this is the deck currently dominating our small circle.

Shub-Niggurath / Yog-Sothoth

RE-OCURRING NIGHTMARE

Diseased sewer rats x 3
Guardian of the key x 2
Black dog x 3
Opener of the gate x 3
Ghoulish predator x 3
Many angled thing x 3
Hungry dark young x 3
Spell bound shoggoth x 3
Corrupted midwife x 2

Cursed skull x 2
Altar of the blessed x 3
Snow graves x 2

Unspeakable resurrection x 2
Chant of thoth x 3
Speak to the dead x 2
Burrowing beneath x 3
Come to the altar x 3
A single glimpse x 3
Foiled! x 2

just looking for ideas to counter as our group is VERY small, and this deck is only just starting to be refined ( to mill events / supports perhaps and increase characters if needed plus a couple of cards waiting in the wings ). also looking into different self sacrificing / ( resurrecting / back into hand ) of sewer rats / many angled thing like come to the altar.

any decks in your area that people are finding hard to beat??

***************FIXED ABOVE****************

this is really wierd in that i can't edit above unless i post a reply, then the option comes back. SORRY!!

but while i'm here, making a strong case to replace spell bound shoggoth is elder thing scavenger, to return cursed skulls and destroyed snow graves in the operations phase of a glimpse deck ( though guardian of the key is also here to screw with this deck type ). in this case the deck might mutate to SOMETHING like this:

RE-OCURRING NIGHTMARE

Priestess of bubastis x 3
Guardian of the key x 2
Black dog x 3
Opener of the gate x 3
Ghoulish predator x 3
Many angled thing x 3
Hungry dark young x 3
Corrupted midwife x 2
Elder thing scavenger x 3
Y’Golonac x 2

Cursed skull x 3
Snow graves x 2
Foiled! x 2

Eldritch nexus x 2
Feed her young x 3
Chant of thoth x 3
Speak to the dead x 2
Burrowing beneath x 3
A single glimpse x 3

for muchos exhaust / cursed skull / sacrifice / refresh ( repeat ), but i have plenty more playtesting / refining to do so i'll leave it at that and maybe keep the rest as a surprise!!

and BTW, is anybody attaching khopesh to gugs?? seems like a very good thing to do ( a 3 card bonus in one case ). spesh if you include rays of dawn and city of gugs ( 4 cards!! ). just a pity i refuse to make cthulhu decks.

its funny how actually seeing a deck in print can spur some new ideas. really liking the above deck, primarily for the extra domains. it was always an option to make the best use of chant of thoth, but now with priestess of bubastis along with opener of the gate, it might be possible to be bringing back ghoulish predators and black dogs for a measly 1 cost. i have been far too pre-occupied with having a restricted card though and with this change in deck foiled! ( a lingerer from the initial deck ) may be replaced by reckless elder thing ( another monster for the resurrecting ), or extra snow graves / guardian of the key / eldritch nexus.

nowhere near complete as it's been constantly changing for 2 months now ( especially with the intro of glimpse of the void and new AP's ) and may change further. i'm happy with it so far though.

im also constantly amazed and fascinated by how decks evolve. cursed skull was never in the original deck, which was a chant of thoth / gate opener / monster resurrector, then 2 copies edged their way in for being an artifact, and now may play a major role without the chant of thoth!! and it's still growing / changing. the addition of corrupted midwife / black dog / elder scavenger to the pool of available cards has only strengthened the deck, brought it off the backbench, and i can't wait to see more.

its also a good idea to keep up with these forums, because as someone pointed out ( kudos and thanks ), 'playing' a card is from hand only, so the initial deck i was actually playing wrong ( where i was sacrificing sewer rats with come to the altar to bring out hungry dark one and resurrecting sewer rats for another wound as it didn't specify 'from hand' - WRONG!! ). hence the big shift to the new deck.

lastly, m.jamburg will probably make his way into the deck, though prob only 2 copies. he's no good at returning cursed skull, but he might be useful to seal the snow graves / guardian of the key / m.jamburg anti - glimpse of the void play ( this should be the needed fix ).

COCLCG said:

I tried Gugs a while ago and found they were just too high a cost to build a deck around. There is a combo I was thinking of though to get them out faster. You need a Twilight Gate, Khopesh, and Puj-Dunk. Resource PujDunk, play Twilight Gate, put Puj-Dunk into play, attach Khopesh - clear your opponent's board, and put into play all your Gugs at the same time. Then when Khopesh comes up again, you can use your regular gugs to draw cards, exhaust, and/or wound other characters. They are weak to insanity and are a little slow, but maybe giving them investigation icons can speed things up. Maybe play The Locked Door. Also, this won't do anything against Glimpse if they can get it out turn 2 or 3.

didn't mean a whole gug deck, just laboring gug and khopesh in a cthulhu / yog deck.

latest EDIT to go into playtesting:

RE-OCURRING NIGHTMARE

Priestess of bubastis x 3
Guardian of the key x 2 / 3
Black dog x 3
Opener of the gate x 2 / 3
Ghoulish predator x 2
Many angled thing x 3
Hungry dark young x 3
Corrupted midwife x 2
Reckless elder thing x 2
Elder thing scavenger x 3
Y’Golonac x 2

Cursed skull x 3
Snow graves x 3

Eldritch nexus x 2 / 3
Chant of thoth x 3
Thunder in the east x 2
Burrowing beneath x 3
A single glimpse x 3
Speak to the dead x 2

thunder may make way for bast's hunt or something else. playtesting will reveal. any comments??

COCLCG said:

Interesting - given all the recursion ideas, I was actually thinking that Chant of Thoth had some interesting possibilities, looks like you are ahead of me on that one.

I think the main weakness of this deck - although it isn't much of one - would be anything designed to counter discard fishing, such as the usual suspects, The Stone on the Peak and Snow Graves. Granted, your deck does have support removal, but given the current direction in the meta, I can see decks that are packing a whole lot of ideas to keep supports in play, such as Guardian of the Key or Marcus Jamburg.

On a related note, I am coming to dislike the "must include in every deck" nature of Snow Graves - would be really nice to have faction-specific variants that allow players to wreak havoc on the enemy's discard pile.

One random thought, Syndicate could also cause some problems for this deck with Gregory Gry. Given the number of discard fishing decks floating around right now, I don't think I would play a Syndicate deck without taking Greg along.

haha. you can blame marcus jamburg for the return of snow graves to many decks i think. he's such a crap card. basically every single deck running s.destructions HAS to have snow graves now and i personally don't think there should be a card like this that practically nullifies a whole heap of other cards. i won't complain though, i'll just roll with it and screw him. which is why 'speak to the dead' is one of my favourite cards. with it you should be able to out snow graves and s.destruction most decks, hopefully making m.jamburg useless. another reason i'm almost maxed out in this department. i WILL have my discard pile to fish, and you WON"T ( haha - if i can help it ). i'd actually like the opponent to waste their card choices and domains trying to stop it so i can set up a nice nest of domains for a multi chant of thoth monster rush / single glimpse board cleaning. though of course my favourite design is the elder scavenger / cursed skull combo.

i'll also be the first to admit ( and i know its to my detriment ), that i'm a bit odd / idiosyncratic in that i really need to keep my decks 'pure'. so i probably wouldn't play snow graves in anything but a shub deck ( did ONCE and found out that jade salesman really sucks ), nor master of myths in a non - twilight deck. i like my cards to all get along ( one ticket to arkham asylum please ). and i flat out refuse to use cthulhu.

as for snow graves, i think it should remain a shub only card available to everyone. every faction has its strengths and weaknesses and as soon as you start giving them to other factions you might as well have miskatonic character destructions and agency support removal ( non - location ).

thanks heaps for the input / ideas and some cards i may need to keep an eye on and possibly modify to counter. feedback is ALWAYS appreciated and it's good to see you on the boards Runix ( and you too Danigral ) with all the entusiasm you have.

a cthuhlu version ( if i ever finally lose my resolve ) might look like this:

Degenerate serpent x 3
Guardian of the key x 3
Opener of the gate x 3
Brood of yig x 3
Many angled thing x 3
Laboring gug x 3
Guardian shoggoth x 2
Elder thing scavenger x 3
Hideous guardian x 2
Uroborus x 2

Cursed skull x 3
Khopesh of the abyss x 3

Eldritch nexus x 3
Chant of thoth x 3
Deep one assault x 3
Get it off x 3
A single glimpse x 3
Speak to the dead x 2

just wanted to get it up here before someone else rips the idea basically as i know its a pretty dangerous combination. but see what i did there ?? ( haha ). the hideous guardian can take a whole bunch of wounds for the khopesh wielder and then get brought back by chant of thoth / opener of the gate to do it again. dunno about serpents but meh, i only put 5 minutes into it and its 3am. no doubt when i really look at it sac. offerings and a coupla others ( spesh princess zura ) might make the cut but we'll see.

it's **** tempting i'll admit………

COCLCG said:

I used the Khopesh/Hideous Guardian combo at regionals except that I used Twilight Gate to recur the Hideous Guardian. Put just enough wounds so that he remains in play until the end of the phase so that he can go back into any of your domains instead of the discard pile from taking too many wounds.

Its quite fast as you can have the Khopesh equipped to any plebeian you control and pop out Hideous Guardian as an action on an opponents turn to wipe his characters out before he gets a chance to challenge stories.

very nice ( thought someone might be hiding this one - sorry ). its a wicked combo and perhaps in some areas we may see eye to eye !! hahaha.

did you ever come across bast's hunt ?? this is in a lot of my shub decks already to get rid of master of the myths.

the guardian shoggoth / laboring gug are both monsters too so with one chant of thoth / opener of the gate you can bring either back with the hideous guardian as soon as you get a khopesh in hand ( late game of course if it ever gets to that stage ). along with elder scavenger(s) / chant of thoth recurring cursed skull it should be pretty awesome once i streamline / refine the deck.

COCLCG said:

Very nice. I also thought hideous guardian would be great with khopesh, but always dismissed it as too expensive, so I totally forgot about it when I was considering this gug / twilight gate combo.

On aside note, though loosely related, I was playing last night, and apeirophobia is just brutal - it would destroy this combo before you had a chance to play it… Are there any thoughts on countering apeirophobia?

not much you can do against it i believe. i've pondered walk the path so it's equally as destructive and may make the opponent wary of playing it again.

i guess when i make decks i'm more aware of what i put into mine which isn't necessarily the trend. as stated, bast's hunt is a ridiculously good card for anti - khopesh plays and really should be in every shub deck. i will probably mod my yog / shub combo as stated and include:

bast's hunt

but perhaps also:

faceless abductor

as this second card is fantastic for instantly removing a low skill khopesh recipient straight after its played, which may send the khopesh to a snow graved discard pile.

one thing i'll say, its getting dangerous out there !!

On aside note, though loosely related, I was playing last night, and apeirophobia is just brutal - it would destroy this combo before you had a chance to play it… Are there any thoughts on countering apeirophobia?

also just another reason that i'm a drum beater for recursion decks / discard fishing. apierophobia has limited effects on most of my Yog decks and in some cases even speeds the process of what i'm trying to do!!

Well, yes and no. If you used Twilight Gate to put into play Hideous Guardian and your opponent apeirophobia'd it for 4 card discard, including your Khopesh before you had a chance to play it on the Guardian, then it's safe to say that is likely your entire hand. You'd probably want to drive it insane, but it would just go back to a resource. So it puts you at least a turn behind before you MAYBE draw into recursion or something to allow you to play twilight gate again, but maybe more turns if you have to get rid of a Snow Graves first. It's an interesting combo, but probably too easily disruptable.

Hastur/Cthulhu FTW.

AGoT DC Meta said:

it all depends on when the fear of infinity is played and what the state of cards in play are. Lets assume a lowly plebe has the Khopesh and guardian has yet to be twilight gated from a domain.

If you put apeirophobia on another creature who wields the Khopesh before a potential twilight gate occurs, then the player will likely choose discard to avoid losing the Khopesh due to insanity of the wielder, potentially losing the twilight gate event.

If you have already twilight gated the guardian, then discard is likely irrelevant and would be chosen over the insanity.

It assumes much on the player of the madness event to guess what is in the hand if the khopesh/guardian player.

Personally, I am not impressed by the otherwise fantastic fear of infinity.

hahaha. you've got it all wrong. Yog-Sothoth / Shub-Niggurath FTW

thing is ( and i'm not talking khopesh / guardian here, but my usual shub / yog decks ), i usually design them so that after a few turns they can basically run a whole turn or 2 without even touching my hand cards through various special abilities recurring cards from discard, so apierophobia really doesn't bother me, and as stated might put another card in discard that really helps me out anyway ( same with milling - love it !! ). quick decks usually start finding themselves short on cards in hand and this is why i moved to compensating with cards in discard ( and before you say it snow graves is road kill under the wheels of a yog / shub deck also designed to keep the discards free - and before you say it marcus jamburg is snot caught under the fingernails of a yog / shub deck also designed to lock down an opponent's discard pile ).

also cards like chant of thoth ( when part of a draw and played first before apierophobia can be ) gives a player the equivalent of 3 extra untouchable cards in hand, and when characters like corrupted midwife / elder thing scavenger ( possibly shock transformed in if cost is a concern ) and the great AO's Yog and Shub themselves are also available ( and these can be brought into play as early as turn 3 in some decks ), then who needs hand cards ??

that's why i love Yog / Shub. destruction decks are GENERALLY not a problem as the domains an opponent is using to do this are the mirror domains i'm using to just bring them back, and i can practically treat most of the discard as if it was sitting in my hand. it has enough sacrificing of its own to cause its own brand of havoc, superior in some ways for its card effect bypassing against wounding / destroyed, can continually remove any supports / relics that it faces while protecting its own, and blended together has a beautiful mix of terror / combat / arcane ( with a few investigations too if you want them ). finally it also has some really great cost for skill ratios happening ( 2:4 / 3:6 etc ).

zealous much ?? haha.

( and truthfully, everything i've ever said here and every deck i've posted is just blather when compared to my REAL yog / shub secret squirrel deck - i had to edit the above cause i almost gave it away !! - and the key is NONE of the above )

ok. spent the whole day playtesting and playing my first ever cthulhu deck ( boo hiss ). but i admit it is good, but not very satisfying as its a very easy faction to build a deck with. was against a friend and his sneaky syndicate / twilight deck ( skill / bouncing ). did discover that the hideous guardian / twilight gate combo is actually hideously flawed as it doesn't work against twilight who ( after all the work setting it up ) can simply pose mundane ( a staple in our decks ) the hideous guardian and lose a resource, to play farrington who returns the khopesh wielder to hand. i'll leave 2 copies in there for other factions but went back to my usual twilight gate of guardian elder thing with an added ravager of the deep in the opponents story phase after he has committed ( both non monsters ). ended the day with my deck looking like this:

HAVOC KAZ-ED-DUM EL ROMBOKO LOMAX

Cult of bathos x 3
Guardian of the key x 3
Faceless abductor x 2
Lurking deep one x 3
Many angled thing x 3
Laboring gug x 3
Elder thing scavenger x 2 / Deep one rising x 2
Hideous guardian x 2
Guardian elder thing x 2
Ravager from the deep x 2

Cursed skull x 3
Khopesh of the abyss x 3

Sacrificial offerings x 3
Twilight gate x 3
Chant of thoth x 2
Deep one assault x 3
Get it off x 3
A single glimpse x 3
Speak to the dead x 2

which cleaned his clock 3 - 0. but still plenty more refining to do. also played the reworked Yog / Shub version ( RE-OCCURRING NIGHTMARE ) which performed well from the get go but will also change a bit ( as i'm more familiar with playing this deck style - and the Y'golonac / scavenger / cursed skull worked a treat with the extra domains ). deep one rising / elder scavenger is still to be worked with but we ran out of time. basically you can sit back sacrificing and destoying / wounding for the first few turns to build up the domains and it goes downhill from there, spesh with guardian elder / ravager popping up mid story to wound all opposing characters ( poor poor mr. pan never lasted even a single story phase and master of the myths died very quickly with these 2 ). its brutal enough as it is and the only weakness / competition i foresee is a rush deck, so i may replace something with dampen light to counter this style of deck.

P.S. if you're wondering about the deck name, a long time ago we crossed the teenage mutant turtles RPG with the RoleMaster RPG ( an excellent mesh which converts smoothly ) to populate a fantasy world where a rogue warp mutated the creatures into humanoid forms. One character was an african Rhino berserker who killed / hacked / slew / maimed everything it came across. this is a tribute to that monster from the past ( mine was a ninja porcupine who could throw his own quills ).

COCLCG said:

Perambulans would be good, of course, for anti-rush. Then you may not need A Single Path either. Do you think you need that much attachment control with Get it Off and DOA?

( i'm guessing you're referring to the other completed version under DECK ).

can't have perambulans as already have khopesh. get it off is really the only attachment control i'll be using, for snow graves / khopesh / stygian etc. DOA is really just a cthulhu destroyer of low cost characters / supports and won't be used for attachments unless really needed, but its nice having the option. single path / dampen light are not just for rush decks. these screw with any deck for only cost 1 so with 5 it should be a fair chance from turn 1 the opponent will be seriously hampered, but a rush is the major weakness of most destruction decks. not with this one!! problem with most is they go too much destruction and are then vulnerable to a rare few circumstances. better to ease up and cover the bases i feel. so its not all about destruction, if it was the cards would be different. i've tried to make an overall good performer that limits the opponents play and destroys / sacrifices / abducts what does come out. and if you look closer you'll see that single path is not only a rush stopper. when played, the opponent will be forced to make a decision - do i commit more than one to have a hope of winning the single story, and if they do, hello twilight gated ravager.

and its ridiculously quick for a destruction style deck with 16 x 1 cost, 17 x 2 cost and 3 x DOA which i anticipate to be 1 or 2 cost. that's 36 of 50 very cheap cards, and the higher ones can be played with twilight gate for 2 cost as well. it can perform at nearly full capacity with only 2 resource domains, with no huge rush to get to 3 or 4 ( when it happens it happens ). all this time of course single path / dampen light will be popping up.

i'd advise you to try it and see. of course it's only version 1.0, has only been played a couple of times ( but ripped through 3 - 0 every time ) and has a couple of cards that may replace others ( like which of dragged into the deep / chant of thoth / speak to the dead / princess zura to take for example and whether -1 rising / ravager for +2 hideous guardian ).

a quick word on strategy is that i've found elder scavenger to be most useful in the opponents turn where you can commit it to make sure it gets the refresh, exhaust it to bring cursed skull back, and then it and a newly refreshed scavenger are waiting for you on your turn.

in saying that about elder scavenger, only it and chant of thoth are really in danger of being changed due to playtesting. apart from the others mentioned, guardian shoggoth and unspeakable resurrection are also on the table. time will tell.

COCLCG said:

Well, that resolve didn't last long!

COCLCG said:

It's a good idea . . . if only the designers would implement it.

The problem is, there are factions where the designers are fastidious about adhering to limitations on card design (such as Agency, which has virtually no ability to compete in the Terror struggle), and then there are factions that have access to everything. In the latter category would probably be Hastur and Yog-Sothoth; while they tend to be slightly more costly, they seem to have access to virtually every ability, not just all four struggle icons, but support removal, direct damage, action cancellation, discard pile control, etc., etc.

That very broad range in card design for Hastur, Yog, and to a lesser extent Shub is probably why they are gaining ascendancy in competitiveness. While they are less cost-efficient than Cthulhu (which in my mind wins the cost-efficiency battle hands-down) and slower than Agency and Miskatonic U, they have an answer for virtually every situation, which is invaluable.

Hellfury said:

It's combinations like this that are the reason why direct character removal is becoming the dominant strategy, I think. Basically, there are a lot of ways to move wounds around, shield characters from wounds, and shake up the Combat struggle, but you can bypass all that trouble with direct removal. Hideous Guardian shielding your Khopesh wielder is a great idea; and one that Lord Jeff doesn't find to be the slightest problem.