One of the biggest complaints about Season 1 of Diamond Dynasty was the lack of grindable programs. We used to get fun programs that were packed with rewards, often including free packs of whatever themed pack was in the Show Shop.
That was non-existent last season in lieu of premium packs overfilling the Shop.
Not only does the Architects Program change that, it’s an incredibly fun way to introduce cards to the Cornerstone Captain builds.
Architects Program Breakdown
The Architects Program features 4 earnable player cards and there’s many ways you can complete it. In order to fully complete the program, you’ll need to earn 50 program stars.
Moments
There are 4 Moments that each pay out 3 program stars each for a total of 12 program stars. These are your typical Moments that shouldn’t be challenging or take too much time. There’s also an optional Extreme Moment that’s worthy of the attempt. If you can tally 3 Hits and 2 XBH with Fernando Tatis Jr. on Hall of Fame, you’ll earn yourself an additional 9 program stars.
Completing all Moments, including Extreme, rewards you with 21 program stars and gets you nearly halfway complete.
PXP Missions
- Tally 500 PXP with Season 2 Cornerstone Captains – 5 program stars
- Tally 150 PXP with Incognito Tim Locastro – 3 program stars
- Tally 150 PXP with All-Star Mike Napoli – 3 program stars
- Tally 150 PXP with Rookie Ronald Acuna Jr. – 3 program stars
Season 2 Cornerstone Stat Missions
- Tally 15 Hits with players that have 85+ Speed – 3 program stars
- Tally 5 Home Runs with players that have 74 Fielding or lower – 3 program stars
- Tally 9 Innings Pitched with Live Series players – 3 program stars
- Tally 15 Hits with Live Series players – 3 program stars
- Tally 8 Extra Base Hits (XBH) with hitters from 2010-2019 – 3 program stars
Program Rewards
Successfully completing the Architects Program will you earn some sizable loot.
- 4 total Season 2 player cards
- 5 total Show packs
- 30,000 total XP
- 1,000 Stubs
This is a really good handful of rewards for what should amount to a fairly small time investment. The 30,000 XP alone is a great reward as it’ll help boost you in the Season 2 XP Program quite a bit. The packs and Stubs aren’t crazy, but certainly appreciated in addition to the 4-free cards that you can plug into your Season 2 collection.
Card Rewards
LF Incognito TimmyLo! [Tim Locastro] (Arizona Diamondbacks)
C All-Star Mike Napoli (Texas Rangers)
LF Rookie Ronald Acuna Jr. (Atlanta Braves)
SS Rookie Fernando Tatis Jr. (San Diego Padres)
Cornerstone Reinforcements
Part of what makes this program so cool is that each of these cards fit on various Season 2 Cornerstone Captain builds.
Every card fits onto each Cornerstone build outside of the Luis Castillo build. Obviously, that theme is built around Live Series cards and none of these are Live Series cards. Still, even though that Captain isn’t involved in these cards, there are still two missions you can complete using Live Series which is a nice touch.
This is the kind of content that was missing in Season 1. Having cool, diverse Cornerstone Captains and programs with cards that directly support them is a huge improvement. Everyone knows Byron Buxton was the most used Cornerstone Captain in Season 1. And for good reason – that card and boost was ridiculously good.
Coming into Season 2, the Cornerstone Captains were already more balanced relative to each other. That made choosing a Captain more difficult, though Luis Castillo’s Live Series build was probably the best out of the gate. If SDS is going to continue boosting the other Cornerstones to bring them all in line power wise, then the overall feel of Season 2 will be much better.
I’m rocking a Castillo/Swanson (Braves) hybrid build right now that’s a ton of fun. I’m getting gnarly boosts on my Live Series Braves while sprinkling in some other fun cards. The other Cornerstone Captains have fun builds and being able to add these 4 new cards to them makes it more enticing to actually run those Captains.
You get all of these cards just for completing the program. You’ll be able to experiment even more and that’s a huge win.
The Closer
The Architects Program is a huge win and a clear sign that SDS heard us. It’s not just a throw-in program, either. It’s grindable which gives us a reason to play. Utilizes the Cornerstone Captains which creates incentive to build those teams. Powers the Cornerstone Captains with solid cards eligible for each boost. It adds free cards for the Season 2 collection, pays out some free packs and Stubs and offers up a whopping 30,000 XP.
Give us more of this!
Seriously, this is the kind of content that can make Seasons more fun and palatable and make solid use of the rotating format. If SDS continues with programs like this, we’ll be having a whole new round of positive conversations about Season 2.
What are your thoughts on the Architects Program? Which Cornerstone Captain will you build around with these new cards? Let us know in the comments!
Cory Wayne Dell
Cory has been writing about all things baseball and gaming since 2022 and has been featured at Operation Sports as well as cited by Forbes. Cory is also a multi-instrumentalist and founder of the band Cargocastle. Cargocastle's latest single, "Truth and Reconciliation," is available on Spotify and all major streaming platforms. Cory is also the author of Shadow of a Monster, a personal memoir currently seeking publication.
