crowdedmind
-
Content Count
100 -
Joined
-
Last visited
Posts posted by crowdedmind
-
-
Dam said:
crowdedmind said:
The problem is that blitz aggro have had some frankly ridiculous cards printed for them which has distorted the environment. There are a few 2-4 cards that either need to be banned or some board-sweeping counters need to be printed.Are you talking about Skaven, Spider Riders (what else)?
Warpstone Excavation is the primary culprit. At the very least it should have been limited and really should have required you to corrupt one of units to generate the power as well. There is currenlty too great a disparity between the first turn or two of production that each deck has. Destruction (and probabaly Orcs in particular) have a massive production advantage. An average turn 1 for an Order deck is probably a 2C unit/support and a 1C unit/Contested Village. A poor start will be one 2-3C unit/support. You might be running Warpstone Excavation (although as a slower Order deck they hurt your more) and you might be running enough cheap cards to try to use Innovation on turn one. An avergae Orc start is probably a 2C unit/support and a 1C unit/Contested Village, plus an Innovation/ We's Bigga trick, plus the increased chance of a Warpstone Excavation. If that first unit is a Lobba Crew or they have a Pillage in hand the situation is even more ridiculous because you can significantly disrupt your opponent's first turn, thus effectively buying yourself a free turn.
We've been testing decks for the Sheffield Regional and played a lot of games against Orcs to see if we're better taking a different deck. If the Orc player goes first and has a Lobba Crew or Pillage in their opening hand it's a massive advantage. If they have both it's probably game. Common starts also include a We's Bigga/Innovation Squig Herders/Clan Moulder Elite or some 1C units. On top of all this you've got a good chance of seeing 1+ Warpstone Excations (assuming you mulligan) which distort the starts even more. Lobba Crew and Pillage both need an extra point of loyalty at least as you should not be able to hose your opponent's turn one and have resources left over to develop.
Ahem. Sorry. We were discussin the game's tempo issues last night so the rage is still strong.
What would I ban? Warpstone Excavation, Clan Moulder Elite (really, a 2P 5HP unit for 2C who's downside is they can't defend? Really?) and Deathmaster Sniktch. Whilst Orcs have too many cheap 2P units no single one is in itself a huge problem. I would add some extra loyalty symbols to the Orc stuff however. Compare the Orcs to the Dwarves. The Dwarves have several cheap units but a lot of them are dounle or triple loyal to stop you being able to thow out too many units too quickly.
The game's basic mechanics currenlty favour aggro (attack in the turn you're played and can pick your zone of attack to dodge early defenders). This is fine, but it's compunded by a lack of general cheap board sweepers to counter the blitz aggro builds ( and most cards like Judgement, Flames, Troll Vomit etc have to be played in your own turn). Each faction has a theme but the Skaven/Orc themes shouldn't have been 'burn two zones' and 'play efficient cards'.
As I said, I don't think that High Elves are underpowered, but blitz aggro with access to cheap and easy control elements are distorting the environment making it difficult for players to see past 'how much power do I get for my cost?'.
-
Dam said:
I just can't see how you'd get picked apart with a single RBT. For one, you need it in play, which is hard with just 1x. I've gotten it out early and tried to use to the fullest, but IIRC it was against Chaos, they just kept dropping tons of units to suck damages (or just plain put it to their capital) and burned two zones. Your resources geared toward fueling RBT are away from other uses, meaning you're putting out fewer units/playing fewer cards, so even those few units that the opponent gets out will do a lot of damage.
Ironically, I think the RBT would've served them better if it had been worded "each player takes indirect damage". Then they could've comboed with Glittering Tower and their own healing abilities almost each turn, healing and hitting, healing and hitting.
High Elves look to be a control faction, so counting up power on units doesn't really mean anything.
Bolt Throwers are lethal. You don't do a bit of damage each turn, you're looking to do 10+ each turn. You get enough economy and card draw going and in each of your turns you spend whatever remaining resources you have in phase zero then pass. You sit on all your resources into your opponent's turn, play some sort of stall card (Gifts, Flames, Vallaya etc) and then dump your remaining resources through the Bolt Thrower in you pahse zero. Repeat until one player loses. This is how High ELves work at the moment and as a control deck you need three of each card. If you don't have them then you will be at a severe disadvantage against aggro decks. Why? Aggro decks just want to make angry guys and attack you. If they don't have three of each card then threre's likely a weaker substitute that they can use (another unit that has a power icon and a low cost). Control decks don't have that luxury. There tend not to be weaker but similar versions of key control cards so you need own as many copies of the key cards as you're allowed to play. If you don't want to do that then don't play pure High Elves.
You want a stand-alone High Elf deck to work in the same way as an Orc aggro deck and it just doesn't. Play High Elves or play aggro. The High Elf deck is about where the power level should be in the game right now. The problem is that blitz aggro have had some frankly ridiculous cards printed for them which has distorted the environment. There are a few 2-4 cards that either need to be banned or some board-sweeping counters need to be printed.
Your idea for the Bolt Thrower would make for a broken combination. It would allow you to play two Gifts of Aenarion, shoot yourself for one damage and generate two resources. This allows you to create an infinite loop which would end with your opponent taking more indirect damage than he could possible handle in one turn. Don't feel bad though, it's not much worse than some of the stuff that's got through playtesting so far.
-
Dam said:
crowdedmind said:
It is fact.
Can you quote a source saying they (FFG) are designing from an Order vs Destruction POV, disregarding individual factions?
As soon as I wrote that I knew that I should have phrased it slightly differently. When I wrote 'fact', I meant that to not design the game looking at the widest possible implications for each card is ridiculous. If cards can work together then they need to be designed and tested with that in mind. The widest possible grouping for a set of cards is it's overall facton (Order, Destruction, or both in the case of some neutral cards). The opposite stance from my suggestion is that FF don't consider how other cards can affect the design of a new card, which would be very worrylng. If it's not a fact then the game has some serious design problems.
You talk about unit power but you don't address two points:
1. The cost of those units. Chaos may have more units with three power, but they tend to cost 5 which is too expensive at the moment for a single unit.
2. The assumption that High Elves are meant to have lots of power. The design premise for High Elves may be low power but longevity or a more control-focused style of play.
You also have access to Greatswords, Grudge Thrower etc (certainly more the latter than the former) which can pump your units' power. The fact that you choose not to use them despite wanting to play a style of deck that may not suit your race is no-one's fault but your own. I realise that you want to play pure High Elves, but pure High Elves don't appear to be a race that focuses on damage pumping (whereas the Orcs most certainly are). Either pick pure High Elves or pick the style of deck you want to play, but don't assume that you can pick both and they will fit together. Just because you want both doesn't mean that it's healthly for the game for Order to have duplicate cards.
For an extreme example take this imaginary card:
White Lions of Chrace (High Elf)
2C,1L
3P
Forced: When this unit enters play you may reveal a support card from your hand. If you do so you may put it into play reducing its cost by 1.
Let's assume that this card is balanced. It would see a lot of play in a lot of Order decks and would be a staple High Elf card. What would happen if FF then released:
Tiranoc Chariots (High Elf)
2C,1L
3P
Forced: When this unit enters play you may reveal a support card from your hand. If you do so you may put it into play reducing its cost by 1.
Most players would acknowledge that it is unbalanced to print what is essentially the same card twice. There might be some High Elf players who really like building theme decks and don't see this as a problem as it would only be boring competitive players who play both; after all the two units come from different cities and wouldn't normally fight together.
This is how your argument strikes me. You want to limit yourself beyond the game's rules and yet you don't want to suffer for it. Should be imaginary Tiranoc player be given the chariots they want because they don't want to use something that will break their theme?
-
I'm not even saying this should be the case. However, one should expect a mono-faction race A to be as powerful as mono-faction race B (regardless of whether they are both Order or Destruction or one each), and that is the point of this thread.
I've already said that balancing six factions is tricky so whilst this is the ideal I wouldn't be surprised if one faction is better than another.
For me theme comes before anything else. Any ccg/lcg deck I have is built around a theme. Some games make this really easy (Middle-Earth ccg, Dwarven Rings Deck, One Ring Deck, etc.). Making an Order or Destruction deck that's purely min-maxed hodgepodge of the "best" cards, theme will be non-existant in most cases. This often applies to competitive players (esp. in tournaments) which is my key reason for not caring about them. You get the same basic cookie-cutter decks (certain cards that will absolutely be in a deck, just because it's that good even if thematically it makes no sense) and the cheezemasters come out of the woodworks.
What is theme? Theme is what you add to the mechanics of your deck. I willing to bet that you could post any theme deck and somebody could explain why that doesn't fit the theme it was designed around. It is better to design a game that competitive players cannot break because this will not impact on whatever theme the game carries once it exists. If you design a game with theme as the primary goal however then competitive players will be able to break the game and make it a very boring experience for everyone (and the rules will not prevent them from doing so).
Is this a fact or an opinion? Based on the current balance discrepancy doesn't seem like the game is balanced on the O vs D level (like the last tourney report here, nobody even touched Order). Checking my stats, Dwarves, Empire and Orcs are pretty much all even since adding Assault on Ulthuan, Chaos and DElves still tied at the top and HElves bringing up the rear.
It is fact. I never said that Order and Destruction are equally powerful, but that the primary point of balance is Order and Destruction, not Empire vs High Elves vs Dwarfs vs Chaos vs Dark Elves vs Orcs vs neutrals. You could print a card that is great for High Elves, but you must also be aware of how powerful it is an Empire, Dwarf and mixed deck. This is my point. You can't design cards for each race in isolation, but rather how they will affect any Order or Destrution build.
-
Aryan said:
Exactly. This game can be played both ways and none of these should be unbalanced. I don't see me doing any constarints to myself.
If you are playing (for example) Empire and only looking at the Empire cards then you are ignoring more than 2/3 of your card pool (the Order cards plus available neutrals). That is a constraint you're placing upon yourself. Fantasy Flight hasn't stopped you using those cards, you have.
As to why there are three races in each of the two factions, there are likely many reasons. Variety and theme, card balance and focus. I'm not saying that you shouldn't play theme decks (mono-Empire, pre War of the Beard Dwarf/high Elf etc), just that you can't expect them to be as powerful as an Order deck that is built potentially using all the Order cards. Balancing a card game is very tricky and I don't expect the six races to be equally powerful. Thankfully with the monthly releases we should see the relative power levels shift back and forth so no one race is at the bottom of the pile for too long. Remember however that the game is primarily balanced as Order vs Destruction. The fact that cool card X is High Elf means that it's less likely rather than more likely to see a similar card come out for the Dwarfs (unless both cards have massive loyalty costs).
-
Aryan said:
Not everyone enjoy mixing races. If two players share 1 core set they can't mix races if for exeple they both want to play destruction. Furthermore your arguments are ... funny. Races should be meant to be equal with thesame chances for winning. Many people rather look at every race seperately than divide decks to order and destruction.
If a player chooses to limit themselves beyond the restrictions the game imposes then they must accept the consequences. If you don't want to mix races within a deck when teh game allows it then you will be putting yourself at a disadvantage. The design team don't have an issue with players mixing races so what basis do you have for saying that "Races should be meant to be equal"?
-
We'll be bring some players from Manchester, probably between 2-6 of us.
-
dormouse said:
Um... no the probability of drawing a card is the number of times the card appears in the deck by the cards in the deck, in the example I showed it is 3/42. Period. This is basic expression of probability. Hypergeometric shows the percentage of not drawing a card. They are not the same thing. Google probabilities. We are talking past each other here. I understand how to figure for the decreasing chances of my not drawing a specific card every turn, but that is not the same thing as what the base probability is that I will draw a card, and it is not six of one and half a dozen of another, you can't just replace probability of a draw with the percentage chance of not drawing a card. They are different expressions, they tell us different things, and the math to figure them out is different. Different does not equal wrong.
I'm not sure how to explain this further, but you are wrong. You take away the chance of seeing 0 of a card from 100% because you want to know the chances of drawing not-0 of that card. If you want to see one in your opening hand and see two you still have the one you need. Hypergeometric distribution can show you the odds of drawing exactly 1 of a card if your want, but that's not particularly useful. you didn't use a simpler and easier method than I, you used an incorrect method.
-
Dam said:
I don't see how each faction having some options in support removal for example can lead to negative experiences TBH.
Imagine if a similar version of Pillage was printed for each Destruction faction. A Destruction control deck could then run nine copies of what's effectively Pillage and keep you locked out of the game for turns as they are likely to see muliple copies of the card across turns 1-3.
-
Dam said:
Clamatius said:
you almost want a support-removal eventually, which of course, HElves don't have.This is a good example of why you shouldn't be so obsessed with mon-faction decks. If you print support removal for each faction then each faction has the option of playing all the support removal for their side (Order vs Destruction) which could lead to some very negative play experiences. Whilst teh basic themes of a faction should be supported by faction cards not everything you want for High Elves with have a HE icon in it for balance reasons.
-
I tried to avoid chopping up Dormouse’s post and answering piecemeal as it risks distorting their argument, but as the post is quite long I’ve had to so as to avoid confusion. The forum didn't like the quotes so I've italicised his post
I'll try and come back to this with something more detailed but the basic probabilities of card draw I've been discussing work like this -
50 card deck 7 card starting hand opening draw of 1 card. Your chance of having any given card is 1/50 but should probably be referenced as 3/50 if we can assume you have all important cards x3, and even that could be expressed differently if we were to assume that you do not have the card you need in your opening hand as 3/42.This is incorrect. Probability is not calculated in the way that you describe. The easiest way to calculate this is to use the hypergeometric distribution function in Excel (unless you want to spend time calculating lots of factorials by hand). If you want to know the percentage chance of drawing at least one copy of a card use the following fuction:
=100%-HYPGEOMDIST(A,B,C,D)
where:
A is the exact number of cards you wish to draw. This will be zero as what you want to calculate is the chance of drawing anything other than zero copies.
B is your handsize at the time.
C is the number of copies of that card in your deck.
D is the size of your deck.Using this the chance of drawing at least one copy of a card in your starting hand from a fifty-card deck is:
=100%-HYPGEOMDIST(0,7,3,50)
or a 37% chance. 3/42 is a 7% chance.
For a better explanation on this, here’s an article I found.
But lets keep this relatively simple. I believe we can agree a good deck is not utterly dependent on a single card or card combination, but on a layering of cards where you have multiple card effects that create a built in redundancy, or a over-lapping of cards to create multiple combinations, and ideally full of synergistic effects so that as the game progresses each draw sees you tightening a lock, accelerating your rush, or further disrupting your opponents strategy and tactics while increasing your board and/or card advantage. In a min-maxed deck you vastly limit your ability to include multiple combinations, the amount of effect redundancy, and deck accelerants, as well as including cards that do not further your own goals or protect your strategies from what you perceive to be the most likely played counters.
I agree that unless a card combination is incredibly powerful (probably to the point of broken) you shouldn’t rely on it alone, but I disagree with your idea of a smaller deck being limiting. Not every card is equal so you want to see the best cards as often as possible whereas every card after that dilutes your deck’s primary goal. If I could play a 50 card deck that was say, 36 Spider Riders and 14 Warpstone Excavation then I would (as a starting point) as my strategy of playing three Spider Riders each turn whilst drawing three cards. The problem with this deck is that it is massively susceptible to disruption.
So ask yourself how many cards with similar effects do you include in your deck? How many combinations do you include in your deck? How central are they to your victory? Can the pieces of those combos be used outside of the combo to good effect? How many counter cards do you include in your deck? From what I've been seeing on the deck forum is about 6 cards of similar effect or stats, no more than two combos in a deck, with usually at least one of the cards having limited usefulness outside of the combination.
Every draw gets us closer to seeing one example of each card in our deck. If we draw a single card a turn we increase the probability of drawing a particular card by 1 each round. Because this game allows us to increase our draw beyond one we can determine an ideal number of cards to draw in a turn and figure out how quickly we are to hit that ideal number based on how many cards would allow for that to happen. Of course this game also has a decking rule, if you draw your last card you lose, which means that we need to be careful not to place the ideal number to high because we may give ourselves a loss even in the process of drawing the card we sought.Firstly a quick point on decking: if your deck is not efficient enough to win most games before you deck yourself when drawing 5 cards a turn then it’s highly likely that your deck is weak.
Every card you draw increases the chances of seeing the card you need by x% or x/y, 1 in isolation is meaningless.
If a card is good enough to act as a duplicate of one of the cards that fit your central build idea then it goes in and pushes out a weaker card. Every argument you can make for duplication/redundancy and card draw in a larger deck applies to a 50-card deck as well, plus the 50-card deck is smaller so you’re more likely to see the card in the first place.
If we start the game effectively with a hand size of 8 and a deck of 42 we can safely draw up to three cards a turn with no risk of being decked (unless facing an aggressive siege deck) and possibly as high as five but running a very real risk of being decked even by decks that do not include that as central strategy. We are likely to achieve a draw of three by the third Quest phase in what looks like the average 50 card deck on here and Board Game Geek. That means we go from 3/42 to 3/40 to 3/37 by the third Quest phase and stay relatively consistent there after. So if what you need to draw is a way to remove a specific unit you have maybe as much as six cards that could make that happen though some may require the use of other skills and strategies to make the cards effective. Lets express this as four. So turn three we have a 4/37 probability of getting the card we need.
Again, the maths is incorrect. What I would say here is that if you have enough resources (in the general sense) to win the game you want to draw as many cards as you can in one go (that won’t cause you to lose immediately). I would love to have the option with my Empire deck on about my 5th turn to draw the entire deck-1 cards. The only reason in any given turn not to draw deck-1 cards is that you cannot win that turn. If your deck is designed to win in a reasonable number of turns then you want to draw as many cards as possible during each of those turns.
Now lets look at a larger deck.Say 60 cards. The decks I've been seeing that fall around this number have much higher numbers of redundant effects, multiple ways of accelerating the deck, numerous combinations of cards that can be used to greater effect in large or small combos. They also have a higher ideal number of cards that can be drawn in a turn safely going from 3 to 5 and unsafely from 5 to 8. It certainly takes longer to achieve those maximum numbers but so far it appears that the safe draw is hit no more than a turn later and the unsafe a turn after that (larger decks so far seem to universally use a lot of inexpensive supports and cheap units to allow a larger cycling through of cards from hand into play). If I am looking for a way to remove a specific unit I am likely to have as many as 8 ways with about two of those being dependent on a combination of cards or specific strategy. The probability of drawing what I need is going to be seen as 8/47.
Do you see? One out of every 9.25 cards on turn three in a Min-maxed deck is going to have the effect I need. One out of 5.875 cards is going to have the effect I need in a 60 card deck.
This still doesn't take into account that as the later rounds progress where I am drawing more cards safely than a min-max deck the probability of a card effect I need continues to climb higher and higher, nor does it take into account that by having more redundant effects each individual card is less likely to be deemed "irreplaceable" and so can be safely set down as a development without drastically harming the effectiveness of the deck as a whole.Obviously the maths is incorrect. Also bear in mind what I said about card draw. Saying that you can draw more cards each turn in a larger deck is disingenuous as you have created an artificial limit on how many cards a smaller deck can draw each turn. Ideally a deck would be able to increase or decrease its card draw each turn dependant upon circumstances (which is one of the reasons why Pistoliers are so good).
As my imaginary Spider Rider deck shows, if a card is good enough to be a duplicate of another powerful card then it goes in the deck. The difference is that I’m removing a weaker card rather than just adding a card which will reduce the chances of me seeing the cards I need.
I can understand the argument you’re making, but it doesn’t hold up without putting artificial limits on the 50-card deck. Also consider that if we have similar decks, mine being 25 of card A and 25 of card B, yours being a 30/30 split (A being a series of different but very similar cards and B being another set of different but very similar cards), you’re more likely to see all As or all Bs as a hand because you have a greater number of each, which could be terrible.
I think that your argument is really that you want to build a deck that has answers to (almost) everything and that a smaller deck can’t hold all those answers. I’d be inclined to agree if there weren’t cards in the pool that had powerful general effects. These let you cover a range of threats for fewer card spaces. The other problem your deck will have is that you have less chance of seeing a specific type of answer to a threat (bearing in mind that we’re both playing the good general cards so your extra choices are likely to be more narrow answers) and you’ve also reduced the chances of seeing your deck’s key cards that advance your own victory.
How does all this relate to sideboards?
You’re prepared to put extra cards in your deck so that you have more answers. Most players who understand the benefits of small decks do not. Of us, some want the chance to play those answers without having to make difficult decisions about which cards to play without seeing a specific deck (sideboarding in cards after game 1). Others prefer to emphasise the skill in deckbuilding which comes with making those difficult decisions, knowing that it could come back to bite us during an event if we made the wrong decision. I believe that the latter of those two options makes for a better environment.
-
I must have missed something because I thought that from now on all the battlepacks were going to contain three of each card. Why is there only one copy of each relic in a battlepack? Are they going to have a new type of uniqueness that affects deck construction?
-
Why not just use dice to track damage and resources?
-
cyberfunk said:
I hate to interrupt this philosophical inquiry into the merits of sideboards with merely pragmatic concerns, but I'm still waiting to hear how a tournament structure is going to: 2) not give the finger to everybody playing something other than rush
If you think that rush is going to be dominant (and the likelyhood is that it will be) then build your deck with that in mind. Play 3x Will+Judgement, Flames Valaya, Gifts etc in an Order deck and Troll Vomit, Invoke etc in a Destruction. Build decks that hammer rush and do reasonably well against the rest of the field.
As to the rest of this thread players who build large, cumbersome decks that run lots of cards 'for variety' rather than consistency probably don't quite understand the minutiae of a competitive environment and should re-evaluate their arguments. I don't want sideboards, but I wouldn't attempt to defend my position by saying that you can just add more cards to your deck instead.
-
dormouse said:
As to the 50 card limit, I have in the past shown mathematically how this game does not decrease the effectiveness of a deck in real life terms. I can do so again if you want, but the long and short of it is the math behind a min-max deck with a minimum ideal draw for a deck makes very basic assumptions that do not truly reflect the realities of game play, namely that there is a single card represented in your deck in a random position (or in three random positions) that is the perfect answer to what you need at any given point in the game. When you do the math to compensate for a deck with synergistic design and a variable to aggressive draw a larger deck actually shows demonstrable higher rates of drawing the needed effect. We cannot assume in a min-max deck the ability to have the same representation of synergistic cards due to the need to balance effects across a range of costed cards to ensure an ideal setup hand, nor can we assume the ability to vary our card draw because each card has to serve such a narrow purpose to make the min-max deck effective, nor can we assume the ability to draw aggressively since drawing your last card means an automatic loss in this game.
So what the final result is that a somewhat larger deck when built with this in mind can provide far more options to a given problem while still being able to put forward its main strategy in an aggressive manner that duplicates the same kind of statistical pulls of effects that a smaller deck can get yet is unable to reliably draw aggressively because of the constant risk of an automatic loss.
Not derail this thread, but could you link to this working because I can't see how increasing your deck size will give you more access to the cards you want to see.
-
At the moment it's seems a shame that Innovation was reprinted rather than Contested Village.
I would have liked to have stuck around and played my last match so that I could keep testing. Discard looks to be a viable control strategy, especially if you can play an early pair of scouts or a scout and Harpies. The higher costs on the Order scouts means that it doesn't seem like they lend themselves as well to the strategy.
-
I've managed to play Raw Deal and L5R for years and not need a sideboard. I can see why they are needed in some games, but I see them in general as a crutch. Players should learn to make difficult choices about the cards they put into their decks.
I would rather see the game designers produce a game that didn't need sideboards to allow for fair games.
-
Judgement's real power comes fro forcing your opponent to play developments early on (thus shrinking their hand) in case you play it. If your opponents aren't playing 3+ developments into their kingdom then they need to start doing so. The Empire player also has to play multiple developments before Judgment in case the opponent knocks out their 1-2 developments in response to the card being played. Between this and destroying the Empire player's support cards early on (to slow their development) you should be able to buy yourself enough time to either put the squeeze on the Empire deck.
-
Both Order and Destruction have access to board-clearing and stalling tactics (in the general sense) that you can run if you're struggling against blitz. One of my favourite for Destruction is Seduced by Darkness as it's so cheap even in a non-Chaos deck. You also have to adapt your playstyle and accept that you can't spend the first few turns building without any regard for your opponent.
-
jogo said:
You should have at least 1 zone burning before the opponent can build a bit defense. Get one Waagh/Totem and smash the other zone, even if your creatures are dead after it, you won.
WIth Rock Lobber you will need to pay 4 resources and destroy one of your units to only to 2 damage.Rock Lobber is great for letting you hit a second zone in the same turn as an attack. If you've been attacking the battlefield but not desytroyed it and your opponent play a lot fo units there you can then attack and burn the quest zone whilst using the Rock Lobber to poach the battlefield. You certainly don't need three in a deck, but having one available near the end can be a game-ender.
TubBelly: Oops. I'll correct the list.
-
Not every card is going to be useful all the time. I'd prefer to see a few dormant cards in each set that create a stir a few months down the line rather than a constant cycling of decks to fit in as many new cards as possible because they are strictly better than previous releases. Even if you don't like anything your get from a release it's only a one-month wait for the next set.
-
stevetrpi said:
I'm gonna disagree about dumping Rock Lobber. Unless you're killing on turn three every single game, your opponent my be able to stall long enough to make you pay. With Rock Lobber you still have a chance for the kill even if your opponent has some defense out. I personally like Rip, and might take out some combination of Big Uns, Ironclaw's Horde, or Boar Boyz to get in Rip/Bloodthirster. This does look like a really solid list though.
The problem is that the Bloodthirster is a dead card unless you see Rip, which makes it a bit combo-riffic. What about dropping a Big Unz and a Waaagh! for two Rip just to add speed?
I'll dig out my Empire deck and hopefully post it soon. It's working a little better now (thanks to the crazy bolt thrower).
-
I'd keep both 3 WIll of the Electors and 3 Judgement as it's such a powerful combination (and probabaly add a third Demolitions). You don't even need to play the Judgements for them to affect your opponent: just knowing that you have them will force him to discard cards (develop each turn).
I'd certainly shrink the deck to 50 cards and add some more alliances to avoid stalling your growth early on. Overall though I'm not sure that you've got the mix of Empire that you need. You're playing a lot of Empire cards for effectively two tricks (Judgement and huge Pistoliers) and it feels a bit clunky. Do you really need the Pistoliers trick? Does it give you a definite advantage over a more pure Dwarf deck with just Will and Judgement? If you keep this aspect int he deck I'd also suggest some Innovation to give you that extra chunk of resource to help steal tempo from faster decks.
-
After being introduced to the game a few weeks ago I bought the releases so far and started tinkering with an Empire combo deck. in order to test it I built a version of a friend's Orc deck but with a total focus on blitz (becasue if my combo deck can cope with being attacked early it should be good to go). Needless to say the Orc deck rolled my Empire time and again (ah, well, back to the drawing board). As I might be able to make it to a tournament at the weekend I wondered what I could do to improve the Orc deck (as it seems much easier to play).
Units
3x Spider Riders
3x Crooked Teef Goblins
3x Ironclaw's Horde
3x Lobber Crew
3x Squig Herders
3x Followers of Mork
3x Big 'Uns
3x Veteran Sellswords
3x Boar BoyzSupport
3x Grimgor's Camp
3x Warpstone Excavation
3x Contested Village
3x Choppa
2x Rock LobbaTactics
3x We'z Bigga!
3x WAAAGH!
3x Seduced by DarknessThe only thing that I'm really not thrilled about are the Big 'Uns as they cost three, but the possibility of some defense against sniping has given them a slot so far. The deck is fairly self-evident, allowing you to attack (and possibly burn a zone) on your first turn or build for a turn before burning a zone on turn two/three and one on turn three/four. Free stuff makes blitz so much easier to build.
I can't decide whether or not I like Rip Dere 'Eads Off! or not. I can see the combo with big units, but part of the deck's power seems to come from playing out your hand and having the units as a threat turn after turn.
High Elf Musings (rantish)
in Warhammer: Invasion The Card Game
Posted
Dam said:
This is where you started to make mistakes. You know that you're playing Dwarves and so toughness is going to be an issue. You have cards in your deck to deal with this (I hope) and so your turn two should have been one Spearmen each to the Kingdom and Quest zones.