Post by Deleted on Jun 12, 2006 4:43:58 GMT -5
I said before during my reports from the regional this weekend I had something in mind about the archers. They only finished 8th of 15, but that was from one of our "lesser" players, and, having witnessed his matches and noticing things he could have done better (that is, he failed, not so much the deck) and with the fortunate pairings he had, that deck could have finised as high as 2nd or 3rd!
Do I think it's a top deck? No, not exactly, but I do think it can smack some top decks around, and also might prove more annoying in the immediate future (rules rumor coming soon!)
Ok, let's look at a variation of the archer deck on the ME site...
Lady Phe-Ronde
1x City Wall
1x Heavy Ballista
3x Barricade
3x Woodland Sanctuary
4x Dust of Invisibility
3x Elfwood Bow
2x Amulet of Life
2x Ring of Temporal Acceleration
1x Trade Agreement
3x Sneaky Snyder
4x Cranial Leech
3x Mounted Archer
4x Elven Archer
3x Goblin Archer
2x Archer Recruiter
4x Peasant
3x Master Mason
3x Master M'Kinn
Hold your laughs for later. Ok, believe it or not, the deck flows really well, easy to do when you draw twice as much. Slow to start yes, but I think you see that it will attempt to stabilize by picking every offender down and then eventually the character itself. Now, it has excellent match-ups against most any deck at comparable speed. It has a better match-up than you might think against aggro...and I'll tell you why
VS. Aggro...
Glye- Yes, it might hurt early, but a great defense is Amulet of Life on anything to block/defend Glye incessantly. Now, Glye usually has 4 Cranial Leech, but you have 4 Dust, not to mention 2 Amulet and 3 Sneaky Snyder, plus you out draw him, so it's an almost lock. The best part is, your established archers pick off all of his warriors, dealing all that false loyalty damage to Glye. Sworn Defender, you ask? Well, they have 3, yes, but you have 4 Cranial Leech and 1 Trade Agreement, or you can just ping it to death in one huge effort.
Sutraps- This is annoying because of his natural resistance. Rest assured, the above plan still works, and eventually you can reduce most aggro decks to just topdecking the rest of the game with no creatures or useful items in play, and then you can start attacking back with 2 power creatures. Also, building that Woodland Sanctuary for Sharpshooting seals the deal.
George- A combination of both above plans
For all of these, a City Wall is "gg" as well.
VS. Wizardburn... Ok, now is where it goes downhill. This deck has no prayer currently against burn decks...it's just disaster. No amount of Amulet is enough, and they kill you and anything you own in 5-6 turns and then Heat Wave. The deck can't protect against burn to the face except by killing their wizards with archers, but if you're getting domed, your creatures are probably dead. City Wall is the only hope, but there is like less than 5% chance you could ever build it. But more on this later...
VS. Grimus overall...it depends on what form of Grimus, but overall, the false loyalty hurts a lot. It could get pretty messy with controllive Guardian Angels and Sworn Defenders, but Cranials and Trade Agreement help. It's iffy but not impossible
VS Zycon control...hmm...I don't know. The jury is still out. The wizard are weak defense to the archers, buy Zycon is good at slowing things down further. The nightmare here is Peacetime, as there is no main deck way to deal with it. That's the main reason the Heavy Ballista that made you laugh earlier is there. In my experience, I've forced Peacetime to go the distance, even to the bottom of my deck. I have inumerable creatures that don't deal damage, but with that 1 Heavy Ballista they can blow Zycon out, even if it was the very last card in my deck, in 3 turns. (remember, by now, my critters are behind walls and protected from manipulation) The sideboard helps with 4 Priests of Riverwood, also hopefully behind walls.
Ok, so, as it is now, it's tough for this type of deck to win it all, but it can make tough matches for a lot of the current popular decks. But if you stayed with me and read all this, I did say something about a rumor I heard...
ATTENTION!!! RULES RUMOR!!!
Unless I'm horribly mistaken, in current ME gaming all you can hope to do is build a wall and then move in-play creatures behind them, using an action. Well, I believe I have it on good authority that soon if not already by as of Sunday 6/11, creatures may be hired DIRECTLY BEHIND WALLS.
Let it marinate.............................
(By the way, if by some freak of stupidity this was already the way it was played since like the beginning, then I'll be very embarrassed to say the least, but we were told you couldn't do that, until...)
If this is true, then this could change things to the up and up for this deck for sure, greatly accelerating the process. The problem with walls is speed...it's like you're twice as slow as your opponent while he swings for 6 or 8 at least. Being able to hire right behind walls is awesome for immediate protection and by elimniating the waste of a turn moving behind in the first place. How awesome would Barricade be filled up with Masters M'Kinn and Mason behind them? With this development, this is a lot more realistic. Of course, this new rule could change a lot more than just this deck.
I'll stop now since this has been really long, but I would like feedback. Thanks in advance for enduring the lecture.
Do I think it's a top deck? No, not exactly, but I do think it can smack some top decks around, and also might prove more annoying in the immediate future (rules rumor coming soon!)
Ok, let's look at a variation of the archer deck on the ME site...
Lady Phe-Ronde
1x City Wall
1x Heavy Ballista
3x Barricade
3x Woodland Sanctuary
4x Dust of Invisibility
3x Elfwood Bow
2x Amulet of Life
2x Ring of Temporal Acceleration
1x Trade Agreement
3x Sneaky Snyder
4x Cranial Leech
3x Mounted Archer
4x Elven Archer
3x Goblin Archer
2x Archer Recruiter
4x Peasant
3x Master Mason
3x Master M'Kinn
Hold your laughs for later. Ok, believe it or not, the deck flows really well, easy to do when you draw twice as much. Slow to start yes, but I think you see that it will attempt to stabilize by picking every offender down and then eventually the character itself. Now, it has excellent match-ups against most any deck at comparable speed. It has a better match-up than you might think against aggro...and I'll tell you why
VS. Aggro...
Glye- Yes, it might hurt early, but a great defense is Amulet of Life on anything to block/defend Glye incessantly. Now, Glye usually has 4 Cranial Leech, but you have 4 Dust, not to mention 2 Amulet and 3 Sneaky Snyder, plus you out draw him, so it's an almost lock. The best part is, your established archers pick off all of his warriors, dealing all that false loyalty damage to Glye. Sworn Defender, you ask? Well, they have 3, yes, but you have 4 Cranial Leech and 1 Trade Agreement, or you can just ping it to death in one huge effort.
Sutraps- This is annoying because of his natural resistance. Rest assured, the above plan still works, and eventually you can reduce most aggro decks to just topdecking the rest of the game with no creatures or useful items in play, and then you can start attacking back with 2 power creatures. Also, building that Woodland Sanctuary for Sharpshooting seals the deal.
George- A combination of both above plans
For all of these, a City Wall is "gg" as well.
VS. Wizardburn... Ok, now is where it goes downhill. This deck has no prayer currently against burn decks...it's just disaster. No amount of Amulet is enough, and they kill you and anything you own in 5-6 turns and then Heat Wave. The deck can't protect against burn to the face except by killing their wizards with archers, but if you're getting domed, your creatures are probably dead. City Wall is the only hope, but there is like less than 5% chance you could ever build it. But more on this later...
VS. Grimus overall...it depends on what form of Grimus, but overall, the false loyalty hurts a lot. It could get pretty messy with controllive Guardian Angels and Sworn Defenders, but Cranials and Trade Agreement help. It's iffy but not impossible
VS Zycon control...hmm...I don't know. The jury is still out. The wizard are weak defense to the archers, buy Zycon is good at slowing things down further. The nightmare here is Peacetime, as there is no main deck way to deal with it. That's the main reason the Heavy Ballista that made you laugh earlier is there. In my experience, I've forced Peacetime to go the distance, even to the bottom of my deck. I have inumerable creatures that don't deal damage, but with that 1 Heavy Ballista they can blow Zycon out, even if it was the very last card in my deck, in 3 turns. (remember, by now, my critters are behind walls and protected from manipulation) The sideboard helps with 4 Priests of Riverwood, also hopefully behind walls.
Ok, so, as it is now, it's tough for this type of deck to win it all, but it can make tough matches for a lot of the current popular decks. But if you stayed with me and read all this, I did say something about a rumor I heard...
ATTENTION!!! RULES RUMOR!!!
Unless I'm horribly mistaken, in current ME gaming all you can hope to do is build a wall and then move in-play creatures behind them, using an action. Well, I believe I have it on good authority that soon if not already by as of Sunday 6/11, creatures may be hired DIRECTLY BEHIND WALLS.
Let it marinate.............................
(By the way, if by some freak of stupidity this was already the way it was played since like the beginning, then I'll be very embarrassed to say the least, but we were told you couldn't do that, until...)
If this is true, then this could change things to the up and up for this deck for sure, greatly accelerating the process. The problem with walls is speed...it's like you're twice as slow as your opponent while he swings for 6 or 8 at least. Being able to hire right behind walls is awesome for immediate protection and by elimniating the waste of a turn moving behind in the first place. How awesome would Barricade be filled up with Masters M'Kinn and Mason behind them? With this development, this is a lot more realistic. Of course, this new rule could change a lot more than just this deck.
I'll stop now since this has been really long, but I would like feedback. Thanks in advance for enduring the lecture.
