Yesterday I was introduced to Keyforged after my Local Game Store owner gave me a free deck to try the game. I was quickly put through a tutorial game, but before that the guy running the event gave me a brief overview of the houses.

Brobnar: Big Guys, brutish and all about fighting and straight power.

Sanctum:Knights, well armored and likes to borrow your opponents stuff.

Dis: Discard, bouncing, and a smattering of other things.

Logos:DRAW<DRAW<DRAW!

Untamed:Monsters, often gain power from having more or buff.

Shadows:Or how to steal everything not nailed down.

Mars: Aliens! Also the Archive, but Aliens!

I went into my first game, and then my second and third and watched even more. As I played my thought formed. I experienced each house until finally I sit here typing wondering what I am doing with my life until I finally got around to telling you guys my thoughts after getting my Salt Shaker.

Brobnar: Big Guys, don't do much other than smash things. Was constantly stuck fighting and not Reaping.

Sanctum:The rage inducer. Always taking your things and often to tough to kill.

Dis: Or how to mess with your opponent and have it not matter (Cue Salt).

Logos:DRAW<DRAW<DRAW! (Seriously played All my Logos cards in one turn, didn't do much \_(ツ)_/)

Untamed:In my experience, Untamed = Victory. (I hit the point were if my opponent played a creature I gained 1 amber and it would die on my turn after taking 9 damage before I reaped for 6)

Shadows:Or how to try and steal stuff but get swated like a fly as you failed to do anything of import if your opponent had sanctum, or untamed, or...well you get the idea.

Mars: Surprisingly powerful, Brobnar but better and had good synergy. Untamed steamrolled. (Seriously, wth)

In the end I started seeing a pattern of whoever had Sanctum and Untamed would just win. Like it was kinda silly how often it was happening.

I found Logos and Mars worked well with other Houses because of archive and draw power. Meanwhile Brobnar was failing to do it's job as they just constantly died trying to do it.

Dis and Shadows tried to take the reins on the opponent but fell short.(Discard doesn't do much if they just draw back to full, and Steal was just out done by Capture surprisingly)

Sanctum and Untamed were the real stars, they were amazingly durable and on average everything stayed on board for more turns or had a longer lasting effect than everything else.

Sanctum often had decently large creatures with armor on top of that in addition to healing making them insanely hard to kill and let them just keep doing what they do.

Untamed creatures did better in combat than most with the help of skirmish and good board removal and amber gain.

All in all I had a great time but it kinda worries me that I COULD see some of the houses just dominating the others with the ease they did. While some houses like Logos and Shadows had only really showed to be somewhat of a minor annoyance, others just dominated with ease such as Sanctum,Untamed, and Mars. The others just didn't match up. I really love Shadows and Dis and they are conceptually my favourite but they were just...ignored as other houses just brought a player closer to victory with less luck and because they could actually take a hit.

I am curious to the thought and opinions on the matter of others.

What do you all think?

I noticed that almost everytime I went first I lost. Play one card, draw nothing, then let your opponent put down 3-4 creatures/artifacts. Seemed like it was always hard to catch up without a board wipe card (which usually chained you). Getting plus one card doesn't seem to make up for the only being allowed to play one card rule. I also noticed that with new decks, if people didn't do a really, really good job shuffling, we would constantly pull mostly one house for each hand, allowing for constant large hand plays. A really good shuffle, however, helped ensure that, for the first few hands, I had close to an even 2 card per house split in my hand. If my opponent had a new deck, they often could play 5 cards of a single house on turn 1-2, while I am struggling to get out more than two cards. This is a minor thing since over time decks will naturally be better shuffled, but it seems to make sealed event play not so great. Personally, I have moved from the "super excited and in love with this game" camp to the "I am not sure if this is for me" camp. I am going to try focusing on just learning one or two of my many decks and see if that improves play experience.

On 11/18/2018 at 6:49 AM, Dyn-Darklyn said:

I am curious to the thought and opinions on the matter of others.

What do you all think?

My favorite (and arguably strongest) deck uses both Brobnar and Dis with the third being Sanctum. I would say they are pretty far from useless.

On 11/17/2018 at 9:49 PM, Dyn-Darklyn said:

I am curious to the thought and opinions on the matter of others.

What do you all think?

So far I honestly have had fun with all the houses, they all do great in different ways. Bronbar attacks a to keeping your opponents board state low and can easily go toe to toe with sanctum as they tend to attack more than once or in hordes all while gaining aember while doing so.

Shadows are probably my favorite, sure they don’t pack the punch some others do but that’s not their point. They mostly just reap, gaining and stealing amber getting your keys forged quicker and holding your opponent back from doing the same even if they don’t last for many rounds. In fact using a combination of the dis card “lash of broken dreams” (which you use to increase the aember requiremenr for your opponent to forge a key by +3) and “Bait and switch” from shadows as well as shadows steal abilities I’ve managed to take an opponent from 14 aember to 4 in a single turn while gaining 10 myself and that wasn’t even an optimal play.

So far untamed has impressed me the least because I only have them in one deck and there’s so few creatures in it that the actions and abilities that rely on playing creature plays just don’t pack much of a punch though I can seeing them doing so with the right cards.

I like all of the houses and (so far) have enjoyed all twelve of my decks. What I have to do now is to pick a few to concentrate on and improve my play with them..

Welcome to the Jungle. How many decks did you see played? (under your control or your opponents?) I've been playing the game for a few months and watching new players come in - most new players have the same thoughts as you about some houses being stronger than others. But which houses they choose as the strong ones are always different. Your house is only as strong as the cards it contains in your deck, and how well those cards work with the others. There is also a considerable amount of skill involved. New players don't always know what to look for, but I'm not really talking about that. The understanding of your deck and what it might want to do is really important. That usually goes way beyond any specific houses, other than my opinion that "steal" is the most powerful mechanic in the game in general, and shadows tends to have a lot of steal.

In fact, the most common factions I've seen complaints about, are that Shadows is too strong (I lean this way) and Mars is too weak. (I think they have a high variance - some mars decks are insane, and others are insanely dumb). That you have said the opposite (that mars is pretty good, and shadows is pretty bad) would be surprising if not for the fact that you only have played in your local meta. In keyforge all meta is local.

One tip: now that you know what the houses strengths and weaknesses are, see if you can do better against the ones you think are too strong. For instance, when going against sanctum, you now understand the might and power of 3 or more really tough armored opponents. If you can slow them down or pick your targets better earlier, maybe you can prevent things from getting out of hand. Still, depending on the decks you face, you may need to either find a deck that is a better counter, or only play against that deck if its pilot agrees to add some chains.

3 hours ago, Moes1980 said:

I noticed that almost everytime I went first I lost. Play one card, draw nothing, then let your opponent put down 3-4 creatures/artifacts. Seemed like it was always hard to catch up without a board wipe card (which usually chained you). Getting plus one card doesn't seem to make up for the only being allowed to play one card rule. I also noticed that with new decks, if people didn't do a really, really good job shuffling, we would constantly pull mostly one house for each hand, allowing for constant large hand plays. A really good shuffle, however, helped ensure that, for the first few hands, I had close to an even 2 card per house split in my hand. If my opponent had a new deck, they often could play 5 cards of a single house on turn 1-2, while I am struggling to get out more than two cards. This is a minor thing since over time decks will naturally be better shuffled, but it seems to make sealed event play not so great. Personally, I have moved from the "super excited and in love with this game" camp to the "I am not sure if this is for me" camp. I am going to try focusing on just learning one or two of my many decks and see if that improves play experience.

I am not sure if this is still how players feel, but it seemed like most experienced players prefer going first. There are two advantages - even though it's only one card, you get to set the pace of the game and force your opponents response. The other advantage is that you essentially can mulligan for free (you start with 7, mulligan to 6, play 1 to 5, and ending your turn with 5 get to draw back up to 6). Put these two together, and you should have a pretty good chance of having a strong single card to play, seeing a potential total of 13 cards.

Anyway, mulligans are usually a good idea in general. If you are at 2/2/2, the worst you can get is 2/2/1 - which is really the same thing.

The shuffling is a big deal for sure. Shuffling properly in most card games is important. For sealed/new decks, I have been pretty successful with sorting in 5 random stacks, and then doing a few overhand shuffles. The 5 stacks are nice because you get a bunch of 2's of a faction, but a few 3's, and then the overhands should make it less even.

I went from having one deck for a week to having 8 in less than three days. I think its very possible us newer players are diving in too deep too soon, and possibly hurting our experience with the game unintentionally.

My plan for myself is to slow down and be more deliberate with the game, focus in on one of my decks and play multiple games with it before switching.

These are just the thoughts that came to mind as I read the OP, and they probably apply mostly to me but maybe to a few others as well. Don’t let the excitement of discovering this great game and all the cool decks sully the fun and experience of discovering a single deck!

Love the game and I think I’ll be playing it for a long time.

I found that some shadows decks can do a lot of direct damage, didn't expect that the first time.

Sanctum is a tough cookie with all that armor. One game I just sat back and reaped.

Also won a game by healing my and my opponent's creatures. That was a hoot!

At the pre release, when you heard the phrase "I choose Dis" late in the game, it meant things were gonna blow up.

Has anyone actually tried using the starter decks against unique decks? I wonder how well they'll hold up.

I honestly don't see the use of overall assessment of house power. What matters is what cards you get from that house and how they synergies with the other cards in your deck. Untamed is probably the most powerful possible house (theoretically able to win the game on opening turn as p2 with full moon hunting witch dust pixie chota hazri and 2x nature's call) but that doesn't matter if all you get is save the pack and niffle apes.

56 minutes ago, Robin Graves said:

Has anyone actually tried using the starter decks against unique decks? I wonder how well they'll hold up.

They hold up quite nicely from the few games we tried.

I don't think its accurate to characterize houses by their power. That depends on the specific cards that you get from that house in your particular deck.

Instead, I've tried characterize the deck by how they play and what they accomplish. Even doing that, the rules aren't hard and fast, but I suppose I'll try. I only have two decks, so the houses I have personally seen are Dis, Logos, Mars, and Sanctum, but I've been looking at decks online via the app to see some trends. Each house's power is derived from a mixture of its creatures, its actions, its artifacts, and its upgrades.

Sanctum seems to derive its power from a balance of its creatures and their actions. They don't always have a LOT of creatures out, but what creatures they have are robust. Their creatures are tougher to beat in combat because of their armor, and they get enhanced offensive capabilities from their action cards.

Logos relies much less on creatures and more on actions, artifacts, and upgrades to accomplish goals. This is in keeping with the theme of Logos: tech, tech, and more tech. My Logos decks make heavy use of the archive mechanic to manipulate your deck (to either set up powerful synergies or thin your deck to recycle valuable cards more quickly).

Mars relies heavily on offensive power from its creatures and machines of war. My Mars deck has a lot of creatures in it, and this seems to be a trend. There are certainly some actions and artifacts that help them as well, but for Mars it seems to be about the creatures and numbers.

Dis seems to be focused on disruption of your opponent's plans using artifacts and actions, with a moderate reliance on creatures with disruptive powers. Dis cards have a tendency to fundamentally shape strategies for both players using "board wipes", forcing certain houses to be active, purging creatures/cards, and stopping the forging of keys.

Those are my impressions so far.

Personally the only faction that doesn't do it for me is Shadows, they have a lot of terrible cards, bad Penny for example, I routinely discard her rather then playing her......

So many of their cards depend on others cards, Miasma without a Doorstep of heaven or Bait & Switch or too much to protect is nearly a dead card...

Mind you perhaps all I need to change this opinion is obtaining a deck with 3-4 routine jobs in it

I can’t mirror the sentiments about going first. I have gone first on all but two games at multiple stores and playing at home and I have only lost one game split amongst multiple decks. I think it is more important to realize the strategy of how to play first versus going second. Also, don’t be afraid to mulligan. If you do, you will get to “draw” two sets of 7 (one seven, one six, play one, draw one) before your opponent goes. Gives you more chances for specific starts. Plus something like a first turn ember imp really sets the tone.

I have noticed that the decks I have seen played, including my own have either one faction be the top tier of the deck (the game winners), one the medium tier, and one more useless/situational. I have seen some decks with 2 synergistic houses and one thats along for the ride. I have yet to see a deck that truely works well with all three houses.

In my local play Group, Brobnar is almost always in the situtaion houses, except for one deck. which murders everyone. Dis tends to dominate in our local meta right now.

So, I would say all the houses are usefull, though it might not be true in every meta.

On 11/20/2018 at 10:03 PM, Strange1 said:

I can’t mirror the sentiments about going first. I have gone first on all but two games at multiple stores and playing at home and I have only lost one game split amongst multiple decks. I think it is more important to realize the strategy of how to play first versus going second. Also, don’t be afraid to mulligan. If you do, you will get to “draw” two sets of 7 (one seven, one six, play one, draw one) before your opponent goes. Gives you more chances for specific starts. Plus something like a first turn ember imp really sets the tone.

Yeah, in one of the games I played I didn't mulligan and I regretted it.

I think for me there is a lot of thoughts here that "ring true".

We have also had a Magic player go Meta on us, outlining his "good deck" and how we should all chase a similar deck.

Now, I wouldn't recognise a "good deck" if it bit me, I'll have to play and learn. I do hope that there are good decks and bad decks of all houses and varieties.

I am concerned though, because if it is true and there are meta concerns shaping the game then I fear the design brief was missed by a huge margin.

27 minutes ago, Amanal said:

I think for me there is a lot of thoughts here that "ring true".

We have also had a Magic player go Meta on us, outlining his "good deck" and how we should all chase a similar deck.

Now, I wouldn't recognise a "good deck" if it bit me, I'll have to play and learn. I do hope that there are good decks and bad decks of all houses and varieties.

I am concerned though, because if it is true and there are meta concerns shaping the game then I fear the design brief was missed by a huge margin.

A deck that is consistent is generally better than a deck that isn't. That is, if the consistency is meaningful. I think a double horsemen deck is likely to be really strong, but it doesn't necessarily make a great deck. Synergy is so important in the game, and the ability to destroy the Horseman of Death is the primary answer needed.

What I'd like to see in the expansion is a card that allows you to pick a trait and destroy all creatures with that trait. We have Custom Virus, true, but it requires you have a creature of the same type.

I don't mind that there are good decks and bad decks, that will be exactly what you get when you buy random decks.

But if you have to have Shadows, Dis and Untamed with "X", "Y" and "Z" represented in the deck then I am worried.

11 hours ago, Amanal said:

I don't mind that there are good decks and bad decks, that will be exactly what you get when you buy random decks.

But if you have to have Shadows, Dis and Untamed with "X", "Y" and "Z" represented in the deck then I am worried.

Oddly enough my best performing deck is Shadows, Dis, and Untamed. Its the first deck in my local meta to start getting chains to play it.

I think once the App updates to include chains and power, Metas will become much more fluid.

17 hours ago, Amanal said:

I don't mind that there are good decks and bad decks, that will be exactly what you get when you buy random decks.

But if you have to have Shadows, Dis and Untamed with "X", "Y" and "Z" represented in the deck then I am worried.

Being able to steal/capture/prevent keys is important. Being able to direct remove or mass remove is important. Being able to generate aember, forge out of turn, or prevent steal is important. Those are my top 3, as they are either direct counters to very bad things opponent decks can do, or get you to the win condition. Below that on tier 2 are things like sick combos, ways to cycle your deck or build up big turns, or disrupting the opponents board. If anything on tier 2 is strong enough, you may be OK having misses on tier 1, but you are probably in danger of some disruption effects or playing when chained. There's also a bit of a rock-paper-scissors: if your aember comes from creatures, you are weak to removal or strong boards. If your capture comes from artifacts, you are weak to artifact hate.

If all of your good stuff comes from action cards, you are in pretty good shape Only a few types of control, probably from dis, has a chance to slow you down.

All houses have options of varying performance in these categories. The fact that each deck contains 3 houses is smart, and minimizes the chance that you get a total whiff or require a specific house combination.

18 hours ago, Amanal said:

I don't mind that there are good decks and bad decks, that will be exactly what you get when you buy random decks.

But if you have to have Shadows, Dis and Untamed with "X", "Y" and "Z" represented in the deck then I am worried.

I don’t think this is the case.