Balancing Ashur Tablets

Lets break this down from my perspective. Remember, Im anti-ban, pro erratta on EVERYTHING, and originally saw no problem with Ashurs, until they (and girls style mmpa) gained popularity.

Too strong?
Ashurs are ok. Fine in a vaccuum. Its the other stuff that breaks them. You have the numbers. Its not that EVERY ashurs deck is a mmpa deck, but that style is what creates the problem. Lilliths was banned for contributing to the same problem. Ashurs are identical in that they are a good card that works with other good cards and some other cards that are only good in a combo to make this machine of too good/broken stuff. Very Gestalt, the whole is far greater than the sum of its parts.

So, specifically, Ashurs are GREAT for recurring stuff, especially for combat and stuff that burns through cards and wouldnt be as reliable without what ashurs allows.

Problem with ashurs isnt a problem with just ashurs, since even those combat decks recurring fame isnt allowed with my proposed solution. A deck capable of nearly no VTES interaction is bad. Ashurs allow good and that bad part.

The problem is being able to dump cards for pool then shuffle them baxk into the deck as you please.

The issuexisnt one of clan specific recursion, since tablets can help everything.

No problem with popularity, and yes they very by meta, but its one specialized application thqt warrants a change.

Poolgain and recursion is hot. Needing 3 is too. The issue isnt an every use thing, its that you can barely interact with a table and do what girls mmpa does thats an issue.

Solutions are tweak components to weaken it, or make a rule that no non-trifle source can allow more than ome adsitional mpa a turn.

Ankha wrote:

FrançoisV wrote:

I find sad with Ashur Tablets is that even if it could be beneficial and enable a variety of card-intensive decks, it compels you to play with multiple masters (if only to be able to reduce the risk to get out-tabletted by another player or to out-tablet others more easily)

It's true for every non-unique masters: being able to play many Minion Taps in a row is better than only one. That's why Villein is so popular.
I understand that there's a slight difference with Ashur Tablets since its mecanics require to play multiple copies before it does something. Does that mean that "all decks (mmpa or not) [should be] on equal grounds for playing tablets"?
I've been playing Ashur Tablets for quite a while now, and never in MMPA decks. I've already been racing against MMPA decks to put the third tablet in play. Sometimes I won. I know the risk and accept to take it, and I don't find it so unbalanced.

Well from your stats (and not your personal deckbuilding preferences) most succesful ashur decks are mmpa decks (or I'm reading it wrong).

Any other master does what it does whether or not you have multiple mpas or not. Ashur has a risk of doing nothing in single mpa decks, risk you can reduce to zero in multiple mpa decks.

Regardless of your personnal deckbuilding taste, your Tablet techs will always be more succesful with multiple mpas, even if sometime the single mpa deck will be lucky and win the tablet race.

It's not really a problem in itself : it's only natural that cards designed with drawbacks (here : the 3 tablet requirement and the risk to lose everything) have these drawbacks circumvented more easily by specific deckbuilding paradigms than by others (no one complains it's unfair that Protected Resources works poorly in bleed decks). That being said : was the MMPA paradigm so weak that it needed another advantage in being better at tableting than single mpa decks ? And am I even using the word "paradigm" correctly ?

I'm far more concerned by the Giant's Blood+Villein lottery that allows a random player to start at 40 pool instead of 30 (27% of the decks contain Villein + Giant's Blood, 46% of the decks contain Giant's Blood).

I won't disagree with you on that since Villein.... ah, I understand that it enables more fatty decks but in the current state of the card you could just erratum Minion Tap as a trifle and the state of the game would not be very different and that bothers me. But this is another topic

Wow, lots of input and reactions, that's good.

Apparently lots of people do believe that Ashur, at least in combo with some other cards, do pose problems. Lots of people also offer interesting solutions.

I'll just answer to a few things (including the ones directly adressing me).

Yes, I've been out of the game for a while. I was still playing when Ashur came out but barely. So I knew the card. Still, I was surprised and impressed by its efficiency. And having been out of the tournament scene didn't make me forget what a good card or mechanism was.

Recursion has always been (too) good. At one point, some players included Carlotta Giovanni in Arika decks just for recursion. Then some got the Sargon Fragment, then it was Anthelios for the MMPA decks, then Ashurs. Nothing new in the mechanism, except that it is available to all, includes direct recursion (into hand), recycling the deck, gaining pool, and combo with Liquidation, Anthelios etc. That's a bit much in the end isn't it ?

"Are other cards often included in decks too good" ? Well, the Blood Dolls, Villein etc. are must-play in every decks, nearly since the beginning, and getting back the blood toyour pool is part of what makes a deck playable. It doesn't "break" anything.

Sure, Govern is strong. Certainly, Deflection is. Dominate is a very good discipline, one of the best. Still, it requires the vampires to have it, and either be untapped to react or able to pass their actions. All normal part of the game, and limited to some vamps. Arguably, Second Trad and Parity Shift are at least as strong, possibly too strong, but once more they require a title.

Ashur might make MMPA decks stronger, but it is also played in other decks with some success. I wonder, in the ones not including Nana, Anson or Cybele etc. , how many play Parthenon ?

Anyway, I've seen that card break other already good (but hard to play) decks, like Tupdogs, Summon History etc. As a general rule, when the 3rd Ashur hits the table, the way to victory is all but paved. At least, it gives a biiiig advantage.

So many players will include thelm in their decks. It's not like you can just put one as kinder : you need at least 3, more often 6+. So it means that this card will take an important part of the deck, without being part of the initial strategy, as it is just there to reinforce a winning strategy. This in itself I dislike.

But apparently, in the experience of many players, the effect of Ashur is worse in MMPA decks.

In my experience, for having played Giovanni a loooong time, getting back the minion card you need at the right moment is often enough to give you the game. Most of you seem to think that recycling Master cards is worse, especially with MMPA and / or Liquidation.

I feel that it would still be too strong if you could only recycle minion cards, but it's just my non-tested opinion. So I would be more than ready to test variants on your ideas to fix Ashur, and see which solution would make it interesting enough to keep seeing it sometimes, as any "normal" card, without giving such an advantage to the player who puts his combo into play.

I would be glad to see Steve printing some cards back. But if some are broken or unbalancing they need to be fixed before that, because if Ashurs become available to all they will be included in many more decks.

Oh and BTW, not being sure that you will be the one playing the 3rd Ashur makes it less easy for someone at the table to play them, but either it gives the advantage to the MMPAs, or to the random player who will get the 3rd Ashur at the right time, which just isn't good in a strategic game.

Asnek wrote:

Lönkka wrote:

How often do you really run across the apparenty "dreaded" Liquidation + Ashur combo?

Been quite a while for me at least...

hmm quite often i'm affraid... 2 weeks ago i played my own on casual games and not more than 2 months ago i met this deck in tournament finals.

that's twice in 6 weeks.

Wouldn't call that "quite often" myself, unless that was the only times you played VTES during that time (in which case playing a bit more oten might remove the problem?)

If MMPA-Decks seem to be such a Problem, why not add a Card somewhat like this:

Incompetent Leadership
Unique Master.
Cost: 1 Pool
Only one Incompetent Leadership can be played in a game.
Put this Card in play. While you control this Card you may Play no more than one Master Card during your master Phase.
Tap this Card to cancel a non-out-of.turn
Master Card as it is played (No cost is paid).
If you tap this Card, put a Counter on it and your Predator takes control of it.
Burn this Card when it has 5 Counters.

If the table feels a MMPA Deck is harassing the table, it adds 4 Sudden Reversals
to the Table. It doesnt shut down MMPA per se, but helps to Keep it in Balance.
Not being able to Play more than 1 master Card while you control this Card prevents the MMPA deck to Play it and just Keep it all game.