My guild (CH_5_News_Team on Ector-76) and I recently moved to this game from a different one. We were immediately impressed by both the depth of the game, and the multitude of options available in which to play. This however, is both a blessing and a curse, because the learning curve is so stupid high. As I'll try to make this as comprehensive a guide as possible.
CARDS AND EVOLUTION[]
CARDS - To state the obvious...these are the reason for playing this game. They are what you level, evolve, buy, hope for, etc. As such here are some basics:
- (Higher the # of *'s the better the card (GENERALLY speaking))
- (Higher the # of *'s the more expensive in mana points it is (again, GENERALLY speaking))
- (As the *'s increase, so does that card's max level. Ex 1* = level 10 max, 2* = level 20 max, etc)
EVOLUTION - Evolution is the combination of 2x cards with the same name to create a more powerful card. Adding a dimension to this is that while combining gives a latent stat boost, your finished card also benefits to some extent from the leveling done to some cards.
Furthermore, every time (nearly) a card is evolved it's max level increases by 10. So if you evolve 2x 1* card's, the outcome is a card that has a potential max level of level 20. Essentially, think of evolution as basically adding a * each time. Note: This is a gross oversimplification, but for the sake of fundamental understanding it works.
LEVELING / STAT CARRYOVER - Leveling your cards provides stat carryover when evolving as well as the immediate boost of making your current card more powerful. There are 2x choices for stat carryover:
- (< Max level - these cards give 5% of their stats to the final card. )
- (= Max level - these cards give 10% of their stats to the final card.)
Note: Leveling in this game costs exponentially more per level. A full list of COST TO LEVEL is located on the Heroes of Camelot WIKIA (which will be heavily referenced henceforth). However a quick example of leveling a 3* card is below:
- (Level 1->10 - 45 EXP)
- (Level 10->20 - 110 EXP)
- (Level 20->30 - 150 EXP)
EVOLUTION EXAMPLE - taking the above described, lets look at the actual outcome of an evolution:
¹ I take 2x 2* 1890 def / 590 atk lvl 1 cards. Evolve them and the resulting card is 2457 def / 767 atk with a max level of 30.
² I take 1x 1890 def / 590 atk lvl 1 card and 1x 3314 / 1034 level 20 card. Evolve them to and the resulting card is 2608 def / 841 atk with max level of 30.
³ I take 2x 3314 / 1034 level 20 card. Evolve them to and the resulting card is 2759 def / 914 atk with max level of 30.
So as you can see, there are benefits to leveling your cards prior to evolving them, but note that leveling your cards during the EVO 1 phase (especially for cards you get a lot of) has a HEAVILY diminishing return. I.E In the example above the difference in leveling a card to level 10 initial is the difference of 151 def / 74 atk. If you multiply that by .1 over the next two evolutions, that means a difference of 1.5 def / .7 atk.
EVOLUTION METHODOLOGY
In other websites or in chat (guild or world), you'll see the following notation: A-B. Example: 8-1, 8-3, 8-5, etc. [LIST] [*]A - References the number of cards used [*]B - References the number of cards at max level (ALWAYS level the last evolutions first and work to front) [*] [/LIST]
So for instance if someone does a 8-1 evolution, that means they used 8 cards and only maxed the EVO 4 card. An 8-3 means they used 8 cards and maxed the EVO 4 last card, as well as the 2x EVO 3 cards as well.
Note: Only a perfect evolution of 8-15 (8 cards, 15 cards maxed - 8x EVO 1, 4x EVO 2, 2x EVO 3, 1x EVO 4) will yield 100% an EVO 4 card that can achieve 100% of it's stats. However, this is foolish, even with the VERY best cards. Instead, people choose to do lesser evolutions to maximize the cost / benefit. ESPECIALLY since in this case each level costs exponentially more (see above).
Here are some key % to perfect numbers to consider (~ FULL LIST OF EVOLUTION %'s) 8-15 (perfect) - 100% 8-7 - 99% 8-3 - 94-96% 8-1 - 77-83% 6-7 - 97-99% 6-3 - 94-96% 5-3 - 92-95% 4-3 - 88-92% 4-1 - 72-82%
[FONT=Arial Black][U][B]DECK BUILDING:[/B][/U][/FONT]
This is one of the hardest things in the game to do. What do I use? What are the good combos? Do I level cards or do I push for progression? UGHHHHH. Well here's a few combos to keep an eye out for:
[B]1.) Level your Arcane Archer to 50.[/B] You might ask yourself, "Is this a good card? I get it free..." The answer is yes. It eventually gets replaced, but not for a long time. At max level the ability procs for 19k damage. You'll use it for a long time. This should also buy you time.
[B]2.) Good early sets:
[B]Knight Warband . [/b] This is easily the single best early set in the game. 2x 3 star cards and 1x 4 star card = +100% attack. Start this combo early and you will use it until much later in the game. It's lost cost / high output for very common cards. The hardest to get card (Paladin) can be found by sharing friend codes (mine is 53ey1i62 for example). If you don't have a horse or grail knight, worry not, both drop all the top with summon stones.
Giant Insects.[/B] If you get this, it is good. They are good in early game (40% reduction), but also good for early / mid late game as well (low cost, high benefit). Note that damage reduction is stackable. So this + another damage reduction set = 60+% attack mitigation. Note: Mitigation does not resist spell abilities.
[b]Gifted and Talented[/b]. This is less amazing than the aforementioned sets, but is still a decent proc increase (15%) for the price. These two + Archer is a good early party to help proc her damage and a maxed archer is 19k per party. There are several options to replace this set late in the game, so not worth doing a heavy duty Evolution, but is good for starters (might literally want to just run a 4 card, 1 max if you can get enough early as there's not many combos that pair with either of these cards).
Note: Will update this thread as I go. I'm starting it 8/2 will likely take 2-3 days to get everything. I just miss-clicked and lost an hour's of work so I'm sending it pre-finish to hopefully start helping people out. MUCH more to come.