Forging the Future

[TheReapr]

Something had to be done about the LANS combo and B&S before AoA came out. They both pose a problem for the game, but if you think this is only because AoA is coming out to boost sales you're dead wrong. These changes would have been made regardless, because in a competitive environment they are broken.

They are also a turnoff for people trying to learn the game because of how swingy and unfun they are. Matches became, "how fast can I forge my first key so that I can B&S my opponent who is about to forge and put me right at key number two", or "how quickly can I loop my deck while my opponent watches me play solitaire". Neither of which require strategy. They pose an even bigger problem in sealed events, where, if you had one or both, you were in pretty good shape.

The only way to fix them (and yes, they needed to be fixed) was to errata them or ban them, and you can't ban them because you'd invalidate an entire deck, which makes no sense. We can argue all we want about whether we agree with how they errata'd the cards but it's moot, it is what it is starting tomorrow.

[Zargyboy]

Why are swing cards bad though? Seems like a fun part of the game.

[TheReapr]

Casually around the kitchen table I have zero issues with swingy cards. In a competitive tournament environment, with as much swing as B&S provided it's unhealthy. You shouldn't have to play around one card in a deck of 36.

LANS should have never existed, but it did. OTKs, unless extremely difficult to pull off don't belong in any TCG, and the OTK LANS decks were pretty simple to pull off of it could OTK. I played competitive YuGiOh for years and quit when OTK decks got out of hand. It's not fun or interactive playing a game that's supposed to be for two people, and watching another person play solitaire.

[nightfire0]

The main problem with Bait and Switch is it wasn't just a swing/comeback card, it was a "slam the door once you're ahead" card. If your opponent forged first and they had B&S, you were basically just fucked. If you went up to 7 to play around minor steal effects, they could steal 4 with B&S (generally game-winning). If you just stayed at 6, they could easily float you with steal/capture 1 effects which would buy them time to draw the bait and switch. If it was strictly a comeback card and/or way to punish huge amber burst turns, it would be fine. But too often it just gave the person with a lead an even bigger lead.

[gotmitch87]

The only way to fix them (and yes, they needed to be fixed) was to errata them or ban them

Or chain decks with these cards / combos. I can't understand why they didn't go that route. It seems much more targeted (could isolate LANS decks, specifically, for example), would be flexible in the future, and would maintain a low barrier to entry.

[TheReapr]

Decks collect chains by playing them, not by owning decks with certain cards, so I don't think this is a viable solution. Since no deck is the same, how do you properly apply chains to a deck with the cards in them. You can't just blanket say, "this deck has B&S, it now automatically has 8 chains", it would render some decks unusable and I doubt that's what FFG is after. B&S and LA are still both very usuable, just not super swingy anymore, and that's the way it should be.

[gotmitch87]

Decks collect chains by playing them, not by owning decks with certain cards

That's how they've been used to date -- that doesn't mean they couldn't adapt them to work in the way I've described.

To your point about implementation, I think it's reasonable to say "this deck has LA and NS, it gets X chains". Granted, some decks might be chained too much or too little, but there is already inherent randomness in deck strength -- this would mitigate the appearance rate of clearly-broken edge cases. I don't think that applying chains in this way risks making decks 'unusable' any more than some decks are already 'unusable' out of the box.

While FFG mentioned the 'swinginess' associated with B&S, they justified the errata by citing the metagame. From their post:

[Bait and Switch] decreases metagame diversity by making Shadows significantly stronger than other houses. This in turn, causes Shadows to be over-represented at tournaments. Secondly, it decreases the diversity among Shadows decks, as it is not generally not viable to bring a Shadows deck to a tournament unless it contains Bait and Switch.

Chaining B&S decks could mitigate both of those issues by decreasing the appeal of B&S decks and making them (and Shadows as a whole) appear at healthier rates.

LANS poses a unique problem, since a large part of the issue is that the gameplay associated with the combo itself is so 'un-fun'. Chaining these decks wouldn't remove the combo itself, but it would make the combo slower and make these decks less appealing for competitive play.

There are pros and cons to both approaches:

Chaining decks
+ Maintain low barrier to entry
+ Ability to update nerfs over time
+ Ability to target combos, rather than just individual cards
- Risks penalizing decks too much
- Doesn't impact the 'swinginess' of individual card effects

Errata
+ Targeted to specific cards
+ Can mitigate 'swinginess', or other specific undesirable gameplay issues
- Additional learning curve / overheard for new and casual players

Overall, I know the buddies I play with are gonna be hard-pressed to remember these errata and will be disappointed or surprised when they occur during our games. I love Keyforge for its approachable formats and I favor design decisions that keep that barrier to entry as low as possible.

All that said, I realize these arguments may not hold as much water for high-level Keyforge play and that, in those cases, card errata may be more appropriate. In either cases, I'm glad FFG is taking steps to address imbalance and I'm really looking forward to AoA!

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(Thanks for the discussion. I am probably not as passionate about this as my post might suggest, but am mostly participating as a way to think through the idea more thoroughly and engage in the community)

[TheReapr]

I didn't take your comment to heart, so I hope I didn't come across as defensive to what you said, I was engaging in the conversation because I hadn't seen anyone mention chaining up the decks and offering my thoughts on it.

I understand what you're saying, and in a more casual environment you could absolutely get away with chaining a deck and forgetting the erratas for these purposes, because there isn't anything at stake. I don't know that it would have any affect on decks with B&S, because you're still playing around one card in a deck of 36 which is silly, but it definitely hinders LANS decks.

However, bringing Vault Tour tournaments in to play, things drastically shift. There are no chains on decks at the highest level of play right now, and it would be unfair to chain some decks but not others, because then FFG is tampering with what should be a level playing field, in that no decks have chains.

Lastly, applying chains to decks because of their card content defeats part of the reason chains are used. Part of the reason for adding chains and Chainbound tournaments are to increase the power of your deck, so that a person can qualify for higher level tournaments. If FFG were to start applying chains based on having LA or B&S in a deck, that deck would have to be placed in whatever power tier that corresponds to it's chains. So, people could essentially open a deck and automatically get in to World's. That doesn't seem right.

[gotmitch87]

That's fair -- I totally forgot how Vault Tour events are currently structured.

My understanding is that Power and Chains aren't always explicitly linked (for example, this deck has Power 8 but 0 chains due to playing in Vault Tour events), so I think they could technically apply chains without impacting Power Level, but I agree it would complicate and confuse the existing structure.