From Undergrowth Champion to Runaway Carriage[Merged Topic]

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  • Plastic
    Plastic Posts: 762 Critical Contributor
    How does aoe damage work if it has " prevent damage"? Lol

    I think somebody forgot that bit icon_e_wink.gif
  • Pqmtg-
    Pqmtg- Posts: 282
    Hibernum_JC wrote:
    madwren wrote:
    Hibernum_JC wrote:
    Reading through a lot of posts in this thread and from my own internal testing, it is apparent that Runaway Carriage is indeed a bit overtuned. I am looking into solutions to change the card so that it remains useful but does not become an unstoppable force. I have several venues I am exploring, so I'll keep you posted.

    Easy fix:

    "Runaway Carriage cannot block."

    It's not that easy, since a when a Berserker attacks a creature, that creature is not considered to be blocking.
    Plastic wrote:
    madwren wrote:
    Hibernum_JC wrote:
    Reading through a lot of posts in this thread and from my own internal testing, it is apparent that Runaway Carriage is indeed a bit overtuned. I am looking into solutions to change the card so that it remains useful but does not become an unstoppable force. I have several venues I am exploring, so I'll keep you posted.

    Easy fix:

    "Runaway Carriage cannot block."

    That could work. Might get funky vs berserkers though.

    Why not give it prevent damage for 1-2 turns and then it falls off?

    Side note: prevent damage needs an icon or animation.

    I cannot give buffs or debuffs for a specific amount of turns - only until the end of your turn, until the beginning of your next turn, or permanently. It's something we have been meaning to add, but it wasn't ever really necessary.

    I personally like the fact that to deal with it, you either need Defenders or AoE burn - it makes for a very resilient creature with a very low life total. That being said, the actual problem as some of you have pointed out is the fact that should it be given Defender, Reach or Vigilance, the other player's entire board will smash into it and die easily. The solution I'm currently leaning towards (I haven't had a chance to work on it yet, so this is all theorycrafting!) is having RC have Prevent Damage and Hexproof but only outside of combat turns. This means that you still need to deal with it, but the difference is Berserkers will give you another out for it. Berserkers are actually used more than Defenders (and I understand that part of that is due to the fact that Defenders are expensive) so it would give you guys another type of way to deal with it.

    Anything concerning buffs/debuffs/etc is not really a problem. Someone giving the creature Unblockable through Rogue's Passage is something you can deal with (through matching the Support away or using Support removal), giving it Flying is also something you can deal with (albeit a bit harder than Unblockable, strangely enough!) but regardless of these, all these combos are what Magic is about, and figuring out the best ways to combo cards together is a huge part of the game's experience. There's always a tradeoff with using combos - with a 10 card deck, every card counts, and slotting a card for part of a combo piece is taking away a slot for another card that could equally be as powerful.

    Carriage cannot be dealt with using aoe burn. Red is especially vulnerable to it due to this.
  • andrewvanmarle
    andrewvanmarle Posts: 978 Critical Contributor
    @ JC

    Can you diversify the prevent damage into a verion that only prevents combat damage?

    That way it -does- become vulnurable to damage sweeps.

    With that you need a blocker, a remove all spell or a damage sweep spell. I'd'say that should fix the problem.
  • fox1342
    fox1342 Posts: 174 Tile Toppler
    Does no-one run Scour anymore? The UC nerf means that prevent damage isn't effective against direct destroy effects. Although I've yet to meet RC I've had my UC destroyed a few times.
  • Barrelrolla
    Barrelrolla Posts: 289
    fox1342 wrote:
    Does no-one run Scour anymore? The UC nerf means that prevent damage isn't effective against direct destroy effects. Although I've yet to meet RC I've had my UC destroyed a few times.
    RC is hexproof, so good luck with Scour.
  • Steeme
    Steeme Posts: 784 Critical Contributor
    I managed to pick up an Undergrowth Champion this morning in the Green pack.

    I'm happy to have eventually picked him up, and I think it's for the good that I got him after the nerf.

    However, one observation, it seems the AI is incredibly efficient at making him completely useless. I know that many players' decks generally evolved to take care of him pre-nerf (and understandably so), but I'm finding that he is too weak of a card right now. Just as a suggestion, you can leave the mana cost as-is but I think that he should now gain +1/+1 when anyone landfalls. I mean, it won't make much of a difference anyways since he's going to be insta-wiped by a 5-cost direct removal.

    Ironically, I started pairing him with Runaway Carriage, and that seems to have confused the AI a bit. I don't think the AI knows which one to prioritize, and it serves as an interesting combination because I can make spontaneous decisions where to cast mantle of webs.
  • Hibernum_JC
    Hibernum_JC Posts: 318 Mover and Shaker
    I misspoke when I meant AoE burn, I meant specifically AoE stat removal or AoE removal in general.

    I will seriously look into it.
  • huntly
    huntly Posts: 99
    I blocked a RC with a creature with first strike. The prevent damage didn't go away till after the first strike attack. Just wondering if it's supposed to happen this way/ is that how it would go in paper version?
  • Mainloop25
    Mainloop25 Posts: 1,961 Chairperson of the Boards
    What's AoE?
  • madwren
    madwren Posts: 2,260 Chairperson of the Boards
    Mainloop25 wrote:
    What's AoE?

    it's short for Area of Effect, a gaming term which means effects that hit multiple creatures rather than targeting one specifically.
  • ridfrenzy
    ridfrenzy Posts: 127 Tile Toppler
    edited August 2016
    Gotta say a change is needed for this card. I am currently using RC + Haunting cloak in several decks now. It is my main killer in Gideon Battle-Forge. Just pop it out and give it flying/Vigilance and it will kill 80% of decks.

    My suggestion would be to reword the ability so it loses damage prevention if it blocks or becomes blocked.
  • HomeRn
    HomeRn Posts: 330 Mover and Shaker
    ridfrenzy wrote:
    Gotta say a change is needed for this card. I am currently using UC + Haunting cloak in several decks now. It is my main killer in Gideon Battle-Forge. Just pop it out and give it flying/Vigilance and it will kill 80% of decks.

    My suggestion would be to reword the ability so it loses damage prevention if it blocks or becomes blocked.
    Uh... don't you mean RC? Isn't Undergrowth Champion (UC) is a green card? When'd he become playable for Gideon?!
  • malafein
    malafein Posts: 65 Match Maker
    Morphis wrote:
    Still do not see why hey changed the effect this much.
    The paper version as pointed out dies at end of the turn, an effect that is already coded in the game

    Anyways, it they are not willing to overhaul it they could just change it to "when this creature blocks or is blocked it loses prevent damage".

    It would still be good enough for sure as an uncommon.


    That's the best suggestion I've seen for it, as it just involves this one card.

    As someone else mentioned, making Hexproof also prevent the owner from targetting it would help.
    Changing it so that each blocker can only block one attacker would help some as well.
  • ridfrenzy
    ridfrenzy Posts: 127 Tile Toppler
    HomeRn wrote:
    ridfrenzy wrote:
    Gotta say a change is needed for this card. I am currently using UC + Haunting cloak in several decks now. It is my main killer in Gideon Battle-Forge. Just pop it out and give it flying/Vigilance and it will kill 80% of decks.

    My suggestion would be to reword the ability so it loses damage prevention if it blocks or becomes blocked.
    Uh... don't you mean RC? Isn't Undergrowth Champion (UC) is a green card? When'd he become playable for Gideon?!
    Oops yeah, fixed original post, thanks icon_e_wink.gif
  • andrewvanmarle
    andrewvanmarle Posts: 978 Critical Contributor
    Actually, if you make it lose damage prevention when blocking, you could remove it completly because it wouldn't serve any purpose any more.

    The only thing it needs is to be vulnerable to aoe damage spells.

    That way all colors have an answer while keeping it a danger on the board.
  • Chad739
    Chad739 Posts: 27 Just Dropped In
    I think one idea is to change hexproof to shroud. A second idea is to change its prevent damage to read that it loses it if blocked or blocking.
  • Hibernum_JC
    Hibernum_JC Posts: 318 Mover and Shaker
    Here's the new balance for the card I'm looking towards - I would simply remove the Prevent Damage buff and it's associated trigger.

    This way it's still Hexproof, so it is still impossible to kill through targeted direct damage, but you can defeat it using a multitude of ways (Berserkers, AoE, Defenders, etc).

    I'll do some more tests, but this is what I'm leaning towards at the moment. This would remove the biggest issue, which is Prevent Damage, make it vulnerable to each color while still retaining some of it's power.
  • Rootbreaker
    Rootbreaker Posts: 396
    That sounds like a fine change. No one is begrudging it having some protection, we're just upset that a card can be combined with Gideon 1's first ability to provide an indestructible blocker that can't be removed by most spells, any attackers, or even ground defenders and vigilance creatures.
  • Mainloop25
    Mainloop25 Posts: 1,961 Chairperson of the Boards
    Faced one today after the update. Still has Prevent Damage, still a pain in the **** when given Vigilance.
  • Rootbreaker
    Rootbreaker Posts: 396
    Mainloop25 wrote:
    Faced one today after the update. Still has Prevent Damage, still a pain in the **** when given Vigilance.
    Yeah, if they were saying they were thinking about changing it today, it's not gonna be in today's patch.

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