Arcane Wonders Forum
Mage Wars => Strategy and Tactics => Topic started by: barriecritzer on April 21, 2014, 12:36:40 PM
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The Blade Master with his 2 defences that have a 50% of hitting and the fact that he has double strike or sweeping basically makes him a slightly better version of my force master when I have Galvitar attached. Yes he costs 12 points to put in my book but he is well worth it.
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I play Devouring Jellies in my forcemaster.
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My friend Steve tried putting a devouring Jelly in his forcemaster book and did not like how it played.
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That's fair. I use my forcemaster to try and make my jellies "sticky" so that people cannot escape them. Once you lock someone down they just chew through them. But, I'm always looking for new creatures.
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I tend to prefer a Steelclaw and/or a Necropian Vampiress. I tried an Iron Golem once, but I didn't like the way it played. I'm sure I could come up with an Iron Golem/Devouring Jelly based play that I would like more, but I would have to focus almost exclusively on position control to allow my creatures to tear my opponent apart. I just threw the Iron Golem into a regular equipment build, and it didn't work out very well.
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I tend to prefer a Steelclaw and/or a Necropian Vampiress. I tried an Iron Golem once, but I didn't like the way it played. I'm sure I could come up with an Iron Golem/Devouring Jelly based play that I would like more, but I would have to focus almost exclusively on position control to allow my creatures to tear my opponent apart. I just threw the Iron Golem into a regular equipment build, and it didn't work out very well.
The Iron Golem being unmovable really does have some downsides. :P
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Wouldn't it be nice if there were mind creatures worth putting in a FM book? :D
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Uh, why not Thoughtspore? I know it's fragile, but in my experience it tends to be worth it. It has spellbind AND is a familiar! Allows me to spam teleport on myself. Teleport-Thoughtspore and galvitar round one is a pretty good opening IMO, but only if you have an alternative to using battle forge, which sadly most forcemasters do not have.
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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.
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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.
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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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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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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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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 all honesty, I expect my Jelly (or two) to die over the course of the game. However their ability to heal themselves and to strip armor from your opponent is why I play them. One game I played the opponent's mage got attacked by one and then immediately responded by throwing two Boulders at it and killing it. But I was able to hang on to that advantage long enough to finish him off.
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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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Back to the OP, [mwcard=FWC14]Sir Corazin, Blademaster [/mwcard] does seem to be the closest in abilities to the Forcemaster. Add in a Lion Savagery or a Critical Strike and he is quite fearsome. The question in my mind would be do I want an expensive creature to duplicate my abilities. I think I would look at perhaps a Flaming Hellion for Burns or a Emerald Tegu for Rot, or perhaps even a Grey Wraith for the Weak and Ethereal attack traits and the Incorporeal traits, played well the Upkeep +1 should not even be an issue....
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I rather pay the spell book points and have a creature that will be harder to kill. Also if both of them are attacking with their doublestrike that is 14 dice around base, more if you have gauntlets of strength, bear strength, and use a battle fury.
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Galador is a good side kick for the Forcemaster, ranged Daze/Stun changes are great support and in melee he gets a good charge/pierce combo. As is Giant Wolf Spider or Stonegaze Basilisk, so you can keep things stuck in place with ranged attacks while you beat on them.
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.
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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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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.
Not for official tournaments or anything. I just really like the mountain ram in general, he's a fun creature.
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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. :)
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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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Uni-purpose? How about Weak tokens from the Gorgon? One of the FM's greatest foils....
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I am using the blade master for his defences and damage out put. A force master has to try and win quickly
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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! :D
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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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I liked Sir Corazin when I first saw him, but I don't think he's a good fit for Forcemaster. It is so easy to cripple the Doublestrike ability with Aegis, Agony, Weak tokens, and simple Armor stacking. I'd prefer to use a creature that helps to shore up the Forcemaster's inherent weaknesses rather than making her suffer even worse from them. Such as the Corrode from Devouring Jelly helping against armor stacking opponents. It is also immune to Weak tokens, immune to Sleep, and can not be Restrained currently. Thus, you cut down the effectiveness of two of the traditional counters to a Forcemaster's damage by using a creature that is very hard to crowd control and fairly long lived (with Resilient and Reconstruct).
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I liked Sir Corazin when I first saw him, but I don't think he's a good fit for Forcemaster. It is so easy to cripple the Doublestrike ability with Aegis, Agony, Weak tokens, and simple Armor stacking. I'd prefer to use a creature that helps to shore up the Forcemaster's inherent weaknesses rather than making her suffer even worse from them. Such as the Corrode from Devouring Jelly helping against armor stacking opponents. It is also immune to Weak tokens, immune to Sleep, and can not be Restrained currently. Thus, you cut down the effectiveness of two of the traditional counters to a Forcemaster's damage by using a creature that is very hard to crowd control and fairly long lived (with Resilient and Reconstruct).
Devouring Jelly is the first creature that isn't Thoughtspore I'm tempted to make a Forcemaster book around.
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"I liked Sir Corazin when I first saw him, but I don't think he's a good fit for Forcemaster. It is so easy to cripple the Doublestrike ability with Aegis, Agony, Weak tokens, and simple Armor stacking"
I have not really had a problem with armor stacking and for the enchantments that is why I run 3 dispels.
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The Bloodcrag Minotaur seems like it will be a nice creature for Forcemaster books. 2 less mana than a Grizzly for a better quick attack (if you can Charge) and Tough -2. If the opponent putseagleclaw boots on you can just pull your minotaur one space away instead. 1 less life than a Grizzly though, and no full attack.
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I'm with somaddict overall. I would like to see some Mind creatures worth using rather than feeling forced to delve into a category of magic that I'm weak in. Feels like a really unfair tax. I will say that I don't think the current mind creatures are necessarily bad, however. Thoughtspore is actually a very good familiar in my opinion, and the other two could be good with the right card support. That support just doesn't really feel like it's present currently.
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I'm with somaddict overall. I would like to see some Mind creatures worth using rather than feeling forced to delve into a category of magic that I'm weak in. Feels like a really unfair tax. I will say that I don't think the current mind creatures are necessarily bad, however. Thoughtspore is actually a very good familiar in my opinion, and the other two could be good with the right card support. That support just doesn't really feel like it's present currently.
I personally don't think anything could save Psylock. A 0-0 full action ranged attack that so many creatures are flat-out immune to feels like it'll always be dead weight.
Invisible Stalker has more potential, and would be a lot more popular if it wasn't a pain in the ass to support it at all. A Mind Mage only (if it was open to all I think it would run the risk of removing the Stalker's only advantage) item that lets you see invisible creatures would change how it's viewed...literally.
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If Psylok were a quick action to cast and had it's attack upgraded to being a quick action, I could see it being usable. In it's current form, it's horrendously bad.
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If Psylok were a quick action to cast and had it's attack upgraded to being a quick action, I could see it being usable. In it's current form, it's horrendously bad.
That would have so much tactical potential! If only...
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The issue of Psychic Immunity is currently a big deal for the Psylok. Psychic Immunity is simply a LOT more relevant in the current meta than other types of immunities. It is both common and protects against a lot of spells, conditions, and attacks. The next closest would be Poison Immunity, but I can't think of any creatures that deal poison damage with their attack. Some have effects that deal it though and there are several spells and conditions affected by it. Besides those two though, immunities don't generally have a huge impact.
Eventually though, I expect Acid, Flame, Hydro, Light, Lightning, and Wind immunity to be just as common and powerful as Psychic Immunity which will in turn make all of them have a smaller impact on the game in general.
Psylok will still have problems with it's attack being a Full Action though. The attack itself is very powerful, being able to slice through defenses, armor, and resillient like a hot knife through butter. It's just hard to pull off with a small flying pest that can't both move and attack in the same round. The Mind School has lots of spells and abilities to put and keep things in position though, so this could be compensated for.
However, it will still be a level 2 creature. Which in my experience, level 2 creatures are usually only popular with swarms or mages who have a "Pet" type ability. The Forcemaster lacks any "Pet" ability, so unless a Swarm becomes viable for her, I don't see any level 2 creatures being extremely popular.
All told, it is indeed a hard fix but I don't believe it is impossible. To illustrate my point, consider the following. If it was an Animal creature in the Nature School with the exact same stats except it dealt Lightning damage, I think Beastmasters would love it. They could get out a swarm fairly easily, use tanglevines/stranglevines to root enemies in place, and then fly in to chew through their worthless defenses. Add a Marked for Death to increase the damage by 50%. This comparison shows that it's the current state of the card pool that limits Psylok and not the creature itself that is "dead weight."
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The issue of Psychic Immunity is currently a big deal for the Psylok. Psychic Immunity is simply a LOT more relevant in the current meta than other types of immunities. It is both common and protects against a lot of spells, conditions, and attacks. The next closest would be Poison Immunity, but I can't think of any creatures that deal poison damage with their attack. Some have effects that deal it though and there are several spells and conditions affected by it. Besides those two though, immunities don't generally have a huge impact.
Eventually though, I expect Acid, Flame, Hydro, Light, Lightning, and Wind immunity to be just as common and powerful as Psychic Immunity which will in turn make all of them have a smaller impact on the game in general.
Psylok will still have problems with it's attack being a Full Action though. The attack itself is very powerful, being able to slice through defenses, armor, and resillient like a hot knife through butter. It's just hard to pull off with a small flying pest that can't both move and attack in the same round. The Mind School has lots of spells and abilities to put and keep things in position though, so this could be compensated for.
However, it will still be a level 2 creature. Which in my experience, level 2 creatures are usually only popular with swarms or mages who have a "Pet" type ability. The Forcemaster lacks any "Pet" ability, so unless a Swarm becomes viable for her, I don't see any level 2 creatures being extremely popular.
All told, it is indeed a hard fix but I don't believe it is impossible. To illustrate my point, consider the following. If it was an Animal creature in the Nature School with the exact same stats except it dealt Lightning damage, I think Beastmasters would love it. They could get out a swarm fairly easily, use tanglevines/stranglevines to root enemies in place, and then fly in to chew through their worthless defenses. Add a Marked for Death to increase the damage by 50%. This comparison shows that it's the current state of the card pool that limits Psylok and not the creature itself that is "dead weight."
In your example you've fundamentally changed how it interacts with other cards. And even then we don't know for certain if that would become a staple of Beastmasters. That hardly shows anything.
The simplest "fix" (in addition to making Psychic Immunity matter less) would be to make the Ranged attack 0-1 instead of 0-0.
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In your example you've fundamentally changed how it interacts with other cards.
That was exactly the point I was trying to make, my dear. It is the OTHER cards currently in distribution (or lack thereof) that are affecting it's viability. I didn't actually change anything important about this card. Lightning and Psychic damage should, theoretically, be equal and the spell's subtype and school of magic does not affect what the card itself is capable of.
These things aren't really messing with what the card itself is doing. It only affects how other cards in the meta interact with it. We could then summon out a swarm quickly using a spawn point and would not have to worry about an overabundance of immune creatures. I'm not saying that it would become a staple, per se, only illustrating that it could be viable in the right card pool without any changes needed to the actual creature.
I think people are a little too quick to dismiss cards or suggest errata for cards because of how they work in the current game environment. They fail to see their potential. I think that a huge opportunity was missed with the Psylok as it could have been a god send against all of the resilient and high armor creatures that have seen a lot of attention. Unfortunately, those creatures are pretty much all immune to it. That doesn't mean it can't see a resurgence later, though, as it is in fact a perfectly decent creature given the right opportunity.