fyrfytr998's views on digital vs physical

[Gondorian]

This is only half true. The hardest cards to get in this game are Legendaries and surprisingly Uncommons. I had to open 5 CotC boxes to get a playset of Shadow Knights.

If I'd known sooner, my advice would have been to check decklists for the class decks, since SK is in the Shadow Warrior one. Most of the uncommons can be found in the class decks. The Legendaries are hard to get, but not the strongest cards in the game, by any means.

For future reference, here's the list of deck contents:

http://www.shadowera.com/showthread....-Deck-Contents

Aldon and Jasmine are in every single human one.

[Padawan Pete]

And you can just buy singles anyway of any hard to get cards. That's what I did.

[fyrfytr998]

We are simply saying that there is a real risk in you biting off more than you can chew.

Focus on what your good at. Providing a fun and familiar alternative that all of us Magic junkies can play on the go.
I would make SF the last physical set for a while. Put that money into advertising.

I've never seen an ad for SE, anywhere....ever.

Pretty much this. What started as a "hey this might be cool" thing has appeared to now become a focus of the company. I'm not saying that Shadow Era cannot become popular as a physical/digital game. A lot of people feel it might have been mistimed by not cementing your status as the premiere iOS TCG app first.

One of the first things to always be pointed out in any interview is how Shadow Era was the first full scale TCG on iOS. That's right! Tiny little Wulven beat WotC and Blizzard to the promised land. And instead of aggressively advertising the game to exploit this, we got physical cards. Let's be honest. People don't find Shadow Era through advertising. They either arrive here by word of mouth or by chance while searching. I know I got here googling TCG's for my Mac back about 2011. I didn't even know they had an iOS app until later. That is how little advertising there was, and pretty much still is. I get that Wulven does pretty damn good for an indie company, but the 2-3 year head start you guys had on the Big Two has all but evaporated. And that was time enough to stake your claim as the premiere Digital TCG. The spot Hearthstone clearly holds now with 10 million players in only 5 months time. I wouldn't be surprised if it was because of SE's success on iOS that WotC and Blizzard decided to enter the mobile platform fray. And it's only a matter of time before WotC gets their act together and ports their flagship game (MtG:O) to mobile platforms to combat Blizzards success. Clearly MtG: 2013,2014,2015 have been craptacular.

Who knows? Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe because of the current state of the digital TCG landscape, Wulven HAS TO have physical cards to remain competitive. I just can't help but think that raising money for cards first, instead of raising money to advertise and implement all digital features, has led to it.

I honestly think this is about all I can say about this any more. Ultimately Kyle is taking his company in the direction he wants it to go, which is his right to do so. All I can do is play it or not.

[Gondorian]

Re: advertising/marketing ...

I loved the way people were offered a free exclusive mount in WoW if they signed up for Hearthstone and played some games. That's the kind of power Blizzard have. Are those people counted in the 10 million? Am I counted in the 10 million even if I have not run the app since January?

Total number of users in a timeframe doesn't really say much about the quality of the game, more the power of marketing. Also, you quote five months, but the game was in alpha and beta for at least a year total before it went live.

Don't get me wrong, I think Hearthstone is super polished, and fantastic at doing what it aims to do, but let's be objective here: I know you may think I can't be, so I won't answer my own question, but hopefully you can be objective, so I ask you this: is the card game underneath all the bells and whistles really that good?

[xSkeletalx]

To be honest, I've been playing SE for years, since right after it hit the App Store with COTC. I've played several different TCGs, and I've either lost interest in them, or the companies have folded.

Some of my best times have been spent playing TCGs with my friends, and they don't really enjoy playing digital TCGs. We've now got into the physical version, and as much as I love SE's digital game we're having extreme amounts of fun with the physical version! Nothing quite compares to feeling the physical shuffle, and holding cards in your hand.

I admit the physical one is a bit clunkier because of changing stats and effects, but if you're willing to commit to it, you can overcome that fairly easily.

[fyrfytr998]

Re: advertising/marketing ...

I loved the way people were offered a free exclusive mount in WoW if they signed up for Hearthstone and played some games. That's the kind of power Blizzard have. Are those people counted in the 10 million? Am I counted in the 10 million even if I have not run the app since January?

Total number of users in a timeframe doesn't really say much about the quality of the game, more the power of marketing. Also, you quote five months, but the game was in alpha and beta for at least a year total before it went live.

Don't get me wrong, I think Hearthstone is super polished, and fantastic at doing what it aims to do, but let's be objective here: I know you may think I can't be, so I won't answer my own question, but hopefully you can be objective, so I ask you this: is the card game underneath all the bells and whistles really that good?

I would assume you are counted amongst that 10 million number just the same as I'm sure there are quite a few quitters amongst the 4 million players SE has quoted.

Granted the have tremendous marketing power. At least they are making use of it. Even if you add alpha and beta, that is still a tremendous amount of players in a small amount of time.

I like how you want me to make an objective opinion about Hearthstone by narrowing the criteria for which to judge it by. Especially since aesthetically, it owns SE right now. I'll be your huckleberry though. OBJECTIVELY, you cannot really compare the two games. The target demographic for both games are different I feel. I believe Hearthstone was designed for gamers looking for a quick linear type of game. So is Hearthstone that good in that respect? Absolutely. It's not meant to be cerebral. It's not meant to have a ton of interaction. It is quite literally the "Wham Bam Thank You Ma'am" of TCG's.

On the other hand, while fun, I find Shadow Era was made to take advantage of the gaping whole in TCG mobile gaming market that WotC and Blizzard had no interest in at the time. Kudos to Kyle for having the vision to realize that a game as good as MtG was viable on a mobile format. It is in fact a shame Wulven doesn't have that Blizzard kind of marketing, because maybe if they did, there'd be 27,000 viewers (as I type) on Twitch right now watching Shadow Era instead of zero, but I digress. As a game, Shadow era is much deeper than HS by design. It was made to cater to hardcore TCG players looking for that Magic fix on their phone or tablet. Your card pool is deeper by default, because you've been around since 2011 or so. And it's mechanics makes it much more thought provoking and engaging. I guess having a chat feature makes SE more interactive by default as well. So as a complete game, Shadow Era has more to offer people looking to exercise their mental muscle.

So "objectively" you are asking me to compare apples and oranges if looked at in their proper context. If you are asking whether I have a personal preference, which is exactly what I think you are really asking, the old MtG player in me prefers Shadow Era.

I think that is all I can say about this anymore. No matter what I say, you'll always come back with something else toeing the company line. No offense, but you really can't be objective, nor unbiased, as an employee and physical card seller in my opinion.

Ultimately, this is Kyle's baby. And he can do with it as he pleases. All I can do is exercise my right to play Shadow Era or not. Right now I drift between a few games. I certainly know the no art issue personally effects my desire to want to play SE currently. Just as the stale meta effects my desire to play Hearthstone right now, even with the recent card additions and all the bells and whistles.

Here is the kicker. And this is kinda ironic. This whole time, you've basically told me that I need to look past the art and get over it. And lookey what I see on the FB page, which has basically been my whole reasoning for stating art should be first and foremost. Digital or physical.

https://www.facebook.com/ShadowEraCo...type=3&theater

Tell me generic place holders would reel them in.

And with that I am out. Cheers.

[Ekoz]

fyr is pretty much hitting the nail on the head. it isn't about whether or not HS or SE is the better TCG; they are two different types of games that are decent enough with the gameplay they provide. plenty of MtG players started playing HS and were disappointed with the lack of depth, so only the casual players tend to stay; just like how SE tends to drive away casual players and retains MtG vets.

it's about whether SE can attract players like HS can. obviously HS will always and forever have the edge, but the cause is only being hindered by slow development on the medium that a vast majority of newcomers are introduced through.

[Gondorian]

Thanks again for the feedback, fyrfytr and Ekoz. When put like that, I think it becomes clear why Kyle has been working on the bells and whistles on top of the game. The lack of art for the SF beta runs counter to that, of course, but the bells and whistles work isn't finished yet either.

So I guess what I'm saying here is that once SF is out of beta then you can consider Shadow Era 3.0 launched and that is the right time to do a marketing push as Hearthstone did when out of beta.

And just as many Hearthstone beta players got an edge on players who only joined when it went live, SE players who have reluctantly been using placeholder art will have a head start on new players for 3.0, via their larger collections and understanding of the game and card pool from pre-3.0.

I assume you agree with this and that's why it is so frustrating to see SE take so long to get to that point. I share that frustration, of course.

On the flip side, all this time waiting for art has given us a chance for a lot of balance testing and bug fixing. If SF had all the art a long while ago, the number of bugs in the beta may well have put off all the people so drawn to it due to how great it looked.

Bug-wise and balance-wise the SF set is going to be in a very very good place in 2.86. So there's not really going to be any upside to not having the art, from whatever angle you look at it (pardon the pun), so my prediction is that it will hit at a much faster rate after that.

Thanks again!

[oggtheman]

I dropped MTG for this game. There are a few reasons:
1) anywhere. I can play this game anywhere I want, and I don't have to have a friend with me.
2) price. I will compare it to pokemon for this. A Pokémon booster box is £75 and has 36 packs of ten cards, which makes 360 cards. This is £0.21 a card (roughly). A digital shadow era booster box is 2400 SC, which is 24/27ths of about £15, which is about £13. You get 24 packs of 15 cards, again 360 cards, and so it is £0.04 a card. This is a massive difference. Even in physical, it is only £30 a box, or £0.08 a card.
3) fun. The main one. This game is so fun to play.

A few grievances, though:
1) Few sets. Only 1 set a year is not enough IMO. I don't want it to be 4 a year, like in MTG, but 2 would be nice. I understand that as an indie game studio, wulven does not have enough resources to make this many sets, though, so I understand
2) polish. Please. Finish a set before major release? Or an option to have 2 separate servers, like with the test server. But this is till art is finished AS WELL.
3)Ads. I would like to see more ads for se, as it would increase the amount of players, which means more physical for me! Thanks for reading

[Airact]

Magic's 4 sets a year pace is probably there to keep Limited fun and exciting. It's really tough to see and play the same limited format for months and 3 months per limited format is both enough time to experience and refine the format as well as enough to get bored of it before the next set comes out.

And yes, limited can be seen as a massive money grab but it's fun and it gives a reason for players to open packs.


As far as Standard rotating every 2 years is concerned: You can definitely be competitive while playing 0 standard matches. I don't think I have played more than like 3 standard tournaments total during the last and current standard formats.

I dunno if it's just a Finland thing but I played in Legacy tournaments before I played any Standard and currently we are lucky to have one Standard tournament per set at my LGS.