Deck Building-Examples and Effectiveness

[Orion's Islands]

Hey All Battlecasters!
As you all may know, you can just pick 3 Skylanders, let the computer automatically generate your deck to be used and BATTLE ON!!! But you can also build your own card decks for use in Skylanders Battlecast!
Each deck consists of three skylanders of your choosing and 30 cards. Each can be named and stored in a library you can skim thru and select at the beginning of any fight: Convienient!

This is an interesting option: Tailoring decks to meet your specific needs!! It brings unexpected depth to the game!
If your going up against a specific type of enemy or want to achieve a specific goal, you can have a hand picked deck of cards and three specific Skylanders that might give you a SERIOUS advantage in seeing "VICTORY!" roll across your screen at the end. Remember, each Skylander has a different ability..eg. Rip Tide heals himself and others while Spitfire deals out a fiery punch for 40 damage. Can't get to those enemies hiding behind the "Active" bad guy?!? Remember Spyro's ability hoses all enemies for 10 damage, active AND waiting in the wings! Slap him into your "Whack the Back" Deck! Still can't bash those guys in the back hard enough?? Well...put a few cards in the deck that "Swap" the inactive guys forward into the danger spot against their will!!! Mwa-Ha-Haaaaaaa!!!



I thought it might be usefull to have a thread where we can discuss the options, what we have tried, what worked really well and which options were a
Feel free to list problem levels in the Story Mode (BEATING WOLFGANG on Kaos' Island is TOUGH!!) and then list off a strategy you might use, list a card, a card combo or a whole deck!
A good example is taking on the Golden Queen! She's standard tough but at a certain point, she gets enough crystals together and then..BAMMO!! She outright crushes a Skylander per turn!!! You have some choices here: pummel her hard and fast to take her out, delay her with snares, etc, etc. (EG. I made a "Golden Queen" Deck with bruisers like Crusher and spells that did high damage)





(and then tell us what you did.)

[Orion's Islands]

To date I have made and saved about 9 decks. This doesn't include a simple deck or two I created (and have subsequently erased) to test the waters initially just to get used to how it works.

My Decks to date are:
1. Sideline Attack: A deck built to target the Sideline Enemies hiding behind the Active Enemy.
2. Smallies: A bit of a test deck to see how formidable three non-Giant type Skylanders would be.
3. Heavies: See #2 deck but think big, hulking Skylanders!
4. Health Deck: Built this deck to maximize longevity, lots of health boost cards and health regenerative Skylanders.
5. Damage Deck: Simple Aim: Forget protecting yourself, cards and Skylanders are out to do hurt hard and fast.
6. Relic Deck: A deck chock full of Relic cards-to address some of the relic based daily challenges.
7. Golden Queen Killer Deck: Could NOT beat this Lady…basically an early version of the Damage Deck. It worked, BTW!
8. Tech Deck: Loaded with like Element Skylanders and their specific element cards.
9. Snare Deck: Deck designed to hold an enemy in place for duration pummeling!

They have all been effective in some way or another, even if to show me how future combinations of abilities could work with future decks. A good example was the "1-2 Deck". I compiled a set almost exclusively made of cards which only cost 1 or 2 crystals to activate and use. In general, of course, low cost cards do proportionally less damage than high cost cards. The idea was to bring down an enemy with 1000 ants instead of 1 Rhinocerous!!! It failed.

It failed not because the idea wasn't sound but because I burned thru my cards too fast and could not replace them fast enough. So while I waited to get more cards to use, I got pounded. I erased the deck but I will do another one. This time I will include some of the "Cards that give you MORE cards" cards, in an effort to keep up my supply of ammo.

Another subtle point I have learned: As you get new cards, it is wise to update your decks. To the game's credit, you can edit your existing decks, swapping out cards for newer or more effective ones. Sometimes though, just erasing the deck and starting over seems to be the easier move.

I'll have to list out a few of my decks, card by card. (I have been wondering if it would be easier to do it visually…work in progress)

[Orion's Islands]

Recap:

My Decks to date are:
1. Sideline Attack: A deck built to target the Sideline Enemies hiding behind the Active Enemy.
2. Smallies: A bit of a test deck to see how formidable three non-Giant type Skylanders would be.
3. Heavies: See #2 deck but think big, hulking Skylanders!
4. Health Deck: Built this deck to maximize longevity, lots of health boost cards and health regenerative Skylanders.
5. Damage Deck: Simple Aim: Forget protecting yourself, cards and Skylanders are out to do hurt hard and fast.
6. Relic Deck: A deck chock full of Relic cards-to address some of the relic based daily challenges.
7. Golden Queen Killer Deck: Could NOT beat this Lady…basically an early version of the Damage Deck. It worked, BTW!
8. Tech Deck: Loaded with like Element Skylanders and their specific element cards.
9. Snare Deck: Deck designed to hold an enemy in place for duration pummeling!

And here are the Skylanders I am using for each one:

[1ofWiisdom]

I didn't read much to avoid spoilers, but I recently started playing Battlecast and love it

I am playing on the iPad...which had to be updated, and that updated killed Skylanders Battelgrounds and Skylanders Lost Islands, so that is bitter sweet.

I'm torn between getting cards IRL or just being content with freebies...if they were to ever abandon Battlecast the IRL stuff would be cool, but mostly a "relic." and of little use/value. I could see 2 people battling it out in person only to debate which card does what and whether it lasts 1 turn, or 1 turn cycle etc.

All-in-all it has been pretty fun though...I might start recording some of it.

[Orion's Islands]

[1ofWiisdom]

Did you see the Ultimate Starter Pack on Amazon though...I'm kicking myself for not getting 2 when they were $12 ($59.99 MSRP). It is still slashed at $16ish, but man...$12 was a total steal.

The duplicates are killers...have you seen my Animal Crossing amiibo card issues, lol. I got burned out and boycotted for Waluigi (still taking partial credit for the Big N caving and meeting my demands), but true to my word that re-kindled the interest and then with the price cut at GameStop to $3.97 I kind of got addicted again...Now the issue is I, the only guy buying the flipping things locally, have depleted stock, haha. I fear a few more Battlecast packs could result in a serious wallet drain with no relic card of regenerating income with each purchase

[Orion's Islands]