Answers to Undergrowth Champion?

2

Comments

  • Barrelrolla
    Barrelrolla Posts: 289
    shteev wrote:
    Does anyone know exactly what happens to Disabled Undergrowth Champion if you
    a) Shoot it with a damage dealing spell for lethal damage
    or
    b) Shoot it with a damage dealing spell for non-lethal damage?

    It gets -1/-1 in both cases.
    What bothers me is if you use a spell that removes a creature nothing happens, not even -1/-1.
    Since I got this card I've rarely played anything other than green in QB, my whole deck is built around it. And I have less than 10 losses in about 300 games with this deck. The card is just broken in its current state.
    The best counters for it are cards that give -x/-x because these actually work, at least I think so, Jayce's first ability works for sure, not sure about effects that lower Toughness and what will happen if it should become 0.
  • khurram
    khurram Posts: 1,093 Chairperson of the Boards
    shteev wrote:


    So I think I know what's going on here... disable will deactivate the abilities of a creature so long as it stays in play (I've just cast some spells with a Disabled Managorger Wurm in play and it didn't get +1/+1). However, if the creature dies whilst it's disabled, it's abilities will trigger as if it's not disabled (Earlier today, I destroyed a Disabled Hangarback Walker, and 8 Thopter tokens were generated).

    I dont think thats it. The abilities dont trigger because it died but because it was directly interacted with either being targeted by a spell or through direct damage. A disabled creature will remain so until it is let alone but if you engage it in a way that would have triggered its ability it would retaliate
  • Morphis
    Morphis Posts: 975 Critical Contributor
    Yesterday a face an undergrowth nissa deck.

    By that I do not a mean a nissa deck with undergrowth.
    A deck completely and only built around undergrowth:

    - the 2 fetch creature spells.
    - mantle of webs
    - the 2 green mana supports
    - one nissa revelation
    - animist awakening

    Other stuff I do not remember.

    I tried so hard... My TWENTY/TWENTY desolation twins died and then I rage quit.

    Such a deck with no disable or bounce is totally unbeatable.
    This card need some serious look at.
  • Plastic
    Plastic Posts: 762 Critical Contributor
    It's funny how troublesome this card is and it's one of the ones that's more like the paper card than many others in PQ. icon_razz.gif
  • PaganMoon
    PaganMoon Posts: 9
    All you need is Ajani,disabeled Champ funny icon_lol.gif
  • nexus13
    nexus13 Posts: 191 Tile Toppler
    It's way more powerful than in paper magic. Defender lets it block the entire team in MtgPQ, it ignores destroy effects in MtgPQ. It starts with 4 lives where in paper in doesn't start with any counters. It can be reinforced with another copy. In paper you would have a chance to respond to the first trigger of adding a counter to try and kill it. It's more similar to paper than many other cards but it highlights some of the underlying differences between the two by exploiting all of them.
  • OhanaUnited
    OhanaUnited Posts: 85 Match Maker
    I haven't encountered this guy in QB yet (thankfully). If you're playing red, consider using Pathway Arrow (activate 1 to deal 1 damage to first creature and disable until beginning of your turn). As long as you keep popping the activation from arrow, you should be fine.
  • Abenjes
    Abenjes Posts: 253 Mover and Shaker
    and it's an elemental, so now Omnath is in in the game even if you do kill it you could take 5 damage, if YOU have an Omnath and an undergrowth champ its even better.
  • fox1342
    fox1342 Posts: 174 Tile Toppler
    Turn to frog is bugged.

    Cast on UC, no damage counters but does gain the frog. It's odd.
  • Morphis
    Morphis Posts: 975 Critical Contributor
    fox1342 wrote:
    Turn to frog is bugged.

    Cast on UC, no damage counters but does gain the frog. It's odd.
    I know many are thinking "transform is different than kill so it should work".

    I am almost sure that even when they will fix it, turn to frog will just give it -1/-1 and spawn the frog(maybe not).

    In this game turn to frog actually kills the creature then spawns the frog. It is coherent to the description but would have been so better if it did transform, avaoiding the on death effect triggers.
    It would have given a nice niche to the card.
  • Sinslayer5
    Sinslayer5 Posts: 45
    Since I got this card I've rarely played anything other than green in QB, my whole deck is built around it. And I have less than 10 losses in about 300 games with this deck. The card is just broken in its current state.
    Same here. I just started playing a few weeks ago, and pulled UC as my first Mythic. Now have a 92% win rate as a direct result of spamming UC with a low-level Nissa - then I saw this post...

    I think it might not be a bad idea to re-visit the card and re-balance it (higher cost should do the trick, IMO).
  • fox1342
    fox1342 Posts: 174 Tile Toppler
    Morphis wrote:
    fox1342 wrote:
    Turn to frog is bugged.

    Cast on UC, no damage counters but does gain the frog. It's odd.
    I know many are thinking "transform is different than kill so it should work".

    I am almost sure that even when they will fix it, turn to frog will just give it -1/-1 and spawn the frog(maybe not).

    In this game turn to frog actually kills the creature then spawns the frog. It is coherent to the description but would have been so better if it did transform, avaoiding the on death effect triggers.
    It would have given a nice niche to the card.

    I agree it should give -1/-1

    I don't know if the frog should spawn or not?
  • ReddMaxx
    ReddMaxx Posts: 54 Match Maker
    Abenjes wrote:
    and it's an elemental, so now Omnath is in in the game even if you do kill it you could take 5 damage, if YOU have an Omnath and an undergrowth champ its even better.


    I was lucky and got Undergrowth champ in a pack the same day I got Omnath. I built a deck with these two and I only lost like 10 in 200 QBs. Most losses was by not getting mana.

    So I can tell you what screws this card combo up.

    - First the Red Support Aether Grid. It really slows it down. But you can out last it by using web and earthen arms. Even though arms is an awaking card it is good in an undergrowth deck. So anything that pings it every round is good.

    - Next there is Murder Investigation. This card is like Aether Grid it will grind it down and if you can put a block ability like knightly valor then you can keep a pumped champ up from hurting you.

    - Flying creatures. This will work short term but the champ will get the web of mantle. So you have to hurt him really fast. But with Seek the Wild is in this deck, not only can you get the camp or omnarth fast but it moves all the other creatures to the bottom of the deck. Why is this so cool in this deck? It makes it fast to draw the pump and web spells. Every time you get Seek the wild use it so you will get to your other spells fast. I can't tell you how important this card is in the deck. I beat other champ decks with just this card. But in the end flying creatures have a limited chance to win.

    - Disable. This is the way to go. White and blue has the best chances. Green has a bit of problem with support spells. They have the creature and with seek the wilds you can get it on demand alot of times but disable really hurts the deck. I am with everyone else I think you should be able to kill champ when it is disable. I think to makes it balance, this should happen. It is not easy to get a disable and then do a killing blow to a creature. It takes 2 and most time 3 cards to do it. I think this should be fixed.

    - Weaken cards. Like -5/-5 black grasp. Or blues ability to do -4 or -5. Those will help. But I get my champ to 10/10 almost every game so you have to hit it early.

    And any destroy outright spells don't do ****. The biggest thing champ has going for it in QB is the computer AI. If I played the cards the AI did I could win more time. Or if instead of the AI playing the champ a person did it would win more times.

    The AI is pretty good on straight forward decks but when you have a card combo deck it doesn't get the logic to do that and creating that logic would have to be combo specific.

    Well I know those tips were in this threat but I thought I put it all in one post and since I played this deck and I am pretty sure I know whats works and doesn't.

    I got to 7th last QB playing this deck. The big thing is you can prevent damage and keep playing and playing. I could play non stop for hours if I wanted with just 3 potions because I seldom took damage and if I did I could play at half health and win most times.

    Later,
    Redd
  • The reason why they have this problem with destroy cards is how they coded the game. If you notice, when you destroy a creature it is not just removed from the board, instead damage is done to the creature equal to its toughness and the game removes the creature. It is not true removal. Since it is damage, the champ instead changes the damage to -1/-1 and continues on his merry way.

    Now I could be wrong, as they maybe are just visually representing this, but after seeing the behaviour with Undergrowth Champion, I am inclined to believe this is true.

    For a fix, they need a command for true removal, which is not a simple fix, as they have many systems that already depend on its current format. They could also write an exception, but then it would have to be updated for this card for every new expansion.
  • khurram
    khurram Posts: 1,093 Chairperson of the Boards
    The reason why they have this problem with destroy cards is how they coded the game. If you notice, when you destroy a creature it is not just removed from the board, instead damage is done to the creature equal to its toughness and the game removes the creature. It is not true removal. Since it is damage, the champ instead changes the damage to -1/-1 and continues on his merry way.

    Now I could be wrong, as they maybe are just visually representing this, but after seeing the behaviour with Undergrowth Champion, I am inclined to believe this is true.

    For a fix, they need a command for true removal, which is not a simple fix, as they have many systems that already depend on its current format. They could also write an exception, but then it would have to be updated for this card for every new expansion.


    The problem is not that it takes -1/-1 from destroy spells instead of being destroyed..... if it did that then it would not be a problem since this is exactly how it is supposed to work..... the problem is that destroy spells currently have no effect on it, not even the -1/-1. And they have acknowledged that its an issue with coding, they are going to fix it with next update hopefully
  • khurram wrote:
    The problem is not that it takes -1/-1 from destroy spells instead of being destroyed..... if it did that then it would not be a problem since this is exactly how it is supposed to work..... the problem is that destroy spells currently have no effect on it, not even the -1/-1. And they have acknowledged that its an issue with coding, they are going to fix it with next update hopefully

    Akk, then it is even worse... They do need to get a fix done for this card.
  • span_argoman
    span_argoman Posts: 751 Critical Contributor
    I think giving creatures auto-Trample against Undergrowth Champion will make it less of an issue. Either that or make it -2/-1 per damage/destroy effect.
  • Abenjes
    Abenjes Posts: 253 Mover and Shaker
    the Great Aurora still does nothing to this creature and I'm pretty sure Scour did nothing as well.
    I live UC but the bugs need fixing
  • Omega Red
    Omega Red Posts: 366 Mover and Shaker
    Just wanted to say this is a **** autowin card. Nerf it. Nerf it hard ASAP. Thank you, have a nice day!
  • Morphis
    Morphis Posts: 975 Critical Contributor
    Omega Red wrote:
    Just wanted to say this is a **** autowin card. Nerf it. Nerf it hard ASAP. Thank you, have a nice day!
    Not at all, I found a secret technique to use when I face undergrowth champion, inspired by martial arts
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rlit8q5viCI&t=12m00s