Petition: Ban SoFree

[Afdarenty]

Just going to throw in my thoughts:

The fact that we can play a deck vs Aether every round with little risk despite them predicting it each time is a problem.

The assumption that SoFr makes Air too strong in general is untrue in my opinion. It has never been our most used or highest winrate deck. It has never felt irreplaceable, as some of our other decks have. The only justification for banning it is how strong it is against Aether.

If anyone finds an Aether legal War deck that consistently beats SoFr then I don't think it should be banned at all. I have one idea in particular that I'd like to test more, but it's around 60-40, or maybe 65-35, for Aether at best.

As things stand, I wouldn't be opposed to an outright ban on SoFr in War #12 - just make the other Air cards a good amount cheaper to compensate.

[JonathanCrazyJ]

Id agree that other air cards have been inflated in price. They are strong but sofree is the real issue.
Afda, the problem is that sofree requires very specific counters, and that makes you so much stronger as a whole because your other decks often beat our sofree counters with ease.

[Higurashi]

I mean, I always liked War better without shards.

Shards make all elements more evenly balanced, which would be good. Except air which they make obscenely good, which is bad.

I'd sub "all" for "most" and that's because all elements can use all shards, but some not very well. Either way the thematic impact is that it reduces the differences between the elements.

As for approaching a better overall balance, I think more upgrades do a better job than shards. Upgrades accentuate the difference between elements and produce fewer hard counter situations, which are quite uninteresting to watch. On the flip side, a problem with upgrades can be that games become faster and less interesting for that reason instead.

I mean, I always liked War better without shards.

There are only 12 aether symbols in this post
#totally unbiased

Considering I've never liked shards in any organized PvP since day 1, I'd say so.

[Vangelios]

Just going to throw in my thoughts:

The fact that we can play a deck vs Aether every round with little risk despite them predicting it each time is a problem.

The assumption that SoFr makes Air too strong in general is untrue in my opinion. It has never been our most used or highest winrate deck. It has never felt irreplaceable, as some of our other decks have. The only justification for banning it is how strong it is against Aether.

If anyone finds an Aether legal War deck that consistently beats SoFr then I don't think it should be banned at all. I have one idea in particular that I'd like to test more, but it's around 60-40, or maybe 65-35, for Aether at best.

As things stand, I wouldn't be opposed to an outright ban on SoFr in War #12 - just make the other Air cards a good amount cheaper to compensate.

Reading your text it seems that you recognize that Sofree is OP and willing to accept a ban on war 12, that is cool.
About your argue that Sofre not be your most winrate or not is most winner deck is because the people does decks to counter Sofree and not for counter another air decks
if air don't have Sofree you can expect more counters for another air decks, but I think you know that, right?

[Afdarenty]

Reading your text it seems that you recognize that Sofree is OP and willing to accept a ban on war 12, that is cool.

I disagree that SoFr is more powerful than a handful of other cards, however I do think the fact that we can field a deck vs Aether and expect it to win every round is a bad thing.

Afda, the problem is that sofree requires very specific counters, and that makes you so much stronger as a whole because your other decks often beat our sofree counters with ease.

About your argue that Sofre not be your most winrate or not is most winner deck is because the people does decks to counter Sofree and not for counter another air decks
if air don't have Sofree you can expect more counters for another air decks, but I think you know that, right?

That's certainly true, but it's also true of our Sanc Stall, Dark Duo, Nymphs... Any strong deck, really, in any Element. For me, that's what War is all about - you can't beat everything. That's why prediction is as important as it is.

[Blacksmith]

On a very different note. Some teams have a very hard time vs some certain cards that totally mess everything up. Sofree is one, dims and fractal are 2 more, sop is a forth etc etc. So now we have a EC that lets you ban 2 cards each round, if you make a decision within the first 24 hours. And it worked good. How about adding a role that does basically the same thing, allows you to ban one card from your opponent vs you that round. That would take the edge of cards that are to Op vs a single element and add some extra strategy.

If you think that the role is to powerful you can balance it. For example it could be worded like this:
Preventer: Ban X cards for your opponent vs Preventer this round. Preventer uses X4 less upgrades, not less than 0.
Preventer: Ban one card for your opponent vs Preventer this round. Your opponent is allowed to use 3 extra uppgrades

Just a thought, that would balance more than the sofree issue. One problem is if all teams uses it vs the same opponent round after round. But is that likely?

[deuce22]

I'm glad this post has stimulated some good discussion.

I'm glad afda agrees that one deck to rule them all against even a single element should be banned.

While I hate shards in PVP, let alone war, I agree with JCJ that it has added some balance to some weaker elements in war.

Honestly, if Sofree were limited to say 3 per deck (maybe 4?), it would be beatable from an aether perspective, but I haven't tested this. Hell, even if sofree was actually banned, aether would still struggle against air because the element counters us in so many different ways. But if I can predict the deck that my opponent brings, I should be able to find a way to beat it. Whether I bring those cards to war or still have them in my vault is my own problem, and a necessary part of war.

[Vangelios]

Reading your text it seems that you recognize that Sofree is OP and willing to accept a ban on war 12, that is cool.

I disagree that SoFr is more powerful than a handful of other cards, however I do think the fact that we can field a deck vs Aether and expect it to win every round is a bad thing.

Have at least 3 decks that I know that can beat sofree consistently, if you don't think SoFree is more OP than some others cards so don't agree with one ban for war 12 so easily
but if you says "It has never felt irreplaceable" well then please use one replace deck,  if don't is many relevant for air is very relevant for the rest 11 teams

[deuce22]

Reading your text it seems that you recognize that Sofree is OP and willing to accept a ban on war 12, that is cool.

I disagree that SoFr is more powerful than a handful of other cards, however I do think the fact that we can field a deck vs Aether and expect it to win every round is a bad thing.

Have at least 3 decks that I know that can beat sofree consistently, if you don't think SoFree is more OP than some others cards so don't agree with one ban for war 12 so easily
but if you says "It has never felt irreplaceable" well then please use one replace deck,  if don't is many relevant for air is very relevant for the rest 11 teams

Do you know how many times I've heard this? Still waiting for 1 idea to actually work...

And where were you last war with these ideas? Huh?

[hainkarga]

I thought you would try sosacs.

[deuce22]

I thought you would try sosacs.

In my testing, hasn’t worked. Might work vs AI, but not human

[killsdazombies]

I actively despise shards in nearly anything and everything, and I can sympathize with a matchup feeling almost, if not entirely unwinnable, you cant count on variance to win every game so a 40/60 is still abysmal.

That said, I dont think its fair to put a limit on airs shards while others are let loose, either all or nothing in my book. (And I'm for nothing)

I think the biggest thing to note is that people aren't saying "Play sofree win every game" theyre saying "play sofree win every game against aether" And there are other polarizing match ups as well, this just being one of the most extreme cases.