Evening all.

It's Come to my rather short-sighted attention that many of us would like Ivy. to become tournament Calibur (?)

I've built a few Ivy decks and while the idea behind stringing poke attacks does the game some justice the harsh truth is that, unfortunatley It's not really Top 8 tables viable.

Henceforth I want to start a theroem siege were us Ivy lovers and innovators can work together to do well with her in Events.

My first three attempts at building Ivy. Will be put up in the deck discussion boards soonish.

Who would like to join me !

I'll update a list...

EDIT: I came 3rd in a tourney of 8 people today using Mono- void Ivy. W33T!!!

Ivy seems like a good way for a Void deck to finally get somewhere. Or Life. OR BOTH!?!?!!?!

Honestly Ivy isn't Bad off of Life, however I find that if Control can set up a wall of OMGWTFREDUCEBBQ then Ivy cannot break away from it.

But she's golden in void.

You want Ivy to be tourney-calibur? You have a couple options...

1 - All Bitter Rivals abuse. Make it so your attack can be partially-blocked, and under most circumstances, that means it'll deal 3 damage or less, triggering her R.

OR

2- Void Ways of Punishment aggro. Void is aggro, and it's unforunate people ignore that. With Ways of Punishment, unlike most characters who go for the one-shot, Ivy does it to string any number of attacks. Personally, I'd go with generic Void aggro, but if you wanna stay in the theme, use Ivy's weenies in conjunction with the fact that they have no hand to pummel them into oblivion. Oh, and btw, Shooting Capoera + Ivy = lol.

MarcoPulleaux said:

I'll consider that for option 1 thanks shinji

@ point 2: Oh! check out my First attempt i'm way ahead of ya! =D http://new.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_foros_discusion.asp?efid=27&efcid=5&efidt=119149

Does anyone want to join me on my quest?

I hope we'll get some more replies once traffic kicks up... anybody? Shinji?

I'm not a huge fan of Ivy, but I'll guess I'll give some personal input...

1) I like .:::Taki:::. a LOT better. See, Ivy has the pressure of either running weenie attacks, which are, well, weenie, and having virtually guaranteed draw, or running bigger attacks, and hoping they draw 3 or less. Taki, on the other hand, just has to deal damage. Furthermore, Taki has access to Wind Dance, something Ivy wishes she had. Also, while Ivy does have access to a lot of "I'm not in the card pool" cheatery, Taki, with the help of Lord of the Makai can clear her card pool, which kinda makes giant card pools useless.

2) Screw Raging Gnome. Seriously. I understand the hype, and Ivy's ability to play it at basically no cost, but really, who cares? 7 damage is cool, but I think the theory of "they won't have blocked any of my weenies" is flawed, and if they actually did not block your weenies, they WILL block your Gnome (especially since, uh, almost every Ivy player will be using it). As I'd mentioned, Rising Hilt makes a MUCH better weenie, even if it only has Life.

3) The reasons to run Ivy are far and few. You've got her Combination of Weenie For Dummies, her worthless asset (bleh), and Prominent Noblewoman. Noblewoman is only cool for its first ability; its Ivy ability is better-covered by Genius Alchemist, which makes ANY attack immune from progressive difficulty. Her asset...again, worthless; I doubt any Ivy player is running Valentine. Switching Weapon Styles is useful, but there's plenty of discard-from-card pool/ready foundation support to make it seem otherwise unimportant.

Sorry dude, but I'm not just being a fanboy; I seriously think .:::Taki:::. is better than Ivy in every way.

The ONLY way to make Ivy stand out is to run her off Life, something Taki doesn't have (and wouldn't want lol). Life isn't bad anymore, but when you compare it to Taki's Air/All/Void prowess, it looks pretty crappy.

But like I said, if you MUST run Ivy, it's gotta be off Life, in which case stuff like Noblewoman might look good since, between Noblewoman, TOS and Calming the Mind, Life shuts down just about everything (not like you'd wanna use TOS in Ivy but you get the point).

Switching Weapon Styles +Flames of Fame or Realm of Midnight is pimp.

Ivy also does some more ridiculous things, and raging gnome may seem like it's not worth much, but off of All, one Flight or Fight puts it to 14 damage. A little good...

Not trying to be a ******, but I just posted my most recent article, which covers my debate of Taki > Ivy in full detail. I think if you guys read it it'll be a tad enlightening, mostly since most people have forgotten there's even a legal Taki lol.

See, the problem I've had with Ivy is trying to justify her over other characters. While it may appear she is the best candidate to run weenies, there are others. Not just Taki; Fei Long has All AND Life, much like Taki has All and Void, and, much like Taki as well, Fei Long can discard not 2, not 3, but ALL pokes in his card pool!

So, as I've been saying, Taki has no purpose. When you say Switching Weapon Styles, I say, "I have two characters who aren't as afraid of KFT and Tag Along as your Ivy is".

MarcoPulleaux said:

And Fei Long is crap, don't try pushing that crap over here. Huge momentum costs + "draw before opponent's turn" ability <<< draw during my combat phase.

Demon's Scourge + Howling Sprits

1) It's funny.
2) Nonexistant +0 low block
3) Kills faster than just the Howling Spirits alone
4) Ivy Support makes Demon's Scourge nonexistant in the card pool
5) Goes through Void which is an interesting spread with All. Example, the very sexy Saikyo-Ryu.

Homme Chapeau said:

A wee bit off topic, but Padma (ShadoWar starter deck character) originally had Void on her. Her + Howling Spirits + Demon's Scourge was brutal. I did some play-testing and consistantly turn 3 I could have a demon's scourge + 12 weenie moves in my card pool. Unfortunately, she was given the water symbol and will probably be left alone for a good long time.

Homme Chapeau said:

O_O

Zhao Daiyu** loves the Scourge part...

Good find

MarcoPulleaux said:

God F****** dammit Shinji you've ruined my quest! GRRRR... I hate you! You prick.

@ Hatman: Good find, I may have to try that one out actually. i'll report back.

So anybody want to help me prove Shinji wrong just because he's shinji or otherwise???

I'll make attempt 2 later this week guys. It'll be off of life too.

Thanks for reading.

Hanzo

Bloodrunstrue said:

=/

I'll give you some help...

Ivy off any symbol is good, so really, run her however you see fit.

If you're going to go off Life, you're gonna need obvious stuff. If you're using weenies (which I imagine you would), Switching Weapon Styles is a given. Howling Spirits, Razor's Bite, Rising Hilt (which must be backed by Professional Soldier), maybe Yi Shan's Dragon Tail Leg Sweep, Fei Long's Forward Kick, etc.

Have fun with it dude. Don't let my opinion kill your quest.

MarcoPulleaux said:

Whilst I appreciate your advice Shinjigameandwatchmarcoman the problem being as that your passage about Taki has completely defeated the purpose of my quest. Although i'll still continue it'll be to no useful yield, how will I get expert's help now?

i hate to admit that you could well be right, for a change. Still I thank you and will look into Taki once again ( I've built her once before see) when I have chance.

RANT OVER

Here are some results of play test games use Ivy. Attempt 1 Mono void: (Key. T=Tournament game, P= playtesting games.)

Ivy Vs. Starter Haohmaru ( i don't really count this) 2-0 to Ivy. T

Ivy Vs. Air **Ninon** 2-1 to Ninon. T

Comments:

The Nino deck was a control/aggro hybrid using Olcatutoring and Ninon's F to destroy my board gradually while abusing Air's amazing foundations to create win conditions for Spike. Henceforth spike decks are better =/.

Ivy Vs. Cervantes 2-1 to Ivy. T

Comments:

The Cervantes deck was only a test build so as such my victory doesn't mean all that. basically the deck worked around abusing Visions of destiny, LOTM and some Chaos attacks whilst making it's control checks Uber high and yours very low... Well built deck and the idea behind it was fantastic; indeed it's changed my opinion of cervantes by a margin. Unplayable my ass! =D

As for the games in game 1 I set up my Capoera comboa nd proceeded to string attacks and even with BRT and myself not using a single kurzuyu reppa he was dead by turn 3.

Game 2 I just got rolled ( By rick astley, seriously I checked 16 attacks by the end of my third turn ) Needless to say I got beaten. The deck is fragile to Mentoring and lots of attacks from the opponent.

Game 3 was very evenly matched but i made a play mistake which made me win and we both didn't realise till today so I promised the Cervantes player a rematch...

Ivy. Vs Typical Order *Gen* 2-1 to Gen P

Comments:

Ivy doesn't fair too well aginst control and it showed. I just couldn't break past Order's wall of control once it set up, Ivy is weak against Control when you use weenies i've found. Oh and game 2 you ask? I just got lucky and pulled a T2 kill ( there's about a 7% of that happening in this deck, yeah and he had no amy's assistance or Foundations in hand =/ )

Ivy. Vs Matt hewitt's Chun-li 6-0 to chun-li P

Comments:

Yup, i played three matches against the unholy terror that be. Spike and darkness blade rolled every time. I didn't even come close.

Tonight i'll playtest Attempt 1 against my higher tier Hanzo kick deck.

Cheers

Hanzo

The quest lives on!

you can prove him wrong pretty easily if you have some money. The All symbol ***** face with Ivy, unfortunately, your foundation base is expensive out the butt.

Hearing this wild claim of Taki>Ivy made me go look up what the deal was.

I shrug at it. Since nothing about Taki seems to be better. With switching weapon styles, Ivy becomes far more practical. It completely frees you from having to use Ivy's Form, making her Response lovely. If Switching weapon style is out, the highest you'll have to hard check is a 4, more or less, so your foundations will remain open for her form, whereas Taki cannot reliably do the same since her progressive difficulty will begin to add up.

Then you'll say well Taki has her Enhance. To which I respond-great, now you have to worry about generating momentum (of course, easily done by lord of the makai, but if you don't have that Controller of Souls out, do you really think your lord of the makai is safe?) on top of having to push the damage through. A smart player will wait for you to go for her E to block an attack (unless of course they are dangerously low on life). Ivy doesn't have to worry about any such momentum gen to make her practical. Just stick the pokes in the deck and have fun.

Most of Ivy's pokes fufill the requirement of her R. I'd much prefer to have a restriction on damage with the bonus of drawing two cards, rather than having to deal damage, only get to draw one card, and then still commit a foundation.

Ivy can play The Gorgeous Team, meaning she can recur Switching Weapon Styles in case she doesn't throw out enough pokes in one turn and needs to get the card back. Thanks to Ivy's support, plus with previous cards, it's very easy to build an All Ivy deck with TGT splashed in.

Taki is cute and all, but no, she is no where near the level of power that Ivy holds.

And Fei Long sucks hard. Very hard. I'd much rather play promo Rock Howard than him. Never mention Fei Suck again. Thanks. =)

^

-One of the main reasons I mentioned Taki being better is that Ivy's use OUTSIDE of weenie rush decks is extremely limited, as opposed to Taki's whose use is not. As far as I'm concerned, weenie rush decks don't even work unless they receive damage pumps (think Twelve, Siegfried, Yuri, etc), something Ivy doesn't want to do. The reason why this thread was created was because bloodrunstrue is trying to make Ivy competitive, which I think means that people have BEEN trying, and to no avail. Once again, I just don't think weenie rush works without damage pump. Taki doesn't have to run weenies, and really shouldn't

-I don't think your example is good enough. As I'd mentioned in my other article, one of Taki's biggest perks is her access to Air, more specifically, Wind Dance. Her signature attack, obviously, is Hurricane Punishment, a 5 mid for 5 damage that you can Wind Dance up to 7 speed. Regardless of what point you use the attack, 7 speed is hard as Hell to block. Also, an intelligent Taki player likely wouldn't use the E unless they knew their attack would go through, or it's a Throw (thanks Rashotep!).

-Do I really think my Lord will survive? Uh, yeah I do; I kinda share symbols with Blinding Rage and Makai High Noble . Also, deciding not to build a deck JUST because of Olcadan's is stupid and paranoid.

-You mention Ivy's draw being better than Taki, yet you neglect to mention Ivy is IMMENSELY crippled by Tag Along, whereas Taki is virtually unfazed. Seeing as how Tag Along is ran generally in 4s and in any deck that can run it, that's saying just about everything. Ivy would HATE to use KFT on her own turn =/

-Fei Long doesn't suck anymore, not thanks to Ivy and Zi Mei. Again, a big deal of his is Air, but let's just put that aside. With All and Life, it means he gives Ivy some arguable competition like Taki does. Fei Long's card draw might not be the same as Taki's or Ivy (working on the opponent's turn), but he also has a 7 handsize, which is good enough, and access to Make a Difference, Feet of Fury, Flames of Fame, Son of a Tychoon, etc etc. He can clear his entire card pool in one swoop, meaning you could do something like poke a bunch, Make a Difference to draw more pokes, poke more, clear card pool, poke more. Much like how Ivy doesn't care about progressive difficulty because of SWS, Fei Long doesn't care because of his ability to clear his own card pool. He has Lord of the Makai and Professional Soldier to do so.

Notice how every card you mention in your defense of Fei Long is a foundation? Think about it for a few minutes. Really. Think.

On an unrelated note, the fact that Air has Blinding Rage and High Noble isn't enough to completely say NO to Olcadan's. Blinding Rage only works best when your opponent is trying to sack your Chester's or something you have 4x of in the deck AND you are certain there are more in your deck {ie, you are not close to milling out}. And it can be blanked by Rashotep. And Makai High Noble only works when you can keep it ready and un-negated. They're strong cards sure, but it's not like you get a suit of armor made out of Kryptonite

^

Your entire post seems to be saying Taki and Fei Long suck JUST because of Olcadan's, or anti-foundation cards.

My point is that Ivy sucks in comparison to Taki and Fei. If you wanna try to tell me Ivy doesn't use her R, good luck dude.

Why would Ivy hate to use KFT on her own turn? It won't clog the pool, and her foundations will be open if the deck is being played right. Not everyone can run/splash Tag Along, by the way. And there are a lot of incredibly strong characters out there (like Ibuki) that perform quite well without it.

If you're implying (not sure if you are or not) that one shouldn't take Olcadan's into account when building a deck, then that's just stupid. Ask a Void player (if such a person existed) pre set 12 what one of the main things that discouraged them immensely was. One of the many answers will be the fact that Olcadan's just made their staging area into a ham sandwich with some cheese. Order has some issues with the card (Makai High Noble is very limited in use)

You're more or less suggesting to run Taki off of Air. Unless you're doing that to Sandbag...that's a huge waste. You're far better off with about 90% of the other air characters out there.

So Ivy's use is limited to weenie rush. Voldo's use was limited to mill. Seong Mina's use is limited to Ira-Spinta abuse. Decks that specialize in extremes have worked out quite well in the past. Taki's use is limited to sandbagging for the better characters off All and Air. Maybe she can be useful in Void.

You ignored a very important point about Fei Long. How the hell are you going to manage to constantly keep that draw up if Make a Difference isn't out? Do you really think that you're going to have all of those draw engines out all at the same time, and have the freedom to have them ready if you have to worry about committing to pass, since a weenie rush deck is going to run a lot of attacks, and subsequently a lot more low checks? And do you REALLY think it's a good idea to give your opponent an immense hand advantage (remember, they get to draw off of make a difference, too)? More or less, the foundations of a Fei Long deck will be committed or destroyed in order to fuel any kind of card draw. So he'd lose instantly to any kind of board control. On top of that, he needs to survive long enough to have all those cards out. Not gonna happen with how the state of this game is going.

By the way, Fei Long isn't hurt by Tag Along, either? Wouldn't Taki be hurt by it, too? or do you mean to tell me that it isn't important for either of them to use their effects to clear the pool?

You're too negative on weenie rush, which I really don't get.

I'm just gonna mention it but... Genius Alchemist and Make A Difference work just as good/far better with Ivy, who can spam out a lot more attacks then either Taki or Fei Long, and while I agree Taki is amazing, she's only better off of Air (which plays a MUCH different game then Ivy, so has very little bearing on this conversation) and Void, which I'll say yes, she's better then Ivy. Off of All... well, All generally likes having it's foundations uncommited for BRT, Chester's, Psycho Style, Fight or Flight, and Controller of Souls abuse, and that's just a small list. Taki's static hurts Alls game very badly, and the worst part is, it's a you MUST effect, so you can't choose to not draw and not commit a foundation.

As for Fei Long. Do it. Get it to work. I would love for Fei Long to be playable and better then Ivy. I don't think he every will be, since he kinda loses to Evil and all 6 symbols on Tag Along

and lastly, Seong-Mina can do far more then I-Spin abuse. There is a reason I have playset of Heavenly Phoenix Dancing Stomp

HolyDragonCloud said:

Ivy may make it viable, but I don't think it was ever proven to be particularly powerful since Adon3.

HolyDragonCloud said:

1. Ivy would hate KFT on her own turn for the very reason anybody else would; committing 2 foundations. That's a given.

2. I'm countering the implication that those who do not build a deck JUST because of Olcadan's are stupid. I realize some decks truly do die hard to Olcadan's, but that shouldn't be the reason you are discouraged, especially when your deck can pack Blinding Ragen and Makai High Noble

3. The argument at hand is, "Is Taki better than Ivy?" Yes, she is, and that's in large part due to her Air symbol. Even off All and Void, Taki is better.

4. Voldo and Seong Mi-Na are good and have history to prove it. Ivy may be new, but it seems she's proving to not exist in this game, and as I'd mentioned, weenie rush only wins when it gets damage pumps, which Ivy does not do.

5. Wow, do I really have to go into details? OK, Fei Long has access to Communing with the Ancients and Soul of Ling-Sheng Su (not sure if there are any other CCbonuses in his symbols), which help him pass the already low-difficulty weenies. I think between all the millions of card draw he has access to, he'll have them out. Next, he has access to both British Subject and Shooting Capoera, which means he CAN have access to his draw in 1 turn, and then get access to more by either readying the draw, or readying British Subject. Remember how I said having Air makes all the difference? This would be why. The rest of your paragraph is unarguable and pointless.

6. Any character with a playable (as in, non-static) effect is in danger of Tag Along, obviously. The thing about constant-effect ability characters is that they generally die without their constant effect, and Ivy's no exception. Taki's E Commit is nifty, but it's not my biggest concern, and as for Fei, I generally abuse Make a Difference and Mentally Unstable, and that generally proves to be enough. His F is just brought up to argue that, while Ivy has SWS to make cards unimportant, Fei Long just clears his entire card pool.

I'm negative on weenies because so far they don't work, and people are investing all of their money into Raging Gnome when they should be buying Rising Hilt. Perhaps the whole reason why new *Siegfried* is just so awesome is because he has access to tons of weenie attacks, and pumps the HELL out of them, which is also why ***Adon*** ran Jumping Shotei and why Clones was the premiere weenie, especially in a **Twelve** deck.

MarcoPulleaux said:

The problem with that concept is that, essentially, it takes you some number of turns where you must play out your numerous combo pieces. While you're playing foundations to draw cards, to help pass control checks, to defend against Olcadan's, to clear your card pool, my deck might be playing cards that commit my opponent's foundations, that negate their abilties, or disrupt their ability to play cards. The cards that I'm playing help me win every game by preventing my opponent from winning, while I use a few powerful cards that can basically kill as soon as I draw them and I can take care of anything that my opponent has down to stop them.

My understanding of your Fei Long deck is basically that you have 40 foundations that either interact with Fei Long directly (pool-clearing assistants, Lord of Makai for momentum) or with another interaction (draw a bunch of cards to make use of that pool-clear effect, or a bundle of attacks that really don't do a whole lot on their own but will stack up once you've played enough -- requiring you to both draw and be able to clear your pool). If you sit down across from an Order deck and they drop T1 Experienced Combatant, then you're going to have to wait until you can play 3 copies of Make a Difference/Mentally Unstable/Lord of the Makai/whatever, OR MORE when they inevitably drop some China Boxes or Program Malfunctions. And when they hit Defender-Lord of the Makai-Rejection, you're probably gonna have to try to mill them out.

I'm not afraid of building a deck just because of Olcadan's when there are plenty of counters, I won't build a deck that (in my view of it) will get completely walked over by a no-frills and faster aggro deck, shut out of the game interminably with no cards to help it get out, AND a hybrid deck that can shut down just a few pieces and keep you from hitting a successful kill before it can.