It's all uphill from here

[Insomniac74]

*RE: Changing strategy when moving from beginner to intermediate stages*

After a lucky die roll in a race-to-the-castle win against Leo, I think I'm ready to try my luck at a 3 cepter match in the Temple of the Medium. My confidence is waining fast, however. Each match has been closer and closer, and even after ten quick matches against Golligan, I haven't gotten many cards that I'd call game winners. I've switched from my Earth/Fire starter and made a mono Earth deck that works well enough in Dunnan, but it's not that hard to level up a land to put my creatures out of the reach of Golligan's mace or long sword. What am I going to do when Ryvern and the like start wielding claymores or tridents?

I consider myself very lucky to have started this game with so little trouble, but I know the other shoe is going to drop soon. How does one overcome this sense of dread when a cepter must step out of the sandbox and face down the big boys? Does even the most cunning of CPU cepter have some predictable behavior patters I can exploit? Culdra help me, here I go...

[WhoseYerLilith]

***Contains Spoilers for People Not Past Battle Four***

Hahah! You sound just like me! When I started doing the "three for alls", I noticed that each game I won was by the skin of my teeth, and I was constantly down on myself for being a "bad player". I have a few comments for you that should help ease your mind:

1- You said you've done multiple brawls with Goliganm but haven't gotten "game-winners". It's amazing how well you can do with just the starter deck with some added creatures you get after winning the first few games. Don't stress about the cards just yet, since you're still in the relative beginning of the game- instead focus on how best to use the cards you have- sadly, that last part really comes with experience and being able to quickly identify the cards in your opponents hand so you can better gauge what to do and play.

2- The Temple of the Medium isn't that difficult of a battle. It's pretty intimidating your first time through as how different the board is and that you have two opponents. The primary thing to realize is that you're two opponents are NOT allies. Ryvern and Luthien are content to attack each other just as much as they'll attack you. And trust me, nobody's wielding Tridents or Claymore's ...yet.

3- It took my third attempt before winning that stage---my one difference in playing that last time was that I stopped focusing on trying to "kill" Ryvern and Luthien and instead took a "minding my own business" approach. I used Holy Words to have them land on each others land, so that they were both always 800-1400G below me. I didn't have great creatures, but I always had a solid mix of offensive creatures, offensive items and defensive items in my hand at all times.

That's pretty much it- don't stress it- you may have to do it a few times, but for some reason, I didn't mind doing that with this battle. Ryvern and Luthien aren't as frustrating as other opponents you'll play later. The worst aspect about them is that they have all these new creautures that you've never seen before with interesting things to them (I.e- Lilith, Succubus, Vision).

[Captain Garak]

I'd like to add something here....

One of the things that I realized rather late in my game playing was the way in which my deck seemed to perform better as I decreased the number of Creatures in it, while increasing the number of Spells that I used. Now that I'm at the end-game stage, my card mix is 40% Creatures, 20% Items and 40% Spells (as others have discussed both here and on GameFAQs). However, I didn't get there gradually, as I didn't know that this was a "successful" method of play until I got rather far along in the game. Since I had started out playing a mix of about 50% Creatures, 25% Items and 25% Spells, the new configuration that I use seems quite different.

So, depending upon the mix of your deck, I would suggest that, as you progress, you might think about moving to a new card mix. Think about leaning toward using primarily one or two colors of Creatures, and when you get a good Spell card or two as a reward, think about altering your card mix a bit in order to include it in your deck.