griffinman01 said:

What you fail to mention is that with the exception of bitter rivals, Lord of the Makai was an enabler for every other card you listed as "problematic."

Hewittzil said:

This is true, as long as a larger percent of characters are playable then it shouldn't be an issue, I guess only time will tell.

quarzark said:

i wouldnt go as far as to say that chun-li or ira-spinta was made better by LotM

but yes defender wont be a problem anymore at all for sure and feline slowed a little bit because you have to get your momentum from white magic or bulky 3 difficulty foundations

Except now Feline is just going to use Natual leader. Defender? sure it stops the infinite loops but it can sure loop spinta to hell and back. Chun-li? Go back to Natural Leader. Ira-Spinta? LotM didn't do anything to that.

And, again, how was the game any different when whereabouts was on the table back in block 2? Yes I'm aware whereabouts took a foundation to use, but you could get 6 momentum by your second attack and from there it can only end in tears (which it frequently did). I can't even count the number of times I was filleted by a turn 2 tsunami saber that was pushed through using the old ::Tira, unorthodox fighting style, discard, etc. It was just as bad of an enabler, possibly more so, and it went unbanned the whole way through.

griffinman01 said:

Natural Leader is a bulky 3 Difficulty foundation that has commits itself and requires you to discard a card. It's not nearly on the power level of LotM in ability to with only it as momentum gen play multiple Multiple attacks. Also, I'm failing to see how Defender can loop Spinta (besides duh, the obvious way) because when they use spinta, you put Defender in their momentum and without Body of Souls, which shares 0 symbols with Spinta, can't grab it back. <- which by the way is what LoTM did for Spinta, make Air/Order able to loop it OR have it have basically no cost by grabbing back the card you put in their momentum.

Also, the decks you want ot mention are Rare Yun-Seong and Talim, because Rare Yun-Seong turns 1 foundation into 3 via momentum and Talim plays Rolling Storm. Tsunami Sabre was a decent kill condition, but there were far better.

Whereabouts is HARDLY comprable to LOTM.

Whereabouts had a cost

Whereabouts could be used by your opponent

Whereabouts didnt allow for loops

Whereabouts was legal when Absurd strength and mortal strike were legal

Whereabout didnt roll a 6 in an environment where ever card is looking like a 7 difficutly

Whereabouts can be discarded by bitter rivals.

They arent even in the same league. On top of that whereabout when it came out was highly argued about.

griffinman01 said:

You can't compare Natural leader to LotM. Natural Leader a) has a cost and comits itself, b) isn't a 2/6, c) DOESN'T mimic chain thow.

LotM does a HUGE number on Spinta. If you can't see that you aren't playing it at the highest lvl that everyone else seems to be.

The biggest thing is enhance comit with LotM and taking back the staging area card your opponent attempts to get rid of for the cost of Spinta. The BIGGER than biggest thing is, playing Spinta turn 2, it deals damage (throw) and it goes to momentum), then another Spinta turn 3 and grabbing back the 1st Spinta back with LotM's chain throw effect for 2X the Spinta on the same turn, followed by grabbing it back a) every time your opponent does damage to you with an attack, or b) every time you deal damage with an attack... Both a) and b) happen a lot in a given game. = LotM is broken.

You also can't compare LotM to wherabouts. Whereabouts existed in a meta with a lot more viable anti-momentum (see Absurd Strength), it didn't run a 2/6, it couldn't loop attacks, and it destroyed foundations as a cost. It could also be used by your opponent... These aren't comparable items. Granted, if you asked me (and if I played any more of block 2, I would have told you that free and easy momentum like what Wherabouts arguably gave, should not be in the game to begin with). = be happy they are fixing it now, better late than never.

- dut

@ Quarzark

I stand Corrected. I forgot that Spinta worked on any card.

And I must say I abused Talim and Rolling Storm enough in my day and saw many Yun-Seong decks.

Protoaddict said:

I beg to differ

Whereabouts had a cost - Yes it did, but if you killed your opponent that fast, was it really that big of a deal?

Whereabout could be used by your opponent - True, but your opponent only got a shot on it if it was their attack as you just used it as your first E:. Not only that but, unless your opponent was using momentum they would hardly use it except to try and deny it for you (which only works so much)

Whereabouts didn't allow for loops - True again, but how many times do you need to loop to kill in all honesty? 6 times? 9 times? That's three foundations my friend and you could sack any of them, even committed ones.

Whereabouts ws legal when absurd strength and mortal strike were legal - again true. But CoS was legal, Kung-fu was legal, as were many other stops to those cards. In this environment we have Chinese boxing which stops LotM cold (whereabouts could be used while committed). We also have Calming the Mind (essentially mortal strike).

Whereabouts didn't roll a 6 in an environment where eevery card is looking like a 7 difficulty - Again true, but whereabout was useable while committed, was a 1 difficulty, and rolled a 5. While it wasn't a 6 check, it was easier to play and made up for the one check difference by allowing itself to be committed to pass the check and still be usable.

Whereabouts can be discarded by Bitter Rivals - Once again True. LotM can be discarded by every other form of discard out there. It doesn't really matter if your opponent draws it and drops it immediately on their turn without playing an attack. Lets face it, you'd have to be pretty careless to play attacks if your opponent had a BR out and you had whereabouts in your hand without another keyword. That's like griping that your rejection was cancelled when your opponent had a ready No memories in play.

Lastly, whereabouts was argued about just as any other card. LotM is different, yes, but not enough to make it the end-all card people claim it to be. It's like Shinobi Tradition was back in the day. Powerful? yes. Used in every deck? yes. Allowed for infinite loops? yes. Busted? possibly. Was it banned? no. Should it have been? Possibly and it was argued, but, like whereabouts, it never was.

The only reason why Whereabouts existed in a meta where Absurd Strength existed was because Absurd Strength was created to counter the incredibly stupid effect Whereabouts Unknown had on the meta. To this point, Whereabouts Unknown remains one of the most disruptive cards I've seen because it allowed for incredibly easy Powerful and Multiple kills, which are a BAD THING. One Whereabouts and one Tsunami Saber turn 2, with the right character meant 19 damage to the face for ONE foundation.

The supposed equivalent to momentum is super bars. Imagine a game of SFIV where you jump forward, Ryu light Shoryuken's you and he magically gets his entire Super bar, allowing him to juggle you with his Super Combo. There's half your life, and that's EXACTLY what Whereabouts Unknown did.

Dreco said:

Dreco said:

Yep, I completely agree with that... and if a reduced character pool creates a greater percentage of playability/balance in characters, all the better!

griffinman01 said:

You are absolutely right, Shinobi is straight-up stupid, as are most of the cards with Ibuki on them (sexist game). So instead of complaining that your 'past' hated cards weren't banned back then... you should be happy that the environment you are dealing with today (what matters) is being cleaned up. You want consistency with the past, when the past was poor? What you are witnessing and complaining about is called 'progress'.

In all honestly, Kunai is more broken momentum gain than anything and it was never banned. Now we have Makai (a promo that isn't even a set card - note all 3 cards banned are non-set, but are PROMOS meaning the bannings shouldn't impact the casual player AT ALL) banned and you are complaining? It makes no sense.

And, I trust the reason you wanted spinta banned was becuase it was played repeatedly, like 6+ times in a game? At least, that is the reason it saw so much attention. If it removed itself from the game upon play it wouldn't be that bad... Stopping the loop function (or severely slowing it down) is a step in that direction.

Meh, it's no point arguing with you. There will always be individuals who abhor change in any sense of the word, perhaps you are just one of them. Give it some time, I'm sure you will enjoy a world without the three cards that leave us end of June.

The big thing is that we ALL deal with the same card pool, so it shouldn't be a big deal now should it? At least 2/3 of the cards banned were straight-up 'NO' cards... If anything, the new meta will allow more cards (particularly foundations) of different symbols to contend, becuase hey - they will be around and be able to use their abilities more often ^^

Come July 1st combo season is on, there is one less owl and one less ugly-face backing him that stop the one foundation you need to pull off that wicked combination of effects!!!

- dut

hmm..

no foils - fair enough, better than more expensive packs. Plus down the line it won't be necessary to be obsessively concerned with sleeving every deck that has a rare in it for fear of how easily scratched they are.

bannings - Olc and LotM were fairly obvious targets and have been for months. Chester's looks relatively tame on paper by comparison but I personally think it to be one of the top contributors to the control heavy meta due to the way it could help on *offense* by ensuring that the narrow loop/lock/otk strategies went off successfully. Getting rid of it will probably help make the meta at least a little bit healthier.

one set at a time - so long as, down the line, they increase the size of the sets a little bit and maybe go down to 14 cards of support or so to help get more charcaters in there. Perhaps increase the number of promo characters as well. Though sadly I'm feeling like this is going to end up meaning the loss of the SNK license once its contract expires; I doubt the complany will care much about advertising those particular games, and the effort to negotiate for an update to newer ones would be silly when they won't be able to adequately support the other 5 properties as is.

extra boxes with prerelease kit - Well, free stuff is free, but my local store can't sell the older stuff it has as is. Same goes for putting set 8 stuff in the new starter kit, that's probably a deal breaker right there. Will just have to order my own if I want the promos I guess.

block format - sounds cool, though in my particular difficult-area scenario I don't think I'm going to have a chance to play it on any kind of regular basis >.<

honestly the only reason cheser's got banned was becuase it had evil. i'm pretty sure steve didn't want another evil world championship.

If the foil stoppage is an alternative to a price rise, I'll live with it. The bannings to me will change the state of the game exponentially.

I've said this on the UK forum, but HELLO mini format. I LOVE YOU! Less time trowelling through stacks of cards to get to a choice, less choice to get amped up on when you think for every card you picked, you could have picked 10 better, in all, it's just so much easier to play, and will be a great reminder of how the game once used to be. However, I would like to know how they will put the Promo's into practice with this.

I'll be happy with the reduction of sets released on the condition that promo characters get released more often and in larger numbers, I do not want to end up going to a tournament filled up with the same characters again and again, we deal with that enough as it is. Having promo characters from the sets that won't be released in the year will most definately offset the upset that people will have from losing their characters.

In all, I'll take the good with the bad, and carry on enjoying my game. I'll almost definately take up the offer for the Fight Life recruitment kit, provided of course that it'll be available in the UK. LONG LIVE THE MINIBLOCK!

Owlface was my first pick to go.

Kinda surprised Bitter Rivals was unscathed. That card is crippling our environment out here in Boston.

Lord of the Makai, that was probably the most important thing to go, pretty much route cause of a lot of issues in the game.

Chester's Backing, another insane stat promo, surprised a bit by this one. Overpowered, yes, broke, no.

I totally agree with less sets per year. I absolutely love those starter kits. I wont miss foils.

My most hated card was not touched. Oh well... I don't think reprinting Blood Runs True would be a very good idea, please don't do it. I don't have a problem with it as long as it can't hack blocks and when its effect yields a result in a check less than 1.

Ima lil sad to hear times for this game are doing a little rough. Im finding it a lil hard to belive as our meta is growing more and more every day.

As for the bans Im glad to see Owlface and LotM go but im sad to see Chesters go.... I think it was more of a necessary evil out there. I dont wanna sit back on my opponents turn and just let them play everything they have without ways to negate random stuff. DOnt get me wrong it was good but not broken

I really wanted BRT to go.... people say its not busted but its definately too good. yeah you draw a card, but you should have to "bait" the dang thing out just so you can play what you want.

Im glad the attacks were not banned. Im glad they have attacks in a fighting game that are worth playing, grey wars are no fun.

Yay Bannings! Been trying to get olcadon's banned for a while now, glad its finally happening. Lord gone means less defender looping of rejection and mega spike (or at least more creative looping). And chester's, well I honestly was caught by suprise at this one, and yet, its banning now makes the most sense to me out of all of them. It was just too versatile. To negate ANY foundation gave Air, all, evil and water a special edge over most other symbols. Every other negation card either focused on a type of ability or a condition that would be satisfied if the effect went off. This just said "Negate Foundations and gain life" making the card a bit of an overpowered tool in the negation/grey wars.

As for the foiling: sad. But if its necessary, I'd prefer a less shiny UFS to no UFS at all. The one set thing, less cards = boo but less power cards we have to track down = yay. Makes it a less expensive game for both the player base and the company, everyone wins.

Overall, good stuff FFG, just wish the bannings were happening now stead of july. I want my meta change NAO!!!! lol.

Wow, this game just got %1000 much better. These banning are soooo good that I am pretty sure I may be able to score some players based on this alone. No free momemtum gen, no annoying chesters, no owlface?

No owlface means every deck has +8-12 slots open for the new meta because no owlface means that we don't need stupid useless answers to owlface in the first place... and "bad" foundations aren't that bad stuff like hope for people and anti k'...

New format - awesome, I love the idea, and I think new players and casual players will really enjoy this. As long as their is a character card tournament for this format, the veterans will want a piece of the action too.

Bannings - these are all hard to get, overpowered promos. These bannings will really help the newer players who are trying to compete and get into the game. Now they won't have to spend a ton of money/time trying to track these cards down. I kind of wish that BRT would have gone away based on this same principle. It also would have knocked order down a couple of pegs, because I think the Spiral lock decks are going to still be really, really strong after the bannings.

New player kit/pre-release kit - these are nice with good price tags, hopefully they help bring in a few new faces.

Only one license per release - hopefully this decision allows more stores to carry product and support the game. FFG should consider upping the cards per set in the future to be more in line with other CCGs - 140-160 card expansions would be fine I think. Base sets could be 200-250.

I don't get the impression that this mini-block is anything too serious. Not to be a negative nelly, but it's essentially an early block 4. It sounds like it's meant to be something for the new/casual players to do until the regular rotation next february(assuming that's when it happens). By that itme, all of the 4-point overpowered/overpriced stuff will be gone.

NJBrock22 said:

NJBrock22 said:

I dont think people are making a big enough deal about this...

Im sorry but I like some of the licenses in this game alot better that others. And not being able to play certain characters/ support in a given block sucks.

Im huge fan of Drakstalkers and this decision coming about means i wont get another darkstalker set till at least three sets down the line.... in like Febuary! and then i have to wait another set or more for more streetfighter and samarai showdown. I definately dont like this!

I think the best remedy although it wont happen cuz of licensing agreements would be to combine two sets into one (SF+ SC4= set15)

IDK I just think this brings up more causes for concern

The problem with combining the two is that the companies don't necessarily want their property mixing with another company's... Plus if we had ~200 card sets it'd be even more annoying trying to pull cards you're interested in than it is already in base sets =/

For the bans im fine with Chesters did too much and Stats were way to good. LOTM needed to guy too much of an enabler and hopefully will cut off the power creep air had. Olcadans ya now other symbols willl have a chance that didnt see play and deck building will be more creative. The only thing I am concerned with is order I am hoping destiny will see a lot more play with order CC hax being more anticipated. Also Mac will help shut down a good portion of Orders tools. I just wonder if it will be enough some of orders weapons might need to go before worlds but who knows.

The foils that truly does suck I think a lot of players will quit to be honest foils is a big part of CCGS for a good portion of payers generally.

The new format is a great idea kinda ironic we did a set 12 only event Sat and was amazing so much fun with all the power cards we see in block 3 not there.

The new kits is great getting extra prodcut for release events to help get new players into the game.

I have mixed feelings about the 1 license per release on one hand it is great to not have to buy 2 sets and get power cards from both . But where grant said about wanting our favorite license dark stalkers is as well my favorite license and I feel I wont see much of it for a while. I do hope the sets are big though like base sets if we are only having one .

The main thing I want to see a change from FFG is more promoting and advertising. It seems ever since POTM nothing really has been talked about I hope we get more attention consistantly the store championships are a good sign lets hope that kicks things off.

Last prize support for big event needs to change if it stays the same it will be difficult to get players to want to travel and FFG needs to change that hopefully Nats we will see something new.

Have to say, that was very much worth the wait. I'm a lot more excited about Tekken now too, especially since I've only been able to get a single box of ShadoWar since it released. A big pitch point I've used in the past was the accessibility of getting into the game, from both a price point, the efficiency of more common cards, and the distribution in boxes, and this just drives the point home anymore. I commend whose ever brain child this idea is.

I skipped through the 4 pages of stuff before this so I don't know how much this has been clarified, but about the removing of foiling, will that be removed from boxes and promos still be foiled, or just a cross the board standard? Either way, its a welcomed announcement, I got to many foils warping anyway, just will have to pay more attention to the rarity on the bottom I guess.

And THANK YOU for making that new player kit availiable to non-scouts/non-stores, I'm definitely gonna grab one for my club at school.

And and...no more Owl face least with my LotM I got a whole box of boosters free when I bought them