Balancing Ashur Tablets

I don't really understand the fuzz of "balancing" a game that is really unbalanced in it's core mechanics.

One thing is banning/errating a card than completely breaks game mechanics, one other thing is trying to seek for "balance".

A 5-player game where seating matters, archetypes matter, silver bullets matter, negotiation matters... Don't think it is really logical to eternally search for perfect "balance".

Having read through all the thread i feel that people who dislike
ashur tablet are very outspoken about it (which is their natural right) but
i haven't heard much from people who like ashur tablets and want to keep
them the way they are.
I feel ashur tablet were the most innovative thing that has happend in vtes for a long time and i do like the mechanic and the new archetypes they enable very much. Decks that enable you to use your "vtes skill" (whatever that is) are much more apealing to me than decks in which your path to victory is paved from the start. (e.g. Toolbox vs. DEM bleed).
Also in the last 2 years I have encountered very few stale mate tables or situations where one player is sitting on an insane amount of pool and can thus never be ousted. I have no precise numbers but I would guess that around 80% of my tournament games ended before the time limit and I do not share the feeling that ashur/mmpa decks are ruining the game for the rest of the table.
If by some coincidence there is a girls mmps deck in front of you that your deck is not fit to oust the situation is not much different from having weenie potence or tupdog torp all your vamps the turn they are brought out.
You simple accept defeat and move on or change your decks accordingly.
I cannot distant myself from the feeling that some people that bash the ashur tech are so set in their ways of how vtes should be played that they are unable or unwilling to change their strategies to deal with the new challenges.
If there were things i could change about vtes, ashur tablets would certainly not make the top of my list but rather reversal of fortune madness network or una or the imbued as a whole.
Just my 2 cents

Ankha wrote:

...but the root of the problem is MMPA decks, not Ashur.

Assuming that's the case, would banning Anthelios suitably rein in MMPA decks? In conversations with players I've had in both Europe and North America about Pentex Subversion and Ashur Tablets, I've often heard that part of their frustration with those cards is that they're recurred by Anthelios in MMPA decks. Obvious counters such as Sudden Reversal and Wash are made significantly less effective as a result of MMPAs + Anthelios.

BenPeal wrote:

Assuming that's the case, would banning Anthelios suitably rein in MMPA decks? In conversations with players I've had in both Europe and North America about Pentex Subversion and Ashur Tablets, I've often heard that part of their frustration with those cards is that they're recurred by Anthelios in MMPA decks. Obvious counters such as Sudden Reversal and Wash are made significantly less effective as a result of MMPAs + Anthelios.

Current text:

Vague suggestion, which you could iterate on:

Hey Ben, James.

I'm not sure Pentex and Ashur would be fixed if Anthelios was. Everybody would still ahve to include 2 Pentex, as for Ashurs see the rest of the thread.

I believe that those cards need to be dealt separately.

This being said, Anthelios abuse is another problem, and the proposition below would be a nice card text change.

Zoroh wrote:

I think it´s a good solution.But then again I ask you Pascal: wich problem exactly we're trying to fix? what's wrong, especifically, with AT?

My issue with AT: It takes forever(*) to resolve 3.
And some tables resolve 9.



(*) forever = more than 10 seconds. From what I've seen, between 1 and 2 minutes.