Guest posts by Shadowjack

1

Archived Decks / Re: Fortress of Solitude

« on: March 30, 2010, 05:59:30 pm »

Seems like there is something weird going on with the FGs and their permanent-playing... Rainbow with no HGs? Incarnate with no GYs?
I wouldn't look to closely at the performance of the deck until whatever that is has been fixed (if it hasn't already).

Yep the trainer A.I. is brain dead atm.  A Fractal based False God killer deck I made that was doing well against the trainer subsequently got reamed when I brought it over to live.  Money down the drain.  Buyer beware.

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Duo-Decks / Re: Dark/Aether Fratcal deck

« on: March 30, 2010, 02:22:18 pm »

Sampling of my wasting my time, hoping against hope.


Octane - Game 1: He destroyed my only dark quantum source and axed my only pest.  Game over. (loss)

Game 2: Pests and Vamps mobbed with ridiculous anti-creature spam and was gassed and Eagle Eyed to death. (loss)

Paradox - Game 1: He got out a quick rush and almost over-ran me but I got Vamp/Frag rush going and won E.M. victory. (win)  Electrum Hourglass from spins.

Game 2: Pest+Vamp rush takes him down before he rolls out any threats. (win)

Chaos Lord - Game 1: No Frag draws and his mutations were too insane to counter. (loss)

Game 2: Looking OK with a Fragged Pest line and he top-decks a dragon while muting into an 11/5...great.  (loss) 

Ferox - Game 1: No Frag draw, if I had I would have won the game. (loss)

Destiny - Game 1: Pest/Frag shut him down and with my quantum generation his rewinds didn't go much.  Elcipse+Pest rush with Vamps= EM victory (win)

Miracle - Game 1: His dual Light Dragons almost took me out before I could Frag/Vampire/Eclipse him into the dirt.
(win)
Game 2: He goes first with insane draw and rolls over me before I can shift momentum my way. (loss)

Morte - Game 1: Ivory Dragon chewed on my ass the entire game and Bone Wall stops me from countering with Vamp+Frag rush life gain to stabilize momentum swing.  (loss)

Graviton - Game 1: Starting to notice my opening hand draws in regular game are waaaaay more sketchy than what I was getting in the trainer.  Beginning to wonder if something fishy is going on here(oh yeah, auto-mulligan ). Oh, and I lost. (loss)

Dark Matter - Game 1: I win, big shock being that I am dual quantum and Dark Matter is designed with the SOLE purpose of screwing over Rainbow decks but sucks at doing anything else.  Grats on designing a deck that the vast majority of False God farmers auto-quit against.

Incarnate - Game 1: My Vamp rush is better than his but Bone Wall spam loses me the game that I would otherwise had won.  (loss)

Divine Glory - Game 1: He screws my quantum base with permanent destruction and I can't establish the Vamp rush fast enough to win the game.  I am so happy that pillar destruction and permanent destruction are one in the same in this game!  I wonder why that might be a problem?  Hmmm, I wonder, hmmmm. (loss)

Obliterator - Game 1: No Pest in opening hand = loss. Hurray!  Oh and the Massive anti-creature+overwhelming quantum/card advantage didn't help much either.(loss)

Scorpio - Game 1: Stole his Permafrost Shield and won.  Otherwise he would have kicked my ass sideways.  (win)

Rainbow - Game 1:  Hey look guys!  I'm Rainbow!  I just hang out behind my massive life until I draw enough Hourglasses to gain so much card advantage it is as if my huge unwieldy deck plays like a tight 30 card deck with access to every card to win in any situation!  Hooray!  That's fair isn't it guys!  Guys? (loss)

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Duo-Decks / Re: Dark/Aether Fratcal deck

« on: March 30, 2010, 12:14:27 pm »

Yep, there is a HUGE difference between how the trainer A.I. acts v/s how the regular game A.I. acts.  DON'T dive into this deck for regular game.  It is far too fragile to handle a real A.I. 

Grrr, sorry guys.  I thought it was too good to be true  .


P.S.: Yeah, this deck is a wash.  I didn't realize the HUGE competence gap between the trainer A.I. and the real A.I. and this deck just can't handle the retarded permanent control that makes Quints auto-include in any serious False God deck but is a weak-assed card in this deck.  I think I am through with trying to crack the False God thing.  There isn't enough reliable, diverse quantum producing sources to allow anything but very narrow deck types viable in that environment.  Yeah, yeah I know you can swing a little into Earth for borrowing but why stop there?  Why not go into Life for Empathy?  Or Entropy for Druids?  See where this is headed? 

Sorry, but I am just getting too frustrated with the lack of diversity of pillar-style quantum generating cards that would allow more interesting interactions with the card base.  I have no big problems the regular card base just the cards that allow you play them more diversely.

But hey!   You can at least whip Dark Matter's ass!  Whoopty-freaking doo!

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Duo-Decks / Re: Dark/Aether Fratcal deck

« on: March 30, 2010, 12:02:58 pm »

For the FG-killing version deck, i have to say i dont like it
I tested it in real game.
There is no healing and by the time you lock FG's quanta, FG had probably put 20damage/round or even more (i already drained his creatures)
Maybe I am doing something wrong?

Vampire Dagger = Healing

Frag+Vampires = Healing

You aren't going to lock up any False God quantum who can produce over two different types of quantum with any consistency.  This isn't a Lock deck, it is a momentum denial deck. 

I wasn't aware Fractal is out in regular game.  I'll make this deck and do some testing and see if there is an A.I. inconsistency between the two.  Thanks for the feedback!


P.S.:  If you don't have Vamp Dagger then put in an extra Vampire.

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Duo-Decks / Re: Dark/Aether Fratcal deck

« on: March 30, 2010, 11:09:02 am »

That is why I point out that I am up against the trainer A.I. because it seems to act kind of strange in relation to my experience with the non-trainer interface.  For instance, Seism will almost always throw an Earthquake at a standard rainbow deck with Quantum Towers yet with this deck it hasn't done it once.  Maybe the A.I.'s threat assessment tends to save earth quantum for casting bodies over blasting pillars if they aren't quantum towers?  Also I noticed that the amount of spell type anti-creature just doesn't get thrown at a Pest like it would at other stuff perhaps because the A.I. is coded to assess it's quantum usage differently when faced with a 0 attack power creature whose activated ability is "Burrow", ignoring the drain ability as the real threat.

If you take this all into account it may go a long way to explaining why it works, at least for me in the trainer, so well against the A.I.  It, perhaps, is just successful at exploiting the A.I.'s blind-side.  I think that, without extensive tweaking, it is a weak pvp deck as it can be easily disrupted by someone who knows how to muck with the deck's engine (i.e. Pest denial/quantum acceleration into Vampire/Eclipse proliferation) unlike the hapless A.I. 

As for wins and amount of games played I didn't make an accounting.  I played at least ten games each against the False Gods in question and tried to note what, in my opinion, contributed to a loss and what contributed to a win.  I was just trying to extrapolate from my experiences with the deck.  I would say that, without a doubt, you need this deck to be upgraded.  If you have a couple of Pests (i.e. upgraded from Devourer) and two Obsidian Towers(upgraded from Pillars) in your opening hand then you have a Pest out on first turn v/s a turn later in an non-upgraded version which is a HUGE difference in how your deck ramps up in the weakest stage for this deck, the early game.  This deck is a prime example of a "momentum"(the concept, not the card) style deck and as such is weaker against early, fast rush.  This deck exerts control through denial which isn't the same as control at all.  If an opposing deck can put out threats before you can deny them the ability to do so then your options are limited as the deck is light on board control and heavy on denial and momentum.

I hope I covered enough ground to at least answer some of your questions.  Thanks for your interest.

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Duo-Decks / Re: Dark/Aether Fratcal deck

« on: March 29, 2010, 01:04:34 pm »

Did some play testing with below version of Dark Frag deck v/s False Gods.  This is pretty well tuned and doesn't often give you a bad draw.  All games were played in Trainer of course so I can't attest to if the A.I. there acts the same as the live version or not.



Strategy Notes(more to come as I write them):

Scorpio - Minimizing poison gain is key.  Use your anti-creature to kill Puffer Fish, they are your bane.  Steal Arsenic soon as it pops up.  Fractal+Vampire+Vamp Dagger will win you the game if you can out race poison and don't get screwed over by Permafrost Shield. (Medium-Hard)

Eldinis - Lots of vectors to win here.  Frag+Pest = Choke down quantum and stunt immortal pump creature growth.  Siphon Life spirits before they even grow.  Frag+Vampires and outrace their damage.  Frag+Whatever+Steal Empathy (Easy).

Octane - Two quantum decks can't handle the Pest rush.  Steal Eagle Eye and you can win on Pest drain and Siphon Life alone.  (Easy-Auto Win)

Incarnate - Sort of a pain in the ass due to Retrovirus, Bone Wall, and, to a lesser extent, Bloodsuckers.  If you can stave off Bloodsucker/Vampire rush plus remove Retroviruses as they come up and Pest their Death quantum down you can win with Frag/Vampire rush.  Narrow vectors to victory make this match-up...(Medium to Hard)

Graviton - Steal Grav Shield, Pest+Frag neuters their Graviton Fireman rush, Thunder Bolt/Siphon Life any early Elite Otys to render them useless, finish off with Frag+Vampire rush.  (Easy)

Chaos Lord - Once you establish your Pest drain you pretty much win.  Rainbow style decks are too quantum fragile to handle shifts in their quantum base.  Here Dissipation Field actually helps you out buy allowing you to further muck up his quantum base with Vampires+Vampire Dagger+Eclipsed Pests.  Maxwell Demons can be a pain but easy to work around.  Time your Steals on Dissipation Field properly and you win. (Easy)

Dark Matter - Pretty much the same as Octane.  Dual quantum decks can't handle this kind of denial with added bonus of his quantum becomes yours so his weak Black Hole non-sense hardly affects you all.  Frag+Pest and you pretty much win. (Easy...yes you are reading that right).

Siesm - Dual quantum deck normally the bane of rainbows falls hard against this deck.  Pests screw with his earth quantum while increasing yours without urgent need for pillars.  Pretty much an easy win unless you stall a bit and can't counter shrieker rush with Vampire spam. (Easy)

Gemini - Oddly annoying deck due to fast damage rush, occasional Electrocuter, and Dimensional Shield.  If you can shut down the Recluse rush and counter immaterial bozos with Vampires you will win.  This deck isn't very forgiving if you stall out too much.  (Easy - Medium)

Fire Queen - Unless you can close down the Fire Queen factory pretty fast you are screwed.  Save steals for Empathy if you can.  Stealing an Eagle Eye with a wind tower might do in a pinch.  Fire Flies are annoying as hell because they produce a third quantum source that "shields" the life quantum you really want to drain.  Winnable but most likely you are going to get bum-rushed like a rabid emo after a box of eye-liner.  (Hard)

Miracle - Normally more than two quantum sources gives this deck a problem but this deck is so Light quantum centric that a decent number of Pests will roll over this deck pretty easily.  (Easy)

Morte - Can be a pain but just Pest spam, steal his Graveyards, and time your Eclipse just right and you will win.  (Easy to Medium)

Divine Glory - Pain as always but you actually stand a decent chance of winning with this deck.  You basically have to establish about a 10 quantum a turn drain with Vampire+Frag proliferation to out-race Glory rush and you will win.  Points for this deck making his fire quantum almost irrelevant with Pest drain and two quantum focus.  (Medium)

P.S.: Yes I know I am improperly abbreviating Fractal as "Frag".  I just like referring to it that way and "Frac" sounds too much like I am caught in an episode of "Battlestar Galactica".