A public service announcement for F2P folks out there. I'll summarize it in here right now:
If you already have a good Classic collection and content with your Old Gods/Kara/MSG cards then start saving TODAY.
If you do NOT have a good collection but want to be ready for the next expansion, plan to start saving February 6th.
Reasoning:
On average you typically will make 50 gold per quest, assuming you:
1. cycle a 40 gold quest every day into a higher one
2. Avoid missing out on a quest. That is making sure you have an empty quest slot i ntime for the next quest to show up.
3. Avoid doing 40 gold quests unless #2 has to be satisfied.
Along with that, I also assume you can get 3 wins a day on average, mostly through getting the quests. Thus I assume you'll get, on average, 60 gold per day. This is the minimum amount of efford I assume you will do. Folks who push harder have it easier.
We also assume that the next content is an expansion and it'll slate at around the time other content has released in Spring, April-May. We'll go conservative and plan for April 1st to be ready.
If you save your gold every day under these conditions, you'll have 5220 gold saved up by April 1st. This amounts to 52 packs. 52 packs is a good amount for an expansion. In fact, buying more than 60 is actually rather wasteful as you'll have most of the rares/commons and packs are POOR investments for epics/legendaries. Anything after 60 packs should be spent in the arena to gather dust.
Thus if you are a F2Per and you are worried about 'keeping up' and you already have a decent Classic collection, NOW is the time. You'll have a great common/rare collection and a few rares and at least one legendary to play with. From there focus on Arena or, if you NEED TO, dust some rotated out cards if you need other epics/legendaries.
If you are newer and, thus, your classic, old gods, MSG collection isn't set or you need more Kara wings, you don't have to start saving now. The minimum I'd say to go for pack openings is 30. That gets you started and typically gets you at least one legendary. If you have dust as well you can compliment it with getting the right cards you need to get a decent deck going.
So when to start to eget 30 packs? February 6th. Start saving then to get 3k gold at April. Thus between now and then use your gold to bolster your current collection. Preferably focus on arena runs for dust/practice unless you can't make 3 wins on average and REALLY need cards right now. Note that rotation hits at that time too so if desperate, there's cards that you may not be using if you stay in standard to dust, though do so sparingly.
So there you go. Your public service announcement. Good luck and happy collecting F2Pers.
Although I do not neccessarily agree on the amount of packs you consider "optimal" to be opened for a new expansion, the other points are legit. There is also a main reason why this is the best time to collect for a new expansion:
Aside of getting a new expansion/adventure, we will lose the cards of 2 expansions and an adventure at the same time. This means that the cardpool will be significantly lower until the remaining 2 are released in 2017, increasing your chances to have all the cards you need for the potentional metadecks.
If you are a F2P player with a limited collection, it's deffinitely not the time to craft the legendaries from TGT, or buy wings from BRM and LoE. Of course, no one is forcing you not to do so, but with 3 new expansions/adventures released each year, keeping up will be really difficult if you decide that you need dragon decks, Finley or Justicar right now.
Save your gold, never miss your quests, and if you have the time, you don't have to stop at a few wins just to finish your quests. 30 wins a day grants you 100 gold, which means up to 9000 gold by early April. Obviously this is almost impossible for most of the people, but something that can be kept in mind.
This is coming from an F2P player like myself, and luckily at this point, I can play almsot any deck I want without investing a dime. It will be easier to achieve for everyone after the rotations, but needs good gold/dust management for the time being.
Although I do not neccessarily agree on the amount of packs you consider "optimal" to be opened for a new expansion, the other points are legit. There is also a main reason why this is the best time to collect for a new expansion:
Able to elaborate on this? Not offended, but actually wouldn't mind a discussion on this one as I THINK my theory works but I know there's far better math folks than I who can get a better estimate, and getting the 'optimal' number right really is critical to knowing when to start saving.
The basis behind 30-60 goes as follows:
There's two ways of using gold: buying packs and running arena runs. Buying packs is a faster way of eaarning cards and tends to be very useful when your eager to get into a new expanson. Arena runs, if you can net 3 wins on average or better, nets you more for your money over time (either through cheaper packs or better access to dust).
Furthermore, packs are the most efficient way of getting commons and rares. However, dust is the best way to obtain epics and legendaries, since they are so hard to get and you typically only want VERY specific ones.
Thus packs are best used to fill out your commons and rares during new expansions. After that, you'll want the better dust access of arena runs to focus fire on specificly wanted epics/legendaries. Given that, the point of the switch is when you start getting 'dust packs': packs of duplicates that you just dust away.
The last bit, then is how many packs does it take to get regular 'dust packs'. For that I went through simulation spreadsheets made during TGT and Old Gods and found that that number seems to be at around 60 packs. At that poitn you get almost all of the commons, about 50-70% of the rares, and a smattering of epics and/or legendaries. Thus chances are, packs gained after that will be mostly duplicates of rares/commons.
Thus the 60 pack limit.
Why 30? Purely personal experiences. I had only 10 packs of GvG when it came out and REALLLLLYYY hated it. OTOH, I had 30 TGT packs. It was a little rough at first since I refused to use any dust the first two weeks (to wait for the hype to go away). The 30 packs were enough to do ..something, then once I could use my dust and specifically made some key decks I was in a good spot. My best standing, though, was going into Old Gods with 6k gold and +9k dust so I could get pretty much anything I wanted. For F2Pers, dust seems to be the Great Limiter more than just raw packs.
Thus 30-60 packs as the ideal, though I've never had it really tested by peers, so I'm interested in anyone able to actually determine if I have the right idea in all of this.
Although I do not neccessarily agree on the amount of packs you consider "optimal" to be opened for a new expansion, the other points are legit. There is also a main reason why this is the best time to collect for a new expansion:
Able to elaborate on this? Not offended, but actually wouldn't mind a discussion on this one as I THINK my theory works but I know there's far better math folks than I who can get a better estimate, and getting the 'optimal' number right really is critical to knowing when to start saving.
Everyone's luck is different when it comes to pack opening, maybe you were a little more fortunate, but 30 packs (even 60) is too low to get even a reliable common/rare card pool. After the release, I've opened close to 100 packs in 2 weeks (most from gold + quest promotion, and quite a few from arena after), and I was still missing not just many rare cards, but commons as well. Really annoying when you have 0 copy of something you want two in your deck, but end up getting 9 Shadow Ragers instead.
There is definitely no "optimal" amount of packs to be opened, but I would say 70-80 is good for many reasons: - will provide a decent amount of common/rare cardpool - the dust you get from duplicates will be significantly higher - 2 legendaries are almost guaranteened, but on average, it will be 3-4 (closer to 3). With 30 packs only, there's a chance you won't even get a single one (pity timer)
As you said, Arena is the best way to collect dust. A good player can average 6 wins in arena, which is almost self-sustainable. Problem is the time again. Even a single arena might take really long, and you haven't even completed your daily quest / player ladder for gold. Also, if you are missing a lot of cards from MSG, the arena reward is more likely to provide cards that you don't have yet, instead of duplicates that you can disenchant. So again, I would only suggest dust-farming with arena if one is actually successful in getting a high winrate, have most of the MSG cardpool already and have the time to do a few runs.
I'll wait until I get my 3rd MSoG legendary (80 packs opened so far, leg on pack 38 and ~65, so ~25 packs left at most) and any days / packs left in January I will spend on WotoG packs...
Much harder is the decision in which epics / legs to invest my 5400 dust ;)
Mmh, good points, I didn't think of saving yet, but indeed, I unpacked something like 50 MSG packs now. Quite unlucky, but admittedly I can't think of any cards I miss from MSG and that I really want.
I guess I'll give myself 1-2 more weeks of packs and then save.
As an F2P player, I find the advice extremely helpful. And maybe it takes more than 30 packs to get the required cards in a expansion, but saving now sounds like good advice. Playing on constructed should help too
Thx, a lot for taking the time to write all that down.
I agree with almost everything apart from arena with 3 wins... but i can't really argue with statistics or something. I just think with 3 wins average you maybe make up for the 50 Gold difference for the pack, but not for the lost 10-20 gold you could've farmed with a fast deck in the same time. But i have to admit i'm really a chicken when it comes to taking risks with my grinded gold^^ and it's just a small thing ;-)
I think I'm gooing to use a link to your thread for future tips to newbies ;-) Well written guide mate ;-)
Although I do not neccessarily agree on the amount of packs you consider "optimal" to be opened for a new expansion, the other points are legit. There is also a main reason why this is the best time to collect for a new expansion:
Able to elaborate on this? Not offended, but actually wouldn't mind a discussion on this one as I THINK my theory works but I know there's far better math folks than I who can get a better estimate, and getting the 'optimal' number right really is critical to knowing when to start saving.
Everyone's luck is different when it comes to pack opening, maybe you were a little more fortunate, but 30 packs (even 60) is too low to get even a reliable common/rare card pool. After the release, I've opened close to 100 packs in 2 weeks (most from gold + quest promotion, and quite a few from arena after), and I was still missing not just many rare cards, but commons as well. Really annoying when you have 0 copy of something you want two in your deck, but end up getting 9 Shadow Ragers instead.
That's sort of the point though. After around 60 packs, you aren't going to do much better in the rare department. At around that point, you'll have MOST of the commons and about 50% of the rares on average, which I bet you hit. After around 100 packs, you won't be much betteras most of your cards will be copies, like all of those shadow ragers.
I'm not saying get 60 packs because you'll get all of the cards you need. I'm saying that because getting more packs will mostly be useless from there. It's the difference between 3 shadow ragers and 9 shadow ragers. After that, you're just going to have to turn to dust to fill out the cards you REALLY need.
As far as 30.. .I'm looking at it from the "I'm new and don't have most of my Classic set yet!" folks. I was there from GvG to TGT. 30 packs is painful but doable if you have to, and early on you are a F2Per, and you'll have to. F2P early life is a sucky life. Better than most F2P games though.
There is definitely no "optimal" amount of packs to be opened, but I would say 70-80 is good for many reasons: - will provide a decent amount of common/rare cardpool - the dust you get from duplicates will be significantly higher - 2 legendaries are almost guaranteened, but on average, it will be 3-4 (closer to 3). With 30 packs only, there's a chance you won't even get a single one (pity timer)
As you said, Arena is the best way to collect dust. A good player can average 6 wins in arena, which is almost self-sustainable. Problem is the time again. Even a single arena might take really long, and you haven't even completed your daily quest / player ladder for gold. Also, if you are missing a lot of cards from MSG, the arena reward is more likely to provide cards that you don't have yet, instead of duplicates that you can disenchant. So again, I would only suggest dust-farming with arena if one is actually successful in getting a high winrate, have most of the MSG cardpool already and have the time to do a few runs.
I was thinking of 80 packs to be sure of the pity timer, but very VERY few people will actually hit the timer. So I'd say if you REALLY awnt to be nitpicky, start at 60, keep going till you get your next legendary, then stop.
As far as arena, after 3 wins is the poitn when you'll get about 50 dust/gold and a pack, which puts the pack at 100 gold effectively. Anything more and you'll get a discount (say, 50 gold, 20 dust, and a pack) which is more worthwhile. Of course, TIME is a big factor. I'm a VERY casual plyer nowadays. I can never get a full arena run going unless it went BAD and I struggle at times to get a quest slot opened. That's why I don't say to, say, take 6000 gol dand spam arena, which IS the most optimal option. But arena IS better than packs at 3 wins or more, and to be blunt, if you can't get to 3 wins on average, and you are a F2Per, you should focus on fixing that and getting better. A F2Per who can't run arena will NEVER keep up. Thta dust is critical.
The good thign is that you don't need to be selfsustaining. Just better than '50 gold/dust+pack' which is 3 wins.
So BEST is 60 packs+ trigger the next legendary, then arena. And get to a 3 win arena average as a priority. After that, treat your dust like your lifeblood because you NEED that dust to get the decks filled out you want. Pack buying really doesn't do anything except get you that common/rare base.
Do selective dusting if you need, prioritize on keeping currently "controversial" cards like Drakonid Operative, Small-Time Buccaneer, etc... in case of a nerf they will generate you 100 dust for each copy instead of just 20, but be aware it may not happen that soon, if ever.
Second, if you have a couple of decks in "good shape" for current meta, save the dust too for next release. Unless, of course, there's a meta shift and you need a/some key card/s you can afford to craft, but after 1+ month it's very unlikely to either happen or your decks falling from good to crap.
A tip: on the search field in collection/crafting page you can type extra to filter all excess cards you currently have, it even shows you extra golden cards. And when you have 2 regulars + 1+ golden, dust the golden ones... I know they look awesome, but awesomeness doesn't win games.
So what do you guys think is a decent Classic collection? I really like the reasoning in this thread, but I'm not sure if my Classic Collection is decent yet.
I think my collection is public, so can you guys give me some feedback?
In my point of view, 50-60 packs is enough for a F2P player without full collection, because it should be enough to build 1/2 tier1/tier2 metadecks, but if you want to go for all the metadecks, you should buy a little more than that. I am a F2P player, but i am now with almost full collections of every expansion, even wild, and i just don´t have the time to get rank 5 and do arenas, so i prefer opening more packs and get rank 5, then do only arenas.
agree with nratw instintively, though I can't bother to check the maths. 2014/1015 I spent a lot of money in packs, refused to dust gold cards and legendary, wanted to collect everything and never had the right cards. Started F2P last year, bought all wings with gold, never more than 30 packs and arena ever since, dusted all my golds apart from hunter, drood card and Ragnaros (he's too nice in gold), played arena ever since with the extra gold and average win of 3 to 5. Now I have all the cards I need for the decks I like to play. Started to play yesterday for the new expansion after 4 months break, opened 5 packs, playing with good old zoolock and shammy to finish my quests. Yes you need new cards. No, you don't really need them until rank 10 if you sort of play decently which sometimes I happen to do. Better a good old sound deck decently played than noobs with all the new cards and just not able to play. Save money, have fun!
A public service announcement for F2P folks out there. I'll summarize it in here right now:
If you already have a good Classic collection and content with your Old Gods/Kara/MSG cards then start saving TODAY.
If you do NOT have a good collection but want to be ready for the next expansion, plan to start saving February 6th.
Reasoning:
On average you typically will make 50 gold per quest, assuming you:
1. cycle a 40 gold quest every day into a higher one
2. Avoid missing out on a quest. That is making sure you have an empty quest slot i ntime for the next quest to show up.
3. Avoid doing 40 gold quests unless #2 has to be satisfied.
Along with that, I also assume you can get 3 wins a day on average, mostly through getting the quests. Thus I assume you'll get, on average, 60 gold per day. This is the minimum amount of efford I assume you will do. Folks who push harder have it easier.
We also assume that the next content is an expansion and it'll slate at around the time other content has released in Spring, April-May. We'll go conservative and plan for April 1st to be ready.
If you save your gold every day under these conditions, you'll have 5220 gold saved up by April 1st. This amounts to 52 packs. 52 packs is a good amount for an expansion. In fact, buying more than 60 is actually rather wasteful as you'll have most of the rares/commons and packs are POOR investments for epics/legendaries. Anything after 60 packs should be spent in the arena to gather dust.
Thus if you are a F2Per and you are worried about 'keeping up' and you already have a decent Classic collection, NOW is the time. You'll have a great common/rare collection and a few rares and at least one legendary to play with. From there focus on Arena or, if you NEED TO, dust some rotated out cards if you need other epics/legendaries.
If you are newer and, thus, your classic, old gods, MSG collection isn't set or you need more Kara wings, you don't have to start saving now. The minimum I'd say to go for pack openings is 30. That gets you started and typically gets you at least one legendary. If you have dust as well you can compliment it with getting the right cards you need to get a decent deck going.
So when to start to eget 30 packs? February 6th. Start saving then to get 3k gold at April. Thus between now and then use your gold to bolster your current collection. Preferably focus on arena runs for dust/practice unless you can't make 3 wins on average and REALLY need cards right now. Note that rotation hits at that time too so if desperate, there's cards that you may not be using if you stay in standard to dust, though do so sparingly.
So there you go. Your public service announcement. Good luck and happy collecting F2Pers.
One does not simply walk into Mordor,
unless they want to be the best they can be.
Interesting perspective.. Thanks for the heads up!
Although I do not neccessarily agree on the amount of packs you consider "optimal" to be opened for a new expansion, the other points are legit. There is also a main reason why this is the best time to collect for a new expansion:
Aside of getting a new expansion/adventure, we will lose the cards of 2 expansions and an adventure at the same time. This means that the cardpool will be significantly lower until the remaining 2 are released in 2017, increasing your chances to have all the cards you need for the potentional metadecks.
If you are a F2P player with a limited collection, it's deffinitely not the time to craft the legendaries from TGT, or buy wings from BRM and LoE. Of course, no one is forcing you not to do so, but with 3 new expansions/adventures released each year, keeping up will be really difficult if you decide that you need dragon decks, Finley or Justicar right now.
Save your gold, never miss your quests, and if you have the time, you don't have to stop at a few wins just to finish your quests. 30 wins a day grants you 100 gold, which means up to 9000 gold by early April. Obviously this is almost impossible for most of the people, but something that can be kept in mind.
This is coming from an F2P player like myself, and luckily at this point, I can play almsot any deck I want without investing a dime. It will be easier to achieve for everyone after the rotations, but needs good gold/dust management for the time being.
Anyone would have already quit this game with my unluck.
One does not simply walk into Mordor,
unless they want to be the best they can be.
After the release, I've opened close to 100 packs in 2 weeks (most from gold + quest promotion, and quite a few from arena after), and I was still missing not just many rare cards, but commons as well. Really annoying when you have 0 copy of something you want two in your deck, but end up getting 9 Shadow Ragers instead.
- will provide a decent amount of common/rare cardpool
- the dust you get from duplicates will be significantly higher
- 2 legendaries are almost guaranteened, but on average, it will be 3-4 (closer to 3). With 30 packs only, there's a chance you won't even get a single one (pity timer)
So again, I would only suggest dust-farming with arena if one is actually successful in getting a high winrate, have most of the MSG cardpool already and have the time to do a few runs.
Anyone would have already quit this game with my unluck.
I'll wait until I get my 3rd MSoG legendary (80 packs opened so far, leg on pack 38 and ~65, so ~25 packs left at most) and any days / packs left in January I will spend on WotoG packs...
Much harder is the decision in which epics / legs to invest my 5400 dust ;)
Mmh, good points, I didn't think of saving yet, but indeed, I unpacked something like 50 MSG packs now. Quite unlucky, but admittedly I can't think of any cards I miss from MSG and that I really want.
I guess I'll give myself 1-2 more weeks of packs and then save.
As an F2P player, I find the advice extremely helpful. And maybe it takes more than 30 packs to get the required cards in a expansion, but saving now sounds like good advice. Playing on constructed should help too
Stay a while, and listen
Thx, a lot for taking the time to write all that down.
I agree with almost everything apart from arena with 3 wins... but i can't really argue with statistics or something. I just think with 3 wins average you maybe make up for the 50 Gold difference for the pack, but not for the lost 10-20 gold you could've farmed with a fast deck in the same time. But i have to admit i'm really a chicken when it comes to taking risks with my grinded gold^^ and it's just a small thing ;-)
I think I'm gooing to use a link to your thread for future tips to newbies ;-) Well written guide mate ;-)
Nah... to soon. I will keep opening packs.
One does not simply walk into Mordor,
unless they want to be the best they can be.
Another good tip is to not Mass Disenchant.
Do selective dusting if you need, prioritize on keeping currently "controversial" cards like Drakonid Operative, Small-Time Buccaneer, etc... in case of a nerf they will generate you 100 dust for each copy instead of just 20, but be aware it may not happen that soon, if ever.
Second, if you have a couple of decks in "good shape" for current meta, save the dust too for next release. Unless, of course, there's a meta shift and you need a/some key card/s you can afford to craft, but after 1+ month it's very unlikely to either happen or your decks falling from good to crap.
A tip: on the search field in collection/crafting page you can type extra to filter all excess cards you currently have, it even shows you extra golden cards. And when you have 2 regulars + 1+ golden, dust the golden ones... I know they look awesome, but awesomeness doesn't win games.
So what do you guys think is a decent Classic collection?
I really like the reasoning in this thread, but I'm not sure if my Classic Collection is decent yet.
I think my collection is public, so can you guys give me some feedback?
Thing is, the next expansion will be an adventure. Not pack-related.. but still you could buy the wings with the gold saved!
In my point of view, 50-60 packs is enough for a F2P player without full collection, because it should be enough to build 1/2 tier1/tier2 metadecks, but if you want to go for all the metadecks, you should buy a little more than that. I am a F2P player, but i am now with almost full collections of every expansion, even wild, and i just don´t have the time to get rank 5 and do arenas, so i prefer opening more packs and get rank 5, then do only arenas.
f2p, playing for fun ^^
agree with nratw instintively, though I can't bother to check the maths. 2014/1015 I spent a lot of money in packs, refused to dust gold cards and legendary, wanted to collect everything and never had the right cards. Started F2P last year, bought all wings with gold, never more than 30 packs and arena ever since, dusted all my golds apart from hunter, drood card and Ragnaros (he's too nice in gold), played arena ever since with the extra gold and average win of 3 to 5. Now I have all the cards I need for the decks I like to play. Started to play yesterday for the new expansion after 4 months break, opened 5 packs, playing with good old zoolock and shammy to finish my quests. Yes you need new cards. No, you don't really need them until rank 10 if you sort of play decently which sometimes I happen to do. Better a good old sound deck decently played than noobs with all the new cards and just not able to play. Save money, have fun!
Before Standard the release plan was to alternate between Expansion Packs and Adventures.
After Standard became a thing, the yearly release plan changed to: Spring Expansion - Summer Adventure - Fall/Winter Expansion.
There are so many things rotating out that an adventure could potentially hurt, even more, the meta diversity.