2663

They are only 40 gold quests so I always cancel them. I only play the 40 old ones if my quest log is full or if they automatically happen as part of a 60 or 100 go;d quest. of course having no friends contributes to the decision too.

2664

I think the reward for ‘watch and learn’ is a free pack, no?

2665

Yes, free pack. I seem to get one every couple of weeks.

2666

I’ve had two “watch and win” quests in the past couple months, and yes, the reward is a free Classic pack.

So I keep getting suboptimal class choices in Arena: Warrior, Druid, Shaman or such. I’ve played Shaman twice in a row this week. For the first run, I had a mediocre deck and went 4 wins, which honestly exceeded my expectations. For the second run, I had a good deck – Lightning Storm, Hex, Bloodlust, Crackle, two Axes, and good minions – and I went 1-3. Each loss involved inexplicable mistakes by me. (Well, somewhat explicable: either time pressure or playing too fast.) It’s sort of therapeutic to describe them here, even if no one wants to read it, so here I go.

Against a Priest, I had a Puddlestomper facing a Cultist and Tadzingo, and instead of playing out more minions, I decided to roll the dice and roll a totem and then use my precious Lightning Storm. And then I forgot to attack into Tadzingo before casting the spell. What was I thinking? Cultist just sends me on tilt every time.

Against a Hunter, I made two mistakes. First, early on he played a Secret, and I had one Puddlestomper on the board alone. I should’ve attacked with it first to test for Explosive. Instead, I tested for Snipe first with Tadzingo, and then attacked into face with the Puddlestomper. That cost my Tadzingo two health, and he soon died to something with 3 attack. Later I made a less egregious mistake: I played into Mind Control Tech when I had the board. He had one card in hand, I think, and either topdecked MCT or was holding it. I probably should’ve been watching to see whether he was holding a card back. Anyway, he grabbed my best minion and it was downhill from there. I lost by a health score of 1-0, so who knows, that full-health Tadzingo might have saved me.

Against a Warlock, I just traded badly early on, wasting a Lighting Bolt on a one-health creature. Sometimes I’m just too obsessed with clearing the board. Apart from that I think I played okay and probably would have lost anyway, as he had a nice deck that played out exactly on curve.

So after a June in which I had a series of 5-9 win runs, I had a July with a series of 0-4 win runs. I seem to be getting worse. What’s up with that?

2667

I hate it when that happens. Probably 9 out of 10 times when you play that 4th minion, it won’t matter because either he has no MCT, or when he plays it he gets one of the crappy little minions you have instead of your big guy. But that 10th time…ugh. In theory, I’ll hold back a 4th minion unless it means I’m threatening next-turn lethal damage, just in case of MCT, but it’s so hard to remember that.

Welcome to Arena, where your play skill is about 20% of what determines your wins. Much more important which cards you’re offered, and how good the cards were for the folks you get matched up with in the first 3-5 games. At least, that’s how it feels to me.

2668

I’ve been brutalized in Arena constantly. I often go 0-3 with a deck I think is perfectly good. I do OK in constructed (peak rank 10) so I don’t know why I’m so awful at it. Maybe I just can’t build decks.

2669

Thanks for your replies, guys. You made me feel better!

I just did a 4-3 run as a Druid, one of my less-played classes, so I feel a bit better still. I played well in just about every game. My worst error came during a game I won, against a Priest. To clear the board, I needed to use face and a cheap minion to finish off two one-health enemy minions. For rope-related reasons, I used my face to attack the 6-attack minion and used my cheap minion to finish off the 3-attack minion. Um, yeah. In the end, it didn’t matter. Other than that, I felt I played reasonably well.

It sometimes seems to me that everybody in Arena has a decent deck. Those older Arena YouTube videos sometimes show you people running dozens of low-value cards, but the people I play against have generally good cards, about the same in quality as mine. Sure, occasionally someone gets stuck with a lousy card, but I see many more good cards than bad. Where are all those newbs when I need them? :)

Also, which do you think is more important in Arena – the draft or the play of the hand?

2670

The memory leak in the current brawl on certain mobile devices blows.

2671

The current Brawl more or less blows. Especially when you’re trying to clear Paladin quests for some stupid reason.

2672

Well, luckily you don’t need to worry about that any more.

2673

I loved it! If I want to minimize randomness, I play Ranked. TB (every other week) gives me the randomness I love in which each player plays by the same rules.

2674

I liked it too! I like getting to play with all sorts of cards I normally don’t see.

2675

I spend 700 gold for open quarter and next is TGT omg …

2676

TGT OMG

2677

TGT continue …

2678

Stusser been slacking off on updating the spam filter?

Anyway, REPORTED.

2679

Thing is, subscription to the forum is usually moderated. It could mean that the forum software has some vulnerability that bypasses moderation, or that it has been compromised somehow.

2680

We’re back on manual account approval? I had no idea! Poor stusser and Tom, heh.

2681

New Card Reveals From Gamescom, New Mechanic: Joust + New Ranked Rewards

2682

The ranked-mode loot is very welcome. Actually gives you a reason to play in ranked. It’s a good call overall, because it will keep the population in ranked higher, so it doesn’t become just a pit of legendary players and trolls.

Also, LOL at Brave Archer.