MArcomage

Free multiplayer on-line fantasy card game

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NG_Beholder on 11:21, 3. Feb, 2017
First of all, some words about my experiment.
When I returned here, I chose a deck which was the most effective in my hands before I left, i.e. this one. At that time the deck had 213 wins, 72 loses and 0 draws.
I was very rusty, so at the beginning I had 10/8/0 with this deck. But then I've played another 20 games and had 17 wins out of nowhere. After that I've decided to play only this deck until I get 100 loses and see how many times I'd manage to win.
That took SO. FREAKING. LONG. I had 26 wins, 11 loses and 0 draws before I've started this experiment, which means 240/83/0 overall (I believe it was in November). Yesterday I lost my 100th game. Wins counter stopped at 342.
Again: I have 129/28/1 with this deck. Or 119/20/1, not counting warmup period. The longest winstreak lasted 28 games in a row.
Let's be honest: I'm not bad, but I'm definitely not THAT good. I think it's mostly the deck. And here's another argument: average game length is 30.5 rounds (29.8 for wins, 34 for loses). 39 games were finished in 20 rounds or less.

The only flaw of this deck is weak defense. Common cards usually raise wall by 3-4, rarely 6 or 8. All three uncommons that can be called "defensive" are not purely defensive, and that means they offer mediocre level of defense at best. Rares… Well, Castle beyond looking glass is great card, but you can't rely only on it. Wall shift and Unliving/Charge rares are not for defense purposes either.
But you DON'T NEED defense at all, because, you know, it's faster than most of the decks I've met. Yes, even faster than tower rush/tower-. And here's, in my opinion, the main problem of this deck: side effect of Charge keyword. Seriously, in rush-versus-rush situation attacking enemy wall with Heavy cavalry, i.e. making him lose 18 resources, is VERY big deal, as well as breaking 2-4 resources each turn. This deck isn't only fast by itself, it also makes enemy deck slower, leaving very little space for counterplays.

Another problem is Charge cardset. Its uncommons are in range from "all-around good" to "extremely strong". I'm not talking about hand-dependent Royal dragoons, although it can be a little bit more expensive. I'm primarily talking about Sea monster/any other Charge uncommon combo. Sea monster returns 20 recruits in almost 100% of cases. You can immediately follow-up with Heavy cavalry or Undead cavalry, dealing massive damage (and sometimes returning more resources).

Overall, I think that this deck needs adjusting.
1. Raise Royal dragoons' cost to 45R OR move some of its attack to Charge effect (say 15 + 8N, Charge(25)).
2. Sea monster should definitely be toned down. On the other hand, lowering recruits gain would cripple it too hard. I'd suggest a rework:
30R, Uncommon, Aqua, Charge (8)
Attack: 30
Recruits: +N
N = enemy wall destroyed (max. 20)
In this case Sea monster would become interesting anti-wall card instead of plain and simple "kill 30 or less wall, do 8+ tower damage, hit tower for 40+ basically for free next turn".
3. And last, but the most important. Charge keyword itself. The damage part is completely fine, considering direct counters — wall+ and Skirmishers, but resources destruction is kinda too much. I'd suggest to revert this effect — instead of breaking random enemy resources it should give random resources to you. Of course, it would make Charge deck faster, but it would leave much more space to counterplay — outrush or just defend.

If anyone has thoughts and suggestions about this deck and my ideas, please post it here.
dimitris on 11:33, 3. Feb, 2017
I thought about Charge in the past.
I don't know if your stats include also normal mode or only long mode, but I think that Charge is a very strong deck in long mode, mainly due to the fact that most players rely too much on their high starting wall, so they easily neglect it.

I think that what makes Charge seem slightly OP is cards like Clay golem, Flood or Ent which cripple enemy wall without using recruits.

As for your suggestions, your change for Sea Monster seems interesting, but I think Royal Dragoons is fine as it is currently.
NG_Beholder on 12:18, 3. Feb, 2017
I've tested it in normal mode several times. Got almost the same results, except for Assassin reward farming — it's hard to get in normal mode with this deck.
Mojko on 23:23, 3. Feb, 2017
Sea monster suggestion seems reasonable. I propose to replace Charge resource reduction with resource gain equal to half of the Charge damage. So instead the opponent losing N random resources, you will gain N/2 random resources.