Ruby Carbuncle vs Solar Prince

[Grain]

Solar Prince / Verlaat is alot harder to get then Ruby Carbuncle, It makes sense, Rarer the card the better it should be, Its a common card vs a Ultra rare card. Not saying thats how it will always be but usely rare cards are better then common cards

DanTheTimid doesn't beleive rare cards should be more powerful.

I'll look for his post...

[DanTheTimid]

Grain is correct, its always been my stance that rarity should have no baring on the balance of cards. If you make rare cards stronger then common cards the game not only favors rich people, but it also becomes alot less interesting because everyones using the exact same cards. There may be 100 cards in a set but 8 super rare and 8 ultra rare are better then the rest you can expect all the top decks to be composed entirely of nothing but a combination of those 8 cards and a few lower rarity to fill any holes. The game becomes boring and predictable because everyone's using the exact same thing.

To me, to make rarity meaningful its best to simply make the cards have really powerful but hard/expensive to use theme specific effects. In this manner you'll probably still want some rare cards for certain themes, but you can theoretically build solid decks with out them and at worst you might need to collect 1-2 high rarity cards that are just especially strong for your specific theme your making right now and not every deck you might want to make. As more cards are released for your theme you may find you don't even need them create the best card file for that theme, but you'll still enjoy having them or desire to have them as they give your card file a unique take on the theme that may trip up players who aren't used to dealing with those cards.

[reydien]

People will use the best cards no matter their rarity. They could be the most common cards in the set, doesn't mean they won't be any less prevalent.

As for rare cards having powerful but specific abilities, isn't that how it is already? Verlaat sets it to day time, Eskutia sets it to night time, Catherina has her array of buffs (but is made of paper). These abilities, when you center a deck around them, can be powerful (well, maybe not Verlaat yet), but you can't really just slip them into any deck and expect much; catherina might be the easiest to work with, but again, she's made of paper, so you'd have to tailor your deck at least some to protect her. The other 5-star cards seem (from my casual glancing and lack of gameplay) relatively balanced with other cards of their level, at least as far as in-game stats and abilities are concerned.

on a related note, I highly recommend anyone interested in this topic read the articles When Cards go Bad and Rare, but Well Done. They are both by Mark Rosewater, head designer of Magic: the Gathering, and go into detail about some of his (and WotC) philosophy behind balancing cards and rarity. Both articles are from Mark's Making Magic Column, in which he basically talks about different aspects of the game: how sets/mechanics/changes came to be, insight into the creative process, and so on.

[DanTheTimid]

I'd like to start by mentioning that I strongly recommend the above linked articles, I recall reading that "Cards gone bad" article when it first came out some 6 years ago and it pretty much holds as true today as it did then.

Next I'd like to mention that I'm not complaining about rarity balance in this game... yet. But when people offer rarity as an explanation for what appears to be imbalance that is when I speak up about how I feel rarity should not be a justification for poor balance.

Now any GOOD card game will never be perfectly balanced, good games just push the envelope too often coming up with all sorts of interesting effects, and because these effects are so unique and interesting their nearly impossible to balance in respect to other effects that work nothing like they do. The good news about an online card game is that if it becomes clear certain effects are over or under costed, a little tweak and bam, balance is restored... or something closely resembling it. In real life card games which those articles refer to you don't have that luxury, once a card is released, its forever. You can restrict it, ban it, or even errata it (and good card games do), but all of those things cause discord amongst players and the sad truth is you will never really live it down.

I think that's why I'm more vocal about balance in online card games. Cause with a real card game often the best you can hope for is to get over powered cards banned and use your weak cards as book marks, but in an online card game if you can spot and prove that a card is clearly too weak or too good, the game designers actually have the power to go in there and change things. If they're willing to put in the effort you can have yourself a game where every card really can be useful. Some will still stand out a little more then others, but only by a tiny bit, and you can actually play and have success with the strategies you enjoy most and not just the handful of ones that are clearly the best.

[Allied]

I understand but like whats the point in a card being rare if its not good? Only thing it becomes good is for collecting all the cards. Which personally im not a collector i sadly play to win, Winning is fun to me lol, So therefore i play the game to have fun by winning. Harder my enemy is the more fun it will become for me lol,
Sorry kinda went off topic there but yeah back to the point, Whats the point of a card being rare?

[DanTheTimid]

Rarity does a few things.

For one it can help deck diversity, the average player isn't going to have access to every rare card which means the rarer the card is, the less often your going to see it (assuming its balanced, obviously if its over powered everyone will just keep reclying until they get the good rare card and use it). So in this manner it helps provide variety in deck construction.

For another, it helps provide money for the game company. If every card is common collecting every card you want from a set will be extremely easy and you won't need to buy many packs unless you get very unlucky.

Another still is that it gives players something to strive for. There's just something that feels extra special or rewarding when you pull a really high rarity or a rare card that you needed for a deck that you don't get as much when you pull lower rarity cards even if they are just as useful to your deck.

I will say though that because of the lack of selling/trading that rarity does lose the "value" element that it has in other card games, but its still not with out its use in this game.