What is missing from VtES?

mathusalem wrote:

well, from my point of view, you seem very reluctant to novelty. Which is fit for an antedeluvian. I won't debate on most of your rebutals because you certainly know the game more than I do. However, from the thread's title I got the impression some were trying to consider fresh design ideas. therefore if you say no to every thing new that you see, you won't get a lot of fresh ideas.

Presenting novel ideas after a few games with probably one and the same play group probably leads to not so thoroughly considered ideas. Ones that might also have been presented several times before. And shot down as many a times.

mathusalem wrote:

I would like to make a specific retort regarding Ashur's tablets however.

Like already said, proxy them.
It is perfectly legal in VTES nowadays!

mathusalem wrote:

(or in the anthology set, which is totally impossible to get, oh pardon me, some guy on this forum today wanted to sell one to me for 120 $. LOL who did he think he was speaking to ? I've been playing Mtg for more than 20 years, I know a shark when I see one -hope you're reading this, pal),

Probably he was thinking about the fact that you needed to pay for the attendance for the Berlin event, trip to Berlin, accommodation and food in order to get those.
Still pretty steep to increase the price by 600% after a month or so... :/

TwoRazorReign wrote:

There's already plenty ash heap recursion in VTES (Ashur's Tablets). Also, a card was banned recently (Anthelios, the Red Star) because ash heap manipulation and recursion were viewed by some as being too big a part of the game.

I feel like the main issue with Anthelios and Ashur's Tablets is the way that they skirt around/break what has been a fundamental design objective of VtES from the start - that each mechanic should have a counter.
Recursion makes several counter-mechanics less effective, since you can recover any countered card from the ash-heap and overwhelm the defenses that your target is using.
Ashur adds insult to injury by being fairly hard to counter - if the only feasible counter is using the same card, that usually points to a balance issue.

skimflux wrote:

TwoRazorReign wrote:

There's already plenty ash heap recursion in VTES (Ashur's Tablets). Also, a card was banned recently (Anthelios, the Red Star) because ash heap manipulation and recursion were viewed by some as being too big a part of the game.

I feel like the main issue with Anthelios and Ashur's Tablets is the way that they skirt around/break what has been a fundamental design objective of VtES from the start - that each mechanic should have a counter.
Recursion makes several counter-mechanics less effective, since you can recover any countered card from the ash-heap and overwhelm the defenses that your target is using.
Ashur adds insult to injury by being fairly hard to counter - if the only feasible counter is using the same card, that usually points to a balance issue.

Anthelios permitted recursion of silver bullets. One might consider that bad.
That's debatable, because one of the consequences was that killing some decks that needed silver bullets to survive, created a bigger focus on DOM decks or AUS decks.
One might consider that bad as well.

To put Anthelios and Ashur Tablets in the same bag is nor correct.
Having played extensively with both, Ashurs imply a big commitment during deck building and game play. Anthelios got the silver bullet to your hand at once. Ashurs are much less effective in this.
Also, without Anthelios, Ashurs are much weaker.

On the other hand, Ashurs brought new types of decks that simply cannot exist without them and created interesting and strong archetypes. I advise you all to try them.

VEKN lost an opportunity with the pdf sets to make VtES an LCG. It was on purpose and I understand there are reasons for this.
But on the other hand, without using design space, the only other way to change things is by either by bans or errata.
And that is bad, imo.

To anyone that hates Ashurs, Imbued or any other degenerate way to play VtES: adapt your decks and play better.
VEKN should not be asked to do your work for you.

PS: breaking "fundamental design" (whatever that is) is what all card games do. That is one of the things that separates a good deck from a bland one.
Vampires are fundamentally designed to bleed for one.
Bleeding for 6 or 9 takes a price in deck design and play.
We are fundamentally designed to have one mpa. 4 transfers, etc..
Its easier to level things from the lowest common denominator. But that kills the game.

PPS: Nobody has a problem with Villein + Giant«s Blood?

Brum wrote:

skimflux wrote:

I feel like the main issue with Anthelios and Ashur's Tablets is the way that they skirt around/break what has been a fundamental design objective of VtES from the start - that each mechanic should have a counter.
Recursion makes several counter-mechanics less effective, since you can recover any countered card from the ash-heap and overwhelm the defenses that your target is using.
Ashur adds insult to injury by being fairly hard to counter - if the only feasible counter is using the same card, that usually points to a balance issue.

Anthelios permitted recursion of silver bullets. One might consider that bad.
That's debatable, because one of the consequences was that killing some decks that needed silver bullets to survive, created a bigger focus on DOM decks or AUS decks.
One might consider that bad as well.

On the other hand, Ashurs brought new types of decks that simply cannot exist without them and created interesting and strong archetypes. I advise you all to try them.

That's a fair point - variety should be encouraged.

To anyone that hates Ashurs, Imbued or any other degenerate way to play VtES: adapt your decks and play better.
VEKN should not be asked to do your work for you.

That only goes so far - if a mechanic is so broken that the only way to win is to play it (or it's counter, if available), then variety suffers, and the game designers should step in to fix the balance.
I'm not arguing we're at that point, though unavailability of some cards has confounded the issue. Printing cards and the Anthology sets go a long way to help disprove it.

PS: breaking "fundamental design" (whatever that is) is what all card games do. That is one of the things that separates a good deck from a bland one.
Vampires are fundamentally designed to bleed for one.
Bleeding for 6 or 9 takes a price in deck design and play.
We are fundamentally designed to have one mpa. 4 transfers, etc..
Its easier to level things from the lowest common denominator. But that kills the game.

That's not what I'm discussing at all. A 'fundamental design objective' is a stated purpose of the game by its designers. I'm fairly sure I've read Richard Garfield state that he intended to increase interactivity between players when designing VtES, and having effective counters for each mechanic is the main way to do it - otherwise you are just throwing cards on the table until one player reaches the win condition.

PPS: Nobody has a problem with Villein + Giant«s Blood?

[raises hand] Oh, Oh, I do!
To be more exact (and using this opportunity to get back on topic) I have a problem with random events having a big effect on the game state, of which drawing a Giant's Blood first is a big example.

The major instance of that is the seating order - no matter how good is the deck or the playstyle, seating is still a major part of how well any player will do in a specific game. It's the main reason why we all want 3-round tournaments, Archon has suggested seating orders, and finals are not random seating.
I would love to hear any suggestions to reduce the influence of random seating on game outcome.

Just a last thought about ashur's tablets.
I think the main issue with them is that in order to make them work you have to put a lot of them in your deck and therefore build your deck around that mechanic. and then, it becomes oppressive.
I think the designers didn't imagine people would break the card that way and make it oppressive. The many limitations written on the card indicate that thy really intended to make a minor card (I may be wrong, but I think so)

That means that you can still make a graveyard card that is less cumbersome to use, has a more limited effect (I.E grab one card of certain kind) and remains what it should be : a tool card of which you can toss one or two copy in your deck but doesn't warp the whole game.

mathusalem wrote:

Just a last thought about ashur's tablets.
I think the main issue with them is that in order to make them work you have to put a lot of them in your deck and therefore build your deck around that mechanic. and then, it becomes oppressive.
I think the designers didn't imagine people would break the card that way and make it oppressive. The many limitations written on the card indicate that thy really intended to make a minor card (I may be wrong, but I think so)

You are probably right, but the problem is really multiple master phase actions, not Ashur's. Normally, to make the Liquidation + Ashurs combo work, you'd need a minimum of 4 turns. With Anson or Nana Buruku in play, this goes down to 2 turns. That's the issue. Multiple master phase actions has been at the top of the power curve since day one (See this great article ).

That means that you can still make a graveyard card that is less cumbersome to use, has a more limited effect (I.E grab one card of certain kind) and remains what it should be : a tool card of which you can toss one or two copy in your deck but doesn't warp the whole game.

Sure, but it probably shouldn't be a master card. And Necromancy already has plenty of this. I'm of the opinion that ash heap manipulation is perfectly fine to stay married to Necromancy for thematic reasons.