Cactus Game Design Message Boards

Deck Size (50)

Lost Souls (7)

“Remnant”
“Exiles”
“Distressed”
“Prosperity”
“Darkness”
“Hunter”
“Lawless”

Dominants (7)

Son of God
The Second Coming
Angel of the Lord
Three Woes
Shipwreck (Vain Visions)
Christian Martyr
Falling Away (CoW)

Utility (6)

Endless Treasures
Magic Charms
Storehouse
Sheol
Treacherous Land
Majestic Heavens

Heroes (10)

Ehud
Gideon
Jair
Samuel
Joshua, Son of Nun
Captain of the Host (PoC)
The Angel Under the Oak
Angel with the Secret Name
David, the Psalmist
Elijah

Good Enhancements (7)

Samuel’s Edict
Ehud’s Dagger
Tested by Fire
Righteous Judge
The Emmaus Road
Death of Firstborn
Delivered

Evil Characters (9)

King Saul
The Lying Prophet
Profane Daughters
Medium in Endor
Necromancer
Persian Horseman
Gomer
The Serpent
The Deceiver

Evil Enhancements (4)

Divination
Death of Unrighteous
Confusion
Accursed of God

Reserve (10)

Angel of the Winds
Uzzah
The Amalekite’s Slave
Daughter’s Grief
Scattered (Was main deck prior versions)
Haman’s Plot
Reap the Whirlwind
The Fall of Man
Flying Scroll
Covenant with Death

Green highlighted cards are a change from the previous version of this list that was posted here.

After posting this list for feedback and thoughts in July I took some of the suggestions made by various board members (Shout-out to Master Q and Josh) and implemented them to create a more focused, streamlined version. I’d like to go through some of the changes and thoughts behind them, as well as provide a game-by-game summary.

The biggest change that was made between States/Regionals and Nationals was the realization that my problem wasn’t that I wasn’t fast enough, but rather, that I wasn’t consistent enough getting to Covenant with Death (CwD). There is a slight, but important difference there.

As a result the majority of my changes centered around getting to CwD.

In the initial list I had 3 ways of getting to CwD - Exiles Lost Soul, Endless Treasures and Storehouse. I also technically had Pagan Sailors, but realistically he wasn’t going to activate it. I added 4 ways of getting to CwD in the Nationals version. Hunter Lost Soul (to grab Exiles) Delivered (to get Endless Treasures) Delivered also meant The Emmaus Road could get me to CwD, and finally Accursed of God which fit in beautifully with my Brown/Pale Green defense.

The other changes I made were Gomer and Persian Horseman in place of Leviathan and Pagan Sailors. While I love Leviathan, he’s a pretty big liability as he only had one negate to back him up. Gomer allowed me to manipulate initiative and helped protect against Angel of the Lord. Persian Horseman was negated literally every single time I blocked with him, but the threat is enough to justify the slot (Sailors would have been negated every time too)

I also swapped Jair in place of Jephthah, traded out Warriors Captain for Prophecies of Christ Captain, and changed my Soul Gen piece from Hopper to Majestic Heavens.

The final change wasn’t truly a change in the end. After much hemming and hawing and thinking that the problem was that I wasn’t fast enough I had changed Shipwreck to Vain Visions (I can get X up to 4) to help improve my speed. Just before leaving for Nationals I wondered if I was going to regret that, and ended up checking 2 copies with Visions and 1 with Shipwreck. The copy with Shipwreck was what I played in the Top Cut.

Game 1 - Jeremy Chambers 5-2 Win.

I opened this game with a couple turns of Soul Drought, I used Vain Visions and David, the Psalmist to help extend another turn or two of drought. Sometimes that’s all it takes. I was feeling great about my decision to play Visions after this game. I established CwD on my second turn, searching for it with Storehouse.

Game 2 - Austin Frank 5-1 Win.

Opened with multiple souls and got to go first. I had an early Confusion on Son of God, and my Necromancer hit his Second Coming from the bottom. I actually had to do it twice because he negated it the first block, but wasn’t able to shuffle his deck before I blocked with him again. I used Hunter-Exiles to grab CwD on turn one. Elijah manipulated a Medium in Endor into battle so I could use Tested by Fire CBN for a soul early on.

Game 3 - Josiah Beers 2-5 Loss

Josiah went first and opened with a fairly standard line of play for a Throne deck. I used a combination of Ehud+Emmaus Road and Serpent+Delivered to establish CwD on my first turn. Which is good because Josiah had Jonah down on his first turn. Game progressed fairly evenly. A really fun play in this game was getting to use Necromancer to banish his King Rehoboam. I created a side-battle using his Samuel to get some extra cards I needed early on. It was also a sneaky way to circumvent a Throne trigger as I used Christian Martyr on his King Saul while the side-battle was ongoing. I did rip my first plot this game - Thinking if I could clear enough of his heroes I’d be far enough ahead, I burned it on David, the Shepherd, Isaiah and Abigail. His Samuel also died by the #’s during the earlier side-battle. I had thought this was enough, but unfortunately I couldn’t get to Three Woes for Throne and Josiah was able to push through enough rescues despite my earlier shenanigans. It was after this game that I switched to the copy of the deck with Shipwreck as I knew I needed another option against Throne beyond just Woes.

Game 4 - BrianJones 0-0 Tie

Game 5 - Jonathan Greeson 5-2 Win

Jonathan was playing an updated version of #Mayhem. Being very familiar with how that deck operates gave me a significant advantage in this game, as I was able to manipulate his blockers with Ehud consistently. This is the one game that I had the option to establish CwD and didn’t take it - It doesn’t affect a lot of what #Mayhem is doing speed-wise and I knew I could simply out-race if need be with my ability to force certain blockers.

Game 6 - Josh Hartzler 4-1 Win at Time

This game had my dirtiest play of the day by far. I went first and didn’t open with a way to CwD - Not ideal. However, I rescued with Angel Under the Oak to Samuel, and drew four cards. I subsequently burned Righteous Judge, Death of Firstborn and made Woes good to rescue my first soul. I then played Delivered which was one of the four cards I drew in my discard phase to draw 2 more cards via Endless Treasures. So I ended my first turn +8 cards and a CwD on board. I misplayed my Shipwreck this game, hitting an early Coliseum (Which does bother me, but could have been handled by my Woes) Josh dropped Gates of Hell on a later turn that got him the last critical block that he needed.

Game 7 - Charles Johnson 5-1 Win

CwD is a serious problem with Genesis decks in general - I went first and established mine, while Charles was holding 7 Years, Faith of Sarah, Faith of Isaac, and Faith Among Corruption. He did eventually get to play those in battle when I made erred in checking numbers for initiative. However, at that point it was too little, too late. Especially since my Death of Firstborn is CBN in this matchup. I also used Medium in Endor to kick Benjamin out of battle for the far less frightening Judah.

Final Swiss Results - 15.5 points, 14 Lost Soul differential. Top Cut #4 Seed.

Read it all.  Great report.  Very cool deck.  Congrats again!

Can we get a game report for the 0-0 tie with brian jones?  Id love to hear how neither of you got a soul?

Most epic game, many hard fought battles

Quote from: Jonesy on August 06, 2019, 01:56:26 PM

Most epic game, many hard fought battles

Don't forget the 10 minute ruling discussion

That was intense. Might be the first time the MC got in on a ruling.