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the only honest-to-goodness reliable counter i can say currently exists in this game is image of jealousy.

Destructive Sin > IoJ IMO.

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the only honest-to-goodness reliable counter i can say currently exists in this game is image of jealousy.

Destructive Sin > IoJ IMO.

not really. its easy to suidice a character to get it off. try suiciding a fort.

or play philistines respond to the attack by slipping second character out oh noes you can block hooray

hezekiahs signet ring/set fire say hello.

I find it REALLY funny that the ONLY counter listed by Master KChief is Image of Jealousy... I always find that 12 evil characters will survive to a garden tomb, as long as they have some kind of protection. THAT'S the best counter. Just use a fricking defense! If all you n00bs didn't use standalone defenses for years we wouldn't have to come to this... sheesh!

 

Hey,

The whole 'ban TCG' sounds to me as some is being unwilling to be open-minded. 

TGT can't rescue a single lost soul.

So only heroes are ban worthy, because they're the only ones that can rescue lost souls.  That doesn't sound very open minded

The Strong Angel can rescue 7 souls in a single game all by itself, and can negate ALL special abilities on opponent's ECs and EEs.  THAT's OPed! 

My Armorbearer has rescued 5 souls in a single game all by itself.  He must be OPed!  The Strong Angel doesn't negate any of the significant abilities on the evil enhancements in my Old Faithful deck.

... I always find that 12 evil characters will survive to a garden tomb, as long as they have some kind of protection. THAT'S the best counter. Just use a fricking defense! If all you n00bs didn't use standalone defenses for years we wouldn't have to come to this... sheesh!

How many defenses are there that can provide protection to evil characters?  About Six?  Limit myself to six possible defenses, that sounds like about the worst plan imaginable.

Tschow,

Tim "Sir Nobody" Maly

LOL!  Jehoiada, the High Priest, singlehandedly won me an entire district booster draft!  WAY OP!!

protection forts are good, but as maly said, you pretty much have to commit yourself to those defenses exclusively, which doesnt make it reliable. also, not every protection fort gives protection for conversion, discard, shuffle, etc all at the same time, which dedicated tgt decks all plan to do. and again, like i said before, set fire kills every commonly used protect fort in the game.

i also find it comical how he consistently uses the term 'n00b', when almost everyone in this thread has been around longer than he has.

In Redemption, no. On the boards, yes. Also, I was joking, hence the  . Well joking about the n00b thing, I wasn't joking about everyone using standalone and forcing a card like TGT to come into play.

When TSA was first printed, he negated just about every evil character and enhancement.  Everyone thought that he was OPed, or else they used him in their deck.  

But he served a purpose.  Prior to FBN heroes, most defenses counted on gaining initiative and playing a battle winner.  Players were SO used to that routine that they felt cheated and complained that the numbers heroes ruined the game.  Rather than simply include some 10/10 or 8/12 ECs and a bunch of set asides and number enhancements, they just complained.  

Well, TSA was probably a little over the top, and if those 8/8 and 10/8 heroes had been 7/7s instead, that would have been a lot more managable, but still, 10 years later, TSA has plenty of counters, so we see that there was no need to ban him.  Just make some counters and we see he is not as bad as people first thought.  (Though I still argue he is the best stand-alone hero in the game).

Players who want to ban TGT are complaining about only ONE card out of the bunch that are required to make that deck work.  Why not complain about Holy Grail?  Why not complain about Women as Snares?  Why not complain about Jephthah?  TGT does not kill, convert, or capture any characters.  It does not rescue lost souls.  It can be used in conjunction with the above cards, plus some heroes that didn't see use for YEARS before TGT released.  It has accomplished a few things that we wanted it to do:

1) STOP the use of the "5 stand-alone EC defense", which was used by WAAAAAAY too many players.  Red Dragon, Emperor Nero, King of Tyrus, Prince of This World, Sabbath Breaker.  TGT had to be powerful enough to beat that deck more often than it lost.  Otherwise, 1/3 of the top players would still be using that defense today (perhaps plus PG).  Another third would be using the defense that Tim Maly used: also only 1-2 characters from each brigade, plus the one CBN battle winner from those brigades.

2) increase the playability of the garden tomb visitors.  4 old heroes, most of which were not used anymore, suddenly become HIGHLY playable.  A side benefit is that many players have learned who those 6 named garden tomb visitors are.

3) increase the amount of defenders players put into their decks.  7 ECs is simply not enough.  Designers thought it would make players build decks that include several ECs of mostly 1 or 2 brigades.  This encourages more variety in deck design.  Otherwise, you just simply use the best 5-6 ECs in the game, or else the 5-6 CBN combo defense, and ... refer to point 1.

4) make defensive themes playable.  One way to make defensive themes playable is to make cards that benefit characters from the same "theme."  Another way to make themes playable is to make slash defenses unplayable.  

In retrospect, I wish we had replaced the "2 characters of that brigade" with "2 cards of that brigade."  That way, if you had a curse that matched, or an enhancement in your storehouse, or an evil enhancement on your site, or a weapon on your EC, you could still block.

Regardless, I like TGT, and think it has been good for the game as a whole.  We will continue to make counters to it, since it is still very strong.  But I think, like TSA, it will be shown to have been a major steering mechanism for the game.

Plus, if there was ever a card in the game that SHOULD be OPed, the garden tomb is a top choice.  

Players who want to ban TGT are complaining about only ONE card out of the bunch that are required to make that deck work.

one card plus an applicable hero make the deck 'work'. all other cards are supplementary to the strategy.  

Why not complain about Holy Grail?  Why not complain about Women as Snares?  Why not complain about Jephthah?

because those cards play second fiddle towards the archetype. remove tgt, what do you have? a not-so-broken deck.

1) STOP the use of the "5 stand-alone EC defense", which was used by WAAAAAAY too many players.  Red Dragon, Emperor Nero, King of Tyrus, Prince of This World, Sabbath Breaker.  TGT had to be powerful enough to beat that deck more often than it lost.  Otherwise, 1/3 of the top players would still be using that defense today (perhaps plus PG).  Another third would be using the defense that Tim Maly used: also only 1-2 characters from each brigade, plus the one CBN battle winner from those brigades.

unless im mistaken, it still didnt exactly stop it. i still see plenty of standalone to this day being used by top tier players...even the last nationals deck used the stand-alone defense. also, stand-alone ec's have never been hard to deal with, given the plethora of interrupt and remove cards, as well as simple numbers to beat a kot and such. personally, i dont think this is an issue that should have been addressed, as the game is already terribly weighted in favor of the offense. there was nothing wrong with maly creating the turtle archetype in lieu of all the speed decks running rampant back then...and even to this day.

Quote from: Bryon on December 19, 2009, 08:30:39 PM

1) STOP the use of the "5 stand-alone EC defense", which was used by WAAAAAAY too many players.  Red Dragon, Emperor Nero, King of Tyrus, Prince of This World, Sabbath Breaker.  TGT had to be powerful enough to beat that deck more often than it lost.  Otherwise, 1/3 of the top players would still be using that defense today (perhaps plus PG).  Another third would be using the defense that Tim Maly used: also only 1-2 characters from each brigade, plus the one CBN battle winner from those brigades.

unless im mistaken, it still didnt exactly stop it. i still see plenty of standalone to this day being used by top tier players...even the last nationals deck used the stand-alone defense. also, stand-alone ec's have never been hard to deal with, given the plethora of interrupt and remove cards, as well as simple numbers to beat a kot and such. personally, i dont think this is an issue that should have been addressed, as the game is already terribly weighted in favor of the offense. there was nothing wrong with maly creating the turtle archetype in lieu of all the speed decks running rampant back then...and even to this day.

I must agree.  Gabe's 1st place deck used standalone, my deck (T-3rd) used it, and I think 2nd might have too.  Yes, it has definitely made me consider not using it as much, but I find an Image of J is plenty to stall a TGT deck enough for my speed to either win or lose.

Quote from: Cameron the Conqueror on December 19, 2009, 11:53:57 PM

I must agree.  Gabe's 1st place deck used standalone, my deck (T-3rd) used it, and I think 2nd might have too.  Yes, it has definitely made me consider not using it as much, but I find an Image of J is plenty to stall a TGT deck enough for my speed to either win or lose.

The fact that you have to play a brown EC, and a brown EE, means that you have at least 2 brown cards in your deck, and likely more if you want a reasonable chance of having a brown EC on which to play the IoJ.  The old "5 stand-alone ECs" deck did not have a single brown card, and certainly not the 3-4 you likely have.

i've had 2 brown ec's and ioj as standalone since texp, and it has worked to great success in ROOT. even so, there are 3 solid stand-alone brown ec's to play it on now: TAS, uzzah, and gomer.

MasterKChief, the game MUST be weighted in favor of the offense.  Timed out games are frustrating for many players, time-consuming for judges, create longer breaks between rounds and thus longer tournaments or fewer rounds, and not as satisfying as true wins.  If a game needs to be over in 45 minutes, then the offense needs to be beat the defense the vast majority of times.

i see, so we create a card that skips the battle phase completely and gives the rescuer a free lost soul. you're right, that DOES save on time consumption! BRILLIANT!

Regardless of your preference as to the strengths of the alignments, the fact that so many of the top decks used the same 5 ECs for defense meant that the game was not very fresh.

and there have been many top decks that have used full-fledged defenses: maly, timmierz, etc. defense has never won a game, and it never will. isnt it a bit presumptuous thinking that since every 'top deck' has a stand-alone defense, it must make it broken? no. instead, see what kind of deck its usually contained in (speed 99% of the time). do you think a stand-alone defense will work in a non-speed deck? more than likely not. speed decks rely on these small speed bumps in hopes of setting up quickly and getting to 5 in the shortest time possible. instead of making a qualm with stand-alone, work on the t1 meta and fix speed first.

If the Garden Tomb is not a big enough threat to make that defense go away, then I guess it isn't as powerful as the whiners claim it is - further proof that it need not be banned.

even though your problem is misplaced, tgt has done far more than destroy stand-alone decks: its even caused mono and dual brigaded defensive decks to break apart at its seams. even if you have 10 or so mono-brigaded ec's in your deck, what if you dont top deck any? what if you pull only 1 that you can place down? what if your deck does not have the necessary room for reliable counters? tgt has done far more damage than it has fixed. clearly, there is a problem if 90% of us 'whiners' (so professional when individuals cannot take responsibility for their own mistakes) complain about a single card. the other 10% not complaining about it are the ones abusing it.

90% as a numeric value is unprovable since nobody knows how many people play Redemption. 90% as a euphemism is totally believable.

amen