Initial Vault - Deck brainstorming

[10 men]

Ok, since the initial vault will mostly be comprised out of the decks we intend to play, we should start with those. Generally I think starting vault is one of the factors that we can improve on compared to war #2, where we had a pretty loose vault which only survived through the rounds because we got very cooperative salvages (and won a lot). For this war I would like to have a tighter starting vault that is basically comprised of two types of cards:
1) cards that are in our decks
2) "silver bullets", cards that are specific counters to some deck for when we have a good idea of what to expect from the opponent (examples: Purify vs Death/poison, Holy Light vs Death/Darkness, Reverse Time vs Immo/Nova)
That is basically the system that Team Fire used the last two wars which worked extremely well for them. (I remember from round 6 (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/index.php/topic,17055.msg232032#msg232032) that if we had had their round 5 record (5-4), we would have had to suicide 2-3 decks or so...)

Enough talk, let's get to decks:
I'll start with deck we used from last war:

Disco-Boids:

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4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vl 4vl 4vl 4vl 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 590 590 590 590 590 590 593 593 593 593 5f6 5og 5oi 5oi 61qOur matchwinner form war 2. Fast, disruptive and versatile. Plows pretty good through almost anything that isn't a rainbow, but will get problems against those.

Pandebonium:

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4vp 4vp 4vp 4vp 4vp 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 52o 52o 52o 52o 52o 52q 52q 52r 52r 52r 52r 52r 542 542Combines very good defense with the inevitability of poison damage. Weaknesses are faster non-creature based decks (such as Poison-Bolt), and probably non creature decks with healing (Sanctuary concerns me a bit, since people will play it againgst us a lot, and this deck might get the splash damage). Maybe very fast rushes too.

Mono-Entropy rush:

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4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4ve 4ve 4ve 4ve 4ve 4vf 4vf 4vf 4vf 4vf 4vi 4vi 4vl 4vl 4vl 4vl 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50uEntropy is fortunate enough to have a very respectable mono-deck. Idea is to duly play a discord on turn 2 and kill the opponent while he tries to overcome the scrambling. This variant is the one with the most brute force (did very well in The Draft ), but it is very customizeable. Maxwell's Demon and Purple Nymph are good when we don't expect a lot of CC, you can make it bigger and add one or two miser's DissShield to beat stalls.
In the beginning of the War, we can play this deck in its raw form, later we will often use it as a skeleton with mark splashes. Frequently used are:
- Darkness for Steal, Lycans and maybe Dusk Mantle
- Time for Reverse Time (against Immo, Voodoo, Nova, Buff Decks)
- Air or Aether for more CC, Fog Shield
- Gravity for Black Hole and Gravity Pull

The above decks were all played extensively last war. However we obviously can't just replay them all and expect to win. So now I'm going to post some more experimental decks. Help with testing and tweaking is appreciated.

Immocats:

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4vh 4vh 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vq 4vq 4vq 4vq 4vq 4vq 50u 52q 590 590 590 590 5c1 5c1 5f9 5f9 5f9 5f9 5fa 5fa 5fa 5ogSchrödinger Cat gives us some interesting options for deckbuilding, namely making a pillarless rush. This here is pretty much the fastest possible version. It has no disruption though, so it will lose if the opponents packs some cheap CC.

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4vh 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vl 4vl 4vl 4vq 4vq 4vq 4vq 4vq 4vq 55u 5c1 5c1 5f6 5f9 5f9 5f9 5f9 5f9 5fa 5fa 5fa 5fc 5ogTherefore, adding some Discords is tempting. However, with Entropy mark you just can't get away with playing Graboids anymore, so it's slower.

Speedbow:

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4sa 4sa 4sa 4sa 4sa 4vh 4vh 4vi 4vi 4vi 4vi 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vl 4vl 4vl 590 590 590 5c1 5c1 5f6 5f6 5og 5og 61qI tried to get this deck into War 2 and I still think it's good. Fast, disruptive and with a lot of control.

Sanctemonium:

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4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vi 4vi 4vn 4vn 4vn 4vn 4vp 4vp 4vp 4vp 4vp 4vp 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 5li 5li 5li 5li 5li 5li 5lm 5lm 5lm 5lm 5lm 5lmThis is a pretty nice deckout idea. Sanctuary and Miracles provide Healing throughout the game while Panda clears the board.

Firestall:

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4vg 4vg 4vp 4vp 4vp 4vp 4vp 4vp 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 5f4 5f4 5f4 5f4 5f4 5f4 5f6 5f6 5f7 5f7Panda and Bolts clear the board and DissShield can lock up the game, while Fahren + Bolts finish the opponent. Being able to actually kill the opponent with damage is useful for a stall, and with Fire it doesn't take up a lot of slots.

Skull Shield stall:

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4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vf 4vf 4vi 4vi 4vi 4vn 4vn 4vn 4vn 4vn 4vn 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 52l 52l 52l 52l 52l 52q 52q 52s 52sSkull Shield and Antimatter have some nice synergy, as AMd creatures get ignored by the shield. Deck still needs a lot of testing, especially if more damage is needed and if Aflas are useful.

Aether stall:

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4vc 4vc 4vc 4vp 4vp 500 500 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 61q 61t 61t 61t 61t 61t 61t 61u 61u 61v 61v 621 621This can stall with both quinted Nymphs and DimShield Chain. Both deckout and beatdown with immortal creatures is possible.

Voodoos:

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4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vf 4vf 4vf 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vl 4vl 4vl 55t 55t 55t 55t 595 595 595 595 595 595 5f6 5v0 5v0 5v0 5v0Voodoos are pretty good against everything without RTs that isn't too fast.

Hmm, ok, I probably forgot a few decks here. 

Anyway I'd be grateful for sharing test results, tweaks or some entirely new ideas I've overlooked.

Random links:
War#1 - card usage stats (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/index.php/topic,13943.0.html)
Antagons tips, old but interesting (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/index.php/topic,7419.0.html)
War #2 deck archive (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/index.php/topic,19439.0.html)

[Shantu]

I will see if I can come up with some decks tomorrow.

[BluePriest]

The nice thing about the new and improved trainer is that we get the chance to test our decks against the deck types we think we will see the most.

[BluePriest]

Im testing the decks against ai3s starting with discoboids and keeping track of my wins and reasons for losses https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?hl=it&key=tKiGowZgYZxUHGvgKZiVLQg&hl=it#gid=0 that way we can understand what the decks are good and bad against. If the loss falls into more than one catagory I mark more than one.  The better understanding of or decks we can get the better chance we will have.

Also, note that I know that it is all pretty subjective, but the more information the better. We will hopefully be able to get some info from it.

[Shantu]

Testing decks in the trainer is nice, but sadly the AI is still stupid. You might win a game in trainer that otherwise you would have lost.

[BluePriest]

I have currently just been testing against ai3 (none trainer) disco boids is brutal. Does anyone think there would be harm in testing it in pvp1? That way it can be tested against actual humans, or is there concern about the decks leaking out if that is done?

[Shantu]

It's a known deck, and testing it in pvp1 shouldn't be a problem. The chance of meeting people from the opposing teams is very low. Even then, you can say it's your usual pvp1 stomper deck.

[10 men]

Im testing the decks against ai3s starting with discoboids and keeping track of my wins and reasons for losses https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?hl=it&key=tKiGowZgYZxUHGvgKZiVLQg&hl=it#gid=0 that way we can understand what the decks are good and bad against.

Yes, very good, that's one of the reasons I made this thread. Testing the decks, finding out which cards are pulling their weight (and which aren't), if the quanta balance is right, what cards they lose to. Also you can find out which decks you enjoy playing. In the first rounds, matchups are relatively random, so you might as well play a deck you like there.

Some additions to the OP:
The good thing about the Entropy mark Immocats is that you can also play RT in that deck. Useful in a lot of matchups.

I'll also add some lists for the Entropy rush+splash x decks:
Darkness:

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4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vd 4vf 4vf 4vf 4vh 4vh 4vh 4vh 4vh 4vl 4vl 4vl 500 50u 50u 50u 5up 5up 5up
Time:

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4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4vd 4vd 4ve 4ve 4ve 4ve 4vf 4vf 4vf 4vl 4vl 4vl 5rk 5rk 5rk 5rk
Gravity:

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4vc 4vc 4vc 4vc 4ve 4ve 4ve 4ve 4ve 4ve 4vl 4vl 4vl 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 55t 55t 55t 55t 55t 55v 55v 55v 55v
You can use those lists as starting points in your testing.

[Shantu]

I took the skull shield deck for a few games. I really like it. However:
 - Sometimes I get very slow starts (2 pillars, for example). This could mean death against fast immo decks or novagrabbies.
 - Aflas, while fun, are barely useful. They are very slow to come out. I'd rather have some poisons or another arsenic in their place. Or dragons.
 - Death quanta is very tight in the first few turns. Denial could stop the deck with ease.

[BluePriest]

Disco-Boids is an insane pvp deck. I havent lost a single match with it and thats even when the desynch screwed me over by letting the opponent play 2 dragons and 2 hematite golems turn 3, and then healing himself all the way back up to full health on the 5th turn.

edit
lost my first match against scarab swarm. Too hard to put out creatures since the CC was so powerful and burrowed graboids got out healed by jade staff. It was still pretty close, but it was a loss

[BluePriest]

Im convinced (although I stopped recording fast  I still played with it mroe) that discoboids only real weakness is scarab swarm. Testing  Pandabonium so far. Not having good luck The one game I won I faced a purify and got down to my final card when the opponent had only 1 hp left. Way too close. Then I fought a healing rainbow deck, and then a life rush that outhealed me (and I got no pandemoniums, when down to 11 cards left)

Pandebonium is giving me a good run... All the battles have been real close and really could have gone any way.

[DSSCRA]

Im convinced (although I stopped recording fast  I still played with it mroe) that discoboids only real weakness is scarab swarm. Testing  Pandabonium so far. Not having good luck The one game I won I faced a purify and got down to my final card when the opponent had only 1 hp left. Way too close. Then I fought a healing rainbow deck, and then a life rush that outhealed me (and I got no pandemoniums, when down to 11 cards left)

Pandebonium is giving me a good run... All the battles have been real close and really could have gone any way.

What teams do you think can/will build scarab swarm.