Yeah but without Sandman the meta is dominated by Shulk shenanigans and “cheat everything t6”
I dunno, Shuri itself is already an interactive matchup against Deathwave, though I wouldn't necessarily say it's advantaged, so I don't think that Sandman is really needed to keep it in check as much as people say. Really, Electro Ramp is mostly good at shitting on Thanos shenanigans right now.
It also doesn't help that Sandman and Leech mostly benefit Shuri? Like, you're probably not too upset to have your Red Skull be 30 power straight up, although it does mean your T6 play is a bit weaker.
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Munkus BeaverYou don't have to attend every argument you are invited to.Philosophy: Stoicism. Politics: Democratic SocialistRegistered User, ClubPAregular
Like, my games have improved since before the sandman changes. Yeah, it sucks to get blown up by a Shuri mook, but I am not running into sixty different versions of spam discard and deathwave right now.
Humor can be dissected as a frog can, but dies in the process.
Yeah but without Sandman the meta is dominated by Shulk shenanigans and “cheat everything t6”
These are meta problems and not "Sandman is saving us from the dark timeline" problems. We didn't have these problems in prior seasons when Sandman was unplayable. They can move the meta back in that direction if they want to but Sandman will still be a problem.
The other thing too is like, is "cheat everything t6" a problem? Obviously everyone likes different shit but is the game better if we just play very linear curve out strategies with one card a turn? For me personally it's more fun when you're doing Sera Surfer, She-Hulk, etc kind of things. I'd like more finesse than just a "no" button. We definitely had more diversity before, which is really the killer here. It's just boring playing into the same shit constantly.
Yeah, this meta is really pretty stale, though Shuri is fun and simple to play. It's too easy to defend your first Shuri lane and then you've either got priority, in which case Aero will usually win and Tasky makes the game a 50/50, or you don't, in which case you are vulnerable to an Aero from the mirror but can probably risk just playing Carol and winning one of the two other lanes, especially if they are relying on that T6 Aero. The mirrors are also pretty unpleasant, with a lot relying on either having the best series 3-4 early game point cards available and the rest relying on some moderately skill testing but mostly luck testing games of "what do each of you double with Shuri".
Yeah Shuri gets called "LOL EZ MODE" and I'm definitely not going to defend her as the most difficult deck in the world, but a lot of the difficulty in piloting the deck is in the early game and setting it up so you can give and take priority as needed given the win cons you draw into. The flexibility of the end game is a double edged sword, you have a lot of tools and paths to win but you really need to be able to select the best tools for the job.
The real problem with the meta is that Leech and Sandman aggressively shit on every lower tier deck that wants to do something interesting so it's very much if you're a have not get fucked right now. I would love to play more Negative, Surfer, Stature, or more anything else, but those decks just fold to that.
Sandman makes my Sera "spam cards on t6" deck cry so much.
Right now I don't have Taskmaster or Shuri bu tI did just pull Aero so I'm excited to see if I can do anything with her in a deck I can make
Still slowly climbing with Sera & friends, featuring Shang "Mr Steal Yo Points" Chi and "This Lane is More Boring Now" aka Enchantress. Can I tell you about the number of times I have been excited to get Sera played on t4 and then like a moron put Enchantress in her lane on t5? Because it's a lot of times.
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Munkus BeaverYou don't have to attend every argument you are invited to.Philosophy: Stoicism. Politics: Democratic SocialistRegistered User, ClubPAregular
It’s a problem when I am not given the cards/tools to deal with that and only have Sandman.
Like ya’ll playing at infinite with access to most every card are not playing the same game the rest of us are.
Humor can be dissected as a frog can, but dies in the process.
Yeah, I'm not sure that dropping a bunch of things T6 or having a Discard deck that actually works and benefits from Swarm literally being designed around letting you swarm the board are a bad thing to have. It's fine if they have counterplay, but I don't think it's good if most alternative styles are completely removed from the meta.
I will say I'm still having fun but when someone drops a card I don't have to win it does sting. I think unranked mode will help a lot as I want to make progress without draining cubes. Luckily Electro Ramp has been mostly gains into the 60s so I think with just that I can still hit a new high rank this season.
But it feels like the cards I have left to get all pretty good. Like Valk was a huge draw as my last card drop but as soon as I slotted her I haven't seen Shuri in 10 games lmao. Just how the game works sometimes.
Also it's been said but, time of day and what day it is matters a lot! I make a lot of gains on weekends in the early morning when I imagine it's just parents and or kids playing. Playing during the week feels sweatier.
Balance changes coming down are all going to be sort of assuming everyone is pool 3 complete - just because balance around wildly different collections isn't possible.
Changes to red skull seem like a good target for now - though I feel like its going to require some kind of creative change to make that card remotely similar to it's original idea and make it playable with or without shuri.
Making sandman playable was probably a mistake they will regret for awhile - and turn 6 plays where you drop your hand are way more interesting then just best in stat curves.
Red Skull is a 5-drop, so I don't think directly comparing him to Hulk makes sense. That said, he is almost exclusively played in decks that can (ab)use his high base power while mitigating his downside, so he does need to maintain a significantly higher power than any other 5 drop in the game to remain relevant.
E: If Red Skull cost 6 I think he'd probably need a power boost to 16-17 but I'm probably missing things about it.
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I honestly think if you make Red Skull a 6 the Shuri issues go away pretty instantly. I'm starting to think it's more of the absolute value of 30 is too high, especially when doubled with Taskmaster. So you could just make him like a 6/18 or 6/20 or something like that.
The problem I thought of immediately was "oh but what about Dracula?"
I honestly think if you make Red Skull a 6 the Shuri issues go away pretty instantly. I'm starting to think it's more of the absolute value of 30 is too high, especially when doubled with Taskmaster. So you could just make him like a 6/18 or 6/20 or something like that.
The problem I thought of immediately was "oh but what about Dracula?"
6/20 is too high unless you also make him like, give enemy units +3 since a 6/20 is Strictly Better Hulk. With Dracula, it'd make him more powerful in the decks that are running him and Infinaut but I dunno if you'd sub out a possibly ressurectable Infinaut for a worse but possibly playable Red Skull if your deck is Discard and not Zoocula or whatever.
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ChaosHatHop, hop, hop, HA!Trick of the lightRegistered Userregular
I honestly think if you make Red Skull a 6 the Shuri issues go away pretty instantly. I'm starting to think it's more of the absolute value of 30 is too high, especially when doubled with Taskmaster. So you could just make him like a 6/18 or 6/20 or something like that.
The problem I thought of immediately was "oh but what about Dracula?"
6/20 is too high unless you also make him like, give enemy units +3 since a 6/20 is Strictly Better Hulk. With Dracula, it'd make him more powerful in the decks that are running him and Infinaut but I dunno if you'd sub out a possibly ressurectable Infinaut for a worse but possibly playable Red Skull if your deck is Discard and not Zoocula or whatever.
Yeah sorry I should have lined out that 6/20 would need a change to the ongoing too, the 6/18 means he'd be a 6/10 worst case scenario so that might ALSO be too good?
But I think the ceiling for Shuri otherwise is two 20 power targets (She-Hulk/Tasky), or two 32 power Black Panther both of which are inherently more fair for a variety of reasons.
I honestly think if you make Red Skull a 6 the Shuri issues go away pretty instantly. I'm starting to think it's more of the absolute value of 30 is too high, especially when doubled with Taskmaster. So you could just make him like a 6/18 or 6/20 or something like that.
The problem I thought of immediately was "oh but what about Dracula?"
6/20 is too high unless you also make him like, give enemy units +3 since a 6/20 is Strictly Better Hulk. With Dracula, it'd make him more powerful in the decks that are running him and Infinaut but I dunno if you'd sub out a possibly ressurectable Infinaut for a worse but possibly playable Red Skull if your deck is Discard and not Zoocula or whatever.
Yeah sorry I should have lined out that 6/20 would need a change to the ongoing too, the 6/18 means he'd be a 6/10 worst case scenario so that might ALSO be too good?
But I think the ceiling for Shuri otherwise is two 20 power targets (She-Hulk/Tasky), or two 32 power Black Panther both of which are inherently more fair for a variety of reasons.
6/18 seems fine given it lines up pretty well with him currently being Abomination at 3 opposing cards and worse at 4; he'd be Hulk at 3 and worse at 4 and also not muscle in on Infinaut's highest base power turf.
OK, call me a dumbass, but how specifically does She-Hulk fit into Death decks? Like, how is the best way to play? I never see that combo in the crap ranks.
OK, call me a dumbass, but how specifically does She-Hulk fit into Death decks? Like, how is the best way to play? I never see that combo in the crap ranks.
Wave T5 = Death (-4 from kills, 0 cost) + She Hulk (-2 from spare energy, 2 cost) + Any Other Card (4 cost)
Looked up the cards I still need for my collection and I suspect that it's part of what's behind my issues. I'm missing so many key cards for certain meta decks.
- Cerebro
- Quinjet
- Red Skull
- Venom
- Hell Cow
- Psylocke
- Doctor Ock
- Doom
- Absorbing Man
- Hazmat
- Luke Cage
- Helicarrier
Plus, no Shuri either.
Which, I mean, doesn't seem bad overall but when you've only got like 20 cards left in Pool 3, that's a lot of high-use cards to be missing.
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Munkus BeaverYou don't have to attend every argument you are invited to.Philosophy: Stoicism. Politics: Democratic SocialistRegistered User, ClubPAregular
Looked up the cards I still need for my collection and I suspect that it's part of what's behind my issues. I'm missing so many key cards for certain meta decks.
- Cerebro
- Quinjet
- Red Skull
- Venom
- Hell Cow
- Psylocke
- Doctor Ock
- Doom
- Absorbing Man
- Hazmat
- Luke Cage
- Helicarrier
Plus, no Shuri either.
Which, I mean, doesn't seem bad overall but when you've only got like 20 cards left in Pool 3, that's a lot of high-use cards to be missing.
I'm missing all of those but Cerebro and Doom, plus Ghost Rider, Wave and Kingpin.
Doom is lousy into Shuri and Deadpool decks and they're like all I've seen since Friday. It's a real bummer.
Balance changes coming down are all going to be sort of assuming everyone is pool 3 complete - just because balance around wildly different collections isn't possible.
Changes to red skull seem like a good target for now - though I feel like its going to require some kind of creative change to make that card remotely similar to it's original idea and make it playable with or without shuri.
Making sandman playable was probably a mistake they will regret for awhile - and turn 6 plays where you drop your hand are way more interesting then just best in stat curves.
It has been discussed, lots of folks are way above others as far as CL here, but making Sandman playable was bad? Why even have the card in the game if it would be unplayable before? And some of us were talking about good and bad cards in pool 3, they obviously exist, as well as 4 and 5.
Sandman is a tool, specifically a wrench you can toss into the enemy's well oiled machine. I get the hate but he served an important role like Cosmo or Enchantress. They have to have cards like that to mitigate all the bullshit lol
OK, call me a dumbass, but how specifically does She-Hulk fit into Death decks? Like, how is the best way to play? I never see that combo in the crap ranks.
Wave T5 = Death (-4 from kills, 0 cost) + She Hulk (-2 from spare energy, 2 cost) + Any Other Card (4 cost)
Some cards are kinda just there to be fun and not really reliable ways to win - looking at you orka, love owning this card.
But the sandman change came with the developer note of countering decks that play multiple turn 6 cards; and I think those style of decks are probably healthier for the meta than the alternative - which keeps pushing everyone towards the same good card list
OK, call me a dumbass, but how specifically does She-Hulk fit into Death decks? Like, how is the best way to play? I never see that combo in the crap ranks.
Wave T5 = Death (-4 from kills, 0 cost) + She Hulk (-2 from spare energy, 2 cost) + Any Other Card (4 cost)
Of note too is that She-Hulk is just another death if you don't draw her or can't get the destroys off. Wave on 5 means you can play She-Hulk and any other card while your opponent theoretically only plays one. She-Hulk is an insanely versatile card.
Balance changes coming down are all going to be sort of assuming everyone is pool 3 complete - just because balance around wildly different collections isn't possible.
Changes to red skull seem like a good target for now - though I feel like its going to require some kind of creative change to make that card remotely similar to it's original idea and make it playable with or without shuri.
Making sandman playable was probably a mistake they will regret for awhile - and turn 6 plays where you drop your hand are way more interesting then just best in stat curves.
It has been discussed, lots of folks are way above others as far as CL here, but making Sandman playable was bad? Why even have the card in the game if it would be unplayable before? And some of us were talking about good and bad cards in pool 3, they obviously exist, as well as 4 and 5.
Some cards can be designed as safety valves in a bad meta to prevent overtuned shit from just running rough shod over it before their devs can intervene, but their play rate increase is usually a canary in the coal mine. They're like a stop gap. You can see this in a lot of earlier Magic designs. There are some pretty specific hosers out there where you'd ask "on what planet would you play a card this off rate?" and the answer is "the alternate universe where we fucked up and you'd take any tool to fight it."
Honestly, I think Shuri has to cost five.
Any other change really doesn't help the math that Shuri+card+Taskmaster/Zola= 4x six-cost value.
So there's too much value there, compared to any other deck, aside maybe discard/Hela or big stuff Lockjaw.
A lot of people seem to think that snapping on T6 is a very bad play, but I'm not so sure, so I figured I'd try to talk it out here. Obviously, it's better to snap early in situations where you're ahead or have the nuts, but taking it as a given you didn't do that for whatever reason (e.g. you're clearly in a Shuri mirror and drew into Shuri T4 + Skull T5), at least in the current meta it seems like the math does work better for you getting a near-guaranteed retreat than playing any sort of remotely tossup match.
Like, the numbers are fiddly because you have to figure your chance of winning if the game is played out and the chance of an opponent retreating if you do/don't snap, but my math suggests that for snapping T6 to be "wrong" in a winning position you need to have a very high chance of winning (>80%) and need your opponent to swing from almost guaranteed to stay to almost guaranteed to retreat, and in my experience a lot of people will already limp away T6 without the snap and you're often playing a hand with something that's not a complete lock. If you have a complete lock you're 100% sure of, then yeah, moving an opponent from 70% to retreat to 90% to retreat or more is bad cube equity, but if there's even a little bit of a chance for a mixup that one guaranteed cube and a small chance to take four often beats a good chance to take two cubes.
A lot of people seem to think that snapping on T6 is a very bad play, but I'm not so sure, so I figured I'd try to talk it out here. Obviously, it's better to snap early in situations where you're ahead or have the nuts, but taking it as a given you didn't do that for whatever reason (e.g. you're clearly in a Shuri mirror and drew into Shuri T4 + Skull T5), at least in the current meta it seems like the math does work better for you getting a near-guaranteed retreat than playing any sort of remotely tossup match.
Like, the numbers are fiddly because you have to figure your chance of winning if the game is played out and the chance of an opponent retreating if you do/don't snap, but my math suggests that for snapping T6 to be "wrong" in a winning position you need to have a very high chance of winning (>80%) and need your opponent to swing from almost guaranteed to stay to almost guaranteed to retreat, and in my experience a lot of people will already limp away T6 without the snap and you're often playing a hand with something that's not a complete lock. If you have a complete lock you're 100% sure of, then yeah, moving an opponent from 70% to retreat to 90% to retreat or more is bad cube equity, but if there's even a little bit of a chance for a mixup that one guaranteed cube and a small chance to take four often beats a good chance to take two cubes.
If someone snaps on t6 and I'm not very confident that I'm winning, I'm out. Let them have the 1 cube, I'm not running the risk of getting blown out because you hit your key card on the t6 draw while I'm feeling even the least bit iffy. It says to me "oh yeah, I've got this one".
I will say I'm bluffable in this regard. If you've got fuck all and you snap t6 I will probably still leave because I don't want to see your 400 point play + three dozen thumbs-up emojis.
Not that it's necessarily a problem because Shuri hasn't always been meta, but she has a fundamental problem where Shuri + whatever + Taskmaster is multiplicative scaling in a game where a lot of additive buffs exist, so as long as there's a sufficiently big 5 drop her design makes her one of the biggest points scorers.
A fun fix for Shuri I've had milling about in my head is making her add +X to the next card you play, where X is her power, then tweak her cost and power; 3/2 or 4/3 are both "on curve" at that point, while a 3/3 or a 4/4 would be super efficient to make up for the lines being way more awkward. It is still sort of a "doubling" ability and has a ton of synergy hooks with the other Wakanda cards and with the existing locations that make Shuri + whatever + taskmaster silly, but they're very different and create a lot of weird builds. The downside is it becomes another card that's Super Stupid with Brood, but hey, if you wanna play Nakia into Shuri into 21 power of Broodlings, that's still less than Red Skull into a full lane!
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I dunno, Shuri itself is already an interactive matchup against Deathwave, though I wouldn't necessarily say it's advantaged, so I don't think that Sandman is really needed to keep it in check as much as people say. Really, Electro Ramp is mostly good at shitting on Thanos shenanigans right now.
It also doesn't help that Sandman and Leech mostly benefit Shuri? Like, you're probably not too upset to have your Red Skull be 30 power straight up, although it does mean your T6 play is a bit weaker.
These are meta problems and not "Sandman is saving us from the dark timeline" problems. We didn't have these problems in prior seasons when Sandman was unplayable. They can move the meta back in that direction if they want to but Sandman will still be a problem.
The other thing too is like, is "cheat everything t6" a problem? Obviously everyone likes different shit but is the game better if we just play very linear curve out strategies with one card a turn? For me personally it's more fun when you're doing Sera Surfer, She-Hulk, etc kind of things. I'd like more finesse than just a "no" button. We definitely had more diversity before, which is really the killer here. It's just boring playing into the same shit constantly.
Sandman makes my Sera "spam cards on t6" deck cry so much.
Right now I don't have Taskmaster or Shuri bu tI did just pull Aero so I'm excited to see if I can do anything with her in a deck I can make
Still slowly climbing with Sera & friends, featuring Shang "Mr Steal Yo Points" Chi and "This Lane is More Boring Now" aka Enchantress. Can I tell you about the number of times I have been excited to get Sera played on t4 and then like a moron put Enchantress in her lane on t5? Because it's a lot of times.
Like ya’ll playing at infinite with access to most every card are not playing the same game the rest of us are.
But it feels like the cards I have left to get all pretty good. Like Valk was a huge draw as my last card drop but as soon as I slotted her I haven't seen Shuri in 10 games lmao. Just how the game works sometimes.
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I guess I'm just curious what you were doing to deal with it before when those decks were fine and Sandman was not the answer.
Changes to red skull seem like a good target for now - though I feel like its going to require some kind of creative change to make that card remotely similar to it's original idea and make it playable with or without shuri.
Making sandman playable was probably a mistake they will regret for awhile - and turn 6 plays where you drop your hand are way more interesting then just best in stat curves.
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E: If Red Skull cost 6 I think he'd probably need a power boost to 16-17 but I'm probably missing things about it.
I honestly think if you make Red Skull a 6 the Shuri issues go away pretty instantly. I'm starting to think it's more of the absolute value of 30 is too high, especially when doubled with Taskmaster. So you could just make him like a 6/18 or 6/20 or something like that.
The problem I thought of immediately was "oh but what about Dracula?"
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6/20 is too high unless you also make him like, give enemy units +3 since a 6/20 is Strictly Better Hulk. With Dracula, it'd make him more powerful in the decks that are running him and Infinaut but I dunno if you'd sub out a possibly ressurectable Infinaut for a worse but possibly playable Red Skull if your deck is Discard and not Zoocula or whatever.
Yeah sorry I should have lined out that 6/20 would need a change to the ongoing too, the 6/18 means he'd be a 6/10 worst case scenario so that might ALSO be too good?
But I think the ceiling for Shuri otherwise is two 20 power targets (She-Hulk/Tasky), or two 32 power Black Panther both of which are inherently more fair for a variety of reasons.
6/18 seems fine given it lines up pretty well with him currently being Abomination at 3 opposing cards and worse at 4; he'd be Hulk at 3 and worse at 4 and also not muscle in on Infinaut's highest base power turf.
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Wave T5 = Death (-4 from kills, 0 cost) + She Hulk (-2 from spare energy, 2 cost) + Any Other Card (4 cost)
- Cerebro
- Quinjet
- Red Skull
- Venom
- Hell Cow
- Psylocke
- Doctor Ock
- Doom
- Absorbing Man
- Hazmat
- Luke Cage
- Helicarrier
Plus, no Shuri either.
Which, I mean, doesn't seem bad overall but when you've only got like 20 cards left in Pool 3, that's a lot of high-use cards to be missing.
I lost.
Edit: or retreated!
I'm missing all of those but Cerebro and Doom, plus Ghost Rider, Wave and Kingpin.
Doom is lousy into Shuri and Deadpool decks and they're like all I've seen since Friday. It's a real bummer.
It has been discussed, lots of folks are way above others as far as CL here, but making Sandman playable was bad? Why even have the card in the game if it would be unplayable before? And some of us were talking about good and bad cards in pool 3, they obviously exist, as well as 4 and 5.
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Sub me on Youtube
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Ooooooooh. Awesome, thanks!
But the sandman change came with the developer note of countering decks that play multiple turn 6 cards; and I think those style of decks are probably healthier for the meta than the alternative - which keeps pushing everyone towards the same good card list
Of note too is that She-Hulk is just another death if you don't draw her or can't get the destroys off. Wave on 5 means you can play She-Hulk and any other card while your opponent theoretically only plays one. She-Hulk is an insanely versatile card.
Some cards can be designed as safety valves in a bad meta to prevent overtuned shit from just running rough shod over it before their devs can intervene, but their play rate increase is usually a canary in the coal mine. They're like a stop gap. You can see this in a lot of earlier Magic designs. There are some pretty specific hosers out there where you'd ask "on what planet would you play a card this off rate?" and the answer is "the alternate universe where we fucked up and you'd take any tool to fight it."
Any other change really doesn't help the math that Shuri+card+Taskmaster/Zola= 4x six-cost value.
So there's too much value there, compared to any other deck, aside maybe discard/Hela or big stuff Lockjaw.
Like, the numbers are fiddly because you have to figure your chance of winning if the game is played out and the chance of an opponent retreating if you do/don't snap, but my math suggests that for snapping T6 to be "wrong" in a winning position you need to have a very high chance of winning (>80%) and need your opponent to swing from almost guaranteed to stay to almost guaranteed to retreat, and in my experience a lot of people will already limp away T6 without the snap and you're often playing a hand with something that's not a complete lock. If you have a complete lock you're 100% sure of, then yeah, moving an opponent from 70% to retreat to 90% to retreat or more is bad cube equity, but if there's even a little bit of a chance for a mixup that one guaranteed cube and a small chance to take four often beats a good chance to take two cubes.
If someone snaps on t6 and I'm not very confident that I'm winning, I'm out. Let them have the 1 cube, I'm not running the risk of getting blown out because you hit your key card on the t6 draw while I'm feeling even the least bit iffy. It says to me "oh yeah, I've got this one".
I will say I'm bluffable in this regard. If you've got fuck all and you snap t6 I will probably still leave because I don't want to see your 400 point play + three dozen thumbs-up emojis.
Snapping just tells the opponent it's time to lose, unless they too snap back.
A fun fix for Shuri I've had milling about in my head is making her add +X to the next card you play, where X is her power, then tweak her cost and power; 3/2 or 4/3 are both "on curve" at that point, while a 3/3 or a 4/4 would be super efficient to make up for the lines being way more awkward. It is still sort of a "doubling" ability and has a ton of synergy hooks with the other Wakanda cards and with the existing locations that make Shuri + whatever + taskmaster silly, but they're very different and create a lot of weird builds. The downside is it becomes another card that's Super Stupid with Brood, but hey, if you wanna play Nakia into Shuri into 21 power of Broodlings, that's still less than Red Skull into a full lane!