1 hour ago, Khudzlin said:

LCGs also don't have nearly as much binder fodder as CCGs.

I don't believe this is true. At least for Netrunner, maybe 35-40% of the card pool is actually playable that's just estimating based on looking at the number of played cards in a few packs.

12 hours ago, Sparks Duh said:

This is a dumb comment. Seriously...

That's rich from someboy who keeps claiming over and over CCGs are cheaper! XD

Quote

So because I prefer to have expansions be bigger, I don't get all the cards to play in store championships and just wait 6 months for an entire cycle of cards? Really??? And even then, an entire cycle of cards don't have the same amount of cards as a single CCG expansion. And CCG expansions generally come out quarterly or every 4 months. Give me a fckn break, man.

I'm not saying you have too. In fact I think it's a really bad idea. But I'm pointing it's an option. And, if you have a like-minded group and all of you decide to apply the same legality ruleset, you wouldn't be at a disadvantage (other than waiting a few additional months to add complete cycles) . It's not like there have been different formats in L5R before. Chill out a little, man.

1 hour ago, Danwarr said:

I don't believe this is true. At least for Netrunner, maybe 35-40% of the card pool is actually playable that's just estimating based on looking at the number of played cards in a few packs.

I would say in general, you probably get less binder fodder than in a CCG, because the expansions are smaller and there are therefore less cards to use, but percentage wise I would agree. And with Netrunner, there were a number of data packs where I did not use any cards, and most of the rest I used one or 2 cards. That left 28-30 cards that I didn't use and went into the binder.

With fate cards also being restricted to clan, I think we may actually see an increase as the cost of splash is pretty high.

1 hour ago, Danwarr said:

I don't believe this is true. At least for Netrunner, maybe 35-40% of the card pool is actually playable that's just estimating based on looking at the number of played cards in a few packs.

I sort of agree. I mean there is less "binder fodder" in absolute terms due to the slower LCG release rate as compared to CCGs. However in relative terms I doubt there is any difference... at least no due to the release rate. Design-wise it might be that this version of the game generates more competitive deck archetypes requiring diferent cardsets, and thus, a more "efficient" use of all the cardboard available. But again that's more an issue of design that a marketing one (which the CCG/LCG split is all about).

3 minutes ago, Mirith said:

With fate cards also being restricted to clan, I think we may actually see an increase as the cost of splash is pretty high.

Good point! That would a perfect instance of a design decision having nothing to do with the CCG/LCG issue.

1 hour ago, Danwarr said:

I don't believe this is true. At least for Netrunner, maybe 35-40% of the card pool is actually playable that's just estimating based on looking at the number of played cards in a few packs.

Glad you said that, as I can just chime in and agree!

40k: Conquest was my game of choice, and card quality varied massively. Some, like Guardian Mesh Armour, were entirely unplayable. Others, like Klaivex Warleader, were a clear cut above the rest in quality. That's inevitable to some degree, though it did sometimes feel like the design team were deliberately including some bad cards to help differentiate good deckbuilders from bad ones in tourney competition.

I'd also note that a lot of cards were weak for a long time, till the final pieces of the puzzle fell into place. For example, the warlord Aun'shi was awful at the time of release, but became playable a couple of expansions later thanks to the key cards he needed being released.

That in itself lends some merit to the idea of bigger and more infrequent expansions, as it means that you're less often holding onto cards that are "waiting for the future meta" to become good, as the expectation would be that the card is being released at the time of the meta it belongs in.

Personally though, I quite like small frequent cycles, mostly because it keeps the community active. Just look at this forum, and how we get a little surge of activity every time another preview drops. If FFG had held back all the previews then released them all on one day, the net buzz would have been much smaller.

The same is true of expansions. It's good business sense to have a constant level of buzz, to keep the community engaged in the game. And a game that is a successful business venture is also good for us, the players, as it means a higher likelihood of the game line continuing to be supported.

3 hours ago, Danwarr said:

I don't believe this is true. At least for Netrunner, maybe 35-40% of the card pool is actually playable that's just estimating based on looking at the number of played cards in a few packs.

I think what is and is not binder fodder is gonna be a bit subjective. Different types of players are looking for different types of things like efficient cards, combo pieces, cards to flesh out a suboptimal theme or cards with flashy effects. Some of those things may be fun but not entirely practical in a competitive deck. They still gotta cater to those players that want to make fun, unique and/or thematic decks. If you take that into account I do think there were very few truly worthless cards in the LCG games I've played. Even something as seemingly worthless in Netrunner as Record Reconstructor or Monolith can find a place in a very situational or thematic deck. Also in that game a card's worth fluctuated greatly as time went on and the meta shifted. So what may seem worthless now could become valuable later. See Whizzard for example. This is especially true in these LCGs since they are updated monthly and cards in the current rotation policy have a long life.

What you objectively won't have is tons and tons of copies of the same commons from buying boosters and hunting for rares. Also you won't really have any type of feasible secondary market for cards. For promos and alt art cards you can see their values rise quite high, but nothing like the secondary market for a successful CCG.

3 hours ago, Mon no Oni said:

That's rich from someboy who keeps claiming over and over CCGs are cheaper! XD

There is no claim, it's fact. CCGs are way cheaper than LCGs for me. I have a full play set of every card from the initial release and expansion of SW: Destiny and I haven't paid any money for it. That's about equivalent to buying 3 core sets, the entire first cycle, and deluxe in an LCG. How much money will you spend on all of that? Way more than free, I'm sure. Hell, even the last 5 or 6 years of L5R CCG, I didn't spend any money on cards. So yeah... for me, LCGs are way more expensive than CCGs.

8 minutes ago, Sparks Duh said:

There is no claim, it's fact. CCGs are way cheaper than LCGs for me. I have a full play set of every card from the initial release and expansion of SW: Destiny and I haven't paid any money for it. That's about equivalent to buying 3 core sets, the entire first cycle, and deluxe in an LCG. How much money will you spend on all of that? Way more than free, I'm sure. Hell, even the last 5 or 6 years of L5R CCG, I didn't spend any money on cards. So yeah... for me, LCGs are way more expensive than CCGs.

Yeah - my girlfriend doesn't pay for her lunch with me, that doesn't mean it was free...

Just now, shosuko said:

Yeah - my girlfriend doesn't pay for her lunch with me, that doesn't mean it was free...

It was free for her!

Just now, Sparks Duh said:

There is no claim, it's fact. CCGs are way cheaper than LCGs for me. I have a full play set of every card from the initial release and expansion of SW: Destiny and I haven't paid any money for it. That's about equivalent to buying 3 core sets, the entire first cycle, and deluxe in an LCG. How much money will you spend on all of that? Way more than free, I'm sure. Hell, even the last 5 or 6 years of L5R CCG, I didn't spend any money on cards. So yeah... for me, LCGs are way more expensive than CCGs.

It may be fact, but it is also anecdotal. It would be like me getting the Core Set as a birthday gift and claiming that, for me, CSs are free! It would be fact, but it would be also totally anecdotal and it wouldn't add anything to the discussion other than noise.

Because at some point somebody has to pay for the product. It may be tournament prizes by the store (paid for all participants as tournament entry fee), or a beloved one buying as a gift, but SOMEBODY PAID FOR IT. Then, once you take that from the equation, LCGs are cheaper than CCGs by a wide margin.

Just now, Mon no Oni said:

It may be fact, but it is also anecdotal. It would be like me getting the Core Set as a birthday gift and claiming that, for me, CSs are free! It would be fact, but it would be also totally anecdotal and it wouldn't add anything to the discussion other than noise.

Because at some point somebody has to pay for the product. It may be tournament prizes by the store (paid for all participants as tournament entry fee), or a beloved one buying as a gift, but SOMEBODY PAID FOR IT. Then, once you take that from the equation, LCGs are cheaper than CCGs by a wide margin.

Sure. But even if it's prize support that you pay for with entry fee, you still pay entry fees for LCG tournaments. And there is no product to be won... except promos, tokens, or playmats.

Just now, Sparks Duh said:

Sure. But even if it's prize support that you pay for with entry fee, you still pay entry fees for LCG tournaments. And there is no product to be won... except promos, tokens, or playmats.

From my experience with CCG - the prize for tournaments is typically booster packs with a promo card. LCG have playmats, tokens, and other cool stuff instead, still with a promo card typically.

7 minutes ago, shosuko said:

From my experience with CCG - the prize for tournaments is typically booster packs with a promo card. LCG have playmats, tokens, and other cool stuff instead, still with a promo card typically.

Yup and winning booster packs is way cheaper than buying them. So again... CCGs are cheaper for me to play than LCGs.

EDIT: I will say that after winning various store championships in SW: Destiny that promo, playmats, and tokens have value. So I may actually get to play the LCG for free as well. It's looking like that may be the case so I'm hopeful!

7 minutes ago, Sparks Duh said:

Yup and winning booster packs is way cheaper than buying them. So again... CCGs are cheaper for me to play than LCGs.

Maybe monetarily. But when you consider the incalculable aggravation of having to attend a tournament, how can you really be considered to be coming out ahead?

If CCGs are cheaper for you, personally, than LCGs, then great. For most of us, LCGs will be far cheaper. So, what point are you trying to make, exactly?

Just now, JJ48 said:

Maybe monetarily. But when you consider the incalculable aggravation of having to attend a tournament, how can you really be considered to be coming out ahead?

Because tournaments aren't aggravating to me? In fact, the only reason I play card games is to go to tournaments. To compete with other people, hang out with friends I don't get to see very often, and just have a great time.

Coming from CCGs I am looking very forward to the ease of getting a full playset of cards. I remember buying boxes upon boxes of boosters to get a full playset of rares. Only to find myself getting 5 of one rare and 1 of another. Atleast with the LCG model. I know buying 3 coresets will give me everything I need to play any clan deck I want and really have multiple decks with me for play. The only thing that might be an issue with is say splashing Crane in say a Lion deck when I have a Crane deck too. However, I am thinking proxies will be handy for those situations in causal play.

1 hour ago, Sparks Duh said:

Because tournaments aren't aggravating to me? In fact, the only reason I play card games is to go to tournaments. To compete with other people, hang out with friends I don't get to see very often, and just have a great time.

Yeah - regular meet up / tournaments are essential for how I play. I imagine that will be my primary method of playing this game, not at home or with a few friends but at the game shop with several people I know only through playing.

14 minutes ago, shosuko said:

Yeah - regular meet up / tournaments are essential for how I play. I imagine that will be my primary method of playing this game, not at home or with a few friends but at the game shop with several people I know only through playing.

Same here, only minus the tournaments. Why should I pay money to play a few games against random strangers using meta-driven decks when instead I could just play at my local game store against friends using fun decks for free?

1 hour ago, JJ48 said:

Same here, only minus the tournaments. Why should I pay money to play a few games against random strangers using meta-driven decks when instead I could just play at my local game store against friends using fun decks for free?

Sure, but Tournaments often have awesome promo tokens / playmats / cards that are pretty nifty and you don't always have to win to get prizes either, depending on the format sometimes everyone gets tokens and the winner gets a playmat or something. I'm not sure how FFG does it.

20 hours ago, JJ48 said:

Same here, only minus the tournaments. Why should I pay money to play a few games against random strangers using meta-driven decks when instead I could just play at my local game store against friends using fun decks for free?

Depends how often you play your friends and how competitive you can be. I find tournaments a refreshing change of pace versus playing the normal people over and over. I actually get annoyed at a tournament when I end up playing one of the local playgroup (Assuming it isn't run at the local store). I can play them anytime! Also, it guarantees you some number of games. You KNOW that you will get X games in the swiss, if you stick around long enough, where sometimes you can't always get to play since you don't know who is showing up for the standard game night.

Also, my local stores usually supply a store credit prize as well as the standard promos/etc.

Also, most non-major tournaments will have an interesting selection of decks, not just "What is the best meta". You will still get some of those, but often people will bring in what they think is best.

The game store who ran Netrunner had the typical weekly "Netrunner Day" as well as a tourney once a month. A lot of people (Maybe 1/3 of the tourney) would only show up for the tourney since they knew people would be there, and they had to travel 1hr+ from outside the main metropolitan area. This especially matters once the game calms down after release.

20 hours ago, shosuko said:

Sure, but Tournaments often have awesome promo tokens / playmats / cards that are pretty nifty and you don't always have to win to get prizes either, depending on the format sometimes everyone gets tokens and the winner gets a playmat or something. I'm not sure how FFG does it.

True, but in most cases I'd rather just purchase the item in question if it's something I want, rather than deal with going to a tournament. Even if it's a tournament exclusive, it would have to be something I considered overwhelmingly incredible to be worth the hassle of a tournament.

1 hour ago, Mirith said:

Depends how often you play your friends and how competitive you can be. I find tournaments a refreshing change of pace versus playing the normal people over and over. I actually get annoyed at a tournament when I end up playing one of the local playgroup (Assuming it isn't run at the local store). I can play them anytime! Also, it guarantees you some number of games. You KNOW that you will get X games in the swiss, if you stick around long enough, where sometimes you can't always get to play since you don't know who is showing up for the standard game night.

Also, my local stores usually supply a store credit prize as well as the standard promos/etc.

Also, most non-major tournaments will have an interesting selection of decks, not just "What is the best meta". You will still get some of those, but often people will bring in what they think is best.

The game store who ran Netrunner had the typical weekly "Netrunner Day" as well as a tourney once a month. A lot of people (Maybe 1/3 of the tourney) would only show up for the tourney since they knew people would be there, and they had to travel 1hr+ from outside the main metropolitan area. This especially matters once the game calms down after release.

Maybe "meta" wasn't the correct term, but there definitely were particular types of decks I saw at the tournaments I attended. In particular, most of the decks seemed designed to win in 4-5 turns, with minimal interaction. Whether it was Honor Rocket, or EnLightningment, or just a plain, old, military Blitz; playing against a deck that can consistently knock you out before you're even really able to start playing simply isn't fun.

Of course, I realize that the fault lies with my own deck, and that it simply wasn't good in a tournament environment. But that's just the point. The kinds of decks that did work well in tournaments (from what I saw) were the types of decks that I neither enjoyed playing nor enjoyed playing against. I preferred longer games with more interaction between characters, which I could get from local play but not from tournaments.

Now, it does seem that the FFG is actively trying to eliminate the "avoid interactions" style of decks, so it may very well be that it will become possible to make a deck that is both fun to play (for me) and competitive enough to at least give a good game, even if it doesn't win. If that's the case, maybe I'll give tournaments a try again, at least at the local level. As it stands, however, tournaments hold no appeal to me, and if attending them were a requirement of the LCG, I'd be giving it a pass.

On 6/7/2017 at 5:12 PM, Tekwych said:

New deluxe policy came out in October when they dropped Deluxe 2 between cycle 2.3 and 2.4 of AGoTv2. Ir was stated in one of the news articles that making people wait 4 years to flesh out a faction did not seam fair so deletes would no longer be in-between cycles but instead drop as the 'card sets' dictated. Deluxe 3 then dropped between 3.1 and 3.2 and we could get deluxe 4 before the end of cycle 3.

This is true, but really the rate at which the deluxe boxes have been released has not dramatically increased. The 4th AGoT deluxe should come out this fall around the two year mark for the game. So one deluxe every six months. Not too different than just releasing one between cycles, if they could keep to a regular release schedule of one pack per month without a longer delay between sets. Thinking L5R will get three deluxe boxes in six months (or even a year) seems really optimistic.

10 hours ago, JJ48 said:

Of course, I realize that the fault lies with my own deck, and that it simply wasn't good in a tournament environment. But that's just the point. The kinds of decks that did work well in tournaments (from what I saw) were the types of decks that I neither enjoyed playing nor enjoyed playing against. I preferred longer games with more interaction between characters, which I could get from local play but not from tournaments.

So essentially what I'm getting from this statement is that you'd rather play crappy decks against crappy players playing crappy decks than to have a good time at a tourney. I guess that makes sense???

5 minutes ago, Sparks Duh said:

So essentially what I'm getting from this statement is that you'd rather play crappy decks against crappy players playing crappy decks than to have a good time at a tourney. I guess that makes sense???

It does - some people prefer thematic or casual play where they enjoy the game through experiencing the game on a surface level. Those who are more competitive prefer decks more optimized for performance than style. These decks tend to focus on the specific meta game rather than what looks fun