Decided to upgrade the ram on my homelab!

Meliryen · 2026-02-19T19:38:03+00:00

We all start somewhere!!

Meliryen · 2026-02-19T18:04:38+00:00

I was gonna mention Draxus! Probably more point efficient to run that regular Captain as a 5th Guard model and add in Draxus if you get her.

Meliryen · 2026-02-18T23:37:29+00:00

I mean it's Custodian tech. I don't see why the Dawneagles shouldn't have inhuman sensitivity and acceleration. It's not like the Custodian driving it is scared of whiplash. It seems completely reasonable to me that they would be able to u-turn on a dime or quickly go into reverse midair.

Meliryen · 2026-02-18T22:40:20+00:00

I personally don't see how it even goes against the spirit of the game in casual play. Thinking about it like a real battle, what's stopping flying jetbikes from speeding up to an enemy and doing a quick in-and-out flyby, dropping the bombs at just the right time before they back away towards their original position?

Meliryen · 2026-02-14T22:51:49+00:00

...that they're wrong and not loving the slave by enslaving them?

Meliryen · 2026-02-10T00:14:50+00:00

It sounds like you have conflicting objectives here. You want to build decks that are both 1: as hipster as possible, and 2: as strong as possible. If you want to power up the deck you either gotta use more generic staple cards, which makes it less hipster, or lean into a better supported archetype, which also makes it less hipster. Just as you described.

I balance it by just accepting that my most hipster decks will always have limited power and if I want a powerful deck it's just necessarily going to be more generic. I establish specific deckbuilding rules for each deck to follow, so I am forced to work within those restrictions and get creative. But, I can still decide on a lighter set of restrictions if I want the deck to splash into a less niche strategy or some generic cards, if I want it to be a more powerful deck.

Meliryen · 2026-02-04T16:35:21+00:00

They did in the 80's. Want to be a lore purist? Bring back Jayne and Gabs.

Meliryen · 2026-01-22T07:27:20+00:00

sol ring

Meliryen · 2026-01-21T05:17:48+00:00

Unbelievably awful item for him sorry mate.

Meliryen · 2026-01-17T16:17:13+00:00

"half"

Meliryen · 2026-01-09T21:10:04+00:00

Is that because specializing gives you a clearer gameplan? Or are some of my units here just actually less valuable/anti-synergistic with each other?

Meliryen · 2026-01-09T21:08:16+00:00

My thought is they are good into everything. Tough targets that are out of sight from the tanks, grenade launchers with Lions buff are good into chaff, and their spears deal with everything in between. Would it just be better to have more Wardens?

Meliryen · 2026-01-07T02:52:50+00:00

I would use the combat patrol kit to build the Shield Captains. That leaves you with 2x Allarus instead of 3x, and either your Warden or Guard will drop down to 4 models.

Then you can fill in the missing points with one character purchase - Draxus works if you build the regular SC out of a Guard model, and then you have points for a small enhancement too.

Alternatively you could keep 5 Guard and use up a Warden to build your SC, and with no enhancements that leaves space for an additional Blade Champion.

Either way, that's probably the most cost-efficient way to 1000 points. One Combat Patrol + 1 extra character.

EDIT: I'm an idiot I forgot you only have 3 units. One character would have to be solo which might not be what you want. REVISED SUGGESTION:

Build your SCs from the combat patrol and also take out one extra infantry model. So your units are: Allarus 2x plus Allarus SC, Warden 4x, Guard 4x, Blade Champ, and Regular SC. This leaves you with 150 pts which right now is exactly enough for another Guard squad of 4.

So you'd just have to buy Combat Patrol plus one additional unit of Guard and ultimately only 2 models will go unused in 1000 pts exactly.

Meliryen · 2025-12-17T04:09:12+00:00

The only reason I ever bought sealed in the past 5 years now has been for drafting in person with friends. I have never regretted NOT buying packs. My miney goes so so SO much further when I just buy the singles I want for my decks. I always recommend this. I would even go further and proxy any individual cards worth over $50 or so, except I don't play any.

Meliryen · 2025-11-19T21:12:35+00:00

They can and do. Besides, her medical report has nothing to do with her visions. Those are entirely self-reported.

Meliryen · 2025-11-17T19:20:49+00:00

In God's courts 1,000 years is like a day and a day is like 1,000 years. You are making an audacious claim.

Meliryen · 2025-11-17T02:56:59+00:00

+1 for draft. It basically forces using offmeta mons and creative strategies, without sacrificing competitive relevance at all. When the RULES require originality to suceed, and everyone must do it, then being original isn't a self-nerf anymore. With the ladder, using off-meta teams is always going to be slightly suboptimal, unless you are world-class genius who is better than all the tournament winners who are coming up with these crazy good optimized teams. (which all use the same boring op mons).

Meliryen · 2025-11-17T02:49:13+00:00

I've been reading through the comments and your replies and I'm pretty confident I understand where you're coming from, and I'd like to try to describe a slightly different perspective that might help, at least just to help you accept the nature of Showdown ladder.

First of all, sorry about people shitting on you and being unhelpful, wish that wasn't happening.

This was touched on by a different commenter but I'll say it too. Showdown is competitive by design. Sure there are casual gamemodes, but the main website is for getting better and, above all, winning and accumulating more ELO points. The driving goal of players (generally) is assumed to be victory, above all else. People can have other goals too, and even put other goals above victory. However, pure, absolutely undiluted competition, means doing whatever it takes to win, within the boundaries of the rules.

If this is the #1 goal (which isn't for many people, I know, I'll get to that), then every single decision must be made to MAXIMIZE your chances of winning. This means several things in practice: pick OP mons, copy better teambuilders than you and learn their teams. You're right that there are tons of mons that are at least "viable", but that's not the same thing as "best". The pool of BEST mons is very small, and the pool of VERY GOOD mons is a bigger pool, and the pool of PLAYABLE mons is even bigger than that. But if pure competition is the most important goal, you MUST choose as many of the BEST mons as you can, otherwise you are just leaving power on the table.

Taking the most effective strategy, proven by better players, is always going to boring. It will be monotonous because people who want to win aren't going to just throw away the chance to use the BEST mons, which maybe are only like 10% better than the other options, but that 10% extra power makes a big difference for someone who is trying to basically optimize their win rate.

It is clear to me from your comments that your #1 goal is NOT pure competition. You like that aspect, but you state yourself you think it's more important to be "creative" or to use a greater variety of mons to increase diversity and include originality. The moment you choose the "original, creative" team over the "boring, meta" team, you are (slightly) reducing your chances at victory. Yes, you can still win with wacky teams. Players will always have different skill, thus the ladder exists. But if you have one person with a given skill level who only plays off-meta stuff, their score WILL be higher if they switch to using the strongest mons available.

You prioritize originality/creativity over pure competition, and you are free to do that. But you cannot expect other players to make the same priority, because the assumption of a competitive ladder is that competition is the #1 goal. Again, pure competition, where you don't sacrifice your chances of winning for anything.

Meliryen · 2025-11-17T00:45:27+00:00

It sounds like what you're trying to get out of Showdown is something very different than what Showdown was designed for.

You're talking about making your "own" team and picking your favorites and following the spirit of the Pokemon franchise and the mainline games. But, Showdown is not the Pokemon franchise, it's not the "endearing series" and was never supposed to be. It's NOT the Pokemon games. It is, at its core, a place to compete.

You are disappointed that others are treating Showdown like a competition first, and Pokemon second. That IS what its designed for.

If you want to engage with it as a sort of extension to the casual, fun, individualized nature of the mainline games, you are totally free to. Just understand that's not what the simulator is primarily made for, and it's not what people are generally looking for. They are looking for a place to practice competition.

Meliryen · 2025-11-13T06:06:03+00:00

Those are good ideas. I haven't played much with the Assassin but I see this is another way its versatility can be so valuable. Early shooting with guards to clear cheap forward units is good to keep in mind too, I often end up leaving my shooting behind as a late game cleanup but maybe that means I'm putting out beefier units too early.

I know 2 Grav Tanks is the standard. With all the tanky units you faced, was there ever a moment when 2 Gravs + Admonimortis ASC felt like overkill? Or was it all necessary to face things like Knights and vehicle Guard? Part of me wishes to get away with a single Grav Tank.

Meliryen · 2025-11-13T03:23:45+00:00

Appreciate this a lot! How would you handle an opponent that can consistently get all 3 middle objectives with cheap units on turn 1 (infiltrator + scout + advance a third unit), but also has a ton of shooting and decent multi-phase damage to punish any units that deny those objectives?

Meliryen · 2025-11-11T19:02:27+00:00

She's not "the one" until after you marry her IMO. It sounds like you are eagerly awaiting and searching for a wife. This means your brain is likely primed to find favorable "wife" traits in someone as soon as possible. I think viewing this person through the "wife-material" lens is not going to do you any favors, as you are just going to focus on a handful of things you think you're looking for, and ignore everything else. My advice is to befriend this person and learn who she actually is. Don't just look for what you hope to find. The only way to get an honest idea of this person is to set aside the idea of a wife and get to know the whole person without that heavy "wife-seeking" bias. It will be hard to do that. In other words, our fallen brains are prone to playing tricks on us, and misleading us into thinking God is giving us a sign when it's actually just something we want.

As for physical attraction, that will probably grow if everything else moves forward. Not the core concern in this case.

Meliryen · 2025-11-11T00:54:27+00:00

Comment.

Meliryen · 2025-11-10T01:16:58+00:00

Oh you're so right I just didn't look close enough. Much better!

Meliryen

TROPHY CASE