[Order] Nobles on Steroids

[xenorite]

This is my deck so far. Haven't spent a cent on the game yet and on a sample size of 20 games through auto-matchmaking it hasn't lost (I know that's not saying much).

It's a deck focused on cheap, weak, income agents that get boosted to have staying power. The combination of borgia towers, beautiful heiresses, and just causes makes a 6/6 teodor viscardi pretty common. And that's without using his effect.

Royal Decree is there for those ever so common site decks, on the uncommon, but not rare, chance that I didn't manage to win before his sites kicked in. It also comes in handy as discard fodder. If he doesn't run sites or discards the +1 income is still a consolation prize.

Agents
5 Teodor Viscardi
5 Dante Moro
5 Beautiful Heiress
4 Charles de la Motte
3 Cesare Borgia

Actions
5 By Order of the King
5 Tactical Upheaval
5 Forced Inheritance
5 Court Order
4 Just Cause
3 Royal Decree

Sites
5 Borgia Tower

Tips I wish someone had told me:
Campaign your agents right after launching beautiful heiress. Her effect will come into play a split second before your agent scores, wasting no time waiting around.

On the other hand, Borgia Tower's effect does not come into play until it is fully launched so do not do the split second strategy with it.

Don't be afraid to campaign boosted Dantes and Beautiful Heiresses. Just make sure you have at least one Dante in your HQ.

Leading to the conclusion that sometimes it's preferable to get a Dante through By Order of the King rather than getting a Cesare or Charles.

I'm open to any suggestions, especially combos with other colors. I've only been playing this game for about a week so I'm not too familiar with most of the cards.

[Brontobeuf]

It looks like a deck I've made in 2011. True Story.
It lacks of new strong cards (your army should be SAFE for instance)... is it intended to be with no Revelation cards?

[lurifaxb]

Suleiman is an obvious addition to get some counters in there and he is a noble. Otherwise you may lose to effects such as wrath of the righteous.
Selim is also really good. He makes your nobels deploy as a surprise, making the deck very fast. Take him First with tutor cards.

I think media is the best counterpart to order. There are really good cards there. The best for this type of deck is bearer of mixed tidings (draw a card for each of your agents on the field). There are also effects that give your agents +3/3 and fierce (man of the people and magnetic personality). These cards speed up the win.

[rexseraphim]

Here is the low budget area.
Sulieman may be too expensive

[lurifaxb]

Suleiman goes for around 350. Selim around 1000. It is true. They are not cheap.

But I purposefully did not mention 5x political patronage.

For a low budget deck, I think the above is really good.

[lurifaxb]

Jul 25, 2012 5:59:41 GMT -5 lurifaxb said:

Suleiman is an obvious addition to get some counters in there and he is a noble. Otherwise you may lose to effects such as wrath of the righteous.
Selim is also really good. He makes your nobels deploy as a surprise, making the deck very fast. Take him First with tutor cards.

Edit: didn't see the court orders. If you get Suleimans, you van an swap court order. More synergy.

I think media is the best counterpart to order. There are really good cards there. The best for this type of deck is bearer of mixed tidings (draw a card for each of your agents on the field). There are also effects that give your agents +3/3 and fierce (man of the people and magnetic personality). These cards speed up the win.

[kyleess]

I agree with Bronto. The first thing I would do is decide what you want to replace with a couple of Harbors which are super inexpensive. Safe nobles will make a mess of a lot of decks. Thief rushes don't stand a chance.

[xenorite]

Definitely did not know some of those cards existed. Right now I'm trying to get some Suleimans right now, 2 so far. Should I run both harbor and Borgia tower? I don't want to start depending on sites too much because if I'm up against a site deck my own royal decree may end up setting me back more than I want. I'll try it out along with media but I'm gonna have a huge headache tryin to figure out what to cut, lol. Ty lurifaxb for your suggestion to swap out court order for Suleiman. Definitely wouldn't have thought of that myself. My thinking is definitely pretty narrow when it comes to this game. And bronto, what revelations cards were you thinking? Thanks for all your advice guys!

[Brontobeuf]

Good! :]

[Joek]

If you go with Media, try swapping out the Upheavals for Clothes Make the Man. 2 cost surprise. Play it on any launching action and get a zero cost copy. It goes great with Just Cause and, if you want, Bearer of Mixed Tidings. A Hard Ride hurts influence sites and Shameless Theatrics stops Underground Maze Thief decks.

[lurifaxb]

Jul 25, 2012 23:50:51 GMT -5 Joek said:

If you go with Media, try swapping out the Upheavals for Clothes Make the Man. 2 cost surprise. Play it on any launching action and get a zero cost copy. It goes great with Just Cause and, if you want, Bearer of Mixed Tidings. A Hard Ride hurts influence sites and Shameless Theatrics stops Underground Maze Thief decks.

This is a really good idea with clothes makes the man. You have many good effects that you can clone.

When you get 1-2 Selims I would change them for Cesare. He is good, but with Selim you get the surprise effect to all nobels. Charles becomes a stronger and cheaper Cesare. I took out all mine in a similar deck. Play 2 Selims. You win much earlier.

I would put one man of the people in there, just to see if you like it. Take out a forced inheritance. Without Cesare I think you are already good on income.

Try out the site that gives nobels safe - habour of theodosius. Swap for 1 Dante. it may not be better but see if you win games with this where you wouldnt have with Dante. They do somewhat the same. Problem is that you have to kill the site yourself with royal decree if you are under pressure from site decks. I honestly think Dante is better here but you should experiment.

Also try out 1 ottoman janissary instead of a royal decree. He goes nicely into the deck with just cause since he is a soldier.

Consider added an agent killer as well. Umberto Albertini can be tutored (grabbed with by order of the king) and Byzantine brute is a soldier. These are good for killing idle agents that don't come out and fight you - like Piri or courtesans or ottoman gunman. Since you don't have tactical upheaval to kill power 0 agents you need something else.

Finally, try adding bearer of mixed tidings. Start with 2. Take out something like a Borgia tower and an Heiress (or something else). Yes, those cards are good but the idea is to get to the essential cards faster with draw power from bearer. Just see if it works

You can duplicate your deck in the menu and have variants. This way you can find out what works better easily by switching without having to alter the deck every time.


Hope it helps. And you are welcome

[xenorite]

Here's an updated look at my deck:

Agents:
5 Teodor Viscardi
5 Dante Moro
2 Selim
2 Beautiful Heiress
5 Charles de la Motte
5 Suleiman
2 Uberto Alberti
2 Ottomon Janissary

Actions:
5 Den Defense
5 By Order of the King
3 Clothes Make the Man
3 Magnetic Personality
2 Bearer of Mixed Tidings

Sites:
5 Borgia Tower

The play of this deck has slightly changed. Instead of pumping up 6 agents to nigh-invincibility it focuses on getting a Selim out ASAP. This is then followed by one or two Charles and constantly topping off the HQ. Beautiful Heiress plays a much lesser role, mostly just another noble but with a bonus ability. Wins are much faster when your agent is 5/5 by the third day instead of x days later.

Reasons for changes:
Took out Just Cause because of its high cost that made it a later game action. Usually by that time it was either useless because most of my agents were dead or its effect won the game a half day earlier.

Chose Magnetic Personality rather than Man of the People for similar reasons as above and for its surprise ability.

Stuck with Dante instead of Harbor because Dante counts as a Noble and Harbor slowed down the strategy rather than maintaining the speed. And there were a few instances where it benefited the opponent as well. Dante can also get extra safes by campaigning one on Borgia Tower.

Ottomon Janissary instead of Royal Decree (despite taking out Just Cause) because I can target which site to neutralize rather than a possible loss of Borgia Tower.

Uberto Alberti for killing the agents I wasn't able to catch with Suleiman.

Selim and Suleiman for obvious reasons.

Bearer of Mixed Tidings usually gets me at least 4 draws, as well as another 4 with man of the people.

TY to lurifaxb and joek for the excellent suggestions!

One question is whether I should switch out Den Defense for Forced Inheritance. I run Den Defense right now because it gives twice as much income as it costs versus only 150% with forced inheritance. Also it is playable on the first turn. But I'm sure those aren't all the points to this debate so I want to hear what other arguments there can be made for either. Or even that I may need to put more income cards into this deck. (hmm, I may take out the two beautiful Heiresses for two Forced Inheritances but that may tip it too far in amount of agents vs actions)

Still looking to improve this deck as well as variants that can be an ezio killer. Played three ezio decks today. Nearly got him the last time...

[Joek]

I'd use Dante to safe Uberto, forcing him to block or lose his Ezio Mentor. If he blocks, whatever he blocks with will take four damage. Also, Magnetic (Fierce) Uberto can score over blockers. 7/6 Fierce (Magnetized Uberto) vs any 6 or less health agent will let you score, and if you score, you can erase one agent.

[lurifaxb]

Looks good. I don't think clothes makes the man is as powerful in this setup. You only
really want to copy your bearer of mixed tidings and you only have 2. I would make it 5 of these.

The heiress is also really good. Maybe ad some more again? With surprise deploy she is good at boosting campaigning agents.

I think den defense is better in your deck. You need speed and it boosts early compared to a bit later.

Is it working better than your first version? If so, how?

Also, how is Umberto doing in this deck. I think he is very good in the current meta (vs Piri and ottoGunmen), but I haven't tried him yet.

[lurifaxb]

Jul 29, 2012 9:51:57 GMT -5 Joek said:

I'd use Dante to safe Uberto, forcing him to block or lose his Ezio Mentor. If he blocks, whatever he blocks with will take four damage. Also, Magnetic (Fierce) Uberto can score over blockers. 7/6 Fierce (Magnetized Uberto) vs any 6 or less health agent will let you score, and if you score, you can erase one agent.

Magnetic is so good. Even if your Umberto gets power 0 use it just before scoring = kill agent anyway.

I Think I would do this:

Take out:
3 clothes
1 dante

Add:
2 bearer of mixed tidings
1 heiress
1 magnetic