I see a lot of folks posting here who are a fair bit younger, and approaching them feels a bit awkward, although maybe that's just me. I get along with a wide range of ages, but I don't have great social initiative, and have difficulty getting a read on folks based on text alone. I'm happy to meet up with anyone at least once to see how things go, and if the vibe isn't right, just go our own ways.

I'm autistic, nerdy, in decent shape, very progressive, quite patient (except with injustice), and great with critters. I'm much more interested in discussing philosophy, science and sociology than sports or pop culture. I'd love to learn a new practical skill.

My favourite place to be is anywhere that is full of rocks, trees, water, and growing things, especially wildlife.

My favourite activity is just about any kind of game; analog or digital, I prefer co-op but ok with competitive. I play a lot of Slay the Spire (co-op and solo), D&D, Hearthstone, I'd like to play more Wyrmspan, and I just got back into Hades 2. I've also logged a silly number of hours in Deep Rock Galactic and 7 Days to Die.

I'd really like to get out more and improve my fitness, whether it's walking, hiking, jogging or running. I've got pretty good endurance, but my cardio could use some improvement.

Based in Saanich, but can easily get to just about anywhere in greater Vic.

Hello all,

I am Leia, a very dignified and easygoing lady cat. I quite appreciate sitting on dad, he's usually acceptable cat furniture. Mada is an ok alternative when dad doesn't have enough flat, and ze often has the best soft cushions and blankets.

When they are together at night, it's the best time to occupy as much of both of them as I can, for maximum warm snuggles.

Sometimes they'll move, but I'm so patient about being disturbed I have to do a full patrol of the bed to find a better spot that has less movement. Sometimes I need to daintily step over their heads, and I"m very delicate and careful and never stand on their hair, but I do sometimes give them an opportunity to appreciate my butt up close. It's very clean and nice.

One morning after I was disturbed by a movement, I was doing my normal patrol and as I was passing dad's head, suddenly I was airborne! I think in his sleep he mistook me for a cushion! I gracefully sailed to the far side of the room, acrobatically touched off the far wall to reduce my momentum, and landed perfectly.

Of course, it was incredibly rude of him to make such a terrible error in judgment, so I denied him my presence until I got hungry.

Still, I can't help but wonder if maybe, possibly, he didn't mistake me for a cushion? Maybe stepping on his head provoked this response? Clearly in that case he meant to gently lift me away (as he has since done in similar situations). Perhaps he misjudged his strength? Often when he means to give me gentle pets it results in me being pushed off him, which I"m confident is an error, and in my infinite patience, I just return to my previous spot, even if he pets too hard again, and I have to once again reclaim my spot on him.

AITC? Did dad ... mean to toss me off the bed??

No cats were injured by this FU.

This didn't happen today, but it's haunted me long enough that I feel like I should share it.

My cat is very chill, fairly affectionate, and loves to snuggle. She also has the unfortunate habit of needing to walk around a fair bit before she settles, and no sense of personal space. She loves it when my partner and I settle down for the night, as that is a prime opportunity to pick the best spot to occupy.

Often, in the morning, as we're waking up and starting to move around, she'll get disturbed and need to find a new spot to occupy.

On the morning in question, as part of her patrol for new nap spot, she basically walked across my head. This wasn't the first time. Still half asleep, and quite irritated, I put my hand under her and pushed up and toward the foot of the bed. I meant to toss her a foot or less. Unfortunately, I totally misjudged the force, and launched her off the bed and into the far wall, a distance of about 2.5m/8ft.

Hearing her collide with the wall (thankfully not hard) was sickening, I was fully awake immediately, and went to check on her. Fortunately she was fine, but VERY offended, and it took a while for her to forgive me.

Now when she walks on my head I gently pick her up and set her down elsewhere.

TL;DR: Cat walked on my head, in my half asleep state I launched her across the room.

Obviously only applicable if you actually appreciate them reaching out.

People can often feel awkward or uncertain about asking for help (especially guys). Sometimes folks feel like they're a burden, or that their request is 'too much', regardless of how innocuous it may be.

If you're like me, and enjoy helping people (especially if it's something that plays to my strengths), make a point of thanking people for thinking of you when they ask for help, even if you're not able to fulfill that specific request.

This achieves two things. First, it makes it more likely that they'll seek help in the future if they need it, and second, it pushes back on the societal narrative that we should all fend for ourselves.

I just realized that with the pride event happening today, busses going downtown will be very full all morning. In past years I've ended up having 3-4 full busses go by before one came that had space, and I've ended up taking a cab once.

Plan your trips accordingly.

Playing this game for free is like a control matchup. It's about consistent, incremental gains over flashy explosive plays. It's not as exciting, but in the long run it can be worth the payoff.

This guide is for optimizing your collection. It has resulted in me having a stupid amount of excess gold and dust while playing standard totally free.

For reference, I consistently complete daily/weekly quests, I'm ranked D5 or higher every month, and I finish each reward track at 150+. I have a life, a job, and a family, and I touch grass almost as often as I probably should. I have other hobbies too, and I play Slay the Spire at least as much as Hearthstone. I don't hoard resources, I play a wide variety of competitive decks (just not all of them), I don't grind matches or bot, and I don't have a big spreadsheet tracking my gains and expenses (it's a little text document with 7 lines per expansion that I update about once a week). I often use the HSReplay deck tracker, and get most of my competitive/metagame info from Vicious Syndicate.

All that said, I'm certain that a noob could have acceptable results with half my playtime or rank.

I'd estimate that I claim about 90% of the freebies offered through Twitch and the store (although I don't spend much time actually watching streams), and I still haven't won any giveaways (although I enter the easy ones here on Reddit).

It requires some patience, as you won't have all the cool new legendaries or decks in the first week of release, although you will definitely have some competitive decks beyond budget aggro.

It requires some skill, although you don't have to reach legend every month (D5 is nearly as good, and D10/Plat 5 have very decent rewards).

It requires some attention, so you know when and where to claim freebies and get full rewards from events, and what packs to open or stop opening.

There will likely be a fair bit in here that you already know, but I'd rather include things that might be 'common knowledge' than omit things that newcomers may not be aware of yet. If you're already doing what the heading suggests, skip to the next part.

TL;DR at the end.

Complete all quests/events.

Why it matters: Doing so will net over 200k xp for the rewards track, which should put you over level 150. This will give you 8k gold each expansion, as well as all the packs, legendaries, tavern tickets, and a number of extra cards/dust.

Some people think this requires logging in daily and playing for hours. It doesn't. It does require logging in at least 3 times a week, and playing (not necessarily winning) about 14-20 games a week (2-3 games a day average), with intention to complete quests.

Depending on your deck preferences, this could take as little as 15 minutes a day. Note this doesn't have to be done every day. If you play for half an hour twice during the week and an hour on the weekend, that should be sufficient. If you play more, they'll get done without any special effort. Ideally, if you play decks/game modes you enjoy, it won't take any 'effort', and you'll always have quest slots available when new ones come up.

Dailies:

Reroll any 900 xp quests, or quests you really can't be bothered to progress. I play all classes, so usually I'll look for the class that progresses two or more dailies and play a few games with that class in ranked.

Weeklies:

Win 5 ranked games: As long as you're getting at least 50% winrate over the course of a week, you will complete the weekly 'win 5 games' by playing 10 total games. The MMR system should ensure that you'll get matches that give you a reasonable chance of doing this. The only other one that may not be completed organically is the 'Win 5 Tavern Brawl/Battlegrounds/Arena games'.

Win 5 games of Tavern Brawl, Arena, or Battlegrounds: I happen to enjoy Battlegrounds, even if my rating is sub 7k, getting top 4 isn't too much of a challenge. Arena should be avoided if you're learning anything from this guide. Tavern Brawl is the easiest place to get wins, but after the first few games it can get repetitive. This is the quest that's most likely worth re-rolling.

All the other weekly quests should be finished about the same time you complete the '5 ranked wins'.

Events:

You don't need to get all the daily quests done, just about half of them. As long as you're playing with some new cards in each deck, they should get completed if you're completing your daily/weekly quests.

Play ranked ladder

Why it matters: Free stuff at the end of the month, and you'll probably get better at the game.

I spent a LOT of time playing casual, because I felt like there was less pressure to win, and I'd face more 'fun' decks. That hasn't been the case for a long time, and (ironically) wild is now the place to go for playing silly/absurd decks and having a decent chance to win (not guaranteed, of course, there are still a few tryhards in low ranks).

Now I play ranked standard almost exclusively, and get D5/Legend every month. It's low legend, I'm often in the 10k+ bracket, but the rewards are the same.

The important thing to remember is that the brackets matter and you will be matched against people of similar skill (based on your past winrates) in the same bracket. If you feel like you suck at the game, you'll be matched with other people who suck at the game, and have at least a decent chance of winning half your matches. This will happen regardless if you play ranked or casual, so you might as well get a few packs/cards out of it, and you might learn you're better than you thought.

Most importantly though, play decks you enjoy, don't grind out games, the rewards aren't worth the stress. As noted above, you'll end up in winnable matches over time.

Spend gold on unique cards, spend dust on cards/decks with proven value.

Why it matters: You get a lot of packs for playing the game (as noted above), and gold spent on packs is best when you're getting lots of unique cards. The bulk of your playable legendaries will come from crafting, not packs so this is also about getting the most dust (and spending it well).

The reasons for this are complicated, so here's the simplest way to put it, prioritizing top down:

Buy class sets on release or as early as possible. (Usually 2-2.5k gp)
Buy packs for new/incomplete sets until you've got two of each rare for that set, then stop. (Usually ~50 packs)
Buy golden packs for each set one at a time until you get a legendary. (400-4000 gp)

Note that all of the above averages over 8k gold. This means that claiming packs and rares from the rewards track is an important part of filling out the collection. Claiming cards from the track as early and often as patience allows, and rerolling all duplicates will ensure that you get as many unique cards as possible.

Any spare gold leftover after this should be saved for next expansion. If you start an expansion with more gold than you started the last one with (more than 8k) then buying more golden packs will yield the best value, so long as you dust all the cards in them.

What cards to craft is even more complicated, because different cards appeal to different playstyles. I have no interest in having a copy of Chromie, but Timelooper Toki is a welcome addition. For the purpose of this guide though, we'll focus on 'necessary in competitive decks', which is still not simple, but easier to address.

The short version is that if you have to ask if a card is worth crafting, don't craft it.

Craft decks, not individual cards is generally sound advice, but sometimes you can make a perfectly decent deck without all the epics and legendaries. I find HSReplay to be a good resource for this. Looking at a decklist, the 'Drawn Winrate' will give you an idea about how crucial a card is to the deck's success.

Any deck that is still played competitively after being nerfed is a good candidate.

I also like Vicious Syndicate as a resource for tracking a deck's viability over time.

Dust all cards with full refund (recently nerfed), avoid hitting the 'dust all' button, search for 'extra' instead.

This one is a bit more contentious and not as necessary, but I feel that it's a good practice. I'll note that the reason I don't dust all is that I haven't needed to for years, and despite having an extensive wild collection (including sigs and duplicates I"ll likely never play) I always have enough dust from nerfs to make what I do decide to craft.

Use tavern tickets for arena achievements and pre-release tavern brawls.

If you have to ask if Arena is good value, it won't be for you. Arena is very much it's own metagame, and even a top legend player will struggle with drafting and piloting a deck to 12 wins consistently. Arena can be fun, but the current rewards model is only borderline sustainable for people who know how to play Arena well. It converts tickets to packs at an ok rate, but they're better saved for specific scenarios.

It is a very good practice to always have an arena run active for both basic and underground. When the card pool/games are changed (as they were recently), active runs are retired and the cost is refunded, meaning you get the rewards for your wins for free.

The last few expansions have featured achievements that are unlocked by opening a certain number of packs (max 50), then getting an Underground Arena run with 6+ wins. Each achievement awards 2 arena tickets, which is challenging but doable. A single run is sufficient to clear all the achievements so long as you've opened 50 packs.

Since it may take several attempts to get the 6+ win arena run, I recommend saving up tickets. Even if you don't manage to get the 6 win threshold, the ticket to resources ratio is ok for building your collection. It is a risk, since failing to get it within 5 attempts will have diminishing returns.

Pre-release tavern brawls are usually a good value early on if you're willing to focus on playing an aggressive deck. 4+ wins is typically good value for the tickets spent.

Check the launcher for news, this is where you'll find leads on Twitch Drops and other giveaways.

For Twitch drops, you just need a Twitch account connected to your battlenet account. You don't actually have to 'watch' anything. It's perfectly ok to open it, mute the tab, and leave it running, then check back later for the reward. Now and then there will be 'choose your champion' events associated with championships, which can yield some packs if you're well informed/lucky.

Optional: Track your gold/dust gains between expansions, and how many packs you've opened since your last legendary.

I mostly play on PC, and I have a little text document that I update when I open packs, or a new expansion launches. Each expansion looks something like this:

Cataclysm
Last level: 221 (from AtT)
27520 gp Spent: 1900+2.5k
83k+44k dust
Legendary packs: 4, 5, 37, 61, 81, 99
Packs since last legendary: 0
Golden Legendary Packs: 4
Golden packs since last legendary: 2

So far it hasn't led to me buying packs for a guaranteed pity timer legendary after 39 packs, so maybe I'm lucky. It has let me know that I can be more spendthrift with my gold and my dust, which is useful, and definitely improved my enjoyment of the game.

If you're reading this, wow, thanks for reading all that (unless you skipped to the TL;DR and happened to see this first. :P).

I've played this game (mostly free) since launch, and found that the F2P experience has steadily improved over time. I see a lot of complaints about how difficult it is to enjoy the game for free, and I enjoy the game a lot (although I do have some serious issues with certain practices, like the Darkmoon Faire, and some of the pricing). I do appreciate that the overall monetization has shifted to focus much more on cosmetics, which in turn has made the collecting and playing much more accessible.

If you're ever looking for someone to help with the 'Play a Friend' quest, or a Battlegrounds Duos partner, I'm on NA, dm me for my bnet handle.

And if you saw something up there you disagree with, just keep in mind that I probably have more free time and inclination to argue the point than you do.

Time to go touch grass.

TL;DR:

Completing all quests and events can be done by logging in 3 times a week and a few total hours of gameplay.

Ranked gives rewards, and you'll win just as often as Casual.

Prioritize buying Class Sets>Packs until you have all rares from the set>Golden packs one at a time until Legendary>Golden packs.

Craft proven decks, dust all nerfed cards, search for 'extra' cards to dust instead of hitting 'dust all'.

Given how many people seem to miss the in-game info, and then come here to complain that they couldn't finish the quest when starting it 24 hours before it ends, maybe this will help someone get the full rewards.

It's 4k event XP, weeklies get you 2.4k, dailies get you 250. If you complete 6 dailies over the two weeks, plus the base xp you get from just playing, that should get you to 4k.

So long as you play about 15 games over at least three different days in a week, you should get full rewards.

It was mainly about a punk who marries a geek, and the 'odd couple' comedy that resulted.

There was one strip in particular where the guy points out to the girl the difference in how they perceive colour, where she sees dozens of different colours, he just sees 'red'.

There was an extended story arc when she introduced him to her RPG group, and he thought the GM was a pretentious asshole who was hitting on her, but they got things sorted out to some degree.

There was another strip where the GM talks about his 'novel', and all the things he's created for it, but then it's revealed that he's never actually written a single chapter.

There was another introverted female character who joined the RPG group and doing so helped her come out of her shell.

I don't even know if it still exists somewhere, but if anyone can at least help me with the name, it'd be much appreciated.

The weather, the flowers, and the trees create an amazing atmosphere. Do yourself a favour and spend some time walking through.

I've lived here for over a decade, and I was down there this afternoon and just struck by how nice it is.

https://reddit.com/link/1t2buik/video/dikqfibzsuyg1/player

Motorcycles on day 6, Q6 Nerd armor on day 11, Q6 SMG on Day 13...

I also have 15/27 legendaries from Cataclysm. I don't grind xp, I don't even always hit Legend (although I did this month :)).

I have multiple meta decks and the dust to make anything I want. The game is in the best F2P state it's been by a huge margin.

So if Blizz wants me to spend an extra 500 gp to get the new cards, I really don't care, I'll buy them anyway. The mini sets have always been an excellent value, even without nerfs turning their dust value to 11 (like Fall of Ulduar, which I bought Golden and normal, and still haven't fully dusted).

Look, I'm the first to call Blizz/Activision/MS on their BS practices. The Darkmoon Faire is a gambling gacha that preys on poor decision making while gating cool cosmetics behind stupidly high prices. Heroic Brawl funnels resources from people with more confidence than skill to folks with actual skill, while siphoning off net resources in the process. Dropping Hat as a community manager was a huge loss to everyone involved (anyone know what happened with him after?).

However the net changes over time have become much, much better for F2P folks. I've played since launch, and I've never remotely had it this good. I literally have almost 30k gold saved because I have nothing better to spend it on. I have almost 90k dust. I have (as mentioned) multiple meta decks I can play.

And I'm very close to making the first money purchase I've considered in years because having a golden Onyxia means that all the stuff she generates will be golden, I have a Kalec that I should be able to reroll after claiming the diamond version, and the Magmaw card back actually looks pretty cool.

So yeah, 500 more gold is fine. Maybe I'll change my tune if they ratchet down on the F2P gains, and stop giving us so much free stuff.