Should forms be reformed?

I agree that Spirits should have Teleport movement and a block like Barrier Of Hate as Kalin suggested, it suits the theme.

As for Vamps I believe that the simple solution is to make the form heal ALL allies when the player does damage, like Avenging Touch.
If that is too strong, then just add more cards like Avenging Touch.
Or since they have mind control abilities add Maze Of The Mind in their deck.

A nerf for wolves could be that once the form is removed, they discard their hand, since when werewolves revert to their human form they are usually naked and having no recollection of what happened the night before.

My 2 cents.

 

All vamps need is for their form card to have melee frenzy and they would be viable (in addition, or in place of heal 3 each round).

 

Thanks for chipping in. As I said, let's try to keep the talk focused on the forms now, rather than on the card-pool of each form. I agree that spirit form should have some type of damage-mitigating card too (wolves have hides and heals, vamps have swarm of bats), but let's just focus on the card forms for now please. If everyone starts chipping in on possible cards to add the the pool forms, the topic will just go out of hand.

If vamps healed all allies for what they damage, that's clearly going to be broken, immagine a 7+2 or 4 with buff damage attack that heals al teammates for 7 or 11. That's never going to be viable. If they heal for a fixed amount, that's more viable.

Also, I don't think anyone thinks wolves are broken, they are strong, but not broken, and that's what the forms should be. So, rather than talking about nerfing wolf form (which would just mean we will have 3 forms that don't see play instead of 2), let's focus on simple good ways to improve forms.

So far we have the following ideas for vamps:
1) Add armor to form
2) Add a greater heal bonus to attacks
3) Add a team heal bonus (which can't be the full attack ofc)
4) Add a frenzy bonus

For spirits:
1) Add fly to moves
2) Add teleport to moves

 

Then you should have said you were talking about the form cards, not the forms as a whole. Also, you're discussing why people use one and not the others, and much of that is because of the card pools, as you mention in your initial post. If you made Ethereal Form act like Martyr Blessing, people still wouldn't use it because the card pool stinks.

 

I think you are totally right on that point, but let me put it differently to you then, why not talk FIRST about the forms, and THEN, about the card pools?

 

I like the idea of form attachment doing something when it expires:
- werewolf shed their cards (credit to @think_panther) or maybe just armor cards.
- zombies replace all held Shuffle with racial movement cards
- spirits get maze'd
- vamps cleanse the current terrain square
etc

 

And we should use the wording from Doom so the effect only happens when it expires from age, else it will trigger when they draw themselves.

 

It may add "dodge" to spirit form that tiggers once per turn, spirits must be hard to aim.

 

I think that instead of vampire's current boost they get melee frenzy 2 or frenzy 1 (melee not needed) and heal 3 at the start of round.

Spoiler: About Cards

Wow spirit form is incredibly unfocused.
Has hex of dissolve but only acid jet to combo with it.
Has curse of fragility but only has 4 cards that do damage only 1 of which can proc more then once.
Has doom but doesn't really stop the doomed character from acting outside of Boo! and memory loss.
Has ancient grudge. Do I even need to explain that forms don't add to the discard piles.
I almost forgot, the form card can only work on 1 card that this form draws which is traveling curse.

Considering the top cards of spirit form is doom which doesn't work in mp, and fly which should be like silver= (B, 6), this form really needs a buff.
Maybe: Memory Loss => Barrier of Hate & Curse of Fragility => Dastardly Curse
PS: I still think Medium's Garbs could use a nerf, how about removing that Keep on the armor part.

 

Vampires could get penetrating to all unholy and holy(if avenging touch is holy) attacks.
Spirits need something that doesn't power up the garb even more, maybe the first draw of each turn is guaranteed to be silver or gold quality?
Werewolves are fine as they are, if they really need a nerf just switch the charge on reckless lycantropy with the five damage penetrating attack.

 

I find it remarkable how the itemization for the three forms compare and how they affect the desirability of the Form cards.

For Werewolves there's two decent tokenless Martial Skills, there's the excellent Howling Lycanthropy which gives two Lycanthropic Forms and Howl and you can get a focused Lycanthropic Form item for a yellow token. Lycanthropic Form is also the only Form card to appear outside of a class slot, appearing on a single yellow token Helmet with one copy. Meanwhile there's also Howl which gives a random Werewolf card and 2 HP which can cause a draw of Lycanthropic Form, and it's richly itemized across Helmets, Weapons and even Human Skills.

Compare that to Spirits. There's again two decent tokenless Arcane Skills and a focused yellow token Arcane Skill, but there's no blue token Arcane Skill with double Ethereal Form. If you want to commit to Spirit Form you'll need to invest a yellow token. The other source for Spirit Form cards, Medium's Garb, is solely itemized on Robes and grant one additional Spirit Form card at the start of each round, and for a yellow token you can get two copies of the card. So for one yellow token you can either get three copies of Ethereal Form which replaces your draws with Spirit cards, or you can get two copies of Medium's Garb which give an additional Spirit card on top of your regular draws at the start of each round.

Then for Vampiric Form there's one decent tokenless Divine Skill, a blue token Divine Skill that gives two Vampiric Forms and Blight which as a trait makes it a deck thinner and there's the dedicated yellow token item. There's one other source of Vampiric Form cards in Vampire's Kiss but that card is an attack and it's usually used on opponents, not yourself like Howl and Medium's Garb.

Comparing the three forms, there's access to Werewolf Form in both well-itemized Martial Skills and Howl, making it very easy to get a lot of Werewolf cards if you want to. Howl complements Lycanthropic Form well and both cards have an equal opportunity cost, they effectively replace your regular card draws with Werewolf form cards with an additional bonus of either a small heal or 2 armor. The two cards can even draw each other, while Ethereal Form can't draw Medium's Garb and you can't Vampire Kiss yourself.

Meanwhile, Spirit cards are less well-itemized across Arcane Skills and directly competes with Medium's Garb for giving out Spirit cards. The big difference here is that Ethereal Form's opportunity cost is that your regular draws become Spirit cards while Medium's Garb simply gives an additional Spirit card. Unlike Howl and Lycanthropic Form, Ethereal Form and Medium's Garb compete with each other, and Medium's Garb is simply better. Why would I want to spend a yellow token on three Ethereal Form cards when I can get two Medium's Garbs and can get two spirit cards per turn as well as drawing two regular cards from my deck? Even in the case Medium's Garb gives me Ethereal Form I'm still getting more Spirit cards per turn. Even if I use both Vasyl's and Focused Ethereality I'm still reducing my odds of getting Medium's Garb if I draw a Ethereal Form, which in turn might leave me with less Spirit cards in the long run!

Vampiric Form doesn't fare much better, it doesn't have to compete with another source of Vampire cards but it faces much stiffer competition inside its own slot in the form of Talented Healer. Talented Healer might not give Vampire cards but if you're using it then you're probably using lifesteal cards in the rest of your deck anyway so then what's even the point of Vampiric Form? Swarm of Bats and Sneaky Bloodsuck seems to be the answer, but I'm not sure it's enough.

Lycanthropic Form clearly comes out on top here, it's the best form just in its card pool and the ways to get Werewolf cards are generously set up to encourage the use of both Howl and Lycanthropic Form.

I think there should be a blue token double Ethereal Form item at least, preferably one with a third card that cycles. There should also be something that budges with Medium's Garb since any improvement to the spirit card pool just makes Medium's Garb even more OP than people already argue it is while an improvement to Ethereal Form would still indirectly buff Medium's Garb since it can also give you Ethereal Form. Access to Ethereal Form in a tokenless Robes item would also go a long way towards giving the player a way to get more Ethereal Form without having to as directly compete with blue/yellow token Medium's Garb Robes.

Vampiric Form would also benefit from being itemized outside of Divine Skills to less directly compete with Talented Healer, and perhaps the introduction of a new card that gives the user access to random Vampire Cards on Divine Items/Weapons.

 

@Maniafig, fwiw, I played with Advanced Vampirism in Campaign and amazingly drew Talented then the Form, as one would hope. Unfortunately, the other way around would fail of course. Your post made me wonder if the Form would benefit from having Talented Healer in its pool -- but don't worry, @Janet, I know that the card pool isn't the point of your thread. $;^ J

But yes, itemization and accessibility go a long way toward each's desirability, too.

EDIT: P.S. Janet, where did you get that Boost|Handicap version of Zombie Form? I don't remember ever seeing it. Hm. Also, @hello world, Avenging Touch is Unholy since you wondered.

 

The only sources of Holy damage in the game are Misguided Heal and Daylight (and heals targeting Negative Energy Being).

 

Yes! You heard the man with the badge... er banner. Really well written piece! I agree, that Lycanthropic Form takes the win in the itemization division as well.

I can answer that. It's one of the first (if not the first) test version I dug up, dated 1st October, 2016.

 

I'm all in favour of changing the card pools a bit, I totally agree with @Kalin that spirit cards need a bit of a boost especially (though as I and others have said, there is the issue of garb), but if we start talking about both at the same time the topic will get hard to follow.

First, we can propose some simple upgrades for the two forms, which can easily be implemented. Then we can talk about the card pools (which needs sorting, but I think is a much trickier business).

Or simply, as @Kalin was say, make the form available somewhere else too? Wars have access to warewolf on helmet for instance?

 

I don't think this issue will get out of hand as much as you think it will.
While it's true you could give spirits teleport, dodge, and more, it still doesn't change the fact the card pool is terrible and if the form got strong enough that way then people will be playing it just for the non-form effect.

I am surprised at seeing warewolf form on a helmet, and guess what it doesn't belong there according to the live csv file (just like kolt 45 has ember burst).

 

Ok, I give in, let's discuss card pools at the same time and see how it goes lol, but I hope we don't have people suggesting unreasonable things like toughness!

http://wiki.cardhuntria.com/wiki/Items/Volkov's_Warmask

 

People are going to suggest unreasonable things like toughness regardless of rather we discuss it here or in another thread.

Hence why I said "I am surprised at seeing warewolf form on a helmet".

 

Balancing spirit form and garbs is easy. Just add more untargeted dmg to the card pool like Brain Burn.

 

And, just to throw it out there so that it's not lost from the discussion:

• Two Human Skills feature Howl -- granting a Werewolf card, including a 1/13 chance at Lycanthropic Form, to priests and wizards as well as warriors. Everyone gets to share the werewolf fun! $8^ |
  
• Vampires on non-priests, only if you're bitten for 6 natural damage.
• Spirits on non-wizards, nope. Just nope. (Humans Training their Battlefield allies to carry the Garb notwithstanding.)
• Oh, Shifting Block, right, heh. (Which would see more play if people cared to play Forms. Not even talking about the 1/4 Zombie chance.) Walpurgis Night, too, of course.