CAMS 2017: ARMed-PIrate ([Present]/Strength/Anarchy) vs. Eijolend ([Finesse]/Discipline/Disease)

[ARMed_PIrate]

I was really lucky drawing a ship on the fat-deck reshuffle.

P1T10

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StartingHand Workers

STARTING HAND
Pirate Ship
Chameleon Lizzo
Detonate
Marauder
Detonate

WORKERS

Temporal Research
Plasmodium
Time Spiral
Hardened Mox
Tinkerer
Forgotten Fighter
Fading Argonaut

NextHand

Ardra’s Boulder
Earthquake
Temporal Distortion
Bird’s Nest
Disguised Monkey

Discard

Argonaut
Pirate Ship
Temporal Distortion
Argonaut
Earthquake
Marauder
Chameleon Lizzo
Detonate
Detonate

Tech 0 card(s)
Get Paid - ($11)
Recruit Pirate Gunship - ($5)
Recruit Marauder - ($2)
Summon Zane - ($0)
Gunship attacks Orpal, killing him and taking 1 from Tower; Brick Thief and Plague Lord are obliterated; Zane to Lv. 3; you draw and get $1
Marauder kills Grave and dies to Tower; Zane to Lv. 5 (midband)
Zane hits your Tower for 3, taking 1
Skip worker

Float ($0)
Discard 3, draw 5

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[B]Board Info:[/B]
[B]In Patrol:[/B]

• [I]Squad Leader[/I]:
• [I]Elite[/I]:
• [I]Scavenger[/I]:
• [I]Technician[/I]: Garus Rook, Lv. 8 (0/1 from 4-5/6-5 in runes, Two Lives)
• [I]Lookout[/I]:
  [B]In Play:[/B]
• Battle Suits
• Pirate Ship (7/5, Flying, haste, long-range, resist 2, obliterate 2)
• Captain Zane, Lv. 5 (3/2, Haste)
  [B]Buildings:[/B]
• Base HP: 18
• Tech I HP: 5
• Tech II HP: 5 (Anarchy)
• Tech III HP: 5

[B]Economy Info:[/B]
[B]Cards:[/B]

• Hand: 5
• Deck: 2
• Disc: 9
  [B]Gold:[/B]
• Gold: 0
• Workers: 11

[details=Afterthoughts][spoiler]
He could kill Zane and Rook with Plague Lab and Fencer, but it was worth it to get rid of the sword rune and Too Much Disease Man.

I doubt he’ll leave Rook around for the EQ, but I still have Max Zane->Monkey->Geiger+TD for Taxman->replay Monkey->Boulder.

EDIT: See Eric’s note, below. Also, I had forgotten that I only have one Monkey in my deck! An alternate line for my T7 had been double-Monkey, but I had skipped that in favor of re-playing Marauder. So, the much easier play is Max Zane (if alive) -> Hit with Ship -> Monkey -> Geiger+TD for Monkey -> replay Monkey -> Boulder.
[/spoiler]

[/details]

[EricF]

Note for ARMed_Pirate regarding his Afterthoughts (readable now)

Temporal Distortion requires the new unit to be the same tech level as the old unit. The “or less” only applies to the cost.

[ARMed_PIrate]

Y’know, I knew that, but had forgotton. @Eijolend Don’t sweat. Eric’s just making sure my plans for my next turn are legal (assuming you don’t completely wreck them anyway), heading off a turn that might need to be re-done.

[FrozenStorm]

For Spectators

I just re-read Geigers maxband and realized it can affect tech 3s, Gunship Flicker OP as fk!

[Eijolend]

After looking at my Technician Draw (Tenderfoot) all I have to say is:

GG I concede, you shut down all of my threats simultaneously. @EricF

What an exciting game - had a lot of interesting moments in it imho, and I’m looking forward to reading over it again with your thoughts.

Btw @Penatronic , your next opponent is @ARMed_PIrate .

[ARMed_PIrate]

Thanks @Eijolend! You really had me on the run for a bit. I think Disease is a fantastic answer to Rook + Birds, but it didn’t hold up against Anarchy. I was hoping to surprise you with looping Monkeys, but I drew my Temporal Distortions together and early, and had to throw out a Lizzo when I couldn’t afford more. I was quite worried for a while, and really impressed with all the Bloom runes on top of the Wither/Sickness/Orpal runes.

Sorry I denied your Grave double sword. (; I barely had what I needed to wipe both heroes, then lucked into the Ship on the re-shuffle to do it again. If I had had a couple bad draws on that last turn and the following, I think it could have gone the other way.

[Eijolend]

So I finally got around to reading over the game again.
Let me start by saying that I have no idea how games like this one are supposed to be played over the board on a tournament timer. There were so many moments where the whole turn had to be pre-calculated and every single hit point and armor point mattered in order for the plays to work.

I’m also very happy I finally got the Disease spec to do something useful for me. I’ve never successfully used Plague Lab at this scale before.

One thing I definitely learned from this game is that a Gorgon in Squad Lead is crazy good against Anarchy - there is just no efficient way to deal with it. In general I feel like I need my Disease plan to center around Gorgons much more, even though Ghoul and Raven look much flashier at first. Especially, since I always seem to have problems keeping my hand size up with this deck.
In total I feel like a big weakness of my deck is that while all of the specs have good cards, none of the Tech II choices is threatening to end the game immediately and the Tech III units are slow as well unless you have a Nimble Fencer to go with your Blademaster. The closest to a game-ending threat at Tech II is repeatedly destroying Tech buildings with Young Lightning Dragon, which costs you too much tempo on the ground.

On your side, I definitely underestimated the power of the Present + Anarchy synergy. That seems like an excellent combination and Rook in combination with Nullcraft or Mox basically guarantees a solid early game.

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Comments on specific parts of the game:

My Turn 3 kill of Rook seems clearly in my favour and I felt good about the follow-up turn as well. However, it seems pouring all my resources on keeping your board clear, led to me to just keeping the status quo instead of getting farther ahead on board. Still, I don’t see how my play here is a problem economically.
Maybe not killing the Argonaut on Turn 4 and preserving Orpals health and cash in on the patrol boni instead would’ve been better? Not sure. It would’ve allowed me to threaten Death and Decay though.

On Turn 6, as you correctly pointed out in your thoughts, I could’ve simply left Zane alive. There is still no good way to trade with my Gorgon. That would’ve potentially influenced the turning point of the game:

Your turn 7. First off, amazing turn. You needed exactly the two floating gold for it to be that devastating. Not only did it shut down the Sword Lab, but the kill on Orpal made my next turn completely non-threatening to you.

The rest of the game - even though the Disease shenanigans were interesting and allowed me to destroy your Tech III once - was basically just my Tech III being too late. I couldn’t see this game going to Tech III in a way that would be advantageous for me even though I had the economic advantage because Anarchy just felt like too much pressure. But after your turn 7 I had to go to Tech III anyway, now it was just after the reshuffle instead of before it.

I wonder how this game would have turned out if I built Tech III on turn 6 instead of Orpal, killing Zane and playing the Plague Spitter. It still feels like you could have made a great turn 7 regardless.

In the end it was still very close. One more gold on T9 would’ve allowed me to keep the Tech III destroyed. And while it was quite likely you had a Gunship, an unlucky draw on your side would’ve been a possibility.

Again, GG!

Wow, this turned out a lot longer than I planned.