Duel of Champions

[Great Deceiver]

I managed to get a Strength of the Sea yesterday and my deck improved quite a bit with it - I've broken 1000 and by now stall decks are common, both Stronghold stall decks for the trample creature combo (I don't even know exactly what it does since there's no aftergame log and it happens too quickly - all I know is that they use the hero that pays 6 resources to add swift/trample to some creature, I don't know exactly which, they keep milling their decks for that spell that prevents damage to your hero until they have the combo, and then they one shot you. I wish there was a log in the game, sometimes things happen too quickly and you don't quite get what's going on) and Academy stall decks (guy tried to one shot me with a fortune but I had Strength of the Sea at a crucial turn).

In any case, things like spells being too good and creatures being weak is something very evident even at my low 1k level of play already. It's unfortunate, as the game is fun when you're not getting spammed by 4 fireballs in a row.

I also started running into Crag Hack decks and those are ridiculous for me, there's literally no way to beat them so far. I think I need more aoe spells, I have 4 Geysers but not enough most of the time.

On another note, I wish Heroes were easier to obtain. I'm tired of playing my deck but restricted by not having other Heroes to play around with. I did manage to get a couple of Stronghold ones but my Stronghold cards suck.

 

[Occasionally Fatal]

So I'm still pretty scrub like, only played like 15 matches or something (at maybe 150 elo), but I'm only seeing Necro and Haven decks so far. And I'm playing Necro. I've seen maybe 1 Stronghold deck, and no Inferno decks. What's the deal?

Also, is there some place that has good card definitions? I'm trying to figure out Blizzard, which says it should randomly choose an additional adjacent target after casting, but it seems to just disappear despite having cards right next to it, either below or above or either side. I've only seen it actually hop targets once.

 

[procrastinator]

Well, it's just unreliable like that. Sometimes it even stays on the original target.

 

[Zeriel]

Also keep in mind that starting players can only pick Necro, Inferno, or Haven. So that limits the very low ELO games to certain factions, typically.

Also, is there some place that has good card definitions? I'm trying to figure out Blizzard, which says it should randomly choose an additional adjacent target after casting, but it seems to just disappear despite having cards right next to it, either below or above or either side. I've only seen it actually hop targets once.

The card text is generally literal and makes sense once you see it in action. There is a site that lists all the cards in the game, but it simply is cropped screenshots of cards from the game itself, so that won't help if the text isn't illuminating.

I've seen similarly finnicky behavior with 'adjacent' spells. It may be that they only hop in the same row (left to right, right to left, et cetera). I can't offer much more because I don't use the adjacent spells.

Incidentally, if anyone wants to add me on DoC for random duels or whatever, my id over there is brbragequit.

 

[Aldebaran]

I think the thing with Blizzard is that if the enchanted creature dies, the effect where it travels to an adjacent creature never resolves. The damage is dealt, but then the creature immediately dies since it is at less than one health, taking the enchantment with it. At least, that has been the case in my limited experience.

 

[Great Deceiver]

Blizzard seems to randomly check for conditions to spread - I think there's a 20% chance of it going to an adjacent square (and a 20% chance of staying on the same target). If the adjacent square it goes to is empty, the spell is lost. That seems to be what I observed at least.

 

[Occasionally Fatal]

Thanks, I think Aldebaran's explanation meshes with what I have observed. I'll have to play with it some more. Wish practice mode let you choose your hand or something. I'm Occ_ccO on there.

 

[Great Deceiver]

So after playing Hearthstone a little bit, I think this is far, far superior. +1 for the underdogs!

 

[Zeriel]

The thing I miss the most in Hearthstone is the lane system for attacking. To think I once thought it was too easy to damage heroes in Duel of Champions--compared to Hearthstone, it's a monumental struggle.

 

[Berekän]

Is there any way to improve the log or does it always suck so much? :/

 

[abija]

So after playing Hearthstone a little bit, I think this is far, far superior. +1 for the underdogs!

Someone tell that to ubisoft. Fucking mongoloids it's like they're ashamed of the game.
There are some things that aren't hard to implement at all and could improve a lot the first experience and retention of new players.
- get a proper deck builder in the client and FOR FUCK'S SAKE ALLOW CARDS TO BE IN MULTIPLE DECKS (and fire the guy who decided on current system, guaranteed moron)
- give beginners more base decks, let them play around; all the "no special ability" heroes should be given at start with base decks, or at least half of them and let people unlock the other half in some easy way
- make it easier to play fun games against friends because atm if your skill and card collection aren't similar it sucks donkey balls (a proper deck builder would take care of most issues by itself)

 

[Great Deceiver]

I suspect that not being able to use the same card in multiple decks wasn't a simple oversight, or a mistake, or even an idea that originated from the designers themselves; there's probably some jewlord suit at Ubi that suggested it, in order for the game to make more money. It's a ridiculous inconvenience and actually detracts from me spending more in the game - multiple deckbuilding is so painful that I get lazy just thinking about having to shuffle cards around. The irony is palpable.

The deckbuilding interface itself is also atrocious, I have no idea why the screen is squashed outside of the match itself, with a weird aspect ratio. Having to use a third party website to get marginally better results is depressing.

The underlying game is really good, I hope they understand that these issues aren't trivial, and that the developers don't get discouraged by the success of Hearthstone - I believe that game will have no longevity at all for the dedicated CCG players.

 

[Occasionally Fatal]

Is there any way to improve the log or does it always suck so much? :/

Yeah, you can go to MMDoC King in the tools section and get the Game history viewer. If you right click on a replay you can view the log.

 

[Cyberarmy]

I started this one on weekend and enjoying it greatly. Got some lucky drops from decks I got and made a barbarian deck.
It consist of mostly raw creature power and some nice fortune cards but lack spells which I really need if I want to win against friggin undead. That deck got some annoying cheap raise dead cards.
Only won 2 games against undead with orcs and I was extremely lucky.
I got really old for this kind of games though Made really funny mistake, commonly forgot to use my creatures attacks or stepped on my own land mine...

Deckbuilding interface is really mess, small scale. And they should really fire the guy who thinks not allowing cards to be in multiple decks is a good idea... It is a pain to switch decks when you don't have enough cards for other deck...

 

[Berekän]

Is there any way to improve the log or does it always suck so much? :/

Yeah, you can go to MMDoC King in the tools section and get the Game history viewer. If you right click on a replay you can view the log.

Oh well, was expecting something that would display ingame, it's hard sometimes to keep track of the plays while they happen, thanks anyway!

 

[Disgruntled]

I want to get back into it but im daunted by the repetitive cycle i fell into.
I got a solid common/uncommon necro deck that played out virtually the same for 2 weeks before i quit.

Being able to reuse cards and lowering the real money costs a bit would help this game a lot.
(no idea how it would affect ubi's bottom line, probably a net loss unless they start a fresh marketing campaign alongside the changes so the player influx negates the loss)

 

[Great Deceiver]

After reaching 1200 elo, I can say that I've hit a brick wall. My Necro deck isn't too shabby (I have 4 banshees, 2 paos, atropos, strength of the sea, 4 geysers, some other stuff, even though I'm using the default hero, Seria), but it literally can't win vs the currently trending decks, namely Crag Hack rush and Shurima ambush spam. I even bought out Arianna but I don't have enough Earth spells or Spitters to make her work the best.

At higher levels, spells are way too powerful, board clears are too spammy, and the game becomes generally unfun.

I'd like to try a few new ideas, but the way that decks are restricted by heroes, and how starting out another hero brings with it a whole new set of costs (different spell schools), means I have no patience to grind out forever for those. It's a nice game, but too rigid in its hero-deck relationship to make switching to a new deck possible when you get sick of your current one. I like some variety in my card games, so I've basically stopped playing.

 

[procrastinator]

I feel pretty good about Crag Hack matchup actually. Untamed Wraiths and Soul Consuming Liches are perfect against him. There is a great Adark-Malik guide on the official forums, I'm going in a similar direction with my Seria deck. Although I'm stuck in the 1100-1300 range too at the moment

 

[catfood]

Played about 20 matches so far. Out of those I've had 3 or 4 losses, all of them to negromancers with imba decks. I think I can see where this is going...

 

[Great Deceiver]

I feel pretty good about Crag Hack matchup actually. Untamed Wraiths and Soul Consuming Liches are perfect against him. There is a great Adark-Malik guide on the official forums, I'm going in a similar direction with my Seria deck. Although I'm stuck in the 1100-1300 range too at the moment

Well, Adar-Malik is infinitely superior to Seria, especially in the lategame, because of the unlimited recycling after a certain point, and not having to burn space in your deck with lesser cards such as Graveyard or Arianna's Lair. Also, I feel Fire magic is superior to Water in just about every way, Fire Bolt is simply too cheap for what it does.

So, I don't think building an Adar-Malik deck with Seria is a good idea, but maybe you've had more success than I have.

Also, thinking back to what someone else said in this thread, Altar of Wishes probably ruined the balance in the game. There's probably not a single one of these copycat netdecks that doesn't have 4x Dark Assassin and 4x Pao Deathseeker. It gets a little grating...

 

[Zeriel]

Adar-Mallik is really more about being a pao-whore than anything else. I don't like decks that lack prime, though.

 

[Jaedar]

I'm stuck at 900 elo cause I never play the game (also because my deck is not very good I suspect)

 

[procrastinator]

Looks like a new expansion is coming up in a couple of days, they are currently spoiling it at http://www.twitch.tv/duelofchampions.
Also,

Our community has been requesting the ability to add a card in multiple decks and we’re happy to say that with this next update coming in just two days time, this will now be possible.

 

[catfood]

Our community has been requesting the ability to add a card in multiple decks and we’re happy to say that with this next update coming in just two days time, this will now be possible.

 

[Jaedar]

Don't really see any inferno cards in the new expansion that I want. Most inferno stuff is just make enemy discard or trigger on enemy discard.

Academy looks to have some cool shit though.