Post by Brontobeuf on Jan 10, 2012 6:12:40 GMT -5
I wanna talk about some cards. Because I face a lot of them in decks they don't belong to: the ressource cards.
Let's start with the "Pure Ressource Cards". Here is the list of them all:
- Plentiful Crop
- Forced Inheritance
- Political Patronage
- Knowledge has a Price
- Nothing Ventured, Nothing gained
The core idea of this thread is that this cards will cost you the card advantage (twice for the Scholar one).
Card advantage is a card game concept. You want all your cards to be able to remove (destroy, discard, counter, fight, etc) at least a card in the opponent's deck/hand. Another way to gain the cad advantage, is by drawing cards of course.
For instance, you have a Pikemen 1/1 on the field, and a Guard 2/2.
I play Mario Auditore. When he arrives, he kills the Guard. Then, he goes in a fight with the Pikemen and kill him. You are obliged to kill him with a Surprise.
I won the card advantage a lot in this situation, because with 1 card (Mario), I got 3 cards of your deck (Pikemen, Guard, Surprise). That's good, and that's what you want to achieve with, ideally, all your cards.
Card advantage is awesome, but you can choose to lose it if it directly increases your chances of victory. Playing a Palal Influence, for instance, is no card advantage at all, but can give you control of a Region, or the game.
As I said, when you play Plentifull Crop, you just lost a card for nothing. That's what you want to avoid. Especially when you face a discard deck who will prevent you from drawing cards as soon as your hand is empty.
I'm playing discard a lot recently, and each time my opponent starts with a ressource booster like this, I'm thinking: "woot, -1!". You got the idea.
You can't just add them in all decks like if it was a good idea to have a big big income.
To be sure it's a good idea to play them you have to check this points:
- do I have a good draw power?
- do I have a majority of cards who will give me card advantage?
- is my deck really in need of ressources all the time? (see Ressource curve of the deck)
- is it ok to draw a ressource booster mid/end game?
- do I need such speed early game?
It's the same thing with
- Ressource Booster Sites who give 0 influence (Stables, San Pietro)
- Agents with 0 atk (you need to do something with them to play them)
- hard-to-find-a-target spells (Papal bill, Power to the People, Holy Calling)
- deck manipulation cards who does nothing (Sacred Vision, Benevolent Midwife)
What will you do with these cards if you draw them mid/end game? If you have nothing to answer to that, don't play them.
I've seen control decks with Political Patronage. I don't get it. Ok, it can make awesome openning hands, but as soon as a control deck has no cards in hand, what does he do? Nothing. Think twice before adding 5 copies of a Card Disadvantage Card.
I've seen combos decks throwing their Knowledge has a price without even knowing what their opponent is playing. Are you sure you want to give this card to someone who is playing Media Rush, or Order Control, or even Faith Discard? I don't think so.
You have substitutes everywhere. Ressources booster who will help you all game long. Of course, they are a bit slower in most of the cases.
Here is the list:
Merchants:
- Hard Worker (this guys is worth +7).
- Tactical Upheaval (not 100% reliable, but so much of a card advantage when you kill an Amerigo Wall)
Media:
- Rare art Merchant (can give +3, or go in a fight, be boosted, etc)
- Dama Rossa (Courtesan, can go in the Art Gallery, block, etc)
- A call to action (it's a surprise, so the +1 is reliable early game)
Faith:
- Divine Intervention (guaranteed 1 for 1; can lock hand in end game)
- Heathen Followers (deck reduction, fill the hand for Machiavelli or Lab Research, can fight in the Gallery, the Borgia Tower etc)
- San Pietro (only if you do something with it, which should be easy just by playing mass sites, or Santa Maria Novella)
Order:
- Faux Pas (awesome to support a rush)
- Dante Moro (big big ally to play if you like your other allies)
- Theodore Viscardi (epic ressource booster, free and good in end game by himself)
- By Order of the King (deck reduction, priceless tutor effect on Cesare or Dante)
Crime:
- Mona Paola Lisa (so painful to play against her)
- Discreet Calling (insane with the mercenaries or Lanz)
- Forced Charity (deck reduction, huge rare, but slow)
- Rosa in Fiore (a bit slow, but +3 is great, can combo with sites related cards too)
Scholar:
- Knowledge is Power (you need a good reason to play less than 5 of this when you build a scholar deck as it is the only good ressource booster available).
For most of you, this is basic deck building knowledge. But I still see too much decks wrongly built that end up by day 4 or 5 with no card in hand and who are just waiting for a new day to get a new card (and when they draw another ressource booster, they cry).
Don't get me wrong, ALL cards in this game can be useful if played well. That's just a fact. But the "played well" is not that easy to achieve when you have a flawed deck.
I hope this will help some of you. I hope nobody will take this thread badly, I'm just trying to help readers who may not have a huge deck building experience.
Let's start with the "Pure Ressource Cards". Here is the list of them all:
- Plentiful Crop
- Forced Inheritance
- Political Patronage
- Knowledge has a Price
- Nothing Ventured, Nothing gained
The core idea of this thread is that this cards will cost you the card advantage (twice for the Scholar one).
Card advantage is a card game concept. You want all your cards to be able to remove (destroy, discard, counter, fight, etc) at least a card in the opponent's deck/hand. Another way to gain the cad advantage, is by drawing cards of course.
For instance, you have a Pikemen 1/1 on the field, and a Guard 2/2.
I play Mario Auditore. When he arrives, he kills the Guard. Then, he goes in a fight with the Pikemen and kill him. You are obliged to kill him with a Surprise.
I won the card advantage a lot in this situation, because with 1 card (Mario), I got 3 cards of your deck (Pikemen, Guard, Surprise). That's good, and that's what you want to achieve with, ideally, all your cards.
Card advantage is awesome, but you can choose to lose it if it directly increases your chances of victory. Playing a Palal Influence, for instance, is no card advantage at all, but can give you control of a Region, or the game.
As I said, when you play Plentifull Crop, you just lost a card for nothing. That's what you want to avoid. Especially when you face a discard deck who will prevent you from drawing cards as soon as your hand is empty.
I'm playing discard a lot recently, and each time my opponent starts with a ressource booster like this, I'm thinking: "woot, -1!". You got the idea.
You can't just add them in all decks like if it was a good idea to have a big big income.
To be sure it's a good idea to play them you have to check this points:
- do I have a good draw power?
- do I have a majority of cards who will give me card advantage?
- is my deck really in need of ressources all the time? (see Ressource curve of the deck)
- is it ok to draw a ressource booster mid/end game?
- do I need such speed early game?
It's the same thing with
- Ressource Booster Sites who give 0 influence (Stables, San Pietro)
- Agents with 0 atk (you need to do something with them to play them)
- hard-to-find-a-target spells (Papal bill, Power to the People, Holy Calling)
- deck manipulation cards who does nothing (Sacred Vision, Benevolent Midwife)
What will you do with these cards if you draw them mid/end game? If you have nothing to answer to that, don't play them.
I've seen control decks with Political Patronage. I don't get it. Ok, it can make awesome openning hands, but as soon as a control deck has no cards in hand, what does he do? Nothing. Think twice before adding 5 copies of a Card Disadvantage Card.
I've seen combos decks throwing their Knowledge has a price without even knowing what their opponent is playing. Are you sure you want to give this card to someone who is playing Media Rush, or Order Control, or even Faith Discard? I don't think so.
You have substitutes everywhere. Ressources booster who will help you all game long. Of course, they are a bit slower in most of the cases.
Here is the list:
Merchants:
- Hard Worker (this guys is worth +7).
- Tactical Upheaval (not 100% reliable, but so much of a card advantage when you kill an Amerigo Wall)
Media:
- Rare art Merchant (can give +3, or go in a fight, be boosted, etc)
- Dama Rossa (Courtesan, can go in the Art Gallery, block, etc)
- A call to action (it's a surprise, so the +1 is reliable early game)
Faith:
- Divine Intervention (guaranteed 1 for 1; can lock hand in end game)
- Heathen Followers (deck reduction, fill the hand for Machiavelli or Lab Research, can fight in the Gallery, the Borgia Tower etc)
- San Pietro (only if you do something with it, which should be easy just by playing mass sites, or Santa Maria Novella)
Order:
- Faux Pas (awesome to support a rush)
- Dante Moro (big big ally to play if you like your other allies)
- Theodore Viscardi (epic ressource booster, free and good in end game by himself)
- By Order of the King (deck reduction, priceless tutor effect on Cesare or Dante)
Crime:
- Mona Paola Lisa (so painful to play against her)
- Discreet Calling (insane with the mercenaries or Lanz)
- Forced Charity (deck reduction, huge rare, but slow)
- Rosa in Fiore (a bit slow, but +3 is great, can combo with sites related cards too)
Scholar:
- Knowledge is Power (you need a good reason to play less than 5 of this when you build a scholar deck as it is the only good ressource booster available).
For most of you, this is basic deck building knowledge. But I still see too much decks wrongly built that end up by day 4 or 5 with no card in hand and who are just waiting for a new day to get a new card (and when they draw another ressource booster, they cry).
Don't get me wrong, ALL cards in this game can be useful if played well. That's just a fact. But the "played well" is not that easy to achieve when you have a flawed deck.
I hope this will help some of you. I hope nobody will take this thread badly, I'm just trying to help readers who may not have a huge deck building experience.
