Hey guys

I just wanted to start a conversation about Mill decks. Do you think they could ever be Tier 1?

I have been testing a Hero mill deck with Elite Rey, Padme, and a rebel trooper, which I am finding to be too slow for any aggro deck that has lots of melee damage.

Even with the Rebel's guardian ability, those deck are punching out 5-6 damage per turn (at the minimum), and I can't seem to mitigate the damage and Mill at the same time. Also, since its 3 characters, I'm finding that claiming the battlefield has been difficult, since these agro decks only have 2 characters.

I wanted the 3 three characters so I could have scouts, launch bays, and patience all in the same deck, plus the extra meat shield rebel trooper. However, I have not been able to get patience to work because I need the dice from cunning and infiltrate to control my opponents dice versus blowing my wad with the card.

I have now switched to elite ackbar and elite padme, dropping all blue cards and adding commando raid and defensive position in the spots, and keeping 2 outposts, 2 falcons (to increase the chances of pulling it), and a launch bay. the outposts, combined with cunning and falcon are to trigger the battlefield (command center, discard 2 cards from top of deck) multiple times in a turn.

I still am worried that these types of decks are too squishy. I have some shields on the dice, and I have a diplomatic immunity in there, but it is expensive. and I'm not sure adding events to add shields is worth the slots. I have 2x second chance for padme, but ackbar is left out on his own.

soooo...is there anything hero mill decks can to stay alive against agro, or are they always going to be tier 2?

I can post a decklist, but I wasn't really trying just to tailor my one specific decklist, as to just get some insight on this deck archetype. Is Villian Mill better?

Mill is close to being viable, there's got to be a few more really solid control cards so the Mill deck can sustain itself.
Right now the choice is either to focus on denial or discard. I'm honestly thinking the best duo is eRey/ePadme. Just because Patience is such a huge card for mill decks.

You need to chew through about 25 cards to win, so if you can resolve Patience about 3 times (Return of the Jedi to pull it back) then you can hopefully pitch about 18 cards, leaving the last 7 due to discard/natural play.

I've been running a mill deck with Padme, Ackbar and Rey. I have the 30 cards split roughly in two, with half the cards providing milling or discarding and the other half providing damage mitigation of some sort. Damage mitigation includes things like the card that heals two damage, Diplomatic Immunity for shields, Block/Dodge to survive those nasty turns, etc. In the mill half, I have 2x Launch Bay, 2x Thermal Detonator and 2x Cunning. TD is a great mill card, but I'll happily trigger it to kill a character. Cunning is usually good for some damaging shenanigans. Launch Bay has a 1/3 chance to deal 5 damage as the second action of a turn. I definitely try to win by milling, but killing a character allows me to live longer and makes the mill victory condition more likely.

I also have a Hyperspace Jump so that I can just call a turn if the opponent looks nasty and make sure I get my battlefield. I'm happy to claim the battlefield with an unactivated character if it means I get to go first next turn.

Play more cards that remove or change their dice rolls. This is sort of the first deck I started with padme, rey, rebel trooper on minimal boosters when the game came out. At first I had the same issue agro decks were running over me. I took out other cards and replaced them with more of a remove die(dice) or change a die roll. If my opponent had a god roll I simply tell them nope reroll and whiff, whiff, resource or remove the dmg roll.

I've been running a mill deck with Padme, Ackbar and Rey. I have the 30 cards split roughly in two, with half the cards providing milling or discarding and the other half providing damage mitigation of some sort. Damage mitigation includes things like the card that heals two damage, Diplomatic Immunity for shields, Block/Dodge to survive those nasty turns, etc. In the mill half, I have 2x Launch Bay, 2x Thermal Detonator and 2x Cunning. TD is a great mill card, but I'll happily trigger it to kill a character. Cunning is usually good for some damaging shenanigans. Launch Bay has a 1/3 chance to deal 5 damage as the second action of a turn. I definitely try to win by milling, but killing a character allows me to live longer and makes the mill victory condition more likely.

I also have a Hyperspace Jump so that I can just call a turn if the opponent looks nasty and make sure I get my battlefield. I'm happy to claim the battlefield with an unactivated character if it means I get to go first next turn.

without looking at my cards, that character combo is 3 dice right? I have killed off a character with launch bay, by activating it twice with that one event card, but I have since removed that combo for dice control. I'm finding that I have not been able to utilize the special on TD for kill off a character, and I end up re-rolling it, and hoping to hit discard. the chances of the special being useful to me are making me consider dropping down to a one of in the deck, but I'm not there yet because of the possibility of situation you mentioned. I do like field medic, but its only 4 damage back for 2 cards you might not see both of. I added one dodge to my deck as a meta-card, and I have one hyperspace jump.

Do you actively try to focus on killing a character from the get go early, trying to hit damage sides? or do you focus on mill, and if the damage comes up, use it?

I've been running a mill deck with Padme, Ackbar and Rey. I have the 30 cards split roughly in two, with half the cards providing milling or discarding and the other half providing damage mitigation of some sort. Damage mitigation includes things like the card that heals two damage, Diplomatic Immunity for shields, Block/Dodge to survive those nasty turns, etc. In the mill half, I have 2x Launch Bay, 2x Thermal Detonator and 2x Cunning. TD is a great mill card, but I'll happily trigger it to kill a character. Cunning is usually good for some damaging shenanigans. Launch Bay has a 1/3 chance to deal 5 damage as the second action of a turn. I definitely try to win by milling, but killing a character allows me to live longer and makes the mill victory condition more likely.

I also have a Hyperspace Jump so that I can just call a turn if the opponent looks nasty and make sure I get my battlefield. I'm happy to claim the battlefield with an unactivated character if it means I get to go first next turn.

Yes, I like this setup much better than eRey because Ackbar has a discard side, and more health than the Rebel Trooper. I don't like Thermal Detonator or Launch Bay for this deck, and I only run one Cunning. I do run two copies of the Falcon though.

Play more cards that remove or change their dice rolls. This is sort of the first deck I started with padme, rey, rebel trooper on minimal boosters when the game came out. At first I had the same issue agro decks were running over me. I took out other cards and replaced them with more of a remove die(dice) or change a die roll. If my opponent had a god roll I simply tell them nope reroll and whiff, whiff, resource or remove the dmg roll.

I have since included infiltrate and negotiate to mitigate a lot of this. I have only had limited testing so far, so I haven't seen them work their magic yet.

I've been running a mill deck with Padme, Ackbar and Rey. I have the 30 cards split roughly in two, with half the cards providing milling or discarding and the other half providing damage mitigation of some sort. Damage mitigation includes things like the card that heals two damage, Diplomatic Immunity for shields, Block/Dodge to survive those nasty turns, etc. In the mill half, I have 2x Launch Bay, 2x Thermal Detonator and 2x Cunning. TD is a great mill card, but I'll happily trigger it to kill a character. Cunning is usually good for some damaging shenanigans. Launch Bay has a 1/3 chance to deal 5 damage as the second action of a turn. I definitely try to win by milling, but killing a character allows me to live longer and makes the mill victory condition more likely.

I also have a Hyperspace Jump so that I can just call a turn if the opponent looks nasty and make sure I get my battlefield. I'm happy to claim the battlefield with an unactivated character if it means I get to go first next turn.

Yes, I like this setup much better than eRey because Ackbar has a discard side, and more health than the Rebel Trooper. I don't like Thermal Detonator or Launch Bay for this deck, and I only run one Cunning. I do run two copies of the Falcon though.

I only run one launch bay, but I am considering taking out thermal detonator for something else, since most of the time the special is useless, and my characters usually are trying to roll into the discard sides. Plus ackbar and commando raid is great.

Well really the truth of it is you can't run 100% mill. The reality is other decks are trying to kill you and you need some kind of answer. If you're going to run blue/yellow, that answer is control/removal. Mess with their dice at every opportunity, target their damaging upgrades and get rid of them, make it a pain in the neck to get to you to begin with. You also need to threaten their characters at some point, 100% mill as an offensive strategy will just let them know that they don't need to worry about shields and they'll focus on the offensive instead.

I've seen decks work well with qui gon jin and padme, using diplomatic immunity and riposte. Qui Gon Jin has shields natively, pile up with Diplomatic immunity, keep plinking with qui gons ability and hit them back with riposte now and again to remind them they need to be concerned about their own characters too. Pair it with some control (either for moving your dice to mill or theirs off of damage) and you should be able to stem the tide while still primarily focusing on defense/mill.

I think of it this way... I'll have 29 health on the board for my opponent to chew through. I'm somewhat indifferent as to which character goes down first, so it's really just a matter of putting upgrades on the characters who look like they'll survive longer.

My opponent has 30 cards in his deck. The initial hand puts that down to 5. He'll likely use at least 5-10 more himself over the course of the game, if not more. Burning a card to get me to reroll a discard is just as good for me as actually using the discard. That means I only have to get him to discard 15-20 or so. I'd happily roll out my dice and then play Patience, removing them all if it means discarding a large chunk of that 20. In a game last week, I played an 8 die Patience, discarding about half of my opponent's remaining deck. He had the rest of the round to beat on me, killing a character, but it won me the game.

To answer one of the above questions, I run one Falcon and one Launch bay. IF the damage comes up, I use it. IF I can kill a character by triggering a TD, I'll do so. Generally speaking, I try to avoid wasting cards or activations to reroll dice unless I'm super close to killing a character or wiping an opponent's hand out after he's claimed the battlefield. I find that it's sometimes better to bluff using a TD and let my opponent waste cards/dice to gain shields when he could be killing me. Mill decks need time. Every action an opponent takes that DOESN'T deal you damage helps you out by buying you time. Every card they play that doesn't deal you damage might as well be a discard as it gets through their deck quicker.

Second Chance is also a great card to play on Padme if possible. It's a bonus 5 health and keeps you in the game longer.

I've played 7 games so far with my mill deck and have won 5, including against heavy aggro decks. Still needs tweaking, but that's a nice start.

Well really the truth of it is you can't run 100% mill. The reality is other decks are trying to kill you and you need some kind of answer.

I think of it this way... I'll have 29 health on the board for my opponent to chew through. I'm somewhat indifferent as to which character goes down first, so it's really just a matter of putting upgrades on the characters who look like they'll survive longer.

To answer one of the above questions, I run one Falcon and one Launch bay. IF the damage comes up, I use it. IF I can kill a character by triggering a TD, I'll do so. Generally speaking, I try to avoid wasting cards or activations to reroll dice unless I'm super close to killing a character or wiping an opponent's hand out after he's claimed the battlefield. I find that it's sometimes better to bluff using a TD and let my opponent waste cards/dice to gain shields when he could be killing me. Mill decks need time. Every action an opponent takes that DOESN'T deal you damage helps you out by buying you time. Every card they play that doesn't deal you damage might as well be a discard as it gets through their deck quicker.

The more I lose to aggro, the more I am realizing the fact that you have to threaten their characters enough to make them make decisions that are not focused on dealing damage. You make a great point. I'm still not sure what direction I want to go with it. local meta has a lot of grievous, vader, and even luke. I think that I just need to alter my play style with the deck that I have and see if it works. currently have elite ackbar and elite padme, but can quickly switch it to Kriswall's setup.

Why does nobody love outpost??? It's perfect for "claiming" the battlefield 1-4 additional times per turn (that's including Cunning: Cunning the Outpost to "claim" the battlefield).

~D

Why does nobody love outpost??? It's perfect for "claiming" the battlefield 1-4 additional times per turn (that's including Cunning: Cunning the Outpost to "claim" the battlefield).

~D

I run x2 in my deck, think I mentioned it above

Hate to say it, because I don't want to appear overly negative.... but I hate mill. Always have in other games.

Basically, when you force me to discard everything in my hand, you ruin my ability to actually PLAY the game, which is not fun. If Mill gets any more powerful it will ruin the fun factor of this game as far as I'm concerned.

Imagine you go to tournament and Mill is dominant in the meta - every card that gets drawn all day can't be played? Gosh that would make for a boring day in gaming.

Obviously I'm taking it to an extreme here, but that's basically how I feel when I play against a mill deck. Kinda sad they introduced discard as a core mechanic of the game (A side of dice) as opposed to being a special or occasional type thing.

Well, that's actually kinda what we're saying here. You can't 100% mill in this game. Full aggro is a hard counter. You can have mill as your end game strategy (which does of course involve trying to mill some each turn) but you can' do a full on slaughterhouse deck like in VTES (where I discard 30 cards out of 60 in one turn). You still have to be able to do damage, control dice, react to your opponent. I think it's a good balance currently. In fact it's exactly why OP is having trouble.

I've just dipped my toe into discard decks, and was trying an E-Qui-Gon and Padme. Anyone have experience with this?

Well, that's actually kinda what we're saying here. You can't 100% mill in this game. Full aggro is a hard counter. You can have mill as your end game strategy (which does of course involve trying to mill some each turn) but you can' do a full on slaughterhouse deck like in VTES (where I discard 30 cards out of 60 in one turn). You still have to be able to do damage, control dice, react to your opponent. I think it's a good balance currently. In fact it's exactly why OP is having trouble.

Sure... but I made my post to say that I kinda hope it doesn't continue. Like, if you can only mil 50% of the deck.. I hope the next expansion doesn't fill in all the gaps, and allow for full mill decks to run wild.

I'm sure there will EVENTUALLY be those... but this early in the game's lifecycle, there are just too few deck archetypes right now and if Mill becomes too strong I feel it would really take a toll on the playerbase. Any deck format that denies your opponent the ability to actually play the game, should be a fringe-type deck at best. Something you might see once in awhile, but certain nothing that runs rampant.

Well, that's actually kinda what we're saying here. You can't 100% mill in this game. Full aggro is a hard counter. You can have mill as your end game strategy (which does of course involve trying to mill some each turn) but you can' do a full on slaughterhouse deck like in VTES (where I discard 30 cards out of 60 in one turn). You still have to be able to do damage, control dice, react to your opponent. I think it's a good balance currently. In fact it's exactly why OP is having trouble.

Sure... but I made my post to say that I kinda hope it doesn't continue. Like, if you can only mil 50% of the deck.. I hope the next expansion doesn't fill in all the gaps, and allow for full mill decks to run wild.

I'm sure there will EVENTUALLY be those... but this early in the game's lifecycle, there are just too few deck archetypes right now and if Mill becomes too strong I feel it would really take a toll on the playerbase. Any deck format that denies your opponent the ability to actually play the game, should be a fringe-type deck at best. Something you might see once in awhile, but certain nothing that runs rampant.

Unless there are core mechanic changes, you will ALWAYS be able to play a card from your hand (assuming you have resources) each round... two if you had claimed the battleground. Compare this to Magic where you can easily get into a situation where you have to more or less ask for permission before doing ANYTHING. The dice and the alternating actions make me think it will be VERY hard to pull off a real control deck in Destiny. Mill decks can be annoying, but it's not like they lock you out from performing any actions. Yes, they make pulling off combos harder if certain cards get discarded, but combo decks are inherently risky.

Realistically, it takes longer for a mill deck to ramp up to effectiveness than it takes an aggro deck. Pure aggro is VERY hard for a mill deck to handle. Mill decks work better against decks that have a more varied build.

Well, that's actually kinda what we're saying here. You can't 100% mill in this game. Full aggro is a hard counter. You can have mill as your end game strategy (which does of course involve trying to mill some each turn) but you can' do a full on slaughterhouse deck like in VTES (where I discard 30 cards out of 60 in one turn). You still have to be able to do damage, control dice, react to your opponent. I think it's a good balance currently. In fact it's exactly why OP is having trouble.

Sure... but I made my post to say that I kinda hope it doesn't continue. Like, if you can only mil 50% of the deck.. I hope the next expansion doesn't fill in all the gaps, and allow for full mill decks to run wild.

I'm sure there will EVENTUALLY be those... but this early in the game's lifecycle, there are just too few deck archetypes right now and if Mill becomes too strong I feel it would really take a toll on the playerbase. Any deck format that denies your opponent the ability to actually play the game, should be a fringe-type deck at best. Something you might see once in awhile, but certain nothing that runs rampant.

Mill is a necessity in a game like this because in Star Wars many of the characters are not combatants so they need to have some alternative way to win. And the threat of mills in the environment isn't really a bad thing as it encourages more balanced decks that have a bit of everything to help deal with a variety of strategies.

Look at it this way, it isn't much fun getting pounded into oblivion by a couple of beatsticks, either -- especially when one of your characters ends up getting wiped off the board on turn 2. That's a form of denial, too, since the player expected to actually use that character in the game for more than a couple of minutes...right?

Well, that's actually kinda what we're saying here. You can't 100% mill in this game. Full aggro is a hard counter. You can have mill as your end game strategy (which does of course involve trying to mill some each turn) but you can' do a full on slaughterhouse deck like in VTES (where I discard 30 cards out of 60 in one turn). You still have to be able to do damage, control dice, react to your opponent. I think it's a good balance currently. In fact it's exactly why OP is having trouble.

Sure... but I made my post to say that I kinda hope it doesn't continue. Like, if you can only mil 50% of the deck.. I hope the next expansion doesn't fill in all the gaps, and allow for full mill decks to run wild.

I'm sure there will EVENTUALLY be those... but this early in the game's lifecycle, there are just too few deck archetypes right now and if Mill becomes too strong I feel it would really take a toll on the playerbase. Any deck format that denies your opponent the ability to actually play the game, should be a fringe-type deck at best. Something you might see once in awhile, but certain nothing that runs rampant.

I disagree. Mill is a necessary evil that provides an alternative way to win. If players didn't have this option, then Destiny would just become a game where whoever brings the biggest/baddest damage dealing team wins. How is that fun?

I disagree. Mill is a necessary evil that provides an alternative way to win. If players didn't have this option, then Destiny would just become a game where whoever brings the biggest/baddest damage dealing team wins. How is that fun?

Hmm,.. I'm not sure I agree with this either. I mean I agree that it's good to have alternate ways to win. I don't agree that without it the game wouldn't be fun as I've already seen some great control decks, or creative win criteria using say Crime Boss (or whatever the card is that is pay 5, defeat character). We're early in the games life, I think where we are in the balance is good, it's an option to mill but you do so with the knowledge that you're going against the grain and it'll be difficult.

Ok, so decks needs to be created to use discarding as a control effect, rather than a win condition. So for example you run decks like qui-gon/padme, or jabba/vader, or ackbar/luke...etc. basically a character that packs a punch coupled with a character that can reduce the options the opponent has by discarding their hand.

I kind of agree if that if the game just boiled down to who has the pointest sticks, deckbuilding would get stale after a while. I think milling the hand of your opponent could counter some agro decks to prevent them from getting to the breaking point so quickly.

I tried an Ackbar/Padme mill deck and right now, they're just not quick enough to act for you not to bring adequate offense along as well.

I'm not saying Destiny shouldn't have Milling... I'm just saying it's not what I enjoy. All the rest of you keep on milling... I'd just rather not bother trying to build a Padme/Ackbar deck any time soon.

And I hope that the meta doesn't ever get to a place where the top 16 at worlds are all mill decks.