Author Topic: How to Build: Choose the Blocker (Read 1576 times)

Warrior_Monk · « **on:** November 07, 2012, 07:55:32 PM »

This is going to capitalize on a very difficult ability to stop—choose the blocker. The most effective way to do CTB is to do it pre-block, as you won’t get a chance to use CTB if they block with Uzzah, for example. Unfortunately, pre-block can be stopped, in T1 primarily by artifacts, so you’re going to have to include CTB, pre-block cards, and anti-artifact cards. Here’s a list of the most useful CTB cards:

Obedience of Noah
Provisions
King Amaziah

As you can see, the list is fairly small, and King Amaziah can only be used once per game. Obedience of Noah is the only one of these that aren’t automatically preblock. However, Jacob and Joseph (with Hidden Treasures) can fairly easily play it preblock, so let’s throw those two in.

King Amaziah
Jacob
Joseph

Provisions
Obedience of Noah

Right now it’s looking primarily blue, so let’s throw in Asher to recur Obedience of Noah and to give us another blue character. We also need some more green for Provisions. Micah isn’t a bad choice to recur Provisions, and Benaiah is a powerful user of Provisions because he negates any chance of your opponent using your characters against you. Ira falls into the same category as Benaiah, but is Blue.

Hidden Treasures

Ira
Asher
Jacob
Joseph
Micah
Benaiah
King Amaziah

Provisions
Obedience of Noah

Now to add some supporting cards that will help the already powerful base. Reuben’s Torn Clothes fits well, Hur can be nice when combined with Gifts for speed, and finally let’s throw in Claudia, ET, AoCP, Brass Serpent, Pentecost, and Feast of Trumpets, because I’m a sucker for the old school. Finally, we have plenty of Genesis, so a Seven Years of Plenty would be great.

Hidden Treasures
Gifts of the Magi

Ira
Claudia
Jacob
Asher
Joseph
Micah
Hur
Benaiah
Ethiopian Treasurer
King Amaziah (RoA2)

Authority of Christ (Promo)
Obedience of Noah
Seven Years of Plenty
Reuben’s Torn Clothes
Provisions
ANB (You didn’t expect me to forget, right? Goes great with Benaiah and Ira)
Brass Serpent
Feast of Trumpets

At this point you can beef it up a bit with Aaron/Moses, but that’d give us two more cards and worse, two extra brigades. So let’s just go with this for now. Now let’s look at some support. This isn’t super fast, and you’re going to need defense (to block for both you and your opponent), so let’s suppose 57 at this point, keeping it slim while getting extra dominants. These four good dominants work well in almost every deck.

Current Total: 32
Lost Souls: 8
TBD

Good Dominants: 4
Son of God
New Jerusalem
Angel of the Lord
Guardian of Your Souls

Artifacts: 2
Hidden Treasures
Gifts of the Magi

Heroes: 10
Ira
Claudia
Jacob
Asher
Joseph
Micah
Hur
Benaiah
Ethiopian Treasurer
King Amaziah (RoA2)

Good Enhancements: 8
Authority of Christ (Promo)
Obedience of Noah
Seven Years of Plenty
Reuben’s Torn Clothes
Provisions
ANB
Brass Serpent
Feast of Trumpets

Some of the biggest threats are going to be Covenant with Death and Darius’ Decree. A DoN and Captured Ark will help, but these are going to be problematic no matter what, potentially destroying your entire offense. That brings us up to 34, giving us 20 cards for the defense, with 3 remaining dominants. That’s a beautiful number for a choose the blocker deck, giving you quite a bit of beef on defense, allowing you to properly defend both sides of the field. Choosing the defense is the most tricky part though. You probably want two brigades, and they should work well together. For this deck, I’m going to use gold and black, working primarily with Herods, and Sadducees for the main defense, but the CTB will have bigger options.

Warrior_Monk · « **Reply #1 on:** November 07, 2012, 07:56:23 PM »

I’m going to start with Egyptians on defense, which is more to aid the offense, giving you fodder for your CTB abilities.

Pharaoh’s Baker
Pharaoh’s Cupbearer
Egyptian Magicians

These three are fairly weak and suicidal. Magicians is the only one you should be cautious choosing to block, as a Death of Unrighteous can be devastating. We should have some CTB fodder for King Amaziah as well, so let’s add a King Elah and King Jehoahaz (ki/Israel), which will give us some soul generation as well. Now we have 15 cards remaining for the main core of the defense. We already have a decent amount of gold, but let’s throw in a few last characters. KoT is an absolute powerhouse, and Herod Agrippa II. One of Herod’s most powerful cards are Herod’s Dungeon, and if we throw in that we need a way to clear it, namely with Salome.

Herod’s Dungeon

Pharaoh’s Baker
Pharaoh’s Cupbearer
Egyptian Magicians
King of Tyrus (warriors)
Herod Agrippa II
Salome
King Elah
King Jehoahaz (ki/Israel)

We really don’t have many herods or black, so let’s use Herod the Great from apostles. We also want some Sads for Agrippa, so let’s use Alexander and Disbelieving Sadducee. And since our defense is primarily N.T., let’s use Ceserea Philipi to protect them from opponent's territory destruction, as well as protecting Herod’s Dungeon.

Current Total: 47
Lost Souls: 8
TBD

Sites: 2
Ceserea Phillipi
Herod’s Dungeon

Good Dominants: 4
Son of God
New Jerusalem
Angel of the Lord
Guardian of Your Souls

Evil Dominants: 1
Destruction of Nehushtan

Artifacts: 3
Hidden Treasures
Gifts of the Magi
Captured Ark

Heroes: 10
Ira
Claudia
Jacob
Asher
Joseph
Micah
Hur
Benaiah
Ethiopian Treasurer
King Amaziah (RoA2)

Good Enhancements: 8
Authority of Christ (Promo)
Obedience of Noah
Seven Years of Plenty
Reuben’s Torn Clothes
Provisions
ANB
Brass Serpent
Feast of Trumpets

Evil Characters: 11
Pharaoh’s Baker
Pharaoh’s Cupbearer
Egyptian Magicians
King of Tyrus (warriors)
Herod Agrippa II
Salome
King Elah
Herod the Great
King Jehoahaz (ki/Israel)
Disbelieving Sadducee
Alexander

We know we’ll want 3 more dominants, so that leaves us 7 evil enhancements, unless we decide to drop some stuff. Let’s see what we want to add. Herod’s Treachery is super powerful because it can take out heroes after they win the battle, so that’s definitely going in. Beheaded is nice because it can be used in battle or out of battle to cause problems. Wonders Forgotten and Failed Objective are standard for gold. For some black help, let’s use Tenants Kill the Son and Just a Hireling. Finally, Herod’s are also Roman, so let’s use Romans Destroy Jerusalem. If we’re using Tenants Kill the Son, let’s also throw in Hormah. So: Herod’s Treachery, Beheaded, Wonders Forgotten, Failed Objective, Tenants Kill the Son, Just a Hireling, Romans Destroy Jerusalem, and Hormah. That’s one too many, but we also have a soul stalling strategy we three sites, so at this point let’s drop a lost soul and a dominant to bring it down to 56. The final deck then is:

Total Cards: 56
Lost Souls: 7
TBD

Sites: 3
Hormah
Ceserea Phillipi
Herod’s Dungeon

Good Dominants: 5
Son of God
New Jerusalem
Angel of the Lord
Guardian of Your Souls
Grapes of Wrath

Evil Dominants: 2
Burial
Destruction of Nehushtan

Artifacts: 3
Hidden Treasures
Gifts of the Magi
Captured Ark

Heroes: 10
Ira
Claudia
Jacob
Asher
Joseph
Micah
Hur
Benaiah
Ethiopian Treasurer
King Amaziah (RoA2)

Good Enhancements: 8
Authority of Christ (Promo)
Obedience of Noah
Seven Years of Plenty
Reuben’s Torn Clothes
Provisions
ANB
Brass Serpent
Feast of Trumpets

Evil Characters: 11
Pharaoh’s Baker
Pharaoh’s Cupbearer
Egyptian Magicians
King of Tyrus (warriors)
Herod Agrippa II
Salome
King Elah
Herod the Great
King Jehoahaz (ki/Israel)
Disbelieving Sadducee
Alexander

Evil Enhancements: 7
Romans Destroy Jerusalem
Herod’s Treachery
Just a Hireling
Tenants Kill the Son
Wonders Forgotten
Failed Objective
Beheaded

Warrior_Monk · « **Reply #2 on:** November 07, 2012, 07:57:00 PM »

Finally, for lost soul selection. We have a nice stall system going here, so let’s use 2 Liner, being able to reset it with Hormah or Just a Hireling. Punisher can wreck an offense. Cannot Be Prevented is nice too, but you should be cautious about them exchanging for it because it can hurt too. N.T. and Female are pretty standard as well. For the last 2, let’s use */4 and the Withdraw, and the last change would be to drop Pharaoh’s Baker and use Goliath instead, who will work well with the Withdraw. The final deck then looks like this:

Total Cards: 56
Lost Souls: 7
2 Liner
N.T.
Female Only
Punisher
Cannot be Prevented
Withdraw
*/4

Sites: 3
Hormah
Ceserea Phillipi
Herod’s Dungeon

Good Dominants: 5
Son of God
New Jerusalem
Angel of the Lord
Guardian of Your Souls
Grapes of Wrath

Evil Dominants: 2
Burial
Destruction of Nehushtan

Artifacts: 3
Hidden Treasures
Gifts of the Magi
Captured Ark

Heroes: 10
Ira
Claudia
Jacob
Asher
Joseph
Micah
Hur
Benaiah
Ethiopian Treasurer
King Amaziah (RoA2)

Good Enhancements: 8
Authority of Christ (Promo)
Obedience of Noah
Seven Years of Plenty
Reuben’s Torn Clothes
Provisions
ANB
Brass Serpent
Feast of Trumpets

Evil Characters: 11
Pharaoh’s Cupbearer
Egyptian Magicians
King of Tyrus (warriors)
Herod Agrippa II
Salome
King Elah
Herod the Great
King Jehoahaz (ki/Israel)
Goliath
Disbelieving Sadducee
Alexander

Evil Enhancements: 7
Romans Destroy Jerusalem
Herod’s Treachery
Just a Hireling
Tenants Kill the Son
Wonders Forgotten
Failed Objective
Beheaded

There are plenty of things you can do with Choose the Blocker, even with such a limited number of good CTB cards. A Samuel deck could be great, and depending on if your metagame often uses defense, Ehud can be pretty sweet. This certainly isn’t the best or only way to build a CTB deck, I just was bored in math class and decided to give it a shot. I honestly haven’t had much experience with Herod’s or Sads, so there are likely better options, but experiment and have fun with it.

No feedback on this deck please (or PM me with suggestions), this is just a basic guide on utilizing one of the most underrated strategies in the game: Choose the Blocker.

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Author Topic: How to Build: Choose the Blocker (Read 1576 times)

Warrior_Monk

How to Build: Choose the Blocker

Warrior_Monk

Re: How to Build: Choose the Blocker

Warrior_Monk

Re: How to Build: Choose the Blocker