16th August and the season ended overnight for me. I woke up to 18 reward chests! After opening I had a total of 13 different owned cards with two more duplicates and 160.657 DEC burning a hole in my pocket.
The past season has taught me how much difference those zero and 1 mana cards Furious Chicken and Creeping Ooze make to a team, so they were at the top of my list. They are reward cards, but are now out of print, so there's no chance of winning them any more. They're only available at the market.
Next on the list was the Divine Healer, an Alpha and Beta card. I couldn't afford the Alpha, so Beta it was. Then another Beta was the Feral Spirit. For a 3 mana card, it’s got a lot going for it. It's fast and has sneak attack. These two should help strengthen my life splinter. Then I'm coming up just short for a Clay Golem or Silvershield Paladin.
The daily quest was earth splinter and by completion I had enough rewards (gaining some from the reward chests) to buy that Clay Golem, another Alpha/Beta card, only available at the market.
Current stats stand at 18 unique cards and 30.141 DEC.
17th August and I only really got time to retrieve up the daily challenge, which was water splinter.
18th August and I'm completing yesterday's quest. I got a first in any match I've ever had; my opponent had the exact same cards! I sat looking at it and figured that the first one to go would be the winner. Unless the other gets a dodge, by some miracle. Then I pressed “battle” and it didn't even play, just came up as a draw; which was kind of disappointing. However, the reward chests on completion of the challenge made up for my disappointment with two cards. A Wave Runner and a Screeching Vulture. The vulture is a duplicate, but the Wave Runner is a new one for me. A few more duplicates and I'll be able to start levelling some cards up!
New daily quest was fire splinter, but it was late by the time I got around to retrieving it.
19th August and the fire quest is completed. I hit Silver II league, so I got 3 chests and cards in all. A new one in Nectar Queen, then two duplicates.
I've levelled my first card, the Screeching Vulture, up to level two, which I'm pretty pleased about.
The next quest was 3 battles with no neutral and it highlighted for me just how low some of my splinters are without the neural cards. I got another Vulture and 188 DEC along with a potion. Another visit to the market is in my future!
It's 22nd August and I'm sitting in silver I league. I have 24 owned cards, not counting the duplicates and while I enjoy the extras rewards of being in higher levels than I'll be able to reach when the changes come in at the beginning of next month, I'm also now more aware that, despite resistance from some, these changes could be a good thing. As an actual game player, there are a few things in the game which are off putting as things stand now. Playing with level 1 cards at this level, I'm very much aware that the teams I'm coming across are so vastly superior to mine that it wouldn't matter how well I played (not that I play well anyway) I have no chance of defeating them. Having game after game like this is exasperating and there are days when I just give up for the day. If I was doing this just for fun, I'd be wondering where the fun was. Sometimes, the only way I get through the quest is by dropouts/surrenders at the last moment or a fluke team which is as low powered as mine. This keeps me up in the leagues which perpetuates the problem, when I could drop back down to being on more equal footing.
Another thing I come across on occasion, is an inordinately long wait for a team match to be found in certain leagues. Again, this doesn't do much for the gameplay. So if this upcoming change keeps a more consistent amount of people in each league, of a similar strength, it could be just what's needed. Because, ultimately, we want real life players and not bots. No point in putting them off with frustrating or boring gameplay. I'm actually looking forward to the game changes to see the comparison.
Back to the LR account, though. I've got 345 DEC and I'm at the market. I could really do with more magic cards, but I'm not finding much in my price range. I got myself a Sea Monster, because it was cheap and it's a healer. Unfortunately, it's also a high mana card and I mostly get low mana matches with this account. I think I've reached the point of needing to build up the DEC to get what I'm needing.
23rd August, is it Sunday already? I thought I'd finished yesterday's quest, but I guess I was more tired than I realised! I didn't even watch the progress of the last match I put in for. Unsurprisingly, I lost. First match of the morning and I forgot the chicken!! Thankfully, I still won, but it was a close call.
End of week 3 and I have 24 different owned cards, with my first at level 2. DEC stands at 321.732 and I'm back in silver II.
