What to do with SC

[TheHighMage]

This post is partially targeted to those that tell newbies who just started to buy raikka decks with SC. In this post, I will explain why this is bad advice.

What newbies should be doing with SC

First, you should figure out what kind of heros you like. This can be done in several ways. Maybe you like certain cards that mages have. Maybe you like the way skervox looks. Maybe your current hero is fun enough for you. Maybe you want to make a deck you saw while observing a high rated game. Through any way you choose, picking a hero or a class that you want to play shouldn't be too hard. Now what?

The first two purchases that should be made, in most cases, is two of the decks that correspond to the hero you want to play. That means the alignment and the class of the deck is the same. This will give a solid base of cards to start playing PVP. Sell the leftover cards that you have more than 4 copies of, and buy a few that you really want that wasn't in the decks.

After that, the decks you buy should be based on the heroes you want to start playing. If you start wanting to play Garth, then buy the Garth deck. Only when you are not interested in almost all of the cards that each of the decks offer, is when you should start buying Raikka decks with the intent to sell the contents. This should be of help: http://shadowera.net/new-premium-class-decks/

Why this is better than just selling Raikka decks

I'm going to give a real life example here. An actual newbie in the game asked what to buy, and expressed an interest in wulvens. A couple of players suggested buying raikka decks and selling them, and then buying cards for a wulven deck. This is bad advise for several reasons.

1. A newbie doesn't know what cards are good for a wulven deck. Netdecking is something that is done of course, but I feel this is not a good path. It is better to descover for one's self how the cards work. Without direction, however, many cards that are bought may turn out to be weak cards that don't fit together, or are of several different tribes or themes. My advise alleviates this, because a newbie will have a solid foundation of cards in which to make an competitive deck without having to choose specific cards to buy at first.

2. Cards in the premium decks are useful by themselves. I have a Threbin deck that works at my 200 rating, and has potential for a higher one. It is made up of cards from two Threbin decks, plus a few other cards that total less than 2000G While this is not the best rating to be sure, it is a great outcome for measly preconstructed decks. I am sure that similar performing decks can be made with the other pre-cons.

3. It is less efficient (by a lot). Here is the main reason: A card that is bought costs twice the gold recieved when it is sold. Let's think about this. A shadow mage deck sells for 7255G. A human priest deck sells for 6595G. If you double those numbers, that's how much gold it takes to buy each of the cards in the decks individually. If a newbie wants to build a Threbin deck, and it happens to include 1/3 of the cards from the threbin pre-con (a conservative number), then it will be much easier (take less gold) to build it by buying threbin decks over buying raikka decks and selling them. Also, if the newbie goes on to love SE, and wants to build more decks, then it's a waste of gold to sell cards when you have 4 or less of that card. Selling a card, and then buying it back later leaves you in the same place card wise, but your gold is down half of that card's cost.

In conclusion, the best way to use shadow crystals when just starting out is to buy decks that share the same alignment and class as heroes you want to play.

[FunkyGandalf]

Agreed.
Probably should be stickied too.

[Kip thorp]

What if ya don't know what class you wanna play? If that's the case then the buy and sell mode is perfect, buy what ya want. Sell what ya don't.
Ofc, there's the grinding route and farming, or buying the $20 worth of SC and then your just buying & selling.

I'm a bit bias I'll admit, I ground my way up, then Ofc, a few pop ups helped, plus friends! Making friends on SE is invaluable, for advice and all kinds of things.
So I guess it's how you approach the issue that determines your course. I can't argue your logic, it's very sound, but for me, It was a different path.
(I bought and sold up to 4x everything in Cotc & Dp, then SF &LL casued an actual investment)

But pretty solid opinion, just very different than mine.

[Alzorath]

Actually, the best way has, and always has been - buy one of each class deck THEN farm raikka decks (was Elemental decks before, Raikka is better now though)

[seedog]

Nice thread, sticky please!

[TheHighMage]

Actually, the best way has, and always has been - buy one of each class deck THEN farm raikka decks (was Elemental decks before, Raikka is better now though)

I respecifully disagree. Make that two of every deck, and then farm Raikka decks. I am confident that this way will take less SC to create a complete collection.
I might do the math sometime, but don't have the time to do that at the moment.

[highmystica]

Seems a bit wasteful ... the only deck I would recommend buying multiple copies of is the Crystal Anthology deck, you get alternate art, and the extras of those heroes sell for crazy bank. Also you don't need one of each of the 100 sc decks, the CotC starters have a lot of shared copies of cards. All the humans have essentially all the same heroes, same goes with the shadow heroes. Likewise those of the same class share the same ability cards. In the SF decks there is more diversity, those you can buy one of each if you want.

My shopping guide:

Firstly, don't sell anything unless you have more than four copies of it, it will cost twice as much to get it back.

- CotC

Don't buy another copy of the deck/class you start with.

Get Elemental first (he makes the most consistent deck to farm the AI with - you can follow the link in my signature for a good idea).

Then get the "unique" classes that compliment the deck you started with, Rogues and Priests. Not sure if you can start as Shadow.

Get Moonstalker.

Get one copy of Warrior, Mage, and Hunter (mixing up the factions).

Buy the missing heroes individually, except the legendary ones.

At this point you have a really good basis for CotC and you have made a ton of bank because you have sold the cards that you have more than four copies of, also should have an idea of what classes you like.

Start to go shopping for those cards that will bring you preferred heroes to the next level.

-DP (sorta)

I would then suggest saving your crystals from leveling to get at least one crystal anthology deck (2000 sc, has alt art and the two legendary heroes that are really expensive). Actually aside from the heroes all the cards are from CotC and DP.

-SF

After that you can worry about the other SF decks, but to be honest I never have bought any of the "normal" SF starters just one booster and 4 copies of Crystal Anthologies. I keep hearing that Raikka has great resale value, but I doubt two copies of her deck sell for as much as five elemental for the same investment of 100sc. I don't know what is in her starter deck though.

There are other fun things to buy with SC like mats and sleeves too. Advice when buying mats think about how they look with cards on them. I have Raikka (first mat I got) and as badass as she looks, she is really quite bashful and shy - she hides under the cards.

Just my 2 cents.

[TheHighMage]

Sorry if anyone misunderstood, but I wouldn't reccommend the original CotC decks either. Basically trash and a waste of shop space imo, since if you take the cards that are acually useful and buy them individually, you probably can get them for less than the gold value of 100 shadow crystals (which is the price of a raikka deck divided by 250)

This weekend, I'll do it. I will crunch the numbers and give practical reasons why buying two decks of the same type is a good idea. Also, I will find the best way to use SC to achieve a playset of the non-foil cards from the first three sets.

Might even make another thread depending on how significant the results are.

[Raphael Majere]

Actually, the best way has, and always has been - buy one of each class deck THEN farm raikka decks (was Elemental decks before, Raikka is better now though)

This.

[TheHighMage]

This.

In each of the premium decks, almost all of the cards are two copies or less. If you buy one of a deck and sell excess copies from Raikka decks for the rest of the cards, then you lose value. The value of your purchase is roughly equal to the amount of cards that you get under the 4x limit, plus half of the value of all the cards that go over. The Raikka deck is about 7,000 gold when sold. The lowest one is about 6,000. This, I estimate, is not worth the few extra copies over 4x you get when buying two of a premium deck.

The only problem that I see with this is duplicates across multiple decks. This is where my number crunching is going to get interesting. Currently, I am in the phase of typing out a text file of all the cards in the first three sets and their prices. Fun work