- We are testing out having an unranked queue in the game! Quick Match now does not affect your rank, while the new "Ranked" button will queue you for ranked matches. Enjoy more casual and experimental gameplay in Quick Match without risking your position!
- Daily Deals have been added to the Shop! Check the shop for FREE items and special discounts that rotate each day.
- Balance hotfix! We have heard the cries of the players, and are doing a pre-expansion balance patch to address Warlock tempo and a few minor things. Take a look!
We're making some general balance corrections with today's hotfix:
- Slight nerf to Warlock tempo.
- Slightly reducing the power of buffing units that are already on the board.
- Slightly reducing early game unit removal.
- Minor adjustments in anticipation of interactions with new expansion cards.
- Infestation: Now adds the rats to the bottom of your deck instead of shuffling.
- Minotaur: Stats reduced to 4/9 (was 6/9).
- Wyvern Rider: Stats reduced to 3/6 (was 3/7).
- Forbidden City: Cost increased to 4 (was 3).
- Flame Knight: HP reduced to 5 (was 6).
- Lava Font: Cost and turn count reduced to 2 (was 3).
- Dark Matter: Cost increased to 2 (was 1).
- Dancing Swords: Cost and Attack increased to 4 (was 3).
- Reckless Firemancer: HP reduced to 2 (was 3).
- Guard Tower: Turn count reduced to 2 (was 3).
- Soul Steal: Cost increased to 3 (was 2).
- Fat Bard: Attack reduced to 1 (was 2).
- Master-at-Arms: Attack reduced to 2 (was 3).
- Lightning Bolt: Cost increased to 2 (was 1).
- Incinerate: Cost increased to 4 (was 3).
- Shadow Katana: Damage option reduced to 2 (was 3).
- Spear of Odin: Damage option reduced to 3 (was 4).
- Essence of Hatred: Effect reduced to -3/-3 (was -4/-4).
Welcome to Cards and Castles 2!
Minor Pre-Launch Balance Update
- Strange Magician: Stats reduced to 3/2 (was 4/3).
- Rakanoth: Cost increased to 8 (was 7). Stats changed to 8/5 (was 5/9).
- Firestorm: Cost increased to 2 (was 1).
- Manticore: HP reduced to 3 (was 4).
- Doormaster: Attack reduced to 1 (was 2).
- Rakanoth: Cost increased to 8 (was 7). Stats changed to 8/5 (was 5/9).
- Firestorm: Cost increased to 2 (was 1).
- Manticore: HP reduced to 3 (was 4).
- Doormaster: Attack reduced to 1 (was 2).
City of the Gods!
City of the Gods is now released! Hades is gifting everyone 20 free card packs to celebrate the launch, available for THIS WEEKEND ONLY! Check the shop for your free packs and more goodies!
Minor Balance Patch
Surge of Life: Cost increased to (4).
Dwarven Digger: Cost increased to (4). Stats increased to 2/4.
Dwarven Digger: Cost increased to (4). Stats increased to 2/4.
Weekly Leaderboards are Here!!
WEEKLY LEADERBOARDS AND ECONOMY REDESIGN
We've done a significant overhaul of how rewards and long term play work in the game, which extensively touches all aspects of earning cards and ranking up. Several existing sources of currency have been removed, and new ones have been added. Instead of providing an extensive list of notes, we are going to give an overview of the most significant changes.
- Crafting and New Players: Player will no longer be able to disenchant cards unless they have extra copies. Attempting to balance a highly fungible card economy is very difficult, so we are shifting the general intent of crafting and card collection toward steady forward progression with long term investment. However, THE QUALITY OF REWARDS FOR NEW PLAYERS HAVE BEEN DRAMATICALLY IMPROVED. New accounts now start with a very wide array of legendary and other cards to play with, allowing for a high degree of deck experimentation right from day one!
- Weekly cadence: Improving your rank score is now a significant source of rewards, which should be generally accessible to all players with extra incentives for high skill players. Weekly resets occur every Tuesday. We expect players to play about 10-20 ranked games each week to reach their ideal placement (based on their skill) for rewards. Rewards start scaling significantly after the 300 point mark, with max rewards at 1000. Participation is generally rewarded as well, and resets will be minimal for players who don't play a lot and end the week at a low score.
- Shinies: We've seen the playerbase almost exclusively treat shinies as a shard source, and this was very much not our intent with the system. We want shinies to be treated as a neat optional collectible, so their sell prices have been reduced to be equivalent to a normal card. They are now generally easier to obtain as well from all sources.
BALANCE CHANGES
Check our discord for a complete list of card balance updates!
We've done a significant overhaul of how rewards and long term play work in the game, which extensively touches all aspects of earning cards and ranking up. Several existing sources of currency have been removed, and new ones have been added. Instead of providing an extensive list of notes, we are going to give an overview of the most significant changes.
- Crafting and New Players: Player will no longer be able to disenchant cards unless they have extra copies. Attempting to balance a highly fungible card economy is very difficult, so we are shifting the general intent of crafting and card collection toward steady forward progression with long term investment. However, THE QUALITY OF REWARDS FOR NEW PLAYERS HAVE BEEN DRAMATICALLY IMPROVED. New accounts now start with a very wide array of legendary and other cards to play with, allowing for a high degree of deck experimentation right from day one!
- Weekly cadence: Improving your rank score is now a significant source of rewards, which should be generally accessible to all players with extra incentives for high skill players. Weekly resets occur every Tuesday. We expect players to play about 10-20 ranked games each week to reach their ideal placement (based on their skill) for rewards. Rewards start scaling significantly after the 300 point mark, with max rewards at 1000. Participation is generally rewarded as well, and resets will be minimal for players who don't play a lot and end the week at a low score.
- Shinies: We've seen the playerbase almost exclusively treat shinies as a shard source, and this was very much not our intent with the system. We want shinies to be treated as a neat optional collectible, so their sell prices have been reduced to be equivalent to a normal card. They are now generally easier to obtain as well from all sources.
BALANCE CHANGES
Check our discord for a complete list of card balance updates!
Minor Update
- Medal of Bravery (card awarded to player 2): Now gives 1 gold immediately and 1 Treasure when your turn ends.
Dev Note: Changing the medal of bravery to 2 gold has made the turn order win rates very balance so far. However, we understand that being able to high roll some very high cost openers can feel bad for the opponent, so we want to try spreading out the value over multiple turns.
- Adjusted the medal associated with ranked scores for lower ranks; it now takes less points to earn a bronze, silver or gold medal.
- Weekly rank rewards for low ranks have been slightly improved and are generally more consistent.
- Made slight adjustments to the shop; removed some 20 pack tiers as these were not being used.
- Added a new 3x limited silver purchase offer at the $80 price point.
Dev Note: Changing the medal of bravery to 2 gold has made the turn order win rates very balance so far. However, we understand that being able to high roll some very high cost openers can feel bad for the opponent, so we want to try spreading out the value over multiple turns.
- Adjusted the medal associated with ranked scores for lower ranks; it now takes less points to earn a bronze, silver or gold medal.
- Weekly rank rewards for low ranks have been slightly improved and are generally more consistent.
- Made slight adjustments to the shop; removed some 20 pack tiers as these were not being used.
- Added a new 3x limited silver purchase offer at the $80 price point.
Guaranteed Shards
After reviewing feedback from players, we've realized that the experience around shard acquisition specifically is not exactly how we intended. Because shard acquisition relies on pulling duplicate cards, especially duplicate legendaries, it can be very inconsistent between players and many players feel that they are unable completely unable to target specific cards to eventually add to their collection.
We have a very simple fix for this; instead of earning shards from destroying cards, players will now earn a fixed amount of shards per card pack earned. This more closely aligns with how the crafting system's goal of being a reliable backstop if card pack RNG is not in your favor. Thus each card pack will now give some random rewards, and some guaranteed value toward the specific cards you want.
Extra cards can now be exchanged for extra card points, which can cycle into more packs.
- Card packs now grant a guaranteed 35 shards per pack opened.
- Extra cards are now exchanged for CP instead of shards.
- Daily Deals will no longer be added to the shop.
- Win bonus quests have returned, to take the place of the free CP in the daily deal section.
These changes are not live yet but will be going into the game very soon!
We have a very simple fix for this; instead of earning shards from destroying cards, players will now earn a fixed amount of shards per card pack earned. This more closely aligns with how the crafting system's goal of being a reliable backstop if card pack RNG is not in your favor. Thus each card pack will now give some random rewards, and some guaranteed value toward the specific cards you want.
Extra cards can now be exchanged for extra card points, which can cycle into more packs.
- Card packs now grant a guaranteed 35 shards per pack opened.
- Extra cards are now exchanged for CP instead of shards.
- Daily Deals will no longer be added to the shop.
- Win bonus quests have returned, to take the place of the free CP in the daily deal section.
These changes are not live yet but will be going into the game very soon!
Long Term Ranking
Hello everyone, we've been working on an update to the ranking system that involves less resets and a more long term ladder climb as well as leaderboard. An issue with that work caused players to not receive rewards from today's weekly reset. As apology, we have added a free limited time item to the shop containing 3 City of Gods packs and a deck box.
Secondly, we've just rolled out our scoring update. The new scoring system works more like the old star-based ranking system, with monthly seasons and a longer climb with more fixed win/loss points until very high ranks, and much less rank loss with the reset. However, it uses the new scoring system instead of stars, with 2000 points between each league. All players have had their score updated based on their previous star/tier rank at the end of May, so no progress has been lost.
Weekly quests have been added back into the game, with improved rewards, to account for the loss of weekly ranked rewards. This means players will NOT need to play ranked mode to keep up with weekly rewards if they do not wish.
We look forward to continued feedback on the new system and excited to see who places on the leaderboard. Have fun!
Secondly, we've just rolled out our scoring update. The new scoring system works more like the old star-based ranking system, with monthly seasons and a longer climb with more fixed win/loss points until very high ranks, and much less rank loss with the reset. However, it uses the new scoring system instead of stars, with 2000 points between each league. All players have had their score updated based on their previous star/tier rank at the end of May, so no progress has been lost.
Weekly quests have been added back into the game, with improved rewards, to account for the loss of weekly ranked rewards. This means players will NOT need to play ranked mode to keep up with weekly rewards if they do not wish.
We look forward to continued feedback on the new system and excited to see who places on the leaderboard. Have fun!
July Season Updates
Welcome to the July ranking season! We're opening up this season with a reversion of the ranking system and a small but important balance patch. Ranks will now use the original star and medal system for the foreseeable future. This shift back is based on community feedback and our own analysis of the new system. While the point system had some interesting upsides and the leaderboards were cool for some players, we felt we rushed the system overall and didn't give it enough clarity of polish. The star system has much more intuitive incremental goals for all players to strive for, and we love hearing how excited players are when they reach a new division. Unfortunately this revert means that, for now, public leaderboards will not be visible. We will be investigating smaller more incremental changes or upgrades to the existing system in the future rather than an overhaul.
Card changes:
- Zeus: 8g - 9g, 6/5 - 5/4
- Heavenclaw: 4/5 - 3/6
- Kosui: 7g - 8g
- Holy Avenger: 7g - 8g
- Halls of Frost: 2g - 3g
- Dragon Egg: +1/+2 - +1/+1
- Draconic Temple: 3g - 4g
- Lionel: 7g - 8g
- Piper: 5/5 - 4/4
- Beastmaster: 7g - 6g
- Infernal Furnace: 3g - 2g
- Dwarven Halls: 7g - 6g
- Loch Ness Monster: 5/8 - 5/9
Card changes:
- Zeus: 8g - 9g, 6/5 - 5/4
- Heavenclaw: 4/5 - 3/6
- Kosui: 7g - 8g
- Holy Avenger: 7g - 8g
- Halls of Frost: 2g - 3g
- Dragon Egg: +1/+2 - +1/+1
- Draconic Temple: 3g - 4g
- Lionel: 7g - 8g
- Piper: 5/5 - 4/4
- Beastmaster: 7g - 6g
- Infernal Furnace: 3g - 2g
- Dwarven Halls: 7g - 6g
- Loch Ness Monster: 5/8 - 5/9