Sets owned: 1x Core Set, 1x BP#1, #2, #4 and 1x Assault on Ulthuan.

Mono-faction decks, with Neutrals added as needed, so each deck has the same amount of cards. I know there is no requirement for this, but it's the way I make up all my decks for all LCG/CCGs if they don't have one fixed number (Spellfire for example). I feel like especially in games where decking out is a lose-clause, it is important the decks have the same number of cards.

(rantish)

Okay, so it's still very early days, just 3 games in, but so far the High Elves have verified all the fears I had after the Assault on Ulthuan spoilers came out. Namely it is their lack of hitting power that worries me. In the three games they've played, they have burned 0 zones. Been close to burning a zone on couple of occasions, but good effort doesn't count for much, even less when I take into account the amount of work needed to get close to burning just one zone, let alone two to win. Their games have been against the three top factions, Chaos, DElves and Orcs, I'll grant that much, but it still doesn't show any light at the end of the tunnel.

Below are my thoughts on their problems.

Point #1: Lack of power. This is the big one for me. HElves have no units with 3 Power like Chaos, Dwarves and Orcs. Empire only has 1 3P unit in Thyrus, but they at least have the means to pump with Greatswords and Shrine to Taal, HElves have no such options. Only real booster HElves have is Isha's Gaze, except point #2 shows how useful that is. DElves have a couple of 3P units and a quest to pump their units, but so far for them, haven't seen that they have much need for more power, given their manipulation and sniping abilities, 2P is plenty when there is nobody to defend.

HElves have a few 2P units, namely the Swordmasters and High Elf Spearmen, along with their Heroes. Of these, Swordmasters are the main damage-dealers, being right at home in the BZ, where they also work perfectly for defense. Spearmen have so far been the equivalent of Savage Marauders, dropped to KZ hopefully on turn 1 for 5 resources on turn 2. This further reduces the hitting power of HElves. Should the Spearmen go to BZ and attack? Maybe that's a way to go, but then, they only pack 1HP so will go down fast. Then there are units that just baffle me with their lack of power, leading the way is the Dragon Prince. What dragon is this guy riding, Puff??? 1P, 4HP, argh. There is no doubt a personal bias in effect in general, given that the HElves were my first WH race back in the day, so seeing them as so utterly powerless saddens me.

Point #2: Healing. Or as in, how useless it is. Was supposed to be a major strength of theirs. In three games, there has been one occasion where healing has been used. What good are healing abilities when all your units keep hitting the discard pile if they defend? Dead men, err, elves heal nothing. This also ties in with point #1 I think. When you lack power, you can't kill of attackers in numbers, meaning the amount of damage they keep hitting you with drops slower than your output. Vicious cycle where you have to work your butt off to remove one attacker, while 3-4 have entered play in the meantime. And it's not like the Dragon Warriors help a great deal here. Their ability might be nice, but when you're facing 5-7 Power from just 2 units, they do nothing.

Point #3: Reset button. HElves have a resetter. Except all it does it put all units back to hand. BACK TO HAND?! Are you kidding me? Compared to Troll Vomit and JoV, it's pathetic. At least with those two, everything is destroyed, so they have a lot harder time coming back, with HElf card, they'll be back next turn. Okay, so not all will be back in a turn, but even here they lack oomph of the other resetters. Those factions that don't have a resetter (Chaos, DElves, Dwarves), they have other options with which to work around that lack. Chaos packs the most Power with its units (Great Unclean One on turn 3, 4P, 6HP, yes please), DElves snipe and manipulate, Dwarves can combo with Dwarven Ranger (speaking of which, why is that guy direct damage instead of indirect?) and they have nice HPs to go with decent Power. High Elves just seem low-Power, low-HP.

It also seems to spill over to other cards. Banishment? As in a weaker Pilgrimage? Great, just what they need.

I'm not saying HElves are a lost cause, but so far, there has been very little indication that they can muster enough power to win. What to do with them? Go with my utterly least favourite option, give them Infiltrate Quest (one of the few Neutrals that has not been used since the very early days) and play them as decking out deck?

zzzz. Oh, sorry, dozed off just thinking about it. Now, where was I?

Faction-mixing? It shouldn't be needed. If 5 of the 6 factions work as mono-faction, shouldn't the HElves work as one?

to be honest, i have worked around most of those issues.

Dragon Prince i agree...the 1P sucks. if power was increased and/or keep the 1P and destroy all but 1 BZ unit... The problem with him is that even if you're in that bad a shape that they have >2 units in their BZ, it is VERY likely they have 1 or 2 heavy hitters & the rest auxillary units. OK, maybe you're playing against weenie rush and it kills some Crooked Teef & Veteran Sellswords. Very good chance Dragon Prince is still going to die next opp. attack. Just too watered down for him it seems. Disappointed with him & Dark Sorceress, being featured on box.

Flames & Banish - Banish still a second choice to Pilgrimage (that can cost less & no restriction). HE, so-called Masters of Bounce, should've had this for cost of 2 or lose the Attachment qulifier. But even so, glad it's another option to return to hand. It's a good layer to a return-to-hand strategy that I feel is their best option. Flames is definitely playable more often than JoV, and since units are your main threat, i'm fine that it doesnt destroy or return to hand supports.

Units - yeah, they're weak, so use Repeater in the meantime! HE with Empire might soon be very good as an Empire weenie deck though. I also am not big on the healing, as most of the time it's going to be enough damage to outright kill the unit. So then you need unit damage cancellation, more cards...eh. The new HE relic CAN give some considerable power to ONE of your units. LIke i've said before, it pales in comparison to the Skaven one and seems to be one of the weakest Relics, but still can be good in a stall-centered deck. And I'm kind of puzzled about For Ulthuan!...i don't ever seeing having enough power to warrant attacking 2 zones simultaneously with HE as they stand now....i think it was included for their order buddies (mainly Empire)? Maybe shouldve been an order only neutral...

IMO any race should play to its strengths as much as possible, and exploit opponent's weaknesses as much as possible. HE right now are strong in stalling, returning to hand and arguably their most deadly opponents are rush, who fall in the later game if you last that long. One thing that is very frustrating when going this route though is HE lack of single unit REMOVAL and support removal. even support return to hand would be great, but definitely something to take care of really nasty guys like Sniktch. Also very tough to manage a DE discard/control deck

I find it quite annoying that repeater seems to be the only option right now. And it seems the only possibility to use flames the right way. Otherwise, if you´re going for lots of units in your BF to deal dmg, you hurt yourself the same way or even harder than your opponent most of the time. Thats what i dont like about the flames. I would love to see a healing deck. But as you said, most of the time units get wiped out and theres no chance to throw in some healing cards. It there were more chances to heal, glittering tower would almost be useful. Even with its "deal only ONE dmg for healing 6 hp or whatever". And blessings would be nice too, to get some extra hammers.

When I played a healing deck the first time, it seemed to me as if ffg thought highelves to go the healing-strategy but never playtested it.

true - unfortunately it leaves you VERY vulnerable if you rely only on the Repeater (i.e. 3 cards in your deck, max.) to win

all that being said (and in other threads on this forum) I really believe that the next cycle will take these & other order shortcomings into consideration by the designers and the tides may very well turn to Order being ahead in the arms race. At least one could hope that's how a LCG evolves!

Artemus Maximus said:

In the very first game with HElves, I had For Ulthuan in hand from early on, was hoping to get 2x Swordmasters to BZ then use it. 3x Swordmasters + For Ulthuan seems the ideal setup, 6P against 2 zones, your guys are protected from combat damage barring BT and such.

Dont you split up your damage? I wonder how I could deal 6 dmg to every zone with this card...

Kako K. said:

For Ulthuan allows you to attack two zones when used (normally can only attack 1 zone). Are 2 For Ulthuan cumulative? I wouldn't think so, since it says 2 zones, not one extra zones (or something like that).

On a related note, HElves burned their first zone today, against the Empire. Hooray ! Okay, so they still lost, not even close to burning second zone. Early Swordmasters + one of the 2P Heroes (Tyriel? I think he was) managed to burn the Empire QZ, "defended" by Huntsmen. Empire then used their Shadow Warriors against the HElves, Forced March + Twin-Tailed to swap Swordmasters to KZ, Spearmen to BZ. Start of HElf turn, assign the Shadow Warrior damage to Warrior Priest, redirect to Spearmen. Also, with Gold Wizard Acolyte and/or Surrender, Swordmasters can't even defend, so they lose even that one helpful aspect of their ability.

Check out the new card coming along with arcane fire. +3 power should give the missing dmg. But I wonder why skaven get the same power continously for only 1 ressource more...

You mean War Crown of Saphery? While I agree it might help with their power issues, it's still just 1 card (no, won't be buying 2 or 3x of any BP). Furthermore, it goes against their own resetter, namely if you return all units to hand, poof goes the WCoS, being an attachment. Add to that the big bullseye the unit with it gets and somehow I foresee a short lifespan for said unit.

So far since adding Assault on Ulthuan, Chaos and Dark Elves are 4-0, having each trounced the other four races. Tomorrow, those two face off. $49.99, only on Pay-per-View!

Will there be scantily-clad Dark Elves girls??? Hmmm...still, i think i'd use the money towards Horus Heresy lol

Kako meant the new Tactic revealed today from Arcane, Charge of the Silver Helms. cost:1 loyalty: 2. Action: One of you units gains 3 power and -1 HP till end of turn. Definitely a much needed card for the High Elves I'd say

it's almost like they're reading these forums....creepy!

Artemus Maximus said:

Agree on both counts !

Artemus Maximus said:

Kako meant the new Tactic revealed today from Arcane, Charge of the Silver Helms. cost:1 loyalty: 2. Action: One of you units gains 3 power and -1 HP till end of turn. Definitely a much needed card for the High Elves I'd say

Yep, just read the News after posting. Helps, especially if the card comes 3x (Arcane Fire is the last of the Corruption Cycle, so still old distribution, right?). Still, it's a Tactic, so one-shot, too cheap for the HElf retriever-Quest, no easy way to recycle it (unless I'm overlooking something). Permanent boosters would be more preferrable. Also, Mortella will love to hit you with it against you.

I have been able to win as high elves quite a few times over my friends DE/Orc/Chaos. Heres a hint. take out all the useless cards that do heals, as well as all the 1hp units. take out ishas gaze, glittering towers, Hell, take out shadow rangers too, because your foes will find a way to abuse that forced ability.. add some neutral support cards, and pick a few hard hitting units from dwarfs. Get some Runepriest to power up your swordsmen. Use Innovation (x3) to get out a lot of high hp units. In my opinion, with one core set and one of each battle pack, no high elves are currently going to need some help from the other order races to compete. I also think this is true for dwarfs and empire. One core set + 1bp each Destruction races > Order Races for sure.

High Elves + Dwarves/Empire is not a mono-faction deck, which is what my decks are and what they will be. Like I said in the OP, if 5 of 6 races work as mono-faction, shouldn't the HElves works as one?

If you refuse to take advantage of all the options, then your complaint is without merit. You may as well be complaining you can't build a deck with just Support cards and no Units.

Evilgm said:

Every other race works with mono-faction setup. None of them need any help. I don't see why HElves would need to take in other options, like the other 5 races, they should work in mono-faction.

So you're saying there is no way for the HElves to win unless you play mixed factions? Why did FFG bother to give us 6 factions then? Why not just Order and Destruction sides, if they are "meant" to be mixed fully in regardless of their race? Since apparently HElves can't work in mono-format, there is no point in having HElves faction in the first place, should've just given us 2 sides and cards without loyalty symbols (unless they have Order or Destruction loyalty).

Also, aren't there already non-unit decks posted?

Throwing in my Call of Cthulhu experience as well, that has 7 factions. I also use mono-faction decks in CoC these days and they all work. So in two LCGs, 13 factions, 12 of which work in mono-format. To me that points to an inherit weakness in the HElves that they can't function on their own.

At the risk of pointing out the obvious, new cards come out _every month_ so I do not expect it to be long before the card pool is deep enough for HE to be at least somewhat competitive in a mono-race deck. Right now they're not though. They do have a bunch of good cards - e.g. Swordmasters, Dragonmage, Temple of Vaul, Silver Helm Brigade, Repeater Bolt Thrower, Gifts of Aenerion - so it's really just a matter of time.

Clamatius said:

Not sure I'd class these two as good cards (assuming you mean Silver Helm Detachment from BP4 and not the Silver Helms that came with Core Set, though neither is a favourite of mine). ToV looks great, 3P for 3E, meaning you can it on turn 1 for 6 resources on turn 2, but the 2 dmg to capital per turn, you almost want a support-removal eventually, which of course, HElves don't have. Otherwise you're hoping to win fast, which I just can't see HElves doing rushing with the current selection. Having 2 of the cancel 1 damage to capital Neutral would make ToV very nice, but getting all 3 early seems again hit and miss at best. Silver Helms, 1P, 3HP, with the option of boosting to 2P three times (but still once per turn, so no 4P rushes). Nothing too exciting or powerful. At least not when compared to similar units from other factions. On the HElf scale, they are one of the better units, which is another sign of how weak the faction is atm (put the Silver Helms to another faction and would they even see play?).

Savage Marauders are 3C for 2/1 and that's a reasonable unit. The Silver Helm Detachment (that's the one I meant) is 3H for 1/2, pumpable 3 times. I like it much better than the Marauders or the Spearmen given the Dark Elf 1 hp hate. Is it a Deathmaster or Clan Moulder's Elite? Clearly not.

Temple of Vaul, on the other hand, is much better than it looks. Its downside is definitely a big downside but 3 hammers on a single card that's playable turn 1 is not to be sniffed at. It's already seeing play in the unitless thrower decks.

Dam said:

I agree that there are few opportunities to use their healing abilities in the game. I usually use their healing powers on the indirect damage left by the Loremaster of Hoeth or on the single point of damage left on the Dragonmage.

Clamatius said:

I think there is a difference in where one plays the unit as well. For me, Savage Marauders are THE Chaos KZ unit, one I always hope to have in my starting hand (very likely a mulligan if it's not in there). But that is because one can "afford" to them there, Chaos has SO many hitters available, having 2x Savage Marauders in KZ doesn't impact their damage-dealing one bit, not with Savage Gors, Great Unclean One, Bule, Chaos Knights, etc. on offer for BZ. If you the SHD to KZ, you're losing another optional 2P unit from BZ, further reducing the already weak HElf offense. And in BZ, 2HP leaves them open for quite a few Tactics.

DElves do like to hate on people with 1HP, that's very true. Will see what goes down today in the Chaos vs DElf game, two undefeated factions (since adding AoU) going head to head.

Dam said:

This is a good example of why you shouldn't be so obsessed with mon-faction decks. If you print support removal for each faction then each faction has the option of playing all the support removal for their side (Order vs Destruction) which could lead to some very negative play experiences. Whilst teh basic themes of a faction should be supported by faction cards not everything you want for High Elves with have a HE icon in it for balance reasons.

Chaos lacks support-removal, but it does well enough without it (so far in almost 100 plays Chaos tops the win-loss column). Chaos gets around those issues with Power, Power and more Power. DElves also lack support removal, but because their unit removal is the best out there, again, they get around the issue. Orcs have the best support removal and pack a punch. Dwarves have support-removal and unit removal with D. Ranger, Slayers, Quest, etc, though not in the amount the any of the Destruction factions have. Empire is full of tricks, JoV can remove all supports and units, but rarely does these days. Still, if your units aren't in the zone where they attack (Forced March) or just plain can't defend (Gold Wizard, Surrender), again, Empire has ways around the issue. Leaving only HElves with neither unit removal or support removal. They move units back to hand, but theirs go back as well, minor BZ sniping with Shadow Warriors (which probably the Orcs rushes don't like).

I don't see how each faction having some options in support removal for example can lead to negative experiences TBH. And here's another tidbit I thought about while putting together the decks are getting Assault on Ulthuan. If you only have 1x Core Set and 1x AoU, each faction has 45 cards. But there are 34 Neutral cards (not counting Alliances), meaning if you add 5 Neutrals to each factions, voila, you get 6 fully legal 50-card mono-faction decks. Coincidence? Could be, but seems doubtful.

I'll agree I have a bias toward mono-faction decks, but what's the obsession people have with mongrelman deck as the flipside? For me, since I own the cards and we play with my decks, I want as many decks that are (or should be) competitive against each other. Why as many as possible? Well, having 6 decks means 3 games without seeing the same deck twice in a session whereas 4 decks means only 2. Like in games where you play a character, I don't want to see the same character two games in a row, for card games I don't want to play with or against a deck that has already seen action in the session. From the cardpool I have, I'm very doubtful I could make 6 mongrelman decks, but making 6 mono-faction decks was pretty simple.

Dam said:

Imagine if a similar version of Pillage was printed for each Destruction faction. A Destruction control deck could then run nine copies of what's effectively Pillage and keep you locked out of the game for turns as they are likely to see muliple copies of the card across turns 1-3.

crowdedmind said:

So? Less Supports more Units leaves Pillage less useful. Use all Unit-Tactic deck and your opponent just wastes 9 spaces in his deck. If you're too reliant on Supports, you deserve to get hit by Pillage. Same goes for the other side of course, heavy on units, Troll Vomit will hit you hard. Certain decks will beat other decks easily while get crushed by others, it's generally the nature of the beast with ccg/lcgs. Which I suppose is as good a segway as any to...

the HElves win ! First win, woot! Against Dwarves. Key proved HElves heavy use of Supports in the KZ, seeing them collecting 17 Resources per turn (Treasure Vaults, 3 developments, 2x Contested Stronghold among them) while the Dwarves in a combination of bad draw and planning were getting pretty much all of their resources and cards from units (they'll know better for next time). Flames of the Phoenix thus hurt them bad, while the HElves recovered with 3x Swordmasters and Spearmen back into play over the next two turns, while the Dwarves were stuck on 3Res, 1-card.

I'm still not happy about HElves, but perhaps the light has been lit. Even more than Chaos, HElves might be about KZ, dump everything you got into it, because you'll need them. 4 for Flames, then you'd still want 10+ in store to replay units just returned to hand, to make the no-defense window count. But if you take for example 12 Resources, 4 for Flames, leaving you 8 for 2x Swordmasters, giving you 4 dmg. Compared to the Orcs for example, Troll Vomit to clear the board, then 8 resources left, 3x Spider Riders, 3x Crooked Teef and 2x Choppa packs 13 dmg! Okay, very hypothetical, Orcs should still easily get in 6+ dmg after TV if they have somewhere around 8 resources left over.

On a side note, the main event (undefeated Chaos vs undefeated DElves) didn't really live up to its hype. Chaos utterly annihilated the DElves 2-0, taking a whole of 1 dmg to their capital, dominating from start to finish.