Project: Countering Life's enemies from War #4

[drolly]

So far I'm a bit clueless about where to begin with vault planning. Because I don't have many original Life deck ideas ready, I crawled through the archives of War #4 to collect decks which defeated Life back then. If we can't defeat a deck with our vault, this could indicate that we are missing necessary decks - well, the information we get out of this can be a little outdated, of course ...

This post is also meant to stimulate vault building activity - if you think this is the wrong way, tell me. If you want, you can help by loading the decks into the trainer and try to fill out the templates below.

So far I've not done very much and have only been using will's first deck list. The decks I'm afraid of most are the ones with Discord.

(TheForbiddenOracle) - Round 1
Grabbow + Ragepots

by TheForbiddenOracle

Hover over cards for details, click for permalink

Deck import code : [Select]

4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 590 590 590 590 590 5f0 5f0 5f0 5f0 5f0 5f6 5f6 5fb 5fb 5fb 5fb 5fb 5fb 5gi 5ia 5og 71a 74e 7ds 8pm

Won against: Cockatrice + Poison
Best counter: AdrenaTitans
Other counter: PUgons
Counters with luck involved: Nature's Wrath (Phoenixes get ragepotted), Frogtal from Hell, Shockwave Dragons
(PlayerOa) - Round 2
Pandebonium

by PlayerOa

Hover over cards for details, click for permalink

Deck import code : [Select]

4vp 4vp 4vp 4vp 4vp 4vp 52g 52g 52g 52g 52g 52g 52o 52o 52o 52o 52o 52o 52q 52r 52r 52r 52r 542 542 542 542 542 71a 71a 71b 8pj

Won against: Cockatrice + Poison
Best counter: Frogtal
Other counters: AdrenaTitans, Stoned Dragons (with right strategy)
Counters with luck involved: Nature's Wrath, AdrenaGhosts
(bogtro) - Round 2
PUgons Earth Version

by bogtro

Hover over cards for details, click for permalink

Deck import code : [Select]

58r 58r 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 61q 61q 61q 61q 61r 61r 61r 61r 61t 61t 61t 61t 6rk 77b 77b 8pu

Won against: Winged Life Rush
Counter:
(Jappert) - Round 2
Winged Toadfish + CC from Air

by Jappert

Hover over cards for details, click for permalink

Deck import code : [Select]

5i4 5i4 5i4 5i4 5i4 5i4 5i4 5i8 5i8 5i8 5id 5id 5ie 5ie 5ie 5ie 5ie 5jm 5jm 5jm 5jm 5jm 5jm 5jm 5ol 5ol 5on 5on 7n0 7n0 7n8 7n8 7n8 7n8 8pr

Won against: Frogtal
Best counter: Nature's Wrath (Ragepots for Toadfish, Deflags for OE)
Other counter: PUgons (Lightnings)
Counter with luck involved: AdrenaTitans (Titans can be defeated by Freeze + Shockwave or mass poison)
(suxerz) - Round 2
Light/Aether Duo

by suxerz

Hover over cards for details, click for permalink

Deck import code : [Select]

5la 5la 5li 5mq 5mq 5mq 5mq 5mq 5mq 5mq 5mq 5mq 5mq 5mq 5mq 5mq 5mq 5mq 61q 61r 61r 61r 61t 61t 61t 61t 61t 622 6rk 7ju 7ju 8pu

Won against: Mono Life + Reverse Time
Best counters: PUgons (Silences), Frogtal
Other counter: AdrenaTitans (Beware of PUs! Cast Adrenaline only to win, only animate Titans if they can be replaced immediately.)
(PoLdeR) - Round 2
Discord Grabbow

by PoLdeR

Hover over cards for details, click for permalink

Deck import code : [Select]

4vh 4vh 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vl 4vl 4vl 50u 50u 50u 50u 50u 590 590 590 590 590 590 5c1 5og 5og 61q 61q 74f 7dm 7dm 8pm

Won against: Adrenaline Grabbow
Best counter: Shockwave Dragons with Wings
Other counter: Helston's Novabow (still requires some luck)
Counters with luck involved: Nature's Wrath, AdrenaTitans
(Sevs) - Round 3
Earth Firestall

by Sevs

Hover over cards for details, click for permalink

Deck import code : [Select]

594 594 594 594 594 594 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5f4 5f4 5f4 5f4 5f4 5f7 5f7 5fb 5fb 5fb 5fb 5fb 5fb 77c 77c 7dk 8po

Won against: MitoDragons, Staves and Dim Shields
Best counter: AdrenaTitans
Other counter: Frogtal from hell
Possibly additional counters: Scorpion firestall, XL version of Stoned Dragons
Counter with luck involved: PUgons
(Odii Odsen) - Round 3
Bonebolt with Fractal Mummies

by Odii Odsen

Hover over cards for details, click for permalink

Deck import code : [Select]

52o 52o 52o 52o 52q 52r 52r 52r 52r 61q 61q 61q 61q 61q 622 622 63a 63a 63a 63a 63a 63a 63a 63a 63a 63a 63a 71a 71d 71d 8pk

Won against: Cloaked Adrenapires
Best counter: AdrenaTitans
Other counter: Frogtal
Counters with luck involved: PUgons (Lightnings), AdrenaGhosts (if opponent runs out of Lightnings)
(Calindu) - Round 3
Charged Grabbow

by Calindu

Hover over cards for details, click for permalink

Deck import code : [Select]

4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 55k 55k 55k 55k 55l 55t 55t 55t 576 576 576 576 590 590 590 590 590 590 5og 61q 61q 745 745 745 8pm

Won against: Healing Firestall
Counters: Nature's Wrath, PUgons

[willng3]

Nice work taking the initiative to do this.  I managed to do quite a few test runs on Pandebonium myself:

Pandebonium:
Nature's Wrath - 5-5:  Based on luck.
-Really dependent on how soon the opponent is able to play Arsenics/Bone Walls and a)  If you can Deflag Arsenic quickly and b)  If you can play Druidic Staff quickly enough to resist Poison damage.  Still can't decide if it's better to burst with Phoenixes or hold off on playing them until Bone Wall chaining stops.  Deck out wins appear to be common victory methods.

AdrenaTitans - 7-3:  Somewhat reliable counter.
-Somewhat of an iffy match-up based on RNG; Pandemoniums TUing or RTing Titans are about the only things that give the opponent a chance to win.  This might be more consistent with Heals instead of G-Pulls.

PUgons (Lightnings) - 2-8:  Not a counter.
(Silences) - 1-9:  Not a counter.
-Not surprised by these results; Bone Wall and Poison basically perfectly counter this deck.  I'd never consider using these against Death unless their Vault was really dwindling though.

Frogtal - 9-1:  Hard counter.
-Expected.  I built this Frogtal variant to take care of decks like Pandebonium and Bonebolt.

AdrenaGhosts - 4-6:  Counter with luck
-Surprised by this outcome.  Basically, if the opponent runs out of Bone Walls then you're safe.

Shockwave Dragons - 2-8:  Not a counter
-Basically the same problems as with PUgons.  Wings instead of Carapaces would probably help a lot though.

Stoned Dragons - 6-4:  Counter with skill/luck involved
-Okay, so the first two duels were sort of experimental which means beating me was much easier.  However, after I learned how to play the deck properly it became much easier to win.  Basically if you play ONE Adren'd Dragon and no more until the opponent has either used all their Pandemoniums or they're clearly not going to be able to make a comeback against you, your chances of victory are increased significantly.  You'll need to keep your as high as possible minus the one Dragon to Stone Skin yourself to a healthy HP range.  Early Druidic Staffs help tremendously.

I wouldn't run test runs on the Scorpion Firestall unless you feel it's absolutely necessary; it was more of a deck built on spare parts that I expected to go into the Vault than anything else.

[Helston]

Accidentally skipped the earth PUgon and went straight to the next one
Winged Toadfish + CC from Air:

Nature's Wrath 9-1*. Hard Counter
Ignored the ice dragons and rage potted the toadfish at every chance I got. Deflagged Owl's Eye over Fog to win by out-stalling.

PUgons (Lightnings) 7-3*. Counter with skill/luck.
Was occasionally able to win the rush, but most of the time I had to sit behind dim shields and hope to burst them down. Playing against a human may have made things trickier. As a side note, I reckon this deck could do with a little extra aether quanta generation, I almost never had enough of it, even towards the end of matches.

PUgons (Silences) 1-9*. Not a counter.
Getting rid of the toadfish seem to make all the difference. It's easy enough to handle fog shield or toadfish, but not the two together.

I also did some testing using a 2/11 pillar/pend split, and it worked much better in both cases.

PUgons (Lightnings, mod) 9-1*. A good counter.
I'm very surprised how well this worked compared to the others. I haven't tried to fine tune it, but I feel the quanta flow is much better in this version and really allows this deck to burst.

PUgons(Silences, mod) 6-4. Based on luck.
Again, I'm surprised how well this worked compared to the other silence deck.

Frogtal 3-7. Not a counter
No surprises here. Probably would've been at least 2-8 against a human, but silences gave me an extra win or two.

Adrenatitans 7-3. Somewhat reliable counter.
Turns out RTs aren't the only CC that can bother Titans. Ice Bolt + Shockwave is still an instant kill, and for the first time ever I saw a titan run out of health, thanks to 7 poison counters and adrenaline.

Adrenaghosts 2-8. Not a counter.
Wings, 'nuff said.

Shockwave dragons 3-7*. Not a counter.
A combination of fog shield, high attack creatures and Owl's Eyes' persistent 5 damage per turn and what always seemed to be enough CC to handle any dragons was just too much to handle. Wins came only with a couple of early dragons and a slow start from the AI.

Stoned dragons 6-4*. Based on luck.
It all seemed to depend on whether or not I could hold off playing stone skins until ~50 quanta. Once I had that much it was a simply a matter of bursting with a few dragons. Also had the chance to deck the AI out a few times, but that's based on the coinflip.


*Replaced wings in opponents' decks with useless pillars as the AI played smarter without it (wasting air quanta, replacing fog shield with wings).

[drolly]

Wow, I didn't expect so much response. Thank you for supporting the project!

I've done my most dreaded enemy, the Discord Grabbow:

Nature's Wrath: 5-5. Purely luck-based.
Wou win if you can put down a Phoenix before Discord comes. Healing can stall quite a bit.

PUgons: 1-4. Not a counter.
You lose if Discord comes early or if your shield gets deflagged.

Frogtal: 0-5. Not a counter.
Too slow for Discord, shields get exploded. Novas make it hard to time Silences.

AdrenaTitans: 5-5. Luck-based.
You win if you can get out the whole combo before your opponent plays Discord. A Gravity Pull will give you a 2-turn stall, which can be quite handy.

AdrenaGhosts: 0-5. Not a counter.
All your creatures can be killed by Lightning, Eternity is useless, Discord slows you down, Black Hole destroys you, Fog Shield absorbs much of your damage. Loss even with a good draw.

Shockwave Dragons: 0-5. Not a counter.
Discord after < 4 turns equals auto-loss. Otherwise you'll get outrushed even with so much CC.

Stoned Dragons: 3-7. Luck-based with low odds for you.
Play according to will's suggestions. If you get out a dragon with Adrenaline, you'll have good chances. Discord can disrupt your quanta production for Stone Skin, Thorne Carapace is useless.

[willng3]

Light/Aether Duo:

Note:  I stopped testing after 5 games for some of these became the results were so obvious.  Others I stopped sooner for various reasons.

Nature's Wrath - 1-4:  Not a counter.
-There's really no way for this deck to win unless you manage to magically draw all of the damage while your opponent draws 0 Dims.  PUing Phoenixes and Emerald Dragons sucks too.

PUgons (Lightnings) - 3-2:  Not a counter.
-I could have kept going with this, but against a human opponent I can't imagine them playing Dims as quickly as the AI and therefore the outcome would be much more slanted in their favor.

PUgons (Silences) - 5-0:  Hard counter.
-Hardly a challenge.

Frogtal - 4-1:  Hard counter.
-The one loss resulted from me going through 3 Dims and several other cards without drawing a single Fractal.  It completely massacres otherwise.

AdrenaTitans - 8-2:  Counter with skill
-I went 3-2 at first before I changed up my strategy which gave me the key to victory here.  Basically, NEVER play Adrenaline on Titans on the field since they can just get PU'd.  Also, don't Animate Titans unless you have another waiting in your hand that can take the other one's place.  Damage advantage is key here.  When you've lowered the opponent's HP enough, Adrenaline everything for victory.

AdrenaGhosts - 1-stopped:  Not a counter
-I stopped here because the AI's too dumb to realize that I have the ability to rewind its Archangel every time it plays it.  We had a very similar matchup last War that we lost.

Shockwave Dragons - Didn't test:  Not a counter
-Light creatures have too much HP for Thorn Carapace and this deck can't hide behind Dims like PUgons can. 

Stoned Dragons - 0-2-stopped:  Not a counter
-Since a human opponent can just hold off on playing everything until they're ready to kill you, this deck just doesn't stand much of a chance.  Even without the opponent playing creatures this deck will likely still lose just because Light's creatures just have too much HP.

Overall, these results are expected given that this deck was Light's main stallbreaker of last War.

[willng3]

Bonebolt with Fractal Mummies:

Nature's Wrath - 1-3: Not a counter
-Basically becomes completely dependent on you drawing a Deflag and a Staff or not.  Not to mention Fractal screws you over.

PUgons (Lightnings) - 4-6:  Requires luck
-It's more or less dependent on you being able to play your cards faster than the opponent can block you.  For instance, I managed to win in 8 turns once.  Lightnings help deal a bit of extra damage.

PUgons (Silences) - 0-2:  Not a counter
-More or less the same as the Lightning mod, but without the Lightnings helping you deal damage.

Frogtal - 7-3:  Other counter.
-One game drew 0 Frogs.  Other losses were mainly due to Fractal Mummy.

AdrenaTitans - 9-1:  Hard counter.
-Really have to hope you don't get a draw that gives you 0 of a piece of the combo the entire duel, but that's pretty normal for this deck.

AdrenaGhosts - 2-3:  Requires luck.
-If the opponent runs out of Lightnings then you're safe.  Otherwise, dear god.

Shockwave Dragons - 0-2:  Not a counter.
-Dragons and Bone Wall do not go over well.

Stoned Dragons - 0-2: stopped testing: Not a counter.
-Damage is just too fast to be handled.  Without Fractal Mummies it would be more manageable.

[Helston]

I've got a novabow which works well-ish against the discord grabbow.

by Helston

Hover over cards for details, click for permalink

Deck import code : [Select]

4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 55q 590 590 590 590 5bs 5bs 5bu 5bu 5bu 5c1 5c1 5c5 5c7 5c7 5de 5de 5de 5de 5de 5de 5f6 5og 61q 8pm

First I went 6-4, but I had changed the deck around a little over the time I did those, so I decided to have another 10 and went 7-3. Not an easy win by any means, but win rate >50% is never a bad thing. Going to put some Wings into the Shockwave Dragons and see that goes too.

And I've got the wings results

by Helston

Hover over cards for details, click for permalink

Deck import code : [Select]

5bs 5bt 5bt 5bt 5bt 5bt 5de 5de 5de 5de 5de 5de 5de 5de 5de 5de 5de 5de 5de 5de 5ol 5ol 5ol 5on 5on 5on 5on 5oo 5oo 5oo 5oo 8pr

5-0. I don't think the AI ever had a chance (I was watching quanta, it favours Lycans over Discords) to get a discord out before my first wings. Hard-as-a-brick-wall counter.

[drolly]

Oh my, thanks for your contributions, will and Helston! I already feel a little bad because I didn't have as much time as I wanted to have for testing yesterday. I merged your results into the OP and did the Earth Firestall. With the AI not being able to play a firestall effectively, the results are not too reliable and include some guesswork done by me.

Earth Firestall:

Nature's Wrath: 4-1 against AI. Possibly not a counter.
I doubt that the AI can play this deck correctly. The easiest strategy for your opponent is to wait for enough Fire quanta and OTK you while stalling via Stone Skin. Furthermore, they just have to double-ragepot some Phoenixes or dragons. If they are not that smart, you can suddenly overrun them by putting out a raging dragon and deflagrating the Diamond shield, resulting in ~24-27 sudden damage.

PUgons: 4-1 against AI. Possibly not a counter.
If you're lucky, you'll be able to outrush your opponent. Lack of PC makes Fahrenheit far less dangerous but a Fire Bolt OTK still seems possible.

Frogtal from hell: 3-0. Counter involving skill.
Frogs need to be upped obviously. Your best strategy somehow depends on your opponent's playing style. Always keep a Frog in your hand until you've drawn out the Ragepots. Use your Silences wisely. If you can prevent a Diamond Shield, it should be easy to win. If not, predict the use of Stone Skins and start a well-timed Silence chain to win. Dimensional Shield blocks Fahrenheit if necessary.

AdrenaTitans: 3-0. Best counter.
Gravity Pulls are useless. Seems to be a hard counter. Diamond Shield? OTK via Fire Bolt? tl;dr, this is a real rush. Your opponent won't even get enough firepower to take down a single Titan.

AdrenaGhosts: 0-3. No chance.
Diamond Shield nullifies frogs' attack and reduces ghosts' damage to 6. Having no means of defense adds to your misery.

Shockwave Dragons (Helston's mod with Wings). Needs human testing. Possibly not a counter.
Basically, your opponent just has to save his bolts to kill your dragons instantly and then wait for you to deck out, taking 5-15 damage per turn (OE + 1 dragon at most) while having 6 Stone Skins ready. At least Fahrenheit won't harm you because Wings are awesome.

Stoned Dragons. 0-1 (sorry for being sloppy). No chance.
This deck has the ability to kill your first few Stone Dragons until it can reduce the damage of your remaining one to almost nothing. Your deckout is inevitable then. At least your Stone Skins are able to hold off the Fahrenheit so an enlarged version of this deck should have a chance to be a counter by deckout.

Scorpion Firestall. Needs human testing. Possibly counter involving skill.
Could have a chance because of faster production of Fire quanta. Scorpions are useless after Diamond Shield is out. I don't know whether the Stone Skins can be accurately timed to prevent a OTK by your bolts.

And the next one ... Charged Grabbow:

Nature's Wrath: 7-1. Good counter.
As a rule of thumb, one of your creatures will get killed by Lightning and/or Gravity Pull. Rage Potion can finish every opposing creature with a single hit. Deflagrate the lone Fog Shield. Your staff is save due to lack of PC. Stalling from Heals is incredible.

PUgons (Helston's mod): 7-1. Another good counter.
Lack of PC and somewhat predictable damage makes Dimensional Shield extremely useful. Use Lightnings on Chargers. Never put out a dragon without doubling it immediately.

To be continued ...