Magic the Gathering - Duels of the Planeswalkers. Now with red hot fury!

[fenrizz]

As I was sitting peacefully at my computer, browsing trough Steam, I noticed an ad for Magic the Gathering - Duels of the Planeswalkers.

Having always loved the TCG version of the game, and noticing the price was only 9 Euro, I decided to buy it, and restart my obsession with creating the perfect deck.

I waited for it to download and install, all the while anticipating many, many hours of enjoyment.


As I played trough the first campaigns (or duels to be quite honest) I decided it was about time I created my own custom deck.

I looked around on the menu, slightly surprised that I could not for the life of me find the option to make a custom deck.

I looked some more, and thought to myself that I better google this, before I get too frustrated.

And google it I did.
Much to my surprise, and horror (obviously), I found out that there is no such thing as an option to create a custom deck in this game.

My vision went red for a few second, and I imagined horrifying images of bloodied gore.


I feel cheated, I feel ripped off.
Arguably I did not do the research [http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/DidNotDoTheResearch] beforehand, but I could never have imagined that they'd leave such an integral part of Magic the Gathering out of the game.

I want my 9 Euro back!


TL;DR:
There is no "Custom Deck" option in this game.
I feel cheated.


Feel free to discuss this obviously lousy game design choice.

 

[minus_273c]

You can build a custom deck out of the cards available to you.

To do so, click on the deck 'colour wheel', bottom right where it has the deck name and the colour. This is available on the main menu. Click on it, and just below and to the right of that appears the option to edit the deck. Click on that and you're away.

Or am I missing something?

 

[Sneaky llama]

i've never played "duels of the planeswalkers" but i do play the tcg and i agree that building the "perfect"deck was the most integral part of the game i cand fathom of a reason why you can't create your own, all i can guess is that maybe the creators are planning to make a dlc (with more cards or something)
EDIT:sorry was called to the door so didn't see the above comment as was halfway through this.

 

[fenrizz]

You can build a custom deck out of the cards available to you.

To do so, click on the deck 'colour wheel', bottom right where it has the deck name and the colour. This is available on the main menu. Click on it, and just below and to the right of that appears the option to edit the deck. Click on that and you're away.

Or am I missing something?

But you can't remove card from that basic deck, so it make's it rather pointless.
When I cannot remove cards that don't need, nor want in my deck, what is the point of customizing?

But I shall try this that you say, and feel quite silly if it turns out that I missed it.

In real life I tend to try and stick very close to the minimum 40 card rule.
Red and green (separate colors) speed decks are my favorite.

Unless I want a big fat monster deck that is.

 

[AnOriginalConcept]

I am a fairly avid player of Magic. The lack of custom decks prevent me from purchasing the game. The majority of the skill in Magic comes from creating a working deck.

I would feel ripped off if the same thing happened to me. Sorry.

 

[fenrizz]

Tried rechecking, and still no customizing.

I feel tired now.
*sigh*

Guess I won't be playing this much after all.

I am a fairly avid player of Magic. The lack of custom decks prevent me from purchasing the game. The majority of the skill in Magic comes from creating a working deck.

I know.
I could sit for hours pondering with a new deck.

And yeah, I should have checked more closely before I bought it.
But I couldn't even imagine there not being a "custom deck" option.
I blows my mind.

 

[ginty2]

that's the reason why didn't buy the game. it's a shame really i remember playing duels of the plainswalkers in the late 90's and it had a customizable deck feature.

 

[OceanRunner]

You can only choose which unlocked cards to keep in a deck. Also, I learned on GameFaqs that the number of spells in a deck affects the number of lands, so it's a good idea to remove expensive and/or superfluous cards.

 

[fenrizz]

that's the reason why didn't buy the game. it's a shame really i remember playing duels of the plainswalkers in the late 90's and it had a customizable deck feature.

I remember that too.
Used to have it, and I think I might still.

But, alas, it's too outdated now.
Shame.

You can only choose which unlocked cards to keep in a deck. Also, I learned on GameFaqs that the number of spells in a deck affects the number of lands, so it's a good idea to remove expensive and/or superfluous cards.

You can add and remove unlocked cards as you please, but the base deck is somehow "holy" and cannot be altered.

 

[VampSmiley]

One of the main reasons that they didn't include a custom deck option is that if Wizards did that, what reason would anyone want to play Magic Online? It would cut into their profits if all we had to do was download Duel of the Planeswalkers and get a lot of great cards and build a deck from scratch.

 

[fenrizz]

One of the main reasons that they didn't include a custom deck option is that if Wizards did that, what reason would anyone want to play Magic Online? It would cut into their profits if all we had to do was download Duel of the Planeswalkers and get a lot of great cards and build a deck from scratch.

That is true.
But still...

I feel alienated by them, at least a little.
I don't have many friends that play Magic anymore, living in a small town in a small country.

I saw this as a chance to get back into a game I love.
But no.

Oh, and sorry for sounding so bitter.

 

[Asturiel]

Thats the major reason I didn't pick this up, the only redeemable feature of it is the puzzle section...Which they gave away free on the site for the longest time... So I guess I offer my sympathies that you bought a bad game.

Nothing really beats playing it in person, but perhaps you would like to play on Magic Workstation? It's basically free Magic Online.

 

[VampSmiley]

I don't see it as being bitter. I quit the actual card game right after the Kamigawa block because I felt everyone was getting too competetive around here. It became about who could spend the most money and net-deck for a tourney win. Even FNM became a huge competition. So I sold all my cards and quit. I saw Duels on Xbox Live and picked it up just because I liked the idea of being able to play without paying out the wazoo. I do enjoy it from time to time with my friends online.

 

[mada7]

If you think that is bad wait until you try the challenge/puzzle modes there's one that can only be beaten because the AI makes a horrendously stupid play that no intelligent human or even stupid human player would ever do

 

[migo]

I am a fairly avid player of Magic. The lack of custom decks prevent me from purchasing the game. The majority of the skill in Magic comes from creating a working deck.

I would feel ripped off if the same thing happened to me. Sorry.

Half that 'skill' is really just 'money' though. Real skill is taking the deck you have and winning with it. Having to continually buy new cards is what turned me off Magic.

 

[fenrizz]

I am a fairly avid player of Magic. The lack of custom decks prevent me from purchasing the game. The majority of the skill in Magic comes from creating a working deck.

I would feel ripped off if the same thing happened to me. Sorry.

Half that 'skill' is really just 'money' though. Real skill is taking the deck you have and winning with it. Having to continually buy new cards is what turned me off Magic.

While I agree that new cards are coming out a little too often, I must respectfully disagree with the first statement.

Yes, there is an investment to be made in cards.
But you can get by with just the regular edition cards (ie. 10th edition).

Of course there is skill involved in beating another player with an inferior deck, but there is also considerable skill involved in fine tuning a deck to perfection.

It's not about having the best cards (somewhat) available, it's the balance of a deck, the way it is built.
You get a whole lot further with a well balanced deck than a deck filled with OP cards.

 

[migo]

I am a fairly avid player of Magic. The lack of custom decks prevent me from purchasing the game. The majority of the skill in Magic comes from creating a working deck.

I would feel ripped off if the same thing happened to me. Sorry.

Half that 'skill' is really just 'money' though. Real skill is taking the deck you have and winning with it. Having to continually buy new cards is what turned me off Magic.

While I agree that new cards are coming out a little too often, I must respectfully disagree with the first statement.

Yes, there is an investment to be made in cards.
But you can get by with just the regular edition cards (ie. 10th edition).

Of course there is skill involved in beating another player with an inferior deck, but there is also considerable skill involved in fine tuning a deck to perfection.

It's not about having the best cards (somewhat) available, it's the balance of a deck, the way it is built.
You get a whole lot further with a well balanced deck than a deck filled with OP cards.

Maybe it's changed. When I played, the 6th edition core was pretty weak, and for that matter, almost none of the prepackaged decks were any better. Some of the special edition decks coming out more recently are a little better, but I already sunk several grand into it, and while I can make some infinite damage and life combos with the cards I have, they're still not the optimal ones, and to really tune it I'd have to spend more. I've got the same thing going with my shadow decks. They're good, but there are better shadow cards than the ones I have, so tuning ends up being less about the skill in putting the cards together and more about recognising which cards are best for a particular strategy and acquiring them.

As an example, a life.dec works fine with Worthy Cause, Task Force and Warrior en-Kor, but works better with Swords to Ploughshares, Angelic Protector and Nomad en-Kor.

 

[fenrizz]

I am a fairly avid player of Magic. The lack of custom decks prevent me from purchasing the game. The majority of the skill in Magic comes from creating a working deck.

I would feel ripped off if the same thing happened to me. Sorry.

Half that 'skill' is really just 'money' though. Real skill is taking the deck you have and winning with it. Having to continually buy new cards is what turned me off Magic.

While I agree that new cards are coming out a little too often, I must respectfully disagree with the first statement.

Yes, there is an investment to be made in cards.
But you can get by with just the regular edition cards (ie. 10th edition).

Of course there is skill involved in beating another player with an inferior deck, but there is also considerable skill involved in fine tuning a deck to perfection.

It's not about having the best cards (somewhat) available, it's the balance of a deck, the way it is built.
You get a whole lot further with a well balanced deck than a deck filled with OP cards.

Maybe it's changed. When I played, the 6th edition core was pretty weak, and for that matter, almost none of the prepackaged decks were any better. Some of the special edition decks coming out more recently are a little better, but I already sunk several grand into it, and while I can make some infinite damage and life combos with the cards I have, they're still not the optimal ones, and to really tune it I'd have to spend more. I've got the same thing going with my shadow decks. They're good, but there are better shadow cards than the ones I have, so tuning ends up being less about the skill in putting the cards together and more about recognising which cards are best for a particular strategy and acquiring them.

I suppose that is true.
Some cards you just "need" to get, like Silhana Ledgewalker [http://magiccards.info/query?q=!Silhana+ledgewalker] and combo that with Blanchwood Armor [http://magiccards.info/query?q=!blanchwood+armor].

That is a pretty damn powerful combination, the Ledgewalker is common and Blanchwood Armor is not too hard to come by.

4x them and you got a pretty good start for a green deck.
Not that I have played much since these cards were new though, so it might have changed a bit since then for all I know.

 

[Kpt._Rob]

I agree, that was really annoying that you couldn't build a custom deck. I never played Magic, though I had played some other card games back in the day, and I decided to try Duels of the Planeswalkers because I figured it'd give me a way to have some of that fun again without spending rediculous amounts of money on cards and having to find friends to play it with.

But the fact that you couldn't build a custom deck pretty much killed it for me. I had assumed, considering what an integral part of any card game that is, that it would be there. What the hell were the designers thinking when they didn't put it in?

 

[Slycne]

Maybe my reaction was colored differently because I knew about there not being full deck construction going into it. I still have and continue to have fun with the game though. It's not replacing the feeling of laying out all the cards and constructing a deck from scratch to play against friends, but that's not what this game was designed for.

It's a refresher or interest gatherer for Magic The Gathering, it's great to load up while I'm surfing, watching TV or I'm looking to distract myself a bit. With a small number of exceptions, the AI is decent enough to garner a challenge, but is content to wait minutes at a time while I'm busy with something else.