Quantum Index

[Naii_the_Baf]

I've been lately working on a tool that helps you know the optimal amount of quanta generation; better known as quantum index. This tool already exists in the original game, but I've seen none for this one.

For those who don't know, here's how it works:
The quanta cost of an element is the sum of all its costs. One-use abilities are summed as-is, but multiple-use abilities have their cost multiplied by at least 2. This amount is divided by the quanta that a deck can generate to get the quantum index of an element. Quantum index should be in between 4 and 5, optimally.

To calculate the quanta that a deck can generate, a standalone quanta (e.g. Nova) has a value of 0.2. One quanta per turn (e.g. a pillar) has a value of 1. So for example, an Amethyst Tower would contribute a total of 1.2 ; 0.2 from the standalone you get from playing it and 1 from generating each turn.

This is calculated for each element the deck can use.

Currently, I'm making the tool in Google Sheets. It's already working.
Editing is enabled in the original sheet so we can all test in the same sheet when updating. Also so making a copy isn't obligatory if you just want to use the tool

Spoiler for Notes:

is divided into two types: Chroma and Rainbow.
Chroma is costs that don't have to be of a specific element OR generation for elements where you have a cost.
Rainbow doesn't discriminate; it adds cost/generation to all elements regardless of circumstances.

Generally, Chroma will be used when you get to pick what element you want the cost to be (e.g. Reinforce) to some capacity, whereas Rainbow will be used when you don't get to pick (e.g. Yoink!), which leaves you at the hands of RNG. costs are regarded as Chroma, but generation is Rainbow instead. This should improve accuracy in some decks that were hard to measure previously.

Cards that use Chroma:

Spoiler for Hidden:

Quantum Locket
Metamorphosis
Dissipation Field^
Pink Jelly
Lodestone^
Mitosis
Equalize
Nymph Queen / Nymph's Tears
Crusader
Reinforce
Hand Drill
Desert
Fractal

Cards that use Rainbow instead:

Spoiler for Hidden:

Regrade
Alchemist
Fallen Elf / Mutation / Spider Cow
Nova / Immolation
Shard of Serendipity
Georesonator
Clepsydra / Stormspike / Yoink!
Mindgate
Unsummon^

Quartet pillars: Generate 5 quanta in average every 3 turns, so quanta is 5/3 %u2248 1.67, adds this to respective elements/4
    Note: All these not divided in DB for the sake of accuracy
Chromatic Butterfly: Using base stats
Quantum Locket: Regarded as generating mark quanta and using element switch once. Unupped: gets a second Single from 1-turn freeze (1 mark-element cost)
Disc: Needs to be replayed, so Ability A is ability cost and B is replay cost
Metamorphosis: Considered to be a pillar that generates 1
Regrade: Single is 1 generation



Alchemist: Ability B is (average of costs of alchemy cards)
Fallen Elf/Mutation: Ability B is (average cost of abilities)*(chance to get improved mutant)
Spider Cow/Fallen Druid/Imp. Mutation: Ability A/B is (average cost of abilities)
Golden Goose: Ability A is Fate Egg summon, Ability B is hatch
Alicorn: Ability's quanta generated ignored
Dissipation Field: 6 / 15 upkeep
Nova / Supernova. Generate 12 / 24
Shard of Serendipity: Ability A is (average of costs of Entropy cards) and Ability B is 2*(average of costs of unupped cards)
Pink Jelly: Ability cost is 4

 

Soul Catcher: Treated as a pillar generating 3



Shard of Focus: Ability treated as a single costing 3 since that's usually the amount of times you'll get to use it, single B is Black Hole
Inertia: Treated as a pillar generating 2
Fluxor: Ability treated as two singles costing 1 each. Dunno why one would want to spam flyself
Chimera: Ability cost ignored


Antlion/Shrieker: Ability treated as single
Graboid: Treated as having burrow, same as above
Lodestone: Ability effect ignored
Lodestone^: Ability cost is regarded as 1
Shard of Integrity: Ability is (average of ability costs)



Rustler: Generates (2x generation) . Number does not increase with multiple rustlers
Fungus: Rebirth treated as multiuse ability, cost 2
Georesonator: Treated as 3 pillars; 2 generating Mark quanta and 1 . Small adjustments made for pend chance
Mitosis: Ability cost is (average cost of creatures) (Thank goodness these are grouped by card type, otherwise I'd just ignore it)
Georesonator^: Single: 0.4 Mark quanta, 0.2 chroma quanta
Equalize: Single cost is (average cost of all cards)



Phoenix: Rebirth treated as single
Thermal Recoil: Treated as a pillar generating 9 (3 creatures assumed)
Immolation / Cremation: Generate 5 / 7 and 12



Squid: Ignore possibility of turning into Arctic Squid. Just replace Squids with Arctic Squids if you're gonna turn them into that
Arctic Dolphin: Ability costs are 1 and 1 since it alternates
Nymph Queen / Nymph's Tears: Ability cost is (average of nymphs' upped and unupped ability costs) . Single in the case of Tears
Clepsydra: Ability is regarded as single, cost 10/5 . Second single is (average of card costs)*5
Dry Spell: Assume 6 creatures, generates 6



Solar Shield: Treated as pillar generating 3 (assume 3 creatures)
Luciferin: Treated as pillar generating 2 (assume 2 vanilla creatures)
Reinforce: Single is (average of creature costs)*3



Fenghuang/Tornado: Ignore replay cost (since it depends on the enemy/RNG)
Firefly Queen: Assume 3 Fireflies generating 3 /
Blue Nymph: Assume 2 Unstable Gases for a single of 2
Stormspike: Ability B is (average of card costs)



Pharaoh: Assume two scarabs, so Ability B is 2
Hand Drill: Ability B is (average of creature costs)*2 . Repetitive because you can add as many as you want, this might be the most expensive card of all
Desert: Assume 3 creatures, passive B is 3 upkeep



Devourer: Treating burrow as single
Yoink!: Single cost is (average of card costs)
Blood Moon: Generates 1



Blue Mage: Ignore cost of new ability
Mindgate: Ability B cost is (average of card costs)
Fractal: Single ability cost is (average of creature costs)*6 .
Unsummon^: Single ability cost is -(average of creature costs)

Spoiler for Old notes:

My current idea is to have a warning system, and handle those cards individually via user input or ignore the values. My notes on each card that causes problems are in the spoiler.
Metamorphosis, Locket
%u2500Configure for elements to generate for. Gen divided by elements selected; metamorphosis adds 1 to mark per copy
%u2500Metamorphosis: Warning: "Your mark and pendulums' generation might be inaccurate".
%u2500Locket: Warning: "Locket generation might not be accurate to gameplay".

Alicorn
%u2500If Light generation is >0, multiply PPMs by 2.
%u2500Warning: "Accounting for Alicorn's ability being used every turn".

Cow, Serendipity, Mutation, Fallen Elf, Goose, Egg, Tomb?, Mindgate?, Shapeshifter?
%u2500Warning: "Random/unknown abilities/cards are not being accounted for". Too unpredictable

Inertia, Soul Catcher
%u2500Configure for amount of triggers/triggers per turn. If amount of triggers, 0.2 per quanta per trigger; if triggers per turn, 1 per quanta per trigger

Luciferin
%u2500Would need to differ between vanilla and non-vanilla creatures. Possible, but not accurate. Warning: "Light generation should be lower than desired if vanilla creatures are present".

Rustler
%u2500Add Light*2 to Life
%u2500Warning: "Make sure to account for Rustler!"

Georesonator
%u25006*(2/3) to mark element. 6 because of average TTW + bias from starting hand. 7 instead of 6 upped

Thermal Recoil, Solar Shield
%u2500Assume 4 dmg sources. Recoil: 3 quanta for each = 12 per turn
%u2500Not stackable; ignores copies
%u2500Recoil: Upped generates 0.2 extra
%u2500Warning: "Fire/Light generation might not be accurate to each game".

Dry Spell, Mitosis, Dissipation Field, Readiness, Lodestone
%u2500???

Oceanus
%u2500If mark is Water, generates 0.6 water
%u2500Else, generate 0.4 water and 0.4 mark element
%u2500If mark is Chroma, generate 0.8 extra
%u2500Not really a problem on its own. Metamorphosis is the real issue here
%u2500If Metamorphosis is present, warning: "Quanta generation might be inaccurate due to Metamorphosis".

Brawl, Miracle, Sky Blitz, Sacrifice
%u2500Warning: "Gravity/Light/Air/Non-Death generation should be higher than desired".

FFQ
%u2500If Life generation is >0, warning: "Light/Fire generation should be lower than desired".

On warnings, include card name in parentheses.

[Septima Rhay]

So QI/math stuff is not my forte, but I'll try to help somewhat.  I guess the way I understand this is there are quanta-generating cards and quanta-costing cards that are unpredictable in their generation or cost or intended uses.

As Naii points out, there are some cards that allow one to acquire a new card that has a different quanta-costing source, like:

Unpredictable quanta-costing cards:
Examples: Tomb, Stormspike, Clep, Yoink.  A player employing these strategies may or may not care about quanta sources to play the new cards and/or the skills of the new cards acquired. The cards may be viewed as CC/PC or part of a Mill strategy rather than for additional usage.  Most cards depend on opponent which is tough to plan for in advance unless in a very restricted meta match. A warning seems fine but could be forgone as well to keep things streamlined.  As players advance, they'll better understand how to plan for the intended usage of new cards/new skills.

Examples: Alchemist, Shard of Serendipity, and Mindgate is trickier because the player usually wants to play the new cards received.   I think it is obvious to most players that they need a chroma quanta base to maximize the chance to play newly acquired cards.  These cards can get a warning, but like the group above, have the card and skill costs factored in a straightforward manner.  It would be interesting to see if someone did come up with an average QI cost guidelines for these cards.  Alchemist would be easiest.  Serendipity might be able to draw a reasonable QI average from testing X times.  Mindgate is too dependent on opponent but a base guideline for chroma quanta production might be helpful beginners.

Card: Pink Jelly.  Depends on other creature's element/quanta source.  Would the QI tool allow the player to manually increase QI components based on what they think their deck will need or generate?  For example, if I had 6 water creatures that are intended to be jellied, can I add overall quanta for water or per creature quanta to the QI?

Card: Squid.  Straightforward as Squid.  When Frozen and turned to Arctic Squid, now incurs a heavier water cost and no more dark quanta is needed.  I wonder if this can be solved by offering players two versions: Squid remain as squid option an Squid intended to -> arctic squid option.  For players using squid as a swing card, it's an advanced strategy and QI accuracy is not needed, but rather testing.  The squid -> arctic squid option doesnt even need dark quanta in the deck and can be calculated with water costs pretty straightforward.


Card: Arctic Dolphin.  Can use both water and gravity costing skills.  Like squid, can their be two versions of this card in the QI calculator: Dolphin (no gravity) and Dolphin (gravity)?  Off the top of my head, this is the only card that has two skills using two different quanta sources.


Card: Upgraded Whirlpool.  Unlike the fixed quanta version for unupgraded, upgraded can use as much dark quanta as one has in a single turn.  No suggestions for this, but just pointing it out.

Unpredictable quanta-generating cards:

Card: Butterfly - seems straightforward, but in practical usage, more complex because it is often buffed and generates much more quanta as a result.


In a nutshell, I wonder if the following two features can be incorporated into the tool:
1. Player may manually adjust QI cost or generation based on some "average guidelines" or "intended uses"
2. If a card can have more than one version for players to select to reflect the intended use more accurately.

Also warnings are fine, but a referral to guidelines in forum might be helpful to further explain things.

[Naii_the_Baf]

I've decided to go ahead and revamp the entire thing since it was both outdated and having DB in the same place as calculations is gross, plus the system was a bit wonky. Warnings aren't exactly the way to go, configuration is just complicated and can wait.

Database now consists of 15 columns, where each card has the following data:

• Code
• Name
• Element
• Cost: 2 columns, number and type
• Passive A: 2 columns, number and type, e.g. Pillars
• Passive B: 2 columns, number and type, for stuff that does two different things e.g. Pendulums
• Single A: 2 columns, number and type, single-use quanta activation costs/bonuses e.g. Quantum Tower, Lycanthrope, Nova
• Single B: 2 columns, number and type, single-use quanta activation costs/bonuses, e.g. Locket (see notes), Clepsydra (see notes)
• Active A: 2 columns, number and type, e.g. Schrödinger's Cat
• Active B: 2 columns, number and type, for stuff that does two different things e.g. Alchemist (see notes), Arctic Dolphin

Normal, Upped, shiny, and upped shiny all have their own respective DB, which then merge in a single total DB sorted by code (if you're wondering, shiny cards have different codes and I hate it)

Difference between passives and actives is that passives (upkeep and pillars) are considered as generation and actives are considered as costs.

Positive numbers are costs, negatives are generation (just to keep everything consistent)

Spoiler for Notes this time around, some old, some new:

generation: (Total number of generated)/12, add value to each element
costs: (Total number of costs)/(total number of different quanta types that have something being generated), add value to each respective element
Quartet pillars: Generate 5 quanta in average every 3 turns, so quanta is 5/3 ≈ 1.67, adds this to respective elements/4
    Note: All these not divided in DB for the sake of accuracy
Chromatic Butterfly: Using base stats
Locket: Regarded as generating mark quanta and using element switch once. Unupped: gets a second Single from 1-turn freeze (1 mark-element cost)
Disc: Needs to be replayed, so Ability A is ability cost and B is replay cost
Metamorphosis: Considered to be a pillar that generates 1
Regrade: Single is 1 generation



Alchemist: Ability B is (average of costs of alchemy cards)
Fallen Elf/Mutation: Ability B is (average cost of abilities)*(chance to get improved mutant)
Spider Cow/Fallen Druid/Imp. Mutation: Ability A/B is (average cost of abilities)
Golden Goose: Ability A is Fate Egg summon, Ability B is hatch
Alicorn: Ability's quanta generated ignored
Dissipation Field: 3 upkeep
Nova / Supernova. Generate 12 / 24
Shard of Serendipity: Ability A is (average of costs of Entropy cards) and Ability B is 2*(average of costs of unupped cards)
Pink Jelly: Ability cost is 4
Dissipation Field^: 9 upkeep

 

Soul Catcher: Treated as a pillar generating 3



Shard of Focus: Ability treated as a single costing 3 since that's usually the amount of times you'll get to use it, single B is Black Hole
Inertia: Treated as a pillar generating 2
Fluxor: Ability treated as two singles costing 1 each. Dunno why one would want to spam flyself
Chimera: Ability treated as single


Antlion/Shrieker: Ability treated as single
Graboid: Treated as having burrow, same as above
Lodestone: Ability effect ignored
Lodestone^: Ability cost is regarded as 1



Rustler: Treated as a pillar generating 2
Fungus: Rebirth treated as single
Georesonator: Treated as 3 pillars; 2 generating Mark quanta and 1
Mitosis: Ability cost is (average cost of creatures) (Thank goodness these are grouped by card type, otherwise I'd just ignore it)
Georesonator^: Pillar generated at start is treated as 2/3 mark and 1/3 chroma



Phoenix: Rebirth treated as single
Thermal Recoil: Treated as a pillar generating 9 (3 creatures assumed)
Immolation / Cremation: Generate 5 / 7 and 12



Squid: Ignore possibility of turning into Arctic Squid. Just replace Squids with Arctic Squids if you're gonna turn them into that
Arctic Dolphin: Ability costs are 1 and 1 since it alternates
Nymph Queen / Nymph's Tears: Ability cost is (average of nymphs' upped and unupped ability costs) . Single in the case of Tears
Clepsydra: Ability is regarded as single, cost 10/5 . Second single is (average of card costs)*5
Dry Spell: Assume 3 creatures, generates 3
Gift of Oceanus: Treated as generating 2 and 3 mark quanta regardless of mark



Solar Shield: Treated as pillar generating 3 (assume 3 creatures)
Luciferin: Treated as pillar generating 2 (assume 2 vanilla creatures)
Reinforce: Single is (average of creature costs)*3



Fenghuang/Tornado: Ignore replay cost (since it depends on the enemy/RNG)
Firefly Queen: Assume 3 Fireflies generating 3 /
Blue Nymph: Assume 2 Unstable Gases for a single of 2



Pharaoh: Assume two scarabs, so Ability B is 2
Hand Drill: Ability B is (average of creature costs)*3 . Repetitive because you can add as many as you want, this might be the most expensive card of all
Desert: Assume 3 creatures, passive B is 3 upkeep



Devourer: Treating burrow as single
Yoink!: Single cost is (average of card costs)



Blue Mage: Ignore cost of new ability
Mindgate: Ability B cost is (average of card costs)
Fractal: Single ability cost is (average of creature costs)*6 .

This post's been sitting on my tab for a while, posting now and will keep updating it as I fill out the DB EDIT: DB finished
There might be a few cards I might have not put in my notes; just ask if you're unsure of why I set a card like I did or if it's worth putting in notes.

[Naii_the_Baf]

The Quantum index tool now works!... 4 months later, but it works. Refer to notes from OP for particular cards which alter quanta generation.

[serprex]

Despite my opinions about QI, this is pretty cool

Elite Firefly is counting as 2 fire pillars. It's a bit recursive in that the QI contribution of Firefly is dependent on the QI of . For now I'd recommend halving non-free quanta producers, so Elite Firefly is worth half a pillar (was using this code: 0j7ms027n0027n4017n5067ng018po)

Another deck that's difficult to measure: 01mrt067ac077bu02nam06nau01ngq06nh301ngp018pn Spore's rebirth cost isn't budgetted, but most Fungus decks run self CC. Ah well, can't win them all. Pretty good estimate on 016u002mu00171k01n4501n7p02n7g067bu0277u04n7u02nai01nak01ndq017h8017kj01nn301nq501ntb01o0h018pi

[Naii_the_Baf]

It's the mark that's counting as 2, fireflies are only worth one pillar
Spore's rebirth could be considered a multiuse ability instead of a single use ability, that should increase accuracy in fungus decks. Also forgot to fill out abilities for Toxic Fungus. Fixed spore rebirth cost because it generates 2 spores, not 1
Dry Spell is another issue though, alongside quanta shields
Forgot Dry Spell hits the entire board, single generation increased to 6

[Naii_the_Baf]

Opened up editing rights to public so we can all test decks in the same place when checking where a few corrections should be made. Should be better than copy-pasting from original to personal sheet whenever an update happens

[Naii_the_Baf]

Fixed a horrible mess regarding .
Basically fixed it not doing things it should do, which significantly reduced the amount of generated, and a few parentheses.

Georesonator:

• Now considers getting pends from opponent (Passives: -0.25 , +0.25 mark)
• Upped now accounts for extra quanta from multiple cards entering play, not just one (Passives: +0.2 , +0.4 mark, singles removed) EDITED EDIT: (Single: 1 , 2 mark)

Dissipation Shield: For some reason I forgot how this works, increased upkeep to 6 / 15

EDIT: I forgot about unsummon as well. Unsummon now has Single -(average of creature costs)

[Naii_the_Baf]

Rustler and Gift of Oceanus now work correctly

[Naii_the_Baf]

Now handles legacy and original codes

No longer has separate DBs, now only has a big unsorted DB and a big sorted DB

I hate Fractal and Mitosis because original creatures aren't grouped

Shard of Integrity: Ability is (average of ability costs)

Crusader: For some reason I put its ability as multiuse and not single

[Naii_the_Baf]

Updated database just to make the spreadsheet easier to update. Added Special Values sheet (for abilities that depend on other cards' costs)

Gift of Oceanus: Fixed stupid mistake which made marks OP even if GoO wasn't in deck
Marks: Fixed another stupid mistake which made marks besides chroma OP. Chroma mark was UP
Chimera: Ignore ability cost
(Legacy) Nymph's Tears / Nymph Queen: Now have ability costs akin to their oEtG counterparts (ability costs for generated nymphs' abilities)
Nymph's Tears: Nymph ability cost is repeatable
(Legacy) Fractal: For some reason ability was repeatable
(Legacy) Mindgate: Forgot about activation cost, just had gated card's cost
Stormspike: Forgot to consider obtained card's cost (see Yoink!)

TODO Weapon abilities' average cost for Crusader ability A. Should be simple with the updated DB. Use Type 'W' EDIT: Done

[Naii_the_Baf]

Revamped Cost/Generation calculation. Formulas are prettier and shorter now

Separated into two types: Chroma and Rainbow.
Chroma is costs that don't have to be of a specific element OR generation for elements where you have a cost.
Rainbow doesn't discriminate; it adds cost/generation to all elements regardless of circumstances.

Generally, Chroma will be used when you get to pick what element you want the cost to be (e.g. Reinforce) to some capacity, whereas Rainbow will be used when you don't get to pick (e.g. Yoink!), which leaves you at the hands of RNG. costs are regarded as Chroma, but generation is Rainbow instead. This should improve accuracy in some decks that were hard to measure previously.

Cards that use Chroma:

Spoiler for Hidden:

Quantum Locket
Metamorphosis
Dissipation Field^
Pink Jelly
Lodestone^
Mitosis
Nymph Queen / Nymph's Tears
Crusader
Reinforce
Hand Drill
Desert
Fractal

Cards that use Rainbow instead:

Spoiler for Hidden:

Regrade
Alchemist
Fallen Elf / Mutation / Spider Cow
Nova / Immolation
Shard of Serendipity
Georesonator
Clepsydra / Stormspike / Yoink!
Mindgate
Unsummon^

Most cards (or details) that would go to an obvious type were omitted.

Hand Drill: Reduced multiplier of ability B to 2, 3 is overkill since you still have to draw the cards (more time to generate quanta)

[Naii_the_Baf]

I've fixed several little mistakes that were all over the database over the past month.

Spoiler for Mistakes:

Reaper^: Cost was 2 instead of 1
Luciferin (unupped): Had 2 upkeep, not 2 generation
Golden Goose: Hatching cost was 2 instead of 1
Aether Pendulum: Was generating instead of mark quanta
Entropy Pendulum^: Same as above but with instead
Devourer: Had 1 upkeep, not 1 generation

Also added token/unobtainable cards for the sake of completion. Might be useful for a few decks like Goon/Midas' Touch, where you'll want to input Golden Relic in addition to Midas' Touch for a more accurate calculation (i.e. take on count the cost for drawing).

Spoiler for Hidden:

4t8   Malignant Cell
4vr   Singularity
567   Blob
597   Shard Golem
5cf   Spore
5cs   Pack Wolf
5fd   Ash
5s8   Golden Relic
629   Phantom
6ro   Malignant Cell^
6ub   Singularity^
74n   Blob^
77n   Shard Golem^
7av   Toxic Spore
7bc   Pack Wolf^
7dt   Ash^
7qo   Golden Relic^
80p   Phantom^

EDIT: Golden Relic now costs 0 in-game, so instead of replacing Midas it should just be added