Magic: Planewalkers on Expansion 3
PostPosted:Sun Jan 02, 2011 8:36 pm
Anybody play Magic The Gathering: Duels of the Planeswalkers? It's a lot of fun and a lot less setup than the real card version.
However, I'm disappointed with the third expansion. I always thought there were some balance issues with some of the decks, like the Elves deck, but overall, you never really felt that one deck was grossly overpowered. Even the early starter decks seemed a lot better than I originally thought, and could still go toe to toe with any of the other decks, for the most part.
But, I think everybody was scared of the future when the second expansion came out, and had to fight the final boss with his Vampire deck. Traditionally, the final boss of the expansion becomes a boss with an earnable deck in the next expansion. Fighting Sorin is always HARD. And the deck is completely unfair. Heat of Battle and maybe the original black deck are the only two that really have a chance to defeat him. (Shellie ended up beating him with the Elf deck, but it took several tries.)
Some of the chatter on various forums seemed to indicate that the deck had to be nerfed when it was offered to the player. Nobody could possibly wield this much power.
BUT IT'S NOT! You get the original deck. No changes. Hell, I'm playing with the deck and hating how easy I'm defeating both the PC and players. If you thought the Elf deck was popular, well, this will be the new Elf deck times five.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Here's the problem with this deck. First, creatures come out really fast. There's a lot of small 1 and 2 mana creatures in the deck. That, in and of itself, is not the issue. Many decks rely on small creatures, including the new white equipment deck (which is pretty damn good, btw). The problem is what you get with these creatures versus the mana it takes to cast them. See, here's an example of a good card with a good mana cost from this deck:
So, it's a one mana card as a 2/2. Since most one mana cards are 1/1s (with no abilities), this card has an additional life draining cost to pay for the additional +1/+1 bonus. This is a balanced card, and it's still a good one because you could be doing up to 4 to 6 damage unblocked while your enemy is trying to get a creature out, and still have a good 2/2 creature to fight with (as long as you can deal with the life drain).
On the other hand, these is NOT balanced cards:
Guul Draz Vampire is too damn cheap for what you get out of it, even with the late bonus tied to it. The intimidate basically means that you're totally screwed when you're down to 10 life, unless you can get a quick destroy/counter (which some creature decks may not have). Terror (and other "nonblack" bury cards) are useless.
This is another "too cheap" card, but still not terrible. It should be a 2-3 mana card.
These lifelink cards in this deck just kill me. I mean, you play through all of these different decks and on a rare occasion, you might find lifelink on a Legendary rare card with a fairly high casting cost. And here, you've got a 2/1 creature with lifelink for 2 measly mana. It's like 4 damage, as you gain 2 life and decrease the player's total by 2 (or at least kill a card). A comparable card to this would be the Lightning Elemental (4/1 with Haste), but that's still costs 4 mana.
This one is even worse. In fact, this may be one of the most bullshit cards. You get a 2/3 flyer with lifelink AND deathtouch for only 3 mana. Lifelink, flying, deathtouch, and good stats. You would need to sack a 3/3 (or higher) flyer to kill this thing, or a bury that isn't "nonblack", which are typically rare or expensive. Or something like a first strike flyer, which almost doesn't fucking exist. In the meantime, this guy is flying over your army and hitting you for 2 points of damage and gaining 2 points of life each turn, unless you want to take the hit of one of your bigger flyers to get rid of it (if you have any, which you probably don't on the third turn).
Five or six mana for this thing, not three.
Who wants a card that can bury any creature (including black) with two toughness for one mana? Me! Who gets one? Only this deck. The guy is above two toughness? No problem! Just attack/block with something until it is 2 toughness, and then kill it.
Again, the problem isn't the card details, but the mana cost. Terror costs 2 mana, and though it works on any toughness, it is worthless against black and artifact decks. Terminate requires two colored mana, so you need a deck of that type. And the fact that the good counters for small creature decks are typically using other small creatures, so Disfigure is going to kill off most creatures.
Another overly cheap bury card. Yes, it's the same cost as Terror, but look at what you get out of this that you don't get out of Terror: the ability to kill ANY creature and 4 extra life. Sure, you have the two vampire stipulation, but so what? It's a fucking vampire deck. The vampires will be out already. For two mana and the stipulation, you should get EITHER 4 extra life OR the ability to kill any creature, not both.
Four mana for this card? Seriously? Okay, yes, you need an all black deck (which this card would still not work on land cards), and people know what your top card is, but four mana gets you +2/+1 to all (including Nocturnus) and flying?
Let's compare this for a second. Elvish Champion (and other creature type buffers) gives you a 2/2 with +1/+1 and forestwalk. One, the Champion is not affected by the buffs, which is big deal if somebody is trying to get rid of it, or hell, if you want to use it to do damage. Two, it's 2/2, not 3/3, which is easier to kill (especially without any self buffs). Three, it's forestwalk. Forestwalk is pretty damn opponent specific. Sure, it's great when it works (and even then, there's so many elf cards in other decks that it can backfire), but it's useless against the other four land types. Flying is useful against ANYBODY. Even blue flying decks still have a few ground forces. Everybody else is either going to have some flyers or almost no flyers.
The Champion is one less mana, but I would gladly trade an extra mana, some random behavior (when the top card is a land), and people seeing my top card for all of the buffs this Nocturnus card gets.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
It's a shame because the other two decks look pretty damn cool. One is a white soldier and equipment deck. The low casting cost of the cards means creatures come out about as fast as the vampire deck, but it actually looks balanced (unlike the vampire deck). The burn and counter deck is basically my dream deck. I love Heat of Battle and I love blue counter decks.
But, again, there's that final boss on this one. Sorin is still the King of Overpowered Bullshit decks, but this new deck worries me a bit. It's like the opposite of Sorin's deck. Like Eons of Evil, the dragon deck, the green deck, and other big creature decks, it's a slow play deck, trying to stave off the enemy until you can get the mana for large creatures. But, it has few things going for it. One is the land grab cards seem to be a lot more effective. I generally don't see a turn that a land isn't put down or summoned. It also has a Damnation (black Wraith of God), which is just cool to see.
However, none of these decks have a payoff like this:
I don't even need to review or explain these cards. Just pick your jaw off the floor and say "OH MY FUCKING GOD! THESE CARDS EXIST?!?!?!!!!" I did a search for Eldrazi on MagicCards.Info and about shit my pants when reading some of these cards.
Oh, and while we were talking about overpowered and undercosted cards, Sarkhan the Mad's deck also has this:
Hell, not even the dragon deck's 5/5 dragon enchantment thing can beat this card. Sure, destroy enchantment cards are less common than destroy creature cards, but you don't even need to use up mana to create the dragons.
However, I'm disappointed with the third expansion. I always thought there were some balance issues with some of the decks, like the Elves deck, but overall, you never really felt that one deck was grossly overpowered. Even the early starter decks seemed a lot better than I originally thought, and could still go toe to toe with any of the other decks, for the most part.
But, I think everybody was scared of the future when the second expansion came out, and had to fight the final boss with his Vampire deck. Traditionally, the final boss of the expansion becomes a boss with an earnable deck in the next expansion. Fighting Sorin is always HARD. And the deck is completely unfair. Heat of Battle and maybe the original black deck are the only two that really have a chance to defeat him. (Shellie ended up beating him with the Elf deck, but it took several tries.)
Some of the chatter on various forums seemed to indicate that the deck had to be nerfed when it was offered to the player. Nobody could possibly wield this much power.
BUT IT'S NOT! You get the original deck. No changes. Hell, I'm playing with the deck and hating how easy I'm defeating both the PC and players. If you thought the Elf deck was popular, well, this will be the new Elf deck times five.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Here's the problem with this deck. First, creatures come out really fast. There's a lot of small 1 and 2 mana creatures in the deck. That, in and of itself, is not the issue. Many decks rely on small creatures, including the new white equipment deck (which is pretty damn good, btw). The problem is what you get with these creatures versus the mana it takes to cast them. See, here's an example of a good card with a good mana cost from this deck:
So, it's a one mana card as a 2/2. Since most one mana cards are 1/1s (with no abilities), this card has an additional life draining cost to pay for the additional +1/+1 bonus. This is a balanced card, and it's still a good one because you could be doing up to 4 to 6 damage unblocked while your enemy is trying to get a creature out, and still have a good 2/2 creature to fight with (as long as you can deal with the life drain).
On the other hand, these is NOT balanced cards:
Guul Draz Vampire is too damn cheap for what you get out of it, even with the late bonus tied to it. The intimidate basically means that you're totally screwed when you're down to 10 life, unless you can get a quick destroy/counter (which some creature decks may not have). Terror (and other "nonblack" bury cards) are useless.
This is another "too cheap" card, but still not terrible. It should be a 2-3 mana card.
These lifelink cards in this deck just kill me. I mean, you play through all of these different decks and on a rare occasion, you might find lifelink on a Legendary rare card with a fairly high casting cost. And here, you've got a 2/1 creature with lifelink for 2 measly mana. It's like 4 damage, as you gain 2 life and decrease the player's total by 2 (or at least kill a card). A comparable card to this would be the Lightning Elemental (4/1 with Haste), but that's still costs 4 mana.
This one is even worse. In fact, this may be one of the most bullshit cards. You get a 2/3 flyer with lifelink AND deathtouch for only 3 mana. Lifelink, flying, deathtouch, and good stats. You would need to sack a 3/3 (or higher) flyer to kill this thing, or a bury that isn't "nonblack", which are typically rare or expensive. Or something like a first strike flyer, which almost doesn't fucking exist. In the meantime, this guy is flying over your army and hitting you for 2 points of damage and gaining 2 points of life each turn, unless you want to take the hit of one of your bigger flyers to get rid of it (if you have any, which you probably don't on the third turn).
Five or six mana for this thing, not three.
Who wants a card that can bury any creature (including black) with two toughness for one mana? Me! Who gets one? Only this deck. The guy is above two toughness? No problem! Just attack/block with something until it is 2 toughness, and then kill it.
Again, the problem isn't the card details, but the mana cost. Terror costs 2 mana, and though it works on any toughness, it is worthless against black and artifact decks. Terminate requires two colored mana, so you need a deck of that type. And the fact that the good counters for small creature decks are typically using other small creatures, so Disfigure is going to kill off most creatures.
Another overly cheap bury card. Yes, it's the same cost as Terror, but look at what you get out of this that you don't get out of Terror: the ability to kill ANY creature and 4 extra life. Sure, you have the two vampire stipulation, but so what? It's a fucking vampire deck. The vampires will be out already. For two mana and the stipulation, you should get EITHER 4 extra life OR the ability to kill any creature, not both.
Four mana for this card? Seriously? Okay, yes, you need an all black deck (which this card would still not work on land cards), and people know what your top card is, but four mana gets you +2/+1 to all (including Nocturnus) and flying?
Let's compare this for a second. Elvish Champion (and other creature type buffers) gives you a 2/2 with +1/+1 and forestwalk. One, the Champion is not affected by the buffs, which is big deal if somebody is trying to get rid of it, or hell, if you want to use it to do damage. Two, it's 2/2, not 3/3, which is easier to kill (especially without any self buffs). Three, it's forestwalk. Forestwalk is pretty damn opponent specific. Sure, it's great when it works (and even then, there's so many elf cards in other decks that it can backfire), but it's useless against the other four land types. Flying is useful against ANYBODY. Even blue flying decks still have a few ground forces. Everybody else is either going to have some flyers or almost no flyers.
The Champion is one less mana, but I would gladly trade an extra mana, some random behavior (when the top card is a land), and people seeing my top card for all of the buffs this Nocturnus card gets.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
It's a shame because the other two decks look pretty damn cool. One is a white soldier and equipment deck. The low casting cost of the cards means creatures come out about as fast as the vampire deck, but it actually looks balanced (unlike the vampire deck). The burn and counter deck is basically my dream deck. I love Heat of Battle and I love blue counter decks.
But, again, there's that final boss on this one. Sorin is still the King of Overpowered Bullshit decks, but this new deck worries me a bit. It's like the opposite of Sorin's deck. Like Eons of Evil, the dragon deck, the green deck, and other big creature decks, it's a slow play deck, trying to stave off the enemy until you can get the mana for large creatures. But, it has few things going for it. One is the land grab cards seem to be a lot more effective. I generally don't see a turn that a land isn't put down or summoned. It also has a Damnation (black Wraith of God), which is just cool to see.
However, none of these decks have a payoff like this:
I don't even need to review or explain these cards. Just pick your jaw off the floor and say "OH MY FUCKING GOD! THESE CARDS EXIST?!?!?!!!!" I did a search for Eldrazi on MagicCards.Info and about shit my pants when reading some of these cards.
Oh, and while we were talking about overpowered and undercosted cards, Sarkhan the Mad's deck also has this:
Hell, not even the dragon deck's 5/5 dragon enchantment thing can beat this card. Sure, destroy enchantment cards are less common than destroy creature cards, but you don't even need to use up mana to create the dragons.