The 40percent RRG 1k Grand Archive Experience
By Nathan Chin Last weekend we wrapped up the first big Grand Archive tournament in the GTA and what an event it was. As someone who has loved the game since its early Kickstarter days, it's great to see so many people jumping in the game. Today I’m going to walk you through my preparation, experience of the event, and the local scene. Tournament Structure and Snapshot of the GTA Scene While the game has been in various levels of availability for testing online, most players jumped into the game a little over a month ago at the launch of Dawn of Ashes Alter Edition. As expected this meant most players were less experienced, playing odd lists and/or playing at a slower pace. All this aside for many players GA isn’t their first foray into competitive TCGs and at the top tables there was definitely a lot of impressive play to be seen. The tournament was structured as a 5 round 50 minutes per round pure swiss tournament with very top heavy prizing. A bit of an interesting choice I’ll revisit later. Meta and Preparation Having played the game quite a bit I am well aware of what the online meta has evolved into. To be fair I’ve probably also had a small hand in shaping it. The deck that sets the tempo for the whole format has always been Fire Arcane Rai. If you give him space to breathe he can put out an essentially infinite amount of damage while also drawing infinite cards.He’s basically impossible to stop once he gets going and it can be done reliably and very quickly depending on the build and the pilot. For this reason I tend to look for decks that can apply pressure early and force cards out of Rai to interrupt what can otherwise seem like a game of solitaire from the Rai side. Many styles of Lorraine from both wind and fire can do this while still maintaining a good matchup against less popular decks in the format. The weapon flexibility, extra health pool and abusable lvl 2 are all big reasons to want to play Lorraine. I also won’t be the first to tell you I’m a slower player. There’s a lot of decisions to make in GA even when it comes to what you risk putting into reserve. Many games have been won or lost simply by reserving the wrong cards in memory and being forced into an unorthodox line of play. As a result, for important tournaments like I tend to take a proactive deck to offset my personal slower pace. After all a drawn match can in many ways be essentially a loss and more controlling decks can find the physical clock as intimidating as the opponent. That being said, my main concern with taking Fire Ascension Lorraine was that most valiants of Wind Lorraine have good matchups into the deck. And while I also expected most people to be on Wind Lorraine thanks to the starter deck I think I correctly assumed most people would either be fairly inexperienced and/or have an unrefined deck lists negating that edge. MatchesRound 1 My round 1 opponent was a Wind Lorraine player that was self admittedly fairly new to the game. A classic early mistake in the Lorraine matchups is to overplay your board and not hold out protection against sweeps. Having drawn 3 cards off of doing exactly this in game one it enabled me to go my lvl 3 follow up turns with a large hand making the combos decidedly stronger. In the follow up game my opponent played a similarly low pressure opener allowing me to play fairly greedy and set up my optimal transition into the late game with a devastating blow. Round 2 The second round was decidedly harder. He was on another Fire Lorraine of a similar build that I’ve played against in the past. While perhaps having less experience on the deck he played very well if not also a bit slow like myself. The mirror is extremely scary because of the burst potential of the deck. Oftentimes you cannot afford to fully set up before being forced into lvl 2 for health. Going first can be really big as being ahead on materialization can give you that extra bit of set up to snowball the match with a drawn blade. Of course I was going second in the first game and was immediately on the back foot as my opponent was able to creative shock and cremate allies into an early rending flame. I had the potential to come back and win the match but unfortunately I was forced into reserving key cards for my lvl 2 and dungeon guide turns and losing them put me too short on damage to close the game out. Game 2 I chose to start and the cycling was a bit better allowing me to set up while not risking too much against sweeps. I was able to get into lvl 3 without losing critical cards or having to put my defensive cards into reserve. Ultimately my opponent stumbled a bit more than me and I was able to deflect a big rending before safely landing my own big fire attack from the safety of lvl 3. Unfortunately because we’re both kinda slow the timer decided we would not have a game 3 and we would have to settle for a draw Round3 The third round was against a Wind Ascension Lorraine list but with a more experienced pilot. He ended up playing the human tribal package early, pressuring me but simultaneously not respecting the sweep which gave me a lot of tempo in the following turns. Since the majority of units were not floating memory the loss of cards in hand made his follow up a bit too clunky. Game 2 he went first and played a very conservative board while holding tricks which I believe is the best way to play the match. Failing to find dungeon guides or rending flame I got too greedy trying to set up and eventually forced into a lackluster lvl 2 just for some damage. The extra turns allowed him the cards to follow up my lvl 2 turn with his own full combo into lvl 3 with beseech landing a ton of damage in the process that was ultimately unrecoverable from. Game 3 I was on the play again giving me a bit of extra room to cycle and get a fairly standard set up off. On the other side my opponent was not able to turbo into level 3 either leaving him on lvl 2 for an extra turn. I was then able to close the game with a big devastating blow. Round 4Round four was an interesting one against another Wind Lorraine but this time running the Crux Knight. This opponent went for an extremely aggressive opener with the allies, even playing a dungeon guide with no effect just to get the human count high enough to land the captain on turn 2 with cards to spare for an inspiring call taking an early 9 damage or so. Admittedly the play was all in on me not having a sweep or dungeon guide of my own and it sorta paid off. I had to go to lvl 2 without the sweep just to get health and clear a Captain. Thankfully I eventually found a sweep to clear the board but unfortunately for him there wasn’t much left in hand to follow up for the last bit of damage. I was then eventually able to convert the card advantage into a game win. Perhaps emboldened by the close game one, my opponent tried the same in game two but this time I was able to sweep on the lvl 2 turn essentially ending the game on sheer card advantage. Round 5 My final match of the day was against a Fire Rai with a pilot that knew what he was doing. Definitely the scariest match up of the day. Fire match ups always end up being essentially a race with limited defensive options for both sides thanks to there just being none for lorraine outside safeguard amulet and spark alight being able to nullify Rai’s best defensive card. I lost the dice roll for the third time that day which put me on the draw and forced me into a very aggressive line of play. It was so aggressive in fact that I didn't even get a sword back when I went to level 3 for the pure tempo. However, thanks to this I was able to use the existing sword to put out a huge rending flame while holding up a spark alight for the arcane barrier that would have ended the game for me should it have resolved on the rending flame damage. Game 2 felt a bit better as I was able to side out some of my dead cards in the matchup for some more aggressive cards. I had a potential lethal on an earlier turn but with my opponent being able to draw into 3 cards I couldn’t safely land the dmg through a shield so decided for a “safer” turn of trying to bait my opponent into using enlighten counters to keep their barrier servant up. Fortunately I believe they were just short of killing me that turn and so opted to play a single fireball to set up the next turn and hold up the rest for defensive play. Thankfully I was able to spark alight the barrier attempting to defend my swing preventing them from having enough to cast what could have been a second barrier and then squeaked past the finish line with a blazing throw using my remaining weapon. Overall a very close match that could have gone either way. My final score that day was 4 wins and a draw which fortunately for me was enough to put me in the top spot having defeated the player with the highest score in the last round. There was a lot of great play on display and honestly it could have easily gone to any of the top players had things played out a tiny bit differently. I was especially impressed to see fire zander make the top tables despite being an often overlooked deck. Closing ThoughtsWhile it was definitely a blast to play I think there were things that could have gone better. For one the rounds felt a bit short at 50 minutes. With newer players, sideboarding and slower decks the recommended 60 minute rounds could definitely help resolve some of the draws we had. Secondly with an extremely top heavy prize pool it would probably feel better to have a top cut. With pure swiss the results of any one match plus tiebreakers can wildly move you around in the final standings. With a top cut at least players that survive the swiss cut can have a better understanding of where they are likely going to end up at the end of each match at the cost of more rounds. That isn't to say 1st seed won’t lose to 8th seed but atleast expectations can be tempered. Lastly, some sort of online deck submission would have definitely helped the event kick off in a more timely manner. All in all I had a great time playing and talking about the game with everyone. With regionals right around the corner I hope some of the rough edges get smoothed and I see everyone out there again with more reps under their belt as we move into the first season of sanctioned organized play!
Utility in Defense in Flesh and Blood Part 1: The Strengths of Unity
By Dimos It is no secret, in any game, that cards which can do multiple things or give options are powerful. Flesh and Blood holds no exception to this, with multi-role players like Enlightened Strike and Command and Conquer being controversial and ubiquitous examples of this. This two-part series is going to examine the options that cards can provide when used to defend rather than attack, then talk about Levia, a hero who often does not have the option to defend with flexibility and why that has made her one of the most written-off heroes in the game. For today, we are diving into cards that have an upside when defending – mainly the new Unity cards. Legend Story Studios is slowly teasing their 10th set, Dusk Till Dawn before spoiler season officially begins. So far, the bulk of the cards we have seen are specializations. Most interestingly, we have been introduced to a new keyword: Unity. This keyword seems to reward two-card blocking, and consequently, playing a bit more of a midrange, back-and-forth game. When you defend with a card that has Unity, you gain some benefit in the form of a token. It’s, as is consistent with Flesh and Blood, thematically well-fitting as we see the forces of Rathe unite against shadowy invaders. I think Unity is a great way to incentivize interaction, and isn’t one that we have seen used extensively before. In fact, some of the only other cards that incentivize interaction by blocking are defense reactions that deal damage (Steelblade Shunt, Reckless Swing, and anything that triggers Riptide’s ability), which are attached to heroes who generally enjoy operating on a back-and-forth basis. Other than the aforementioned cards, the only thing that really draws interaction on an individual attack are on-hit effects, which can sometimes become an arms race to see who can block the least (see: the most aggressive deck in every format FaB has ever experienced). I’m very excited to see the flip side of this coin, and I’m curious to see what it does for power creep in the game. Based on what we’ve seen so far, it seems reasonably balanced and restrained in its usage, partially by being limited to specializations. What I think Unity brings to the table is utility in defense, which is a very rare feature in Flesh and Blood. Historically, it has been seen on defense reactions, such as by cycling a card with Sink Below, on certain pieces of equipment, such as Hornet’s Sting, and on niche cards that don’t often see play outside of limited formats, such as Rally the Rearguard and Flameborn Retribution. What all of these cards have in common is that their primary purpose is to defend. Sink Below can’t do anything other than defend well, Hornet’s sting only triggers when it defends, as it does not have any other triggered or activated ability, and Rally the Rearguard and Flameborn Retribution offer defensive utility, but at the cost of reducing their attacking abilities. There is a very real price to pay for adding defensive utility to your decks with these cards. And that price is opportunity cost for when you need to go on the offensive. Unity is the further exploration of this, and one of FaB’s key tenets: Every card matters. When you can get a higher value than average by blocking with two cards (as most Unity-created tokens so far appear to be worth at least one point of value – see Seismic Surge), without sacrificing the other utility of the card, more interesting decisions can be made. Do I block with this key card for extra value now? Or do I play it out on my turn for a potentially greater benefit? It is the same core choice that FaB gives to its players with any card, but with higher stakes and more direct benefits. Each of the Unity cards we have seen so far seem to provide something very different to their decks. Star Struck has an amazingly powerful Crush effect that is almost universally disruptive to opponents. It looks like a classic Majestic that is yellow because it would simply be too good if it were a red. This addresses Bravo’s recent need for an increased threat density on the first deck cycle. It also boosts the power of his two-card hands. Four-cost attacks such as Debilitate and Chokeslam become more valuable in block-heavy matchups because now you know that in the worst-case scenario, you will be getting at least three free Seismic Surge tokens just from blocking with your Star Strucks. Naturally, the more interesting decision will be whether to block with them in the first place, since they are so powerful. Dorinthea’s Chorus of Ironsong provides her with the ability to get around damage prevention, something that was historically challenging for her, going all the way back to Prism’s heyday. The advent of Oasis Respite has only made her Resprise-based cards weaker as even when it was played from hand, it did not count as defending from hand. With Chorus of Ironsong, she now has a niche counter to her opponents’ niche counter. And in the matchups where damage prevention prevention is less relevant, it still pitches well and can create her a Courage token when blocking. While we don’t know what that is, it is surely something beneficial, and possibly related to cost reduction on weapon attacks. Finally in this discussion, we see Briar get the perfect utility card with Anthem of Spring. It is blue, it is Earth and so can be used to Fuse or keep Mount Heroic alive, and it costs zero so it can easily be made into half of an Embodiment of Lightning if played. However, it also blocks insanely well, which is in stark contrast to other cards like Weave Earth. If Briar uses Anthem of Spring as part a two-card block, she can cover seven damage, with three, she can cover eleven easily. More interestingly, Briar can now stack Embodiments of Earth again, just like she could do before her errata. This means that if she has an existing Embodiment of Earth, she can block 14 damage off of three cards. Overall, I am a big fan of all these cards for either how fun they look to play or for how much better they will make the other fun cards in the deck. Defensive utility is clearly a powerful feature in a card, and I am curious to see how it plays out in the decks that can run Unity cards. Now that Flesh and Blood is slowly power creeping its way up in more recent sets (see: quivers), I wonder how Unity will play its part. Some cards, like Star Struck, seem uniquely powerful. As much as I love Star Struck and Bravo, I think that with it, he comes close to having a critical mass of oppressive universally-effective Crush effects. Add a hypothetical Codex of Crush to that mix, and Bravo may have the consistency to become the next Lexi. Other cards with Unity seem to be utility or niche role-players with some upside to make their niche uses less of a deckbuilding constraint. I think this is where the design space of Unity can really shine – by adding utility to cards other than just their pitch colour. It makes niche tech cards more palatable to include in your deck, as even if they are not required outside of niche matchups, they still offer some upside in every matchup through their strong defensive utility and Unity effect. Could Unity cards replace the default efficient blocking of Sink Below in most decks? I doubt it, but I can see the case being made in a few instances. I am curious to see what the other Unity specializations in this set have in store. P.S. Oldhim’s specialization was revealed while this article was being edited. It is worth noting that the Freeze on this card only lasts one turn, and is not permanent. Northern Winds is fine enough, it looks like some niche tech on a resource card for a hero who already every other kind of niche tech on his resource cards. The Unity effect is lackluster, as it provides a fixed, singular point of defensive value, but is attached to a card that blocks for two in a hero that is already so good at covering split damage. I think that unless there is a very specific reason to run this, Winter’s Bite is usually better since there is rarely an instance where stripping a card is worth less than delaying a key piece of equipment and/or item for one turn. But the same was said about Buckle until people wanted to use it to destroy New Horizon, so maybe Northern Winds will see its day. Overall, I think that this card, when contrasted to Star Struck, really shows how LSS uses new printings to balance heroes and classes. The much-discussed Codex of Frailty has been confirmed by the games designers to be a bone thrown to historically under-performing classes. I think the same scenario is true between Star Struck and Northern Winds.
Drone of Brutality is Back from the Grave
By Dimos Drone of Brutality is back from the grave that it never actually makes it to in game. When I first read this, I was surprised and gleeful. Surprised for game design reasons, as the reasoning for the initial Drone ban in 2021 left it in no uncertain terms that Drone broke the game and was hardly a Flesh and Blood card. I briefly discussed my thoughts and agreement on the ban, even though I personally enjoyed the card, here in 2021. I was gleeful on hearing this news because Drone being back makes Merchant heroes and all of their goofy potential playable. Not good, not competitive, but playable. In retrospect, it was odd that LSS chose to exclude Drone from future printings of Welcome to Rathe without discussing the impact that the card has in draft. In draft or sealed Welcome to Rathe, getting your hands on two Drones of brutality (of any colour) makes an average deck become fantastically powerful. Complement those drones with a couple defense reactions like Unmovable to help make the games go longer, and Drone becomes an almost auto-pilot win condition in all but the highest levels of draft play. Removing the card from future printings of Welcome to Rathe also removes it from limited formats, which is where it is a larger offender in my opinion. However, while Welcome to Rathe draft has not evolved by virtue of being a closed set, the Blitz metagame has due to the introduction of new cards, and that is the key reason given for the unbanning of this card. Cards are increasingly breaking the base rules of the game. Not to the same degree that Drone did, breaking a “core design tenet” of the game, but they are still breaking previously established formulae. As the design space for cards fills up, and LSS can’t print more cards in the vanilla attack cycle (Raging Onslaught, Brutal Assault, Critical Strike, and Wounding Blow), cards become more complex. That leads to a higher frequency of cards that do more. The recent Codices are a great example. Each one has three to five different effects to resolve. Even the new arrows in Outsiders like Infecting Shot are more complex. They have an on-hit effect and a conditional buff from an Aim counter as well. My point here is not that there is power creep in the game (there is, but that’s a story for a different day – look at Quivers), but that there is an increase in complexity and versatility of the average card. There is also a lot of fun to be had in cards that break the design of Flesh and Blood. Illusionists are some of the most popular heroes in the game and have had excellent successes competitively and casually. Summoning dragons as Dromai is something that I think is very far removed from the basic design of the game, but works well and is fun. Permanents as a whole work against the basic design of the game. James White has stated that starting with your equipment and then using it throughout the game works to evoke the idea of becoming fatigued, tired, and weary as a battle continues on. By developing permanents on the board in the form of Items, Allies, or Auras opposes this idea. But I think it can be a good opposition when applied correctly, which it generally has been. The question that remains now is: Has the standard for “game-breaking” changed enough for Drone to work again? I’m curious to find out. The logic laid out this time states that Blitz is such a fast format that slower decks could use some more tools. Drone is one of these tools that LSS believe can be brought back without being “problematic”. There is always a tension in Blitz due to the lack of sideboard. Midrange and lighter control decks that usually want to run some key defense reactions like Sink Below or Fate Forseen are heavily punished due to the existence of Kano’s arcane damage. This leads these decks to lean more aggressive and creates an arms race. That arms race has led to a Blitz ecosystem that many people call a “two-turn format”. Because of this, I’m not sure that reintroducing Drone into the system will make a significant difference. There are three possibilities that I can see happening from a Drone reintroduction, not all of which can or will happen immediately: it has small impacts for mainstream decks, it creates a new staple to put in decks, or it only impacts casual play and oddball decks like my Merchants. Firstly, there could b little impact outside of a couple of fringe decks getting marginal improvements but not making a big splash. Chief among these is likely Ira, who can make a dangerous two-card hand from Drone. One Kodachi swing and the ability-buffed Drone is eight damage with awkward breakpoints. This is extra dangerous in the late game. The overall question is whether games will actually make it to that late game state? Against aggressive decks like Dash and Chane, Ira can definitely get there through the use of Flik Flak. However, against Kano the game will be forced to end earlier. Which requires Ira to build more aggressively, which reduces the strength of adding Drone to the deck in the first place. Perhaps this is a meta call, or perhaps this remains as a sleeping dragon until Kano inevitably hits Living Legend status. The second possibility is that Drone becomes a powerful element in Blitz and nearly every deck is required to run a few copies to be able to continue blocking in what would otherwise be a fatigue state. I don’t think this is a particularly desirable situation because that is one of the few stalemate situations that can exist in this game. Also, it was the reason Drone was banned initially. With the continued existence of Kano in the format, I don’t see this being an immediate concern. That being said, Kano looks like he is next to hit Living Legend in Blitz, so the options for deckbuilding, and the inclusion of defense reactions, may be blown wide open soon enough. The final option is that Drone just doesn’t matter at all and is relegated for use in decks that are prone to fatigue at the best of times. Decks like Shiyana, Genis, or Kavdaen are the three main contenders for this. These decks really need something like this to be even a touch more viable. In their current forms, it is difficult to close out games against an opponent who knows how easy it is to fatigue these heroes because of their lack of a permanent weapon or class benefits. Classes that have weapons with a power value will always be able to present damage just by pitching a card. Classes that have support weapons (bows, staffs, orbs or scepters), have other ways of avoiding fatigue, either by building a board state or having access to readily-available and effective combos. Our Generic-limited heroes listed above have no such luxuries. However, with Drone back, they can build a weapon of their own, within their deck, that they can swing to avoid fatigue. I think that there will be a fun Armory-level Kavdaen deck that can come from this advent. With a suite of defensive cards to survive, a high number of blues to regularly trigger his hero ability, and some form of combo threat with potions, a two-cost attack of choice (Surging Militia, Demolition Crew, or Command and Conquer). Here is a very basic list that focuses on a core of defensive cards and life gain, designed to whittle down your opponent with Kavdaen’s hero ability. Game closing options include looping Drones for fatigue, Last Ditch Effort, and swinging big with a Demolition Crew and Pummel. But if you want to have a bit more fun with it, Mage Master Boots and Tome of Fyendal is the first combo I would add. Additionally, Heart of Fyendal is great in this list, but I have excluded it for price reasons. Overall, I think that the reintroduction of Drone will eventually be interesting to Blitz. But for now, I think that Kano’s continued threat will make it challenging to use to its full potential. As a post-script: I don’t think that the removal of Drone from some Welcome to Rathe printings and then legalizing it again is a problem. As a rare, it is still much more plentiful than any Majestic-rarity card in FaB. Additionally, even with its reduced availability, it is still much more available than any Crucible of War rare, simply due to Welcome to Rathe’s higher print run.
Value and Modularity in Flesh and Blood: A Wounded Bull Case Study
By Dimos Wounded Bull has always been a draft and sealed all-star in Welcome to Rathe. In constructed play, it has historically been relegated to Merchant decks who are desperate to maximize their damage per card and avoid fatigue. That is, until Iyslander came along and made Wounded Bull a staple in her deck. What makes her usage of the card so different? In short, it’s the high density of blue cards required for her hero ability, how she breaks the action point economy of FaB, and a predilection for lower life totals. I will discuss these elements much more in depth later. For now, I want to establish the concepts of value and modularity in this game because those are what make Wounded Bull bad in most decks but strong for Iyslander. Defining the value of a card can be a challenge in FaB. It’s something that is core to the game, since being limited to four cards every turn creates a need to squeeze every last bit of value from the hand. For the purposes of this article, a point of value will be damage dealt, damage prevented (including blocking), or the amount of resources generated when a card is pitched. For simplicities sake (and because Wounded Bull does not have an on-hit effect), we will be ignoring conditional value-generating aspects of cards like on-hit effects and Dominate. Three is the absolute minimum value that a non-permanent card should provide your deck (blocking is a good default benchmark), with a standalone four-point card being actively sought after. Another way of viewing value is that each card should generate three points of value, but should generate at least one additional point of value if it consumes your action point. However, the most important practical consideration of this math is how the value on each card combines with another. A deck comprised of only high-value standalone cards (like Snatch) will ultimately be substandard. We can look to Fai as an example of how cards can piece together to be greater than the sum of their parts. His bread and butter are red cards that cost zero damage, deal three damage, and have go again. This allows him to play any number of these in a turn. However, his output scales up after the first card in hand when it becomes more efficient to pitch a blue card to swing Searing Emberblade and follow it up with Fai’s ability to play a Phoenix flame (representing a minimum of four damage from the pitched card). Adding a further card to attack with allows him to threaten a trigger for Mask of Momentum, or make triggering Mask of the Pouncing Lynx a larger threat. At a basic level, we can see Fai enjoys having more cards in hand. One card is three damage, two cards is seven damage, and any additional cards representing not only more damage but more non-damage threats as well. Some five-card hands in Flesh and Blood can be insanely powerful, dealing upwards of twenty or even thirty damage. Key combo cards like Bloodrush Bellow, Channel Mount Heroic, Aether Wildfire, or Art of War can make this possible. However, the strength of these hands decreases exponentially as your hand loses cards to blocking. This is where I think modularity is important in Flesh and Blood. Since disruption has always been a powerful force in FaB, one cannot always count on holding a five-card combo hand. This leads to there being a secondary value in having flexible hands, which is not represented well when using the previous point system. If your hand can represent four damage with a single card and add an additional three points of damage or blocking value with each subsequent card, you gain a plethora of options. I think the best representative of this modular value (or modularity) is Kassai. In blitz, she can almost always represent seven damage from two cards through pitching to play Blade Runner, Warrior’s Valor, Driving Blade, or Run Through and swinging her Cintari Sabres. Each extra card that Kassai can hold onto after blocking usually represents an additional three damage. Tools like Ironsong Response, In the Swing, and Hit and Run all accomplish this while costing zero resources. This is a big reason (in addition to a large armor suite in the lower-life Blitz format), why I think Kassai has always been a contender. Another great example of modularity is what Rhinar can do with a Primeval bellow in draft or sealed formats. With Primeval Bellow and some six-power attacks, Rhinar can craft strong hands from one to four cards. With four cards, one can play out Primeval Bellow to buff a follow-up attack like Pack Hunt or Smash Instinct, threatening 11 or 12 damage with two Intimidates. If he is forced to block with one card, then he can play Primeval Bellow and follow up with a Romping Club attack for 10 damage with an Intimidate. On two cards, he can just play the Pack Hunt or Smash Instinct for 6 or 7 with one Intimidate. If he was really forced to go on the defensive, he can pitch his only remaining card to swing Romping Club for four. All of these numbers represent good value no matter how many cards are being played out, and they all block for three, giving a high degree of flexibility that can respond to what his opponent is threatening him with. It’s important to remember that FaB is a two-player game, and that what your opponent threatens you with has as much impact on your game as what your plan is. I don’t know about you, but I have brewed up some decks with very fun combos and items. But when I actually try playing them against a real opponent it often fizzles when I’m forced to block (looking at you, Blossoming Spellblade). You cannot always guarantee a four-card hand, but when you do get one, you should be able to take advantage of it. Building modularity into your deck is a key aspect of success in this game, as all of the top performing decks at major events since its inception have been able to play out strong hands with any number of cards in them. Chane saw plenty of success because Soul Shackles allow him to hold two cards to pay for the five playable-from-banished cards that appear on his turn. Dash can Boost with any number of cards and can always efficiently spend pitch for resources to load her pistol and accessories whenever she is left with an extra card. Most recently, Iyslander can also do this very well. However, Iyslander does it very differently from heroes in the past. While Dash and Chane are concerned with preserving their action point through Go Again to keep their turn going, Iyslander is happy to only take one action per turn, and spend her extra cards playing on her opponent’s turn. Iyslander’s main proposition is that she can load her deck full of high-value cards while allowing herself to extend her turn cycle through her hero ability. Rather than being left with an extra card to arsenal, Iyslander sees extra value in arsenaling a card. She not only gets to play it out at instant speed (solving the problem of needing Go Again on her turn), but it provides at least one point of disruption (a Frostbite), that could snowball into extra value if an opponent can’t pay through it. The fact that she doesn’t need Go Again to play out all of her turns is a boon to her value proposition, since Go Again usually costs at least one point of value per card that it is printed on. A great example of these high-value instant-speed plays are Polar Blast and Cold Snap. While the actual effect from each card is lackluster, the fact pitching a blue to play them creates a Frostbite (one point), activates and pays for Waning Moon (three points of damage) and draws a card (replacing the pitched card), means that a blue Cold Snap is at least four points of value for a single card. Iyslander gets so many of these value cards, and gets to play them out on her terms, that she has become the pinnacle of a value deck in FaB. Each turn cycle, she is aiming to be one or two points more efficient than her opponent while also actively making them less efficient through her Ice-fueled disruption. Now let’s get back to Wounded Bull. Wounded Bull is only good when you have exactly two cards left on your turn: Wounded Bull and a blue to pay for it. It can also be decent when you have four cards so you can pitch the third card to play a Pummel, but this requires a very specific card combination that blocks poorly. On a two-card hand, Wounded Bull is fine if you are on higher life than your opponent and actively good if you’re on lower life than your opponent. If you are left with a third or fourth card, playing Wounded Bull becomes extremely awkward, as it can never be paid for with leftover resources and it only blocks for two. Because of this, other decks have found that this means Wounded Bull only performs well when you block with exactly two cards. Iyslander gets around this by being able to shift the continuation of her turn, and some disruption, into her arsenal when she has extra cards left over. One should also remember that Iyslander nearly always starts on a lower life total, so Wounded Bull is active from turn one, and that she will stay lower than her opponent for nearly the whole game. Wizards have a unique ability to appear behind through the entire game and then use Storm Striders and arcane damage can cheat a turn away from the opponent on the final turn. Iyslander has created the perfect storm for Wounded Bull to shine through her lower life total, bountiful blues, and unique ability to not care about which card consumes her action point. I think it is unlikely that we will see another hero utilize Wounded Bull as well as Iyslander has, but I do expect to see some future heroes utilize other high-value but restrictive cards in the future. I have high hopes for Surging Militia and Demolition Crew to become good for the right hero who can bring their own on-hits to generic attacks. Overall, I think this goes to show the value in seriously reconsidering each and every card when building a deck for a new hero. That’s part of the reason why I write about a lot of what I think are mediocre but interesting cards and how they can be used in decks. It’s an exercise that keeps deck building skills sharp and allows one to make important connections when the time comes. Maybe you can find the next Wounded Bull and put it into the next big deck.
The Versatility of Outsiders’ New Generic Cards.
By Dimos Outsiders provides some fantastic and accessible options in its Generic cards. While these are not all new or game-breaking effects, they make certain staple effects accessible to any hero and any player. This article is going to dive into the ones that I think are most interesting for constructed formats, including Classic Constructed, Blitz and Commoner. Like any set, the Generic Majestic-rarity cards are always worth discussing, but before I mention those, I want to talk about some Generic Rares and Commons in the set, which have me very excited. The fact that they are universally-accessible disruptive options open up so many doors for both budget decks and non-meta decks. Rares, even with their altered appearance rate in Outsiders (which I’m not exactly jazzed about), will still likely be selling below the $1 price point. Any budget player can put these into their deck instead of Command and Conquer (CnC) or other pricey Majestics. The three low-rarity cards that I am particularly looking forward to throwing into budget sideboards are Wreck Havoc, Cut Down to Size, and Humble. The combination of Wreck Havoc and Cut Down to Size pieces out what CnC does. Currently, CnC does three things, and it does two of those things uniquely. Firstly, it blocks for three, which neither Wreck Havoc nor Cut Down to Size do. This is a downside for our budget-friendly replacements, but we aren’t running them to defend with, we are running them to be proactive and counter an opposing strategy. The second thing that CnC does is naturally beat defense reactions, particularly those that are held in arsenal. Wreck Havoc addresses this perfectly, as it can’t be defended by defense reactions and destroys them on-hit if they are in arsenal. The third thing that CnC does is help to slow down aggressive decks that refuse to block. By unconditionally destroying their arsenal on hit, CnC nearly guarantees that your opponent will not be able to play a five-card hand (unless they defend with Crown of Providence or have an intellect bonus). This is addressed by Cut Down to Size, which does this job a bit better in some respects. Cut Down to Size guarantees at least one card out of the opponent’s hand, and can’t even be avoided with effects like Crown of Providence. The opponent is forced to lose at least one card, which will slow down their aggressive deck. Additionally, both of these cards work fantastically with Pummel, just like CnC does. The major drawback to Wreck Havoc and Cut Down to Size is that each one only does 50% of what CnC does (but at 1% of the price), so you will have to be more deliberate about exactly why you are bringing in this disruption. Are your local armories plagued with 27-defense-reaction Dashes and Araknis? Bring Wreck Havoc. Are you struggling to overcome the Ninja players on the block? Bring Cut Down to Size instead. Humble has a frequently relevant on-hit effect that has only been accessible to the disruption-oriented Ranger and Guardian classes so far. I think that the nature of Ice disruption and aggressive decks, which have been at the top for a long time, has skewed the amount of competitively viable heroes. By offering these Generic tools to everyone, it may reduce the number of decks that are otherwise invalidated. Being able to render a hero’s textbox blank is useful, just maybe not today. Maybe Levia becomes too strong when Dusk Till Dawn releases and this card becomes a staple to try and force her to take Blood Debt damage. The Generic Majestics in this set fall in what I think is the right place for them moving forward. There are plenty of them, and they generally have situational effects or are sideboard options. Even with their reduced appearance rate in Outsiders, I expect that they will generally remain affordable since they are not universally useful. I see more parallels to Erase Face here than I do to Enlightened Strike. Amnesia is a 3-block that can trigger Phantasm, and the text may become more widely relevant as the game evolves. Overall, I think that the situational uses of this are close to Snag. Snag saw use to target a single deck (Chane with Rift Bind), even though it is theoretically universally usable. I think Amnesia will do the same if name-based effects become out of control with Ninjas. It is also possibly relevant against future Illusionists if we see an evolution of the Miraging Metamorph-style effects that this could apply to. For now, it will keep Combo-focussed Ninjas in check. That last sentence would have sounded like a joke a couple weeks ago, but not so much any more. Down and Dirty is a very versatile card that can pop Phantasm. This is a great way for decks that run few poppers naturally to be able to still play their game without having to make the annoying decision to keep a six-power card in hand and forgo arsenal. Instead of playing with an effective three Intellect, now Warriors and other classes can just arsenal Down and Dirty and make decisions with their full four-card draws. The two points of defense that this card offers may be enough to get around key breakpoints of Dominated attacks from Rangers and Guardians. However, I think the fact that this can still be used offensively if you are not pressured is a fantastic boon. Getting defense reactions stuck in arsenal is never a good feeling, and I think Down and Dirty provides options for decks that are looking to avoid disruption while maintaining offensive pressure. The card also helps provide more options for counteracting Command and Conquer. Even though the best counter to Command and Conquer (Reinforce the Line) has existed for ages and is still underutilized for that niche purpose, additional options are nice. Just be careful using this card against attacks with Overpower, as it is still an action card. Give and Take is a card that looks very appealing to me. Even without the effect, the fact that this is an attack with unconditional Go Again and three points of block is notable. I like the fact that the opponent has an opportunity to interact with this card through their own potentially challenging decision-making. The effect itself is interesting and has some details that make it better than it reads initially. The condition of cost versus power makes this card universally usable by every class except Guardians. The fact that the card goes to the top of your deck while conserving your action point is excellent. So many heroes now care about what is on the top of their deck, and even those that don’t are getting more ways to draw into it anyways. I also like the expansion of universal recursion options beyond Remembrance which don’t make block-only fatigue strategies stronger. While I don’t think block-only fatigue strategies are particularly strong, and that there are enough existing tools to counteract them, I don’t think they’re the pinnacle of fun FaB. Gore Belching reminds me of Ravenous Rabble with higher highs and lower lows. I’m not sure what the use case for this is, but that only makes me like it more. It means there is some discovery to be had with it. Uzuri can swap it in with her ability, which is nice, but she can also do that with other big attacks that block. It may be a good Snapdragon Scalers target, like Enlightened Strike. I think Kano may have some dumb fun with this, running a single Gore Belching and a single Rouse the Ancients, while filling the rest of the deck with standard Wizard non-attack actions. Burdens of the Past is another three-block Generic non-attack action with niche applications, like This Round’s on Me. This card parallels heavily with Snag in my eyes – it has some very specific niche uses that will be entirely predicated on the meta. Snag never really saw use outside of countering Chane, and I don’t know when Burdens of the Past will see its day. This is especially the case since decks that are running defense reactions aren’t running as many as they used to. I can however see this being useful to help get yourself out of a tricky end-game situation. If I’m playing Bravo and I know my opponent has their last red Unmovable in arsenal, it makes it challenging to play out my last Crippling Crush to seal the game before Dash’s pistol shots become overwhelming. Would that be worth playing a card that has no other synergies with my deck? Doubtful but possible. Which is why I like a lot of these Majestics, they are answers to niche problems which may not even have occurred yet. With how many good six-power Generic attacks came from this set, should we be worried about the power level of the upcoming Illusionist? Is LSS trying to give us the tools we need to prepare for Chane 2.0 and Illusionist Bravo Star of the Show? Or maybe it’s a sign that the new Illusionist will care more about Ward than Phantasm. Either way, reading to far into things can be fun. Finally, why is it called Wreck Havoc and not Wreak Havoc? Is “Havoc” going to be revealed as the name of something relevant in the lore of the Pits? I certainly hope so, because until more information comes out, I will Wreaking Havoc, not Wrecking Havoc.
What We Know About Outsiders and How it Will Impact Flesh and Blood Limited Play
By Dimos This week we will be examining how what we know about the upcoming Outsiders set will impact the limited play found within. If you haven’t read last week’s precursor which discusses what makes a good limited set in Flesh and Blood, you can do so here. We know Outsiders will feature six heroes across three classes and have 14 cards and two tokens per pack. With just this information, we can use information from previous sets to guide us in surmising how the drafting experience will be. The three-classes-and-six-heroes combination (in addition to dual-class cards) will function most similarly to the split we saw in Tales of Aria, where three heroes had access to flexibility in builds based on a focus on Ice, Earth, or Lightning. This also means that, in contrast with the four-hero sets, there will never be an even split of heroes of these six heroes at an eight-person draft table. However, it does open up some flexibility in options for sealed deck building which is something that I love to see. With the majority of players’ first experiences of a new set being a sealed deck pre-release, I think it’s important to have sealed be a positive experience. Beyond sealed, I’m curious to see what the ideal Outsiders draft pod will look like. It is my favourite format for armories because of the higher amount of card and player interaction, deck-building and in-game decision-making, and accessibility to new and budget players. Will it be one of each unique hero with two dupicates? Or will Riptide carry the bulk of the “default” options as Ranger and leave Azalea to exist as a more niche alternative? We know that Stealth exists to be interacted with, and we can surmise that the unique interactions will likely come from Uzuri and Arakni’s unrevealed hero abilities. This could allow similar draft pools to be played in different ways, or it could incentivize the drafting of slightly different pools of Assassin cards. We have the most complete information about Benji and Katsu, as they remain unchanged from their previous cards. From the cards that we have seen so far, I think that there is going to be more competition between Benji and Katsu in drafting Ninja cards than was initially thought. Previously, I would have assumed that Katsu would aim to draft Combo cards like Bonds of Ancestry while Benji would focus on standalone hit effects at awkward breakpoints. However, Mask of Many Faces and Be Like Water will let Benji change the name of cards to play out full Combo lines, which may make our Ninjas compete over the same cards but in different colours. Benji is incentivized to take yellow or blue cards to make them more likely to hit from his ability, whereas Katsu, like most heroes, generally wants to maximize powerful red cards. Another reason I’m excited to see Benji in the set is because he helps to address the longstanding issue of yellow cards in limited FaB. Generally speaking, no one wants them. Uprising tried to address this, with mixed success, by only printing Draconic cards in red. Not even Prism, who cares extensively about yellow cards in constructed formats (due to Luminaris) cares about them in limited. This is why I like having Benji available as a release valve in Outsiders. There could be pools where there are no Benji players due to a high amount of red Ninja cards, and there may be pods where there are multiple Benjis because of an abundance of yellows. Either way, Ninja cards will be used in the draft pod to their best ability, whether through Katsu or Benji. For example, in Uprising, if there happened to be too few blue cards and too many yellow cards for Iyslander to draft, she felt like an incomplete hero. This situation also created feelings that the draft pod as a whole was incomplete, where one third of the heroes are lagging behind. In Outsiders, regardless of what the other cards have in store for us, we know that if there is a box with very few red Ninja cards that Ninja will still be playable through Benji’s unique utilization of lower-power cards. I am curious to see how yellow cards are similarly addressed in the other classes without causing imbalance. We can surmise that the Assassin “Spike with…” reactions will only be printed in their red form due to having consecutive set numbers. These cards are all powerful as they block well, deal an appropriate amount of damage for their cost, and each have a uniquely powerful standalone on-hit effect. My guess is that this was a partial way of addressing how lackluster yellow cards can feel in limited play, while also limiting it to the Rare slot in the pack, so decks are unlikely to have a dozen of these cards hidden within. Additionally, the Rare slot in each pack is likely getting rarer, as each pack is no longer guaranteed two rare or better cards. Depending on how this pack configuration change is executed, it may meaningfully change expectations in the drafting process. It may be something akin to how the Equipment slot in Tales of Aria was shared with the Amulets. This may mean you could either get a second Rare card or a colour-locked common, Generic equipment, or something else specific. My assumption for Rangers is that they will have colour-specific Traps as most of their Rare cards. We have seen LSS be particular about the colour of defense reactions in the past, with Springboard Somersault, That All You Got, and even the previous Ranger Traps (which features a uniquely strong ability on a yellow card). Additionally, most class-specific defense reactions in draft sets have come at the Rare rarity. Outsiders looks like a set that will be providing some interesting play options. Death Touch is a card that gives options to the attacking player on hit, and the trade-off of the Ponder token delay from Peace of Mind is an interesting cost to consider. There were plenty of interesting play options for Dromai and Iyslander in Uprising draft and the payoff for those complex mechanics was a lot of fun while playing. Even though we know Outsiders won’t have Dragons or Arcane Damage (and consequently fewer instant-speed shenanigans), I hope that there are still new and interesting mechanics that reward depth of knowledge in the set without making it a requirement for playability. This looks like it could be the case with the use of the Ponder, Bloodrot Pox, Frailty, and Inertia tokens we have seen so far. Most of these interact directly with the arsenal zone, and it’s looking like this set will focus heavily on arsenal management and interaction. Now I want to shift gears and talk about what I think Outsiders limited should avoid, based on the experiences of previous FaB sets. In short, I think that individual cards that provide power spikes should be avoided. Additionally, the probability of drafting low-power or low-option decks should be minimized. Based on what we have seen so far with Benji and some red-only cards, I think that drafting low-power decks is less likely, but the 14-card packs still frighten me in this regard. That single extra card per pack makes an outsized difference in the feel of a deck. In terms of individual cards, I hope that Outsiders does not have Majestic-rarity weapons. Monarch had generally well-balanced token weapons, but also had the Majestic-rarity options that could blow draft or sealed events out of the water. Luminaris is event-warping in its power, Raydn is a solid and consistent upgrade that allows for some slightly alternative playstyles, Dread Scythe opens an interesting inevitability-through-arcane-damage build in Chane, and Hexagore is entirely unplayable. If you manage to open a Hexagore and your opponent opens a Luminaris, it isn’t a great feeling since so much of the game is now decided by a single card. In Tales of Aria there were similar feelings, as having Winter’s Wail was oftentimes a blowout, while Voltaire or Duskblade rarely saw play even if they were opened. In the same vein, I hope that Outsiders avoids playable “bombs” (cards that are so powerful they can warp your drafting process and decision-making on their own). Monarch featured Soul Reaping, which was effectively a resource-generating attack that buffed one of your other cards, dealt six damage, and nearly always had Go Again. It also had V of the Vanguard, which could easily create massive turns that your opponent could not defend against in a format with little disruption or defense to mitigate it. The fact that these cards were printed at the Rare rarity meant that they would feature in nearly every limited format experience and could occasionally create a “who sees their powerful card first” game, rather than a more engaging back-and-forth. However, it is always fun to play powerful cards so I’m less dead-set on this than I am on the Majestic weapons. The last major thing that I want Outsiders limited to avoid is weak or non-playable tokens like Uprising had. Helio’s Mitre addressed some very specific problems in the set, namely unblockable early arcane damage from Iyslander and early Ash generation for Dromai. For this reason, I think it was okay. However, I don’t think it made up for the 14-card packs, which result in having three fewer cards to build your deck with. Compounding this was Phoenix Flame. Iyslander couldn’t play any copies at all, putting an even higher deckbuilding burden on her. Most Dromai builds could use a Phoenix Flame similarly to how a deck would use a Cracked Bauble – as a last resort. Fai was usually happy with one or two in his deck, but he was the hero with the most playable cards to begin with. Overall, Phoenix Flames being the only in-deck token which also only really functioned well in the hero with the widest card pool made the other heroes feel short or boxed in on lackluster choices. I hope that Outsiders doesn’t have the same issue with their tokens and that they are more playable. Titanium Bauble, for example, would be something that I would consider a very suitable power level for a token to have in the set. It blocks for three and is blue, which will help to fill out the resource base of heroes (which are usually the least interesting part of the deck to draft, except in Tales of Aria), while also offering meaningful downsides to hero abilities. Katsu could not discard it to search for a Combo card, and it is unplayable out of arsenal if Azalea uses her ability to put it there from the top of the deck. It offers some tools (pitching and blocking) while not enabling any one particular strategy for one hero over another. Overall, I think this set has a lot of potential to be a strong limited experience, and the team at LSS has had a good amount of time to work on it. With supplemental sets like Everfest and Dynasty being released alternately with draftable sets like Uprising and Outsiders, there is more time to balance out the limited play experience. I have high hopes for Outsiders and am actively looking forward to pre-release weekend even though I remain very wary of the 14-card packs for draft. I’m excited as always for the impending spoiler season as it sets the whole community racing with deck ideas, draft line speculations, and a desire to get back to shop to play some limited games. I also have a sneaking suspicion that we will see some key reprints in this set, and my money's on Fate Forseen.
