What is the current meta like?

[fdsfgs71]

Hey there! New member here, and currently looking to getting into what seems to be an amazing game, but I just wanted to know real quick: are there any codex or spec combinations that see a lot more use, or that are more favored to play as than others?

Thank you!

[Nopethebard]

Mono color is highly recommended for new players, and they continue to be good at high level play

[zhavier]

The best place to check the meta is tournament threads. Look at the last 6 or 7 tournaments. Note the latest tournie was a bit wierd, and harder to see what decks did well or were chosen more frequently. It also had illegal deck options, by design.

[Nopethebard]

Actually, the banned decks in that tournament would be a good starting point for the very reason of them being excellent decks that are legal in most tournaments.

[charnel_mouse]

Welcome to the forums!

As said above, the last tournament (XCAPS19) allowed technically illegal decks and in-match spec counterpicks, and two tournaments before that (XCAFS18) some of the stronger decks were banned, so the meta’s been a bit different recently. The easiest thing to do is to go to the thread for XCAFS18 and see what was banned and why.

In addition to those bans, it’s common to take a monocolour deck and swap a spec out for Finesse. Using the Neutral starter avoids any multicolour cost penalties, River’s spells are pretty efficient, and Nimble Fencers are good in pretty much any deck.

[FrozenStorm]

@zhavier

Look at the last 6 or 7 tournaments

Agreed on this point. Here are those threads, for lazy’s sake (excluding XCAPS19, which was a draft format for funsies):

CAWS18 (Codex Async Winter Swiss)

[Tournament] Codex Asynchronous Winter Swiss 2018 (CAWS18)

The Codex Asynchronous Winter Swiss tournament for 2018 is now taking signups! In a return to form, any deck will be accepted for this tournament. This will be a swiss tournament, one match per week, with a grace period if your match doesn’t finish on time. First match will be paired on the first day of Winter: Friday, December 21.

Nit picky details of how pairings will work

Each round, pairings will be assigned as follows: If a match between two players who each have two losses is not comp…

XCAFS18 (eXperimental Codex Async Fall Swiss 18, experiment was meta ban list)

[Tournament] 19XX Codex Asynchronous Fall Swiss (XCAFS18)

The Codex Asynchronous Fall Swiss tournament for 2018 is now taking signups! We will be adding the ban list to this tournament. Strength + Growth cannot be paired Peace cannot be paired with purple starter Demon + Necro cannot be paired (yes, this means mono-black is blocked) This will be a swiss tournament, one match per week, with a grace period if your match doesn’t finish on time. First match will be paired on the first day of Fall: Friday September 21.

Nit picky details of how pairings…

CAMS18 (Codex Async suMmer Swiss 18)

[Tournament] Codex Asynchronous suMmer Swiss (CAMS) 2018

I don’t know what has happened to @EricF But I thought someone should take up the role of running this tournament format in his absence. The Codex Asynchronous Summer Swiss tournament for 2018 is now taking signups! This will be a swiss tournament, one match per week, with a grace period if your match doesn’t finish on time. First match will be paired on the first day of Summer: Thursday June 21.

Nit picky details of how pairings will work

Each round, pairings will be assigned as follows: If…

… Hiatus of Spring and Winter

Bob ran a CAS-Like tourney Fall 17

[Tournament] Let's do This

It’s been a while since we’ve had a tournament, methinks it’s time to fix that. Signups end in one week from today. Using the CAS ruleset, Sign ups here: Bob199 (Setsy + Garth & Arg) FrozenStorm （PtW.dec =b ） Andreas （[Necro]/Demonology/Anarchy） petE ( [Necro]/Balance/Anarchy) Shadow_Night_Black (Mono Purple) ARMed_Pirate ([Law]/Strength/Fire) Zhavier ([Finesse]/Demon/Ninjutsu)

Archive of results from CAS tourneys prior

CASS results archive

No these were the results from 2016. 2017 has only been CAPS thus far, and no summary has been made for that one tourney yet. To clarify further: CASS is the Swiss Series, the summary of all 4 tournaments that run in a year (or at least ran last year, AFAIK Eric intends to do it this year as well) CAPS is the sPring Swiss CAUS is the sUmmer Swiss CAFS is the Fall Swiss CAWS is the WInter Swiss Tournaments

I wrote up an explanation of the bans in XCAFS18 here:

[Tournament] 19XX Codex Asynchronous Fall Swiss (XCAFS18)

Strength + Growth has finished Top 3 in multiple CASS series. Necro/Str/Growth, Demon/Str/Growth, Growth/Str/Necro, and most notably Anarchy/Str/Growth, have all had very strong tournament finishes. The purpose of this proposed ban list was to shake things up and see what’s “next tier” below these clearly established “top tier” combinations that were proposed as bans (by me, as an observation) and (mildly? generally?) agreed upon / unobjected to by the community. Growth and Strength have a ton…

I also wrote up a speculation of what would be A-Tier (if that ban list is my S-tier), but I don’t think it was borne out:

What's "just below" top tier?

Hmm, I’m not sure I agree (I think your CAMS '18 deck is less of a problem than Nightmare or Mono-Black), but I’d be fine with the broader ban if people would prefer that. Upon reflection, I think the following combos would emerge as “just below S-tier” [Necro]/Blood/Fire. @Bob199 ran this a fair bit in early tournaments, and I can attest it is Very Strong (graveyard + lobbers is nasty, skeletons + drakk frenzy is gross) [Present]/Truth/X (probably Necro or Anarchy, maybe Future or Feral. Qu…

[Castanietzsche]

Hello @fdsfgs71 !
I 100% agree with zhavier and FrozenSorm. What is more, keep in mind that these tournaments doesn’t have prize of any kind and that the competition really takes place after the deck choices.
Tell me if I’m wrong but there is IMO a consensus on these ideas :

• black starter is definitely defining meta
• competitive decks have some kind of hand management (at least to counter thieving imp)
• competitive decks have a way to deal with Vandy and Garth cause they’re really bulky heroes
• Blood and Peace have good Tech II units and Anarchy has a terrifying Tech III unit
• Rook + birds is a good opening and boosting birds with Finesse or Growth spells is nice

here comes my tier-list (I’m not as good as most players there, open to debate, and listing only two specs each time)
Tier 1 : Demonology+Necromancy
Tier 2 : Past+Peace, Strength+Growth, Necromancy+Blood

But maybe the synergy with starters is even more relevant. My convinction is that the banlist is a huge improvement to Codex.

Oh and by the way in 5 players FFA the tier-list is almost inversed with Law, Disease and Fire going from 2nd, 3rd and 4th worst specs to 2nd, 3rd and 4rth best specs. But bottom Bashing stays at bottom and best Necromancy stays best.