DJ Deathstalker and the Puffer Fish

[Boingo]

Code: [Select]

710 710 710 710 710 710 71e 71e 71e 71e 71e 74a 74a 74a 74a 74a 74a 7gk 7gk 7gk 7gk 7gk 7gk 7gk 7gr 7gr 7gu 7gu 7gu 7gu? ? ? = deathstalkers

I'm looking to rework some of the classic element duos and here's an attempt at / .  I think the deck is nearly optimized, and I had half a mind to post this as is in the Duo/Trio deck section, but I'm posting in the Deck Help section to address the question at the bottom**.  It has no problems winning in T50, and even at AI5 (depending on the level of creature control.)

It's a poison deck but I have no idea if it's fast enough to qualify as speed poison--I just like seeing poison counters in the 30s and 40s!!!  Since it has no shields or weapons, the Arctic Octopus is your creature control.  It's a little tight on pillars overall but it seems to just work out most games.  An ideal opening seems to be 3 , 1 with a deathstalker, unstoppable and either a pufferfish (or octopus.)

THE GOOD

Some example T50 matches:

Timebow:

Lava destroyer rainbow:
AI failed to quint them, but the alternative was not to play them I guess.  As you can see, the deck handles common T50 threats well like antimatter (who cares when your attack strength is 1), fractal and even miracle (note the deficient quanta).  You pray the AI fractals your deathstalker since they'll have a dead card without nighfall or an attack buff, but even pufferfish are hard to deploy en masse since they cost so much.

denial deck:
A slow start for sure, and the EQs on my towers didn't help, but the deathstalkers are deadly if you don't address them early.

THE BAD

Here's what happens when you get the cards in the wrong order:

**So my question is:  Is there a tweak I can make to this deck to prevent bad starts (like no pillars for 6 turns), or do I just chalk it up to bad luck?  I don't know if there's a pendulum solution as I haven't really figured out how to best work them in at this point.

[EvaRia]

Okay... this is what I think.
You don't need 6 and 6 of momentum/deathstalker. 5 and 5 will still work, and allow room for other cards.
For your deck you use lots of  , so change your mark to water. change the pillars to gravity pendulums and death pendulums.
In your deck, it is better to have Ice Shields than Arctic Octopus, so you don't have too much upkeep on water, allowing you to play your pufferfishes easier.

So I would say:
Mark of Water
5x Deathstalker
5x Unstoppable
4x Pufferfish
2x Ice Shield
1x Arsenic
5x Gravity Pendulum
8x Death Pendulum

This is just my opinion though, there are others who would probably have better advice.

[Higurashi]

Between poison damage, expensive Puffer Fish, Arctic Octopi, Deathstalkers needing a buff to work and it being a trio, it's medium speed. If you wanna speed it up, skip the water and get some Death critters to draw CC for the Deathstalkers. Mummies are good and powerful, and even Skeletons can find a use here. Not to mention the poison spell is very yummy and fast. That said, this speed comes with the prize of less survivability, as Freeze is extremely useful for that (as illustrated by the original poison rush with Physalia and 6 Congeals). I suppose a small fix could be to only get some freezes for the water cards, which would work alright when using Pendulums.

As EvaRia said, a pendulum solution to make it more consistent would look like something like that. It would still suffer from inconsistency though, being a 30-card trio.

[Boingo]

Okay... this is what I think.
You don't need 6 and 6 of momentum/deathstalker. 5 and 5 will still work, and allow room for other cards.
For your deck you use lots of  , so change your mark to water. change the pillars to gravity pendulums and death pendulums.
In your deck, it is better to have Ice Shields than Arctic Octopus, so you don't have too much upkeep on water, allowing you to play your pufferfishes easier.

So I would say:
Mark of Water
5x Deathstalker
5x Unstoppable
4x Pufferfish
2x Ice Shield
1x Arsenic
5x Gravity Pendulum
8x Death Pendulum

This is just my opinion though, there are others who would probably have better advice.

Thanks for the input--for the record, the deck I posted has only 5 deathstalkers.  I tried what you have above and, maybe it was just the draws I was getting but I found I have way too much quanta and not enough .  After all, if I played every card in the deck it'd only require 5 which makes 5 pendula a bit much--if you play 3 of them you've already exceeded your needs. Moreover, not getting a gravity pendulum means you have 10 dead cards in your deck.  The arsenic is an addition worth working in somehow. 

I prefer the arctic octopus to ice shields, though they both have strengths.  I like the octopus since it can stop an otyugh right away, though with quints showing up in nearly every deck, the shield will have the upper hand in those cases.

Between poison damage, expensive Puffer Fish, Arctic Octopi, Deathstalkers needing a buff to work and it being a trio, it's medium speed. If you wanna speed it up, skip the water and get some Death critters to draw CC for the Deathstalkers. Mummies are good and powerful, and even Skeletons can find a use here. Not to mention the poison spell is very yummy and fast. That said, this speed comes with the prize of less survivability, as Freeze is extremely useful for that (as illustrated by the original poison rush with Physalia and 6 Congeals). I suppose a small fix could be to only get some freezes for the water cards, which would work alright when using Pendulums.

As EvaRia said, a pendulum solution to make it more consistent would look like something like that. It would still suffer from inconsistency though, being a 30-card trio.

What you said was true--reducing the deck to a duo will give the deck more consistent draws but I wanted to make this a  deck.  I still think the pendulum mix has to be better tuned.

[EvaRia]

Btw, if you really wanna make a death/water duo, you could always use Physalias.
They are way cheaper and they ARE water/death.

[Boingo]

Pendulum variant:

Code: [Select]

71a 71e 71e 71e 71e 71e 72i 72i 72i 72i 72i 72i 72i 72i 74a 74a 74a 74a 74a 75m 75m 75m 75m 7gp 7gp 7gu 7gu 7gu 7gu 7guRemoved:
6 bone towers
7 sapphire towers
2 arctic octopus
1 unstoppable

Added (all upped):
8 death pendula
4 gravity pendula
2 permafrost shields
1 puffer fish
1 arsenic

[Boingo]

Btw, if you really wanna make a death/water duo, you could always use Physalias.
They are way cheaper and they ARE water/death.

You are correct.  I suppose I'm just being stubborn because I feel like the physalia deck has been perfected and wanted to give some love to some of the B-sides.