5th Trials - Phase 3 - Community Vote

[kev]

Phase 3 - Community Vote

Phase ends when above poll expires.

It's time to vote for your favorite Master candidate!  Every community member has one vote. You can change your vote at any time as long as there is still time on the clock.

Vote based on who you think would make the best Master of that element. Do not vote based on who is the best player or who you know personally. Try to pick someone who you think would help the community the most.  Feel free to ask the candidates difficult questions to help you make your decision.

For reference, here are the 5th Trials Standings (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/index.php/topic,35936.0.html) and Phase 1 Submission (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/index.php/topic,35922.0.html) threads.

[Kuroaitou]

Sorry for the 'spam', but I really did put some thought into these questions! ^^; (Even though some of them are a bit absurd and more of a personality gauge than anything)

Q: “Darkness players can be pretty sneaky with their tactics (Cloak, Nightmare, etc.)… name a prank or something silly that you have done (in elements or in real life) that you managed to pull off and laugh about later. Do you think that Master of Darkness should embody this 'trickiness' that I speak of? Or do you think that they should have a different characteristic than what I described?”

[RavingRabbid]

Last time, I asked Darkness trialists to show me the brightest side of Darkness. Now, I ask you to bring the rainbow in Darkness and build a deck about it.


Is Darkness evil?


Add to your responses a song that reminds you of Darkness.

[Calindu]

Darkness is complex: Haves good CC, PC, anti CC/PC, denial, damage and staling power.

Q:"Design a card that can make darkness even complex, bringing darkness another archetype, building a deck around it."

[majofa]

The following questions/comments will be sharp and pointed. They may hurt your feelings, but they are meant to help me and the community see how you handled adversity and tough questions. So, don't take too much offense to it, I'm gonna be grilling everyone. Also, I don't hate any of you, it's just my RL interviewing being used for the community vote.

TheonlyrealBeef
It's no secret that you used a glitching technique to gain additional Marks, do you plan on using those in War? Most people would view this as unfair, do you?
bogtro
Why did you choose Darkness when your avatar is Earth? As far as PvP skill with Darkness, I think TorB is leaps and bounds above the three challengers, how do you stand out above the rest?
-Why is this Mark Earth?

by majofa

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5rg 5rg 5rg 5ro 5uk 5uk 5uk 5uk 5uk 5uk 5uk 5uk 5uk 5uk 5uk 5ul 5ul 5ul 5v1 5v1 5v1 5v1 5v1 5v1 7q8 7q8 7tf 7tf 7tf 7tf 8pm

Xenocidius
You're very active, but I've never viewed you as a great PvPer. What process did you go through in preparing for the Trials battles?
ji412jo
Darkness seems to hate you, although you probably don't seem to feel the same about it. As it stands, TorB and Xenocidius will most likely get all the votes.. How are you better then Xenocidius?

[TheonlyrealBeef]

First off, time for a speech! (answers to questions later, in that spoiler down there)

Third trials for me, second in which I am a master, and such I will remain until someone manages to beat me fair and square in trials. That's right, I have no intention of becoming inactive for as long as I'm Darkness Master, regardless of RL.

As for what I've done...
Of course, there's this trials. My card ideas were poor, to be frank, but then again I don't like the whole CI&A thing. If you think card designing is a must for a Master, tl;dr the rest and vote for someone else.
No, I'm for Master as a pvp title. I may not be perfect at that, but at least I'm ever-learning and having fun: what it's all about. Last war went significantly better than the war before that, but I'd be a liar to say it was the work of a genius. Just sheer stubbornness, luck, and one strategic sub helped a whole lot. Ghostmare had a significant chance of losing vs Earth at least twice, yet we persevered. Masters' Tournament was less-than perfect, I wasn't sure what to expect from 10 men and was kind of expecting Higurashi not to bring the same old decks yet again...

Either way, it's your choice to vote for me! I won't have hard feelings regardless of whom you vote for, voting against me is like trying to give me a challenge I get to look forward to! (but don't see that as a reason not to vote for me! )

I'd normally leave a comment about you Darkness challengers, but none of you were in team Darkness last war and Phase 2 outcome is far from conclusive to tell anything about that just yet, so just, uhm... good luck! Whomever gets to face me. But most of all, have fun!

Sorry for the 'spam', but I really did put some thought into these questions! ^^; (Even though some of them are a bit absurd and more of a personality gauge than anything)

Q: “Darkness players can be pretty sneaky with their tactics (Cloak, Nightmare, etc.)… name a prank or something silly that you have done (in elements or in real life) that you managed to pull off and laugh about later. Do you think that Master of Darkness should embody this 'trickiness' that I speak of? Or do you think that they should have a different characteristic than what I described?”

I always used to be the "poor innocent child", if I actually did something, I'd make sure I wouldn't get the blame. Of course, that was quite some time ago and I'm more of a lurker irl nowadays.

I do not think a Master should be deceitful, maybe in battle, but not in general.

Last time, I asked Darkness trialists to show me the brightest side of Darkness. Now, I ask you to bring the rainbow in Darkness and build a deck about it.

Hmm, I was recently thinking about a Darkbow, might as well share the draft version:

by TheonlyrealBeef

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4sa 4sa 4sa 4sa 4vp 52r 52r 52r 52r 55t 55t 595 5fb 5un 5un 5un 5un 5v0 5v0 5v0 5v0 5v2 606 606 606 606 606 6qq 6qq 7tb 8pk

Is Darkness evil?

Just like previous trials my answer remains no, I'll restate the arguments if you so desire.

Add to your responses a song that reminds you of Darkness.

Fear of the dark (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/index.php/topic,32032.0.html), or I would never have used it as war propaganda

Darkness is complex: Haves good CC, PC, anti CC/PC, denial, damage and staling power.

Q:"Design a card that can make darkness even complex, bringing darkness another archetype, building a deck around it."

I'll make this simple, I hate designing cards. Regardless, Darkness could use some mass CC, if anything, to make it more complete. Rushing cards could be good too, a quanta burst like immolation for example, maybe while sacrificing hp or something.

The following questions/comments will be sharp and pointed. They may hurt your feelings, but they are meant to help me and the community see how you handled adversity and tough questions. So, don't take too much offense to it, I'm gonna be grilling everyone. Also, I don't hate any of you, it's just my RL interviewing being used for the community vote.

TheonlyrealBeefIt's no secret that you used a glitching technique to gain additional Marks, do you plan on using those in War? Most people would view this as unfair, do you?

At least I'm honest about it, I have no intention of using them merely for the sake of an advantage (it's not just hypothetical either (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/index.php/topic,33334.0.html)), no more than one would expect me to have that is (currently 1). Hopefully, I made people think about just how many people use glitches/exploits and go unnoticed.
I could easily go and sell them if it makes people happy, but as long as the bug is in the game it doesn't really matter how many I currently have.

And about hurting my feelings, the truth may hurt, but at least it's not a lie.

Who has been your favorite Master and why (you cannot choose me or yourself)? What qualities makes this person an ideal Master?

Well if I really cannot choose myself...
Probably Higurashi, for having activity only rivaled by her pvp skill. I wish more Masters would be at least half as active

TorB: Do you ever plan to change your avatar?

Hah, maybe.
I already have in mind what it'd look like, more awesomeness and Darknessness(!), but let's face it, I don't have the patience nor experience to create something even worthy of replacing my current one.

TorB: What do you think is the best quality/qualities of your challengers?

As I mentioned earlier I know little about either of you to properly judge, but I'll give it a try...

ji412jo: Persistence, only challenger this trials to have participated in a previous trials.
bogtro: PvP skill, not only for having scored the most of all Darkness challengers against Light, but I also remember bogtro from tpvp. In fact, team 187 was quite close to eliminating team , and even beat us once.
Xenocidus: Card designing, being card curator and everything.

If you needed to remove 1 card of the darkness pool, what would it be?

I like most of them, but there are 2 cards that could use improvement, or replacement for the following reasons:

• Parasite: Worst card in Darkness' arsenal. I've tried a lot to get this card to work yet keep on losing with decks including it (usually with 4-5 hp left on my opponent, FUUU).
• Dusk Mantle: One of the things I like about Darkness is that I find it to be rather consistent compared with some other elements. Yet Dusk Mantle happens to be the opposite of just that by blocking anything between 0 and 100 percent. I still mathematically keep choosing for Dusk over Tower Shield since it's supposed to block more damage most of the time...

If it's just removal, Parasite is the only candidate, since Darkness wouldn't be a proper element without a shield.

Hello drakness trialers : I have some questions for you :

Who are they?

Do you think TorB did a good job as a master? if not or not enough what will you do to improve it ?

I never do a good enough job or I'd have nothing left to strive for.

I wish I can see a never seen darkness deck that can beat AI3 at least 5 times in a row. (a darkness deck is a deck with 50 % darkness cards in it)

Any deck can do that. Whether or not it can beat elders 5 times in a row is a matter of pure luck, regardless of whether the chance is 0.001% or 99.999% per game to win. Regardless, if it's originality and Darkness you want, I really like this deck from phase 1 (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/index.php/topic,34421.msg483323#msg483323):

by TheonlyrealBeef

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5ih 5ih 5ih 5uk 5uk 5uk 5uk 5uk 5uk 5uk 5uk 5uk 5uk 5uk 5uk 5uk 5uk 5uo 5uo 5ur 5ur 5us 5us 5us 5us 5us 5us 5v1 5v1 5v1 5v1 8pp

I'll think up more decks that can beat elders if this one doesn't suffice

Which one non-darkness card (excluding Shard of Void and Marks of Darkness), do you believe should be darkness instead of its current element?

I think Black Hole could just as well fit Darkness. I know it involves Gravity, but it's an anomaly that drains away Light, denies your opponent of quanta and uses this quanta against it's owner by healing you. That's three vs one argument to let it be Darkness. Of course, Gravity needs it more than Darkness, so let them keep it

Which one darkness card (including Shard of Void) do you believe should belong to a different element, and which element should it belong to?

Like ji412jo said Parasite is kind of borderline. Yeah, I be hating on Parasites, those creatures never did me much good and Infection fits Death. I bet Death would have tons more fun with them, too.

Question : You discover a magic incantation that allows anyone using it to possess another's body, and if to survive death through this process if so desired. What do you do after this discovery?

Discard it as being bogus and throw it in the nearest trash can.

[MrBlonde]

Who has been your favorite Master and why (you cannot choose me or yourself)? What qualities makes this person an ideal Master?

[bogtro]

Well, I guess I better make a short speech as well xD

My Elements "career" is short, yet I like to think (pretend?) that I've achieved a decent amount during that time. I played this game very briefly long ago (accounting for my join date), back in 1.26, and returned about 6 months ago. For all intents and purposes, I consider myself to have started playing this game 6 months ago. During that time, I have  competed in several PvP events (including War #4 with Earth), created some cards, developed my own theories about the metagame, provided (hopefully) helpful feedback to the community, and I hope that my presence here has been a positive one. I know it has been for me.

In this trials, Phase 1 was a bit easier for me than I expected, since I already had quite a bit of card ideas lying around, which left mostly feedback as the problem. Making helpful feedback was difficult for one reason - most of the Darkness decks were already quite decent, mostly by virtue of the fact that Darkness is just so awesome. I did get through it, and hopefully made some decent feedback on the way. Phase 2, the PvP phase, caused me to create, in my opinion, some pretty decent decks that scored me two perfect 3-0 victories in the tiebreaker. This was very surprising to me - I did not expect to be able to beat such well-known players, and certainly not 3-0.

Why did you choose Darkness when your avatar is Earth? As far as PvP skill with Darkness, I think TorB is leaps and bounds above the three challengers, how do you stand out above the rest?

The current avatar that I hold is a result of my War #4 experience on team Earth. Darkness has always been one of my favorite elements (along with Fire), as can be seen from my old War Application (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/index.php/topic,31242.msg423290#msg423290). I've actually been looking for a good darkness-themed avatar recently - any suggestions?

In terms of PvP skill, TorB is one of the best players in this game, and anyone who tries to deny that is either lying or a fool. Despite this, I feel like I'm perfectly capable of doing battle with the best and succeeding (Note that I went 3-2 in Phase 2, the highest score of any Darkness competitor, although much is attributable to luck). I can't claim to be on the level of TorB at this point, but I certainly feel like I'm making serious progress in advancing my PvP skill.

Considering that my time seriously playing Elements is significantly less than many challengers, I don't find it wholly unreasonable to make the claim that I have enough skill to be competitive with great players like TorB. This is possibly best illustrated in Phase 2, which is the fairest comparison between competitiors. In Phase 2, we all went 1-1 necessitating a rematch, where I went 2-0 (winning both matches 3-0). Although this is a small sample and far from conclusive, I do think that my PvP skill is not significantly worse than anyone else's.

It should also be considered that the Master of an element should not necessarily be a PvP title. Masters, in my view, should do much more than just successfully PvP with that element (although it is a major part of it). Card ideas, deck feedback, PvP skill, War skill (these are different things IMO), and now Forum Brawl skills are all things that masters need to have a strong command of.

-Why is this Mark Earth?

That was in error - thanks for pointing it out. Fixed.

Q: “Darkness players can be pretty sneaky with their tactics (Cloak, Nightmare, etc.)… name a prank or something silly that you have done (in elements or in real life) that you managed to pull off and laugh about later. Do you think that Master of Darkness should embody this 'trickiness' that I speak of? Or do you think that they should have a different characteristic than what I described?”

Heh, this is a much lighter question Pranks are something that I haven't done too much of (although I've done quite a few minor pranks [shock gum, shaken soda, etc.] a lot), but childish silly things are things I've done a lot of. For example, my friend was talking to his mother on the phone in Chinese. I know absolutely no Chinese beyond "Ni Hao". Being a siwwy child, I started yelling random syllables into the phone. Evidently I said something along the lines of "Hello, your son is a stupid dog". We had a good laugh over that one

I do feel like these are the kinds of qualities that Darkness masters should possess, but more in-game than outside of it.

Q:"Design a card that can make darkness even complex, bringing darkness another archetype, building a deck around it."

I feel like Darkness should be about using opponent's strength against them, and as such a card that would copy certain attributes (ability? attack/hp? etc.) would be beneficial. I'll add a specific card later [hopefully]

Last time, I asked Darkness trialists to show me the brightest side of Darkness. Now, I ask you to bring the rainbow in Darkness and build a deck about it.


Is Darkness evil?


Add to your responses a song that reminds you of Darkness.

a) Here's what I successfully used in grid against Cheesy111, slightly modded (will be modded for better results):

by bogtro

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4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vl 52q 55q 590 590 590 590 5fb 5oo 5uk 5uk 5uk 5uk 5uk 5ul 5ul 5ul 5ul 5um 5um 5um 5um 5um 5um 61q 8pm

Here's a funbow that I'm working on (started from ralouf's question and kinda went crazy from there):

by bogtro

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4sa 4sa 4sa 4sa 4sa 4sa 4sa 4vp 4vp 4vp 52r 52r 561 561 561 5un 5un 5un 5un 5un 5un 5v0 5v0 5v0 5v0 5v0 606 606 606 606 8pk

People seem to sometimes forget 2 things about catapult: Freeze increases damage, and poison counters get added. The idea of this deck is to use Voodoos, Pandes for effects, Parasites to infect Voodoos (or troublesome creatures), and fling away. When it gets going it actually works reasonably well.

It is difficult to create a rainbow that is primarily Darkness (and not voodoo-based; that's overused imo), because Darkness doesn't have many qualities that would fit into rainbows (the most obvious being a cheap creature). In contrast, Earth has Graboid, Entropy has Nova, and many other elements have decent CC that can be packed into rainbows (Aether has lightning, Air shockwave, etc.). The power of Darkness lies in manipulating the opponent to your will, something that I don't feel fits well in rainbows.

b) Darkness is, simply, not evil. It is all about manipulating the opponent; using their own strength against them. There is a bit of a sadism about Darkness, but most of it is ramped up since Darkness is good at denial - no fun for the opponent. Fun for Darkness

c) I've never really thought of a song that I feel really captures what Darkness is all about. I'll keep looking and come back to you later.

Who has been your favorite Master and why (you cannot choose me or yourself)? What qualities makes this person an ideal Master?

majofa. What qualities does majofa have?

• Excellent PvP skill - a must for any master.
• Participates in many events. I like that masters compete in PvP events for a number of reasons. It's like an MLB player playing in a local game - great for people to see.
• Has valuable insight into the game in general, including the metagame, strengths and weaknesses, and card balance.
• Works to improve PvP events, even when it goes around people. I don't necessarily agree with the methods, but it's admirable nonetheless.

Bogtro: You are not yet known a lot from this community. What have you done that is notice-able in this community, and what do you plan on doing in the future?
Also, tell us a bit more about yourself.

Let's see. I feel like I'm not quite as known yet simply because of the amount of time I've been here (which is relatively low). Most events I join I am joining for the first time (TPvP, Grid, BL/CL, Trials, etc.). Being noticed comes with time, and success. I feel like I'm having reasonable success, so I figure with time I should be more known (although I prefer being the overlooked underdog ).

In this community, I have competed in some PvP events, doing reasonably well (2nd place TPvP, very close to winning, ~10th place BL, where I was holding top 6 for quite a while before a losing streak, competed in War on Team Earth (admittedly the LVP of that team [timing issues] ), etc.). I've also been learning about the metagame and developing my own conclusions on it, applying these to deck feedback and card creation. To sum that up, I haven't done a whole lot so far, but I consider what I have done to be reasonably respectable considering my time here. The future? That's easy! I plan to lead Darkness to a War 5 win In more seriousness, I plan to basically continue what I've been doing - compete in PvP events, develop my theories, apply these theories to helpful feedback, card ideas, etc. I'd possibly like to run an event sometime.

About me: Being intentionally vague, I live in the US, more specifically EST, am of school age, enjoy online games (particularly EtG ), enjoy chess, math, American football, robotics, and getting out of school. I travel a decent amount for competitions in these (chess/math/robotics). I enjoy helping/teaching with math/chess/etc. I like good movies, preferably with enough action that I don't fall asleep.

Which one non-darkness card (excluding Shard of Void and Marks of Darkness), do you believe should be darkness instead of its current element?

Which one darkness card (including Shard of Void) do you believe should belong to a different element, and which element should it belong to?

a) Parallel Universe. Its mechanic symbolizes what I feel embodies Darkness. Of course, would it be a darkness card, it would need a significant rework (Phase Dragon is Immaterial because people abused PD+PU).

b) Parasite, which should really be a Death card. Death is about things dying, so Parasite's mechanic fits Death far better than Darkness (which is why the ability cost is Death). It's likely only Darkness in order to avoid it being a mono-card.

Do you think TorB did a good job as a master? if not or not enough what will you do to improve it ?

TorB has been an excellent master, and highly deserving of his position. I freely admit that any of us will be hard pressed to improve upon his accomplishments, but I feel that we could improve on community projects (card design, balancing, etc.). TorB, while skilled in these areas, has his main strength in PvP. That's something that even he admits, and there's nothing wrong with that. However, being a Master is more than just PvP, and so others may be better suited to the general Master position (particularly with the new Forum Brawl).   

I wish I can see a never seen darkness deck that can beat AI3 at least 5 times in a row. (a darkness deck is a deck with 50 % darkness cards in it)

Here I will assume a "never seen" deck to mean a combo that is new to the game (or underused), and "beat AI3 at least 5 times in a row" to mean being able to beat AI3 5 times in a row with decent (>20% [slightly above 75%^5]) chance. I have a few decks in mind - I'll get back to you on this one.

by bogtro

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5oi 5oi 5oi 5oi 5oi 5op 5op 5op 5uk 5uk 5uk 5uk 5ul 5ul 5ul 5ur 5ur 5ur 5ur 5ur 606 606 606 606 606 606 606 606 606 606 8pr

Almost all of the credit for this deck goes to ji412jo - him using blitzing daggers against me in Phase 2 served as the inspiration to this deck. Almost all of Darkness's creatures are Airborne, and so Sky Blitz actually synergizes quite well with Darkness. Normally I would try and post something that's entirely original, but besides the fact that it's difficult to do so with Darkness as it has limited synergies with other elements, this deck performed too well to not post. Not only did it win 5 in a row very consistantly, it won the first 18 games in a row that I played with it against AI3. Incredible. Again, jijo gets most of the credit for this. He created the idea. Also thanks to UTAlan for showing me the deck code tool.

Question : You discover a magic incantation that allows anyone using it to possess another's body, and if to survive death through this process if so desired. What do you do after this discovery?

I would do the same as ji412jo. Such a spell is too dangerous to have any possibility of being found, even if I had good intentions for using it. There are always people who will misuse something that is otherwise intended for good purposes, and this incantation doesn't seem to be so much intended for good purposes. These things happen over and over again with weapons, drugs, etc. It's not worth it.

[Onizuka]

TorB: Do you ever plan to change your avatar?
Xeno: Do you want/expect people to vote for you based on the tools you create? How will your tool making benefit darkness individually?
ji412jo: How active do you plan to be in the future?

[MyNameIsJoey]

  DARKNESS 

I have been with this community for a little while now, those are my 2nd trials, and it is no secret to anyone that darkness is my favorite element.

But, honestly, does anyone know the real reasons of it? Does anyone really know me? Is there anyone that would be able to even tell what is my favorite color and why? It doesn't really matter, but it's a part of myself anyway.

A bit about myself
I am a young man of 18 years old. I live near Trois-Rivières in Quebec, Canada. I am currently in college ( we have a different school system, here we have 2 years of college before university), and next year I'm going to university for a double-bacc in Math and Math teaching ( if I am not wrong, in your system this is like a double-major). I spent the time needed to do my homeworks and studies between classes, which makes it so that , when I am back home, i have time for elements.

I am someone that is really open-minded and I love communication, which is mostly why I want to be a teacher. To me, communication is the key to everything. That's also one of the reasons why I absolutely love the elements community. It has a wonderful chat and incredible members which can help you when needed, and my goal is to be a great part of this community, to stand out as someone that helped this community, as someone that we will remember, and not only for the bad parts, but also the good parts, and the things I've done.

Speaking of, let's go with my elements past.
I am someone that loves events, I've participated in many events, and even organised some back when I was a PvP Organiser , which is now called PvP Event Manager.
I am also the creator of SHUT ( with some credits to Hyroen, gavsword, ddevans, Sorry if i forgot someone who thinks deserve some credit), which I believe I can say without a doubt, was the longest ever-lasting unnoficial tournament, which happened 2 times each sunday. I would show up each sunday, almost all day long to be able to organise both tournaments. By the way, for those interested, I plan on restarting SHUTs very soon.

What about my PvP part of which i spoke of earlier? What , as a PvP player have I done in elements community?
-I was lieutenant in War 2 in the Underworld team. Which means I had to fight in a double-elimination tournament to end up in the top 8 to be on the team. By the way, I would like to mention that I got lucky in 1 matchup of that tourny where I got countered and still won because of bad draws. ThatNewGuy most probably should have been on the team.
-I won a weekly tournament, and got a couple 2nds, 3rds and 4ths.
-In the first Draft, I was in an awesome and got a good win/loss ratio (10/7), and I was extremely active and played loads of matchups.
- I played in a lot of events, I think those are the most worth telling. If you have any question, you can ask me personally.

But now PvP , PvP , PvP... what about PvE?
I somehow do not like PvE all that much. I simply do not have fun grinding. I am someone that really dislike doing things for nothing. I am someone that needs a goal, an objective beneath things before I spend time. Though, when I find it, I put my all into it.
While not liking it, I grinded a lot lately to widen my darkness set. While I still don't have it complete, I am very close to it and it might be done soon. I honestly think I have all I need for any upgraded darkness event.

 Darkness, Darkness, why Darkness?
When I first started elements, I chose fire. I manatged my decks and based it on my dear fireballs. Basically, my first ever element deck was a fire stall. I played it for a while, but then ended up getting bored. I reseted my account.

I then used water, because the creatures seemed to have many synergies. I thought that water would get me a better understanding of every element. I tried a waterbow. I disliked it, got bored, and I reset my account.

Then, I made a FFQ deck. I ended up getting bored, and I reset my account.

Then ...
...
...
...
...
 ( i pretty much tried all the stuff, reseting my account after every time.)
Then, I went on with the super hyper awesome uber SG bow. I killed FGs tons, got loads of upped cards. Got bored of the FG bow and , even though i had a lot of money and i could ahve bought new cards, I reset my account. ( I was young and stupid )
Then, I re-tried darkness. Because of 2 things : I loved how devourers worked. Steal your opponents quanta while giving you quanta. Denials the opponent while it brings in the main function of a deck; building up quanta. The second thing was Vampires. I like how it dealt damage while it healed you back. How, just like pests, it had 2 functions at 1 time. I also loved the EMs it brang to me while I played AI3.
And i played with darkness,
And played with darkness,
And played with darkness,
And I never got bored, and never reset my account again.

Just for the ones of you that were wondering, my favorite color is blue. To me, it represents the deepness of things, it shows the infinity with the skies, and the unknown with the ocean. I love blue eyes.
Now , questions.

Sorry for the 'spam', but I really did put some thought into these questions! ^^; (Even though some of them are a bit absurd and more of a personality gauge than anything)

Q: “Darkness players can be pretty sneaky with their tactics (Cloak, Nightmare, etc.)… name a prank or something silly that you have done (in elements or in real life) that you managed to pull off and laugh about later. Do you think that Master of Darkness should embody this 'trickiness' that I speak of? Or do you think that they should have a different characteristic than what I described?”

Oh wow, a prank of something silly I have done. I have done loads of silly things, though I don't think they fit here . I have not done many pranks, to be honest, I belive the worst I've done was in a class in my 3rd grade of highschool. The teacher had left the class to go get something, and , as the one sat near the door since I arrived late, I locked the door, and his keys were in the class. He wasted 10 minutes to go bother the teacher of another class to get his keys to open the door to our class. We all had a great laugh, and the teacher never learned who did it, nor did it matter as we all got a punition ( a very long homework  ). I do not think that darkness is trickiness itself. To me, darkness is to prepare your actions greatly, to be sure that nothing can counter your plans. Cloak doesn't let your opponent control your things, and Nightmare doesn't let your opponents hand to fill with cards that could destroy you.

Last time, I asked Darkness trialists to show me the brightest side of Darkness. Now, I ask you to bring the rainbow in Darkness and build a deck about it.


Is Darkness evil?


Add to your responses a song that reminds you of Darkness.

DarkBow!
As I do not know if you mean it to be an unupped or an upped bow, I will make one of both.
Unupgraded : A Denial Bow.

by ji412jo

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4sa 4sa 4sa 4sa 4sa 4sa 4vl 4vl 55v 55v 55v 593 593 593 5um 5um 5um 5um 5um 5um 5ut 5ut 606 606 606 606 606 606 622 622 622 622 8pu

Compared to pestal : Advantages: Offers more opportunities, Can help versus novas bows where pestal fails.
Inconveniants: is a bit less straightforward, so less consistant and bad draws, so getting fractal devourer can take a bit more time. But discord/EQ/blackhole can help slow your opponent while you put it up.

Upgraded:

by ji412jo

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6u3 6u3 6u3 6u3 6u3 6ve 6ve 6ve 6ve 6ve 6ve 7an 7an 7dr 7dr 7jv 7jv 7jv 7n2 7n2 7n9 7ta 7ta 7tb 7tb 7tb 7td 7td 7td 7td 7td 7td 8pt

Vampirebow. Is very weak to Reverse time, but otherwise its awesome-ish.
I always loved vampires Almost as much as I love pests

I always will stand my point on this. Darkness is NOT evil. Darkness is , in fact, the unknown, and humans, instinctly , tend to fear the unknown. Like people are scared of death, because they don't know what's coming after it. Darkness just takes advantage of that, of the shadows, of what people fear only because they are in the ignorance.

Skillet - Whispers in the dark (

)

Darkness is complex: Haves good CC, PC, anti CC/PC, denial, damage and staling power.

Q:"Design a card that can make darkness even complex, bringing darkness another archetype, building a deck around it."

First of all, I would like to point out that Darkness's CC is not as great as many other elements. Second of all, stalling , .

Card Idea: Shadows|Shadows (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/index.php/topic,36664.new.html#new)
This would be an other way of not letting your opponent control you, as answered in kuro's question. Adds in a hax random aspect as the dusk shield, too.

ji412jo
Darkness seems to hate you, although you probably don't seem to feel the same about it. As it stands, TorB and Xenocidius will most likely get all the votes.. How are you better then Xenocidius?

First of all, I do not pretend to be better than Xenocidious. He is a great part of this community as well, we just bring in different things. While doing card image builders is not my thing, I, personally, have not seen Xeno prove himself in PvP. I believe me and Xeno are complementary , not better one than another, but both excellent challengers for the darkness master title.

As for torb... he is already the longest ever-lasting darkness master, time to let place for other people .

As for bogtro, while he is a little less known, he is definitely a great challlenger too. I got to learn him more in this trials phase 2, and he loves darkness a lot, and surprised me a whole lot in those matchups. He is a great person to put votes in too.

As for darkness hating me... I don't see why darkness would be hating me...I'm still not sure i totally understand the question.

Who has been your favorite Master and why (you cannot choose me or yourself)? What qualities makes this person an ideal Master?

Damn I was gonna choose you
I would have to say Napalm. Because she represents her element so well. When you say fire, Napalm comes to mind. Napalm is the incarnation of fire in the community.

ji412jo: How active do you plan to be in the future?

While I have left once for a few months, for both elements reason and real life reasons, exams were a pain >.<, I plan on being active in elements a lot, as I have been in the last few months. If i did not plan to be active, I , ofcourse, would not have joined trials, mind you.

[MyNameIsJoey]

Questions for my opponent:

TorB: What do you think is the best quality/qualities of your challengers? If you needed to remove 1 card of the darkness pool, what would it be?

Xeno: From what I have noticed in phase 2, considering your time zone it is very hard to reach you during the week. What will you do if the war round lasts from monday to thursday?
I also have not seen a lot from you on the PvP side, can you show us some of the PvP you have done before those trials?

Bogtro: You are not yet known a lot from this community. What have you done that is notice-able in this community, and what do you plan on doing in the future?
Also, tell us a bit more about yourself.

[Xenocidius]

Hi, everyone!

The question you're probably asking right now is "Why should I vote for you?" (It would be quite strange if you weren't, actually.)

Well, before I answer that question I should be perfectly honest about something: I probably won't be participating in War.

Now, wait a minute, hear me out before you discard me like an unwanted Graviton Mercenary! I would love to participate in War, but I simply do not have the time nor the schedule reliability. My education is far more important than Elements, and I'm sure you can all understand and appreciate that. Rest assured that Team Darkness will have a good General should I become Master. It just won't be me.

So why should you vote for me?

For one thing, I love Darkness. And when I say that, I mean I love Darkness. Darkness simply embodies me so well as a person; I'm a complete introvert, and like to remain inconspicuous until I have something to prove. I'm subtle, intelligent, and also like physical darkness (overcast days, for example - I hate sunny days).

In every single game I've ever played, I've always taken Darkness where it was an option. There is simply no other choice. When I first created an Elements account, I knew I'd be choosing Darkness or Death (in most games, they are the same element). I'm glad that I chose Darkness, as it truly is a king among elements - it is incredibly versatile, and arguably the most 'complete' element there is.

"That's great, Xeno," I hear you say, "but you're not really doing anything as a Master, are you? So what's the point?" Well, let me direct your attention to the Forum Brawl (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/index.php/board,483) event, in which there is no PvP. As you probably know, Masters are given the first opportunity to become the Boss for their element's team, similar to how they are given the first opportunity to become the General for their team in War.

Though I may not have enough time for War, I will certainly have enough for Forum Brawl. Plus, although PvP is certainly not my strong point, creativity and forum awesomeness definitely is. I daresay I easily outmatch all the other Darkness Trial participants in terms of Forum Brawl; I am an avid card designer, incredibly active in virtually all sections of the forums, and have a huge desire to help the community. My opponents seem to be almost entirely focused on PvP, without paying much attention to the other aspects of the community.

I am very glad that the Forum Brawl event is happening, as it gives me a chance to run for Mastership without the necessity of participating in War. I have always been of the opinion that being a Master isn't just about being a General, and Forum Brawl gives me a chance to prove that. Quite frankly, I hate that Mastership is so heavily PvP-weighted. I think forum activity should count for much more.

So what do you think? I know it's unorthodox, but will you give me a chance? By voting for me and others like me, you're extending the title of Master from just representing PvP success, to something much more: participation in the community and desire to improve it.

Oh, and I'll manage the Cards section pretty damn well.

Questions

Sorry for the 'spam', but I really did put some thought into these questions! ^^; (Even though some of them are a bit absurd and more of a personality gauge than anything)

Q: “Darkness players can be pretty sneaky with their tactics (Cloak, Nightmare, etc.)… name a prank or something silly that you have done (in elements or in real life) that you managed to pull off and laugh about later. Do you think that Master of Darkness should embody this 'trickiness' that I speak of? Or do you think that they should have a different characteristic than what I described?”

I was always the top of my class in high school. Naturally, people would often cheat off me while we were doing tests. I usually tried to hide my paper, such that someone couldn't cheat off me without being conspicuous. One day, however, this person was very unsubtly copying me. The teacher was barely paying attention to us, so she was no help. Instead of just letting him or confronting him (the latter option was definitely out, as I was way too socially awkward), I circled the complete wrong answers, while making a mental note of the correct answer. Once I (and consequently he) was finished, I quickly went back and corrected all my answers, as he was looking away with a satisfied smirk on his face. The look on his face when he failed and I got 100% was priceless.

Darkness is all about subtlety and trickery; remaining mysterious and inconspicuous while manipulating and tricking people. A Master of Darkness should embody these traits.

Last time, I asked Darkness trialists to show me the brightest side of Darkness. Now, I ask you to bring the rainbow in Darkness and build a deck about it.


Is Darkness evil?


Add to your responses a song that reminds you of Darkness.

Darkness, although already amazingly versatile, can really benefit from the speed and versatility of a rainbow. Consider the following deck:

by Xenocidius

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4sa 4sa 4sa 4sa 4vh 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 5c9 5c9 5oi 5oi 5oi 5ul 5ul 5ul 5ul 5um 5um 5um 5um 5um 5um 5ur 5ur 5ur 5ur 8pt

Darkness is not evil, just as Light is not good. Darkness can be used for good, and Light for evil. It depends not on the element itself, but how it is used. That Darkness is associated with evil merely stems from fear of the unknown and the strange (heh, xenophobia). Darkness by very definition cuts information (in the form of light/vision) from people, and lack of information naturally creates fear. Also, acts of 'evil' (murder, rape, etc.) are usually thought to be done at night. Correlation does not imply causation. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correlation_does_not_imply_causation)

Here (http://incompetech.com/m/c/royalty-free/index.html?keywords=devastation+revenge&Search=Search) is a song that reminds me of darkness. (Not really a song, more an instrumental piece. Still amazing though.)

Darkness is complex: Haves good CC, PC, anti CC/PC, denial, damage and staling power.

Q:"Design a card that can make darkness even complex, bringing darkness another archetype, building a deck around it."

I've designed countless Darkness cards already, and I'm very busy right now. So I hope you don't mind, but I'm displaying one of my old card ideas here. I can design a new one if you want.



This essentially gives Darkness a cheap, durable and rushable creature. Here's an example of a rush deck that could be made:

Xenocidius
You're very active, but I've never viewed you as a great PvPer. What process did you go through in preparing for the Trials battles?

Good question. You're right, PvP is not my strong point. I've never been that great a deckbuilder, and I hate testing decks. So to prepare for Trials I thought of decks the other players might be using, and what I could use to counter them. My biggest tool here was quanta index: I made sure that all my decks were quanta-balanced perfectly. As I played my battles, I got to test my decks, and so during Phase 2 I was constantly tweaking my decks. In the end, I'm quite proud of them, really. The thing I mostly failed at was prediction.

Who has been your favorite Master and why (you cannot choose me or yourself)? What qualities makes this person an ideal Master?

My favourite Master was, believe it or not, ex-Master of Light, xdude. He essentially embodied everything I think a Master should: he loved his element tremendously, he knew it well, and he embodied it. He also helped the community a lot through his work as the Trial Overseer. That's what I think a Master should be. He's also confident, a skilled player, and we share the uncommon first letter of our names. That said, I don't know many Masters very well.

Xeno: Do you want/expect people to vote for you based on the tools you create? How will your tool making benefit darkness individually?

I do not want people to vote for me based on my tools. Rather, they should vote on what went into making those tools (dedication, desire to help the community, etc.). I doubt my tool-making will benefit Darkness individually, unless I decide to for whatever reason make some sort of Darkness-specific tool ('Hack the game and buff a Darkness card!'), which doesn't sound very helpful.

Xeno: From what I have noticed in phase 2, considering your time zone it is very hard to reach you during the week. What will you do if the war round lasts from monday to thursday?
I also have not seen a lot from you on the PvP side, can you show us some of the PvP you have done before those trials?

I am indeed very busy during the week (and on weekends, but to a lesser extent). In fact, as I've stated above, I probably will not be participating in War.

I participated in Elements Chess (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/index.php/topic,28588) way back when I was a newbie. I mostly avoided PvP from then on, until I started joining tournaments. Thus far I've ranked in: Old Times (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/index.php/topic,36464) (4th), Name Game (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/index.php/topic,34565) (3rd), Fright Night (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/index.php/topic,32935) (2nd) and Fresh Change (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/index.php/topic,36246) (1st).

I'll admit I haven't done an amazing amount of PvP, but as I stated in my intro, I don't believe Mastership should be entirely about PvP.

Do you think TorB did a good job as a master? if not or not enough what will you do to improve it ?

TorB did a good job as a Master in many respects. He has been an active member of our community, and has contributed to it greatly through his work as a Tournament Organizer and Council Member. He also kept the Darkness Cards section nice and tidy. He hasn't done that well in War, but I'm not going to comment on that for obvious reasons.

Darkness has a great Master and will still if TorB keeps his title. However, Darkness still seems obscure. Sure, Darkness is all about obscurity, but only until it leaps out of the shadows and takes its rightful place as king of all the elements. TorB has so far done nothing that I can see to set Darkness apart.

And that's where I come in. I will bring Darkness to glory through the Forum Brawl event, I will promote Darkness with decks and/or card ideas, and I will show everyone that Darkness is the best element!

I wish I can see a never seen darkness deck that can beat AI3 at least 5 times in a row. (a darkness deck is a deck with 50 % darkness cards in it)

Well, I can't say I've seen this one before:

by Xenocidius

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5f9 5f9 5f9 5f9 5f9 5f9 5fb 5fb 5fb 5fc 5fc 5fc 5fc 5fc 5fc 5v0 5v0 5v0 5v0 5v0 5v0 606 606 606 606 606 606 606 606 606 8po

Well, before I answer that question I should be perfectly honest about something: I probably won't be participating in War.

Right now, masters are mostly seen as war generals. Though, I dislike this idea, that is pretty much how it is seen right now. What will you do for the community as a master, considering you do not want to do war? What will being a master allow you to do that you can not already do?

I've addressed most of this in my answer to ralouf1. Apart from my love for Darkness, the main reason that I want to become a Master to get rid of the idea that being a Master is all about being a War General.

Question : You discover a magic incantation that allows anyone using it to possess another's body, and if to survive death through this process if so desired. What do you do after this discovery?

I would memorize this incantation, then destroy the source. Something like this could be incredibly useful one day - for example, avoiding a dangerous situation by possessing the source of the danger (assuming it is a person).

As for achieving immortality through it, I'm not sure. Jumping from body to body, watching (and possibly contributing) as we humans discover the various mysteries of the universe ... that sounds very appealing to me.

Following an interesting conversation in chat, here's a question to all my competitors:

In Phase 2, one of the bans was Devourer.
a) How do you feel this affected your deckbuilding?
b) If you were choosing the bans, would you have banned Devourer [or: do you agree or disagree with the ban?]
c) How do you feel about in-element bans? Should they be allowed, disallowed, or forced? Should there be a limit?

a) I probably would have put Devourer in just about all of my decks, because it is such an incredibly useful card.

b) I would have banned Devourer. The fact that it fits in so many Darkness decks and hinders so many duos (especially mark-powered duos) means it stifles creativity. Forcing challengers to think outside of the box and using knowledge of their element to make effective decks without Devourer nor the hindrance of Devourer threats greatly improves the quality of battles, and makes them more effective in assessing whether a challenger would make a good Master or not.

c) Having too many in-element bans is a bad idea, especially considering we can only use up to 6 cards from other elements. I see nothing wrong with banning the 1-2 most used cards in the element, though, especially in cases like Devourer.