Author Topic: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread  (Read 150761 times)

Mеа

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Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #450 on: August 18, 2016, 10:34:22 PM »
A friend and I are getting back into yugioh after like years, except there's only one card shop in the area and no one plays there :v
But apparently it's a pretty nice place and community so I plan on going this weekend or so to visit and, idk, ask someone how to actually play pokemon or something.
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commandercool

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Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #451 on: August 18, 2016, 10:50:39 PM »
I have a buddy who plays Yu Gi Oh who I've been pestering to explain the metagame to me and it sounds like a fucking mess. Lot of crazy, craaaazy stuff going on there that frankly doesn't sound like any fun at all. I don't think I could ever stand behind a game where restricting a card to less copies counts as game balance. That's crazy. It just makes draws more random (I'm aware Weiss Schwarz does that, but I couldn't really see myself ever playing it competitively for that reason among others).

Edit: Wait, Weiss Schwarz doesn't do that, does it? Don't they have that weird restricted list where some cards can't be played with other cards? Or do they also have restricted cards? I forget.
« Last Edit: August 18, 2016, 11:22:54 PM by commandercool »
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Mеа

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Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #452 on: August 18, 2016, 11:44:02 PM »
Guess that's what happens when you a card game that's always been an anime/show before being a card game. Kind of like the main pokemon games that is an (nintendo) rpg before being a competitive gam. Or, you know, freaking smash.

Not sure what you mean by limiting cards making draws more random. Personally playing magic felt more random from the some I've played, what with the times when you draw mana terrain cards for like 3 turns in a row. From what I understand from talking to people who actually play magic, it's really about striking that balance so you (statistically, at least) aren't in that sort of situation. What with limited mana resources and mana costs, balancing the card types, mtg strikes me as a very economical game, and more strategy as opposed to tactics. Which, isn't necessarily my cup of tea since I don't like having to manage those 'outside' resources, similar to why I would prefer fire emblem as opposed to, say, age of empires.

Going back to the draws thing, yugioh has a way of just getting what you need out of the deck with lots of searchers. With the way the more powerful cards work, most of them stay in the extra deck, that is, outside the actual draw pile. Most archetypical strategies revolve around good 'low cost', flexible monsters that have convenient effects for calling out more of such mons or getting some anchor card out of the deck and then using those mons or cards to bring out the actual powerful, strategically pivotal monsters from the external, extra deck. This is what makes things quite a clusterfuck since some decks can literally use up half the deck in a single turn.
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MatsuriSakuragi

Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #453 on: August 18, 2016, 11:47:57 PM »
From what I've heard, Yugioh has become the most obnoxiously convoluted, broken mess over the years. I remember when the game was simple. Those were the days. :(

commandercool

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Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #454 on: August 19, 2016, 12:04:44 AM »
Not sure what you mean by limiting cards making draws more random.

If there's only one copy of a card in your deck you're going to draw it much less often. If the reason a card is limited to one is because it's too powerful, that means it's not going to come up often, but when it does it's a huge bonus because it's de facto better than cards that you're allowed to play full copies of. That creates very swingy games where if you get lucky and draw a few super powerful cards you get a big advantage. And if those cards are just auto-include utility cards, which I'm told Yu Gi Oh does have as one-ofs, then you're creating a game where whoever draws their free one-sided board wipe more often is just going to have an edge on their opponent that's based on nothing but random chance.

Granted you can mitigate that some with a ton of card searching, but most games (Magic, Pokemon) more or less agree at this point that card searching is not healthy. If you can just search for whatever card you want whenever you want then you're not really playing a game with random elements anymore, and card games aren't typically built to be sustainable if they're not random. It leads to too many combo wins and lockouts. So you can fix the problem of your super-powerful cards only showing up occasionally at random... by introducing another large problem into your game. It's just bad design. If a card is too good, get rid of it. Making it less likely to be drawn only fixes the problem if the only way the card is good is in multiples, and even then it doesn't really full fix it.
I made a PADHerder. It's probably out of date though.

MatsuriSakuragi

Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #455 on: August 19, 2016, 01:13:05 AM »
Just saying, the MtG combo decks that do nothing but goldfish and search as non-interactively as possible for their win pieces are the most fucking boring as shit decks to play against. Having some degree of randomness and chance and strategy is what makes the game fun and interactive - - meanwhile decks that do nothing but search without interacting is rage-inducing and discouraging. For example, the Jeskai Ascendancy combo is a golden example of this. The winning combo goes off on turn 2 and the other player does nothing but sit and watch while the player comboes off for TEN MINUTES.

Mеа

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Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #456 on: August 19, 2016, 01:36:09 AM »
Ah that's what was meant, thanks you two. I do agree with those points, and also that sentiment of boring-as-ass is shared in the ygo community, they call those 'solitaire' decks. I wonder if it's a term used by trading card games in general(?)
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MatsuriSakuragi

Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #457 on: August 19, 2016, 02:57:10 AM »
Oh yeah, it's a common snark in MtG as well. "Dude, your deck is so non-interactive you may as well be playing Solitaire."

Me? I prefer either straight-up in-your-fucking-face aggro decks or completely disruptive aggro-control decks-- nothing that stops the opponent from being able to play (Mindslaver lock aside, but that's only if they choose to not scoop, which is their own damn fault)-- but enough to be frustrating to play against.

Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #458 on: August 19, 2016, 04:19:39 PM »
don't a lot of the uninteractive combo decks in Modern get hit with the banstick precisely because they're unfun and unbalanced (see: Birthing Pod, Summer Bloom, Shoal Infect, EGGS)

and Legacy lets you pretty much kill any combo with Force of Will/Cranial Extraction

commandercool

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Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #459 on: August 19, 2016, 04:51:48 PM »
Yeah, and Wizards doesn't really try to support solitaire combos. They've been gradually nerfing tutors for a long time and avoiding printing stuff like Storm. Mark Rosewater has something he calls the "Storm scale" which measures how likely a mechanic is to ever see print again from a score of 10 (Flying, definitely going to be re-used constantly) to 1 (Storm, never going to be used in a core product ever again no matter what).

In Legacy as far as I know (I do not play Legacy) combo is still an extremely important archetype since they can bring their own Forces and Misdirections and shit to technically interact, but only to keep their engine from ever being touched. In Legacy a combo has to be able to win very quickly, but a lot of decks can totally do that.

Have you guys seen the combo that's apparently a thing in Standard right now? I hear Demonic Pact+Harmless Offering is seeing legit play and even top-eighting some events. And by most standards that is not a good combo since neither card is really playable on its own (although Pact can at least close out games) and you don't win instantly or early, but that just goes to show how viable even terrible combos are and how badly they've been nerfed if people are willing to play this mess.
I made a PADHerder. It's probably out of date though.

MatsuriSakuragi

Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #460 on: August 19, 2016, 10:17:46 PM »
Harmless Pact is a really touchy, fragile combo that takes a long time to pull off. If your opponent has any way of stopping it, you lose. In practice, it's really not that good unless you are super good at piloting the deck and luck out with enough kill spells to keep you alive.

Legacy and Vintage seem to be the most asinine, stupid formats in all of Magic. Decks cost anywhere from $1,000 to like $20,000, for games that don't tend to last more than 3 or 4 turns at the longest because they're completely uninteractive and just tutor up the win condition on turn 1 or 2. So you're basically spending a ton of money on a format that doesn't even have any Wizards-sanctioned events (and in fact, they refuse to print anything on a "reserve" list anyway because people will get pissy if their precious cards lose value, never mind that it's a fucking *game*), for games that aren't even... games. At least Modern is regulated so that combos that can win before turn 4 are banned.

I think Wizards should have more people on board who are actually aware of the metagames of formats that are not Standard, because they don't even seem to be remotely aware of some of the broken-ass shit that they can put out that's fairly innocuous in Standard, but game-breaking in more eternal formats.

commandercool

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Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #461 on: August 19, 2016, 10:38:10 PM »
It's an established fact that Wizards doesn't really consider eternal formats when balancing sets. They don't want to be constrained in design and it's very likely that they would just as soom see those formats killed off so they can funnel players into formats with non-insurmountable barriers to entry.
I made a PADHerder. It's probably out of date though.

MatsuriSakuragi

Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #462 on: August 19, 2016, 11:32:03 PM »
While Legacy and Vintage are more or less dead formats, Wizards would be stupid to not realize that Modern as an eternal format is absolutely massive-- and it doesn't take much to just stop and consider "hey, maybe this card we're making is completely busted in this format, maybe we should at least ban it in Modern so it doesn't get abused". Or something like that.


Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #463 on: August 27, 2016, 04:53:38 AM »
While Legacy and Vintage are more or less dead formats, Wizards would be stupid to not realize that Modern as an eternal format is absolutely massive-- and it doesn't take much to just stop and consider "hey, maybe this card we're making is completely busted in this format, maybe we should at least ban it in Modern so it doesn't get abused". Or something like that.
I think new cards are taken into consideration on some level, as the explanation for Birthing Pod getting hit with the banstick was "it puts a hard limit on what kinds of creatures can be made", and they admitted they considered the potential interactions with Eye of Ugin when making OGW but had no idea it would become so degenerate

Anyway, I played a Conspiracy 2 draft tonight. Attempted a blue-black flyers deck, got completely destroyed because I got caught up in an arms race with one other player and left myself completely open to getting hit by a huge army of creatures

MatsuriSakuragi

Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #464 on: August 31, 2016, 06:47:57 PM »
New announcements!

https://www.mtggoldfish.com/articles/amonkhet-nicol-bolas-modern-masters-2017-and-product-announcements

- The new block coming after Kaladesh/Aether Revolt is the Egyptian-themed Amonkhet and Hour of Devastation block! Looks super cool.

- Unsurprisingly, Chandra is the lead Planeswalker of Kaladesh. That art tho :*

- MODERN MASTERS 2017 [potential] SNAPCASTER MAGE, LILIANA OF THE VEIL, CAVERN OF SOULS REPRINTS GET HYPE

also some commander/archenemy/dual deck stuff idc about really
« Last Edit: August 31, 2016, 06:54:03 PM by Matsuri »

commandercool

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Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #465 on: August 31, 2016, 07:20:01 PM »
FINALLY MY FUCKING MUMMIES! Come to me mummies, I have waited so long for you. I don't care what the fuck a legendary mummy does, I will build a deck around it. So fucking excited.

Weird that Commander Anthology is four decks since a wave is five. The obvious contents are the first wave of commander decks and I guess just dropping out the least popular one, whichever that was?
I made a PADHerder. It's probably out of date though.

Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #466 on: August 31, 2016, 08:01:05 PM »
FINALLY MY FUCKING MUMMIES! Come to me mummies, I have waited so long for you. I don't care what the fuck a legendary mummy does, I will build a deck around it. So fucking excited.

Weird that Commander Anthology is four decks since a wave is five. The obvious contents are the first wave of commander decks and I guess just dropping out the least popular one, whichever that was?

Commander Anthology is going to be one deck from each wave, so it looks like it's Kaalia (WBR) from 2011/Derevi (GWB) from 2013/Freyalise (G) from 2014/Meren (GB) from 2015

Jq1790

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Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #467 on: September 01, 2016, 02:50:02 PM »
Yesterday was interesting and I actually have a relevant post for here, go figure.

I dont collect Magic or any other card games atm(fighting the urge to start MtG because I KNOW what moneysinks TCGs are) but I was hanging out with a friend who does and he picked up a box of Conspiracy for him, myself, and his brother to play with.  First time in a draft environment and it was actually pretty interesting.  If I get to playing for real I think I def wanna do some stuff with either W/G together or B...er, U, excuse me(if I call blue "B" and black "D" how much trouble would I get in? *looks at ccool pointedly for a moment*).  I could see some interesting synergy with the mass spawning of white soldiers and the  powerful buffs green has if that set is an indication of how stuff normally winds up for those colors.  The time I had a heavy blue focus was amusing though because I got a bunch of denial spells and blocked like 3 spells in one (opponent) turn.  (well I think one of em was actually CALLED Denial, too, but that's besides the point.)

All in all while I won exactly zero of the three games we had time for it was a lot of fun.
« Last Edit: September 01, 2016, 02:55:44 PM by Jq1790 »
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commandercool

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Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #468 on: September 01, 2016, 02:57:03 PM »
I bought a Conspiracy 2 box with the intent to draft it soon. Hopefully in a couple weeks. Looks like a blast.

And I know I shouldn't really encourage people to get into Magic if they don't want to, but of people play Commander in your area it can be extremely cheap to get into...
I made a PADHerder. It's probably out of date though.

Jq1790

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Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #469 on: September 01, 2016, 03:02:14 PM »
Ah yeah I kniw exactly what Id start with if I did Commander as well since said friend in an earlier visit lent me an esper burn/heal deck(modded form of the Eternal Bargain deck I believe?) that I found pretty fun so I could see myself doing something with that if I went the Commander route.

Also dont feel bad if you try to encourage.  I mean, Im posting in a thread for players, of course that's gonna be a thing, haha.

Also while Im here...If I did decide to get into NON commander, what is the general opinion on the Deckbuilder's Toolkit boxes?  Theyve looked neat to me but I wonder if theyre actually crap or something so I wanted to ask here for opinions since if theyre ok I might start with that just to have a solid baseline to jump off from.
« Last Edit: September 01, 2016, 03:08:19 PM by Jq1790 »
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commandercool

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Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #470 on: September 01, 2016, 03:07:05 PM »
While individual Commander decks can be very cheap (one player in our group has a hard line rule against playing any deck that cost more than $30 and he has several of the best decks in our metagame) the danger is the slippery slope of building a ton of decks. I had to set a limit of six decks for myself, but at times I've had ten or more going and the expenses can add up.

Buying a preconstructed Commander deck and modifying it is a great way to start though. And if you keep an eye out you can see them for sale at grocery stores for as low as $20 as part of weird clearance repackaged products.
I made a PADHerder. It's probably out of date though.

Jq1790

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Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #471 on: September 01, 2016, 03:22:11 PM »
Ah, so it's just like when I was doing YuGiOh.  I used to see similar things and took advantage here and there woth the discounted stuff if I knew it had stuff I needed.  Cool to know Magic does the same at times.  Wonder if Target or Walmart also do that like with YGO...
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commandercool

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Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #472 on: September 01, 2016, 03:55:20 PM »
Target definitely does, and they have exclusive repacks. Although they tend to be bsd deals with just a few trash-tier theme decks and low-value promos. Meijer tends to get the good ones, like Commander decks with sll of the dice snd oversized cards stripped out plus a theme deck and some promos for $20. Couldn't tell you about Wal-Mart.
I made a PADHerder. It's probably out of date though.

MatsuriSakuragi

Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #473 on: September 01, 2016, 06:41:49 PM »
The Deckbuilder Toolbox is... honestly, it's a bunch of bulk. Which is fine if you want to play casually, but if you want to play non-Commander in Constructed formats like Standard or Modern, they're a waste of money. It's almost always better to buy singles for building decks-- and in most cases, singles for the most part usually aren't going to cost more than $1 a piece. In fact, for a lot of decks in Standard, the money is focused in maybe 10-15 of the 75 cards.

That said, you can build pretty nifty budget decks for either format, too. There's a lot of solid budget decks to be built in Modern that are really no more than top-tier decks with some of the extremely expensive cards replaced for cheaper options. In fact, my  Affinity deck (aka super cheap robot synergy) probably doesn't cost more than $100 all told and I've come in 1st at Friday Night Magic with it. I'm personally a big fan of SaffronOlive's Budget Magic series for ideas and decklists. He posts decks for both Modern and Standard, so you can choose whichever format you'd like. And the list is huge-- there's something for every kind of play style. That said, keep in mind that Standard is a rotating format and is going to rotate again at the end of the month, so a lot of the Standard decks you'll find will have cards that aren't Standard-legal anymore. Modern is an eternal format though, so any deck you find is fair game (unless there's something listed that has been banned since then, but Modern bans are not that common.)

Modern's the format I play the most because it's the format with the most room for deckbuilding and thus the most budget options. You'll get a more "fair" game out of Standard due to it being a more strict format, but your card pool is super limited in comparison.

If you were interested in Modern, though, I'll suggest these decks for you to look at:
8-Whack - Super-hyper aggressive Goblin deck in which 90% of the non-budget version's cost is in 4 cards (4x Goblin Guide). The budget version is basically the exact same deck without them. Granted, you won't have the same early-game hits without them, but unless you're being really competitive I'd say you can find much cheaper options. This deck is explosively good and can put up a fight against the best of decks. I want to build it myself someday.

Black-White Tokens - This is kind of the equivalent of what Green-White Tokens is in Standard. Lots of tokens being dumped on the board, enchantments that boost them all. Of course, you can build the same concept with green cards instead of black, should you want some green pump spells instead.

Mono-blue Faeries - I make no secret of being a huge fan of Faeries in Magic. It's the perfect mix of aggressive play (note: all creatures in this deck are flying, so you'll often swing for unblockable damage) and control. I don't have the time right now to sit and explain all of the delightful mechanics, but watch the deck tech video for some more details. I love this deck and own it myself.

Tempered Steel Affinity - This is the Affinity deck I mentioned earlier that took me to 1st place before at FNM. I do like the deck a lot, but honestly I think 8-Whack is the better choice overall.

Turbo Fog Tutelage - This is a combo/mill deck. It's a pretty fun alternate win condition that's also a total troll deck for anyone who plays creatures to win. It doesn't do very well against decks that don't, however...

Zombie Hunt - The epitome of BUDGET. This is an combo-aggro deck that literally has 54 lands. Play Treasure Hunt to fill your hand, and play Zombie Infestation to discard all of those lands to replace them with an army of 2/2 zombies. It's a fun casual deck that is prone to MASSIVE blowouts. You will either win hard or lose hard. Mostly lose hard. But still, it's hilarious.

The next few are actual competitive decks that have expensive cards that can be replaced with less effective but still valid options.

Bogles - aka Aura Hexproof. This is essentially "Build a Monster: The Deck". Drop the expensive lands for cheaper ones and you've essentially cut the price of the deck in 1/3 of what it was. I wouldn't suggest cutting much else, though. But basically you play a small Hexproof creature and build it up with a bunch of strengthening enchantments. Since it's Hexproof, they can't kill it with targeted removal spells, and you're free to just stomp their faces in.

Soul Sisters - My personal pet deck and my main competitive deck. Drop the expensive lands (they are NOT vital). Still a little pricey for a budget deck, but it's delightful. Lots of lifegain and destructive power.

Stompy - The purest form of Green aggro. Cheap and competitive, you don't really need to drop anything.

Elves - More fun Green aggro, but revolves more around strength in numbers than pump spells. Drop the expensive lands and it's pretty damned cheap after that.






commandercool

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Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #474 on: September 01, 2016, 07:02:00 PM »
One of my roommates works at a comic book store and is a huge proponent of Deckbuilder's Toolkits. He's always convincing new players to buy those over theme decks. They're certainly not the most efficient possible use of resources, but if you want a variety of cards to experiment with there are definitely worse choices (like theme decks, which are usually pretty terrible).

Honestly for casual and new players I recommend the Commander decks even if you don't intend to play Commander. They contain TONS of rares, a huge variety of cards, and some really interesting effects. They do tend toward being slightly complicated, but shaving one of those down to a 60-card deck will give you much more bang for your buck than buying a theme deck and a few packs.
I made a PADHerder. It's probably out of date though.

Jq1790

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Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #475 on: September 01, 2016, 07:18:47 PM »
Seems I'll have some looking to do if I do decide to go in on this stuff now that I have all this info here.  Thanks for the input you two!
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MatsuriSakuragi

Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #476 on: September 01, 2016, 08:17:54 PM »
Intro packs are total garbage, yeah.

Give XMage a try! It's a free Magic Online simulator that lets you build and play any deck in any format with other people. Lots of people use it for playtesting before buying decks or taking them to tournaments.


Jq1790

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Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #477 on: September 01, 2016, 11:32:32 PM »
Any chance the MtG contingent here uses it too just for online playing?  I know a lot is likely lost in the move to digital but I figure maybe I can use someone here as a training partner if I decide to take the plunge sometime.
If you're a Pazudora player and aren't on #puzzleandlibrarians, come join us!

MatsuriSakuragi

Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #478 on: September 02, 2016, 01:37:54 AM »
I play it every so often. Poke me on Skype or something sometime.

PX

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Re: Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread
« Reply #479 on: September 02, 2016, 04:33:53 AM »
Bought two boxes of Love Live DX2. Opened up 2 Hanayo signed cards D:
Overall I got great value pulls from them though lol
« Last Edit: September 02, 2016, 04:55:08 AM by PX »