I'm going to take a break from the game - well, ok, I might play a bit of draft but I'm giving up on constructed. The current constructed metagame is pretty broken and it seems to be getting worse rather than better as more BPs are released this cycle. Even the Skaven madness (right after the Deathmaster's BP) was a lot better than the current state of the game. I doubt that I will be buying any more product unless it looks like game balance has had more love.

The main culprits in this are:

• Repeater Bolt Thrower.
• Mining Tunnels.
• Reclaiming the Fallen.

The basic design ideas of the first 2 cards are fine, it's just that the execution of them is poor. For simplicity, I would say they should probably just be banned for constructed play rather than any nerfing/uniqueness/etc messing around. I suspect that would improve the diversity of the metagame by a lot.

FWIW (which is not much), "fixed" versions of the cards which execute the idea might read something like:

Fixed Repeater Bolt Thrower. 2HHH. Battlefield. Siege. Action: At the beginning of your turn, spend up to X resources to deal that much indirect damage to target opponent. X is the number of developments in this zone. (Players assign their own indirect damage.)

Fixed Mining Tunnels. 4DDD. PP. Building. Forced: When you play a development from your hand, draw a card.

I wouldn't make Reclaiming the Fallen at all because I think it is out of flavour for the Dwarf faction. That effect is much more in flavour for High Elves. Dwarves should pay a very steep premium for it if they get it at all.

I'm pretty slow when it comes to these things. Why is Mining Tunnels considered broken? I don't understand why drawing a card is really overpowered. In another thread someone mentioned that in multiples it becomes awesome (which I agree with) but you replied that it's broken all by itself, only 1 copy in play. I guess I'm just not seeing it - but I admit I am not a top-tier player and there's lots I don't see haha.

I really believe this game's "sweet spot" is not at the tournament level, but in the casual play. My friends and I don't use the bolt throwers because they just aren't fun, we've developed a few small house rules (such as the ability to play a quest to an existing unit and not just having to play a unit to an existing quest), and we keep the deck strengths purposely nerfed a little bit (maybe 15-20%). And we consider this one of the most fun games we've played in years. We are addicted haha. It breaks my heart that our intense enjoyment of this game can't be felt at all levels of play. I hope the game develops into something you can enjoy again.

Aww, man! I haven't even got March of the Dammed yet. And the next BP should be out in a week or two, too. I only really get to play the first Friday of each month and maybe another random weekend day thrown in each month. I wish I could play enough to be burned out as well.

If you ignore Silent Forge, the meta is actually pretty fun as a trio of Orc/Undead control, Bolt Thrower, and Dwarves.

Silent Forge completely broke the game right in half though. There are no viable destruction decks at all, and no viable order aggro decks that have game against both thrower & dwarves.

@Tauwolf: are there any other cards in the game that give 2 hammers @ 2 cost with no drawback? Errant Wolf is flimsy and easy to kill, and has limited, AND has quest only, and they print Mining Tunnels? Really? And as I said in that other thread, Mining Tunnels do not "get better in multiples". They are always 2 hammers (1 of which has to be in quest) for 2. Actually better than that since you can develop as soon as they enter play,meaning there is no card-neutral means of destroying them short of Grimgor: you are almost always behind on cards and board position the moment your opponent plays one.

Reclaiming the Fallen is such a joke its not even worth talking about. How did that one get past development?

ddm5182 said:

Just a quick question fellas. Where is the mining tunnels 2 hammers coming from and why do you need one in each of two zones? Am I missing a FAQ is there an in play trick to this? My group really doesn't care where the tunnels end up it's just the play a developement and draw a card that is important to us with the order in chaos combos that go with it.

And perhaps it is time for you to take a break. I mean you're beating your heads on a wall that you made yourselves. That is you've fixated on the problems you percieve in the game to the point where you lose the game against them before you sit down to play. A lot of games are like this and you have to step away and come back fresh to adapt. Otherwise you're just playing a frustrating game that will only make you unhappy and draw others into a spiral of not so helpful negative feedback instead of positive feedback that a company is likely to use.

Why not take two weeks or even a month off, come back to the game build some brand new decks with none of the old play ideas you had before and record your results. List what cards you use and what combos against different recorded opponents and their decks/combos. Do something other than hang out here bashing a game you play. Not that you might intend it that way. Just saying when a game company checks their forums the first topic they read isn't "game too broken". And it's certainly not a topic they are going to take seriously if you don't spell out some research to match up with theirs. I'm pretty sure at the regionals and nationals they are taking in feed back and results and using it to change the game. They'd probably use the forum as well for all the local events they miss but not if the tone of the post is acid.

ddm5182 said:

This is unfortunately true. At the moment bolt thrower and dwarves are unbeatable. Destruction decks have no chances against them. Current meta looks like this:

1 Bolt thrower (Earlier dwarves were a viable response to it, now the bolt thrower shoots in the second turn with Outpost of Tiranoc for 0+1 indirect damage 150 times. Unless faq'ed it 's a valid tactic.)

2 Dwarves (Minning Tunnels+Ancestral Tomb+Master Rune of Spite. Now they're getting Reclaiming the Fallen...)

3 Empire (Thank's to Long Winter it's almost impossilbe to protect from Verena)

4 Orcs

5 Dark Elves, High Elves and Choas (not particularly in that order)

Also Order in Chaos is so broken. Especially compared to it's destruction equivalent.

If a card lets you draw one card every turn, it is the same as a single hammer in the quest. Mining Tunnels has it's one printed hammer and another quest-only hammer from it's ability. It's like two Contested Villages in one AND you would still have a third resource to play an actual Contested Village on the first turn, and that's STILL a slow start for Dwarves.

f7eleven said:

Ah that is how we've been using it and it's been nice for the dwarves and order in general

Can anyone post some examples of said "broken" decks? I mean I've tried building a few of them but so far my group is fairly capable of putting them down. And we do so love a challenge.

Bolt thrower does not shoot for 0+1 damage with the outpost. First of all, Outpost says when you deal indirect damage, deal one more. When you shoot for 0, you are dealing NO indirect damage. It doesn't need a FAQ to realise that.

Sining said:

Battlefield. Action: Spend X resources to deal X indirect damage to target opponent. X is the number of developments in this zone. (Players assign their own indirect damage.)

I think you're mixing assigning with dealing. When I'm spending X resources I'm dealing X damage. If X is zero I'm dealing 0 indirect damage which my opponent doesn't have to assign. But with Outpost it becomes 0+1. Just like Extending the Wastes corrupts 0 cost units for free.

About broken order decks. Which destruction deck can compete with for example: Champion's Dawrf deck?

I'm definately not seeing Outpost allowing BT to do 0+1 dmg. Outpost works when you deal indirect damage, when you deal 0, you are not dealing damage.

Dam said:

The man has a point. In this case imaginary numbers do not equal 1. It's the same as I give you no apples but the sale says buy an apple get one free. If you don't buy an apple you don't get one for free. Many of the zero functions do work in this game but not that one.

And would someone care to make a deck list for at least one of these "Broken" decks or are they like that joke from the monty python skit that people die from reading or hearing read a loud? (think about it there's a bad pun I not so cleverly put in there wink wink nudge nudge)

Mentioned champion's deck:

3-Master Rune of Spite
3-Burn it Down
3-Mining Tunnels
3-Ancestral Tomb
3-Slayers of Karak Kadrin
3-Dwarf Ranger
3-Long Beards
3-Demoliton!
3-Innovation
3-Stand Your Ground
3-Grudgebearer
3-Dwarf Cannon Crew
3-Contested Village
3-Warpstone Excavation
2-Great Book of Grudges
2-Grudge Thrower
2-Zhufbar Engineers
2-Zealot Hunter

It doesn't even include Reclaiming the Fallen but I'm waiting for a competitive destrucion deck Harliquine will post soon enough I hope

You can either look in the Deckbuilding Forum or at Clamatius deckbox: deckbox.org/users/clamatius

From a programming pov:
Deal damage is not not called, it is called with 0 as parameter.
Being called 1 is added resulting in 1 to deal.

@ Pogo: In the sense of COMMON SENSE and NOT BREAKING THE GAME FURTHER, 0 is no damage and can't have 1 added. Stop being stupid! (and that's not at you directly, it's at every CCG player who intentionally tries to **** things up when it's clearly not the way it was meant)

@ Harliquine: If you guys will hurry up and have another tournament I'll show you a deck you can't beat. :-)

[ ADMIN: EDited for profanity. Please keep it clean.]

As everyone can tell from my quite conspicuous absence from the boards, I've also lost my zest for the game. I still faithfully run weekly leagues (as it is the only plausible OP format that the game can be run in), but haven't played a social game in months. We've all been playing a lot of HeroClix over here in Orlando, much to my chagrin (harboring much grudge against the Geppi-stapo). That and Ultimate Frisbee (just discovered it, lots of fun). I got 13 people to my W:I Regionals after 2 months of tireless hyping, and 18 to a mere HeroClix booster release with only 1 online posting 5 days before the event. My W:I league has shrivelled from 9 weekly regulars to 2 over the last 2 months. And the main reason cited for this by the players who have dropped is that the game has gotten too predictably myopic. Boring infini-loops and mindless indirect damage (absolutely no strategy or creativity necessary) made all my people shrug and shuffle over to other games, mostly minis (40k, Hordes, Warmachine, and Clix). I'm giving Invasion some time to find its feet like many others are doing

Ha i know who that is, MJ. Im sadly one of the regs hes talking about.. and even im thinking about jumping ship to clix...

imo they are printing some OP stuff just to "balance" out the game.. Check out those new HE dragon... hes OMG good.. for little cost. This game is out of control for a competive format.

Ruling for fun:

Outpost of Tiranoc

2 H

1P

Building

"When you DEAL indirect Damage, deal an Additional Point of indirect damage."

you have to assign a point of damage type "indirect" before it even is effected.

Dealing the dmg = Assigning it.

it dosn't add damage to the sending out, but to the assigning it. IE if you stop the damage or there is no damage, it wont add to it.

SO cards with toughness STOP the additon. Before you cry and say it dosnt, Toughness IS DAMAGE CANCELATION. The Damage was NEVER delt so the Outpost will never add to your damage. (as long as you cancel all of it with the toughness skill.)

HENCE, Paying 0 to RBT will not deal 1 (or 3 if you have all 3) indirect damage, because you never assign that zero. AS for RBT decks.. they are over powered in a sence, but each side of the game has a way to stop it, as well as long winter to pop up the dev that powers it.

it would work like this

player 1) Pay 1 to RBT

Player 2) puts 1 Ind Dmg on his board

player1s Outpost sees hes dealing Ind Dmg and adds 1 more to the stack

player2 adds another point of Ind dmg to his side of the board

the order of chain resolves. last in first out. since its being resolved you cannot add more to it, so the outpost willnot chain to itself or the RBT point of dmg.. it dosnt all happen at once.. you have to PLACE it for it be delt.

EDIT: Im not saying it not broken.. going 1 cost for 2 dmg is SICKING but it can be stoped, tough units (both side have them) as well as counter spells (to stop flames) = gg to RBT.

i think the next x-pac will change alot. and the next 2 battle packs will do something ot this game.. either good or bad.. that new DE brain control is nasty.

Zephe said:

This is all theory, practice (championships) shows that bolthrower CAN'T be stopped and ONLY one side has a real answer to it which is Dwarf (ranger...).

A little confused. I agree Bolt Thrower is really really good and maybe close to being broken, but I did not think it was in the Winner of Gen Con Championships deck???

Berning22 said:

It didn't. The winner carefully looked over the deck and saw that it relied on a developement heavy resource engine and a single developement/support in the battlefield. He played a counter strategy with a solid deck behind it. I think what the previous poster was talking about was the regional events where bolt thrower and skaven decks did very well until bolt thrower decks became a little more perfected. With everyone focused on countering skaven nonsense no one was prepared to deal with a unitless deck doing indirect damage which was previously thought unplayable. But when treasure vaults came out combined with mining tunnels and contested stronghold the mid to late game strategy was formed. The early game was all ready there with all the damage cancelation which many decks did not bother to counter. So here we are today with a stalemate of the usual. That is a series of players in any given game on a forum looks over the playing field of strategies and declares something unbeatable. It's not just here in this game if you were wondering.

Capable players adapting to the times and practicing their game and sharing their ideas on how to over come such walls is what we can do.

Tha company will collect their results from tournaments and gradually change the game.

The ugly truth of card games is that in a competitive environment the traditional CCG only has 2-3 very consistant winning deck themes. Here in the LCG format that seems to have no phasing out cycle of cards we have a bit longer to wait for the kind of environment that casual players enjoy from other games where there are many more themes but the result is still getting your combo to work first and keeping it in place. But I do like the challenge. It's like a puzzle I have to solve so if you come across a new monster of a deck I want to hear about it. I want to find a way to beat it with a deck that is not just catered as a counter to the first problem.

Yes, Dwarves have gotten too much good stuff lately. Mining tunnels does seem particularily unfair to me also. And I don't have the latest pack, but Reclaiming the Fallen looks absolutely ridiculous. Grudgebearer is another overpowered card they got recently. My friend puts them in his Kingdom and he gets massive resources from them, the record so far is 30 something resources a turn, but its normally in the teens or 20's, which obviously is more than enough to win the game. Dwarves right now are broken IMHO. The only time I can beat him is when I get a god draw using the Skaven, and he can't get his Dwarves up and running in time to prevent losing the game to a quick Skaven crush with Deathmaster Snicht combining with the other skavens for an overpowering advantage. But that is a rare event, and Dwarves are definitely overpowered right now. Hopefully in the future expansions they will bring out some powerful cards for the Chaos faction and the other groups so that there is at least a fair chance to beat the Dwarves.

For the time being, I am going ask my friend to play another faction instead of Dwarves so the game can at least be competitive.

fun card to bring back orc/skaven, is this one that stops damage cancelation.. IE toughness or fog cards.. lets you go for wins quick vs UBT decks.

Zephe said:

You mean Mob Up which gets cancelled by High Elf's Disdain?

And making the 0 damage from the flamed units uncancable?