Round 2 - Strategy

[Sevs]

earth1 vs  air4 
wings are a possibility and with their keen to run deflags, they might be hard to counter if we bring pulvy we must carry PA
earth2 vs  death5 
With bonewall they have a very good counter to any sort of rush, IMO I think we should do some with indirect damage, aka poison or firestall
earth3 vs  time8 
Dune scorps is a possible threat and would counter OE control. or a straight dragon rush
earth4 vs  life8 
will be pretty unpredictable but i like the idea of just a fast rush
earth5 vs  gravity4   
still working on a strong deck to use, but discord anything seems like a good option to use
earth6 vs  aether5 
having lost a bonebolt it seems less likely to run into it again. but we should be wary
earth7 vs  darkness2 
They are pretty unpredicatble as well since they have lost most of both decks played
earth8 vs  fire2 
Probably the one we know least about it,

Possible Deck options
- Firestall
- GnG


We have 2 ways of going about this organizing of players.
     -1. We can put the the strongest players against the strongest teams or
     -2. we can put the most upgrades with the decks that would benifit the most from them

[kirchj33]

Start thinking about specific matchups vs. specific teams and what would work well.

I am particularly concerned about fire, because well, they're fire.  They have Napalm & Antagon w/ strong deck possibilities.

I believe they expect us to stall when we play them early on.  Napalm keeps calling earth a stall element in chat.  I'd imagine this is partially a mind game, or maybe that is what she truly believes our strength is.  I think we're a pretty good stall element, but I don't like our odds with a stall vs. fire if they correctly predict one.  Of the possible decks we can run vs. fire, I am thinking discogons or omegagrabbow.

The other concern I have is entropy.  They're already strong, particularly in a war format, but then when you put Matrim at the helm of masterminding their decks, they will be like entropy on steroids.  They've shown 2 grabbows so far.  Both which have a dishole mechanic, one with a discoEQ built in.  We've already shown our one deck which counters both of these, wings.  Matrim will obviously be aware of this.  I believe they will come at us this round with a mono.  4-5 dragons are expected to help counter wings.  Possibly some Maxwell's to help with any grabbow we could bring, but I fully expect ~2 AMs.  I believe neither our grabbow as its currently designed or wings will give us a favorable matchup.   CCC and I did some testing last night & did not come up with anything "great".  We will need to think long and hard on these matchups. 

That being said, I don't believe a winning strategy is to put our full effort into beating these teams early on in war.  Try to come up with something that beats both of these teams with a hard counter (neither will let us get by with a soft counter or something we've shown in round 1), but we need to ensure that we are beating up on the less threatening teams to keep us moving ahead through war.

[Avenger]

If they have a creature heavy deck, go against them with a pandy stall? I'm testing that deck vs. air. Maybe it is good against entropy as well as
Lets hope we won't fight both of them.

[kirchj33]

If they have a creature heavy deck, go against them with a pandy stall? I'm testing that deck vs. air. Maybe it is good against entropy as well as
Lets hope we won't fight both of them.

I don't think we have any pandies in our vault.  I might have grabbed 2, I'd have to check.  Also, 5 hp creatures are tough to counter with pandy and generally, I wouldn't think strategies for countering air will also apply to those countering entropy.

Typically, any duo is going to get torn up by discord/entropy.  Therefore, our options are limited to a duo which protects (wings/dims), a rainbow, a mono, or some other deck concept with nova splashed in (perhaps GnG + 4 nova).  You can start working your deck concepts vs. entropy there, but those are some tough limitations we're forced to deal with.  Especially when you consider they have shown they will be active with supporting Disco with Bhole & EQ.

[Sevs]

grabbow with 6 lightning? all of entropies creatures are 5 HP and beats and discord since it is a rainbow

by Sevs

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4sa 4sa 4sa 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 52q 58o 58o 58o 58o 58o 58o 590 590 590 590 590 590 596 596 5f6 5og 61q 61q 61q 61q 61q 61q 8pu

Something along these lines or an immo deck

[MartyrX]

So we don't know who battles who yet?

[Sevs]

So we don't know who battles who yet?

we decide who faces who.



As for fire if they expect us to stall we should do the opposite and all out rush. they would have to be retarded mistaken to use firestall against us with us having EQ, and pulvy, and stoneskin in our arsenal, I almost think we might run into wings and dragons again. it is a formidable deck and with a few deflags completely removes our defenses and means of removing the wings. My gut would tell me to bring a cc heavy rainbow to counter their faster rush or try out our new SS firestall?

[Mithcairion]

's other matchups:

Entropy:  Likely Gen or Lt. matchup for AirWaterTimeFire:  Possibly Gen. or Lt. matchup for AirLightLifeDeath

All in all, I see three possible Gen/Lt. matchups for Air, and we're one of them.  Given our strengths in both rushing and stalling, I think we are more likely to see a Gen/Lt deck than Entropy simply due to the fact that Air can run a very effective mono vs. them (in similar fashion to what Water can do) that can be done by anyone.  Between us and Fire, I think fire is seen as the bigger threat due to the fact that, well, they're fire, and Air doesn't match up with them nearly as well as they do with us.

As far as actual deck strategy, they need to be able to take an effective deck, but one that can handle both a rush and a stall effectively.  While I highly doubt they would take a "true" UG deck against us, I definitely think that something that combines the best of a NovaGrabby and a UG deck would be a likely deck for them, something along these lines: 

by Mithcairion

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4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 5ia 5ia 5oc 5oc 5oc 5oc 5oc 5og 5og 5om 5om 5om 5om 5om 5om 5pu 5pu 5pu 5pu 77g 77g 77g 77g 77g 7tb 8pm

Another deck I think may be likely from them vs. us is CP Wyrms backed by Discord, as it has the disruptive ability to delay any duo that we would run against them, but still has the ability to ramp damage enough to hurt Immortal.  Also, I can't be sure if we would be more likely to face Wings or Fog Shield from them, but my guy is telling me Fog Shield since we showed two decks in the first round that both destroyed Wings and given their ability to use lots of both, I expect to see Fog Shield. 

[CCCombobreaker]

We only have 1 firestall in the vault and I really think it matches up better against time or darkness or life than fire or death.  Darkness lost 2 decks... we only showed one bow in rd 1.  I really don't think they'll try to pestal us (I kinda expect some kind of vader sader). 

Time having been wrecked by OE will send scorps or a dragon heavy deck... but either of those will be LOW pc and vulnerable to heavy CC + SS.  I am testing our firestall vs fractal scarabs (another OE counter that could be problematic).  *tests done* Sadly fractal scarabs (used the one below) ran all over the firestall... wrecked me 4 games straight.  Not feeling super hot putting the firestall vs time, which leaves darkness or maybe life, depending on what we think they'll run.

by CCCombobreaker

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5rg 5rg 5rg 5rg 5rg 5rg 5rg 5rg 5rg 5rq 5rq 5rq 5rq 5rq 5rq 61o 61o 61o 61o 61o 61o 61o 61o 61o 61o 622 622 622 80i 80i 8pl

Our firestall isn't very strong against death because early arsenic > firestall.  since they usually run 3 arsen in a 30-31 card deck and we run 2 deflags in a 40 card deck... it just doesn't end well, as clearly seen in testing vs aether's bonebolt, light's poison miracle,  and death's poison dial.

[Mithcairion]

's other matchups:

AetherDarkness:  Bone Wall + Plague counters almost everything that Darkness can do well (Darkness will most likely try to Devtal to counter).Water:  Natural Purify counter, possible Poison due to meta, but overall unlikely.Entropy:  Possible Gen/Lt matchup, Maxwell's counters all of Death's power creatures.Light:  Lots of healing, unlikely to bring Poison here.Life:  Poison and Bone Wall is unlikely, too much healing and Adrenaline/creature spam counters Bone Wall.Air:  Death will most likely bring a Wings counter here, as they know Air will likely pack them and they are vulnerable.

I will admit, I don't have the best grasp on Death.  That being said, the only power creature of their that can get past Wings are Dragons, although they obviously have Poison at their disposal, as well.  In addition, we really don't have a lot that is particularly effective against them.  The only two decks that really seem to be are Immortal and Omega Grabow, although the original Pulvybow seemed to perform well (refer to the testing page in War 4 Intelligence for specific decks).  One important thing to keep in mind is that they played two stalls last round, one of which is a certified stall-buster, which says to me that they are planning to rush and rush hard this round, as they didn't show anything at all from that side of their vault/deckbuilding.

As always, they have two very dynamic shields in Bone Wall and Skull Shield, and what one is weak to, the other is not.  Last War they ran very diverse decks against us, although they always centered around things that we didn't necessarily do well.  One was a Nova Grabby centered on Skull Shields (a deck that really hurts us with our reliance on Graboids), and they used a lot of Wings + Death creatures against us as War went on.  While Death is a very versatile element, Blonde is actually relatively predictable, as he has almost always played with 6 upped Flesh Recluses in his decks, and I think that gives us a good idea as to what will be upgraded in their soldiers' decks, as well.  In addition to Recluses, I think we can count on seeing upped Arsenics as well, since they are able to hit over our Diamond Shield.

This was their Nova Grabby that was used against us in Round 1 last year:

by Mithcairion

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4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 52g 52g 52g 52l 52l 52p 52p 52q 52q 52t 52t 542 542 542 542 590 590 590 590 590 590 5f6 5on 61q 8pm

[Mithcairion]

  337 cards

Gravity has to discard 24 cards from this deck:

by Mithcairion

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55s 55s 55s 55s 561 561 561 576 576 576 576 576 576 576 576 576 576 576 576 61r 61r 61r 61t 61t 61t 61t 61t 7n2 7n2 7n2 8pu

The most likely scenario is that Gravity has more Titans in their vault, so I'm guessing that only the catapults and the Flying Weapons get saved as the Dim Shields can be switched out for Gravity Pulls and the PUs can be switched out for Accelerations.  If this IS the case, then this deck becomes much more prone to RT.  Regardless of what strategy they take with building this deck in the future, it is too strong of a deck overall for them to just abandon it and the vital parts (Catapult, FW) should be saved.
Gravity gets to salvage 6 cards from this deck:

by Mithcairion

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5f0 5f0 5f0 5f0 5f0 5f6 5f6 5f9 5f9 5f9 5f9 5f9 5f9 5fa 5fa 5fa 5fa 5fa 5fa 5fc 5l9 5l9 5l9 5l9 5l9 5l9 5ur 7q4 7q4 7q4 8pm

My most educated guess is that they will salvage the two Deflags, the Phoenix or the Stiletto, and the three RTs, as all three are either very strong individual cards or fit very well in a rainbow.  Also, any of these can be converted with little to no remorse
's other matchups:

AetherEntropyFireTimeLightWaterDarkness

Gravity has absolutely brutal matchups this round.  Darkness and Time both have the ability to run NotP vs. them (and I fully expect both to do so, it is simply too strong of a deck NOT to), Entropy and Fire are brutally difficult at the best of times and both have great counters to Gravity's best creature (upped Charger), Light has Sanc which can make both Momo Scorps and Discord/BH all but useless, and they get another matchup with Water that by all rights they should have won in round 1.

Good plays vs. both Time and Darkness may actually be Momo Scorps, since if they're expecting NotP it would actually work to their advantage and they would be able to use the free creatures given to them by their opposition.       Aether also presents a strong challenge, since they have the ability to fry any Charger that shows it's face while still having the ability to copy any Accelerated creature that they put out.  With that in mind, Fractal Chargers is a real possibility for Gravity here, since it negates any card advantage that Aether might have while making their Chargers go the distance.Aether also presents a strong challenge, since they have the ability to fry any Charger that shows it's face while still having the ability to copy any Accelerated creature that they put out.  With that in mind, Fractal Chargers is a real possibility for Gravity here, since it negates any card advantage that Aether might have while making their Chargers go the distance.  Discord/BH is also a possibility, although not as much due to the fact that once Phase Shield goes up, it is very difficult to stop the chain.I actually wouldn't be surprised to see Momo Scorps vs. Fire, either, since they often use Immolation to pump out a variety of spells/creatures and only one hit from a Dune will cause the damage to ramp quickly while BH and RT can take care of any excess creatures/quanta.I really wouldn't be surprised to see the same deck again (or some version of it) vs. Water as Gravity played in Round 1, as it is one of the few decks that they have that is truly resistant to almost anything that Water can do.A gravity mono actually makes a bit of sense vs. Entropy, as it should be able to overpower Discord if pillared correctly.  Also, Upped Otys can help to take out Demons that would limit Entropy's creature base.With light not having any in-element CC, I can see Gravity making use of Acceleration this matchup, possibly as part of a duo with Earth in order to use Pulvy (if they brought any) to take out any Eternities.  Could also be a Fireeater duo with Fire to take advantage of whatever Deflags they have packed and the ramping of Fireeaters mitigates Light's healing.

That brings them to us.  All in all, Black Hole/Discord makes a lot of sense vs. us, which is just a really tough deck to get around, no two ways about it.  While Sancs can be a very hard counter to it, we don't currently have a good deck that matches up with Gravity that takes advantage of them.  The Immortal has them in spades, but Acceleration/Overdrive renders that deck all but helpless.  The good news for us is that this is not likely to be their most dangerous/experienced players, as they have the aforementioned brutal matchups this round.

[Mithcairion]

  319 cards left

Darkness has to discard 24 cards from each of these decks:

by Mithcairion

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4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 590 590 590 590 590 590 5i7 5on 5uk 5uk 5uk 5uk 5uo 5up 5up 5uu 606 606 606 606 61q 7tb 7tf 7tf 8pm

and

by Mithcairion

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52o 52o 52o 52o 52o 52o 52q 52r 52r 52r 5un 5un 5un 5un 5un 5un 606 606 606 606 606 606 606 606 606 606 606 606 71a 71b 71b 8pk

Knowing TorB, he likes to keep his decks intact as much as possible, although that second deck looks more like the work of Terro or Oni (both prefer stalling) than TorB, as he has a great deal of disdain for Parasites' usefulness.  Of the first, I'm guessing they keep the Gargoyles, the Steals, the Dagger, and the Dusk Mantle.  Darkness has a severe lack of damage as War goes along so this deck losing hurts them even more than it may seem.  From the second deck, they will keep the Arsenics and either the Bone Walls or the Poisons.  If I had to place a bet I would guess the Poisons, as they are one of the only reliable offenses they have against Aether and Death's formidable walls.
's other matchups this round:

GravityDeathLifeWaterFireAetherEntropy

Another team with some matchups that really don't do them any favors.  Death, Fire, Aether, Entropy, and Water (given their deckbuilding prowess and versatility) are all tough orders for Darkness.  I imagine they will assume that Terro has an idea of what we are likely to try vs. them, as he has obviously either been master or been a part of Earth's War team from the beginning.  This is a good thing for us, as Terro is part of the old guard of Earth and as we've heard throughout chat, we're doing things that people simply don't expect.  This is a trend we can keep up.

:  I sense some kind of Poison/Bolt deck from Death here.  They simply don't have a reliable way to get around Bone Wall, and Plauge decimates Cloak and the low HP creatures that Darkness employs.  This was a matchup that gave them fits last War, I expect it to do the same this War. 

Edit:  Devtal is also effective vs. Death, so it could also be a possibility:life:  Will most likely bring a counter to FFQ/Adrenaline.  Most likely a Dim Shield deck, possibly PUGons or Liquid PUGons (a favorite of Terro's):  Tough to tell.  It seems like everything we tried last War failed, and it really wouldn't surprise me if it was the same here.  I could see them simply try to outstall Water here and go for Sancs, Miracles, Vamp Dagger, and Dusk, possibly with Drain Lifes or Dragons, also.:  If Darkness has any BHs in their vault, we'll see them here.  Every single match against Fire last War they brought an Immo or Fractix (when they played Napalm), so I wouldn't be surprised at all to see BHs from them.  Also, Voodolleration makes some sense here if Darkness thinks that they are likely to be stalled.:  As mentioned in the Gravity thread, most likely a NotP deck from them.:  Oddly enough, Devtal turned out to be a great play vs. Aether due to the expensive creatures, although as I learned last War the best way to deal with Devs is to use Novas, even if you don't plan on using the quanta from them.  With Terro on the team, EQ + Devs wouldn't surprise me, either.:  Darkness really doesn't have a great answer for them.  As it was, they got their lone win vs. Entropy last War through sheer luck in bow vs. bow.  This will be one of Darkness' strongest decks, if not an attempt at a hard counter.[/list]
As for us, Earth gave Darkness a lot of headaches last War due to Immortal and Grabows.  The dichotomy of the two put a lot of stress on them, as their Grabow has lasting power, but is neither fast enough to keep up with our Grabow, nor does it hit hard enough to defeat Immortal.  They DO have access to Voodolleration, though (a particular favorite of TorB's), and I wouldn't be terribly surprised to see it used against us due to our reliance on BB for CC.  Also, Vader Sader is a very powerful deck for them that can beat the Immortal (legitimately) and actually beat Earth's Grabow last War, as well.  Should they bring Vader Sader against us, I can all but guarantee that they will run Cloaks in it (probably 3) in order to be able to play pillars/pends without fear of EQ for a few turns in order to accumulate quanta.  Of any deck that they can run, I think this one (Vader Sader is most likely).