Love the update but...

Unknown

I understand that Gideon was overpowered before the update and the need to address a few issues. Yes, giving a creature +4/+4, Berserker, and Lifelink was a bit much for 18 gems or whatever it was before…but this update has gone way beyond addressing this issue and has instead nerfed Gideon to the point where he is all but unplayable.

First of all, 21 gems for Champion is too much, especially considering that you’re paying to make a creature a defender with only +4/+4. For example, say you want to add Champion to a fairly large creature to make a heavy blocker/attacker…Archangel of Tithes…which is a 7/9 for a cost of 18. That means that you end up with a 11/13 for a cost of 39 total which is in itself almost impossible to achieve without getting destroyed in the process. Even adding Champion to an average creature, say Anointer of Champions which is a 4/4 for a cost of 11, you end up with an 8/8 that you paid 30 for that won’t last more than a turn or two. Meanwhile Harbinger of Tides is a 6/6 for for only 10 mana...casting four Harbingers for 40 mana would give you an 24/24 and is just as difficult to achieve as one Archangel with Champion for 39 total and you'll end up with a 11/13 that will get destroyed almost immediately.

Secondly, Hixus Prison Warden has been made useless by giving it a counter of 1. Gideon’s decks have always been built around medium cost creatures that can be buffed up and turned to defenders but once you take that away (by forcing the cost as high as detailed above) you end up with initially weak but expensive creatures that take time to be upgraded correctly. Hixus was a way to buy some time for that to happen but by giving it a 1 counter it makes the card unworthy the 15 cost it carries. After the update I’ve played nearly a dozen games and have yet to have it last more than three turns after I play it. In nearly every case it’s lost the following turn.

Additionally other cards which are, IMHO, far more overpowered remained untouched. Specifically Thropter Spy Network which casts 4 1/1 Thropters with flying every turn as long as you have a support on the board is a hugely overpowered support that retains its 3 or 4 counter (I honestly can’t remember which) and a relatively low cost of 13. So it costs 15 for a 1 counter support to stop an attacker but only 13 for a 3-4 counter support that can create a 12/12 creature with flying in 3 turns…

Finally Knight of the White Orchid is broken completely. This is probably more of a bug than a nerf but if it doesn’t kill the opponents’ creature on the first strike, the second strike will deal no damage. For example if you attack a 4/5 creature the first strike will bring it down to a 4/1 but the second strike will result in no damage, yet Knight is killed when the opponent retaliates.

BlackSheep101

First strike is not the same thing as double strike. First strike creatures deal their damage only once, before regular creatures deal damage. If they don't kill their target, the target gets to deal damage back.

Unknown

You're completely right...I got first strike and double strike mixed up, for some reason I thought all creatures with first strike also got double strike automatically. I stand corrected on that one. But I stand behind everything else...

Unknown

I don't agree with all you said but they made Gideon useless. I went from a 40 win streak to 5 straight losses tonight to jace.

It's funny since jace is supposed to have weak monsters and I have only managed to kill several.

Idk orchid was never my favorite card, and I thought it was actually a bit weak without Gideon's powers. Which you said are now useless.

You can use his first 4 times for just 3 extra cost and it does the same thing as his 3rd power.

On top of that most of my best cards already have menace or defender so his powers are useless.

Love the update, just wish it wasn't such a downgrade for Gideon.

aesith

As my first level 50, I'll pour one out for Gideon. He got knocked out across the board by the nerf-bat. First Strike AND Life Strike was too much but now worse skills and 24 points to cast. Egads.

Unknown

Gideon was my favorite PW but now... I can understand wanting to fix him but it seems y'all went overkill on him.

If I might make a few suggestions:

Lower the ability costs down a bit,
remove defender and regeneration replaced with lifelink (first strike was great but needed a fix),
finally the creature costs seem higher for Gideon than for the other PW's (wouldn't be that big of a deal but the power/toughness disparities are discouraging).

Overall though y'all did a great job on the update! Keep up the good work!

Unknown

Gideon's 1 at 3/6/9 seems a bit high, but since his other two abilities are pointless wastes of time it doesn't matter to me if they cost 31 mana. Gideon is a 1 button machine.

That said having it cost 9 for tier 3 is hilarious and means if you have a high level Gideon you're playing on hard mode.

What they need to do is instead make the Tier 1 (and all the other abilities, too) a fixed cost. I'd say 5 or 6 across the board.

Or at the most, make it 3/5/7 or something that isn't some ridiculous cost.

So the reason he seems "super nerfed" isn't that he's bad, but it is because Jace is still the best planeswalker with the best cards.

Gideon used to get around this by being an unstoppable mana efficient wall of death for Jace, but now especially with Jace's flyers being so useful (and Gideons 1 being relatively expensive) Gideon can no longer trade at an advantage against Jace, and if you factor in Jace's mana domination being still entirely untouched, you end up with noone having an answer to Jace.

aesith

Jace at -6/0 for 3 mana.....hopefully he is reviewed next.

Unknown

The abilities should become more powerful without becoming too expensive. THAT is one of the benefits of having a powerful PW. As it is, I finished all 5 Heroic Encounters with objectives using a combination of Jace (20), Gideon (26), Liliana (26), and Nissa (20); mostly Jace. If I'm not going to raise my PW levels for these supposedly broken high-level abilities now, I'm definitely not going to raise PW level now that they cost more. I wish I left my Chandra at L20 but I bumped her to 32 just to get her 3rd ability to tier 2 and I'm regretting it because I never use it. For PvP, I use Jace's first and second ability every turn, when am I going to save up for the third?

I wish we could de-level.