[Suggestion] Control Wizards are a problem

First of all the OP is wrong there isnt only 1 deck dominating there are 2 : 3DC and 2War+Wiz, you can even meet some 2war+1priest now ( granted they are rare) in the 1600+ (if they have this rating u obviously understand that they and had win/won more games than lost), my point is the game is more balanced than some poeple claiming it to be.

The equilibrium between mage and warrior are 80% from the map

1. can you step attack from a cover most of the time = gladuis map = warrior oriented team win
2. can u encomber or WoW from max range in a wide open map = mage can counter/fight warrior = winter map

that the big incomplete picture we need the so luck/random/no fun called element : WWE
and the lesser "soon to be nerfed" : trait cycling

Minors annoying thing like toughness will hopefully have less importance if trait cycle is nerfed (for the obvious reasons that they wont have 4 toughness per mage within 5 turn anymore (take that lil *****s ) )

For me and that my personnal point of view the game is balanced (i have been saying this when i first hited the top 10 during gladius era ) BUT priests, yes for me all these threads about vibrant pain or wwe or 3dc dont look the big picture, we shouldnt nerf but buff, and atm the game need the priest to interact in the meta, no other way around.

So i say it simply : 3dc arent a problem, priest too weak is.

Ofc we could use little tweak like reducting WoW range by 1 or 2, and make WWE a range limited spell ( like a 6 range mass mazze like lot of poeple already thinked, that would reduce the luck factor) but that just minors things, all i see is poeple who played this game to the max like me and getting frustated because they saw all of it actual content, and are starting to get bored at it.

And Phaselock, take it the way you want but i really think that provinding monthly content (i.e : 4 card 15 items (with the new cards+some old on it) per month, nothing game breacking but just new card from lines u already started but didnt continuned like an Oblitering short spark (range4) , or a shifty strong stab (step1; range2) , only work needed is some art and balanced numbers ) to players would do nothing but great money and thanks from gamers that already enjoying your work. That of course just a suggestions and would make perfect sense with the month club, and keeping a player base while waiting on the extensions who am sure will be as great as the sample we already playing.

 

Can confirm. Been playing less and less. 20 chests -> 11 chests -> 6 chests -> 3 chests -> 1 chests -> 0 chests. My issue with the game is that this game has the most volatile turn 2 of any card based I played. Without another limiting resource such as mana, sometimes you draw godly hands at T1/T2 and utterly obliterates your opponent. Or if you draw absolutely ****ty hand and there is nothing you can do to stop your demise. Might as well play rng to the max and WW(E) .

 

And my point is that despite the variation, the linchpin to both those lists is the control wizard. Which is a point I made in my posts. As you have pointed out, using priests leads to marginal success, but it does mean those people who use them have to play at a much higher level than anyone else. But the point seems to have been lost as to how control wizards are BAD for this game. Any list that has as it's basic win condition the complete and total destruction of any counter-play against it isn't great game design.

So let me reiterate, control wizards win when their opponent CAN'T interact with the game. This is the central design point that has never been dealt with by control wizard proponents. If we want a dynamic and thriving Cardhunter, then this style of play simply needs to go. Now mind you, I'm not saying that control abilities don't play a significant part of many tactical games, including Cardhunter. But when it becomes the dominant play style, and the counter to that play style is simply to use control in a slightly different format, we still have a problem.

Hitting trait cycling with a hammer will certainly do a lot to fix this problem, if control wizards have to play with a full deck like all the other builds, then the central reason behind their spamming and proliferation, consistency (by essentially having a deck of 24 cards), will go with it. Card advantage is a central part of Cardhunter strategy as well, we often hear that until dual use cards like nimble strike are nerfed, wizards are forced to use control to deal with this threat. I would say that spamming three of any single class shouldn't be viable in the first place. The best approach to any tactical game (with an all-comers list building approach no less) should be an combined arms approach that severely punishes forgoing one of the wings of tactical option. If dual use cards on warriors are giving you a problem, then your solution should be to have a counter warrior to intercept, not to simply abdicate the field of melee combat, and benefit from that abdication. And on the other side, forgoing a wizard or any single class should be really hard on a list, and currently it is, unless that class is warrior or priest, in which case who needs them?

I agree wholeheartedly with this statement (with obvious caveats :-D ), as I have stated earlier in the thread. Ever since the card advantage of priests was eliminated, they have been struggling to find a place, healz simply aren't that good, and their counter control abilities are so weak as to be laughable. If you get rid of trait cycling and the artificial deck size that gives wizards, and give priests some more utility, then we will have a far more dynamic meta that encourages a supple approach.

However the fundamental issue remains, and always will be, that control wizards depend on the elimination of counter-play in order to achieve victory. If your devotion to "winning is a theme" #worldsendradio destroys the very game you so struggled to win at, then congratulations, you can go be king of your irradiated hill and feel superior; while everyone else goes on to games that allow them to consistently interact.

We are not dealing with design from a position of academic detachment, we are confronting the longevity of Cardhunter itself. Control wizards are problem not simply because they are powerful, but because they fundamentally depend on one player having a truly miserable time in the game. Now losing should be punishing, it shouldn't be terribly fun, but win conditions should not depend on imposing a non-interactive state on their opponents that precludes the very notion of them even ATTEMPTING to have fun. 3 wizard lists need to be regulated to the same status as 3 warrior or 3 priest.

 

I think dwarf wizards control don't need to be nerfed. At the top of the leaderboard I think few people play 3 dwarf wizard control so it isn't op. To win agaisnt them you should have team runs and/or arrogant armor and you probably will do ok agaisnt them. At the moment, i'm running 2 war 1 priest but before that I was running 1 warrior 1 priest and 1 wizard and i'm and was at the top of the leaderboard. You basically can do well with any type of party if u are good and have good itens.

 

I'll second ShadowTitan, in my experience with the 1500+ range (which is, intentionally, only brief spurts), I've encountered more firespam (3) than 3DC (2). Mostly I encounter 1/1/1 or buffed warriors.

 

@Yoyo: Control Wizards (or any other build) should be viable but not dominant.

I think the game is more balanced than it gets credit for at the moment. Sure, there are a few things that should be fixed, but all in all we see a variety of builds at the moment so things can't be all that bad. If 1/1/1 was the only viable build, as you suggest, this game would be quite boring.

I've recently played through the campaign with 3x elf cleric. If the forum is to be believed, it should have been terrible, but it worked quite well. I'm not sure how far this team will hold up in MP but I'll give it a shot when I have the time.

 

I think this is getting off topic tbh.

To anyone that doesn't think there needs to be changes made to control wizards (notice I'm not just talking strictly about 3dc), I would like you to reconsider a few of yoyo's points that have been ignored. If you still don't think there is a problem after that, maybe you can make some counter arguments to these specific statements.

Forget for a second what is Viable or Overpowered and what isn't and just focus on one simple question. Is playing against 3 control wizards fun?

If it is, maybe you could explain the enjoyment you get from that scenario? If it isn't, what can we do to make it more fun?

 

http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showpost.php?p=8099321&postcount=3
http://www.wizards.com/magic/magazine/article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/ld/10

last sentence from mtg article: Hate is such an ugly term, but it helps bring balance to the Multiverse.

A pity that there aren't better articles on hate cards and decks. Just because playing against X build isn't fun doesn't mean it should go. And I'm pretty sure that new cards/items will create more hate builds. Move control hate (3dc) was simply the first.

 

I will explain. Let's assume you play two warriors and a wizard. Your wizard has 4-6 smoke bombs, whirlwind enemies and counterspells. You start by putting smoke screen on the map (and cover yourself in smoke), then you WWE enemies right under your warriors noses. Or bomb bigger area and risk whirlwind but it is less reliable. Just destroy wizards one by one with step attacks and some Team Run and other movement cards. One of the warriors who always goes first to wizard might be equipped with Spell Block ability (on shield). He also can have Duck if you decide on a dwarf with Nimble Strikes. There is nothing boring in this scenario unless you don't draw Smoke Bomb on wizard fast enough. You just need to wait for that and then it is quite simple match usually. You can also do it without WWE - cover wizards in smoke and rush to them instead. This is a bit harder because they will be protecting themselves (and use WoW to move one another). If you are worried about Thoughness, you can try to put Firestorm on your wizard too, to check their defenses.

 

I don't get what milling and side-boarding powerful counters has to do with this. I will say that I have played MTG quite a bit and (if you have the money to burn) it is quite a fun game. If this was a MTG clone I would understand the constant balance comparisons but imo its a very different beast.

You cant just read 1 sentence and respond without taking into account the context in which it was said.

Mosalla thanks for your input. I agree that in that situation it doesn't sound boring. But to be fair it sounds like the deck you are talking about is designed specifically to counter the strategy. This is not what I meant when I asked the question. Lets just say you ran a different setup, double priest with 1 warrior (or anything that doesn't involve a counter control mage). If I then asked you the same question do you think you would answer the same?

 

a) As the other high-rankers have posted, control wizards are not the dominant play style. You can also verify it yourself in game. Do not just take the OP's word and jump to the conclusion that dwarven control is a problem. Yoyo is correct in stating that control abilities should still play a significant part but he was wrong in stating that dwarven control is the dominant play style and that the counter to it is counter-control variation. That was not true, hence, ignored.
b) Mosalla's deck suggestion isn't designed specifically to counter the strategy. The smoke bomb suggestion originated from a productive discussion here. And games have been played and won where no counter control mage was used (cf, TheShadowTitan's post above). I personally have tested during beta that control wizards were beatable using beta-available card and w/o anti-wiz build. Even w/o smoke bomb, there are still many cards that can shut down dwarven control (Walls, Arrogant Armor, Team moves, Immovable, spell blocks, counterspell, steps) as evidenced in the ongoing Peasant tournament.

The context of milling hate in mtg is similar to the OP's control wiz hate. I quote:

"I would guess that your first two opponents may view mill as a "noob strategy" and therefore expected you to be a bad player with a bad deck. Then, when they lost, they rationalized their loss (as many Magic players seem to do) by finding something to blame it on other than "my opponent's deck was better than mine" or "my opponent played better than I did." The mindset "mill is a noob strategy, therefore my opponent could only have won by getting lucky" just serves as a convenient scapegoat."

So in Card Hunter context, losing to dwarven control and pointing at a card is a natural rationalization of the loss to a convenient scapegoat, a la, Winds Of War.

Sideboarding powerful counters is (my pathetic attempt) raising the context that hating a particular build doesn't mean its unbalanced and should go.

 

What is mill?

 

http://wiki.mtgsalvation.com/article/Mill
http://www.wizards.com/magic/magazine/article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/mm/73

 

So, to mill in Card Hunter is to cause your opponent to lose cards. Ok.

 

Having fun is a subjective gauge and while if the majority isn't enjoying this requires attention I think the issue is actually much simpler.
What is the "rarity curve" of a successful control wizard build? if you can (and you can) make such a build using almost no epics, a few rares and mostly commons\uncommons and on the flip side countering it successfully means you need better quality items (because of team moves, arrog. armor etc.) then the build is literally imbalanced and the cards that break this balance need to be addressed.
If on the other hand, there are viable builds in the same rarity curve that rise to the occasion - no change is necessary.

 

I don't know what game you're playing but I see at least one control wizard in almost every match I play. You see a wizard these days, he's control, other builds are much, much less common. But really we're trading anecdotal evidence here, and that is seriously useless when it comes to forming an argument. However, once the API tools are finalized we'll have hard numbers and statistics that'll settle this.

Interesting point, and another that will be settled when item usage statistics become easier to get.

 

Bearson the rarity curve is worth considering, absolutely.

Fun can be (and in many cases is) subjective, but I would argue that there also exist many cases where it is universal.

For me, playing against control wizards in this game is comparable to playing tag with one person that is extremely hard to catch. You could play the devil's advocate and say "well, who is to say that it isn't fun for the slower guy, did you ask him?", but in this situation I don't think fun is subjective at all. I think it's fairly obvious that this will result in the slow guy losing interest very quickly.

The fact that the slow guy would need runner's shoes, aerodynamic clothing and steroids (or in more relevant terms cards like arrogant armour, smoke bombs and team runs) just to get to a point where meaningful enjoyment is even a possibility only further highlights that it is a legitimate problem for the long-term health of the game.

Put simply, unless you factor anti-control cards into your build chances are you will (likely) not have any semblance of fun when versing a control style deck. So from a design-point the question remains, is this how the game should be at higher levels? I don't think so. In fact, I think it is fundamental to the game's success that they ensure that popular strategies don't have this effect on a players mentality.

But then again, maybe I am just rationalising my loss to control wizards by scapegoating cards like WoW and my real purpose is to sabotage the game by attempting to make it more fun for the majority of players . Seems obvious when you look at it that way doesn't it? You got me, I guess the jig is up.

 

The argument that playing against control isn't fun, thus its hated just isn't correct. People have made many detailed threads and posts as to why trait cycling is an abusable tactic that detracts from the game, while negating 99% of otherwise viable items from being utilized.

Its not fun to play against, AND its broken. It's a false dichotomy to suggest that it has to be one or the other. I'd like to see which top players you are referring to also. Perhaps the players that are only 'top' because they run control builds? Or some build incorporation even a single wizard with a control wizard build + wwe? (vast majority of builds at top ratings).

 

Just going to respond to this as its the valid question which I also had many months back. The rest are simply difference of opinions.

In Round 2 of the current Peasant tournament, SLG played mono dwarf control vs TheShadowTitan's. You can watch the video to see the result. I hope that answers the issue of rarity curve. Surprisingly, even if was made known to the few participants that 3DC was going to feature in the tourney, I have yet to see smoke bomb/wall of illusion in any of the videos captured.

For the record, if there was a poll to everyone whether to keep or kick control gameplay (encumber, winds, WW etc). I would vote to keep. Hope it helps.

 

If you are consistently being Counterspell/Forgetfulness for playing a wizard, you are being milled/disabled. You can't interact or play anything worthwhile, aka sitting duck. Unlike mtg, milling leads to an alternate win-condition, usually by decking. But in Card Hunter, milling/disabling leads to card/board advantage and/or victory points.

If you have cards in hand that you cannot use and have to discard voluntarily, I'd consider it as a aggro control. Your hand/position is being controlled, your gameplay is being curtailed. So not being in range to deal melee attacks due to winds/encumber/ww is being aggro position controlled. Not having line of sight is being controlled, board control, that is.

What is the difference ?
Having cards in hand and not being able to use them is different from having no cards in hand to use. Both are valid tactical gameplays but the later is more severe while the former is simply an indicator of an incompatible deck.