To find code I could use to dump my Battle Log data to a file (json) and then from there I can place in a SQL DB, and do queries, and get even nerdier with the game: I first started trying to find code on GitHub and other sources.
The best code I could find was bots, and initially I wanted to also see if I could use it to do "deck presets." Just a term I have been using, or haven't encountered yet, of preselected summoners and a team based on the battle's mana cap. Also, of previously used teams (in a history).
With lower ranks, and standard rules: it became boring and tedious for me to keep selecting the same set of cards…and even using alternate selections: it can be the same set of 6-12-? choices used per mana cap, and as a data guy: initially the more data the better, and manual clicks initially was not giving me the data on my own card selection I would like.
After a few weeks of collecting data, I used this and articles on Splinterlands to buy the cards I hoped I needed, leveled the ones that proved to be true, and I am having better performance. Watching, “Moneyball” and trying to think like a statistician can help, but in addition to articles: plenty of YouTube videos that go through what a good deck can be just listening, or reading, someone else and go through their research.
Into Bronze Two, and past: more than standard rules appear for battles, and my script start needing more features, bug fixes, maintenance, and all things that can come from code (I have read about worries about AI bots, and their use by large guilds, but that was/is not what I am using, nor intend to use). I tried as much as possible to automate my battle process, with the goal of less button clicks and monotony (and more enjoyment). However, my personal intention was not to create some automated DEC money maker using automated choices, especially by an AI.
Using a bot is another debate. I also tried to confirm using what I was did not violate a EULA. I welcome that debate, but my point in this article is to share my experience with a bot and not defend its use, which I still will, but that is not my intent in this article. I will try and do so elsewhere or in comments: as best I can.
Conclusion
Okay, the conclusion, and hint of the point in the title of this article. I stopped using even the automated battle script for one: I started having enough data on my own cards and used that to make what I felt was important buying decisions. Two, using more than just standard rules not only started making for a script that needed more conditionals, more error and case handling, more time, and more work…it made the game less monotonous and a lot more fun. I still wish I could have a way to click on a UI element, somewhere, that does not violate any EULA, that gives me a preselection of a team. Yet now the joy is back even when playing many games back to back: I feel less need, or none at all: to use an automated approach.
Thank you for you time!