[Official] Devourer | Pest

[OldTrees]

@regen2k9
I apologize. I misinterpreted what you were saying.

[regen2k9]

@regen2k9
I apologize. I misinterpreted what you were saying.

No problem at all.  After all, I could have been a lot clearer.  I'm glad we could both work this thing out as civilly as we did 

[blueberrymania]

This IS the end of the world as we know it ... and I feel fine  8)

I am starting to get frustrated.

The OP was sincere in their concern.
Most of the posters have been trolling and disrespectful. Stop it.

Something something elitism something something

Accusations with vague targets (subject to misinterpretation)  and no citation/reasons are not helpful.

That is all I was referring to Old Trees, especially with the growing talk of elitism on the forums. Much like the "blah blah rng haxx blah blah" posts, this is simply a semi-tongue in cheek way of referring to a well-known vice of the community, and I believe that pointing it out, even vaguely, is still helpful to those who may not realize the way trolling new players hurts us.  I respectfully disagree Old Trees, as I believe it is helpful, though snarky and vague.  I am not the type to start flame wars with individual members with on these threads.  Respectfully speaking, I prefer my vagueness to blatant flaming any day.

Um, I'm not exactly a "new" player. I played for a few months back in '09.

[Aves]

EtG in 2009 =/= EtG in 2012. Nothing against you, you're just not as familiar with the game as people who have been playing actively more recently, like the majority of people here.

Anyways, so any refutation to the points that others have made about pest not being OP?

Edit: Also, I suggest that you
1. Click on the "Read this first" posts in each board. Following convention will help for others to take you more seriously.
2. Read up on the game mechanics and for the metagame. I remember there was an in-depth description of that, but don't remember where it is now. The metagame is hard to get a feel for until you can field a variety of decks (you are starting over in a new account, yes?) and have played thousands of matches.

[Heric the Dark Lord]

Not to sound like I'm agreeing with a friend, and I may regret posting here, but I can agree with a plus 1-2 quanta cost for devourer. Pest should have a 1 less than devourer. I will explain why, which is also why I am considering posting a nerf topic on the other card soon.

I have never seen Pestal, and I've used Mono-dark pest. They are strong, giving you quanta advantage while denying that to your opponent, all for 2 or 3 dark, but aren't near unstoppable. I see WAY too many earth/dark hybrid decks, however, that spam earthquake and devourer, where you actually CAN'T counter the devourers, as you will have no quanta at the end of your turn. Maybe it's just my deck, but there aren't enough pillars in the average deck to offset the loss, and it's near impossible to get out enough cards before they get those gruby monsters in the ground to stop them.

If somebody else knows a way to counter, let's hear it, but otherwise...

[Absol]

Pillarless.
Though, they get countered by RT.

[Cheesy111]

Not to sound like I'm agreeing with a friend, and I may regret posting here, but I can agree with a plus 1-2 quanta cost for devourer. Pest should have a 1 less than devourer. I will explain why, which is also why I am considering posting a nerf topic on the other card soon.

I have never seen Pestal, and I've used Mono-dark pest. They are strong, giving you quanta advantage while denying that to your opponent, all for 2 or 3 dark, but aren't near unstoppable. I see WAY too many earth/dark hybrid decks, however, that spam earthquake and devourer, where you actually CAN'T counter the devourers, as you will have no quanta at the end of your turn. Maybe it's just my deck, but there aren't enough pillars in the average deck to offset the loss, and it's near impossible to get out enough cards before they get those gruby monsters in the ground to stop them.

If somebody else knows a way to counter, let's hear it, but otherwise...

Nova, Immolation, Pillar/Pend split soft counter.  Sanctuary, EA hard counter.

[Heric the Dark Lord]

Not to sound like I'm agreeing with a friend, and I may regret posting here, but I can agree with a plus 1-2 quanta cost for devourer. Pest should have a 1 less than devourer. I will explain why, which is also why I am considering posting a nerf topic on the other card soon.

I have never seen Pestal, and I've used Mono-dark pest. They are strong, giving you quanta advantage while denying that to your opponent, all for 2 or 3 dark, but aren't near unstoppable. I see WAY too many earth/dark hybrid decks, however, that spam earthquake and devourer, where you actually CAN'T counter the devourers, as you will have no quanta at the end of your turn. Maybe it's just my deck, but there aren't enough pillars in the average deck to offset the loss, and it's near impossible to get out enough cards before they get those gruby monsters in the ground to stop them.

If somebody else knows a way to counter, let's hear it, but otherwise...

Nova, Immolation, Pillar/Pend split soft counter.  Sanctuary, EA hard counter.

1:Can only be used up to twice per turn, which doesn't give enough for much, and I'm fairly certain they use drain life just in case.
2:I can see how that would work, but this needs to be done no later than a turn from when you use it, or you run out of that quanta. this requires three cards to initiate. A lot of waiting, where they can get out black dragons with ease. Also, see above, as fire creatures have low HP
3:Very soft counter. They have several earthquakes.
4:Only if you can get the quanta to play a 4 quanta card. and this only prevents total mana lock; they can still harm your pillars, forcing extreme sluggishness while they pump out the black dragons.
5:Uncertain what EA is.

[Cheesy111]

Not to sound like I'm agreeing with a friend, and I may regret posting here, but I can agree with a plus 1-2 quanta cost for devourer. Pest should have a 1 less than devourer. I will explain why, which is also why I am considering posting a nerf topic on the other card soon.

I have never seen Pestal, and I've used Mono-dark pest. They are strong, giving you quanta advantage while denying that to your opponent, all for 2 or 3 dark, but aren't near unstoppable. I see WAY too many earth/dark hybrid decks, however, that spam earthquake and devourer, where you actually CAN'T counter the devourers, as you will have no quanta at the end of your turn. Maybe it's just my deck, but there aren't enough pillars in the average deck to offset the loss, and it's near impossible to get out enough cards before they get those gruby monsters in the ground to stop them.

If somebody else knows a way to counter, let's hear it, but otherwise...

Nova, Immolation, Pillar/Pend split soft counter.  Sanctuary, EA hard counter.

1:Can only be used up to twice per turn, which doesn't give enough for much, and I'm fairly certain they use drain life just in case.
2:I can see how that would work, but this needs to be done no later than a turn from when you use it, or you run out of that quanta. this requires three cards to initiate. A lot of waiting, where they can get out black dragons with ease. Also, see above, as fire creatures have low HP
3:Very soft counter. They have several earthquakes.
4:Only if you can get the quanta to play a 4 quanta card. and this only prevents total mana lock; they can still harm your pillars, forcing extreme sluggishness while they pump out the black dragons.
5:Uncertain what EA is.

1) 2xnova provides 24 bonus quanta.  Even if for some strange reason you aren't playing a novabow that can use that quanta to get cards out onto the field ASAP, that's 4 turns of quanta that devourers have to chew through even if they have all 6 of them out.  In almost every game that's going to be more than enough to hand you a win.
2) Immorushes are noted for their speed.  Usually an immorush will have a golem out on the first turn, with some excess quanta from immolation and possibly a few fire pillars/pends.  This is more than enough to crush dev/EQ.
3) Yes.
4) Here's where your story starts to look dicey.  There's just not enough room for 'pumping out' black dragons, siphon lifes, lots of devourers and lots of earthquakes in a deck while keeping it very close to 30 cards (more would make it unreliable).  Can you show me an example deck of what you're talking about?
5)Enchant Artifact.

[mwaetht]

EA=Enchant Artifact

Nova/Cremation are all right; a good estimate is that at worst, early game the opponent has 2-3 of the card in question (devourer) if they run six copies. So:

Turn 1, nothing
Turn 2, Dev 1 or 1+2
Turn 3, maybe another dev

Three devourers will not suck up enough quanta from just one early Nova in time (maybe by Turn 6 if everything goes right for the mono-dark). This is even clearer with Immolation, which will take up to Turn 10 to be absorbed, and for most of the early turns you will retain almost all the fire quanta generated due to how the RNG works. The monodark will just get outrushed. This assumes the opponent can take out every pillar/pend with earthquakes, too.

Drain life sucks. 2 damage kills almost nothing that might actually hinder the opponent significantly by dying (Off the top of my head:  Shard of OP, Arctic Squid, maybe Lava Golem/Forest Spirit/Mind Flayer) and it takes time (and a period of relative safety in which you don't need to spend the accumulated quanta) to build it up to 4 damage, which precludes its use in the early game.

Yes, earthquake is nasty, but if you see the opponent playing a bunch of pendulums with a Mark of Earth you really should exercise common sense.

Ninja'd

[Heric the Dark Lord]

Not to sound like I'm agreeing with a friend, and I may regret posting here, but I can agree with a plus 1-2 quanta cost for devourer. Pest should have a 1 less than devourer. I will explain why, which is also why I am considering posting a nerf topic on the other card soon.

I have never seen Pestal, and I've used Mono-dark pest. They are strong, giving you quanta advantage while denying that to your opponent, all for 2 or 3 dark, but aren't near unstoppable. I see WAY too many earth/dark hybrid decks, however, that spam earthquake and devourer, where you actually CAN'T counter the devourers, as you will have no quanta at the end of your turn. Maybe it's just my deck, but there aren't enough pillars in the average deck to offset the loss, and it's near impossible to get out enough cards before they get those gruby monsters in the ground to stop them.

If somebody else knows a way to counter, let's hear it, but otherwise...

Nova, Immolation, Pillar/Pend split soft counter.  Sanctuary, EA hard counter.

1:Can only be used up to twice per turn, which doesn't give enough for much, and I'm fairly certain they use drain life just in case.
2:I can see how that would work, but this needs to be done no later than a turn from when you use it, or you run out of that quanta. this requires three cards to initiate. A lot of waiting, where they can get out black dragons with ease. Also, see above, as fire creatures have low HP
3:Very soft counter. They have several earthquakes.
4:Only if you can get the quanta to play a 4 quanta card. and this only prevents total mana lock; they can still harm your pillars, forcing extreme sluggishness while they pump out the black dragons.
5:Uncertain what EA is.

1) 2xnova provides 24 bonus quanta.  Even if for some strange reason you aren't playing a novabow that can use that quanta to get cards out onto the field ASAP, that's 4 turns of quanta that devourers have to chew through even if they have all 6 of them out.  In almost every game that's going to be more than enough to hand you a win.
2) Immorushes are noted for their speed.  Usually an immorush will have a golem out on the first turn, with some excess quanta from immolation and possibly a few fire pillars/pends.  This is more than enough to crush dev/EQ.
3) Yes.
4) Here's where your story starts to look dicey.  There's just not enough room for 'pumping out' black dragons, siphon lifes, lots of devourers and lots of earthquakes in a deck while keeping it very close to 30 cards (more would make it unreliable).  Can you show me an example deck of what you're talking about?
5)Enchant Artifact.

1:Why would I play Novabow? It's not like it's the only good deck, nor the only deck that uses Nova.
2:Immorush is only one type of deck, and a deck I don't want.
4:
Earth mark
2  pillars
2  Pillars
8  Pends
6 devourers
6 earthquake
4 Black Dragons
2 Drain Lifes
2 Steals
Seems like it'd work pretty well. I've never memorized the entire decks, but I know they have a lot of quakes, a lot of pests, and quite a few dragons.
5:That would work. Sadly, I've never liked earth. Ever. In any game. Ever.

Drain life sucks. 2 damage kills almost nothing that might actually hinder the opponent significantly by dying (Off the top of my head:  Shard of OP, Arctic Squid, maybe Lava Golem/Forest Spirit/Mind Flayer) and it takes time (and a period of relative safety in which you don't need to spend the accumulated quanta) to build it up to 4 damage, which precludes its use in the early game.

Yes, earthquake is nasty, but if you see the opponent playing a bunch of pendulums with a Mark of Earth you really should exercise common sense.

1:Not against fire, it doesn't. And I also beg to differ. I've seen it work, it heals you, harms them or their creature, and  can be obtained quickly with devourers.
2:Anything you can get off before, there's no way it has the endurance to withstand a drain life at 2-4 damage. Anything you can get off during, same. And with 3-4 devourers, it really doesn't take a lot of time to accumulate 10 quanta. If you somehow manage to get off a colossal dragon, or something of similar build during or before the lock, let me know.
3:When fighting devourers, common sense can only go so far. You still need pillars, you still need creatures, and I can't swap the pillars out for novas, immos, and photons mid-game.

[Cheesy111]

Spoiler for Hidden:

Not to sound like I'm agreeing with a friend, and I may regret posting here, but I can agree with a plus 1-2 quanta cost for devourer. Pest should have a 1 less than devourer. I will explain why, which is also why I am considering posting a nerf topic on the other card soon.

I have never seen Pestal, and I've used Mono-dark pest. They are strong, giving you quanta advantage while denying that to your opponent, all for 2 or 3 dark, but aren't near unstoppable. I see WAY too many earth/dark hybrid decks, however, that spam earthquake and devourer, where you actually CAN'T counter the devourers, as you will have no quanta at the end of your turn. Maybe it's just my deck, but there aren't enough pillars in the average deck to offset the loss, and it's near impossible to get out enough cards before they get those gruby monsters in the ground to stop them.

If somebody else knows a way to counter, let's hear it, but otherwise...

Nova, Immolation, Pillar/Pend split soft counter.  Sanctuary, EA hard counter.

1:Can only be used up to twice per turn, which doesn't give enough for much, and I'm fairly certain they use drain life just in case.
2:I can see how that would work, but this needs to be done no later than a turn from when you use it, or you run out of that quanta. this requires three cards to initiate. A lot of waiting, where they can get out black dragons with ease. Also, see above, as fire creatures have low HP
3:Very soft counter. They have several earthquakes.
4:Only if you can get the quanta to play a 4 quanta card. and this only prevents total mana lock; they can still harm your pillars, forcing extreme sluggishness while they pump out the black dragons.
5:Uncertain what EA is.

1) 2xnova provides 24 bonus quanta.  Even if for some strange reason you aren't playing a novabow that can use that quanta to get cards out onto the field ASAP, that's 4 turns of quanta that devourers have to chew through even if they have all 6 of them out.  In almost every game that's going to be more than enough to hand you a win.
2) Immorushes are noted for their speed.  Usually an immorush will have a golem out on the first turn, with some excess quanta from immolation and possibly a few fire pillars/pends.  This is more than enough to crush dev/EQ.
3) Yes.
4) Here's where your story starts to look dicey.  There's just not enough room for 'pumping out' black dragons, siphon lifes, lots of devourers and lots of earthquakes in a deck while keeping it very close to 30 cards (more would make it unreliable).  Can you show me an example deck of what you're talking about?
5)Enchant Artifact.

1:Why would I play Novabow? It's not like it's the only good deck, nor the only deck that uses Nova.
2:Immorush is only one type of deck, and a deck I don't want.
4:
Earth mark
2  pillars
2  Pillars
8  Pends
6 devourers
6 earthquake
4 Black Dragons
2 Drain Lifes
2 Steals
Seems like it'd work pretty well. I've never memorized the entire decks, but I know they have a lot of quakes, a lot of pests, and quite a few dragons.
5:That would work. Sadly, I've never liked earth. Ever. In any game. Ever.

Drain life sucks. 2 damage kills almost nothing that might actually hinder the opponent significantly by dying (Off the top of my head:  Shard of OP, Arctic Squid, maybe Lava Golem/Forest Spirit/Mind Flayer) and it takes time (and a period of relative safety in which you don't need to spend the accumulated quanta) to build it up to 4 damage, which precludes its use in the early game.

Yes, earthquake is nasty, but if you see the opponent playing a bunch of pendulums with a Mark of Earth you really should exercise common sense.

1:Not against fire, it doesn't. And I also beg to differ. I've seen it work, it heals you, harms them or their creature, and  can be obtained quickly with devourers.
2:Anything you can get off before, there's no way it has the endurance to withstand a drain life at 2-4 damage. Anything you can get off during, same. And with 3-4 devourers, it really doesn't take a lot of time to accumulate 10 quanta. If you somehow manage to get off a colossal dragon, or something of similar build during or before the lock, let me know.
3:When fighting devourers, common sense can only go so far. You still need pillars, you still need creatures, and I can't swap the pillars out for novas, immos, and photons mid-game.

Going by the deck you posted, these are the main weaknesses of Dev/EQ.

1) Low damage
This is the biggest one.  Only 4 dragons and 2 Drain Lifes isn't much damage - 4 lightnings will leave you completely vulnerable.  In a more common case, something like a monolife rush can easily get out a few creatures, perhaps even an adrenalined frog or two before the lockdown is complete.  And with only 4 dragons for damage and 2 drain life's for CC you'll almost surely lose before you can control the board or kill the opponent.  It doesn't have to be just monolife rush, it can be any low-quanta or fast rush.
2) Weakness to Nova/Immo/EA
I think we've already agreed on these.  My apologies if I have misinterpreted something.

So, going back to your original question, a few decks to counter it would be:

-Standard Antabow (or SoFoBow)
-Immorush
-Nova Discake
-Monodeath Rush (Poison)
-Monolife Rush (Adrenaline)
-Any deck with Enchant Artifact splashed in
-Zen (6nova version)
-The Immortal (Earth/Light Stall)
-Firefly/Pegasus/Blessing/Dragonfly

I'm sure there are other decks that can beat Dev/EQ as well, but these should all be really solid bets against it.  Relying on creature quanta generation (Dragonfly, Firefly, Gnome Gemfinder, Devourer, RoL/Brimstone Eater when upgraded) can also aid against Earthquake and make your pillar/pendulum split stronger while fast creature rushes or Nova/Immolation/Sanctuary can protect against Devourers.