What cards are breaking the bank?

I'm all for buffing Purge effects.

 

I think the only card that needed to be changed got the change that it needed. The problem with most of the other "broken" cards is that there are not sufficient counters or that the counters are too class specific. If both the warrior and the wizard class had a purge-like and a cleanse-like card, encumber and lava terrain would not be so dominant in MP. If wizards had better damage options, you wouldn't see encumber and lava terrain so dominant. The game isn't going to be more fun by nerfing all the cards. It will be more fun by increasing deck building possibilities and by creating an evolving meta of strategy and counter strategy as has occurred in all other successful CCGs.

 

Hmm. I like this argument -- if it means that we're going to get more variety in cards, for level 18. Hooray! But what if we don't? Then the argument is just...at level 18, everyone just dominates with encumbers, until you can get to level 19, where the better cards are. And won't the problems still exist, in a different form, at the higher levels, with the system as is? I'm assuming the cards we have are the cards there are. If there are more cards I'm not aware of then fine. But the fact that I HAVE to have an anti-encumber strategy, in any match I play, shows imbalance. Whether it's nerfing or adding cards to the other classes, I don't mind, but a fix is needed.

 

How about we just institute a vigorous campaign of public shaming for people running encumber decks? =]

To paraphrase John Waters, if you play MP against somebody and they're running encumber, don't play against them!

 

That's a long list! (read: everyone). I think just a matching system, where I can quickload a deck based on my familiarity with my opponent, would cure all meta-game issues.

 

Wall of Fire really gets my goat, as there are so many cards which have it, a lot that have it coupled with itself, or something similar, or something useful for throwing your enemies into the lava if they move. The result is that you can easily make a mage who is more or less guaranteed at least one - often two - walls of fire or hotspots per turn.

It's far, far too easy to have one mage, who casts wall of fire and then passes. Your opponent can't pass or risk ending the round (and thereby getting hit with 10 points immediately); and must therefore either attack (if they can); and/or move. If they move, the mage can just cast another one. Most people don't keep *that* many move cards in their hand. Rinse and repeat for unsatisfying experience.

 

Yeah, wall of fire is tough. But there are a LOT more counters against it than encumber. Purge, Arrogant Armor, and (that priest trait I can remember, where you have to stand right next to them.) vs. resistant hide, levitate, all kinds of extra moves cards, etc.

 

If you've played other CCGs (Magic: the Gathering is the one I'm most familiar with) you will know that dominant strategies come up all the time. They stick around until a dominant counter strategy evolves and then the majority of players move on to developing a counter for the new dominant strategy. The fact that there is a dominant strategy doesn't mean there is an imbalance. If it continues to be the dominant strategy, it indicates that there are not enough options for countering the strategy and developing a new dominant strategy. That is what is needed for a thriving CCG.

In M:tG, I remember when small creature swarm decks became a dominant strategy until someone created the Pestilence deckto combat it. Then that became the new dominant deck. Cardhunter needs an evolving meta to thrive.

 

I voted the two encumber cards and unholy wellspring. A lot of my reasoning has already been stated over and over again, so I am not going to get into it. Just saying I second the notion for a change to encumber, and I wouldn't mind seeing unholy wellspring not be so powerful.

 

I realize I will likely be in the minority, given the obvious influence of M:tG on this game, but I have no desire to Card Hunter move in that direction of a "constantly evolving" meta. I think it's a great casual game, and would prefer to not have to worry about obtaining certain necessary "power cards" in order to play MP.

 

That is the wrong way to create an evolving meta game. I don't want to have specific cards to combat dominant strategies either. That would just be the current situation we are in with encumber all over again. I'm talking about creating greater diversity in possible strategies so that there can be a rock-paper-scissors kind of relationship between different strategies. This will encourage players to try new deck ideas, but it is only possible if there is sufficient diversity available. It will not be made possible by creating a handful of power cards.

 

Entangling roots only exists on four items and only on Priest Divine Items. The max you're able to have in a single deck is 9, which is a lot. However, when you consider the range and duration 1 it's not that intimidating. However, there are some interesting (nasty) strategies that couple it with cantrip cards to help with recasting back to back rounds before the opponent can respond.

The most effective solution to lava terrain (or any terrain for that matter) in my opinion is Smoke Bomb or Bless. There are still team-move, TK, and other push/slide cards to consider as an answer to terrain attachments.

As for Encumbering cards, I for one have all but completely given up on using encumber (except on the occasional arcane item) with the appearance of Mom. Encumber casters are extremely weak against their own kind, and have an extreme block deficiency. It's been my experience that without devoting a wizard almost exclusively to focusing on encumber, they don't not cause enough of a bother to merit special treatment (anti-encumber cards). Even if a wizard does have a build with an encumbering focus there are more than enough ways around encumber. For example: Elves , Team-Move, TK and other push/slide cards; not to mention Purge, Shrug It Off, Arrogant Armor, or even a simple Block will prevent it in the first place. Additionally, things like Smoke Bomb which limit line-of-sight and other terrain attachments work wonders against any range attack intensive characters.

 

IMO Wall of Fire is perfectly fine. Volcano however, has gotten me a fair share of turn 1 concedes with a fairly easy setup of durdeling/pass while the opponent burns his visible moves.

 

Have to agree on this one somewhat wall of fire is definitely fine but volcano is sketchy. That said as all ground effects can't be buffed i still think its fine to fine ish. I did however suggest to Jon to nerf lava down to 8 damage but that would probably leave wizards too low on the damage charts to bring as only 8 damage a turn is actually not impressive at all and if they run all the lava some people seem to claim that's a direct cap.

 

There are plenty of counters to volcano. It seems to me that terrain effects are mostly a midlevel strategy. At highlevel there are so many good counters to lava that it does not seem worth it (team dash cards, whirlwind, winds of war, impenetrable nimbus, resistant hide, toughness, bless).

 

I'd be interested to see this poll run again after Leadership nerf. It sucked up most of the votes the first time around so everything else came out loosely equal.

 

I would say unholy well is sticking out noticably still and it would most likely suck up most of the leadership votes i would assume.

 

Great that you admit it in public, now please stop. If you're frustrated then just close the browser and do something else. When we played you stalled the game out -and- called me names because you thought I was taking too long with my moves. I doubt anyone you've done this to has deserved it and it's not cool.

On topic, I really agree that encumber is definitely too powerful and extremely frustrating. I think it could be a lot of fun though and the easiest change would be to have all frost spells have duration 1. It forces you to focus your spells on the biggest threat every turn and maintain line of sight on your target. For this you are rewarded with movement lock down. The issue now is that frost does decent damage and as encumber effects carry over to other turns, it's way too easy to keep enemies on permanent lock down by hitting them roughly once every other turn.

 

And here's an off the wall alternate suggestion : What if taking Fire damage removed the oldest attached Frost card?

 

Sounds good until you realize that you're significantly buffing fire wizards: now I can get rid of encumber by hitting my own guy with Burning Fingers?

I don't think any card is overpowered at this point, but the fact that you can have three Talented Healers in your deck seems a bit much.