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Eaglepreacher
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| Posted: 05 March 2006 at 5:15am | IP Logged
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CIVIL WAR- In this particuliar variation our group decided that civil war occurred. The sector in question had already been won. So we all made a deck of the same empire. Minor empires and allies were allowed. All terrain was allowed except for the empire's own home planet and systems.
Max Deck rules- the longest of our versions. Made for large decks, but balanced play more. The deck building rules state a specific number for maximum number of the same card. Eg 8 strength 1-3 , 4 for strength 4-5 etc. For us we took that another way. We needed 8 strength 1 cards before we coulb have strength 2. 8 strength 2 before 3 etc. The cards need not be the same card title, just strength. We tried two ways for this. 1) 8 strngth 1 ship cards before a str 2 card. and 2) any 8 str 1 card before a strength 2. Both provided more balanced play but longer games and larger decks.
Side Decks- And yet another version we tried was putting one or more side decks. In the deck we placed Hazrd, Occrnces, and Monsters some beneficial and some not. Sometimes we built one deck with all of them and at times a decks for each card type. At the end of each full turn, the losing player would choose the deck he would choose from and to whom it would be played. Then he would draw the card and place it. This added randomness to the game. Sometimes it would hurt the chosen player and at times it would help. We allowed card viewing thru the special rules such as scouts and spies etc. And we allowed bidding where another player could pay the losing player economy, supply etc.
Border Wars- We would divide the table with tape. Ships when played were placed on a planet or border. Bases and ships located on planets, could only fire at oppoonent ships located on the border. Ships on the border could only fire at targets from the opponent on which they are located. EX. If you are on the border with player on the right, you may only fire at his fleet. During any play card phase you may move your ship. There are many things we tried to add to this also. The most favored one was when you destroyed the opponents HQ with at least 5 points(whether 5 was needed or not) then you could take over his sector with all planets under your control. Your command points doubledfrom the original rules(eg 4 players= 4 command) plus one for you. so you would get 8 plus one. The losing player, could self destruct any planet which had a base or character on it, all else you get. Movement for this made it harder for ship movement. If you take over the left side player, then to move a ship from one fighting border to the next, would take 2 turns because you would move from the right side to the center border to the left side, representing the longer distance to travel. Also if you had a Tug that doubled supply on a planet, it could be moved to a new planet on the other side but must also stop at the border.
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MogwaiSC
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| Posted: 17 April 2006 at 11:44pm | IP Logged
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I've been thinking about the issues of deck stocking quite a bit lately. I
like your idea of max deck rules but I don't think it makes the game
smoother or more efficient.
The issues is that particularly with your variant 2 of the max rules, it
really doesn't change the way decks are constructed with the current
rules, other than it changes the way you would use exceptions. This is
because you already will have 8 of any strength 1 card as you are
required to 8 card types in your deck. This means you automatically have
8 strength 1, 8 strength 2, etc. You would need to have as few gaps in
the sequences of your types as possible to conform with max rules, so
exceptions would be particular cards of types that you haven't really
stocked in your deck. This is pretty much how I already build my decks.
I don't remember where I read it, but I have seen it proposed that the
stocking limits be changed so that you could have only 3 of any 1 type of
card in your deck. The problem with this is that you could end up
putting three C10 War Prophets in a deck, or 3 O10 Planetary
Destructions, etc.
I think one thing that would make GE better would be to reduce the
amount of any one card you can put into a deck based on its strength.
Instead of 8 strength 1, 2, and 3 cards, only 4; instead of 4 strength 4
and 5 cards, only 3; instead of 3 strength 6 and 7 cards only 2, and only
1 of anything strength 8 or better. (Entity rules should stay the same.)
This would result in smaller decks that rely more on how your deck is
built so they play well, rather than the current situation of being able to
jam as many high strength cards into a deck as you can as long as you
have your sequence complete for the type. It's ironic, but with the
current stocking limits you can build 300 or 400 card decks that are 60%
- 70% strength 7 cards or better. What this means is that larger decks
will be more powerful than smaller decks because as the size of the deck
goes up, the percentage of high strength cards in the deck goes up as
well. Thus, when you're playing, your chances of pulling a high strength
card (of any type) are much higher than the odds of pulling a low strength
card.
I know this sounds completely counter-intuitive, but I've found it to be
true through extensive play with large decks built this way vs. smaller
decks.
One thing I think would make the game better would be to change the
card types rules. That is, rather than a minimum of 8 card types, reduce
the minimum to 5 or 6 card types.
Just my two cents, let me know what you all think.
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War Veteran
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| Posted: 18 April 2006 at 8:50am | IP Logged
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The problem with this is that you could end up
putting three C10 War Prophets in a deck, or 3 O10 Planetary
Destructions, etc.
These would be entities and still be limited to one per deck.
300 or 400 card decks that are 60%
- 70% strength 7 cards or better. What this means is that larger decks will be more powerful than smaller decks
I do not agree with this at all. The smaller deck, if built properly, should beat out a bigger deck in a duel every time. THe smaller deck is far more efficient at finding the card it needs for the given situation.
as the size of the deck goes up, the percentage of high strength cards in the deck goes up
This does not mean that you have a card that is valuable to the current situation. It just means that you have a high strength card in your hand, possibly one that you cannot even play (or want to play).
As far as what I think would make the game better... i cannot say. i'm working on my own CCG. I've already given you (one or two of you) a few modifications that i think greatly improve the game.
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MogwaiSC
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| Posted: 21 April 2006 at 8:54pm | IP Logged
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"I do not agree with this at all. The smaller deck, if built properly, should
beat out a bigger deck in a duel every time. THe smaller deck is far more
efficient at finding the card it needs for the given situation."
What I think you're overlooking here, is that if you're playing a 100 card
deck against a 400 card deck, even if that 400 deck is still only 25% ships
and 25% terrain, then there are still 200 different cards that can come up.
This allows a wider variety of cards that you can encounter, and yes, not
all of them might be useful. Even then, this is NOT a liability, because
you can use those cards to pull cards you can use out of your reserve,
and have a better shot at getting them out, because the larger deck has a
greater amount of high strength cards of it's total amount of cards that
can be used for swapping a card out of the reserve.
Again however, that wide variety increases the possibility that the smaller
deck will not have a card that will counter what could be played out of the
larger deck, and you can still build a large deck well enough to minimize
the possibility that you'll get cards that won't be useful in any given
situation. Even then, this is NOT as much of a liability as you think,
because you can use those cards to pull cards you can use out of your
reserve, and have a better shot at getting them out, because the larger
deck has a higher percentage of high strength cards that can be used for
swapping a card out of the reserve.
A perfect example of this is with Entities. I have a full 16 entities in my
400 card Corporate deck. A 100 card deck can only have 4. Thus, even
though the percentage of entities in each deck is the same, I have four
times as many different as you do, giving me a wider variety of options/
possibilities, with four times the probability as you that I'll get one of
them in my hand. There is simply no way you can have a wide enough
variety of cards in a 100 card deck to deal with the different things that
can come out of the 400 card deck. It's simple math.
Further, in a larger deck you can put more R cards in. My Corporate deck
has a good 90 defensive reaction cards in it. While you might be able to
get a big ship out before me (which isn't likely, because even at the larger
size, a full 65% of my ships are S6 or better), I have a much higher
probability of getting a card that will let me either deflect, redirect, or
ignore your attack.
Again, this is the same situation as with the entities. While you may have
the same percentage of defensive cards in your deck as I do in mine, the
probability that I'll pull something out of my deck that you won't be able
to defend against is much higher than the probability that you'll pull
something out of your deck that I won't be able to defend against simply
because I have a greater number of those cards than you do.
On the other hand, when I attack you, given that you have fewer total
reaction cards in your deck, and that I have a higher total amount of
bigger ships than you, the odds will eventually go in my favor.
The issue is not percentages, it's probability. A larger deck will create
higher probabilities by type and strength than a smaller deck will because
it's the total number, not the percentages, that dictates the probability.
Again, it's simple math.
Yes, once in a while a larger deck does get screwed by clumping, where
most of your ships or planets end up in the other half after the shuffle
and cut. Yes, you can get going with a small deck faster than a large one,
but the number don't lie; the law of averages eventually wins out.
That is why I say it is an odd quirk of the game, a product of the deck
building rules, that larger decks are more powerful than smaller ones.
And this is also why I made the suggestion to revise the deck building
rules to reduce the amount of individual types of cards that can be put in
them. Galactus and I have had games (each using 300 - 400 card decks),
where we have fought each other back and forth literally for hours, at a
complete stalemate with neither gaining the upper hand, let alone scoring
any points. When either of us has tried to build a smaller, supposedly
faster deck, even building it to the best of our ability, using the absolute
best cards and combinations of the cards we have, the small deck loses
out the vast majority of the time, again, because of the law of averages.
Now I know you're still going to disagree with me. (Probably everyone
else here but Galactus too.) But we can test this empirically. He or I can
post build lists of some of our best decks, and then you can build them
for yourself, have someone else play them against you, and play what you
consider your best deck. See what happens. Do it repeatedly, and record
the results. We've been doing this a while now, and we've worked with
both larger and small decks, and played large and small decks against
one another; more often than not the large deck wins.
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War Veteran
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| Posted: 26 April 2006 at 7:28am | IP Logged
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Yes, i will disagree with you, sorry.
because the larger deck has a higher percentage of high strength cards that can be used for swapping a card out of the reserve.
But in a duel, you are only allowed to have two cards in your reserve. After swapping those two out, which ANY deck should be able to do easily, it doesn't really matter what cards are in the reserve fleet. Honestly are you constantly using the reserve fleet? Or do you use it about once per game to swap out the initial cards that you wanted.
The liability of the bigger deck is that it requires you to draw a lot more cards than your opponent. Otherwise you do not have the advantage of the wider variety of cards. This card drawing technology is very easily countered and it is not hard for me to include the small amount of cards to do this. Will it water my deck down? Yes. But it will totally shut yours down doing so.
In regards to the amount of entities/defensive cards, you might have a bigger deck and therefore have more of them in your deck, but as long as i limit the amount of cards that you draw (so that we are drawing the same amount each turn) you have the SAME percent chance to draw an these cards that i do.
the odds will eventually go in my favor
Yes, IF you can get the game to last, then the advantage WILL shift in your favor as i will start to run out of these cards.
the law of averages eventually wins out
But the game will be over before that happens, i have yet to see a duel last more than a dozen rounds.
As I said before, I will gladly take my 100 card deck against your 400 card deck anytime.
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MogwaiSC
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| Posted: 14 May 2006 at 10:49am | IP Logged
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I would really like to be able to build a 100 card deck that could beat one
of my 350-400 card decks, or Galactus's 500 card monstrosities that he
builds.
As I mentioned before, this is an empirical question. Please post some of
your deck lists, and I'll post some of mine. We each use the cards we
have to duplicate both decks, and then play them against one another
and see what happens.
In our group, we use a 4 card reserve, regardless of the number of
players. This is one thing that does make the larger deck more playable
(and powerful) because we usually swap out a couple cards on turn 1 and
2 to get our main deck strategy going. Usually it's a cybermage or other
card that allows other card draws. Yes, there are ways to prevent the
extra card draws, but doing so does not guarantee you a win. I have won
several games with my 400 card Corporate deck where I did not rely on
extra draws or plays at all. All that is required is to build the deck
accordingly. In it's current incarnation, my Corporate deck is a full 25%
ships; in previous incarnations it was actually 35% ships.
Again, as I said, I would love to be able to build a 100 card deck that
would beat one of my decks or one of Galactus's decks. Please post a
build list of one or two of your best 100 card decks, we'll do the same, try
them out, and see what happens.
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ericbsmith
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| Posted: 14 May 2006 at 11:30pm | IP Logged
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War Veteran wrote:
| In regards to the amount of entities/defensive cards, you might have a bigger deck and therefore have more of them in your deck, but as long as i limit the amount of cards that you draw (so that we are drawing the same amount each turn) you have the SAME percent chance to draw an these cards that i do. |
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Actually, that's not quite true. A bigger deck has more cards to hide the Entity/Reaction cards in; over time the chances of a 100 card deck eventually drawing one of it's 4 entities increases at a greater rate than the chances of a 400 card deck eventually drawing one of it's 16 entities. This means that, given the same number of card draws, the 100 card deck is more likely to draw it's power cards, right up to the point where it runs out of cards; at that time, of course, the balance shifts entirely to the larger deck.
To take this example to the extreme, after 100 card draws the 100 card deck *WILL* draw all 4 of it's entities while there is a not insignificant (~1%) chance that the 400 card deck will have drawn *NONE* of it's 16 entities, and a very reasonable chance that the 400 card deck will have drawn less than 4 of it's entities. Of course, this is paid off slightly by the (slim) chance that the 400 card deck can draw more than 4 entities in the first 100 cards.
The end result is that making larger decks doesn't really increase your chance of drawing power cards; it only increases the likelyhood of having both a "good" game (where you get all the power cards you need) and of having a "bad" game (where you don't get the power cards you need) while decreasing the number of "average" games (where you get a balance of power cards and less powerful cards).
These shifts in drawing cards also goes beyond drawing "power" cards. A 400 card deck is far more likely to go for long streatches without drawing any ship cards than a 100 card deck is. It's also more likely to go for streatches of drawing nothing but ships (and thus not drawing other cards). Either extreme can be bad in some circumstances, and non-beneficial in others.
Edited by ericbsmith on 14 May 2006 at 11:50pm
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MogwaiSC
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| Posted: 28 June 2006 at 3:23pm | IP Logged
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I've been giving this topic a lot of thought the past couple of weeks, and
have been revamping my decks in light of the things I've been thinking
about. Which, Eric, oddly enough, I've come to agree with you on, in spite
of the fact we've agreed on so little before.
To take this example to the extreme, after 100 card draws the 100 card
deck *WILL* draw all 4 of it's entities while there is a not insignificant
(~1%) chance that the 400 card deck will have drawn *NONE* of it's 16
entities, and a very reasonable chance that the 400 card deck will have
drawn less than 4 of it's entities. Of course, this is paid off slightly by the
(slim) chance that the 400 card deck can draw more than 4 entities in the
first 100 cards.
Yeah, I've come to realize this... as I just mentioned, I recently went
through an agonizing process of rebuilding my Corporate deck. It's now
only 160 cards. In the previous incarnation I had 5 Time Knights in it,
now I have three. Before, I would have had to draw 80 cards on average
to draw one of my time knights, now I only have to draw 53 cards on
average. The chances that I can get one of them into play are now
greater than before.
These shifts in drawing cards also goes beyond drawing "power" cards.
A 400 card deck is far more likely to go for long streatches without
drawing any ship cards than a 100 card deck is. It's also more likely to go
for streatches of drawing nothing but ships (and thus not drawing other
cards). Either extreme can be bad in some circumstances, and non-
beneficial in others.
This brings up something else I've been thinking about with respect to
game play; shuffling. I'm curious about what shuffling rules there are.
The group I've played in before hasn't really required hard shuffling,
because most everyone builds larger decks that are hard to do a hard
shuffle with. This plays to the advantage of the larger deck because the
combinations you stack in the deck are less likely to be broken up during
shuffling. However, with a hard shuffle, combinations are more likely to
be broken up. In a larger deck, where combinations tend to be more
along the lines of three or four or even five cards, this breaks them up
and should render the larger deck less effective. If anyone can point out
any shuffling rules on this, I'd like to know what they are. Yes Eric, if you
can quote anything on this for me, I would like to hear it.
The end result is that making larger decks doesn't really increase your
chance of drawing power cards; it only increases the likelyhood of having
both a "good" game (where you get all the power cards you need) and of
having a "bad" game (where you don't get the power cards you need)
while decreasing the number of "average" games (where you get a balance
of power cards and less powerful cards).
I've seen this tendency in some of the extremely large decks I've seen in
the game... but it's balanced out by the shuffling rules, as I mention
above. I'm hoping that my new smaller Corporate deck will mean that I'll
be able to get some of the combinations into play faster. I'm really
looking forward to getting my Council of Six Battleship into play with a
Future Ship and a Deflection Transfer Device on it... :)
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ericbsmith
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| Posted: 28 June 2006 at 11:13pm | IP Logged
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MogwaiSC wrote:
This brings up something else I've been thinking about with respect to
game play; shuffling. |
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I've never given much thought to deck shuffling. It's never really been a problem with people I play with.
The rules actually address it under Getting Started/Ante, by stating that any player may shuffle any other players deck, so if your opponents don't think you're shuffling to their satisfaction... and at any rate one of your opponents gets to cut the deck.
Back in my magic days I knew a few people who would cut a deck by dividing it into multiple small piles... effectively shuffling it. And your killer combos won't do you as much good if your deck gets cut and they're near the bottom anyway.
Edited by ericbsmith on 28 June 2006 at 11:15pm
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Gekonauak
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| Posted: 29 June 2006 at 6:35am | IP Logged
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I recently went through an agonizing process of rebuilding my Corporate deck. It's now only 160 cards.
Care to post it?
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MogwaiSC
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| Posted: 29 June 2006 at 11:20am | IP Logged
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Here it is:
No. Type Description
1 R/S1 Ship From The Future
1 S2 Fleet Tug
1 S3 Independe nt Tug
4 S4 Corporate Minesweeper
4 S5 Independe nt Pirate Ship
2 S5 Corporate Spy Ship
3 S6 Independe nt Pirate Ship
1 S6 Corporate Pirate Battlecruiser
3 S6 Corporate Heavy Cruiser
3 S7 Corporate Pirate Stealth Cruiser
3 S7 Corporate Battlecruiser
3 S7 Corporate Command Cruiser
2 S8 Ship Of The Ancients
2 S8 Lost Pirate Ship
2 S8 Corporate Dreadnought
2 S9 Corporate Battleship
1 S10 Dread Savior
1 S10 Council of Six Battleship
1 S10 Corporate Flagship
1 B1 Military Outpost
1 B2 Defensive Satellites
1 B3 Power Generation Platform
1 B/S4 Battle Sled
1 B5 Energy Storage Facility
1 B/S6 Battle Sled
1 B7 Corporate Defender Base
2 B8 Corporate Economic Base
2 B9 Starbase
1 T2 Captured Moon
1 T3 Vacation Planet
4 T4 Reactionary World
4 T5 Ring System
2 T5 Military Reservation
3 T6 Oversized Moon
3 T6 Binary Star
3 T7 Massive Asteroid
3 T7 Red Giant Star
2 T7 Jozeph
2 T8 Salt Water World
2 T8 Asteroid Field
2 T8 Neumannia
1 T8 Council of Six Homeworld
1 T8 Turrel V
2 T9 Vinciennes
2 T9 Corporate System
2 T9 Corporate Homeworld
1 R/E1 Formation Lights
1 R/E2 Tractor Beam
1 R/E3 Emergency Power
1 E4 Heavy Phaser Refit
1 E5 Surface Probe
2 E6 Reserve Power
2 E7 Cloning Device
1 R/E8 Sound Construction
2 E9 Unit Overhaul
2 E9 Adamantine Hull
2 E9 Shroud
2 E9 Future Ship
1 R/E10 Docking Ring
1 R/C1 Tour Guide
1 C2 Cyber-Programme r
1 C3 Media Personality
1 C4 Lieutenant
1 C5 Quartermaster
1 C6 Cyber Mage
1 C7 Mystic Wanderer
1 C8 CEO
2 C9 Time Knight
1 C10 Time Knight
1 C10 War Prophet
1 T/A1 Shameless Argonian
2 R/A2 Premonition
1 A3 Insurrection
4 A4 Planescape
1 A5 Greater Automaton
3 A6 Promotion
1 R/L1 Lucky Crew Action
2 R/L2 Phaser Malfunction
1 R/L3 Unlucky Targeting
4 R/L4 Miscommunications
1 R/L5 Defensive Override
3 R/L6 Lucky Maneuver
2 R/L7 Anomaly Portal
2 R/L8 Targeting Error
2 R/L8 Demigod Diversion
2 L8 Frayed Time Spindle
1 L9 Accelerated Timeline
1 L9 Discard Equivalency
8 R/O1 Time Skip
1 M7 Mind Thief
2 R/M9 Luck Demon
Here's the breakdown:
Type No. % &nb sp;Ent Exc
A 12 7.2
B 11 6.6
C 12 7.2 2
E 19&nb sp; 11. 4 1
L 22 13. 2
M 3 1.8& nbsp; 3
O 8&nbs p; 4.8
S 40 24. 0 3
T 40 24. 0
Totals 167 100.0 6 3
Here's how I tend to combine things;
S10 Corporate Flagship + R/E 8 Sound Construction
S10 Council of Six Battleship + E9 Future Ship (20 phasers in reaction)
S10 Dread Savior + E9 Future Ship (20 phasers in reaction)
S9 Corporate Battleship + E9 Shroud + E6 Reserve Power
S8 Corporate Dreadnought + E9 Adamantine Hull +E9 Unit Overhaul
(Sometimes I like to combine an Adamantine Hull and a Shroud on an S8
or S9 as well, or the S10 Flagship if I can get it that way.)
C10 War Prophet + A6 Promotion + R/A2 Premonition
C10 Time Knight + A6 Promotion + R/A2 Premonition
C9 Time Knight + E7 Cloning Device
C6 Cybermage + A5 Greater Automaton
C5 Quartermaster + A6 Promotion
C4 Lieutenant + C2 Cyber-Programmer
R/C1 Tour Guide + T3 Vacation Planet + C7 Mystic Wanderer
L9 Discard Equivalency + L9 Accelerated Timeline
(I also tend to combine R/O1 Time Skips with the high strength R/L cards
as we tend to use T4 Reactionary Worlds a lot. It allows me to Time Skip
the Reactionary World and then use the Luck card. If the Reactionary
World owner doesn't negate the Time Skip, it gets skipped. If he does
negate it, I get to use the Luck card; either way, if he doesn't have some
other reaction card, I get to use the luck card.)
B9 Starbase + T5 Military Reservation + R/E10 Docking Ring
B9 Starbase + T5 Military Reservation
(I try and put the C10's on the Starbases if I can; the Starbase on the
Military Reservation makes them particularly hard to kill.)
B8 Corporate Economic Base + T9 Corporate Homeworld + T5 Ring
System
B7 Corporate Defender Base + E4 Heavy Phaser Refit
B/S6 Battlesled + S2 Fleet Tug
B/S4 Battlesled + S3 Independent Tug
T9 Corporate System + T5 Ring System
T7 Red Giant Star + T7 Massive Asteroid
T6 Binary Star + T6 Oversized Moon
T4 Reactionary World + A4 Planescape
That's pretty much it... any comments or suggestions would be welcome.
Edited by MogwaiSC on 29 June 2006 at 12:37pm
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MogwaiSC
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| Posted: 29 June 2006 at 12:33pm | IP Logged
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Oh, forgot to mention: for reserve cards I typically take, in order of
importance:
C6 Cybermage
A5 Greater Automaton
C8 CEO
M7 Mind Thief
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Gekonauak
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| Posted: 30 June 2006 at 7:09am | IP Logged
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how many players do you typically play with?
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MogwaiSC
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| Posted: 30 June 2006 at 9:27am | IP Logged
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In the past, three to five in a game. Lately though just two.
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Gekonauak
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| Posted: 03 July 2006 at 7:28am | IP Logged
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In a 3 to 5 player game, the deck size should be fine.
However, in a 2 player game, I would slim it down even further.
Unless you know your opponent is using Tufor why are you putting minesweepers in your deck?
Do you have any White Dwarf promo cards? I would use them over the T5 Ring System. I would cut back on terrain with strength under 7. Unless they are like T4 Reactionary World, and too damn useful to get rid of.
Why use two E6 Reserve Powers? Distortion Generator is a much better E6, even in a multi-player game. And to tell you the truth, unless you are cloning Cyber Mages, why do you have a cloning device? You don't have boarding parties. And if your opponent is playing Cyber Mage Games, why aren't you running boarding parties? In Equipment, I would get rid of everything over the Cloning Device. They shouldn't be necessary. Shrouds are good, but you can get the same effect from the Distortion Generator i mentioned earlier.
If you are trying to compete in the CyberMage wars i would suggest another Mystic Wanderer or two, and maybe another Cyber Mage, if not changing everything over to a boarding party theme for the cloning device.
Planescape? shouldn't be necessary with all the promo terrain that are fairly indestuctible. Some of which are in your deck. Why two Premonitions? You don't put one in the reserve fleet.
Same thing with two phaser malfunctions. Why? The other Luck cards seem fairly appropriate.
I think you should abandon competing with Cyber Mages and just stick a O9 Insanity in your reserve fleet if your opponent want to play that game. That combined with boarding parties and Wanderers should deter him from getting Cyber happy.
Overall, in a two-player format I'd try slimming it down to around 100 cards. Take out all the little extras and just go with the power cards. Put your two exceptions (O9 Insanity and M9 Luck Demon) in your reserve. And get rid of one of the S10 ships and the Docking Ring.
Edited by Gekonauak on 03 July 2006 at 7:32am
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MogwaiSC
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| Posted: 09 July 2006 at 9:04pm | IP Logged
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"Do you have any White Dwarf promo cards? I would use them over the T5
Ring System. I would cut back on terrain with strength under 7. Unless
they are like T4 Reactionary World, and too damn useful to get rid of."
I only have 3 of the T4 White Dwarf stars, so I use the strategically, I have
1 in each of three decks, each which has a specific purpose. In one deck I
combine one with a T5 Repair Asteroid to double it's production, and I
park a B8 Manufacturing Plant on the combination.
Almost all of the terrain I have that is less that strength 7 is promo
terrain, or terrain that combines with other terrain, like the T6 Binary
Stars which I combine with the T6 Oversize Moons. That makes them 12
strength, and the Supply output of the Oversize Moons are doubled by
the Binary Star.
"Why use two E6 Reserve Powers?"
I combine them with the E9 Shrouds; when they come up together, I can
play the Shroud to any ship I have and then use the Reserve Power to
power the Shroud.
"...why do you have a cloning device?"
I stack them up on a T7 Jozef with one of the C9 Time Knights. That way
I have a Time Knight on a planet that makes a command point, and I can
clone the Time Knight and have two cards that allow me to negate R card
plays.
"Shrouds are good, but you can get the same effect from the Distortion
Generator i mentioned earlier."
Distortion Generators only work on the lowest strength ship in the fleet.
They would be next to useless on an S8 or S9.
"Planescape? shouldn't be necessary with all the promo terrain that are
fairly indestuctible. Some of which are in your deck. Why two
Premonitions? You don't put one in the reserve fleet."
I put the Planescapes on the Reactionary Worlds, which don't have any
kind of damage reduction on them.
The Premonitions go with the C10 Time Knight and the War Prophet, so I
can save them when they get discarded. I love using one with a C10
Legendary Officer as well... I sacrifice the Officer to save the stack he's on,
then I play the premonition and take the Officer back into my hand as
well.
I also put a Promotion in with both the C10 Time Knight and the C10 War
Prophet, so I can double their actions; negate two card plays or two
volleys respectively. Plus, they make a command point then, which
automatically engages them...
Oh, and I put the Minesweepers in instead of Light Cruisers because the
Minesweepers have one more shield point, and do one exactly the same
amount of damage as the Light Cruiser does. That one shield point may
not seem like a lot, but it's one more point of damage the ship can soak
up that won't go towards my planets or Sector HQ. Plus, if I do play
against an empire that uses mines (not just Tufor but Vinciennes and
Nagaridni Indirigans) I have that available as well.
Edited by MogwaiSC on 09 July 2006 at 9:17pm
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Gekonauak
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Joined: 10 May 2006
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| Posted: 10 July 2006 at 7:40am | IP Logged
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three decks? You play often enough to still be running three decks? Even at the hieght of playing, i only had two decks running.
Distortion Generators only work on the lowest strength ship in the fleet. They would be next to useless on an S8 or S9.
Unless the S8 *IS* the lowest strength ship in your fleet. Remember all of my suggestions are based on a duel deck.
Minesweepers in instead of Light Cruisers because the Minesweepers have one more shield point
Yes, by why so many of them? Why not just one?
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MogwaiSC
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| Posted: 10 July 2006 at 2:20pm | IP Logged
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"You play often enough to still be running three decks?"
Yes. Every two or three weeks or so. I used to have a regular group that I
played with that we often got five player games going. Galactus here is
the only one of them I still play with regularly. I actually have enough
cards to build five or six decent decks; I'm hoping to get enough of them
completed to have enough to teach a group of people to play.
"Unless the S8 *IS* the lowest strength ship in your fleet. Remember all of
my suggestions are based on a duel deck."
Well, I still think the Shroud is a better card to match with the S9
Corporate Battlecruiser, although it's not an R card... It also has the
advantage that I can use it with any Corporate ship, and the two Indirigan
S10's I have (with the Future Ship). I'll have to think about it...
"Yes, by why so many of them? Why not just one?"
They're necessary to support my other minor empire cards, the 2
Indirigan S10's, the three Time Knights, and the Corporate Pirates (which I
consider Allied to the Corporation).
The Time Knights are absolutely necessary to the strategy of the deck.
My goal has been to make it so that I can redirect or negate damage, or
avoid it, and negate reaction card plays by my opponent.
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Galactus
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Site Administrator
Joined: 25 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 181
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| Posted: 21 April 2007 at 9:44pm | IP Logged
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Hell...I have 8 decks now...and I plan on building another 6 more...AT LEAST!
:)
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Tarquon
Exalted
Joined: 02 January 2007
Posts: 197
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| Posted: 23 April 2007 at 7:56pm | IP Logged
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Maybe someone has already pointed this out, but you can't skip a
reactionary world.
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MogwaiSC
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Location: United States
Posts: 903
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| Posted: 23 April 2007 at 8:18pm | IP Logged
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Tarquon wrote:
Maybe someone has already pointed this out, but you
can't skip a
reactionary world. |
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Damn! You let the cat out of the bag... I had Galactus fooled on this one
for a while... :D
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Galactus
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Joined: 25 April 2004
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Posts: 181
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| Posted: 26 April 2007 at 3:54pm | IP Logged
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I knew that....fool!!
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Galactic Empires : Deck Construction and Strategy
Topic: Variations
