10 replies to this topic

[GeorgeG]

Hi just curious for the community's thoughts on the state of the game in March 2018?

 

I've not played since December 2016 due to work commitments but have recently started playing online. It's certainly improved since i last played in the sense that there's more variety in the factions i face, but i still find that close fought games are rare, I'd say 75% of the the games I've played or watched the player with the best opening will win and unless a reset is a specific part of your strategy then resets only seem to delay the inevitable.

 

The new agenda's - painted door , brotherhood, conclave and green sight don't seem to have tempted many player away from fealty and rains. painted door the 4 starting gold seems far to large a hurdle to overcome, brotherhood is interesting but only fits with Bara, and i cant say I've seen many conclave or greensight decks.

 

The forum and comments on reviews definitely seem to have died down, are people talking elsewhere? have they moved on to L5R? What's people thoughts on the game in general?

[Palpa]

Discussions moved to somewhere, yeah.

I dont think you're right (sorry!). I have a lot of close games, rarely such that are clear right from the start. There are a lot of ways to reset (Valar D even stops GJ) and I can see A LOT Red Doors. In fact, Fealty seems quite rare in the games I play and watch. Conclave, Brotherhood and Greensight, yeah, these are rare, as those are not as competitive ... But fun to play (what doesn't seem that important for some players).

In general, I think the card pool is great. No real mirrors happen. There are nice themes that can also win. The only thing that really annoyes me is Targ. Burnbrun burn, flea bottom Second Sons, burn burn burn. Neither fun to play with nor against

[GeorgeG]

yeah i think that's fair, since I've rejoined the variety of decks is definitely better,and if someones playing an interesting / fun theme then its a good game for both players. ( i recently played against a majority locations alliance deck,  think it may have had some tyrell singer characters in it to enable its shenanigans) that was cool to play against because it was novel, but its not remotely competitive since if anyone plays political disaster then its gg wp.

 

But as you say in your second point i also feel the genuinely competitive decks are not fun to play, some of the house themes are not fun or interesting either. bara kneel / dom  and NW defense are so tedious to play against, NPE doesn't even begin to describe it. i think the issue with targ burn and a flea bottom is recur-able cheap kill / claim soak. losing a 4g/5g cost character to a 1g event is not an interesting game mechanic. same goes for milk of the poppy. And as for fleabottom,having your Mil claim mitigated by jumping claim, makes redundant 1/3rd of the challenges phase.

 

What i meant but don't know how to explain better is that its a very snow bally game, early success tends to lead to a win.

[Ignithas]

The meta at the moment is pretty much Tyrell Big Chars (Rains), GJ Rains, Targ Burn (Fealty) and Martell Control (most of the time Fealty or Banner Stark). All of those decks have strong powerplays that can snowball the game hard.

 

Targ and Tyrell can field Red Door decks pretty efficiently, but I think that they are a little bit weaker than the mentioned decks. I personally think that Combo decks are competitive, but they see currently not much play. The meta is currently very hostile against attrition decks, because Nothing burns like the Cold often removes key pieces and Mace Tyrell+Renown is almost always faster. Aggro decks are also very inconsistent, because Tyrell and GJ have a lot of saves and Targ and Martell play a lot of small characters, which decreases the value of claim raise. 

[Ironswimsuit]

The card pool is in a great spot. Even novices should be able to stumble on at least a rough draft of a good deck. I don't pay much attention to whining, so I don't know if scrubs complaining about Lannister's early dominance as a foregone conclusion have moved on to other topics.  

As for the new agendas, HRD appears to be the most competitive, or at least has reasonably competent builds for most factions.  Brotherhood is almost unusable in anything but casual play. Requiring faction kneel for this is dumb. This agenda is dumb. Just for laughs try building a GJ Brotherhood deck.   Conclave is pretty weak. It might get stronger, but as the card pool stands now, removing the non-loyal requirement would increase its usage. Greensight feels more like an attachment than an agenda...and again with the faction kneel.  

[GeorgeG]

  
  

  thanks for your thoughts guys, i agree the card pool is in a pretty good spot and i agree with the sentiment that players should stop whining about prominent decks and build something better to beat them.

 

Ironswimsuit i think your analysis of the agenda is pretty spot on, HRD makes some very strong decks extremely consistent, the rest are totally missed opportunities  I'm all for giving FFG's designers the benefit of the doubt that cards are coming that make these agendas at least playable maybe even competitive but then why release them before they were ready? to carry on Twn2dn's racing analogy you wouldn't start a race with only two tires fitted and expect to win the race.

 

as Ignithas mentions the variety in terms of factions with viable decks is now pretty good, my issue is with that snowball effect. i dont have a problem with high risk and high reward plays, for example if you want to run tywin and 57 attachment cards then more power to you, my issue with these prominent decks and lanni when it was dominant is they're low risk /  high reward and pretty consistent.

 

Regarding future agendas i think there definitely space in this game for agendas that promote alternative win conditions rather than gimmicks that encourage specific deck building options.

[Serazu]

The DT should really swallow its pride and start compiling a RL.

[gramyotron]

And what additions to RL  would you like to see?

 

Most of us can agree that FB is a problem. But blocking cards along with it is too much. FB should get an errata that prohibits card to leave play by discard or  sacrafice. This would get rid of the most iritating combos. 

 

Some cards need parameter adjustments (like every terminal, except plaza, Burn -1STR) but we know this will not happen.

[Serazu]

There is no need to break a specific combo just because it's irritating/strong. Since you mentioned FB (which certainly merits a restriction), nobody suggested restricting an otherwise just ok card like the Sons for instance. FB's restriction however could well be accompanied by a staple burn card to prevent Targ from doing *everything* in their decks. Then the player will have to decide which of the two approaches to take. Same goes for the other Houses.

Back in the 1.0 days (and after all this time, I don't think you'll find many players who played both games who won't tell you that 1.0 was the better and smarter game), when a card started appearing in almost all decks, that card inevitably hit the List. Search and Detain is a prime example. Only Valar was an exception to that, but Valar is the signature card of AGoT anyway. And FB, apart from its obvious potency and combo potential, is an all too common sight.

[NikolaP]

FB could get a limit one per deck, or as gramyotron suggested prevent put character from going back to discard pile (character could enter play with text box blanked similar to The White Shadows plot).

[gramyotron]

I am all in if we talk about bringing balance to the game. However, RL does not solve problem. It gives you temporary workaround. Temporary because sooner or later another card will create unhealthly combination with broken card.

Real problem is in the card that is problematic, not in combination with cards. Thus errata is better because it fixes problem permamently. On the other hand I understand resistance from DT to such approach. How would a newbee feel when he starts playing, goes into tournament and first thing he learns is he does not know how his own card works, because somwhere on the internet is a file that changes his card's text. In a perfect world new CP would include errataed card.

 

We all would like to work out a compromise her, because consensus is impossible.