Rush in an Elevator

"I am sorry to write such a long letter. I didn't have time to write a short one.”  ― Mark Twain

For the last 2 days, I have been working on post about pure combat constructs.  I needed to get away from the subject.  I found the post was getting too long to be easily digestible and Twain’s quote was scratching at me like a burr.  So I finished the first part of the blog on “pool gain” to distance myself from the combat subject.

Afterwards, getting some ice cream, the thousands of words on combat crystallized into an “elevator message” and I had to get typing immediately. 

For those not deeply entrenched in a private enterprise:

Elevator message (n): a concise, simply worded series of statements delivered to corporate executives as your shared elevator descends from their lofty office space.

Rush in an Elevator:

In order to secure a game win, any deck design must be capable ousting 2 other decks.  Pure combat decks must effectively oust a 3rd deck (their predator) if they are to be successful.  This additional overhead places even the best combat design at a significant and immediate disadvantage. 

Cross-table rescuing negates many benefits derived from a successful combat, compounding that disadvantage.   That no analogous (cardless) function hampers bleed-based or vote-based decks adds insult to injury.

It’s still a little longer than I like, but it does encapsulate the need to backrush and why that’s inherently inefficient.  It touches on the inequities of cross-table rescuing.   But it’s unfortunately impossible to distill the concepts 1-player isolation (e.g., a One Cap Hack deck), 2-player isolation (e.g., a Legacy of Pander deck) and unrestricted interaction (e.g., [CEL] guns deck) into 5 sentences.

We’ll cover those topics in a later blog.  Tune in next week, for another exiting episode?

The Misnomer of Pool Gain

"Inconceivable"

I have been thinking a lot about "pool gain" lately.  It seems that most of the time I hear someone talk about their deck's "pool gain", I channel an excerpt from one of my favorite films.

"You keep using that word.  I do not think it means what you think it means."  - Inigo Montoya, The Princess Bride

What most folks consider "pool gain," I divide into several different mechanical functions, which I'll cover in more depth over the next few days.  But here's the upshot:  

The most-often seen methods used to “gain pool” don’t GAIN pool …..they RECUR blood to pool. 

Recur implies "to occur again"" – to get back.  You have to have invested, at least temporarily, pool to recur it.    At best, perfectly recurring blood yields a maximum of 30 pool.

Gain implies "create, or add."  There is no link between pool invested and the ability to create pool, nor is there a limit to the amount of pool that can be generated.

People complain violently about Villein-Lilith’s Blessing (V-LB) as "excessive pool gain".  It is not……instead it is perfect blood recursion (getting back everything that was spent) with a subsequent creation of a 3 blood maintenance infusion (not intended to be transformed into pool.)

I'm not saying that people solely rely on V-LB.  I'm merely suggesting that V-LB is not intended to independently yield more than 30 pool.

There are points at which the line between that simple distinction I made becomes blurred.  Extending the VB-L above example, a Villein-Giant's Blood-Villein-Lilith's Blessing sequence transforms a tactic primarily intended for blood recursion into genuine pool creation mechanic.  Voter Captivation-Minion Tap does the same thing in a more repeatable fashion.

This is why "pool gain", "blood recursion" or "pool creation" all inadequately describe the functions associated with the way pool is managed.

Over the next few days, I'll describe the way I think about pool management using the following terminology.

1. Direct Blood Recursion
2. Indirect Blood Recursion
3. Direct Pool Generation
4. Indirect Pool Generation
5. Pool Theft
6. Hybrid Methodologies

I'll also talk about the difference between vertically and horizontally scaling approaches in many of those broad categories and the ramifications of volatility associated with the approaches.  

The Predator's Haiku

Sixty counters gone

from predatory effects
living all the while

All of this section should be a separate blog post, but it aligns well with the topics above so you're getting hit with a Wall of Text.

The short verse above is based on the tactical payload implications of playing against decks with complete blood recursion.

I believe that more perfect blood recursion options lead to a higher average ousting hurdle than was faced before tech like V-LB was introduced.  Instead of some portion of player’s invested pool being "tied up" on minions, it is more often fully returned to the players resource pool.

Still, it’s a fixed target that can be considered.  Assuming perfect recursion, no other pool management and an expenditure of 4 pool that won't be returned, one has to successfully address 26 counters to oust it's prey.  Those counters might be removed through combat with newly influenced minions before blood is recurred, or directly from their pool by bleeding or political actions.

That number passes a gut-feel for the minimum target to address only vertically-scaling blood recursion like V-LB.  It's entirely possible that Lilith's Blessing doesn't come into play before the initial minion (likely lowering the target payload) or that additional pool/blood creation occurs (increasing the target).

If a target payload of 26 seems like a reasonable place to start, the inevitable conclusion is that people simply waiting for their prey to drop into the old-school "10-pool range" before lunging will be sorely disappointed.  

V-LB might have highly volatile pool levels as minions are influenced into play, but there's no reason to believe that they need drop below 15 at any point in the process.

Now, make a set of observations around the single-use case with Giant's Blood to get into a worst-case analysis taking only V-LB into account.

1. The V-LB player can't Bless that minion again.   
2. A second Villein on the previously Villeined minion costs one pool.   

Now, a couple of assumptions are merited.

1. If the VLB player uses Giant's Blood, it is likely being played no later than mid game, before someone else plays it.  It follows that they are unlikely to fully empty the minion at this game stage, they are more likely to exclude at least 2 blood and continue generating offensive pressure.  
2. Because the deck is using primarily Villeins, a 10 capacity minion is the target.

The resulting pool CREATION in this situation is [10 blood on the minion - 1 pool for duplicate Villiens - 2 blood remaining on the minion] = 7 pool created.

Our offensive hurdle increases from 26 to 33 for that player alone.  Any subsequent player who uses perfect recursion and didn't face predation remains a 26 pool target.  If I want to garner 2 victory points, my baseline payload against double V-LB hovers around removing 60 counters from the table, surviving my predator in the process.

Of course this is a highly theoretical target - perhaps even ludicrous.  Its very unlikely that one would face double V-LB without any other pool management or pool rewards from an oust (making the hurdle significantly higher), that both target players get all the cards they need on schedule (making the target lower), that one's eventual grand-predator would entirely escape predation (also making the hurdle lower).

But it still seems like a good place to start.

Echoing of Babbles

It’s been quite a while since my last post.  I’m not apologetic, though I’ll tell you why the blog was idle. 

Sometimes even obsessive players need a lengthy break from this kind of intense hobby.  I know I did.  

Sometimes life intrudes on our hobbies.  My recent landscaping project consumed a lot of time (and even more money).  

Sometimes, we develop new interests that occupy our time, as my latest foray into photography has.  

But somehow, I always get sucked back into this old and comfortable pastime.  My incentive to return from this hiatus is May’s North American Championships and the Week of Nightmares.  It’s not so much the back-to-back tournaments that we play that week that lure me.

 

But the people……that’s the draw.  I get to see friends from everywhere in the world during that week-long marathon.   They are good people, fun people and often among the diabolically clever people I know.  The only downside is that much of the time we spend together is totally devoted to orchestrating their demise.

So, for at least a couple of months, I’ll be back to using Inferior Babble to organize my thoughts for the upcoming week of Nightmares.  Yes, I said I'm going for the people, but I can't help but try to be competitive at the same time.  

Once again, I welcome those of you demented enough to read along with me as I try to organize my thoughts in crystalline ways.

Case Study: The Design Success of Nights of Reckoning.

I played the Imbued deck described below a couple of weeks ago (making a couple of very minor tweaks.)  It took its table pretty handily.  I never really felt like I wasn't in control of my destiny - despite apparently having "TABLE THREAT" tattoed across my forehead from the moment of my first discard.

Ironically, it wasn't the conceptual twist of manipulating convictions that made the deck strong.  In the end, it was simply intercept, Champion and aggravated damage.
But, this exercise still had merit.    When you look at it from a game design standpoint, Nights of Reckoning was a 60 card expansion that immediately created tournament-viable decks.   No other expansion can claim that success.  Yet Nights is the game's most-reviled expansion.  Hmmmmmmm.

I started to think about this in context of V:EKN's discussion about what might be interesting in a new set.  A few themes leapt to mind that I just wanted to jot down.

DECEPTIVE DEPTH

In the cases of (original) Anarchs, Bloodlines and Ebony Kingdom, the new themes lacked enough substance to build competitive decks.  Even after addition of a second set supporting each, the comparitively shallow card pool continues to relegate these many of these decks to gimmick status.

The fundamental difficulty in providing immediate impact with new sets was inherently tied to the game's trait-based model.  Disciplines, clans and/or traits like "Black Hand" and "Seraph" drove access to functionality.  Introducing more than one new trait in a set meant that it was difficult to properly support all of those traits in one expansion of fixed (small) size. 

To this day, disciplines existed in 1994's Jyhad base set have significantly more available cards than other disciplines.  Even the least dense original discipline, Protean, has twice as many card options as any discipline introduced after 1996. 

Depth of options for any given trait generally improves playability.  Even if simply because more cards printed statistically dictates a greater number of playable cards.  If you buy into that idea, it is easy to see why new concepts trailed in the power curve.  They just didn't have the depth to be versatile, or to have a significant number of playable cards.

The Imbued received immediate depth in a different way, tied to only one new trait introduced in that set - "Imbued."  The key cards (Convictions, Church of Vindicated Faith, Angel of Berlin) were broadly useable across the entire pool of available minions, instead of being tied to a more restrictive trait like a clan or discipline. 

Upside.....easy access to powerful options available within a compact card base.  Downside.....every Imbued deck starts to look very similar.  Even when I tried to twist the design around some, it ended up being just another wallish Imbued deck with a +1 bleed options.

MECHANICS THAT BREAK THE GAME.

Bear with me a moment, this gets a little lengthy and introduces a rant that I'll probably expand on more fully at a later date.

V:tES is a card game.  It is supposed to use 3 basic resources for play.  Pool as the global resource, minions to act in one's playspace and library cards to manipulate minions or their abilities..  

Innately tied to that model is a common thread among card games - the random nature of drawing from a face-down deck. 

Recursion from the Ash Heap introduces a 4th resource, one with low development overhead.  Accessing that resource also eliminates the random factors, which are supposed to be closely woven into the fabric of the game. 

In short, significant access to the Ash Heap, where information is complete and random distribution is no longer a factor, breaks the fundamental underpinnings of design for any card game.  From Ashur's Tablets to Sudario Refraction to Sargon Fragment, recursion destroys the reliance on one's library as one of the three primary resources and transfers the focus to "working the Ash Heap."

As an analogy, imagine playing poker and being able to draw cards from the muck (discards of players who folded in that hand).   Immediately, you change the probability of "hitting your raw" into a simple question of having whatever triggers your ability to get the card you want.  The game loses a lot of its appeal and complexity - becoming less random and more an exercise in selecting cards to meet situational need. 

As the ease of use for recursion increases, the mechanic becomes increasingly broken.  Nothing is easier than recursion of Conviction - just stick it on the minion during your untap.  Done, and you get what you need for the upcoming turn.  Pretty broken.

Personally, I find it interesting that a large part of what made Nights tournament-worthy was weaving a broken concept into the design. 

SYNERGY WITH THE EXISTING CARD BASE

There are really two parts to this.  First is that several existing cards greatly improved the playability of ally-based decks.  In particular, the Unmasking leaps to mind.

Being unaffected by a number of cards further broadens the card base available to the minions from this small set.  From shrugging off the effect of almost every Event card to accessing Tension in the Ranks without risk from going to torpor, the Imbued were immediately able to access a wide base of existing deck tech with comparitely low risk. 

While some of the other small sets had syngery with existing sets (after all, the minions shared core disciplines with other vampires), very few of those cards had such a global effects. In my mind, having cards that read "all your minions with [aus] get +1 intercept forever" is the only close parallel to the power the Imbued recieved, just by being allies instead of vampires.

In hindsight, "Imbued" should have implied "mortal minion" but not "ally" and their life counters should have been called something else.

THE HARD COUNTER.

I'll use a World of Warcraft analogy here.  In Player-Versus-Player (PvP) combat models with 2 players per side, the type of characters on each side of the fight can matter more than anything other factor in the fight.  Players commonly call this situation "a hard counter."

The Imbued are, by and large, a hard counter to a lot of deck designs. 

Combat is often viewed as the best way to deal with the Imbued.  But of the 87 cards that say "enter combat," 63 of them also say "vampire" instead of "minion."   That hamstrings a lot of combat deck designs - including the flavor of the month Deep Song rush decks. 

Even after combat is initiated, there are a lot of combat cards that are unplayable against the Immune - most prominantly all Frenzy cards and Taste of Vitae.  More innate benefit simply from Imbued being "allies" - which never really should have happened.

The Imbued's tendency to develop a lot of standing intercept is also a hard counter against any late-developing deck that can't generate consistent stealth.  Having a backup Champion in play makes lunging at them harder too - so another subset of deck designs is greatly hampered by what seems to be general commonality in their deck designs.

FREE MULTIACTION

The Imbued permit a disportionately high level of multiaction by rule, without any other prerequisite or resource cost.  Experience has shown that freedom to act repetitively is very powerful - how many people try to play [for] minions just to get at Freak Drive or use Majesty as much for untap as for S:CE?

Perhaps untapping after gaining a Power should have cost the Imbued one of their most precious resources - a Conviction.  Seems roughly analogous to the typical 1 blood cost associated with a vampire using an untap effect.

STILL A MYSTERY

The new mechanics created an innate complexity at a lot of people just don't care to understand.

This is almost as telling as anything else.  A large fraction of the player population still doesn't understand how to beat them - and might not even understand the cards they play.  Even against seasoned tournament players, I often have to explain what the cards I'm playing do. 

I've even gone so far as to put a die in front of each minion, showing their on-the-table intercept, just so I don't have to keep telling people, sometimes more than once per turn.

SUMMARY

All this adds up to one thing......Nights of Reckoning will always be the most-successful, least-loved expansion ever to hit the presses.