As such, we’ve created this guide explaining everything you need to know cards in Lost Ark, including what they are, how to build a powerful Card Deck, Card Books, and upgrading your cards.
Lost Ark - What are cards and why should I care?
Cards in Lost Ark are Roster-wide collectables that are acquired from a vast number of places all over the world. They can be acquired through packs, rewards from rapport quests, or as rare drops from dungeons and raids. When you get a card, it’s placed into your inventory initially. Once you use the card, it’ll be added to your Card Catalogue that you can access through pressing Alt + C. From there, you can see your Card Catalogue split into three different tabs: Equip, Books, and Enhance. If tracking down a certain card is what you need check your codex! You can find this handy tool by clicking the leftmost button under your mini-map. Once you’re there, simply search for the card you’re looking for and get hunting! Your aim as a player of Lost Ark on the hunt for cards is split twofold – creating a powerful Card Deck and expanding your Card Collection. Doing both will improve the power of your characters significantly, and is a major component to progression in game. If you want to perform well in late-game activities, you need to have a healthy card collection.
Lost Ark - How to build a powerful Card Deck
Under the Equip tab in your Card Catalogue you’ll see a series of card sets listed alongisde your card deck. Each Card Deck has six slots, where cards you have collected in your travels can be placed to provide powerful buffs. Cards placed into the set on their own do nothing, but alongside other cards from their set they grant passive bonuses to your character. By clicking the Set Effect Details button next to a particular set, you can see the bonuses they provide. As you reach higher bonuses from a particular set, the effects strengthen significantly, so it’s absolutely worth scouring the world for certain cards if you’re one short of a full set. In Lost Ark, bringing the appropriate card deck to a fight can be a massive help. For example, lets say you and your party need to take on some Abyss Raid Monsters and are having a tough time. Well, by equipping the Guardian of Chaos card set, you can improve your greatly improve the damage you deal to those particular monsters.
Lost Ark – Why are Card Books so important?
In Lost Ark, roster-wide progression is king. So, while Card Decks can provide some much-needed assistance during a particular fight, it’s your Card Books that will strengthen your entire cast of characters. By clicking on the Book tab in the Card Catalogue screen, you can see all the cards in the game listed as different books. When you collect all the cards included in a particular book you’ll receive a roster-wide passive bonus, something you can check by hovering over the Collect Bonus button next to every Card Book. As you collect and upgrade these cards, all your characters will start to build up more and more bonuses over time. If you’re planning to stick with Lost Ark for the long haul, it is worth tracking down cards whenever you can.
Lost Ark – What is Card Enhancement?
Each card in Lost Ark can be upgraded in the Enhance tab of your Catalogue. Each card has its own experience bar, which tracks how close it is to reaching the next awakening level. To earn experience, cards must either be fed duplicates or special experience cards you can collect by completing a variety of activities throughout the game. Once you max out the experience bar, you’ll need more duplicates to push it over the edge to the next awakening level. The higher level card you’re trying to awaken, the more duplicates you’ll need, so get grinding! As you progress to the later stages of the game, the power of certain cards is paramount to success. As such, it’s a good idea to keep an eye on your collection and enhance key cards if you want to perform at the highest echelon of Lost Ark players. That concludes our handy guide on Cards in Lost Ark! If you’re looking for more help as you venture into this action packed MMO for the first time, check out our Lost Ark leveling guide, as well as our guide on how to pick a main class!
