Once more... HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

To explain the background, there's been lots of speculation on the power level of ***J.Talbain*** and arguments regarding his potential banning. There are threads on both General Discussions and on the Deck Forum arguing this fact. Some of the US players have also hinted at James Hata's experiences in New York playing against Talbain decks. It is the combination of the arguments surrounding Talbain and perhaps James' own experience against Talbain that may lead to Talbain being banned/on watch list.

I am not going to go into the arguments in this post.

Instead, how does Talbain affect the UK meta? Is he widely played or feared? Are players over here building dominant Talbain decks? I am very concerned that the Talbain situaton will turn into CSS/Odious Scion II, where cards that do not greatly affect the UK are banned.

For my take, I would like to play the same ban list as the US (especially if trying to go to Worlds/US Nats this year), but at the same time, our game and meta are very different and what I would prioritise first. I am not completely sure that banning CSS/Odious Scion/Talbain really are necessary in the UK meta, where, perhaps, characters such as Tycho have previously had a much greater impact than in the US.

In terms of Talbain, because Baz/Justin have Talbain decks in Sheffield, others of the Sheffielders keep our hands off "their" character, so to speak. I also know both of them would be very disappointed should Talbain be banned.

well to be honest matt i built him as i thought he woudl be fun and he was nothing of the sort after playing him in huddersfield i felt he was a disgusting experience for the oposition to have. I lay no claim to him in sheffield though micheal does enjoy playing him.

I personally woudl liek to see the back of that version of him or errated to when he has a moon token when someone lays a foundation the other person can as well. this weaken hims enough so that he is still hard to play agianst and not ovelry broken.

As i said after the teams i am dismatling him and not bringing him out unless i really need to and that has not arrised and i now feel it wont have to arrise

Well I've played against a ***Talbain*** deck all of once, an un-finished one at that, and I was playing Promo Alba, so we both had the opportunity to abuse his free-foundation ability as we always had full hands every turn, any other character and I'd have been in real trouble. That being said, I only won by one-shotting him with Concealed Shallow Swipe, and I very nearly didn't win simply because of the sheer amount of foundations I had to explode to get past his huge health and damage reduction foundations. When I say unfinished, I mean it lacked Blood Runs True and Rejection, two staples in your average Talbain deck, were it finished I doubt I'd have stood a chance.

Now that that's been said this next statement will sound slightly odd. I don't care either way about Talbain. Objectively I recognise that he could be problematic for the game state, but I find myself unable to muster the required ****-to-give.

Over in Colchester, we had one or two Talbain incarnations floating around upon DS02's release. However, the sheer fact that he was boring to both the player and the opponent drove said Talbain players away from playing him any more. In competitive play, we did see Baz's Werewolf Terrorist eating face with Lupine Spike, and actually saw how well he could be played whilst keeping the fun factor going.

IMO, Talbain discourages players from playing foundations, which is an intergral part of the game. Though he doesn't prevent foundations being played a la Cammy4, it's still considered to be an NPE. Even still, players can play against him by playing less foundations and forcing the Talbain player to play foundations instead of planting them with his ability. The shop assets (especially Lynette's) help with this. However, this means people have to modify their decks to contend with ONE character, which proves a problem with said character.

In short, I'd rather give him the errata/ban/whatever decision is made, than let him become ridiculous like Hugo3 did.

it's true, he is amazingly good, but by no means unbeatable, at nationals i lost games to mai (evil control) ibuki (evil aggro) and went to quite a few long drawn out games against sakura, donovan and others, yes he's strong and can be degenerately fast but so can zi mei, yang, felicia and a host of other characters that nobody complains about. he has 6 handsize and given the amount of attacks,assets and actions he really needs to function properly you will concievably pull 2 to 3 foundations in your starting hand, a smart opponent will drop everything he can, true you get 3 free foundations but your opponent could end up with 5 to 6 cards on the board and all it takes is an olcadons to deal with your lord of the makai or a blood runs true to hack your lupine spike to seriously slow you down to the point where other decks will muller you. you really need to overlay the promo and drop a lost cathedral ruin to make the most of his card draw ability which is your first turn tied up without attacking, plus the fact that you are automatically guaranteed to roll a lupine spike the first time you attempt to play one! I will admit his vitality is far too high, as a 21 - 23 vitality character he would be far more balanced but thats a mute point, he is what he is, and i for one will keep building the werewolf terrorist for as long as i'm able as if he is banned i'll have fun in the meantime and if he isn't people need to play against him to be prepared for what he can do.

Being someone thats never really been bothered by cards being banned almost at all, I don't really mind whether he gets barred or not. For Baz's sake, I hope he doesn't, as it seems to be his favourite character. But to be honest, I wouldn't be surprised if it did happen. And think about it, even if he does get banned, if we don't believe him to be overpowered, we can always allow him to be played in tournaments in the UK as long as he doesn't go out of control. However, Baz's build is different to these supposedly unbeaten decks in that he aims for an aggressive Spike turn, while others seem to play him to slow the game down to a crawl. I agree that it wouldn't be fair to punish our people for that, but perhaps the reason we don't see him as overpowered is because none of us have built him that way to experience it. I don't like to see anyone upset by their favourite character getting banned, but if it does happen, at least there's still Talbain.. to play with, so he'snot completely lost, and it isn't as if he's naff.

Either way, I'm hoping this long awaited state of the game comes out sooner rather than later so that the discssion can be over and done with.

Being someone thats never really been bothered by cards being banned almost at all, I don't really mind whether he gets barred or not. For Baz's sake, I hope he doesn't, as it seems to be his favourite character. But to be honest, I wouldn't be surprised if it did happen. And think about it, even if he does get banned, if we don't believe him to be overpowered, we can always allow him to be played in tournaments in the UK as long as he doesn't go out of control. However, Baz's build is different to these supposedly unbeaten decks in that he aims for an aggressive Spike turn, while others seem to play him to slow the game down to a crawl. I agree that it wouldn't be fair to punish our people for that, but perhaps the reason we don't see him as overpowered is because none of us have built him that way to experience it. I don't like to see anyone upset by their favourite character getting banned, but if it does happen, at least there's still Talbain.. to play with, so he'snot completely lost, and it isn't as if he's naff.

Either way, I'm hoping this long awaited state of the game comes out sooner rather than later so that the discssion can be over and done with.

I LOVE this thread, sheerly becuase it proposes my Idea of UFS- it's the game in YOUR hands.

Cheers Hewittzil.

- Love Hanzo