I’m still a little hesitant about the deteriorate nerf, just cause starter deck etc etc, and I’d hate to revert a change like this.
Also it seemed like you yourself Zhavier thought the molac change was too much, no?
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Miracle growth is still crazy strong without it, and I do not have any compunction about moving Deteriorate to 1g because I’ve playtested that change quite a bit. It’s still a very good card just no longer free advantage
That card can get the exception for starter cards. It’s probably the most played card in forum games. It’ll still be played a lot at 1g
6 Likes
Additionally, if both Dark Pact and Deteriorate get adjusted to 1g then the interaction where Newsman can ban both of them at once is preserved, and that seems like a good thing to not change.
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Molac probably needed some adjustment, and with the other nerfs I think it’ll be ok. Time will tell.
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So 8 hearts on this post seems like fairly good consensus, any further dissent need to be addressed?
I personally think that’s a super solid list and have no objections to any of those changes. It’s a great starting point.
I would still additionally like to see a purple/peace address and bashing buffs. Those can be a separate discussion though.
I’ve said my piece on Bashing buffs I’d like to see, but on the Purple/Peace topic, is Battle Suits applying only to purple the best solution? I kinda feel like it is. Cadet, DS, Vystari and Hoodie getting that extra 1 attack does make a difference, especially Cadet. You stand a much better chance stopping the engine before it gets off the ground if you can have attackers survive against Cadet especially. Cadet is an MVP type unit of that deck when paired w/ Battle Suits.
Maybe the change is to Garrison or DS but I think those are kinda “balanced” for how expensive they are to get going. It’s hard to protect a Garrison for how much gold you spend getting it going. There’s enough mass removal/damage in the game to punch a hole through to Garrison and it suffers the same problem all building cards do of not hitting back.
Maybe Garrison limiting how it draws is the better angle? I’m open to that argument. I don’t really think it’s DS though. I could see limiting DS to gaining runes only for soldiers as a potential slight nerf, doesn’t seem worth though.
I don’t see increasing gold cost for either of them as the simple solve.
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Fully agree on all aspects. Battle suits limited to purple is what I would prefer, if we decide to nerf this archetype.
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I think it’s fitting for it to get a slight nerf. I feel like it’d be pretty dominant if the other strong decks get nerfs but it doesn’t. That said I also feel like it doesn’t need a big nerf. It was the weakest of big three, most prone to toppling over before it gets going. So a small tweak I think is sufficient, and I personally think the value one gets from Battle Suits is the primary problem. It’s almost a +1atk to all units in the decks it gets played in and that’s just absurd. For Fargo and Plexus and KotC and Stewardess/Seer, it’s still almost always played. Shaving OC and Hoodie and Vystari off the top of that is reasonable tuning down and opens appropriate doors to counterplay IMO.
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Even though I fully agree with you we also have to keep in mind that whatever we do there will always be some tier 1, which has a different power level than the other decks. Whether this then is some variant of PPA or maybe Crashbarrow.Dec, daymare or some crazy new thing that nobody has yet tested in a tournament.
We cannot and should not try to rebalance everything again and again in order to prevent any deck to be in a class of it’s own.
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There should never be a deck just in a class if it’s own, that’s the optimal time to balance something. Once there are a good variety of viable decks then you stop or maybe help improve the least played
The fact is PPA was not the powerhouse the other things we are nerfing were. Battle Suits is probably the right answer, but I think the previous list is a better starting point, put this in phase 2 changes.
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May I propose that if we do implement a patch, it’s a good time to start MMM2?
Have we ever actually finished MMM1?
We all agree that some decks are overtuned, but there’s no need to oversell it - we do see a good amount of variety in the tournaments here. Looking at the last 8 standard tournaments, we see 7 different winning codices, with 5 (out of 7) different starters and including 12 (out of 20) different specs.
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To answer my own question, looking at the MMM1 Google sheet, 4 of 15 match-ups were not completed (Red vs Black, Red vs Purple, Blue vs White, and Black vs Purple)
Balance-wise, the worst offenders were Black vs Blue (10-0), Purple vs White (10-0), Blue vs Purple (9-1), White vs Green (7-3), and White vs Blue (6-1; unfinished).
It’ll be a headache to balance, considering some colors are very strong in certain match-ups and very weak in others.
This is really cool to put in perspective! Thanks for pointing this out. This game is so good 
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It is impossible to balance every matchup in a game. If you balance mono, mulit colour is unbalanced. If you balance 1vs1, 2vs2 is unbalanced. And all the map cards are anyway unbalanced.
So we should focus on the most played style, which is multicolor. And even that is not possible you would need to run hundreds of simulations. So nerf the strongest decks a bit. If other ones are overpowered they need to be weakened in a second step. And buff some cards, which brings new possibilities on the table.
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Multicolour is, arguably, played so much more than monocolour to begin with because enough of the monocolour matchups are out of whack, making some of the six decks unviable for a moncolour tournament. Blue is clearly in this position, I’d say that Green is too. Player skill obviously counts for more, but multicolour has a larger top-tier group than the intended format.
I think I lost my point there. It seems odd to justify balancing around multicolour by it being the most played, when the current balance is what makes it played so much to start with.
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It’s possible that blue is disfavored just because of its awful matchup vs black (which itself is favored because it doesn’t have any really bad matchups). So maybe the nerfs to black would, as a knock-on effect, encourage more blue (which does already have a positive matchup vs purple)?
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Regarding the “what are we balancing for?” / “what is the goal?”, I don’t think we have sufficient data to claim much of any justification around “balancing for monocolor”. We don’t play it enough and haven’t tested the changes against mono color (I am up for doing that! Let’s take MMM2 conversations to a separate thread).
I think everyone’s suggestions have been considerate of what the monocolor effects of changes might be, and we do have some data on justifying the changes in multicolor play.
So for the purposes of driving a decision for CAMS22, let’s focus the discussion on what’s in and out for changes.
I’m going to decide as TO we have consensus on the list Zhav posted, and so far not too much discussion on Purple/Peace and Bashing. I’d like to ask everyone to keep the conversation for right now focused on discussing the remaining undecideds.
Purple/Peace
I’ve heard a maybe yes on Battle Suits changes from Zango and a “probably but better save it for later” from Zhav. Let’s hear some more voices. Anyone else for or against the Battle Suits change? Anyone strongly lobbying for Garrison/DS changes?
Bashing Buffs
Radio silence on this one, is that apathy, dislike for the changes, or just distracted w/ other conversation? If folks are interested in playtesting on this one, Penatronic and I are playing them out here.
TL:DR; is so far, I’ve played The Boot in one of the three games, and it’s actually an interesting card now. Kind of has a Surprise Attack feel to it, high cost but high potential for a game-changing play between the (situational) double unit kill and the anti-hero stall. That’s really fun to have as a now Bashing player, Penatronic didn’t seem to feel it was too strong (I lost the game I played it in) but I want to hear from folks on this.
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I think I’ve said most of this upthread, but for tidiness’ sake:
Purple+Peace
*I’m against changes to Garrison or Drill Sergeant.
*I’m down to test changing Battle Suits to “purple Soldiers and Mystics”.
Bashing
*I’m in favor of the changes to Troq himself.
*I’m in favor of adding “or an upgrade” to The Boot. I’m against other changes to it.
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Good point Frozen, I second Dreamfire’s statement word for word.
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