Faeria, the rather good free to play turn-based card battler has a final release and now official Linux support

Quoting: abelthorne

Quoting: TuxCanadianusHow does this game compare with Duelyst? Has anyone here tried both and could give some feedback?

I've been playing the browser version of Duelyst for a while now, and have also invested a few dollars, but I'd be interested in checking out Faeria too if it has a similar depth to it.

The main difference with Duelyst, IMO, lies in the deckbuilding. Duelyst is similar to HearthStone, where you choose a specific faction and have to make your deck with its cards. In Faeria, there are not factions but colors and you can mix up them as much as you want. It's closer to Magic: The Gathering on this point. Of course, the more colors in your deck, the more it will be difficult to manage your resources in game to play your cards, but it's perfectly viable to play decks made with one, two, three or even the four colors. It's a bit as if you could mix the factions in Duelyst to build a deck (BTW, I think Counterplay plans to experiment with this).

Faeria is also pretty generous with rewards and gold to get packs, more than Duelyst (which itself is more than HearthStone) and it's quite easy to build a decent collection without putting money in the game.

On the tactical side, I haven't played Duelyst enough to really compare both games. It always seemed to me that games in Duelyst were more oriented towards a gameplay that favors power creep. Faeria is easier to apprehend IMO.

Wow, I think I might reconsider, the mana thing is what I miss the most from MtG in HS, its so silly that it just goes up, and that you cant mix colours. Ah, I wish they had a browser version!

Edit: Perhaps one can run it in an emulated Android device later, like with genymotion?


Last edited by buenaventura on 9 March 2017 at 7:38 am UTC

Quoting: buenaventuraAh, I wish they had a browser version!
Edit: Perhaps one can run it in an emulated Android device later, like with genymotion?

I'm not really following: are you talking about Faeria? Because Genymotion is made for playing Android games on PC and it's already a PC game, not Android. Or maybe you're looking for an "inverted" Genymotion, i.e. a way to play the (PC) game on your Android device? If so, there is no such thing and, as you pointed out, there's no browser version like Duelyst provides.

(As a sidenote, Duelyst has a browser version because it's a "web" game, made with HTML+JS; the desktop version is only the game packaged within a standalone browser. Faeria is made with Unity AFAIK, so not easily portable to a web version.)

Faeria only has a desktop version right now (Linux + MacOS + Windows, through Steam only). There are plans for a mobile version, but tablets only I think. The iPad port is currently in open beta in some specific countries (Belgium at least). When it's released, Abrakam will focus on the Android port.


Last edited by abelthorne on 9 March 2017 at 9:14 am UTC

Quoting: liamdawe"Faeria, the rather good free to play turn-based card battler has a final release and now official Linux support"

Carefully nuanced with "rather" to not overdo it, so british. And let's cram the entire article into the headline - that's classic Liam. Never change, dude. <3


Last edited by Beamboom on 9 March 2017 at 9:05 am UTC

Quoting: Beamboom

Quoting: liamdawe"Faeria, the rather good free to play turn-based card battler has a final release and now official Linux support"

Carefully nuanced with "rather" to not overdo it, so british. And let's cram the entire article into the headline - that's classic Liam. Never change, dude. <3

We're so used to blatant, hype-filled adverts masquerading as impartial reviews (or else pure hate-pieces for the giggles) that an informative, honest article is a rarity. And a headline that isn't clickbaity? What heresy is this?

Gotta love/hate the Intertubes.

Quoting: abelthorne

Quoting: buenaventuraAh, I wish they had a browser version!
Edit: Perhaps one can run it in an emulated Android device later, like with genymotion?

I'm not really following: are you talking about Faeria? Because Genymotion is made for playing Android games on PC and it's already a PC game, not Android. Or maybe you're looking for an "inverted" Genymotion, i.e. a way to play the (PC) game on your Android device? If so, there is no such thing and, as you pointed out, there's no browser version like Duelyst provides.

(As a sidenote, Duelyst has a browser version because it's a "web" game, made with HTML+JS; the desktop version is only the game packaged within a standalone browser. Faeria is made with Unity AFAIK, so not easily portable to a web version.)

Faeria only has a desktop version right now (Linux + MacOS + Windows, through Steam only). There are plans for a mobile version, but tablets only I think. The iPad port is currently in open beta in some specific countries (Belgium at least). When it's released, Abrakam will focus on the Android port.

My particular problem is that I cannot get online with steam at work (where I play card games for a living... I WISH), thus for me it would be nice playing the android version on my PC, because that presumable does not go through forbidden steam-ports that are blocked here.

Quoting: buenaventuraMy particular problem is that I cannot get online with steam at work (where I play card games for a living... I WISH), thus for me it would be nice playing the android version on my PC, because that presumable does not go through forbidden steam-ports that are blocked here.

Oh, ok. I don't think Faeria really requires Steam to work, it's mainly a way Abrakam chose to distribute the game. If you're able to download it (I guess you can do it at home and then just copy the Faeria folder that's in steamapps/common on an USB stick), you can run it from its directory. It doesn't launch the Steam client and the game doesn't have Steamworks integration anyway, so I guess it would work but you'll have to check.


Last edited by abelthorne on 9 March 2017 at 1:47 pm UTC

Quoting: abelthorneyou'll have to check.

Awesome, then I might be able to play it! Great, HS is expensive. Any tips on how to gain a good collection, any noob mistakes to avoid when building it?

Quoting: buenaventuraAny tips on how to gain a good collection, any noob mistakes to avoid when building it?

Since I've started playing the game (last august), things have evolved a bit: there was a good amount of gold to get with solo quests and I think the devs lowered it but I guess you still get quite enough. So you might want to start with these. (EDIT: looking at the 1.0 patch notes, I see that they changed the solo mode again, so I'm not sure of how it works now − as I've completed it a long time ago − but it's still a good idea to complete it first before really starting to play games.)

Apart from that, it's like HearthStone: do your daily quests and you might be able to get packs pretty fast.

Not sure how much competitive you want to play but if it's just for fun, you should be able to find decent low cost decks; check resources on the Faeria subreddit, faeria.com and playfaeria.com. At first, I wouldn't dust cards (unless you have more than three of them, or more than one for legendaries) to try to make the meta decks, just build your collection over time with what you get from packs. Unlike HearthStone, I don't think there are completely trash or "fun" cards that are intentionally designed as crap. Of course (and like HearthStone), people mainly play archetypes with cards that have the most value and there are tons of cards that are never played.

A good way to get a bit of free gold and packs too is to watch the official Faeria tournament on Twitch each month (except this march), you'll have a random chance to get prizes just by watching. It will take hours but you can just keep the Twitch tab open in your browser and do something else (you'll have to associate your Steam account to your Twitch one in the settings).

If you're willing to put a bit of money in the game, the currently discounted Steam pack can be interesting (but not really at full price).


Last edited by abelthorne on 10 March 2017 at 2:04 pm UTC

Quoting: abelthorne<helpful stuff>

Thanks, that sounds good! I like playing good decks, so I might invest some money in the future, but I will of course try it out first.

Edit: YAY! It seems to work without Steam, let's hope it needs no weird ports (trying from home now, next week I'll try at work). Awesome, looks nice! Is there a competetive scene to speak of?


Last edited by buenaventura on 10 March 2017 at 7:28 pm UTC

Quoting: buenaventuraEdit: YAY! It seems to work without Steam, let's hope it needs no weird ports (trying from home now, next week I'll try at work).

It might need libs that are in the Steam runtime (and widely installed overall but they might not be on your work PC).

QuoteIs there a competetive scene to speak of?

Yes, though I'm not really into that and don't follow it that much. I know some pro gamers stream (you can probably find them on the Faeria subreddit or playfaeria.com). And as I said, there is a monthly tournament; you can find the details on https://esports.faeria.com/. Besides this, I'm not sure there are a lot of other tournaments, though, I guess the game is not well known enough yet.