Cactus Game Design Message Boards

If you're playing TGT with No Need for Spices, and even Magnificat, you're doing something wrong. The extra cards would be geared towards dismantling a defense, or even boosting your own defense. The whole joy of TGT is that it takes less cards to pull off. Additionally, WaterGarden is TGT. WaterGarden is better than Disciples, hands down.

On further examination I'm looking at teal/green/gold sam as equal or even better than red/purple.

At this point, I don't think Sam variants matter. Both are S tier.

I think issue at this point is which variants of TGT (which can be vastly different) warrant A tier consideration.

TGT/Disciples=S Tier
TGT/Luke=A tier
TGT/anything else=mainly B tier.

TealTomb could still be A tier, IMO.

It's fast (Pentecost/First Fruits), wipes a defense (Zeal/Holy Unto the Lord), and has protected heroes (Phineas/Abiathar). What's not to like? Plus, U&T.

hmm for whats it worth i think tealtomb is still gonna struggle vs a good gates deck if they get nt and female ls early but this is just my opinion and yes i know exchanger blah blah

I think there's a good point here.  TGT dies fairly easy to a good GoS deck.  Of the decks listed, only Genesis and Disciples have a good number of heroes who need multiple hits to take down.

Jacob and Asher get hit by GoS too. Judah will exchange for Joseph anyway...

TGT should be able to handle it. It causes problems, sure, but it's still in TGT's favor to win.

Quote from: Ring Wraith on January 10, 2012, 03:20:35 PM

WaterGarden is better than Disciples, hands down.

I'm interested how you come to this conclusion. There is no better WaterGarden player/deck that the one piloted by John Earley. I played against him at NC Regionals with Disciples and won, in part due to a stupid good draw and a poor draw on John's part. We played against 1st round of Nationals and John won a 5-4 game in which I made at least two crucial mistakes. If we were to play another 98 games I'm fairly confident that the end result will be approximately 50/50. All that to say that Disciples and a well designed TGT deck are on the same tier.

The problem with using a speed versus speed example is that it's a coin flip, as your 50/50 statement shows (which I totally agree with). However, WaterGarden has more ways of taking out characters and walking in, whereas Disciples generally relies on the meta game (Uzzah and Goliath are the only common things that could stop Philip/Bart), as it only has two reliable battle winners. Which is fine, but TGT roflstomps the meta defense too.

I guess it's not hands down like I mentioned. I just really don't like Disciples. Speed vs. Speed is a coinflip (although Water Jar can snag SoG, which is a HUGE advantage), but I believe that WaterGarden beats balanced/defensive heavy better.

Quote from: Ring Wraith on January 10, 2012, 03:20:35 PM

WaterGarden is better than Disciples, hands down.

I'm interested how you come to this conclusion. There is no better WaterGarden player/deck that the one piloted by John Earley. I played against him at NC Regionals with Disciples and won, in part due to a stupid good draw and a poor draw on John's part. We played against 1st round of Nationals and John won a 5-4 game in which I made at least two crucial mistakes. If we were to play another 98 games I'm fairly confident that the end result will be approximately 50/50. All that to say that Disciples and a well designed TGT deck are on the same tier.

So here we have proof that when it comes to S/A tier decks, it's not the tier, it's the player.  So Alex was completely justified.

It still doesn't seem like there is that much separation between the decks. They can all draw well, have the power cards to blow by meta defenses, and all support sufficiently small yet effective defenses.

So once you are at S tier level its hard to say what is better..IMO this is S tier
Sam decks,
Water TGT
GardenCiples
FBTNB


Genesis locks you in on one defense and they are not super fast on offense. Straight DI seems to be outdated as pharisees don't seem to be as good with CWD around but maybe this deck is still okay in type 1, just a guess.

So, looking at my  top post here are the factors/questions that I see between a successful victory and defeat in type 1:

Do I get to play Sog NJ?
Do I get to play Falling Away before my opponent draws Guardian?
Do I get to play Guardian before my opponent draw Falling Away?
Do I draw Guardian and Falling away before they draw either? (Game breaker if yes)
Do I get a good amount of Heroes to work with?
Does my opponent get an adequate number of lost souls for me to rescue?
How many blocks can I pull off?
Considering the current Meta:
Can I use CM effectively?
Can I use Burial for a block?
Will I use uzzah, Charms, Plot?
Will I get a d3 from sabbath breaker?
Will KoT be able to get an early one?

There is a little more than that that goes into a successful victory but these factors I see as being important. Therefore a S deck is one that is generally able to increase the likelyhood of a successful output in the majority of these factors and decrease opponents output. All of theses things are situational so drawing is a big help because it gives you the best chance to get them off. So an S tier deck is one that draws well.
Sam-good
DI-good
Water TGT-okay
FBTNB-okay
GardenCiples

Another thing to look at is limiting the amount of blocks an opponent can make.
Can I use CM effectively? - WTGT and GC Have HT and banding, FBTB has massive banding, Sam decks take a hit here (bp Gideon helps)
Can I use Burial for a block?- No deck can really control this much though WTGT has WaTW, samdecks may contain abigail. It really hard to get off so you just have to risk it usually.
Will I use uzzah- WTGT takes a hit here as uzzah is a sure block any way you go.  Sam and GC take a hit also. FBTNB has well FBTNB so it is the best in this catagory.
Magic Charms- All decks are hurt by this but fbtnb should come out okay.  gs, if they get Bart may be okay too.
UW- Same thing though FBTNB is the best at Countering this. It will usually take a combo of MC Writ and CM to bring it down.
Will I get a d3 from sabbath breaker? FBTNB does the best at stopping this.
Will KoT be able to get an early one? Tough to tell.
Hamans Plot- Hurts FBTNB the most as all other decks have HT.

And so after factoring all these things in it seems pretty even with WTGT coming in last though it has a wc in watever water jar can hit. Overall though these decks are pretty evenly matched. DI may deserve s tier too as they match up pretty well with all of these.

Another thing to look at is limiting the amount of blocks an opponent can make.
Can I use CM effectively? - WTGT and GC Have HT and banding, FBTB has massive banding, Sam decks take a hit here (bp Gideon helps)
Can I use Burial for a block?- No deck can really control this much though WTGT has WaTW, samdecks may contain abigail. It really hard to get off so you just have to risk it usually.
Will I use uzzah- WTGT takes a hit here as uzzah is a sure block any way you go.  Sam and GC take a hit also. FBTNB has well FBTNB so it is the best in this catagory.
Magic Charms- All decks are hurt by this but fbtnb should come out okay.  gs, if they get Bart may be okay too.
UW- Same thing though FBTNB is the best at Countering this. It will usually take a combo of MC Writ and CM to bring it down.
Will I get a d3 from sabbath breaker? FBTNB does the best at stopping this.
Will KoT be able to get an early one? Tough to tell.
Hamans Plot- Hurts FBTNB the most as all other decks have HT.

Sam has enough banding to get around CM. Burial is often sidestepped by soul generation, which I guess is still a risk. WaterGarden doesn't let Uzzah block (the most brown anybody uses is 4, and nobody is going to put Uzzah in a territory, so Holy Grail takes care of it, with AotL, Water Jar, and Meeting the Messiah as safeguards). Sam has Abigail and/or Moses to get around it, but it's weak.
Charms is tough. UW is sidestepped by banding, which all of them have.
SB is overrated.
Plot kills Sam too.

too big of post...just read his...

With a tier that big, I would lump them all into A tier, and just not have an S. Just because one is a superior theme doesn't mean it should be in a completely different tier. The fact is, WaterGarden does some things better than Gardenciples, and vice versa. FBTNB often does Teal, which is better than Sam. Additionally, FBTNB doesn't need as much speed due to using more heroes, which makes Mayhem more efficient as well. Not as fast, but a better meta counter. Nobody is arguing FBTNB is better than Sam, just that they're in the same tier. There's no way they belong in the same tier as Prophets and Judges. Look at both sides of the equation. Both win generally easy, and thus belong in the same tier. Prophets and Judges have to work a little harder, and are thus a tier lower.

Now then, I think the main flaw in your reasoning is that you've accounted for pretty much everything except the actual winning of battles on offense, which continues to support Sam decks and Gardensciples. Looking at the current defensive meta, I think that once fully set up, Gardensciples definitely have an edge over Sam. First off, because defenses are generally so small (rarely more than 10 cards), TGT itself ends up being extremely useful right now. If we're considering a standard defense (I'll say Earley's defense, and add Manny, Damsel, and Charms, for a total of nine cards), unless your opponent gets lucky and gets a lot of their defense out at the same time, using Grail will almost certainly net you a rescue, especially because of the large amount of banding from the TGT ladies, and The New Covenant being able to bring any captured ladies back, should your opponent use Charms. I mean, think about this, if you make a rescue with all four TGT ladies, and your opponent uses Writ, Charms, AND CM, you just use Herod's Temple to prevent the discard, and use The New Covenant to bring the girls back. That's it. That kind of power is simply not something that anything else in the game can offer, and using Gardensciples is fast enough to let it get set up quickly.

Sam sets up quicker than Gardenciples though, and thus gets the edge IMO.

A Tier
Sam
Gardenciples
WaterGarden
FBTNB

I'm not sure where I'd put mono-white...

Fbtnb is not A-tier. I've personally ran and topped with Fbtnb for many, many years and know the ins and outs of the deck. Its glaring weakness is probably the most important factor that Hobbit touched upon in todays meta...draw power/speed. I understand this may have changed a bit by the new red hero that draws, but this gain towards the deck as a whole has been minimal at best, and has benefited other archetypes far better (as proven in Sams). Mayhem is also a great drop as the deck can clear hands easily, but other decks have so much more draw power/searching/etc that they can easily outpace the deck unless Fbtnb gets a marginally great hand. Fbtnb is better than most other archetypes, but not better than TGT/Di/Sams, therefore its proper spot is Tier 1.5.

Quote from: SomeKittens on January 11, 2012, 03:05:57 PM

Sam sets up quicker, but uses card slots to do so.  Said card slots are used for more powerful cards in Gardenciples.  While a quick setup is useful, there have been a significant amount of times when I was using a Sam deck and wished for the endgame power of Disciples.

Disciples? Endgame power? They have two battlewinners. Their endgame is terrible, they just draw quickly and walk in. Gardenciples has endgame power due to TGT, but let's keep these things straight here...

It's really hard to say which is better at this point. I'm giving it to Sam just because of it's speed and CBN power.

Straight Disciples have the best end-game of any theme due to Thad. Backed by The New Covenant, there's nothing that matches that kind of power at the end of a game.