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Spellbook Design and Construction / Re: My first Forcemaster...since 2012
« on: June 16, 2015, 07:15:57 PM »
FM = unplayable
May 07, 2024, 05:34:59 PM
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Strategy and Tactics / Re: Help me beat the Forcemaster
« on: April 23, 2014, 04:45:40 PM »I would argue that galvitar is the force masters strongest card, without it he is pretty much useless which is the only reason I can figure that it was given cantrip when no other weapon in the game has it
Check out the "Grizzly" type spell books that don't run it at all. Not that such unorthodox (read: desperate for points and mana) spell book design is healthy or intelligent.
The FM doesn't have many options for actions and attacking with her every round closes off a lot of options. I know it seems silly, I know.
Anyway, I promised I was returning to my hermit shack. *ninja smoke bomb*
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Spellbook Design and Construction / Re: Forcemaster - Grizzlies
« on: April 23, 2014, 12:57:21 PM »I know there is a lot of concern about the Forcemaster. I just wanted to be sure you all knew that Bryan and I are looking at the Forcemaster quite a bit. We absolutely want to expand the abilities she has access to. We're already working on a few ideas to help her out.
So, if you take anything away from this post please take this, We're sorry that she's lagged and we're working on bringing her back up to speed as well. It may take a bit, but we're not ignoring her in the slightest.
You just oiled this squeaky wheel, sir! *ninja smoke bomb*
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Strategy and Tactics / Re: Finally found a non-mind creature worth putting in my forcemaster book
« on: April 23, 2014, 12:37:31 PM »I am using the blade master for his defences and damage out put. A force master has to try and win quickly
I want to like him too. I gave him several looks at some point yet falcon precision and perfect strike scared me off with his low armor. If he gets stunned, slammed, or dazed that negs his defense as well. 16 mana is a big investment.
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Strategy and Tactics / Re: Finally found a non-mind creature worth putting in my forcemaster book
« on: April 23, 2014, 12:30:29 PM »Uni-purpose? How about Weak tokens from the Gorgon? One of the FM's greatest foils....
I consistently chose to not get hit by her. Kill, control, run, teleport, aaaahhhhh!
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Strategy and Tactics / Re: Finally found a non-mind creature worth putting in my forcemaster book
« on: April 23, 2014, 09:24:00 AM »Attacking a spore to wake it up is nearly a guaranteed impending death.
Mind Shield (reveal for 0) counters Sleep, and Wand of Healing can remove Sleep tokens for cheaper than they are applied.
No hitting your own thoughtspores required.
Wand of healing is not a bad idea. Both of these are just tacking on more uni-purpose spells to protect one creature unfortunately, and how about that irony, huh? "Now presenting that one mage that needs to run mind shield...the Forcemaster." Meanwhile, dark creatures shrug off fire, forest dwellers shrug off water, yadda yadda. Not saying it couldn't work. Would be cheaper than nullify anyway...
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Spellbook Design and Construction / Re: Forcemaster - Grizzlies
« on: April 22, 2014, 07:01:14 PM »Can I ask why you feel the addition of more Psychic Immune creatures makes the book break down? The only Psychic spells I see in your latest-posted spellbook are 1 Mind Control and 1 Sleep. Does having 2 dead cards in your spellbook really turn the tide that much? If you are against a spellbook with many Psychic Immune creatures, isn't Mordok's Obelisk just as effective?
This is a raw "all or nothing" beat down version of the book. It forked into many alternative builds that reintegrated more psychic stuff as the meta adjusted. Obelisk and the like are only as effective as there are number of opposing creatures now. Before, it was a vicious win-win because of the MC superkill. FM is so mana-starved with a book like this that the 2-3 point mana hit on top of various upkeep costs is quite a burden, whereas other mages with tons of extra actions, mana generation, and equipment discounts can shrug off 5+ upkeep a round relatively painlessly.
The grumbling here comes from the bending over backward and inside out to build a viable competitive FM book that relies on spells from all over the place, yet the FM archetype was inherently designed to be very restrictive and focused on drawing from an insular pool of spells that are now basically firewood. The subtle basis of this book design and its forks is the free force pull to control the board and enable creatures with full attacks to use them every round.
There is no answer, that I know of, to how corrode ruined the fun here. Armored fatties was the center point, and it was no easy task to keep them alive once the meta adjusted. Every competitive book runs corrode now, I imagine, but honestly I have not played in 4-6 months so I just have a lot of uninformed opinions here.
I was hoping to come back here to find the next big hack for FM, and with as much scrambling as FM lovers must have made to find it I fear that it isn't going to surface if not already.
I'm not saying this book is no longer fun to play with, but it's no longer consistently competitive, imo, and honestly its very creation speaks volumes about the lack of competitive options the FM has, which are now like zero. I'm being quite pessimistic here so don't let it get you down.
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Strategy and Tactics / Re: Help me beat the Forcemaster
« on: April 22, 2014, 06:35:16 PM »
Yeah, FF would be terrible if trumped so easily. It's possibly the FM's strongest card, imo. Hence getting rid of it. In mirror matches I would tend to run a dispel every round with 12 mana free so I could erase it as soon as it hit the table. The fallback was to dispel a charm or MC as soon as it hit.
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Strategy and Tactics / Re: Finally found a non-mind creature worth putting in my forcemaster book
« on: April 22, 2014, 06:31:43 PM »A pretty awesome creature for her to use is in that newer dice tower promo set. Running 2-3 Mountain Rams gives her a lot of charging damage, conjuration destruction aid, and even more position control for opponents creatures. They are also only level 2 and 8 mana to cast.
Are these legal for official play? Creatures usually find their way into the FM square pretty quickly, unless ranged. I suppose this could be interesting for a kiting FM that is not melee heavy, but she's not widely effective against so many books with psychic immunities galore.
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Strategy and Tactics / Re: Help me beat the Forcemaster
« on: April 22, 2014, 04:01:16 PM »Dispel force field asap.
I agree with all of this but this. I think that you should knock it down to 0 in 1 round or 2. It is not that hard to do, a Force Push through a Wall of Thorns is the quick and action efficient way to do this. Else you should have 3-4 creatures out and have them all hit the shield. Once you have it down to 0, the FM now (I have been here several times) has a very tough decision, do I pay the Upkeep +2 or not? If I do I only get one Forcefield marker in return, else (I typically carry two in my books) it goes away and I have to spend another action and a large chunk of mana again. At this point you should be attacking the FM at least once a round to zero out the Forcefield. Now put the hurt on him and it will take long...weapon and creatures with the Unavoidable trait have high value here.
I think this plays into the FM's game. Playing blocks and reverse attacks stall rounds and get counters back. If you do beat through the FF, even an extra attack may fail to Deflect/Scimitar, then another FF pops up next round. If one dedicates dispelling every FF put up then it is a back and forth soft-lock on mana. I have cast up to three FF in a game before that made the difference of me winning or losing.
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Strategy and Tactics / Re: Finally found a non-mind creature worth putting in my forcemaster book
« on: April 22, 2014, 03:29:26 PM »I play Devouring Jellies in my forcemaster.
Jellies get ate up against swarm in my experience. Do you have a way to deal with this?
I suppose only the obvious ones, Mordok's Obelisk and Suppression Orb. Also, in my experience if they're spending lots of actions to try and take down my jellies then they're leaving my Mage alone and she can really open up.
In my limited experience with them, a swarm of 3-4 smallish creatures can take out a jelly in one round. I suppose using block and/or reverse attack is a way to stall, and battle fury a way to focus them down, but with only one jelly out in early rounds that means the FM has to also help focus down the swarm and is essentially tied up. I agree that jellies are awkward to deal with, but an experienced player will know how to adjust and deal with them, I think. Resilient is quite good, but a few good rolls by the opponent early on is game over if jellies are the sole game plan, which frequently becomes the case with these unorthodox FM books that rely on super expensive creatures spellpoint-wise.
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Strategy and Tactics / Re: Finally found a non-mind creature worth putting in my forcemaster book
« on: April 22, 2014, 03:20:50 PM »I like putting power strike, battle fury or force hammer on my thoughtspores. Try to protect them with a block against my opponent trying to blow them out of the sky. I really don't suggest them though if your enemy is utilizing flying creatures.
Force hammer is too expensive, imo. The best spells to put on them have 0-2 range for sure, yet two spores with fire blast deal with most threats. The chance that an opponent will have fliers is quite high, and if a book is built around spores what is the backup plan? Sleep is also quite good to use with them placed as far back as possible, then one can sleep advancing threats, granted that they aren't immune to psychic, which is unfortunately very common. I have not tried stacking them with extra armor, health, and regen enchantments yet but all of that falls over to one sleep spell against them. Attacking a spore to wake it up is nearly a guaranteed impending death. I think they should have gotten a defense like nearly every other familiar. Chock up yet another enchantment to put on them otherwise. Errata anyone??
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Strategy and Tactics / Re: Finally found a non-mind creature worth putting in my forcemaster book
« on: April 22, 2014, 03:16:47 PM »I play Devouring Jellies in my forcemaster.
Jellies get ate up against swarm in my experience. Do you have a way to deal with this?
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Strategy and Tactics / Re: Finally found a non-mind creature worth putting in my forcemaster book
« on: April 22, 2014, 03:14:25 PM »I like putting power strike, battle fury or force hammer on my thoughtspores. Try to protect them with a block against my opponent trying to blow them out of the sky. I really don't suggest them though if your enemy is utilizing flying creatures.
Force hammer is too expensive, imo. The best spells to put on them have 0-2 range for sure, yet two spores with fire blast deal with most threats. The chance that an opponent will have fliers is quite high, and if a book is built around spores what is the backup plan? Sleep is also quite good to use with them placed as far back as possible, then one can sleep advancing threats, granted that they aren't immune to psychic, which is unfortunately very common. I have not tried stacking them with extra armor, health, and regen enchantments yet but all of that falls over to one sleep spell against them. Attacking a spore to wake it up is nearly a guaranteed impending death. I think they should have gotten a defense like nearly every other familiar. Chock up yet another enchantment to throw on them. Errata anyone??
All in all, the FM needs another familiar or some kind of class-specific method of gaining extra actions. Battle forge is the only solid option in my opinion, and yet so many books run wave or other water spells, and nuking a battle forge is first priority against the FM, imo. Scimitar is quite decent but not exactly comparable. Off hand, I think every other mage has 2-3 methods of generating extra actions, while coincidentally the FM is the most likely to have the biggest strain on her personal actions and needs extra the most.
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Strategy and Tactics / Re: Finally found a non-mind creature worth putting in my forcemaster book
« on: April 22, 2014, 03:10:52 PM »Uh, why not Thoughtspore? I know it's fragile...
Thoughtspores can be be great when they live, yet keeping them alive can be a full-time job. You have to keep throwing blocks and nullifies on them every turn or they will get burned down or slept rather quickly, and either way that becomes inevitable against a good player that adjusts and double-taps them in one round.
