Kill X or more Objectives vs. Creatureless

James13

Ohboy said:

Chandra damage is unpreventable. 

Gideon 2 creature death is also unpreventable(without Exile) . 

You cannot avoid taking damage/killing those creatures. 

Not entirely true anymore.  Chandra damage can be prevented by Djeru (on sale currently, but as an unlootable mythic I wouldn't really consider it) and Gideon's intervention which is more obtainable now.

Gideon 2 token can be permanently disabled before it dies as long as he's at a high enough level.  Riddleform on the other hand is less preventable as it dies the same turn.  But still even that is preventable as long as it's in creature slot 1 which you can give a lockdown effect even on entry to.  Or Hixis, I guess.  But I never think of that because I don't have that mythic.

Notably, both of these proposed solutions require white (or blue claustrophobia for the latter).  If you're running a different non-white PW and see those opponents pop up you're out of luck unless you can close it down fast.


I agree with the sentiment that's it's hard to build around some of these things, though.  And impossible if you can't assign a planeswalker with access to a solution to every node.  And can result in dead cards if you're not facing those or micromanaging for every matchup.

Of course, if they run support removal which is more likely than not, then it's not really avoidable.

Ohboy

It's important to link back to the main thrust of the argument before we get too far down the rabbit hole, that all choice is a step down from the "fairness" proposed(skill is everything). 

babar3355

Eh, players will use whatever strategies the game allows them, and creatureless strategies does help give them a competitive advantage.  On the flip side, game theory would suggest that is none of the players did this and everyone played it straight then then more players and thus the community as a whole would have a better outcome (more players tied for and receive top prizes).   I know some in our coalition ran trolling creatureless decks and ended up trolling our own team.

Anyway, I get that there are a lot of creatureless options with cycling, but I am not sure they lead to better outcomes.  Hard to believe that not including shefet monitor can be considered a better deck in any way shape or form. 

madwren

The easiest solution is just to make all "kill X creatures" objective refer to any creatures, not just enemy creatures.

Corn_Noodles

This could be mitigated a bit if players were matched against others with a score similar to themselves.

Skiglass6

One of the problems is that in the same event as kill x creatures is the objective cast 3 or less creatures. The two objectives butt heads because if you know that there are going to be a lot of kill spells and you can only cast 3 creatures, you need to find ways to continue to do damage after your 3 creatures are killed. Which leads to thinking about a creatureless deck. Also, broken drake cycle deck is the easiest and most avaible deck to use. 

So I do not think of it as a troll deck, just a deck that fulfills lose 3 or less creatures that will win easily. And just FYI, I do have a creature in my geeen deck. This may have aleady been said, but maybe they could force at least 1 creature on every deck for the deck to be valid. 

Lagartha

I'm going out of my way to use Turn to Frog as my form of killing the creatures. It can't do anything to help in a creatureless deck, but it does help if the opponent only has one creature. 

hawkyh1

Skiglass6 said:

One of the problems is that in the same event as kill x creatures is the objective cast 3 or less creatures. The two objectives butt heads because if you know that there are going to be a lot of kill spells and you can only cast 3 creatures, you need to find ways to continue to do damage after your 3 creatures are killed. Which leads to thinking about a creatureless deck. Also, broken drake cycle deck is the easiest and most avaible deck to use. 

So I do not think of it as a troll deck, just a deck that fulfills lose 3 or less creatures that will win easily. And just FYI, I do have a creature in my geeen deck. This may have aleady been said, but maybe they could force at least 1 creature on every deck for the deck to be valid. 

I use summoned creatures for my green node,
together with berserker. don't cast a creature
from a creature card and it won't count against
you. even including shefet monitor to help the
cycling along will make it not creatureless.

(I think there are players that are intentionally
choosing the creatureless option to cause other
players to lose ribbons)

HH

losdamianos

Everytime I see your posts HH I think its a poem or lyrcis to the song and I try to sing them in my head

hawkyh1

it makes it easier for me to read, especially when I
need to correct myself.(...I always need to correct
myself)

HH

Luciandevine

You guys are overlooking a possible solution to the problem that doesn't include altering the events as a whole. If you nerf the format-defining/warping strategy that is the cycle deck, a lot of these problems end up getting solved in the process. A nerfing of New Perspectives and a rework of the cycling mechanic that only counts the mana on the card, as opposed to total mana in hand, might help solve the problems caused by infinite cycle decks.

Sirchombli

Unfortunately, if you play against a creatureless deck on a kill x node, you're gonna drop that objective. It sucks, but it's about equivalent to coming across a black deck on a lose x or less or a red deck on a take x or less node. Slightly worse because it's completely impossible, but you get what I mean. It's irritating, but that's rngesus for you. He's a cruel, cruel trickster. Sometimes I want to kick him in the head. 

Steeme

Luciandevine said:

You guys are overlooking a possible solution to the problem that doesn't include altering the events as a whole. If you nerf the format-defining/warping strategy that is the cycle deck, a lot of these problems end up getting solved in the process. A nerfing of New Perspectives and a rework of the cycling mechanic that only counts the mana on the card, as opposed to total mana in hand, might help solve the problems caused by infinite cycle decks.

Or, they could stop making events with stupid objectives.  No nerfing required.

Luciandevine

Or they just make it so that every deck must have at least 1 creature in it. Just make that an additional requisite, like having to have 10 cards. Not just for events, but all decks in general. It solves this problem in all of it's iterations.

ElvaanStride

Luciandevine said:

Or they just make it so that every deck must have at least 1 creature in it.

That would make beating Nicol Bolas in the RotPG event impossible for new players

bk1234

ElvaanStride said:

Luciandevine said:

Or they just make it so that every deck must have at least 1 creature in it.

That would make beating Nicol Bolas in the RotPG event impossible for new players

I am playing Nahiri for every node with my alt. She is packed with creatures which I cycle to get more Approach and Inferno Jets. 

^^Note to anyone reading this. I do not recommend Nahiri for Bolas. It’s pretty tedious  

Doomstat

Forcing a player to play one creature wouldn't actually hurt a new player going against Bolas "IF" they already knew not to play creatures against him. They could just choose a  creature with cycle and throw it away when they pull it.

Forcing a player to play one creature in every deck they build doesn't hurt any strategy I can think of, because in creatureless you either already had too much room or not enough room to begin with.

The only uproar I can think of is players complaining about not being able to build a deck how they want, like standard did before. 

Mainloop25

ElvaanStride said:hi

Luciandevine said:

Or they just make it so that every deck must have at least 1 creature in it.

That would make beating Nicol Bolas in the RotPG event impossible for new players

Not really. You don't have to cast it. My Elspeth deck has 4 creatures I never cast in it. 

Szamsziel

I don't like idea forcing you to add creatures into deck. For legacy I'm pretty fine using just tokens - there are enough cards making them.
Better solution may be to add cards like harmless offering (from eldritch moon). Forbidden Orchard, hunted phantasm, terrastodont and so on

blacklotus

simplest solution is NOT to create objectives that is dependent on your opponent's deck to achieve it:

Bad objective: kill X or more enemy critters
Good objective: kill X critters

The good objective can be achieved by killing your own critters.

Bad objective: take less than X hp damage
Good objective: win with X or more hp.

Again, the difference is the good objective can be achieved by building the appropriate deck or use the appropriate pw.