I've been doing pretty well with the Deckathalon. Currently in 29th place (though that will definitely change).
If you don't have any of the Deckathalon decks yet, just grab a Deck with a Square socket and a pip and use that. While the Deckathalon decks have both a Tear socket for health and flat resist, their lower TC space means I might switch back to the deck I started with. Seriously, that extra ~10 space will give you a lot less logistical headaches.
If you have a pet with maycast heals, use that pet. Nothing else matters. The more maycasts, the better. Fairy is almost a full heal, and Sprite does a pretty nice job at not overhealing you.
I've also noticed that I fall into a pattern when fighting the floors with one enemy. For the first enemy on the 4th tier, I tend to go Snow Shield->Fire Elf->Fireblade->Sunbird and that fight's done. (Obviously don't Sunbird into a Tower Shield, I guess just Elf again if that happens.) For the final fight, I use Snow Shield-> Fireblade->Sunbird->Snow Shield->Sunbird (and this enemy doesn't seem to Tower, so it's actually the easiest fight here.)
The second fight is definitely the most hectic. I tend to spend the first two turns shielding, and then Fire Elf whoever has the most shields before going into a bladed Meteor, then finishing up with Elves or Sunbirds or whatever. It's still not something I have set in stone though.
Oh, I forgot to mention, if you can get a hold of certain Fire DoT TC like the Links or Scald, they'll help you immensely. The Links both provide a lot of value while bypassing Towers, and Scald is a Meteor Strike that doesn't care about Towers at all. Good luck getting those though.
Trying to figure out how to beat this tower and get to the end of Stage 4 was indeed fun, however that is where the fun stops.
As you can see on the leaderboard someone already has almost 2k points, all this shows is that players (potentially children) are spending what appears to be dangerous amounts of time trying to stay at the top of the leaderboard.
I feel there should be some limit to how often you can do the tower in one day, be it time based or number of entries based, this just seems to be promoting something very unhealthy in my eyes.
Being at the top of the leaderboard has 0 to do with skill and everything to do with how much time and energy you are willing to expend on it.
Please consider something to stop encouraging this detrimental behavior, thanks!
Hi personally i think some detail must be changed.
First the mana only 30 is not enough if you can fizzle in that dungeon on my 4 run today i never beat the final boss because out of mana, i didn't used high cost spell for the too fight before but i just fizzled tree time (too fire elves and an elephant that should kill the boss.
Second can we have our current rank because >999 just say im between 1000 and 5000000 and i don't know if that really interesting
(and i hate the tower shield spamming of the second fight but i hate all ice in this games for that spell so that doesn't count)
Kane GoldenFlame;storm who live far from cold place
I've been doing pretty well with the Deckathalon. Currently in 29th place (though that will definitely change).
If you don't have any of the Deckathalon decks yet, just grab a Deck with a Square socket and a pip and use that. While the Deckathalon decks have both a Tear socket for health and flat resist, their lower TC space means I might switch back to the deck I started with. Seriously, that extra ~10 space will give you a lot less logistical headaches.
If you have a pet with maycast heals, use that pet. Nothing else matters. The more maycasts, the better. Fairy is almost a full heal, and Sprite does a pretty nice job at not overhealing you.
I've also noticed that I fall into a pattern when fighting the floors with one enemy. For the first enemy on the 4th tier, I tend to go Snow Shield->Fire Elf->Fireblade->Sunbird and that fight's done. (Obviously don't Sunbird into a Tower Shield, I guess just Elf again if that happens.) For the final fight, I use Snow Shield-> Fireblade->Sunbird->Snow Shield->Sunbird (and this enemy doesn't seem to Tower, so it's actually the easiest fight here.)
The second fight is definitely the most hectic. I tend to spend the first two turns shielding, and then Fire Elf whoever has the most shields before going into a bladed Meteor, then finishing up with Elves or Sunbirds or whatever. It's still not something I have set in stone though.
These are some great tips!
Especially the ones about using maycast pets!
Spot on.
This is also what I do as well;
May Cast Heals and Defensive spells such as May Cast Fortify does help with your longevity!
I will have to agree with you. I played the Deckathalon the first day for at least at least 8 hrs, off and on. Got to number 31, on Tuesday when I got back on game, I was number 70. I played another 6 hrs or so and managed to rank up some, but once I received the 570 points and was gaining at 16 pts every time I beat stage 4, I was loosing interest. Wednesday morning, I am on number 87. It is like farming and getting no where fast. I do not like to farm and repeat the same thing over and over. Receiving drops that are no use to me, I do not care to craft the Hand of Fate, as a high level player, I have no use for them. Only thing I really wanted was the Ice Pet and it is not worth the time I have to put into the deckathalon to get it. Maybe later when it dies down, I will try again. Maybe this is what others want to do, just not my thing.
You know, as I participated and tried increasing my rankings within the leaderboards, I noticed that I don't have that time to spend farming the event (since that is essentially what we're doing; only for points).
A limit seems like a healthy solution.
If not imposed now, then possibly for future deckathalon events.
I concur. Once you figure it out it is all about TIME and GOLD invested, Which I don't think is fair to all players, especially those that can't get on as often. I also think that the reward tiers are a little whack and might should be extended down lower. Really 25 Ice Pets? I have to go to work so I can afford to pay for Wizard101.
I'm in the top 10, and I cannot possibly agree more. I have to spend upwards of 12 hours a day farming this event just to stay in the top 10, to the point where I even have to neglect my friends. I heavily support the implementation of a time limit, of say, just a few hours, where you can farm the Deckathalon and the points you get from each of these few-hour-long trials DO NOT STACKwith points earned in other trials. This timer should always be paused every second you do not spend in the Deckathalon itself. This way, you can stop to help your friends or do other things without being punished for it.
And the gold, lemme tell you about the gold. In the first two days alone I've spent a million gold. I had tons of gold laying around, and tons of pet snacks that I hadn't sold until now. I know full well that 90% of the playerbase doesn't have that sort of resources available to spend. And I've ran out. And the event is still not halfway over. This event will have to offer an enormous amount of rewards to even remotely be considered worth it from a gold perspective alone (and as for the time perspective, it needs to be even better).
This event is a lot more fun when you do the entire level, but for the sake of point generation I've limited myself to the very first battle on the third level. Sure, credits become a pain this way, but I've done the math. Fire Trap + Sunbird is a lot cheaper per point you get than the TC you spend on the entire run, even if you get more points that way. Plus, the dual mob fights in the higher levels take way too long to kill. It is not efficient to fight these. It should be.
Furthermore, the community progress bar is moving far too slowly. This is the very first Deckathalon, and at this rate I doubt we're going to reach Even Better Rewards. Subsequent events will have even less activity, mostly due to the event losing a lot of its new car smell. It should require SIGNIFICANTLY less points to reach the better rewards tiers.
All I can say is I hope Kingsisle will check the scores to see if they are legit. Some of those people have 4K or more points. I did all 4 levels and a few extra and I’m only at 110 points do how the heck did they get to over 4k?? Even if they did do it all day long they would have to run out of gold at some point before reaching a 4k score I would think? Heck I barely beat the end of stage 4, I had one mana left when I did. So something is a bit screwy.
I really enjoyed the battles and the challenge of being brought back to basics. There are definitely some things I'd like to see tweeked.
1. Prizes by a set number of points rather than in direct competition with other players - eg everyone with over X points get tier 1; over Y points gets tier 2...etc
2. The community bar that is to be filled needs to be achievable. Our progress on there is still very low and even working together the bar is currently far too optimistic. I do however think a lot of people have played it less than they would have due to 99% of participants having zero chance of top prizes (tbh, I'm not sure I'll even get a Ravenwood Hamster having been over-taken by so many wizards).
3. It's supposed to be fair across all schools and levels...but it's not quite fair! I don't like that I have an advantage using a high level wizard whose deck can hold more TC, give a pip, give critical and be jeweled with a boost that is level based. I think we should all get a 'Deckathalon Starter Deck' and we craft decks to improve it. Jewels should be 'Deckathalon Jewels' that are the same for everyone.
4. Harold needs to hold ALL vendor spells eligible for use in the Deckathalon. It doesn't seem right for me to be able to pop to a higher level vendor for better spells when a lower level wizard can't...these spells (eg fire dragon etc) are usually plentiful in the Bazaar but the fire section of the Bazaar was empty within an hour or so of the event starting.
5. Pet may casts work in the tower - this could be good for pet making etc and since maycasts are unaffected by the pet's stats, widely available thanks to the kiosk, only requires one pet for all variations of deckathalon towers, and unable to be relied on as they're unpredictable, I don't think this is a problem but we need to see what the community thinks. I don't think pet talents should be extended beyond maycasts. If the community considers maycasts to be 'unfair' I'd support pets being completely deactivated for the tower; if the community want them kept I'd support that due to the above reasons.
I really enjoyed the challenge of taking us back to basics and to me the big attractions of the Deckathalon concept are in it being fair across all schools and levels. I love the idea of the whole wizarding community working together for a common goal. I don't feel it's quite hit the intended mark yet, but a few tweeks could easily make this a huge success and encourage en masse participation
But is it fair to all of us that have played in the deckathalon to raise the community bar to get better drops, Then on the last day someone get on and plays for the first time and gets the better drops? Or does the community drops not start until they have reached or earned a certain number?
I just ventured in to the event for the first time last night to discover that some treasure cards work and some don't. I've never experienced that before, other than the "no-PvP" cards marked as such. Very frustrating, as I burned my first two entry tokens only to discover I lacked most of my deck. I hope will have some indication of what we can and can't use. Not being able to reset or recall is quite a damper if we have to guess at what cards will go missing.
Also, it seems like getting any meaningful rewards would require hours of play in the limited time the event is running. That's not an option for me, and I suspect for many others.
Deckathalon seems like a cool idea, but may need some further refinement?
Gemma Luna- the problem you had was that some of your treasure cards may have been enchanted or transmuted. These cards are not permitted in the event. But I do think they should have a marking on them like the “no-PVP” ones.
I also agree with Victoria’s ideas.
I have made the run on both non-members and members accounts. What I found was that our “Use a treasure card in combat” progress went over a span of three days or until it reached the daily limit of “20 per day” and has not reset. This should be reset on a daily basis like the interactive housing. Also if I had heard correctly members were to be getting 2 daily credits to use in the event and non-members were getting only one. All of my accounts have received only one daily credit, this is both members and non-members.
But regardless of the above glitches, I have enjoyed playing the Deckathalon, especially with the disadvantage of having low level (below 40) non-member players (meaning a maycast pet / better deck / better TCs).
I thought that as members we were supposed to get 4 entrance credits and 20 event points for tc used daily. I've never gotten that except on the first day.
I'm enjoying the event for what its trying to accomplish, but there are a lot of problems. Currently, I'm in 15 place and just keeping my rank is quite straining. The real reason I wanted to strive for the top was for the exclusive ice pet rewarded. The ice gauntlets are neat, but considering I can craft them, they weren't that appealing. Besides this, the event is rather uneventful. The top 10 positions are either filled with players who either play non stop, are using some form of cheating/cheesing strategy or switching users to continually play. I'm fortunate enough to have my schedule open up to grind for this event, but that's just it, grinding. At first the event was fun, trying out different strategies to climb the tower. However, as I grinded, I started to fall into a rhythm and can easily predict the enemies strategies. The event has now just become a numbers game on how many points one can accumulate in a short amount of time regardless of the deckathalon stage.
In a broad sense, I feel a leader board is great for competition, but it also creates unhealthy competition. To preserve my ranking in the top 25, I must earn around 500-1000 points every day to ensure my reward. I believe the root of this problem is the pet rewarded for the top 25 players; kings isle and the community propped this up as one of the most powerful and unique ice pets leading to this dilemma. Honestly, I'm fine not making the top 10, what's the point? Besides the actual rewards, players get an old gobbler mount and a pack for their friends. Essentially, as long as your in the top 25 you get the good stuff; as a side note, the friend pack is a terrible idea, they may be my friends, but they didn't put the same effort into the event and shouldn't be awarded. Instead much like the statue in the commons, a board with an icy frame should be displayed in the commons to monument the top players. Personally, the top 10 prizes should be the pet, runes, some pack exclusive mount like the ice ghulture, already crafted ice gauntlets to save time and resources and crowns. In addition, the ice hamster reward should be set to at least 100-500 considering the player pool is hundreds of thousands if not millions. And if your reading this Kings Isle, please make the hamsters tradeable, I understand these are badges of honor for players who grinded, but considering this was released near the time of the extra wizard elixir, most players newest wizards could be ice and their grinding with their maxed wizards to trade them. I'm fine with the inability to earn one through hatching, but non tradeable pets only hinder the actual player and their efforts.
As for the changes I'd suggest to the event itself. Instead of a leader board, allow players to earn final rewards based on points. For example, 3000 points should earn you the gauntlets while 6000 gets the school pet; if not this, increase the amount of hamsters like I stated previously. The rewards for this event were rather bugged and poor in retrospect, considering your grinding for these rewards, simple fire runes and wrenches aren't very useful; I'm not sure if it was the community bar, but I've never gotten any superior, strengthening or ultimate ones and should as such be rewards. To craft the ice gauntlets, only the top 500 have enough to craft these weapons so hopefully these ultimate runes start dropping soon. As for treasure cards, only the ones in the library should be useable as a means to curve unfair strategies; add or remove ones as you see fit, also schools that are stronger against the deckathalon (fire in this case) should be discounted so lower level players can afford cards like fire blade which only one costs as much as an entrance fee. I like the addition of the craftable TC recipes in the deckathalon, but I'd only argue that it would be nice to be capable of crafting them outside of the deckathon itself. Most important of all, socketed decks should be removed or adjusted; higher level players get an unfair advantage with their access to higher health tear sockets and outside decks should also be banned to remove power pip chances. Power pip chance should also be included in the event, at least 10-15% seems fair.
Lastly these are some of the bugs I've experienced and some quality of life changes when grinding I'd suggest. One annoying bug is the wizard101 client would randomly close when I would enter the deckathalon; I often disable full screen to allow for multitasking during animations and could be the cause. When heading into the deckathalon disable the prompt questioning if less than 5-6 cards is ok, some players only need that many and it gets quite annoying. The teleport to event feature should be disabled or require a prompt; often times I want to check the rewards and end up flinging myself back to the library. The purchase of credits should be allowed to be bought in bulk; most players can clear 4 credits in no time at all so this would save a lot of time and hassle to refill. I'm not sure if this is a bug or intentional, but I believe accuracy, especially for fire spells is raised. I'm a fire wizard myself and I almost never miss an attack; currently my accuracy is 99% so this could be the case or I'm just really lucky.
Overall, this is a fun event and changes need to be made to prevent unhealthy competition without discouraging players from participating.
I have found this event interesting. I liked the back to basics, and think it might encourage new players to learn more about spells from other schools. It might help low level wizards get ready for pvp too, one shots being good in there. About people with many enchanted treasure cards not working in there, there should be a way to tell which TC were created by enchantment. If there were an enchantment icon on the card it might help. It would also let me know if I have any traded cards that are not sellable at the bazaar. I guess I was lucky that I had many cards that were dropped or gardened. I really like that the pet may casts work. It gave me reason to use some pets that I like but don't usually have in the rotation.
How about we try doing, say, three or four Credits for each floor of the tower? These Credits would be reset at the start of every day with no way to shorten that time or get more Credits, even as a Member. Is that a good idea?
I really enjoyed your post with some insight and suggestions. I did participate but was only able to reach Level 4 and gave up not being able to give it so much time. I am still amazed that as of today some players have in excess of 14,000 points. Considering that this event has only been on for a few days, that you are only able to use 20 TC's per day on a character, how is that achievable? Or am I missing something?
Perhaps, when this event is over, you, another player that reached to the top or KI can give us some insight on how many levels there were in the tower? How many points were you given per fight when reaching the highest levels? Again, how is this achievable when restricted by the use of 20 TC's on a daily basis on your wizard? Also, would be nice to share some strategies with other community members.
It is an interesting new event that needs some tweaking and I believe that you and other more proficient players that made it to the high levels can make recommendations for the benefit of other players. In the end, it should be a fair playing field for all not just a few.
The Ice Deckathalon has concluded with a global progress win for all participants! Congrats on this achievement.
I'm excited to see all of these great comments about the event. We need this feedback to keep improving it from one Deckathalon to the next. Thank you all!
I did managed to craft the 4th version of the Ice Dekathalon deck, but it was a close thing. I hope I will be able to use it in the next Dekathalon, since I assume it will still be better than the 1st deck for that element.
I would like to be able to craft the event treasure cards outside of a Deckathalon event tower. I know that I couldn't craft them on any of my crafting tables.
I saw that pets could use may cast abilities. That was a comfort! I am not sure if stat bonuses or health and mana bonuses from pets worked, because my pet had only casting talents and I didn't have a useful pet jewel to socket. Keeping the pet relevant is a smart idea game wise. May cast abilities aren't reliable but they were a nice bonus at times.
