Six Heads

This post started nearly a year ago. But over the holiday I got to play a TON of the Transformers game with my buddy Jason. So while the Transformers TCG scene has gone the way of fan sets only, I've got one official build in the tank. This was one I was very excited to try when Titan Masters Attack was released: an Orange-Black aggro deck.  

The battle deck:

Combat Dagger	Weapon	OB	3
Escape Capsule	Utility	OB	3
Fight for Position	Action	OB	3
Fusion Borer	Weapon	B	3
Peace Through Tyranny	Action	OO	3
RR Disruptor Blade	Weapon	B	2
Rock Toss	Action	OB	3
Special Delivery	Action	B	2
Wedge Formation	Action	OBG	2
Bashing Shield	Armor	OG	1
Enforcement Batons	Weapon	OG	1
Improvised Shield	Armor	OO	2
Incoming Transmission	Action	O	2
Grenade Launcher	Weapon	O	3
Backup Plan	Action	W	2
Holomatter Projector	Armor	G	1
Heat of Battle	Action	W	1

The characters:

I'll tell you how I chose those characters: I mathed it out. That's right: I looked at star values and maxed out my values. Forget going big; I'm shifting from midrange to wide. 

And every card I could manage had an orange and black pip. Defensive decks had been taking over and I personally like playing aggressive strategies.

So Fangry (with Kreb), Chromedome (with Vorath) and Perceptor (with Parsec) are the crew. That Kreb gives me tough isn't relevant: the important part is that it's a sixth character. 

After the initial testing, Holomatter Projection came in because my meta insisted on builds that did non-combat damage. And then...something weird happened: the game got cancelled, the players took over building cards and many decided that the format was better off if you could only run one Headmaster in a build at a time.

Fans also started producing their own cards, which is why Vamparic Ribbon found a place in this deck. I figure; why not? If I still get to play then let's have some fun. 

And here's the thing: every one of those characters can bring the pain. Nobody wants to let Perceptor do its thing but getting a card with Chromedome doesn't suck and Fangry can always take on their heavy. The automatic bold means that with not much help, a surprising amount of damage can be done. 

Six Heads also includes the trick of using Peace Through Tyranny on a body that is not long for the game, in order to create turns where an overwhelming amount of damage gets dealt. 

I liked this deck a bunch and I'm sorry there's no more game to support it. But we'll talk more about the play patterns next post!

Off for the week

 It's the holiday week and I'm off to Seattle to play games and have pints. Cheers & happy holiday everyone!

The Retired-Omega Supreme

Once upon a time, I tried to make a "big creature G/W" deck.

2 Fangren Pathcutter
2 Sabertooth Nishoba
2 Anurid Swarmsnapper
3 Feral Throwback
4 Wirewood Savage
4 Sunscape Familiar
2 Mold Shambler
3 Feral Hydra
2 Rampaging Baloths
3 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite

4 Mirari's Wake

4 Disenchant
2 Vengeful Dreams

2 Krosan Verge
2 Sungrass Prairie
8 Plains
2 Sapseep Forest
9 Forest

It was bad. 

But it wasn't as though I wasn't trying. Beast synergies, big mana, early drops with Sunscape Familiar to help accelerate other pieces out, Mirari's Wake and the compliment of Disenchants to deal with all the things I have to deal with that makes Disenchant a necessary maindeck card. Various board resets with Vengeful Dreams and Elesh Norn, card draw via Wirewood Savage.

The problem is that it doesn't start doing anything until turn five; assuming I can get out a Familiar, Mirari's Wake would come out on turn four and then I'd get to do something.

Unless that something is Elesh Norn, I would be in a pretty bad spot.

Also, note to self, stop trying to make Amplify happen. It's not going to happen. (I've tried both the Kilnmouth Dragon and Feral Throwback and I need to stop).

Now, part of me wants to pivot this deck into a Hydra deck, because ginormous green creatures are a thing and something like Sunscape Familiar plus Gargos, Vicious Watcher could let me put out some ginormous green creatures. 

But it would still have the same problem and I don't know that it's doing anything more engaging. It could be a Commander deck, perhaps-R/G/x-blue, black and white all make viable cases for that third color. As a sixty card deck though, let's set it down. 

Late To The Party: 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim

I found out about 13 Sentinels from one of the "games that were overlooked" videos on the internet. I'm always looking for a cheap game to pick up for multiple reasons: first, it's good to broaden my horizons and second, it's good to save money. 

So with very little knowledge about what I was getting into, beyond the game studio being known for a great visual aesthetic, I was able to pick it up.

While I played through the entire game, I say this with all sincerity: what the hell was that? 

There are three areas of importance in 13 Sentinels. First; the Story mode, where you click through dialog. There aren't even dialog trees, and at no point do you get to make a choice that matters: it's all just reading/listening to this story. Plus, there were multiple times when I was expected to engage in a task or activate a prompt and I had no idea what that thing was, so I wandered around just pressing X a lot.

That's the bulk of 13 Sentinels and it's boring. That isn't a game, it's a visual novel. Nothing against visual novels, but they aren't games. And I had bought something called a game.

In addition, the story was, in various parts, cringy as hell, creepy, or boring. Nobody has an arc, or nobody I can remember anyway, and the thirteen characters I have to click through don't feel like they have much substance. 

However, you have to read the novel because that gives you points to spend on upgrades for the actual game: an event where you position up to six giant robots to repel a kaiju invasion. This part has a little strategy, as you pick from sentinels with different skill sets to take on different specialized kaiju. It's also very colorful, with battles that have explosions that made me feel like I was doing something cool while engaging in a fireworks display. 

There's also an element of placing the right sentinel in the right place, and using special abilities appropriately to maximize your talents. 

But it's incredibly short. Battles have a timer of about two minutes and while the game pauses that timer while you make decisions, the actual time spent playing is practically nothing. 

In addition, the pilots have a very limited set of phrases so you hear them all the time it quickly becomes irritating and needs to be tuned out.

The final area of interaction is one where you "unlock" story points. I really didn't understand this part at all, because unlocking story points was what I did during the story element. This was just using 'special points' to unlock items from a list that were also referenced in the visual novel. Unlock all of them, and any future special points earned would go towards upgrade points for your sentinel. 

All this part was, was clicking boxes, like I was taking an online quiz. 

This game wasn't overlooked; there just wasn't a game to play. 

Innistrad: Crimson Vow Overview

As always, we start with the link to the gallery. 

While I thought Midnight Hunt was a solid if not very innovative set, my feelings on Crimson Vow are a bit muted. This might start with the mechanics: 

Disturb, a mechanic I was lackluster on previously I am still feeling meh about. I still like the daybound/nightbound shift from the werewolves' previous mechanic. Which brings us to the new stuff.

The return of Exploit is something no one was clamoring for. However, it does appear that while the effects of Exploit don't seem to be stronger than their Khans counterparts, the attached bodies appear to be better. Perhaps this, partnered with the token generation of this set and Midnight Hunt, will give Exploit the boost it needs. 

Training: is bad. First, there is a mechanical disconnect whenever I see it on a card like Torens, Fist of the Angels or even Gryffwing Cavalry: a card that should represent a leader should be boosting others, not needing a boost. Note that most of the cards with training have names including novice level descriptions: Apprentice, Trainee, that sort of thing. 

Second, it's conditional and finite. First you need a creature with greater power (not too hard since they mostly start at 1), but we're already at: you need two creatures for this to do anything. So that's two conditions already. Then, those creatures have to survive to attack step. And if it works and you get to attack with a 1/1 and a 2/2, your reward is a 2/2 and a 2/2. That's payoff, baby! 

Now you need a 3/x creature to train again. If you don't find it, no training for you! 

So it's slow, it's conditional, and it's got a low ceiling. 

Cleave feels awkward. I understand what they are trying to do, but it feels weird and that's because they want to give you more spell by taking words away. Also, visually, I wish that the brackets had been put in bold, so it would be easier to see which phrase goes away. Finally, I don't think the cards are all that strong. 

Finally there are Blood Tokens. Thematically I like these but they seem like a lot of work for not enough payoff. Food, treasure and clue tokens have all made headways into the game but paying one mana and discarding a card to draw a card as a one shot effect seems weak. I wonder if Blood tokens were broken if the mechanic didn't have a mana cost. 

Still, the other tokens have been useful across multiple formats, so I might be underestimating these a little. 

But since none of these mechanics really excite me, Crimson Vow is already at a disadvantage. That said, the art is a lot of fun and well executed, as with Midnight Hunt. 

White
First off; great to see a Thalia reprint. The card was getting expensive and it's a staple across formats. 

Arm the Cathars is a pretty strong card: six power boost for three mana is nice. And Fleeting Spirit strangling a vampire is an awesome piece of art. 

That's...about it. Which feels weird!

Blue
Cobbled Lancer is...messed up. Is what that is. Heck of a piece of art.

Patchwork Crawler looks pretty cool but it's a bummer it can't remove cards from opponent's graveyards. Still, there's got to be some cool stuff to do there. Of the Cleave cards, I think Winged Portent is one of the most playable ones, as the basic version of the spell can draw cards. And Stormchaser Drake will probably take up space in my brain in that 'there's got to be a way to use this' way. 

I also like the flavor of Wretched Throng. That's pretty great. 

Black
As is frequently the case, Black gets some of the standout art and named cards of an Innistrad set. Catapult Fodder, Unhallowed Phalanx, Dying to Serve, Undead Butler; it goes on. I dig it. 

I'm not sure what's interesting here, if anything. Many of Black's cards revolve around the use of Blood tokens so I suppose a great deal hinges on how good those tokens are. 

I am pleased to see a Headless Horseman in Innistrad, after all this time. Cool to see that there are still fun references to make.

Red
Seems like Red is getting in on a little bit of Black's 'let's have fun art' action. The party storyline of Crimson Vow feels like it gets a lot of play here, along with cards like Weary Prisoner make for some entertaining imagry. 

Manaform Hellkite is a beatstick of a card and another player in Red's 4 mana nightmare dragon posse. 

I do see a few cards here and there that might have some nice role player effect like Kessig Flamebreather but nothing out of the ordinary for Red.

Green
Of the Cemetery cycle, Green's is probably the strongest one. I like all of them, but Cemetery Prowler makes for a nice compliment to cards like Endurance. 

Nature's Embrace seems unique as the first Aura I can recall that can enchant either a creature or a land. It's a pretty versatile card that should find a home in both Limited and Commander. 

Finally, the art for Witch's Web is outstanding. 

Multi
Of the cards here, Old Rustein seems weird: why is a human making Blood tokens? It's literally the only human card in the set that does so. 

Similarly, why is Kaya, Geist Hunter making spirit tokens for players? That character is known for destroying spirits! She feels wedged in mechanically to make the B/W tokens deck a thing.

That's right: the complaints about Odric, Blood Cursed are all off the mark. A 3/3 for three that generates tokens-tokens that can enable Madness and filter your hand? What is everyone's problem? At least Odric is a vampire now. It's not as though previous incarnations of Odric were off the hook. 

That's the hill I'm gonna die on. 

Artifact
The artifacts mostly land in the 'solid utility' slot, especially for Limited. The flavor of Boarded Window is great and I think Investigator's Journal will find a home in any controlish decks that want to keep their hands fed. 

Lands
As with Midnight Hunt, I'm happy to see some two-color lands giving options to budget players especially. I also like the way Voldaren Estate came out and it's a near auto include in any Vampire tribal Commander deck-including mine. 

So....all in all, what do we have? Is this enough to shake the metagame up for Standard? Is it a solid Limited environment? These are the questions that Crimson Vow has to answer to justify WotC's experiment of staggering sets like this. 

I personally feel this set errs on the side of de-powered cards, and aside from a couple obvious standouts, won't do a lot to change the decks people are already playing. I don't think the set is bad but it isn't popping out, either. A step down from Midnight Hunt might make sense, since we've witnessed plenty of overhyped weddings. 

Steal What You Can Get

After a few more games, I think I'm set with This Bad Check Is Gonna Stick. Not because I'm bored, or because I dislike the deck. This kind of deck forces me to think differently about play patterns because it really is all about extending the game long enough to do the big floop. 

That is both interesting and difficult. 

However, one of two things need to happen from here. First, I need to play nothing but this deck for a month or so. While I will certainly continue to play this deck, I don't see myself focusing on just this. There are other things to write about, and lots of other decks to get to. 

But it's the only way I can see getting really good at this deck. 

The other thing is that new cards will have to come out. Now, new cards are always coming out but let's not get bogged down in the perpetual hype. The range of cards that fit into this deck is a small one, because of the need to ensure the Cascade trigger. So we're talking about a niche selection. 

Because I don't think I'm going to get a better top end then what I have-unless I wanted to go full Eldrazi- so this means the focus is on something that I can play before turn three that generates permanents. I believe that's been done as well as it can be, at least for now. 

On top of all that, I get to play Whirlpool Warrior. Just to mess with people! 

Still, because This Bad Check... is such a binary one-either it floops a bunch of stuff into play or it doesn't- I don't think there's any improvements I can make to the deck. I can only make improvements to may play. Which means it's a good time to wrap this one up. 

Final decklist:

3 Goblin Dark-Dwellers

2 Foundation Breaker

4 Shardless Agent

3 Wavesifter

2 End-Raze Forerunners

2 Fury

4 Tireless Provisioner

3 Scampering Scorcher

1 Whirlpool Warrior

2 Omnath, Locus of Rage

3 Abundant Growth

4 Violent Outburst

7 Forest

3 Island

7 Mountain

2 Khalni Garden

2 Tendo Ice Bridge

2 Aether Hub

4 Glimpse of Tomorrow

 Sideboard

 3 Zendikar's Roil

The Fruit Is Ripe Now

Sometimes, Magic decks are absurd. This Bad Check... is one of those decks.

I believe that part of this stems from the fact that this deck doesn't have the volume of decision points that most Storm-based decks do. Those decks want to sculpt a hand as quickly as possible using cheap cantrips. 

This Bad Check... wants to try and land permanents every turn, multiple permanents if possible, and then on turn three or four, have a cascade spell in hand. 

But I need to do that without the cheap cantrips. The logical conclusion is that the payoff needs to be worth it. Of course, as this deck is somewhat established already, clearly the payoff is worth it. 

Goldfishing taught me something else though: This Bad Check is Gonna Stick also wants to chain things together, not unlike a Storm deck might, using Goblin Dark-Dwellers. To that end, I think running four copies instead of three is best. If nothing else, you get a 4/4 that's difficult to block but in this deck, I believe that maximizing the opportunity to reuse a Violent Outburst (if necessary) or a Glimpse of Tomorrow (hopefully) and build off my chain is critical. 

So far, against non-counterspell decks, I've been doing alright! I've been able to generate a remarkable amount of pressure off Glimpse floops because many decks are not ready to handle such a shift in the board state. Usually this means 3-4 lands and 2 creatures with 4 tokens to anything from four hasted 5/5s, to four hasted 3/3s with vigilance and trample along with a 7/7. 

I hesitate to think about what happens when Noah is able to sit on a Force of Will in his hand, for example, but here's where I think savvy play will matter. Between the Wavesifter and Tireless Provisioner's tokens, knowing when to utilize them will probably be very important. I view the lifegain from Food tokens to basically be equal to one card, but sometimes I'll have an End-Raze Forerunners in hand and after a couple flips and mana generation, I can outright cast it. That's pretty cool, too.

So far, so good! Or at least, it's interesting which is also good.

Betrayal: Legacy Debrief

 

In October of 2018, I wrangled four people together to start on a campaign of Betrayal: Legacy. It was a challenge to get four other adults to commit to something like this, but I'm happy to say that there were people who wanted to do it! 

I was going to keep the demands on their time minimal-once a month- and we found a fine place to meet for long enough to get a game in. Wrangling five adults to do something seemed feasible...

It is fair to say that things didn't go as I planned, or even hoped.

One player dropped, deciding the game wasn't for them. I recruited another! The place we were playing at closed down. We moved locations!

And in February of 2020, we played our penultimate game of Betrayal: Legacy. We were so close! Next month was to be the final showdown. 

It is fair to say that things didn't go as I planned, or even hoped.

The pandemic prevented gatherings. Life went on, in the way that it did. One friend moved out of the state, another out of the city, a third just to the outskirts. Still the box of Betrayal sat in my room, a book unfinished. I was in a bummer of a position: there were no ordinary games to play of Betrayal-there were no games at all, really, but we were near the end of a campaign! 

There's no good way to invite up to four people who've never seen the movie, just to watch the last 10 minutes of Jaws with you, is there? 

So, on Halloween of 2021, I laid out all the characters, and decided I would play them all myself. 

That felt weird, but I was tired of waiting for the movie to end, and knowing there really wasn't a way to do it unless I knuckled down and did it alone. 

I can't say I did it well. Betrayal has a lot of moving parts and when there were five of us, we weren't always keeping track of them. Still, I did my best and I had dice to keep me honest: nothing says "you have to accept random bullshit" like the dice in Betrayal, which have been described "the most dickheaded dice in gaming". I undoubtedly flubbed rules or forgot triggers.  

Fortunately, none of the characters turned traitor, so I didn't have to engage in the mental exercise of playing against myself. 

Unfortunately, I lost one of my biggest benefits early, and hadn't explored much of the environment. My characters were underpowered, a little unprepared and frankly, Betrayal Legacy kinda wants all its characters to die...which it damn near did.

In the end though-literally the last roll of the last character before what would be certain death at the hands of thralls-I was able to persevere. 

Five went in. One came out. 

Not unlike my experience. 

Then it was over. Unlike many Legacy games, Betrayal has a free play mode that can be enjoyed after the campaign is over. That's partly why I bought it. 

But as I read the last entry in the Bleak Journal, the last card in the Purgatory deck and realized that the game was asking me to destroy its final, undiscovered pieces...I felt weird. 

Lonely, really. I won, but there wasn't anyone to share that with. If I'd lost, that would've been OK, too-at least there's still a story to tell. Hell, if I'd lost at least feeling bad would've made more sense. 

But I didn't exactly do either of those things. I just finished. As though I'd completed a test. There wasn't a sense of anything but solitude.

At the same time: the things that brought this game into my circle have moved on and the world has definitely tilted since I started it. To hold onto this artifact and never let it go or change would be its own kind of madness. 

The last instruction that Betrayal: Legacy gives is to destroy the Bleak Journal itself, and while it is against my nature to destroy a book, perhaps the only way I can accept the transient nature of this experience is to commit to it. Anyone else who played this game had a different experience and that's the point. To go rooting around to find out all the things that coulda, woulda, shoulda is just an exercise in stalling the acceptance of what is. 

That isn't to say there wouldn't be a benefit to studying the journal to see how gameplay mechanics worked! However, that isn't what my motive would be.

So it's done now, and the secrets it holds stay with it. I'll put the game is put into the closet and remember that it was pretty neat, while it lasted.