Round 4 - Main Topic

[pikachufan2164]

Hm, I have no catch-all deck to beat Light since Monoaether loses to SS/Miracle stall, Firestall and Poisonstall. It does beat everything else they have, though.
Devtal with Dragons instead of Vamps often loses to ImmoPhoenix and Dunes are a problem, but it might be my best choice. They only brought one Deflag in their ImmoPhoenix, and it lost as well, so perhaps two Dims and Lobos (for Deja Hope or other antics) would be optimal. Sound good to y'all?

Light seems to be shaping up into running stalls (Firesanc, SS/Miracle, Poisonsanc) and buff decks (Blessing- and Crusader-based); only one of is neither of the two (Immophoenix).

Because of the prevalence of Crusaders, most flying weapon decks are out of the question -- it's quite a shame that we couldn't use PU Flying Titans, as it counters their stalls nicely when combined with Catapults. EQ could be a good idea, since many of their decks use cards with high casting costs. A fast rush like PU Phoenix could work to outspeed the stalls, and can PU either Phoenixes or their buffed creatures for lovely results (their Discord Crusader and Eternity Crusader decks counter it with Antimatter and Rewinds, though).

[Higurashi]

Hah, we have so many Novas and Grabbys it's silly. Maybe it's best I spend one of those decks, and 4-5 EQ's should be fine. EQ's hurt all their Sader decks a lot as well because they're expensive, and I could even bring a Lobo for any Sader that does get out. AM isn't much of a problem with Shriekers and RT even less so.

Their Poison Stall doesn't have Bone Wall, but Plague is actually worse for Grabbow considering how fast damage Poison can do, and Miracle bringing their HP back. EQ will help a lot there too, as their Poison Stall is low on pillars/pends.

That leaves their own Grabbow, which is pretty durn fast when it works. It too only has one Deflag, so it looks like my best bet might be to bring either Dims or Lightnings. Lightnings would be better because I could play more PU's to speed it up against stalls.

I'm concerned about EP's deck though. It's extremely low on damage and will probably get trampled by just about any deck with 31/32 cards. Using that many Lightnings and Dims seems like a waste too, considering the usefulness of Lightning in many of our decks.

[deuce22]

What about panda dragons for EP?

[willng3]

You're not viewing this from a practical counter standpoint.  You want a deck which counters every single deck can use?  Be my guest to try and find one.  You won't.

Fire has practically nothing but rushes left at their disposal.  We have way too many counters to FSS for them to ever consider using it against us again.  Other than this, they have mainly offensive cards at their disposal and as a result 31-32 card decks are so unlikely it's ridiculous.

Panda Dragons is a major no-no.  For one, it does little to solve our Phoenix problem.  Two, EQ will absolutely decimate it in the blink of an eye.  And thirdly, it doesn't resolve the issue of us using cards which we do not want to lose.

I designed the first draft of EP's deck on the basis that it countered as many decks reliably as possible.  It does.  If you somehow come up with a deck that has a better win rate across the entire board, then by all means share it with the rest of us.

[Higurashi]

EQ is a problem for both decks, but Pande can do more against Phoenixes than our 6 Lightnings. The real problem is that it has less pillars. I wouldn't use it either.

There's no deck that can counter everything Fire have, nor any other element. I have no idea why you'd think I want that.

Yep, it counters a lot, but that wasn't my concern. It could deck out against a brick wall, so adding another Dragon seems simple. That standpoint is quite practical and doesn't even involve changing deck type. If your testing shows that deck is optimal as it is, I naturally trust that, but without knowing you had indeed tested it, I had to express my concerns, no? Yes, it's part of my job.

You could simply reply that you had tested it and decided it was optimal and I would be at ease. From the discussion here, that isn't mentioned.

[deuce22]

We did pretty extensive testing yesterday. It beats pretty much all of their 30-card decks.

[Higurashi]

Sweet. Good job :>

[pikachufan2164]

Will and I have done some testing of the feasibility of mono-Aether against their EQ Immorush, and we managed to discover that the AI is terrible at playing both decks >_>

After some live testing on PvP (under some cleverly disguised accounts, of course), Will deemed mono-Aether to have a good shot at beating the EQ Immorush. It should be able to fare decently against some of its straight rushes as well.

Against Fire, we're testing out a mono-Aether (6 Pillars, 6 Pends, 6 Dim Shields, 6 Lightnings, 3 Lobo, 3 Dragons) in hopes that it will be able to crush any incoming Immorushes that come up -- even the version with EQ and Phoenix. Lobo + Lightning puts a stop to Phoenixes, and a single Lightning takes care of creatures like Lava Golems and evolved Graboids. Careful timing of Dim Shields is key, though.

Will's words of wisdom: "I figured out that holding off on playing Phase Shields until another Phoenix appears is the way to ensure wins. Or even then when you don't have a Lobo and Lightning all set. That's why I say that you shouldn't play Dim Shields until you see a Phoenix. Usually if one gets Deflagged that way you can replace it with another. The only way I can see this deck possibly beating us is if they bring 4 or more Deflags. And that's just because it increases the chance of a Deflag to a Lobo earlier on."

From earlier testing, we found that the best chance that Fire can have is to Deflag our Lobos so that we can't fry their Phoenixes.

[Higurashi]

Yep, I agree on the 4-deflag comment. I've had a lot of battles of Monoaether vs. Fire decks, and Phoenix really illustrates how it covered everything Fire was lacking before it arrived. But Dims are still so powerful you have to base your deck on getting rid of them. On the part of Monoaether however, it has to make sure it doesn't lack damage. I've had more in my successful matchups, but as I said I trust your testing.

[willng3]

Apologies for the negative tone before.  Today hasn't exactly been the best day for me, unfortunately.  I had an entire bitter response typed out before finally realizing I was being an a*hole so I took a nap and feel much better

I'm in complete agreement that the deck needs at least one more Dragon.  I've heard from EP's additional testing with the deck's new modifications that it comes down to the point of deck out.  This wasn't an issue when I first designed the deck and it shouldn't happen because despite the deck's countering abilities, it can't prepare for all forms of damage spam in which case we may need to win the damage race in order to win.  Fire has yet to use another 31+ card deck apart from their FSS, but the off chance of that happening could ruin us here.

[deuce22]

Yep, I agree on the 4-deflag comment. I've had a lot of battles of Monoaether vs. Fire decks, and Phoenix really illustrates how it covered everything Fire was lacking before it arrived. But Dims are still so powerful you have to base your deck on getting rid of them. On the part of Monoaether however, it has to make sure it doesn't lack damage. I've had more in my successful matchups, but as I said I trust your testing.

we started with 3 dragons and 3 lobos, but the dragons rarely got out and lobos got deflagged quickly. So we went -1 dragon +1 lobo +1 pill. lobo was out much more consistently, and the extra pill helped prevent deck out and decrease hand congestion in case of RNG.

[Higurashi]

Yeah, this is a big problem when we can only fit 13 quanta sources into it. This is the reason we usually either bring Lightning OR Dims. No room for both.

Well, here's the thing. If you pull Lobo+enough Lightnings, that deals with most of the damage. If they spend Deflags on Lobo, you can play Dims. For this tactical reason, you can probably cut down on Dims to 4. That gives you another Dragon and Pend.

If they spend Deflags on Dims, you have to draw Lightnings for Golems and Lobo+Lightning for Phoenixes (need a combo; bad news for us). If they bring lots of Golems, Phoenixes and Deflags, we can't do anything. If they bring Bolts and Phoenixes, we're also helpless. Too much damage.

Yeah, my experience with this matchup is very one-sided. Nap 3-0'd me in CotO when both were mono and there was nothing I could do. Tried Lightnings, PU's, Lobos, Dims... even tried to Fractal Spiders, but she both topdecked RoF -and- outdamaged me. I wish we could bring Grabbow, honestly, but their remaining decks look like they have a lot of CC. Same issue with Liquid Obsidian.

If we're worried about EQ Cremationbow, ImmoPhoenix is our best bet. Problem is that we'd supply Fire with Phoenixes if it loses. On the other hand, I bet they'd love some Dims too. We're the main providers of Aether cards after all.