On Anthelios 8. "problematic card"

Haze wrote:

basically, Anthelios helps you counter anything that could counter Anthelios. that's not game balance!

And a lot of master are not balanced to be played every turn. To be fair, it's not too much most of the time, but frankly an opponent that can ensure having things like a direct intervention, a wash, a Pentex Subversion, an Archon Investigation, or the combo Golconda / Minion tap as needed is both boring and hard to counter.

CON

I don't think the card should be banned. I think the ability to pick and choose master cards is interesting, and it makes playing some of the more corner case masters feasible, but, at it's current cost only 1 MPA and 1 master from your hand to exchange a card, it is too cheap, especially when combined with multiple MPA's.

I think something like:

Anthelios wrote:

By forgoing all master phase actions this turn, a Methuselah can exchange a master card in his or her hand for one in his or her ash heap . Not usable if the Methuselah has played an out of turn master since his or her last turn.

would be better balanced - still a powerful effect, but slower to abuse, and less of an automatic include in decks with lots of MPA's.

Ohlmann wrote:

Not at all. There is two key difference (that I have highlighted already with Parity shift) :

More the point was that you apparently believe that cards that give powerful effects should only be banned if they remove entire decks or thousands of cards. Anthelios does neither of those.

* Parity shift can be countered, delayed or made less efficient by everything that hose votes (and some other things in some circumstances). Anti-event card are very scarce and a lot less easy to use.

Every deck in the game can use Uncoiling. It has no play requirements. You don't need a minion to use it. It costs nothing. It works after Anthelios is already in play, so you don't need it in your hand when the Anthelios is played. Yes. Most of the anti-event cards blow. But Uncoiling? Can go in every single deck in the game and be played by anyone with zero cost. Yeah, it is random, but how often is there more than 1 event in the game that matters? Once and a while, there will be Anthelios and Unmaskening. Rarely there will be some event apocalypse deck that has 5, in which case, the Uncoiling is gonna be gold anyway.

If Anthelios is as powerful and game demolishing as it is, I'd imagine that every deck would pack an Uncoiling all the time.

Hosing the source of the multiple MPAs is also an option.

In the game I meant, by arsoning Parthenon for example.

bakija wrote:

More the point was that you apparently believe that cards that give powerful effects should only be banned if they remove entire decks or thousands of cards. Anthelios does neither of those.

But then again, Parity shift is powerful where Anthelios is broken (for all the reason I have given, like the fact it's hard to destroy, or the). You forgot the context to compare the arguments.

You may argue that for you P.S is broken, but I don't think so, and the exact list arguments for both of us are already on the other thread.

Also, Anthelios put other cards retrieving to a lot more shame than Parity Shift. using KRC or Consanguinous Boon to replace Parity shift is a lot less of a sacrifice than using, let's say, Ashur Tablet, Potchli or Sundario, or other necromancy or giovanni card retrieving tech.

bakija wrote:

Every deck in the game can use Uncoiling. It has no play requirements.

It has play requirement (like not using event), does not work very well (as have been already said), and is extremely costly to use.

Delaying tactic or Confusion or the eye or a lot of vote are not exactly that hard to add to a deck in comparison.

Haze wrote:

basically, Anthelios helps you counter anything that could counter Anthelios. that's not game balance!

You can't DI The Uncoiling. You can't sudden the Uncoiling. All you can stop the Uncoiling with is Not to Be or Emergency Preparations. I suspect very few of those Cybele/Aksina decks have Not to Be or Emergency Preparations in them. And even if they do, they need to have it in hand when the Uncoiling is played.

people forget that Uncoiling will only ever burn one random event on the table.

Who has forgotten that? I have mentioned it in every post I have mentioned the Uncoiling in. How often will there be more than 1 important event in play? Occasionally there will be 2. Reasonable odds. Seldomly, there will be many events in play. In which case, you really want the Uncoiling anyway.

If someone's deck relies heavily on events to play their game (or ruin everyone else's) then they will definitely pay the pool to burn Uncoiling before it activates a second time.

None of the decks that really abuse Anthelios (Cybele/Aksina decks) use 1 event (Anthelios) or occasionally 2 (possibly Dragonbound). It isn't generally that hard to kill Anthelios with Uncoiling.

Don't get me wrong here--Anthelios certainly might be too powerful. But it seems as if the best way to deal with it (The Uncoiling) is just being handwaved away, when I'd imagine that every deck that was being played in any serious tournament would be packing one. Or two. Along with a Pentex Subversion and a Giant's Blood. Especially in an environment where those Cybelle/Aksina decks (or Anson/Whatever decks) are winning all the time.