Quote Originally Posted by Cyrocco View Post
In all honesty, after four years with the same card system, was anyone actively thinking about what they were doing with the cards?
Does this matter? Familiarity with the class doesn't mean the system isn't still complex and versatile - the cards had different purposes, and knowing which situations in which to apply them, or which cards would be a good draw for that moment, or what you would use each card for if you draw it is still part of the fun. It was great when I was struggling with a dying party in a 24-man and was begging for a Ewer to help me out, or at least hoping I flipped into a Lady of Crowns to buy some time for my mana to regen, or for Lucid/Refresh/Mana Shift/Lightspeed to be up. Even being able to supplement TP for some more AoE rotations for the tank or a neglected DPS felt cool. I've saved several runs with stacking a Bole over a shield that wouldn't've be possible otherwise.

Hell, even the functional DPS increases still made us feel like we had options in how to play them. It was cool to see a party of casters and know that Arrow is going to see more use than it would usually, or to see a BRD in a dungeon and rubbing my hands and hoping for a Spear over a Balance to help smoothen their rotations.

Being able to make those quick, on-the-fly decisions with the cards feels great because we put in the work to know which cards worked when, and had become so familiar with the system that we didn't have to think anymore - we made those decisions instinctively and felt good about it.

Were we solving complex equations every time we drew a card? No. Nobody would say that, either. The fun isn't in staring at your party vs your drawn card and engaging brain for a few seconds; the fun is in having your hard work towards memorising the card effects/classes they work with pay off by being able to rail off cards like a machine gun and feel like you were playing more efficiently because you know the cards so well.

It felt like we mastered something. Now, there's nothing really to master. Every card does the same thing, and the tooltips/UI tell you where to place them.