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Artifact - a Valve card game based on DotA

Self-Ejected

MajorMace

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Still think that the card effects are largely dull and I don't like the art style at all.
I join you on the art style, although I'd go even further and say the game lacks any art style to begin with. Some artworks are really cool, some are goddamn bland or ugly and the vast majority is uninspired.
For the dull card effects however, I'd say it's a plus for the launch, as it'll give more time for everyone to get in the core mechanics and conditions of victory. I'd rather have underwhelming cards than the opposite for now. For the future, they sure need to add some unique shit to keep the game interesting. One way to do this would be to deliver the first major update with 4 new mechanics specific to each colour. I assume that's the way they'll go anyway, as it's the most efficient way to both characterize each colour more and add some new & impactful cards to the game.
 

Frusciante

Cipher
Joined
Aug 24, 2012
Messages
716
Project: Eternity
The hype is real. The double condition of victory, the synergy between heroes, the item deck constructed beforehand. Finally some incline in card games. Praise GabeN.
Only element of disgust for me : The amount of RNG (attack targets, items available, creep deployment...) seems to heavily outweight the tools to manage it (I can already see the little "swap-someone" raccoon card being present in pretty much every deck of the correspondant colour). Teleportation scrolls will also be in pretty much every decks.
On the plus side, the double condition of victory makes room for some mindgame. It reminds me of WH40k Conquest a lot, where deploying on the right or wrong planet could decide of the fate of the game.
In this regard, artifact follows some unwritten golden rule of dota : mistakes should matter, and the more they matter, the better the game. Which is p.cool !

Largely agree. Teleportation scrolls you cannot add to your deck though, it's one of the (4?) consumables that shows up randomly in the right window of the shopping book. There are plenty of teleportation spells/abilities of course. Black seems to have the most and the best. Blue and red though don't have any I believe?
 
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The hype is real. The double condition of victory, the synergy between heroes, the item deck constructed beforehand. Finally some incline in card games. Praise GabeN.
I've been soaking up a bit more Artifact lately too (Watching streams, looking over cards, talking to Daka) and I'm pretty sure I'm in for $20 now. I'm leery on constructed, not only because of the potential cost of cards, but casual draft looks really enjoyable and the basic gameplay has grown on me once I've gotten a better handle on it.

You mentioned the RNG, but one key distinction in Artifact's RNG is that even though it's constant and common (Luck of cards drawn, luck of what items are offered in the shop, luck of which board the creeps go to, luck of where attacks go, a few cards, etc) it's something both players have to deal with and each individual case of it isn't massively swingy. To compare to other digital CCGs I've played, the RNG of a Ragnaros shot in Hearthstone can make or break a game in and of itself, and the results of create could determine games of Gwent (In the open beta. Closed beta had the least RNG. In release just put in nilf reveal for potentially game-winning RNG). Artifact RNG seems like it can throw off a turn or two here and there but there aren't as many cases of watching a coinflip to see if you're going to scoop or not.

I also agree on the potential mindgame front. I know Popeamole talked about a fair number of the Artifact cards being boring (And that's certainly true), but it feels like the mechanics of the game make up for it. Current Gwent makes me want to fucking kill myself when I play it when 90% of the cards are buff/damage +/- shit that makes my eyes glaze over, but juggling 3 boards at once with some slight RNG in unit placement and attacks those simply cards sound better. It's less about any individual card feeling good to play and it's more about wrangling your tards with the cards at hand. When CDPR did the fucking awful release version of Gwent one of the things they harped about constantly was "We want to make it feel like you're a general leading an army on a battlefield", and to try to achieve that goal they made the game boards shitty fields of mud and put little animated action figure leaders dancing on the sidelines. Artifact seems like it does a much better job of realizing that goal because you're keeping an eye on 3 different boards at once and trying to control a bunch of units you don't really have direct control over most of the time. Feels like there's more mindgaming and strategy going on than just pointslamming.

Could just be because I'm a Valve fan and I may change my tune once I can actually play this shit for myself, but once I started to figure out what the fuck was going on I'm kinda digging it. :kingcomrade:
 

Frusciante

Cipher
Joined
Aug 24, 2012
Messages
716
Project: Eternity
So the recycle future is online, it's 20 spare cards for one event ticket. I saw one guy on twitter exchanging his 1600 spare cards for 79 event tickets :)
 

J1M

Arcane
Joined
May 14, 2008
Messages
14,616
The floor on common prices will now be around $0.07. (marketplace fees)

It's annoying that the "public beta" doesn't include any of the public that has pre-purchased the game.

I'm looking forward to playing the pre-made deck events and will likely sell every card I open on the first day to pay back the cost of the game. Not interested in losing to someone because they spent $300 on a deck, so happy to see that codex drafts will be a thing.
 

Sentinel

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Ommadawn
How do you hope to make $20 from the starting booster cards on the first day? I think you're a bit optimistic.
 

J1M

Arcane
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Messages
14,616
I dont expect the starting decks will be worth much, but the purchase price includes 10 packs. And prices will be inflated for meme cards before people have duplicates from keeper draft.
 
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The floor on common prices will now be around $0.07. (marketplace fees)
Might still be lower than that. Much like TF2 keys are bought and sold for less on the Steam market than Valve itself sells them. The real question will be how expensive rare items/heroes get. And blink daggers are only uncommon but since they're ridiculously overpowered they're auto-include in absolutely every constructed deck so they'll probably be fairly pricey.

I'm sorely tempted to do the same thing though, if I end up D1Ping. I'm almost completely buying just it to play casual draft so if I can turn around and sell what I get from the packs to recoup even some of the $20 that'll be peachy. Plus I wouldn't be surprised if the market stabilizes after a few months and then most of the cards'll be cheap and we can pick up decent collections for a couple bucks if constructed is even worth it.

How do you hope to make $20 from the starting booster cards on the first day? I think you're a bit optimistic.
Probably depends on what you pull. Some of the big cards (Blink dagger for an uncommon, the rare OP heroes like drow and axe, etc) will probably be worth a few bucks by themselves. It's a bit up in the air of course but if it goes absolutely fucking insane like Magic you might see rare heroes going for $20 themselves.
Edit: Plus you shouldn't underestimate how fucking weird people can get. In the glory days of the Steam trading cards beta people were spending $1+ for Steam trading cards that have no real use at all. Since these cards have gameplay application and will have the hype of a new Valve game release behind them there'll probably be people out there wanting to have a full constructed playset on day 1 and will pay top dollar for it, and they might go even crazier because the cards will have some perceived value like a paper Magic card since you can sell it on the Steam market. Sure, you can only sell it for Steam scrip rather than actual cash like Magic, but it'll still make people value the cards a bit more.
 
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You don't get real cash right from your cards? Only steam gift card things?
Yep. Selling stuff on the market just gets you Steam-store credit. Once they implement card trading (If they do) it's possible some places will pop up for buying and selling cards for cash but I think they said at launch it's just going to be the market. Alternatively of course you could just buy a game using your Steam credit and then sell it to someone else at a markdown for Paypal. You'd get zapped with the cut Gaben takes on market transactions and lose a bit selling at a discount to entice people to buy your shit, but if you're God's gift to Artifact and you're raking in the packs with your starting event tickets you could make a few shekels.
 
Joined
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Siberia
Aaaand the thing is fucking ruined again. Added completely visible decklists (yours and opponent's) that you can access during the game.

They really have no idea what they are doing.
 

GrainWetski

Arcane
Joined
Oct 17, 2012
Messages
5,081
I was actually thinking about buying it, but that makes it completely unplayable. Just awful.

you mean I can check what he has in his deck while hes playing me?

Yeah, you get to see your opponent's entire deck list. Retards are defending it saying it "increases the skill ceiling". I have no idea how that's supposed to be the case.
 
Last edited:
Joined
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Yeah, you get to see your opponent's entire deck list. Retards are defending it saying it "increases the skill ceiling". I have no idea how that's supposed to be the case.
I suppose it's because you know what you play around, so you can adjust your play style based on your opponent's deck. But I'm not a fan of it either. As a default and especially in draft, anyway. In tournaments I could see it, especially if they let you look at your opponent's deck before the match gets rolling, but in draft it's harder to catch your opponent with his pants down with a rare card. The personal decktracker's a-ok though. Wish other digital card games had them by default.
 
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Patch for today:
Fixed a bug where the opponent's Deck Tracker was completely filled at game start in Gauntlet and casual matchmaking games. It is intended that you can see the opponent's full deck list during tournament games to reduce the value of scouting. You will also be able to see the full opponent's deck list in private lobbies. In other modes, the opponent's Deck Tracker will update based on what cards you've seen, and cards you know to be present (e.g., hero signature cards).
All hail Gaben, hallowed be his name. Listening to the prayers of Cow and delivering exactly what he wanted. :kingcomrade:
 

GrainWetski

Arcane
Joined
Oct 17, 2012
Messages
5,081
Yeah, I'm sure it was a bug. Still good, though. I might actually buy it tomorrow(stupid late launch means I can't play tonight).

Fuck the Heartshtone streamer retards and their mindless sheep followers for trying to push that shit on Draft modes just because they'll be playing the game for a few days before fleeing back to Hearthstone.
 

Jaedar

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Aug 5, 2009
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Project: Eternity Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 Pathfinder: Kingmaker
Has someone mocked valve for charging 20 bucks for a ccg in 2018 yet?

Because damn, that is pretty ballsy.
 
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Messages
2,323
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Bummer, didn't get fantastic wealth from my starter packs. Got two blink daggers but my rares were crap. On the bright side, did the two tutorial games with the starter decks and then played a friend match against Daka with starter decks. He did the red/green brute force deck and I did the blue/black control deck. He bodied the hell out of my heroes and killed them 3-4 times as much as I killed his, thus got flooded with gold, but I was able to swarm down one board with weenies and put another board on the clock with direct face nukes and trebuchets and squeaked out a win. Which was cool since hero kills aren't absolutely everything, thought I was completely fucked at first.

Probably gonna play some casual draft and/or the "Event" with better precon decks later tonight. Assuming the servers are more stable, since right now everything's going down in flames. Once you're in a match you're completely fine, but as soon as you get back to the menu Steam can't keep up.
 

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