=='''Getting started'''==
The journey in Battlecraft starts with a decent Mercenary deck, it can easily carry new players through the tutorial and the easy Campaigns. This Guide will lead from the first steps in the easy campaign to the point where the players can create or join basic raids.
=='''Achievements'''==
One of the most important part of Battlecraft for new players are the Achievements. Those can be found under "Profile\ Achievements".
There are many different Achievements, the most important are the Leveling achievements, the Battle Achievements and the Faction Achievements. The description of the achievements say, that you have to win ladder battles, thats not completely true though, battles in campaign and tournaments also count.
===Leveling Achievements ===
The Level Achievements come more or less automatically. The first 4 require the player to reach level 20 and supply you with 4 basic support cards and new avatars. The other achievements in this section award you for every 20 level you advance and reward the player with shards and more avatars.
===Battle Achievements ===
There are 2 different Battle Achievements, one requires the player to win battles (War Monger), the other requires the player to win battles using the "Autoassign" button (Fortune's Test). Both reward players with shards, the War Monger achievement also gives a mythic support card "Crown of Power", it is a very powerful unaligned support and its recommended to get it as fast as possible.
===Faction Achievements ===
The Faction Achievements rewards players to win battles with decks where heroes of only one or two factions are included. The single faction achievements have very good Heroes as reward, while the mixed faction achievements provide support cards that can be useful later for the more advanced decks.
==Getting new Cards==
In Battlecraft you can get every card without paying with cash, players with a good card pool can easily earn over 4000 Shards per day, for a new player it isn't as easy, but therefor the achievements give a lot of shards.
How should new players spend the shards?
===Buying Packs===
Battlecraft is a CCG, that means if a player buys packs its contents are random. It often causes some discontent for new players when they finally collected enough shards to buy packs and then dont get the cards they are looking for, but thats how a CCG works, players can be lucky or unlucky. If you feel lucky then buy packs.
The best packs for new players are Gold Packs and Platinum Packs, dont bother with Basic Packs or even Silver Packs. Gold Packs (when bought) let you chose from 2 factions, for Platinum Packs you need to chose 3. The main advantage of Platinum packs is the 100% chance for a rare and a 5 times higher chance for a mythic than on a Gold Pack (its still just ~5%) the chance for a Rare in a Gold Pack depends on the choice of faction, but its ~20%.
===Buying Cards from the Market===
If you look for certain cards it is much cheaper to buy them from other players than getting them from packs, its recommendable to ask in the chat for the cards you want, many player sell them a little under market price. Note that new players who are under level 20 AND never bought HC for cash wont be able to sell their cards but can still buy cards from other players.
==Gathering Shards==
Collecting shards in Battlecraft might seem hard in the beginning, but it really isn't.
The most profitable feature is the Global Event, the Scouting Force is easily beaten even by starter decks. It gives 10 to 20 shards per win and each player gets at least a free Gold Pack (if the Global Event is won)
Aside from the Global Event nearly every win gives 10 shards per Battle and every loss rewards the player with 5 shards, that means if you have a high resistance towards losing you can also join the Tournaments which take place every 2 hours. As new player you will most likely lose a lot of battles, but you still receive shards, xp. Additionally the other players will be thankful for the glory points they get from winning battles.
As soon as you are able to do Basic Raids you should do so. Finished alone they can reward you with up to 380 shards for 20 supplies.
The most shards players collect come from campaigns, normal campaigns use 1 supply and reward you with 10 shards per win, hard campaigns have just 15 shards for 2 supplies as reward and elite campaigns give 30 shards for 3 supplies. So for farming shards, easy or elite campaigns are recommended.
As soon as you are lvl 50+ and are able to do elite campaigns its easy to do 13 battles every 3 hours to deplete the supplies (you will have 50 Supplies with lvl 50[40+level/5]) and get ~400 shards
=='''Suggested Actions'''==
Exchange the Mercenary deck as fast as possible with a one faction deck, the easiest and cheapest deck types for beginners are:
Nature(Green):
* Archer (Alya Wind, Sylvan Ranger, Treefolk etc.)
* Mesmer (Fey Seer, Pixie, Tree Goblin)
Chaos(Red):
* Siege (Trampler, Hvrock, Uguling, Overrun)
Qabal(Blue):
* Demoralize (Ruya, Sayeed, Crescent Bow)
Twilight(Black):
*Skeletons (Bone Archer, Skeletal Beast, Zuzuk)
*Ghosts (Apparition, Banshee, Spectre Queen, Phantom)
In easy Campaigns '''ALWAYS '''use the "autoassign" button, with that the 2 Battles Achievements are advanced at the same time.
For the mixed faction achievements it only needs 1 card of the second faction, that means if you have a good single faction deck and finished the single faction achievement then just exchange one of the less important heroes for one of another faction.
Watch the XP bar, every level up refills the supplies, so it'd be advisable not to have a break from Battlecraft if you are at 99% or something alike, if you level up with full supplies you waste 400+ shards, XP and more.
Save some shards and try to build one of the decks mentioned above, most of the cards mentioned sell for 1000 or less shards (the prices arent set, so it may be different for each player)
Buy Gold or Platinum Packs if you want to test your luck or if it doesnt matter to you what kind of cards you receive. Buy from other players if you want to build a specific deck and miss cards for it.
Buy at least 350 Hydra Cash (5$) or 1000 Hydra Cash(10$) to be able to sell cards, some common cards (Health Charm, Jack'O Lantern) and some uncommon Cards sell pretty well.
Join the Global Event when its running and keep hitting the Scouting Force (Global Event takes place every weekend)
In Campaigns the players earn crafting tokens for characters as well as tokens for the Green Hydra Trader. It is recommended to use the tokens for Supplies, the first 5 Supply and 20 Supply option give u as much shards as the shard-trade (when used for battles in campaign) and as many XP as the XP-trade.
