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My NBA 2K20 Advanced Guide: Tips, Tactics & Strategies to Dominate All Game Modes

My NBA 2K20 Mobile is the latest offering in the popular mobile series from 2K and Cat Daddy, and as we mentioned in our beginner’s guide a few weeks ago, this is mostly a companion app for NBA 2K20, which dropped earlier this month. It is, in terms of overall mechanics and game genre, a card battler or a card collecting game, where you can play various modes and take part in NBA-based card battles against players from all around the world. Of course, playing these modes will also help you collect more cards, upgrade the ones you already have, and improve your deck strength from the lowest rarity (Common) all the way to Elite. And just as usual, this game comes with real-life NBA players from the upcoming 2019-2020 season – from the best of the best right down to the 15th men on each of the 30 teams in the league.

In our My NBA 2K20 beginner’s guide, we mostly looked at the Quick Game mode, offered some basic tips on how to win these Quick Games, and guided you through some of the other fundamental aspects of this new title. Now, as we move on to our next My NBA 2K20 strategy guide, we’re going to look at some intermediate and advanced tips, which cover the other game modes available, as well as some other aspects of the game that we didn’t cover – or didn’t adequately cover just yet – in the first guide. Keep on reading if you need some extra help in beefing up your deck and dominating the other game modes!

1. Visit This Site For Daily Global Patterns

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Having a hard time figuring out the Global Pattern for your draft picks? Yes, we know that it could be a bit of a challenge to go through all the trial and error while trying to get the correct pattern and getting that valuable bonus pack that could instantly improve your deck. But it’s as simple as visiting the official My NBA 2K Mobile Reddit, where users (sometimes more than one) share the day’s Global Pattern for everyone to follow. We would just caution you of one important thing, though – follow proper etiquette and do not post a new conversation asking for your fellow Redditors to post the daily Global Pattern! These patterns don’t get shared right away in most cases, so you may have to revisit the Reddit page multiple times within the same day – we haven’t seen a day where someone fails to post the pattern, so be patient and don’t “beg” for it!

2. Connect Accounts To Earn Virtual Currency (VC)

My NBA 2K20 Mobile is, as we’ve said multiple times, a companion app for 2K Sports’ NBA 2K20 for consoles and PC. And if you’ve been playing the console or PC versions for a while, or are planning to/have purchased NBA 2K20 and have set up your accounts accordingly, the game allows you the chance to connect the mobile app to your Steam, PlayStation Network, Xbox Live, or Nintendo Switch account. This allows you to compete in special, exclusive events, which could earn you some valuable Virtual Currency (VC) for the main game! As anyone who’s played a 2K Sports game would tell you, VC lets you purchase a wide array of items – for NBA 2K20, this would include the usual animation packages, equipment, tattoos for your created players, and a whole lot more. So if you’re a console or PC gamer, make sure to link or bind your account if you want to grind for some VC!

3. Play In Reigning Threes For More Draft Picks And Player Packs

In our beginner’s guide, we mostly focused on the Quick Game option, which is typically the most popular game mode and one that can be quite easy to dominate once your deck strength is at Ultra Rare+ or thereabouts. But it’s far from the only available game mode in My NBA 2K20, as you can also match up against other human players in Reigning Threes, for instance. Sow does this mode work and what’s in it for you?

Reigning Threes, for starters, doesn’t just involve your best five players, but rather your best 15 based on all five positions, which means you probably might want to think twice before sacrificing your non-common players while training the better ones. You may also want to devote some training resources toward your less-heralded, non-common players, because once again, this pits your best 15 against that of your opponent, and you’ll need to have a deep deck in order to succeed in this mode. But that’s not the only twist you would need to deal with.

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Before each matchup, you’ll be asked to choose your three “Champions,” which would be players exclusively reserved for the final round. The obvious choice here would be your three top-rated, rarest players, but that sometimes isn’t the smartest way to go here, especially if your deck is on the shallow side. At the end of the day, it’s more important to win the actual game against your opponent, as that will actually earn you some Crowns (just one, to be exact), which are the currency you’ll use to purchase items in the R3 Store. As such, we suggest leaving some of your better players available for the four main rounds in the matchup.

As the name of the mode suggests, each of the four rounds requires you to choose three players – a Ballhandler, a Wing, and a Big. Usually, this would correspond to your best player of the three in terms of Playmaking, your player with the best combined Offensive/Defensive stats, and your player with the best Rebounding, combined with choosing the best possible position for each slot – Ballhandlers would ideally be guards, Wings would typically be small forwards or shooting guards, and Bigs would be power forwards or centers. Each group of three players is chosen at random, and once you’ve assigned each of them to a slot, whoever has the better stats once all bonuses are applied would win. Winning consecutive battles within the round will earn you bonus points, so keep that in mind as well. The round ends once all three battles are completed, then moves on to the next until you complete all four rounds.

Assuming you defeated your opponent after the fourth round, you will then move on to the Final Round, which works exactly the same way, but with higher stakes – sure, it may be technically a bonus round, but winning in here would earn you more Crowns (based on your margin of victory – winning by 6, for example, earns you 6 Crowns) and allow you to choose more draft picks! That makes it important to have a deep deck playing Reigning Threes. Losing after the fourth round would take you straight to the draft pick board, but you won’t win any Crowns – still, you can take solace in being able to watch a video to earn extra draft picks, regardless whether you win or lose after the fourth, regardless whether you win the Final Round or not.

We suggest playing this mode as frequently as possible and not just sticking to Quick Games, because the cheapest pack in the R3 Store (Bronze Pack – one Basic Player from Ultra Rare to Epic, one Basic Player from Uncommon to Elite) costs a whopping 1,400 Crowns!

4. Use Coaching And Pep Talks For Additional Crowns / Points In R3 Rounds

Want to increase the number of Crowns you win after a Reigning Threes victory? Use those Coaching cards you may have picked up via the draft board, as the game gives you the option to use one of those cards before starting a game in R3 mode. To be specific, you can double your Crowns by using Coaching cards – it still might not seem like much at the end of the day, but it’s still much better than no bonus at all.

In addition, if you’ve fallen way behind during an R3 game, the game will allow you to “increase your chances” of victory by activating a Pep Talk for the next round. This increases your Advantage Points for that round, thus giving you a much-needed boost and potentially helping you come from behind to pick up the win. Take note that your opponent may have the same option as well, so don’t get overconfident whenever you’ve got a huge lead while playing Reigning Threes!

5. Play Gauntlet Mode To Collect Better Players, But Play It Regularly

The Gauntlet is a limited-time event that resets on a regular basis, and it’s another mode you should consider playing on top of the Quick Games. As for what’s in it for you if you play the Gauntlet, this mode lets you collect specific non-common players, with the list of available players changing per week – the first Gauntlet series will typically be a Rare player (which you may have a lot of if you’re regularly playing Reigning Threes), but as you complete more series, you could find yourself competing for some Epic players! Again, this will take a lot of patience and a lot of Gauntlet matchups, but it’ll be worth it if you at least strengthen your deck with your common players used as sacrifice cards and have a strong enough Gauntlet roster to improve your overall deck strength once the event for the week expires.

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Talking about the actual gameplay, Gauntlet games involve the 20 best players based on position in your entire deck, and involve five players per quarter. Each quarter would require you to choose a player you believe could beat that of your opponent in a certain stat, and once you complete all four quarters and all 20 individual battles, you will win 2, 5, or 7 points based on the difficulty level you chose before the game – Easy, Medium, or Hard. Losing, as usual, will award you with one point. Accumulate enough cumulative points and you’ll win a card of the player featured in the Gauntlet series you just played.

If you’re having difficulty accumulating points to unlock a certain player and add them to your deck, you can use a Grit card, which you can pick up in the mode-specific Draft Board after each Gauntlet game. Using a Grit card doubles the possible number of points you can earn in your next game, but you must make sure you use all of your Grit before the Gauntlet event expires – any unused Grit cards will be forfeited once the event is over!

6. Enter The Champions Tournaments

Champions is one of the more interesting game modes in My NBA 2K20, and this is another limited-time event where you will join 15 other players in a 16-team tournament where you can win incredible rewards for emerging on top. The 20-player deck for Champions will be arranged based on their roles – Ballhandlers, Wings, and Bigs – and this is important, because certain challenges in the tournament will be exclusive to a certain role. These are the Champion Challenges, and they may, among other things, include those like Upper Body Training (two Rare players), Strategy Adjustment (one Ballhandler), Cardiorespiratory Conditioning (any four players in your deck), and a lot more. You can spend 10 Credits to reset the Challenges, and since you normally wouldn’t want to do that, be sure you’re choosing wisely because players can only be used in one Champions Challenge. Completing a Challenge can earn you various rewards that would be of help in the next game, so once again – think before you choose! These rewards may include stamina or stat boosts, or Support Cards for the next game, among others.

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Furthermore, this mode also features Coach’s Challenges, which can be found on the bottom of the Challenge Board and could be a good way of earning extra rewards.

As for what happens during a Champions Tournament, all games involving the 16 teams per bracket are simulated, with everyone on each team losing Stamina, especially those who actually take part in the simulated game – that’s why the Challenges matter, because that’s how you could give your tired players the aforementioned boosts, Stamina included. Additionally, players are randomly selected to play, regardless of position, stats, or other variables, so keep this in mind and don’t be surprised to see your weaker players get substantial exposure when you go back to the Champions screen and see how your team has performed.

7. Get Social With 2 On 2 Games

Last, but not the least as far as game modes are concerned, 2 on 2 mode is where the social aspects of My NBA 2K20 come into play. That’s because you will either need to invite a friend or find a partner in order to play against another tandem of two human players in order to accumulate more points for this mode and earn rewards based on your Personal Reward Ladder – these could include bonus Draft Picks, Focus Boost Cards, and/or Supercharge Keys, depending on which tier you’re in.

Each 2 on 2 matchup consists of four quarters with four battles per quarter, and involves your top 20 players in the deck, once again based on position. Now the important catch here is that you will only be using four out of the five cards per quarter, with the fifth card carrying over to the next quarter with four new ones. This adds another layer to the strategy you and your teammate will have to employ. As the game recommends, you and your teammate should strategize using the chat function and comparing each other’s cards – we were serious when we said this mode is all about getting social, and the game means it as well when it says that this is a great way to form lasting alliances.

One other important aspect of 2 on 2 mode we need to discuss is the Power Combo, which could be a card(s) corresponding to a certain team, player card, or Focus Ability that boosts the other player cards’ stats when you AND your partner simultaneous play those cards. For example, the current Power Combo as of this writing is Yellow Focus Type/Nuggets, which means you’ll need to make sure you have a Denver Nuggets player on your 20-card roster for 2 on 2 that has the focus type in question. Now not all stats will be boosted once you and your teammate play your Power Combos together – the number of stats improved, as well as the actual boost’s percentage, will depend on the type of Power Combo and the card’s tier respectively. You can play Power Combos together once per quarter, so plan this out carefully (and NOT independently – teamwork, again, is important) to get that advantage over your opponent!

8. What To Do When You Win A Spinner Card On The Draft Board

Spinner Cards are comparatively rare, but if you’re a regular on the My NBA 2K Mobile Reddit, you’ve probably seen a lot of Redditors sharing the rewards from their Spinner Cards, and a lot of them appear to be quite attractive, we must say. What is a Spinner Card, and how does it work?

my nba 2k20 spinner card

Drafting a Spinner Card on the Draft Board allows you to – as the name of the card suggests – spin a wheel in hopes of winning one of the eight available prizes, which may include player cards of different rarities, Focus Cards, Level Up Cards, or other potential rewards. A Rare Spinner Card, for instance, will obviously give you a shot at a Rare card, but there’s also the possibility of settling for a mere Uncommon card or lucking out with an Ultra Rare. You can, however, upgrade your Spinner by watching an ad video, so if you won a Rare Spinner Card, you can upgrade to Ultra Rare by watching the 30-second clip, and consequently get a chance of earning better rewards.

That’s pretty much all there is to it – Spinner Cards won’t come about every day, so make the most out of them and spin that wheel for a shot at a much-needed deck upgrade!

9. About Focus Cards And Other Special Cards In The Game

You’ve probably read a lot about the Focus mechanic in My NBA 2K20 but may not be too familiar with how this works. Fortunately, we’ve decided to hone in on this for the final tip in this guide, and explain the ins and out of Focus Types as they appear on your player cards.

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First of all, there are four different types of Focus in the game, and all are color-based – Red, Yellow, Green, and Blue. Each player in the game has a specific Focus Type, and in order to improve their chances of activating their special ability and getting a stat boost in a given battle, you’ll need to have the corresponding Focus Card, which can be earned as part of the Free Packs you can open every four hours, or on the Draft Board after completing a matchup in any one of the available game modes.

For example, our Epic-rarity Meyers Leonard card – not the best example considering he’s a backup center in real life, but it’s an Epic card nonetheless – has a yellow Focus Type and the Hustler ability. Using a Yellow Focus Card via the Improve Ability option would increase his chances of activating Hustler (+17 REB) in a battle, from 11-20 percent to 12-20 percent.

In addition to Focus Cards, you can also use rarity-specific Level Up Cards to significantly level up players, add another level to the level cap of your max-level Pro cards with Supercharge Key Cards, and take advantage your Support Cards, which add buffs to a specific stat during battles, regardless of game mode. We did mention these in brief in the beginner’s guide, but it never hurts to mention them again while on the topic of non-player cards in the game.