Cactus Game Design Message Boards

Game 1 - Royce Anagnostou

Royce is a relatively new player and was playing a deck he had gotten from Roy, so he wasn’t that familiar with it, so he was at a disadvantage off the bat.  He didn’t have any blockers the first three turns, I believe, so there was no resistance to my attacks. I successfully blocked him, I believe twice, at least once being with KoT (I think I droughted him a couple of times too).  He almost beat KoT by the numbers on one attack with a NT hero but ended up using Faith of Moses’ Parents to ignore him (not fully knowing how ignore worked), causing a stalemate. My final turn I simply soul-genned with Captive Priest and rescued it with SoG, bringing it to a 5-0 win in a short game.  As we were talking, he mentioned it’s a techy deck and it’s called "Frankenstein." I told him that’s funny because I made a deck with the same name back in 2018 Nats that was also techy and got me to topcut.  He said “I believe this may be the same deck.”  So he showed me the deck and, sure enough, it was my deck!  So that was fun playing against it.

Game 2 - Johnathan Steckman

This was my first game at the top table where the livestream was, and I had a lot of fun this game because Johnathan and I had some good battles going on.  John used a Postexilic offense with an orange defense, so I was familiar with both.  I had to fight for souls in regards to making sure I had enough to rescue as he had very few out the whole game, so I mostly soul-genned. I blocked him successfully several times with KoT (except for one hard fought battle against KoT, which he won with Gifts and Offerings), and one time with Foreign Wives (FW).  His offense just seemed to struggle against my defense and John didn’t seem to have many effective interrupts available to him to get around KoT.  He tried blocking a couple of times but I had counters each time.  One notable win was baiting him in to blocking with FW as I ended up tossing By My Spirit off Coliseum to defeat her, which was my tech against her. I also tried using my tech against demons (Seventh Seal), but John caught on and ended up later underdecking it with Joshua the Conqueror, so I never got to use it to win a battle.  He ended up Falling Away one of my souls, which required another rescue. The souls I won were all battle won, except for the last one, which was with SoG, ending the game in a 5-2 win.

Game 3 - Chad Franz

This was the first of two LaFS decks I played.  Chad made a comment pre-game that he noticed, in our past games, that I don’t make many misplays. Well, little did he realize at the time but he had spoken too soon!  There were misplays from me to him that wound up costing us in different ways. But, I don’t think there were any that may have significantly altered the outcome of our game, except for, perhaps, a play involving ANB.

Chad went first and attempted to set up the combo (Pigs soul came out opening hand) by activating Hidden Treasures, but thankfully I drew DoN opening hand so I hit HT.  He battle challenged and then passed the turn. I won a soul on my turn with no block from Chad.  On his next turn, Chad popped off the Creation band, but ultimately I was able to block it with Foreign Wives. We made a couple of mistakes but they seemed to cancel each other out (watch the replay and see if you can spot them).  The next few battles I won souls and I successfully blocked him.  He ended up Falling Away one of my souls.  His final turn we misplayed when he was about to play ANB in battle, and I was thinking my protected FW had SI, so I negated it, and the battle ended in a stalemate.  I was able to block Chad each turn, so the 2 souls he won were from SoG/TSC.  On my last turn I won a soul through battle, bringing the final score to 3-2.

How useful did you find shipwreck at nationals? Would you change anything about this deck post nationals?

Man, where is the Deafening Spirit at? That's like Orange's best negate IMO. Great deck tho, congrats on placing.

I had both of those cards in earlier versions of the deck. Yes they’re good but my concern was if someone was playing a Daniel deck, Daniel would have just shut those down, while he wouldn’t be able to prevent DGRS and Blindness. I had this experience twice in online tournaments, so I went with negates that would get around that in case someone was using Daniel.

In fact, I even had Blasphemies in the deck up until the night before the tournament, but I cut it for David’s Descendant. The reality is I barely use those two negates (DGRS and Blindness). Most players just can’t get around KoT or RD once I block with them. And I still had CotK and 3W to negate. I think I used those enhs a total of about 4 times (that’s combined, not 4 times each) the whole tournament.  And that’s how it’s been with other games (low usage).

Trust me, this deck has been through the gauntlet many times, and there is purpose in the cards I selected in this version vs other cards that aren’t included. 😁

What are you normally hitting with DGRS? I’ve never used the card before but seems like it could be a good utility? Just wondering normal targets or the main purpose for it?

***See top post for deck history***

Deck Analysis:  The offense primarily relies on a heavy band of powerful heroes.  I've had other heroes in past iterations, such as Asahel, but found that he didn't really do much for the deck as I discovered that mainly the big numbered heroes tended to perform better.  So I cut him and added other characters.  The idea is to keep pressing the attack by soul genning and winning a soul each rescue, putting a lot of pressure on my opponent and him having few answers to my overpowering band/attack.  The cherry on top (or in this case, the bottom) of the band is Benaiah, as he negates characters and enhancements, except banding and good weapons.  Naturally, I have a few weapon negates to help deal with any nuisance CBP enhancements but can still work on Benaiah.  I also made sure to have three meek heroes, one of whom was Matthan who is CBN and can soul gen.  The meek heroes were to play Solomon's Dream off of them to get me what I needed at the right time.  I found Matthan was such a great add in as many times I put him at the end of the band to soul-gen.  The offense was supported by cards like Temple Spears and Shields and Shields to add a layer of protection to my heroes.  Additionally, Coliseum is a key to help support the band as it tosses those annoying CBN anti-banding enhancements, as well as those chump-block, soul protecting blockers.  Although the protections on TSaS and Shields don’t work when Coliseum is out, if my opponent negates Coliseum with Woes or whatever, those enhs' protect abilities kick in, and vice versa if they negate the enhs but Coliseum is out.  So it's a layered strategy against anti-banding cards.  An early include was Wall of Protection and Judean Garrison as I didn't want my opponent using my own offensive band against me!

The defense relies on the simplicity of big, self-protecting demons/humans.  King of Tyrus is certainly the MVP of the defense and so many opponents have had such a difficult time getting around him.  I don't need battle winning enhs on the defense as I can usually withstand the attack with just these big, self-protecting blockers.  I do have a few negates to help deflect enhs that negate the protection and/or remove the blocker from battle, and that's all I've found I need for the defense.  They bide my offense enough time to keep rescuing souls. The cool thing is that when one of my opponents was using a similar defense, I wasn't concerned as I knew how to get around them. 

I did tech a little to deal with my opponent's own nuisance CBN blockers, such as Foreign Wives and KoT.  The last month or two leading up to Nats 2021 I included By My Spirit so I could toss it off of Coliseum if my opponent blocked with Foreign Wives (once I had BMS and Coliseum, I liked to bait my opponent into blocking with FW by drawing a lot of cards that turn).  And, knowing I was going to be up against an orange defense, I included Seventh Seal to get around the Judean Mediums / KoT or Red Dragon CBN band.  And it makes it even harder for my opponent to stop Seventh Seal, since it's a neutral card, and if it's activated in Book of the Covenant it's CBN by evil cards! 

Regarding my artifact choices, I've gone back and forth with certain ones.  Broken Covenant was a late add-in as I liked the fact that I could get a potential draw 5 off Endless Treasures to BC.  This also worked out well with LaFS running around as I could easily replenish my hand if I was combo'd against.  Lacking Prophecy has always been an annoying card but has helped shut out my opponent from playing his doms.  Covenant with David was a favorite as it was quite versatile:  I could use the enh side to get one my of good forts, or I could use the artifact side to get one of my two good kings or I could target Abaddon or King of Tyrus as they are both kings (I tended to use it to get KoT).  I went back and forth with Oath of Purity, but decided on it as it was too good not to include.  I could bounce one of my dual-sided heroes to make them meek (or use the SA side) if I wanted to play Solomon's Dream, or bounce a couple of my heroes in territory who had weapons equipped to them so I could unequip the weapons and use them later, or choose to put TSaS or Shields on different heroes.   

As for my dominant choices, I feel they are all on-point.  The flex dominant would be DoN.  I really like Shipwreck as it deals with so many nuiscance forts and sites. This helped some in Nats 2021, but nothing too game-changing really.  So this could also be a flex dominant, but I still like having it to deal with my opponent's Sheol, Throne, etc.  I can also get it out easily with Wages of Sin (and the same with the other evil dominants). 

Really, really like this list. Only thing I might have done differently is tried to squeeze Damsel in (at least in Reserve) to give the deck another potential "catch-up" card if the hand got LAFS-ed.

Obviously she's not a super powerful blocker, but having 2 negates plus the potential to add a demon off of Gates seems like a decent amount of support.

Also definitely approve of the decision to go with 51. 

Thanks sir.  I actually did have Damsel in my first orange version, but I noticed she didn't really do anything for the defense.  Many times she was prevented, or she provided a small draw, and I simply couldn't hold off attackers with her (since I didn't have hardly any battle winning enhs in the deck).  I agree that the Reserve would be a better place for her for sure.  Regarding her drawing, I felt I had enough with Ishmaiah, Broken Covenant, Prosperity and Endless Treasures to make up if I was combo'd against.  And yes, I just couldn't cut anything else, which is why I left it at 51