I have been trying to modify the third turn adaptive format so that chains are bid at the beginning of the first game, rather than the third game. Here has been my thought process and where I am currently and I would like community feedback on specific numbers and how it might/might not work. TLDR at bottom.

First, if chains are bid at the beginning of the round, you can play single game rounds instead of three game rounds. This will help players experience more decks, and not spend as long battling between the same two decks, both of which I personally view as a positive. This would be the first change to adaptive, and will completely veer away from adaptive format, so I would call this format something like pay to play, which is a stupid name so, whatever someone come up with a better name.

Second, if chains are bid at the beginning of the round, I think casual players will suffer the most due to inexperience with new decks. For instance, if the round begins and both players get to look at the decks and then bid for which deck is more powerful, my opponent may think my deck is more powerful, I might think theirs is, my opponent bids 3 chains to use my deck, I bid 2 chains to play their deck and then what? What if the deck should have 12 chains, and mine none? Who decides, and isn't this all speculative and opinionated anyway? This is why I think simplifying the chain bidding process for this format to a specific chain limit and also including two decks in the setup should be used for this format.

So, how would this work: each player brings 2 decks to the event and is given a set number of chains to place on your opponent’s decks each round. Let’s use 7 chains as an example. I look at both of my opponents decks and divide the 7 chains I am allowed between the two decks however I see fit. Could be balanced with 3 and 4, or all 7 chains on 1 deck, however I personally feel my chains will be best spent, and my opponent does the same thing. Once we have both decided which deck we will pay to play, we reduce our chains to the lowest number possible (if my opponent's deck has 3 chains and my deck has 5, my opponent is reduced to 0 chains to start, and I start with 2. The point isn’t to have everyone starting with chains but to balance the game). These chains will NOT carry over from round to round.

Now, why not bring a deck you love and a deck that you hate and just plan on playing the strong deck with max chains, and you spread the chains you are given each round to minimize the impact? Starting with 3-4 chains isn’t horrible if you have an amazing deck. To solve this dilemma I came up with the following solution:

Each round that you win, the winning deck gets a set number of additional chains to encourage playing the other deck. My original thought is that it gets 1-2 chains. Swiss seating will mean that winning decks will play against winning decks so the additional chains won’t severely hamper the winners, but will make them think twice about bringing one strong and one weak deck but rather trying to balance their decks. If you keep playing the same deck over and over again, by the 4 ^th round you could have 4-8 chains on the winning deck, and your opponent could place an additional 7 chains on the same deck. 0 chains on one deck, or as many as 15 on the other will make you think twice about what you are playing. I have also considered that these chains will fall off each round that you don’t use the deck, but it might be hard to keep track of, so lower number of permanent chains might be better than a high number of chains that drop off later.

I think chain bidding is a great balancing concept, but could be very hard to incorporate without some easy parameters. Adaptive gives enough information about both decks to allow the players to bid appropriately, but it takes so long and rushes the best round (in my opinion). The goal of this format is to limit rounds to 1 game (goal met), make bidding chains easy for all players (goal met), and allow players the actual power to impact a powerful deck appropriately (goal met). The most problematic part of this format is the very first round if someone has a powerful deck, as that one will only have 3-4 chains maximum to start if the player is wise.

TLDR; new format, bring 2 decks, place a set number of chains (community input appreciated) on each of your opponent's decks that drop off at the end of the round, winning deck gets chains added to the deck to encourage players to use/bring two good decks rather than 1 powerful deck and a throwaway deck.

I actually like this intitially. I really love the balancing of Adaptive, and this does seem like a way to try and shorten the experience.

We tried this format at our local store last night and found that this was a VERY fun method of play. There will need to be some tweaks, but it's due to the chains system rather than the format.

When we ran the format last night we had 7 chains to bid each round and 2 chains were added as a winning deck. Once both players picked their deck, we reduced chains to the lowest value, so if I picked a deck with 7 chains and my opponent chose a deck with 4, My opponent would actually start with 0 chains, and I would start with 3.

The issues we had were that chains didn't do very much in the way of disrupting the game, and it's because of how many chains you shed by the end of the first turn, and what I feel is first player advantage when it comes to shedding chains.

When you start the game, if you have chains you draw one less card and shed a chain before the game begins. When you take your first turn, you also shed another chain, so the first 2 chains are gone at the end of turn one. For all formats with chain bidding, this is crucial to know.

First player sheds a chain when they draw their cards, meaning they draw 6 cards instead of 7. Then, when they play their one card, SINCE THEY ARE NOW BELOW 6 CARDS, THEY SHED A SECOND CHAIN. The first player has shed 3 chains by the end of their first full turn, and this is a HUGE BENEFIT! Typically the only way a player will draw a card on their very first turn as first player is if they mulligan, but since their hand size is reduced by chains they are guaranteed to draw cards after their first play which means they will shed a second chain during this turn. I personally feel that knowing who will go first would have an impact on how many chains I would bid because of this interaction with chains and the first turn rule.

After our first play, all players enjoyed this format thoroughly and we will be using this as a regular format. We are going to continue to tweak the rules of this format to work for our group, but bidding chains was not difficult when each player was limited to how many chains to bid. There were a lot of 3/4 bids, but there were some 5/2 bids, and higher when an opponent simply knew one deck would be stronger against their own decks, but all bidding took less than 1 minute to complete and then get playing. All players enjoyed the added strategy of both bidding on opponent's decks, and then picking which deck to play based on how many chains they would begin with, but all added rules only increased the enjoyment of the format.

What we are going to try the next time we use this format is instead of reducing chains at the beginning of the game (7 chains against 5 reduces to 2 chains against 0), we are simply going to say that whatever chains your deck has on it will start with that many. I have attached a PDF for TO's to use in their events, very basic explanation of rules on the sheet, and 2 circles that will need to be filled in for house rules on how many chains to bid and how many chains will be awarded for a win with a certain deck. I will continue to update this file going forward as this is only version 1.1, and tongue in cheek, it's named freemium after the whole loot box fun we've had here in the forums.

Please, if you have recommendations for tweaking the format, or this sheet, let me know, otherwise enjoy!

On 12/12/2018 at 11:08 AM, backupsidekick said:

The issues we had were that chains didn't do very much in the way of disrupting the game, and it's because of how many chains you shed by the end of the first turn, and what I feel is first player advantage when it comes to shedding chains.

I think this could this be mitigated by imposing a second restriction on the deck that starts with chains after applying the reduction. Specifically, instead of rolling to see who goes first, the player piloting the deck with starting chains gets to choose: either play first and accept additional chains on top of what you’re starting with (say +2), or play second and avoid this extra penalty. These extra chains would stack with any “permanent” chains the deck has acquired from winning previous rounds. This also makes the bidding even more interesting because how you divide your chains can influence who goes first.

Also, if we’re still open to naming suggestions for this format, I’d like to submit “Preemptive” to match the adjective nature of the name “Adaptive.”

On 12/12/2018 at 12:08 PM, backupsidekick said:

The issues we had were that chains didn't do very much in the way of disrupting the game, and it's because of how many chains you shed by the end of the first turn, and what I feel is first player advantage when it comes to shedding chains.

When you start the game, if you have chains you draw one less card and shed a chain before the game begins. When you take your first turn, you also shed another chain, so the first 2 chains are gone at the end of turn one. For all formats with chain bidding, this is crucial to know.

First player sheds a chain when they draw their cards, meaning they draw 6 cards instead of 7. Then, when they play their one card, SINCE THEY ARE NOW BELOW 6 CARDS, THEY SHED A SECOND CHAIN. The first player has shed 3 chains by the end of their first full turn, and this is a HUGE BENEFIT! Typically the only way a player will draw a card on their very first turn as first player is if they mulligan, but since their hand size is reduced by chains they are guaranteed to draw cards after their first play which means they will shed a second chain during this turn. I personally feel that knowing who will go first would have an impact on how many chains I would bid because of this interaction with chains and the first turn rule.

I am confused as to how the first player has an advantage. the first player draws opening hand and sheds a chain. then plays 1 card and goes to end turn and sheds a second chain instead of drawing a card. the second player goes. They have also already shed a chain from drawing their opening hand as well. They play cards from their hand and go to end step and also sheds a chain. both players have shed 2 chain at the end of their first turn and the benefits and detriments to going first or second are the same just with smaller hand sizes. How does the first player have an advantage?

On 12/13/2018 at 10:54 AM, Ebucklin said:

I am confused as to how the first player has an advantage. the first player draws opening hand and sheds a chain. then plays 1 card and goes to end turn and sheds a second chain instead of drawing a card. the second player goes. They have also already shed a chain from drawing their opening hand as well. They play cards from their hand and go to end step and also sheds a chain. both players have shed 2 chain at the end of their first turn and the benefits and detriments to going first or second are the same just with smaller hand sizes. How does the first player have an advantage?

Equal terms is both players starting with 6 cards. First player does this after playing their first card on, basically, turn 0 since it's not a full turn. If first player does not mulligan, then their hand state doesn't change from the first card they play, to their first full turn, basically they are playing part of their hand, then the rest of it on their first real turn.

When player 1 starts with 1 chain, they drop it when they draw cards, and even if they don't mulligan they will then draw new cards into their hand at the end of their first turn. That doesn't normally happen on turn 1, normally you play the rest of your cards on your next turn. Due to drawing that card at the end of the first turn of first player, the only hamper of chain 1 is limiting the very first card to a selection of 6 cards instead of 7, but that isn't a major handicap in any way, and has no lasting result. Player 2 starting with 1 chain limits the first full play to a selection of only 5 cards which is a bigger impact, or 4 cards if they mulligan. So 1 chain for player 2 is much worse than 1 chain on player 1.

With 2 chains, player 1 will drop both of them before they take their first full turn because of their hand size being reduced by the first chain below the draw threshold. This isn't normal without taking a mulligan for first player to be below the draw threshold so drawing on turn one will only happen about 50% of the time, maybe less. Since you would draw (regardless of if chains let you or not) you will drop a second chain before taking your first full turn, meaning at the end of player 1's first full turn they will have a full hand of cards. Player 2 will start with 1 less card, and still have 1 less card going all the way into their second full turn with 2 chains.

Player 1 needs at least 1 more chain than player two for the chains to have equal impact on the game in regards to impact to full turns, OR (and this is my personal thought) player 1 doesn't drop a chain at the end of turn 1, since it's not a full turn. I know this will never be official, but I think it would make chains more reasonable. I know there is reason to say I am wrong, this is just the opinion the other players in my store came to in regards to chains and player 1.

Hmmm...thats an interesting interpretation. This assumes that you are assigning zero value to player 1's actual first turn. Player 1 still only has 5 cards at the top of their "first full turn" I assume you are assigning value to a turn based on number of cards that can be played and not to number of cards seen when making a play decision. I do think that is debatable but I can now see your logic based on that premise. Thank you.