremely poor.
At this point, if I am going to drop significant amounts of money on Magic, it'll be on paper Magic, where I can buy exactly the cards I want and put together good decks, and also have a much better idea what I'm up against.
I swear, both the matchmaking and/or the shuffling seems dependent upon whether or not you spent money. But seriously, outside of Blizzard games (HotS, Overwatch, Starcraft), I've never seen such terrible matchmaking. F2P decks matched against top-tier Merfolk/Golgari/UW draw-go garbage. Though I feel I have gotten the $5 worth I spent on the welcome pack in Closed Beta out of the experience, it's quickly coming to a point where I can't recommend this game to anyone except as a way to just practice with priority and things to keep sharp. I certainly wouldn't invest much time or money into it right now, and would do much to recommend to potential new players not to, either.
The UI is among the worst I've ever encountered and actively harms the experience. The matchmaking is going to drive would-be new players away from the game in droves. As much as I like the idea of building up a collection and playing online with a large userbase, so far Arena just keeps disappointing more and more. I hate being negative about something like this, where I feel there is potential, but this game has some very glaring issues. A lot of this is going to make this game cater only to the hardcore and/or the whales, and I'd like to find a better place to voice my concerns to Wizards. Not that they'll listen, but somewhere we ought to be able to get the word out: the new player experience in this game is extremely poor.
At this point, if I am going to drop significant amounts of money on Magic, it'll be on paper Magic, where I can buy exactly the cards I want and put together good decks, and also have a much better idea what I'm up against.
And people recommend saving for drafts instead of packs, but the draft experience is just as awful as everything else. I've been able to afford a whopping two whole drafts since open beta began. First one I did decent and went 5-3, last one I went 1-3 due to two games of drawing absolutely NO land turn after turn (one game ended with me having two lands on the board and my opponent had a four color deck with about 10 mana out. Real fun to lose a game you absolutely should be able to win due to the amazing shuffler and not getting a Bo3 draft option). So that draft was two weeks of hoarding gold and it ended in 20 minutes in the most obnoxious, bull***** way one could end. Was hoping to get some gems to play sealed, which costs an obscene 2000 gems (or about $12-13 cash) There's really no room for free players in this game, but then again I couldnt imagine dropping real money on a game like my last draft ($5 a draft!) - it'd be 10x worse and both options seem like great ways to drive away players. So, I really dont see who they're trying to market this game to.
5000 gold gets you a draft and a guaranteed 4 packs (the 3 you are drafting plus one no matter how poorly you do if I remember correctly, could be wrong about that extra pack). Not only that, but are choosing from 15 cards rather than the 8 you get from buying a pack (or whatever it is). On top of that, you have chances of getting multiple rares as the bots pass things based on their draft AI. Plus the chance to earn enough gems to do it again.
I have gone 0-3 or 1-3 plenty, but I have also done plenty of times where i win enough to do it again. So that 5000 gold turns into 8, 12, etc packs.
I am not saying the economy in this game is good (it is not), but based on how the economy is, I say drafts are your best bet to build a collection.
The harder part is the getting the necessary rare and mythic wildcards, you build a cheap U and C collection of wildcards very quickly in my experience (sitting on 20+ each), but always running out of rare and mythics as lands are a must. The crappy thing are the decks with multiple playsets of mythics, they take forever to get. But if you stick with 1-2 colours it isn't too bad, I have 2 competitive decks now, one UW aura and jeskai angels (just finished 4x playsets of 3 checklands and 2 shocklands, took awhile).
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To be frank, now that it is in open beta the game is basically released: They are just labeling it a beta due to the lack of stress testing in real world conditions. That is why they are giving out free packs and letting people play at the moment. I think that it is worth getting in right now while the arena codes are still good for the free packs.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Even the codes and freebies are given so half-assed and half-hearted.
As of the topic of new players. One thing Arena gets completely wrong is the lack of singleplayer content. Other card games, even *****ty predatory mobile ones, have singleplayer gameplay. Some very limited, others amazing as a campaign deserving of a proper strategy game. Arena doesn't even have a bad one. They could use this to give essential cards (I mean essential, not limited pick 7+ cards) to new players while teaching them the real basics of MTG (like card advantage, card evaluation, and so on, not that dumb stuff like blocking, attack, and so on). I'm surprised on how insightful Eternal's tutorial was. I believe Faeria had a very good tutorial system as well. If HS singleplayer had a better reward, it would be perfect (gameplay wise is indisputable).
Also, one thing MTG could beat their competition is lore. Singleplayer would present flavor and identity to new players immersing them in the world building of MTG. R&D spends lot of resources on this, so why not present this valuable asset to them? It would actually help with the old guard as well.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Even if it's story focused on characters and planes are just placeholder stages, it's still miles better than the competition. Yet the competition sells their smudge of a setting way better than WotC with Arena.
We are talking about online card game after all. Not a full fledged RPG. Yet they could have a singleplayer campaign worthy of a RPG that could sell the setting to the public while expanding its branding. The material and resources are there.
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You can have good experience with strategy games even with bad AI or scripted AI. It doesn't need to be 100% MTG game either. They could have puzzle like experiences with only one or multiple solutions. Weekly puzzle challenges could be provided as PvE experience (and as a source of some reward).
The point isn't just teach the basics of the game and the interface. There are so much more you can learn about MTG that could be fulfilled by PvE. The tutorial in Arena is very basic and just there. It's serviceable for what is trying to do. Still it brushes off so many aspects of MTG rules, gameplay, and even interface. Puzzles with scenarios and complex board states could teach timing triggers and so much more complex stuff. No AI needed and could be 100% scripted.
You really don't need an impressive AI at all. Just good and inventive design.
Stuff like that would make a much better advanced tutorial and provide insight into the details of the rules and the game.
Its also totally scripted and can easily be expanded , maybe they could even let players build such magic "puzzles" on the fly in some kind of basic editor, so the community would just make more and more features themselves (just imagine having like 1000 Magic puzzles to solve).
Stuff like that would make up for a much better tutorial.
Right now a new player is just going to grind daily and get the preconstructed decks each day.
That will at least allow some basic decks, but building actual constructed decks out of these cards will require to win enough to keep playing in drafts and paid games (so as long as you get enough terrible opponents, you can quite nicely go "infinited" and keep playing, which quite rapidly grows the card pool).
However, if you get a capable opponent you will lose, and chances are you will just be unlucky, even if its just the horrific land randomizer.
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Do you happen to know if there's a deck list anywhere of the stuff she uses? As someone who loves Angels and is wanting to build an Angel deck, I'd like to see how it plays out in Arena if I can build something along those lines.
Pleasure and pain
Scorpion stings
Pretty things
and the flames of Phoenix wings
—Michelle Schaper
I used the preconstructed white deck and played some dozen games. Even with this deck I managed to win twice (three times if I include one game when opponent suddenly disappeared - probably his/her connection problem).
Of course in this dozen games were several opponents like "Forest, Llanowar Elves, Forest, 2x Llanowar Elves, Gigantosaurus, Prodigious Growth", but I suppose this is to be expected.
As I am nearly exclusively a collector, yesterday I used the redeem code from Ral's planeswalker deck (is this still F2P btw?). It has slightly better results, and I even collect enough coins and was lucky to have Firemind's Research in my booster.
So, I will be strictly casual and, considering I haven't much time, I'll by playing only once/twice a week, just several games in ladder. That way I used to play DotP and it seems Arena is also quite nice for this approach.
(There is only problem with PC resource demanding which I address elsewhere.)
But that was the tutorial, players accidentally killing themselves isn't a problem in regular PvE. And they made the AI work acceptably in Duels, so at least the basic framework is already made. Also, playing against a scripted opponent (or a random choice from several variants thereof, to keep some variation) isn't necessarily a bad thing either. It prevents easy, unskilled wins, which is important for PvE content.
She hasn't posted a decklist anywhere, but as I said, she streams Arena two to three times a week, so you may be able to put it together by watching her VoDs.
Currently Playing:
GBStandard - Golgari Safari MidrangeBG
RBWModern - Mardu PyromancerWBR
RLegacy - Good Old Fashioned BurnR
Clan Contest 3 Mafia - Mafia Co-MVP
I checked the videos and a few of the others running similar lists, so I have a better idea now. I may try to put something together along those lines. If I can get past my sheer frustration with this game's terrible UI and matchmaking.
Pleasure and pain
Scorpion stings
Pretty things
and the flames of Phoenix wings
—Michelle Schaper
Yeah, the UI is weird sometimes, you need to pay close attention to what you are doing or you might end up accidentally targeting your own guy with a kill spell. UI should be intuitive and this clearly fails in this regard. That said, if you are careful, it is just a nuisance. The matchmaking is imo a much bigger problem, fighting the same decks gets stale quickly, especially when some tend to get unfavorable matchups all the time. I don't understand why even make the matchmaking care about colors in the first place, the work put into this would be much better used somewhere else.
Thank you Captain Obvious
Boros angels is quite popular now. It's really strong too taking first at the last SCG classic.
Boros Angels, RDW, GW tokens are the decks to beat now.
My experience with Arena is interesting.
I've been doing surprisingly well in limited and average around 80% of my gems back. There was a standard event I played as well with a UW aura deck that did really well netting me like 20 packs (lost to Boros Angels).
My only complain is the mana system, there is something seriously wrong with the shuffling with the amounts of flooding and screws I experienced (almost 20%).
It helps to choose decks that are only 1-2 colours since they are easier to build. Most players start RDW since all their rares can be used on cards instead of lands (everyone knows good land base is better than cards in multicolour decks). The red deck already has like 50-75% of the cards required for RDW.
Did I spend money? Yeah I spent around $30.00, but that's less than how much I spent on my UW aura paper deck too. I can now playtest it online. Note I only play limited or competitive standard in Arena (need sideboards), so I can now play FNM from home anytime on the competitive events and get good coin. Those events cost like 500-1000 gold, but you can net 100-1000 gold each time.
The UI is among the worst I've ever encountered and actively harms the experience. The matchmaking is going to drive would-be new players away from the game in droves. As much as I like the idea of building up a collection and playing online with a large userbase, so far Arena just keeps disappointing more and more. I hate being negative about something like this, where I feel there is potential, but this game has some very glaring issues. A lot of this is going to make this game cater only to the hardcore and/or the whales, and I'd like to find a better place to voice my concerns to Wizards. Not that they'll listen, but somewhere we ought to be able to get the word out: the new player experience in this game is extremely poor.
At this point, if I am going to drop significant amounts of money on Magic, it'll be on paper Magic, where I can buy exactly the cards I want and put together good decks, and also have a much better idea what I'm up against.
Pleasure and pain
Scorpion stings
Pretty things
and the flames of Phoenix wings
—Michelle Schaper
And people recommend saving for drafts instead of packs, but the draft experience is just as awful as everything else. I've been able to afford a whopping two whole drafts since open beta began. First one I did decent and went 5-3, last one I went 1-3 due to two games of drawing absolutely NO land turn after turn (one game ended with me having two lands on the board and my opponent had a four color deck with about 10 mana out. Real fun to lose a game you absolutely should be able to win due to the amazing shuffler and not getting a Bo3 draft option). So that draft was two weeks of hoarding gold and it ended in 20 minutes in the most obnoxious, bull***** way one could end. Was hoping to get some gems to play sealed, which costs an obscene 2000 gems (or about $12-13 cash) There's really no room for free players in this game, but then again I couldnt imagine dropping real money on a game like my last draft ($5 a draft!) - it'd be 10x worse and both options seem like great ways to drive away players. So, I really dont see who they're trying to market this game to.
I have gone 0-3 or 1-3 plenty, but I have also done plenty of times where i win enough to do it again. So that 5000 gold turns into 8, 12, etc packs.
I am not saying the economy in this game is good (it is not), but based on how the economy is, I say drafts are your best bet to build a collection.