Many of our supporters (and winners of competitions!) have had the opportunity to design a Divination Card with us. A lot of them come with an amazing story or hidden meanings and we wanted to share these with the community! We talked with IronVsWild who designed the "The One That Got Away" Divination Card to learn the story behind their design.
Not many things manage to hold my attention for long periods of time. When I find something that does, I will gladly pour thousands of hours and hundreds of dollars into it over time. If I'm going to be interested in something for that many hours, I want to experience the best it has to offer.
To understand this card, you have to understand the path that led me to it. I honestly have no idea how I started playing Path of Exile. I've never played on Steam and I don't have any friends that play. But somehow, I ended up here during Legacy league. After a few days, I was quickly overwhelmed, and didn't return until Harbinger. Then, I started learning the game on my first character, an unascended Duelist that used Frost Wall and Flicker Strike - without generating frenzy charges. It didn't go well.
I was always into testing the limits of the game. Over time I got into crafting and mastered that system, making crazy items that I thought were interesting - Even if they weren't always good. During Harvest, the high end of crafting was pretty lackluster. Everything that could be made already was, so I decided to play SSF instead. My friend mentioned that someone had built a ladder that tracked unique tab completion in SSF, so I started collecting uniques to get on the ladder. Several months and thousands of hours later. I became the first and only person to collect every unique in SSF. I wrote about the experience on Reddit.
I had purchased a divination card several years ago at this point, and decided I wanted it to be about my accomplishment, but I just couldn't think of anything that fit. Heist came and went, and I spent a few months collecting all of those uniques too, except for Replica Bated Breath. I wrote about that experience on Reddit as well.
One day it hit me. Replica Bated Breath was a Fishing Unique with special drop requirements that nobody knew. It was a unique that nobody knew how to get, and I had the perfect solution. It was the one unique that got away, so that became the name of the card. I decided to hold a contest to design the rest of the card for the players who would appreciate it the most - Players that study Path of Exile's Fishing easter egg!
People offered prizes, there were special awards for various types of submissions, and everyone had an amazing time. There were so many good ideas for the art that I ended up combining a few of my favorites. My one request was that the person in the art was the same one as The Old Man card. I saw the flavor text early in the contest, and I knew it was the one. The feeling you get in the days after you FINALLY finish something you've been working on for a long time is odd. You feel hollow inside, aimless, despite your achievements. The flavor text captures this feeling perfectly.
The card was introduced with one of the lowest drop rates of all Divination Cards in Path of Exile, which was expected since it provided the rarest unique in the game. Despite that, I've received dozens of messages from other collectors thanking me for making it. They tell me about their attempts to farm for it. Some of them have even completed it! Nobody wants to grind for something without knowing how it drops, but grinding a rare drop for weeks on end? That's the lifeblood of this game.
I haven't played Path of Exile since I finished collecting those uniques, but it wasn't my last breath. My final goal wasn't completed. I'm eagerly awaiting Hardmode, so that I can savor life's missing pieces all over again.
