AC/DC

 High Voltage is the newest format in Marvel Snap and this one is great. 

If you haven't heard about it yet, here's an overview in written form but the quick and dirty is; 

Games are only three rounds, and you get increasing amounts of energy each round.

Now, there were some red flags for me before I started playing High Voltage; a new card was part of the winnings and there was a new currency (volts) to earn. I was worried that this would turn into a massive grind, the way Deadpool's Diner did. 

I am very pleased to let you know that High Voltage is a TON of fun (again).

The games are very fast. Losing doesn't incur a penalty; you get volts if you win, and you get volts if you fulfill bounties. That's it-losing doesn't mean you lose volts. Playing at a steady rate will eventually rank you up to the rewards. There's zero drawback to play that I can tell and because the games are risk free, here's a great chance for players to just mess around. 

On top of that, if you lose, you just bounce to the next one. Lingering isn't the point.

So maybe y'all can stop with that Odin/Mystique/Gambit/Wong nonsense. 

Wargaming

This is an absolutely fascinating video that a friend sent me on the games that governments are using to iterate on warfare. 

I can't say it's the most soothing video. But it is engaging and thought provoking. 

I think it's particularly important to talk about now, while the influence of gamers can be felt, while boardgames are possibly their most popular state ever in the popular culture. As with any media, being aware of how we might be manipulated helps us determine the messages that we are being sent-and the appropriateness of them. Who is behind these ideas? Deciding how serious gaming can be used-as the tool that it has clearly become-feels important.

At the very least, we should give these ideas some attention.

Free Pizza:: Venom Season

 

Sometimes, you gotta play dirty.

Hela is certainly making a run for 'best deck in the format' right now so to hell with it, let's play. 

Why? Because I couldn't find anything interesting or fun to do. That's a drag but when that's a drag, fuck it, let's just win.

My little note of cleverness was to sub out Moon Knight (which was getting me more often than it should) with Sword Master and add in Spider-Woman as a target specifically for it. I'm sure someone else did that--or maybe I read someone else doing it. Either way; the deck carried me well from low 80's into the 90th rank.

Now I'm fucking around and the meta seems very screwy but not in a fun way. We'll see what we see in the coming weeks. 

Break it down

I cut nearly 1/3 of this deck-19 cards- right off the bat. 

Because this was a Cataclysm deck, at the end of the day. But times have changed a LOT. What good are Battlemages or Volvers when you can cast Uro, Titan of Nature's Wrath?

Cataclysm means I need to be able to wreck someone after I cast that, but creature spells have become so cheap and so powerful Cataclysm doesn't have the impact it did in Weapon of Choice.

Options: Trostani, Three Whispers, Shakedown Heavy, Prowling Serpopard, the Adversary cycle from Midnight Hunt, Anafenza the Foremost, Garruk's Harbinger, Scrapshooter, and Laughing Jasper Flint. 

And these are all really interesting cards, but I have to admit that I'm definitely mired in the stylings of a very old deck. 

Yes, I know there are combo finishers in certain versions of Aluren; Acererak the Archlich is a one card finisher and using Cavern Harpy + Parasitic Strix can do it too. But I never really liked those. 

The latter because it represents an easy way out. I'm not saying I shouldn't have the combo in there as one-ofs. Sometimes you just need to win. But I don't like it, because it doesn't feel like any real setup was done, no work. Aluren is out: Do you have the combo? Then the game is over. 

I realize it's ego, but winning that way doesn't feel worthy of my efforts. 

Acererak is even worse: I hate what dungeons did to Magic and don't like this method either. 

So why even run the deck at all, right? 

Because fuck it, that's why. 

Fortunately, there are some good choices for me that I hadn't thought of--and I found those by doing some research at Moxfield.

Nah.

The Kickstarter for a new game from Wise Wizard has gone up and the base concept seems neat. I like the notion of laying tiles, and building a deck from them...then I got to the art section and noped right out.

Because it doesn't matter that they are trying to justify AI "used as an artist tool, NOT an artist replacement". By default, what AI does right now is plagiarism. Any work made with AI is scraping the work made by actual people and spitting it out without crediting them. 

And hey, I've seen some neat stuff that people have done using AI prompts. But they weren't making money from it, nor were they trying to pass it off as their own. That isn't what WW is doing here. It's even worse-it's plagiarizing other artists and THEN running it through their artist to make the claim that they are paying an artist!

So no.

It Was Only A Matter Of Time

Anyone who has a sense of the history of things would tell you that Commander being a format that was shepherded by the community was never going to last. At the very least, Hasbro was never going to allow the most popular format to be managed by people who (ostensibly) had the players' best interests at the foremost, instead of the company's. Sooner or later, the corporation was going to take it away from the players.

And now it is done. It happened for the most epically shitty reasons I can think of-the "community" freaking out to the point of sending threats to the Rules Committee. That was never OK, it isn't OK and I don't want people who react like that to be part of my game. 

I also think this bodes ill for the format at large. WotC had a shield from their design mistakes by having the community police the format, and the existence of the Rules Committee meant that the community had a real voice in how that format played out. That's all gone now and I don't think things are going to be the same.

It'll start off slow, of course. These things always do. But eventually Commander will change in ways that are going to surprise the community and I don't think it'll be in a good way. However, if it means that the people making decisions are shielded from the absolute bullshit of community members who think death threats are a good thing regarding a card game then fine. 

Y'all made your bed. Sleep in it.

Weapon Of Choice

This is one of my favorites:

3 Sword of Light and Shadow
4 Birds of Paradise
2 Necravolver
3 Rakavolver
3 Shivan Emissary
1 Sunscape Battlemage
3 Thunderscape Battlemage
3 Thornscape Battlemage
2 Sylvan Caryatid

1 Sterling Grove
4 Aluren

4 Eladamri's Call

4 City of Brass
1 Windswept Heath
2 Wooded Foothills
1 Sacred Foundry
1 Bayou
3 Savannah
3 Reflecting Pool
4 Thran Quarry
4 Gemstone Mine

4 Cataclysm

While I named this after the Fatboy Slim song I also named it after the toolbox effect that we were going for when we built this deck.

That's right! So let me set the stage: it is Summer, 2001 and I am living alone in a small apartment on 50th. 

That fact alone is almost mythological to today's people. Sigh.

ANYWAY: Jason calls me and asks a simple question: Can you pay Kicker costs under an Aluren?

No, I tell him. Of course you can't! That's an extra cost and you're not paying for that.

Are you sure? Because the card says...

And we go round and round on this for about ten minutes before I have a small revelation:

You should help your friend, because you're kinda being a dick right now. 

So at a break in the argument I tell him: Let's find out if it works, first. Because if it does, there's a whole host of possibilities. 

(If you clicked that link then I want you to pretend that half those cards don't exist yet.)

And, as it turns out I am wrong, Jason is right and you absolutely can pay additional costs while under an Aluren.

Well. THAT is a thing, ennit?

So, in addition to this being one of the oldest decks I have ever made, Aluren also became the keystone of another deck by itself! One that has evolved using cards from the D&D set, to enter the dungeon and combo the opponent out.

That isn't what I want to do. However, what is clear is that there have been a bunch of cards printed and this deck deserves an upgrade! So let's go.