First let me say, i am a geniune newbie to the game, and i really like the gameplay and concept.

But there are some problems with the experience for new player imho that probably drive many away.

1. Nothing to do except AI.
Well, that is mostly because the low player count, but some issues strike me wierd. Why are there minimum wins already for the very first formats? I mean free sealed (obviously one of the very first things to do as i do not own competitive decks) and Beginners Clash. I can understand, that you want people to understand how the game works in advance, but then force us to do a tutorial or something. But apparently scenarios dont even count towards the win number, so you force new players first to understand the game and then spend hours beating the easy AI 10 times. That is boring.
Also i just waited hours for a BC and got nothing because noone was there. So i will most likely not bother to wait next time as i might again get nothing. An easy fix would be to hand out 10 gold to the only attendant of a BC, if need be, make an AI join and have them fight about the 10 gold.

2. No free progression.
Apparently phantom cards cant be used in BC. That means unless i spend money i will hardly ever get to a deck not consisting mostly of default cards. And even slight improvements to my deck would require winning lots of BC first given how little 10 gold appears to be on the market.
Constructed seems to be off limit anyways. That also is mostly because of the low player count and the lack of players even remotely my experience and deck level.
Given i do not enjoy playing the AI, phantom cards are thus worthless to me.
It would be a lot better is phantom cards could be used in BC, more players in a BC got anything (instead of only first) and maybe one could even ban owned cards, allowing newbies and free players to stay among themselves in them and thus saving them from the frustration of beeing beaten by paying players repeatedly.

So unless i want to play single player, i cant really improve at all for free. It would however be way better if i could do something for free and then spend money some day in the future or not, but more importantly i would stay at the game and be one player more.

Given the small niche the game is in, you can not afford to alienate new players that would otherwise enjoy and stay by problems like these.

just my 2 cents

Hello Friend. I wanted to address where you say phantoms cant be used in BC. As far as i know Phantoms are allowed in BC. Maybe try using a deck with phantoms next time you are in one. Im fairly sure it allows phantoms. If im mistaken i apologize however i dont believe i am. GL. There is always expert clash as well if you are confident in your skills

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Dont know about the phantoms, the first one i was in with others told me my deck was invalid though it followed the rules stated in the deck builder. It allowed to use a default deck however.
After that (which i could not join afterwards because i did not have 5 wins) i tried to attend 4 more bc but none of them took place due to noone joining except for me.

I am quite sure it would benefit the game (not only me ^^) if i had a chance to win something in them even if i am alone. Then i would continue to attend them. As it is now, i will hardly even bother to launch far wilds if i am playing something else as it is likely that i will just wait a few minutes to get told 'Tournament cancelled'.
Of course that means, that the next eager newbie will also be alone in them and eventually give up as well and you get the picture.

To joining Experts Clash: Suuure, not only would it require hours of boring ai games to get the wins needed to even join, i am pretty positive my deck of default cards paired with my lack of experience compared to the 2000 wins people i see online would render that a not so fun experience.

It already surprises me that i bothered coming to this forums several times already and spending time writing these posts for a game i have played less than 5 hours, i suppose that speaks for the game and its potential, but it REALLY needs a better New Player Experience.

Player introduction and player retention = the two biggest problems for TFW. It has always been that way, unfortunately, and without some serious investment in the game, that is not likely to change.

For those of us who overcame the initial problems we all saw what a great game TFW is. DeVadder, if you have a look at old forum posts, you can see the numerous suggestions that have been made to try to make TFW a better game. jed created TFW and made some really good stuff to keep it going but in the end it was not to be. Altren and Grug also did well in keeping it going but so far it still lacks players.

I have always thought that TFW has some serious potential. Alas, it takes money to realize that potential and, again unfortunately, there never seem to be any around.

But one can always hope, eh?