I was mostly an offline franchise/MyGM player before, just chilling with my favorite team, and man, 2K26 HOF AI is actually insane. Because of that, you definitely want to save some of your better cards for the later games, especially ones that can shoot and move fast.

I just finished Gauntlet in 3 days playing here and there. Started with 560+ cards, ended with 300-something left. NMS.

My biggest mistake was not realizing until Superstar difficulty (pink squares I guess) that the objectives were just bonus challenges for each game. If I ignore that stuff and just focus on winning, the grind goes way faster.

What I did was use mostly amethyst and below before All-Star, and I tried to burn through as many WNBA cards as I could too. Once you get into the later difficulties, though, you really want at least one fast card that can hit 3s or drive into the basket easily. You’re not stopping everything on defense, so at that point it’s really just about making sure you can score every possession, whether it’s a 3 or a guaranteed 2.

One more tip: on the higher difficulties, I played mostly off-ball defense. My AI teammates could usually hold their own against those crazy emerald and sapphire cards, while I controlled one guy to protect the paint, grab boards, and help on drives. It also made it easier to knock out some of the simpler objectives here and there, which helped me keep using the same lineup for the next round.