Brawl #3 - Round 3 Voting

[andretimpa]

Comments on other artists

DL: Sells the product well and is believable. The simplified water/fire art gives the impression that the in game art is simpler than it actually is.
SF: It looks like the kind of banners you saw in the late 90s-early 2000s. If elements had came out at that time it'd have probably used something like this.
DDD: This type of banner is popular around the web, but imo feels a bit complicated and crammed. Could have worked better if we were allowed to animate (to spread the information a bit).
Whispers: A flaw is that it's not clear what is being advertised. All other 4 either tell you or show you that Elements is a card game. If I had to guess just by looking at it and having no knowledge about it I'd say Elements was a webcomic.

Self comment: Tha main fault is the slogan which is a bit weak imo. I'm not an advertiser after all.

[Odii Odsen]

Spoiler for THe Cuckoo's Nest:

Card breakdown:
Ultimate Dragon (pre-fix version)

Spoiler for who said it's UP?:

Chapuz sees the obvious UP-ness
OdinVanguard thinks so too, also explains the pre-fix version (15 cost)

Swallow (pre-fix version)

Spoiler for who said it's UP?:

Pinapple doesn't like the pre-fix version (4 attack, 3 cost)
Huge text by mildlyfrightenedboy. TL/DR: it's UP!

Horizon (pre-fix version)

Spoiler for who said it's UP?:

Odin explains what the pre-fix version was (cost 5 | 5 with 4 | 3 activation)
Zawadx thinks it's UP
Blacksmith agrees that a cost reduction is neccesairy to not be UP

This is the ultimate anti - The Immortal - rush deck!

The Ultimate Dragon can be spamed pretty early, even with that 1 turn delay until they are unlocked should still suffice to gain a fast advantage in the damage race.
As support damage, the Unladen Swallow can hit in some damage whenever you have spare quanta. Combined with the Event Horizon, they can be used to get rid of enemy creatures. If they happen to get delayed, no matter, as they go back to your hand anyway.
Yet another great thing about those Unladen Swallows is, that you can't deck out as long as you keep together with 6 swallows 2 more cards in hand, since you'll always end up with 8 cards in hand and can't draw a new one next turn.

Wow, such rush, very antistall, so totally worth your vote!

Ultimate Dragon (pre-fix version): Yeah, you are totally right. Chapuz sees the obvious UP-ness, but the UP-ness of the unupgraded card. Why are you using the upgraded version in your deck? Illegal.
Swallow (pre-fix version): Pinapple doesn't like the pre-fix version (4 attack, 3 cost). Isn't it illegal because it was changed in the OP?

Spoiler for Divine Light:

The Revenge

A Death/Gravity deck with strong attackers. Both creatures are hard for the opponent to get rid of, and might end up hurting him more instead. Gram is also a very strong weapon, and it's sole disadvatange are countered by the Chromheart shield. If you are about to lose, sacrifice a Deadly Avenger with Dark Ritual to heals 36 HP. On the other hand, if you are very close to winning, you can use Dark Ritual on a Juggernaut instead to deal 4 direct Damage o the opponent.

Spoiler for Deck cards in detail:

x 6   x 7   

x 4   x 2

x 4   x 4

x 4

 

Where is the second negative post for Deadly Avenger? The first one is already very dubious.
Dark Ritual Table / Dark Ritual Alter: Again. Where is the second negative post? This: "I think that this'd mean that either the table is UP or the altar is OP, but it could be that they are both just a bit unbalanced." isn't negative feedback for the card you have used, because you decided for the upgraded card and dragtom obviously said the upgraded card is OP. Correct me if I am wrong. Illegal.

Spoiler for Silver Ferns:

Spoiler for Hidden:

Guardian Shades of the Gate

Spoiler for table: Ancient Gate Amount: x6 Dar'eth's Lash Amount: x2 Deadly Neurotoxin Amount: x2 Quanta Orb Amount: x2 Feeding Shade Amount: x6 Death Pendulum (Upgraded) Amount: x12 >>>>DESCRIPTION<<<< Disclaimer: The version of Dar'eth's Lash used in this deck is the UP version with only 1% cloaking chance instead of 10%. Play your Ancient Gate and at least a Feeding Shade asap. Feed the False Keys to the Shades while keeping your great DR4 shield alive. If you have at least 7 time quanta and an Ancient Gate in your hand, feed the Ancient Key to the Shade, play the Ancient Shield from your hand and start all over again. That way, an Ancient Gate & Feeding Shade combo provides you with 3 attacks of 9 damage each = 27 damage. Furthermore, the 6 different Ancient Gates means you will always be able to replace a PCed shield, while it is almost impossible to be Stolen (Ancient Gate is destroyed if its controller lacks an Ancient Key, except if your opponent PUs the real key; too bad all the False Keys seem like real to him/her!)  In other words, this deck guarantees a PC-resistant DR4 defence. If you are low on keys, you can sacrifice another Spirit to your primary Feeding Spirit or a Quanta Orb. Quanta Orbs can also serve as quanta storages or as big hitters at late game when your quanta supply is full or all your low-hp Shades have been CCed. Dar'eth's Lash can be payed via Death quanta and provides an unblockable poison counter each turn, meaning you can also perform a powerful Dar'eth's Lash & Ancient Gate stalling combo! Finally, Deadly Neurotoxin is excellent for negating that annoying Otyugh, Bloodsucker, Octopus or whatever creature threatens your strategy!  Still, this deck is vulnerable to CC spamming, good shields and bad draws but you can not have everything, especially while constructing a deck full of, supposedly, UP cards, do you?

Spoiler for PROOF THE CARDS ARE CONSIDERED UNDERPOWERED!:

Spoiler for Ancient Gate:

Clever idea, it's a strong shield that's vulnerable to CC, especially AoE kind.  The card feels a little too expensive though - I'd recommend lowering the cost to 7  | 6  .

Oof... a shield that can be dominated by both CC (Hope), AND PC? I guess the defense is wonderful to have, but even then, it feels forced to have such a incredibly extreme shield to be defeated by AOE effects, various forms of CC (Otyugh, Shockwave, Lightning, Owl's Eye, etc.), and several permanent control cards that are all (in a way) much less expensive than this card. If the Ancient Key is rewound, then I'm guessing the shield is also removed...

Any cheaper and it'll cost as much as Diamond Shield. Won't work. Besides, even though it can be destroyed in 2 ways, it's still a single card. It doesn't require you to play more cards, the way Hope does.

any deck with cc can kill it though, and hope only needs two more cards to get get a defense of 10.

what about making it immortal though?

Spoiler for Dar'eth's Lash (1st, UnderPowered version of card with only 1% chance of Cloaking):

Seems a bit weak compared to other weapons. Arsenic inflicts regular poison (only marginally weaker than Shade Poison) and minor damage. This weapon cost about the same, except for with no damage. 

Maybe, but there just aren't enough situations where this card is better than Arsenic.

To be fair I think this card has become a bit UP as the game's changed a bit.

Spoiler for Quanta Gem (1st, UnderPowered version of Quanta Crystal):

I think it is vastly UP. Assuming rounding up, it is 6 quanta for a 2/2 creature. It is 53 quanta for a 10/10 creature, or 78 quanta for a 15/15 creature. It doesn't really help at all against devourers or discord, since it drops you to 0 quanta, which is exactly the worst situation to be in.

If you never use the ability, you have an extremely inefficient creature. If you do use it, you lost a card.

Parallel Universe is powerful with it, if you can get it to survive. Even if you are storing 16 quanta, it is only 4/4 which could easily be shockwaved.

It should maybe be +2/+2 per 5 mana with 16 and 24 for the maximums. Perhaps it should have a base of 0/3 to keep it from being killed by all PC. My hunch is that even with PU, it would not be overpowered. You are spending 9 mana and 2 cards to double your quanta. You need 24+9=33 mana to make it as efficient as nova. Imagine how bad nova would be if it you had to have 33 mana to cast it.

You are right about it being quite UP

But this is a bit intentional because this is not supposed to be a main-hitter for a deck. It is supposed to be a additional attack source when you have excess quanta.

sometimes you may find that you have too many pillars and you simply waste those quanta. And this card can help you speed up the game a little bit, and you can get the quanta back as soon as your Fractal / Miracle / Anything you need comes to your hand.

Also don't forget Fractal....If you store your  in a quanta cloud, you can bypass the requirement of Fractal draining your 

But a base HP is a good idea, and perhaps I should change it to : "Gain 1|1 for every 4 quanta absorbed"

Spoiler for Deadly Neurotoxin:

I'm not sure about this card. Isn't this just a mixture of Aflatoxin (with more poison damage) and Balisk's Blood (with a shorter stun duration and no HP increase)? Its deadliness can be pretty effective against certain enemies (dragons, for example), but the fact that it's a single target spell makes me feel that it can be situational at times if you're facing enemies with extreme HP (Gravity), abilities to negate it (Light), or cards to undo or become immune to the effect overall (Time and Aether).

anyone else thinking that the cost is high?
I would reduce the cost of both (unupped and upped) by one
lightning costs 2 or 3 for 5 damage

I like it, but I actually think its a bit overpriced; howsabout 5 and 4 respectively?  Improved Plague infects all of your opponent's cards for 2 , so this shouldn't be too much more.

Spoiler for Feeding Shade:

Seems kinda weak to me.  For the same cost I could have a Mummy instead.  More health and I don't have to sacrifice a creature every turn. 

I'd think about either letting you sacrifice non-worthy creatures to attack or having it be one sacrifice to enable repeated attacks.

Seems sort of weak unless there's some way to spam worthy creatures to sacrifice...well fractal minor phoenixes could work to a degree if there's some way to quanta balance. Besides that, I don't see any other good uses.

Well done!

Spoiler for Whispers in the Dark:

Whispers in the Dark - Skyfall

Spoiler for deck: Mark of Deck Mark of Deck In Game Card 10 In Game Card 6 Link to the thread 6 Link to the thread 4 Link to the thread 6 Description This deck is designed to be a moderately effective air rush for unupped play.  Thunderbirds deal respectable damage, and can use quanta to CC the enemy or add to their damage.  Falcons ramp up in damage as more of them come onto the field.  Finally, aggressively using discard to ditch unneeded extra pillars and get more birds on the field as fast as possible should help you secure a win.

[/td][/tr][/table]

Omg, what is this? Thunderbird is totally illegal. How you could submit this? Illegal.

[andretimpa]

@Odii about the first point, the task was vague about that. The second one was answered in the round thread, if you can tell what the UP version was you can include THE UP VERSION even if it was changed to something else in the OP. We kept bugging Nae with PMs to know what we could and what we couldn't use. This was not the most well thought out task imo.

[Odii Odsen]

Sorry, but for me it is pretty clear. The post obvious says that the unupped card UP. If you would use the unupped card in your deck, everything would be fine. But the Upped one is more OP than UP. Thats not what rules say.

I also have talked to Nae. Nae said, most ppl would enjoy this task.

[Fippe94]

Where is the second negative post for Deadly Avenger? The first one is already very dubious.
Dark Ritual Table / Dark Ritual Alter: Again. Where is the second negative post? This: "I think that this'd mean that either the table is UP or the altar is OP, but it could be that they are both just a bit unbalanced." isn't negative feedback for the card you have used, because you decided for the upgraded card and dragtom obviously said the upgraded card is OP. Correct me if I am wrong. Illegal.

Deadly Avenger: Lneacx says it is too weak. AnonymousRevival and blahs15 both says the cost is too high.

Dark Ritual Table: skyironsword says that it is not very effective (I am interpreting this as he thinks it is UP). Raptor6789 says it is too UP compared to other healing cards.

I also have talked to Nae. Nae said, most ppl would enjoy this task.

Actually I agree with andre on this one, because many cards were a bit hard to judge if they were considered UP according to rules, it was also tricky to find these UP cards since you had to basically go through the whole thread for every card to see if they counted or not. In theory this seemed very fun, but in practice it was a bit too tedious imo. (Yes, this should probably be the Suggestion thread instead)

[ARTHANASIOS]

Spoiler for Quotes:

Where is the second negative post for Deadly Avenger? The first one is already very dubious.
Dark Ritual Table / Dark Ritual Alter: Again. Where is the second negative post? This: "I think that this'd mean that either the table is UP or the altar is OP, but it could be that they are both just a bit unbalanced." isn't negative feedback for the card you have used, because you decided for the upgraded card and dragtom obviously said the upgraded card is OP. Correct me if I am wrong. Illegal.

Deadly Avenger: Lneacx says it is too weak. AnonymousRevival and blahs15 both says the cost is too high.

Dark Ritual Table: skyironsword says that it is not very effective (I am interpreting this as he thinks it is UP). Raptor6789 says it is too UP compared to other healing cards.

I also have talked to Nae. Nae said, most ppl would enjoy this task.

Actually I agree with andre on this one, because many cards were a bit hard to judge if they were considered UP according to rules, it was also tricky to find these UP cards since you had to basically go through the whole thread for every card to see if they counted or not. In theory this seemed very fun, but in practice it was a bit too tedious imo. (Yes, this should probably be the Suggestion thread instead)

Imho, the problem with Divine Light's task isn't Deadly Avenger or Dark Ritual (they both have 2 negative posts, though it was really difficult to find them and DL should DEFINITELY had put a reference of their UPness). It is Chromeheat and Gram for the following reasons:

* Chromeheat comments about its UPness are too vague; they're like talking about a totally different version of the card:

Spoiler for Hidden:

Love the idea. Though the timer should be on, without it it would be OP. Or affect the timer to something longer if you think it's UP as of now.

What is this "timer should be On" stuff? It is like it is commenting to an older version of the card with an activating ability called 'Timer' or something. In other words, it states as UP a version of Chromeheat that is completely foreign to the current version used in the deck.

cool idea-but it seems a bit weak. it most situations another shield is better for instance against scorpio i would rather use an emerald or reflective shield

This comment looks fine, but why should the author use a DR 1 or DR 0 shield instead of Chromeheat against a poison-heavy deck (Scorpio)? It seems like Chromeheat couldn't block poison when this comment was written.

* Gram's current version is NOT stated as UP. Take a closer look:

Spoiler for Hidden:

A better comparison would be with longsword, or longbow/gavel.  There's no reason you'd use this over one of those.  I like the idea, it's just too underpowered.

Here is the 1st comment...

It's a bit underpowered really.......it can only do 40+ damage before it can be useless and it has to go through several turns to do it.

And here is the 2nd one, but look at the next comment...

Have the upgraded do 8/9 damage?

Done! 8 attack now.

This comment is chronologically AFTER the two comments stating the UPness. It states that the upgraded version is now raised to 8 damage, which means it dealt less than 8 damage before. So, the UP comments are for a previous version of Gram. There are no comments stating the 8-damage Gram is UP after this comment, so you used a normally balanced card and not an UP one. Skyironsword's comments come from a single person and are not downright negative, so they don't really count.

However, taking the difficulty of such a task, it is normal to encounter such mistakes, but it should probably affect voting.

About WITD, you are my faved Deckbuilder Dark Ripper, but none of your CI&A cards are UP and Thunderbird's comments state it as an actually OP card. Yeah, after a closer look, this deck could be considered completely invalid. I am not a hater (I've voted both of your previous decks), but you put no real effort here. Sorry...

Cucko's Nest: I've voted for your task and I liked it a lot! But there is something that troubles me; none of the 'previously underpowered' versions of your cards are clearly stated in their respective threads. They have been replaced by their newer versions. I don't know how legal is that. However, taking the difficulty of such a task, it is normal to encounter such mistakes, but it should probably affect voting.

Death Dots Dominate: The only problem I see here is the lack of a 2nd negative post in Sunset and the fact it doesn't produce extra quanta when used (but this just hurts the deck's strategy and not the deck itself, since Sunset is still a very useful card against Sundials, Dims etc.). Still, it is a very interesting idea and, despite of not voting for it (Cucko's gained my 2nd vote, sorry, but it was a close one) I am going to +rep your DeckBuilder for the effort put in here.

[andretimpa]

Cucko's Nest: I've voted for your task and I liked it a lot! But there is something that troubles me; none of the 'previously underpowered' versions of your cards are clearly stated in their respective threads. They have been replaced by their newer versions. I don't know how legal is that. However, taking the difficulty of such a task, it is normal to encounter such mistakes, but it should probably affect voting.

What we found was people talking about the previous versions (you can reconstruct the cards from the thread). For legality we asked the BMs before using any cards (these were not our first choices).

@Odii Kaker could tell you guys how fun the task was for him but I think he'd rather keep profanity levels PG-13. One major problem was that most of the time, UP cards get fixed quickly and in such an early stage that the poster doesn't feel the need to register the old version. This creates a major confusion when trying to figure not only which cards to use, but which versions too (and forces you to reconstruct the previous versions from the discussion). The only solution is spamming the BMs with PMs, which takes around a day to be answered. The deck itself was put together just some hours before the deadline, when we figured we wouldn't be able to find and check any more cards. None of these things match my idea of fun.

[Fippe94]

About Chromeheart: The first post is pretty obviously referring to the fact that the card only lasts 3 turns, i.e. "a timer". As for the second, I am indeed not sure what it means with reflective shield, but all the next 3 posts are suggesting ways to buff the card, suggesting that they too believe it is UP (why else would you suggest a buff). If the card was actually buffed after these posts, there are no indication about it, and thus I cannot be supposed to know about it while making my task.

About Gram: If you look closely at what Rutarete's post is responding to, it does look to me like he is agreeing with skyironsword's buff suggestion.

The fact that this discussion is even needed shows why I do not like this round's task. Again, very good in theory, but hard to work out in practice. Most people do not make UP cards, and those who do usually fix their cards after getting some feedback, making it hard to find cards for this.

[ARTHANASIOS]

Spoiler for My answer...:

What we found was people talking about the previous versions (you can reconstruct the cards from the thread). For legality we asked the BMs before using any cards (these were not our first choices).

 Glad you asked the Brawlmasters. It seems my vote towards your submission was a legit move after all.

@Odii Kaker could tell you guys how fun the task was for him but I think he'd rather keep profanity levels PG-13. One major problem was that most of the time, UP cards get fixed quickly and in such an early stage that the poster doesn't feel the need to register the old version. This creates a major confusion when trying to figure not only which cards to use, but which versions too (and forces you to reconstruct the previous versions from the discussion). The only solution is spamming the BMs with PMs, which takes around a day to be answered. The deck itself was put together just some hours before the deadline, when we figured we wouldn't be able to find and check any more cards. None of these things match my idea of fun.

 Despite how much I loved the idea, it was indeed really hard to check every version of every card you may encounter while searching the abyssal depths of CI&A section. Please BMs, put easier tasks in the future.

About Chromeheart: The first post is pretty obviously referring to the fact that the card only lasts 3 turns, i.e. "a timer". As for the second, I am indeed not sure what it means with reflective shield, but all the next 3 posts are suggesting ways to buff the card, suggesting that they too believe it is UP (why else would you suggest a buff). If the card was actually buffed after these posts, there are no indication about it, and thus I cannot be supposed to know about it while making my task.

Fair enough. After all, information about this card is quite vague, though I would have preffered a much clearer card choice; a direct explanation of why the card is UP and stated as such would be nice too.
 However, when someone suggest ways to slighly buff a card, that doesn't neccessarily mean the card is UP; it may be a change that makes the card more versatile or even the suggestion of a berf. That's why is so important to clearly state a card is UP.

About Gram: If you look closely at what Rutarete's post is responding to, it does look to me like he is agreeing with skyironsword's buff suggestion.

Nope, you're mistaken here. Ruta states absolutely nothing about the card being UP; he just counters my opinion of Gram being OP. Even Skyironsword states that the card is "fine as it is" (a.k.a. neither OP nor UP) despite of suggesting a small damage increase.

The fact that this discussion is even needed shows why I do not like this round's task. Again, very good in theory, but hard to work out in practice. Most people do not make UP cards, and those who do usually fix their cards after getting some feedback, making it hard to find cards for this.

Agreed. There were many vague parts and voting would be quite difficult. Thanks for clarifying your reasoning behind your card selection though.

 On a sidenote, I think it would be much better if you didn't use Gram at all (e.g. -2 Grams, +1 Bone Tower, +1 Deadly Avenger). Sure, your Chromeheat & Gram combo would lose its significance, but you would had a much more stable deck, let alone you could even replace Chromeheats with other, less vaguely UP cards (e.g. -4 Chromeheats, +1 Deadly Avenger, +2 Elite Juggernauts, +1 Death Pendulum).

[Atom_heart]

I missed the deadline in round 2 
These are my votes for round 3:

- Artist Task: Divine Light
- Boss Task: The Cuckoo's Nest
- Combo Card designer-OT Task: Whispers in the Dark and Divine Light
- Deckbuilder Task: The Cuckoo's Nest and Silver Ferns
- Forum Expert Task: The Cuckoo's Nest
- Writer Task: Whispers in the Dark

[farscape]

- Artist Task: Silver Ferns
- Boss Task:  Death D.D.
- Combo Card designer-OT Task: Death D.D.
- Deckbuilder Task: Death D.D.
- Forum Expert Task: Whispers in the Dark
- Writer Task: Death D.D.

Note: I will explain my votes later when I have more time.

[Zso_Zso]

Looks like my Divine Light votes have stirred up a lot of negative opinions. OK, I'll try to balance it out this round by not voting for them at all -- sorry guys in DL team.

Artist Task: Death Dost Dominate
Although not as fancy as some of the other entries, it conveys a lot more from the game and it would make more more inclined to click on it when it pops up as a banner ad. For visual appearance, I liked the submission from The Cuckoo's Nest, however I feel it would be less efficient as a banner-ad.

Boss Task: Death Dost Dominate
I like the card mechanic, it promotes the use of cloak which is currently underused (probably because of the many counters -- basically all mass CC). It is also very interesting that the difference between basic and upgraded is so big.
DL's Medic somewhat clashes with Guardian Angel and has a non-fitting action name. I am not convinced why WitD's Kain Highwind should be in darkness element, and the action explanation in the Notes feels rather contrived. The 2 totally different cards of the Cuckoos being presented as one (with Upgrade) is just too weird for me, sorry.

Combo Card designer-OT Task: The Cuckoo's Nest
I love the new class mechanic you suggest, it adds a new layer to the game-play -- a major innovation more than worthy of winning my vote!

Deckbuilder Task: Silver Ferns
Very creative time-death duo based on UP card ideas.

Forum Expert Task: Whispers in the Dark
I was disappointed to see that only 2 teams submitted videos for this task. The 2 contenders were fairly similar quality IMHO, what decided my vote was the narration vs visual annotation (along with a music I did not like).

Writer Task: Death Dost Dominate
Now, this was a tough choice. In fact I liked all the stories, but at the end the short but sweat poem won my heart.