I've been ranked 85th at Angers tournament, doing 7-3. I lost last match by timeout, with 5 more mins i was 100% winning and going 8-2, so maybe somewhere around top 50. I was playing an Akesha Kadigir, on my 10 match, i fought 4 times vs Waru (2 win - 2 lose) and 3 times vs Sigismar (2 - 1). Ordis is really the worst possible matchup for my list, considering this, i felt like it was very consistent. To talk about the "Control system" on altered, you are absolutely right to say that at this point of the game, the whole majority of mechanism at our disposal are worthless. It took me a lot of effort to figure out a way to balance my control deck and have a positive winrate with it, and now i've reached this point where there is hardly any variation i could try that wouldn't break it... Because there is just not enough good cards to do the job. To explain quickly my strategy : - First objective is to control "as good as possible" to stay alive up to the 8 mana turn ( it's still ok if i won 0 expedition at this point, as long as i'am not dead ). I achieve this by Zou! turn 1 and again turn 2 (opponent will most likely win 0 or 1 expe each turn). I can also put some Alice or Kadigir Alchimist to block one exp. My uniques almost all have the "send to reserve a character that cost 3 or less, allowing me to control one opponent body while blocking another one with my stats. - Second objective is to draw a LOT I have to figure out the best moment to give up on both expeditions in order to draw as much as possible (playing the rare conjuration seal and/or magical training). - Third phase is when i reach 8 mana (or 7mana if i have a reduction cost in reserve, that i can have with some of my uniques). At this point i stall as long as possible, with my akesha power, then with Alice's support ability. If my opponent dont have enough low cost, he may have deplete enough mana to not be able to counter my incoming combo. I play Kadigir Bastion (rare), then i use it for a celebration Day. - Fourth phase : now the first Kadigir is up, its time to consolidate. If i'am first player, i just replay my Celebration Day from reserve, using my Kadigir ( before my opponent remove my Kadigir eventually ) If i'am second player and my opponent remove my Kadigir, then i just put another Kadigir to replace, and i play the Celebration Day anyway. If opponent sabotage the Celebration Day, then i hope to have another one in hand ( thats why i draw a ton of cards during the turn before ). I have be able to put down a second Kadigir to go to the last phase. - Fifth phase : i now have 2 Kadigir, its time to win the game. Basic combo is, first Kadigir play small step, second Kadigir play Celebration Day, my mana is used to play Conjuring seal 2 times in a row and cycle my deck. at this point i should have 12+ cards in hand at any moment, cycling my deck while moving forward step by step and preventing him to do anything. when i'am 4 expedition away from winning, i can play 4 small step in one turn ( require 12+ mana and 2 kadigir up ). Conclusion : there is a lot more tips and tricks to learn to be able to be consistent with this deck, the complexity goes higher when opponents have answers in hand (permanent removal, lots of sabotage). The number of missplays you could make is big, and you wont feel comfortable playing it unless you trained for 50+ games. ( dont fool yourself you wont reach 75% winrate on ladder with this deck but you can definitly be positive ) The golden rule before 8 mana is : "never play a single card with the intent of winning an expedition"... you should absolutely use every single ressources you have to prevent the opponent from moving forward. (yes, there is a huge difference) Even playing a tiny body on a open field after the opponent passed could be a mistake if you are not sure to have enough to handle what's next. TY for reading, here is the list i used for the tournament (my most recent version is slightly different) : ibb.co/mHQpFBs
Strong video. I like the way you explained what control is about and what it is missing at the moment. Specifically the names of the cards are probably spot on 👌💪
Thanks for the video :) The way Altered works is different to Magic, so it's difficult to compare card in Magic with card in Altered. Your definition of Control in 4'40'' is very close to what Zig-Zag Akesha does : 1) Polar opposite to Aggro : Zig zag Akesha never try to win two expeditions in one day , 2) Nullify the opponent's plays : Let one expedition to the opponent and take the other is nullify the opponent's play, 3) Win with small incremental advantages is actually what Zig-Zag Akesha does with Small Step and Beauty sleep. So for me Zig Zag Akesha is a traditionnal control deck. But the difference is you don't need to have a empty board in Altered to nullify the opponent's play.
Think there are some good points in the video, but a big miss/not a fair representation is "Removal is overcosted". Sure it's partially true when looking at lower cost characters or including robin hood tax, but the removal currently available in altered has a HUGE impact on decks and what cards are even viable. If removal was truly overcosted, we would see things like Kraken, Hydra, and Kaibara, and anchored characters (more on them later) dominating the play space because removal wouldn't be worth running in the first place and larger characters would be left to do their thing. The reason removal FEELs overcosted, is that right now the best characters and strategies are all just better than paying the combined equivalent mana for one big play because removal is actually fairly cheap relative to the cost of those larger threats. The meta has adapted to mitigate the power of removal by just playing lower cost characters and permanents that all gain immediate value or aren't worth using a removal card on, but that doesn't mean removal is "overcosted". There is a reason why there is a dearth of Muna in the top placements; the faction as a whole is reliant on characters (anchored) or permanents (festival) sticking around to gain value turn over turn but the current removal cards available just invalidate that strategy because they DO devalue those plays to the point where the Muna player can be blown out by a simple removal spell devaluing their plays to the nth degree.
Great video, and I’m glad someone finally cleared the air of what is actually control. For your points, I do agree with a lot of them, one of the first things I complained about control was why Kraken’s Wrath was so restrictive lol. I think our tools are a bit better than what you’ve suggested, but I do agree that what we have now are too weak to answer the major threats in a game. Also appreciate you mentioning ZigZag Akesha, it is prob the best example of a tempo build of Alesha rn and I’m looking forward to seeing how it evolves.
Thanks for the kind words! I'm excited to play around with this zigzag build more myself in the near future. I feel like the same idea could be done in other colors too, but obviously those don't have the After You Akesha has.
I really like the Zig-Zag Akesha list you linked. I also had trouble making Akesha work quite as well as I wanted on BGA ranked (evidence in my own vids haha). I still love the hero and will continue to play it more. Great vid.
An aspect of control for magic is also in stealing the opponents spells and minions. Back in the old days of magic you had Bribery, which let you play your opponents best creatures from their deck. And you had Treachery, which was gain control of an opponents creature, while untapping your mana you used on the spell. There was also effects like Pestilence, which let you drain mana into a repeating ability which effects all creatures more each time you use it again. But would go away when the board was empty. Another thing could be a way to use mana as a creature and not have to use your cards each turn as a character.
Gaining control of opponent objects is a strong effect because it is basically removal with an upside. In that sense a control archetype would like it, yes :D
I have a deck very similar to the zig-zag deck but in Axiom. However, in certain match ups, I play it like a classic control deck, just stalling until getting Rare Hive. It does pretty well, though. I've been getting around 4-2 in the Swiss tournaments I've been participating in, so it doesn't seem terrible, although it does have some problems that hopefully get solved in future sets.
One forgotten Problem: you can't wait until opponent has played all His cards and react Afterwards. You have also Play cards...so IS manilulating opponents final Board stat very hard
This is such an important video, gonna have to share and react. There is potentially a conversation to be had about what control COULD look like in Altered versus What it SHOULD look like. but all your points are very good. a friend and I are trying to do Kojo Control and the comment about the zigzag akesha strat is similar to what we came up with.
I wonder as to if they’ll expand upon removal options in the next set. But that aside, I feel like they wanted to encourage sort of the “normal” play they’d set for Altered, where it’s all about having the better stats in an expedition, and for now or maybe still going forward are refraining from flooding the game with control pieces. Also have to keep in mind how there’s no instant speed, which definitely hurts control in this game.
Control needs overstated creatures with defender and gigantic and maybe even tough. Basically a boardwipe that blanks out progression on both exbiditons without actually wiping the board
That's a very good idea I think. Another comment brought up this point too that in Altered you have the special case that removal spells don't need to be noncreature, they can be characters with defender. Kind of what Gulrang tries to do. It would be very interesting because if your boardwipe is a character, then removal that your opponent has can counter it, which sounds like a cool play pattern.
I think control players will get additional pieces and I actually hope that this looks at being able to take out 0 and 1 cost cards (maybe 2 or less). At present most strategies seem to revolve around having 0-3 cost cards in the deck and nickel and diming for wins on a side. You rarely seem that many 4+ cost cards and are incentivized from playing them because creating advantage from 'free' tokens and low cost value cards is the best way to go. Robin Hood is the main counter to this as playing lots of cards will add one per card. However Robin is not fun for anyone to play against, so a better solution is required.
I would like the meta to have at least one "big" deck, be it ramp or control or turtling or whatever. This current trend of small small small feels a bit, idk, same-y to me.
I think Equinox's design philosophy is to try not to make too much control in the game so you don't feel too bad about not playing your game. This was the reason cited for looking at nerfing Robin Hood. Hand hate is also negative interaction and I was suprised when they revealed Baku as its a feel bad card.
One thing, Altered works completly different. Control means you dominante the Board with your toolset. In Magic you have counter and removal. At the end IT doesn't Matter you dominante an Expedition with 1 or 10 Power. You have to Control 2 Boards (both expeditions) create more Content in your Side and BE Higher than opponent to Stop His movement. That are really really many Things you have to do. Also Style of playing one Card per round ISn't easy to act as full Control. I think IT IS important to define control for altered in an other way...also Play in different way
17:40 But both are turn 2 plays :P Also starting hands are way smaller than in MTG, discard is exceedingly handicapping. Interesting video but I don't know... does altered really need the aggro/control/combo archetype thing ?
It not so much about needing this classification, rather that the classification naturally arises. I really like the point about starting hand sizes though, that's a real argument against cheap hand hate. Thanks!
By traditional control you are talking about MtG control and to be frank I'm glad that it doesn't exist. The way Altered is set up the whole design of the game is different and leads to very different decisions in how gameplay works. If I wanted to play with that kind of control in the game then I'd have stayed playing MtG. The Altered GDs have to come up with untraditional ways of control, such as things like After You. Now I'm not saying that they got it 100% correct and seem to have erred on the side of removal being a touch weak, but I am glad they did. Too effective mass removal spells for instance would make the game feel very different and a lot more feel bad.
They definitely made the right decision playing it safe with control cards in the first set. Would be pretty anticlimatic if the meta deck was hardcore control right out of the gate.
The Problem with Celebration Day is that it's so expensive, so you can't play it late in the round even with After You. You have to play it early so your opponent won't commit much to the board, so it ends up not trading very well. It's a shame cause I love the artwork of the card, being a Kojo enjoyer you know xDxD
@@KojoMain yeah, the artwork its really cool! ive seen a waru deck playing celebration + Grand endevor. The decks always try to go control until like 16 Manas, then its all of a mix of issiqot, and the other two cards. I think, i'll try It in the future. nice video btw
I don't fully agree. The fundamental misconception some players make is that one part of the control plan is to be reactive instead of proactive, and usually wins through exhaustion, a thing you could totally do in Altered, as at some points characters will not draw enough cards per turn. Control CAN use bodies. In Altered you can - or could - deny your opponent's plays by playing matching stats for a lower cost, essentially with characters with "Defenders". But these characters are poorly stated (turtle/archivist) and cannot really contest expeditions. A classic removal like fatal push would then be like a 2/2/2 with defender for 1/1 that conditionally get 2 boosts. As you pointed though, there are not much alternative win conditions yet, or they are a bit too much expensive and/or easy to break. I also think that the core mechanics of the game favour low-costed characters and that playstyle is not really punishable in the first set (except with Robin). In that sens Gulrang would be the ultimate control hero. (And generally Ordis and not Yzmiz which is more supposed to be tempo oriented)
I'd like to add to this that, stax/prison is a proactive style of control where countering is reactive. Stax gets AHEAD of or skews any game action your opponent could take or strategy they could implement (rule of law/god-pharoh's statue) Wehee Control RESPONDS to game actions the opponent takes. the former allowing response with different removal pieces and the later requiring good player knowledge and decision making.
I really like this interpretation of "removal spells in Altered" being characters with defender. If more such cards are introduced (or better ones), Gulrang could develop into a very cool "stalling the game" kind of deck, maybe with some powerful topend like Endeavor.
`Goff you go is probably just about okay. I think Teamwork Training is strong and that is not terrible up against it. Wraken's Krath is busted however and not a spell I want to see. It completely breaks the principles of the game and not something I'm keen to see. Footh Tairy is another card I don't want to see. Way too strong for the effect. You are getting double value for the same cost. Discarding a card is worth 2 mana. Sabotage is worth 1 mana. Plus you are getting a 1/1/1 on top of that. Too strong, sorry. Baku is not overcosted. Badigir is fine. I think that wouldn't cause any issues, though I suspect they wouldn't put it in Yzmir 🙂. I would have the rare ability make it cost 5 at common at 4 at rare though.
I would say Waru is an aggro-stax deck that hinder your opponents tempo asymmetrically while stacking value. not quite the same as the proposed control analysis kojo was making.
I think there is a miss concept related to altered, altered is not a value game, altered is a control game. Put a character in play is a controll decision not a value decision because the character are removed from play, there is no value that remains in play. You are constantly trying to counter your opponent. E.g. Put any character counter other character. The exception of this are permanent, they can create value because they remain in play. And i think they are really balanced. If play in the right moment they can create a snow ball effect. The effect of discard cards from play or game are super strong in this game, because a card can be play multiple times, so you cant compare it with magic, maybe a closest game will be you gi oh, where card has a rol of resource too but yugi also dont have hand discard effects. What you are talking about or want to say in your video is find a way to play using only spell instead of character. But thats not control is just play spells. Related to ideas of "controll" card, it could be a card that create a token that have the same statistics that opponent character plus one, but it has defender. This card could be a low cost card to "control" the game and wait until play the win card condition, but the game is on a early state and us as player need to learn to count first Finally i think the prison strategy is also really bad for the game, we are watching it with robin hood and his +1 cost effect, in altered this kind of startegic are difficult to implement because in your turn you have just a few action you can take becouse hand size and resource limits In other word is really difficult to make that a game persist for many turn Finally, Regarding of what a say here, is a really good video that give an start point to try to understand altered Thanks for your work and effort
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I've been ranked 85th at Angers tournament, doing 7-3.
I lost last match by timeout, with 5 more mins i was 100% winning and going 8-2, so maybe somewhere around top 50.
I was playing an Akesha Kadigir, on my 10 match, i fought 4 times vs Waru (2 win - 2 lose) and 3 times vs Sigismar (2 - 1).
Ordis is really the worst possible matchup for my list, considering this, i felt like it was very consistent.
To talk about the "Control system" on altered, you are absolutely right to say that at this point of the game, the whole majority of mechanism at our disposal are worthless.
It took me a lot of effort to figure out a way to balance my control deck and have a positive winrate with it, and now i've reached this point where there is hardly any variation i could try
that wouldn't break it... Because there is just not enough good cards to do the job.
To explain quickly my strategy :
- First objective is to control "as good as possible" to stay alive up to the 8 mana turn ( it's still ok if i won 0 expedition at this point, as long as i'am not dead ).
I achieve this by Zou! turn 1 and again turn 2 (opponent will most likely win 0 or 1 expe each turn).
I can also put some Alice or Kadigir Alchimist to block one exp.
My uniques almost all have the "send to reserve a character that cost 3 or less, allowing me to control one opponent body while blocking another one with my stats.
- Second objective is to draw a LOT
I have to figure out the best moment to give up on both expeditions in order to draw as much as possible (playing the rare conjuration seal and/or magical training).
- Third phase is when i reach 8 mana (or 7mana if i have a reduction cost in reserve, that i can have with some of my uniques).
At this point i stall as long as possible, with my akesha power, then with Alice's support ability.
If my opponent dont have enough low cost, he may have deplete enough mana to not be able to counter my incoming combo.
I play Kadigir Bastion (rare), then i use it for a celebration Day.
- Fourth phase : now the first Kadigir is up, its time to consolidate.
If i'am first player, i just replay my Celebration Day from reserve, using my Kadigir ( before my opponent remove my Kadigir eventually )
If i'am second player and my opponent remove my Kadigir, then i just put another Kadigir to replace, and i play the Celebration Day anyway.
If opponent sabotage the Celebration Day, then i hope to have another one in hand ( thats why i draw a ton of cards during the turn before ).
I have be able to put down a second Kadigir to go to the last phase.
- Fifth phase : i now have 2 Kadigir, its time to win the game.
Basic combo is, first Kadigir play small step, second Kadigir play Celebration Day, my mana is used to play Conjuring seal 2 times in a row and cycle my deck.
at this point i should have 12+ cards in hand at any moment, cycling my deck while moving forward step by step and preventing him to do anything.
when i'am 4 expedition away from winning, i can play 4 small step in one turn ( require 12+ mana and 2 kadigir up ).
Conclusion : there is a lot more tips and tricks to learn to be able to be consistent with this deck, the complexity goes higher when opponents have answers in hand (permanent removal, lots of sabotage).
The number of missplays you could make is big, and you wont feel comfortable playing it unless you trained for 50+ games.
( dont fool yourself you wont reach 75% winrate on ladder with this deck but you can definitly be positive )
The golden rule before 8 mana is : "never play a single card with the intent of winning an expedition"...
you should absolutely use every single ressources you have to prevent the opponent from moving forward. (yes, there is a huge difference)
Even playing a tiny body on a open field after the opponent passed could be a mistake if you are not sure to have enough to handle what's next.
TY for reading, here is the list i used for the tournament (my most recent version is slightly different) : ibb.co/mHQpFBs
Thank you for taking the time to type all this out! A very informative read, I love to hear people's real life experiences at big tournaments! :D
Would you be willing to share your current list?
@@raphaeldieulangard4186 wow this seems like a hard strategy, but pulling it off should feel rewarding
Mais fallait pas éviter de trop spread la liste ? 😂sinon l'explication est pixel !
@@tchzerrid5913 i keep my last changes secret, wanna keep my chances to perform on next tournament haha
Strong video. I like the way you explained what control is about and what it is missing at the moment. Specifically the names of the cards are probably spot on 👌💪
Thanks for the kind words man! :D
Thanks for the video :)
The way Altered works is different to Magic, so it's difficult to compare card in Magic with card in Altered. Your definition of Control in 4'40'' is very close to what Zig-Zag Akesha does : 1) Polar opposite to Aggro : Zig zag Akesha never try to win two expeditions in one day , 2) Nullify the opponent's plays : Let one expedition to the opponent and take the other is nullify the opponent's play, 3) Win with small incremental advantages is actually what Zig-Zag Akesha does with Small Step and Beauty sleep. So for me Zig Zag Akesha is a traditionnal control deck. But the difference is you don't need to have a empty board in Altered to nullify the opponent's play.
I don't fully agree, but thank you for the interesting input! Glad to hear you liked the video :D
Great Video! Really insightful. I like decklists and gamplay but theorycrafting videos is something i now crave more of :)
Thank you so much! :D
Think there are some good points in the video, but a big miss/not a fair representation is "Removal is overcosted". Sure it's partially true when looking at lower cost characters or including robin hood tax, but the removal currently available in altered has a HUGE impact on decks and what cards are even viable. If removal was truly overcosted, we would see things like Kraken, Hydra, and Kaibara, and anchored characters (more on them later) dominating the play space because removal wouldn't be worth running in the first place and larger characters would be left to do their thing. The reason removal FEELs overcosted, is that right now the best characters and strategies are all just better than paying the combined equivalent mana for one big play because removal is actually fairly cheap relative to the cost of those larger threats. The meta has adapted to mitigate the power of removal by just playing lower cost characters and permanents that all gain immediate value or aren't worth using a removal card on, but that doesn't mean removal is "overcosted". There is a reason why there is a dearth of Muna in the top placements; the faction as a whole is reliant on characters (anchored) or permanents (festival) sticking around to gain value turn over turn but the current removal cards available just invalidate that strategy because they DO devalue those plays to the point where the Muna player can be blown out by a simple removal spell devaluing their plays to the nth degree.
Interesting way to look at it. Thanks for typing this out!
@@KojoMain Yeah and also the reason Atsadi does poorly
Great video, and I’m glad someone finally cleared the air of what is actually control.
For your points, I do agree with a lot of them, one of the first things I complained about control was why Kraken’s Wrath was so restrictive lol. I think our tools are a bit better than what you’ve suggested, but I do agree that what we have now are too weak to answer the major threats in a game.
Also appreciate you mentioning ZigZag Akesha, it is prob the best example of a tempo build of Alesha rn and I’m looking forward to seeing how it evolves.
Thanks for the kind words! I'm excited to play around with this zigzag build more myself in the near future. I feel like the same idea could be done in other colors too, but obviously those don't have the After You Akesha has.
I really like the Zig-Zag Akesha list you linked. I also had trouble making Akesha work quite as well as I wanted on BGA ranked (evidence in my own vids haha). I still love the hero and will continue to play it more. Great vid.
Thanks so much! Glad to hear other people have been trying to figure this out too :D
An aspect of control for magic is also in stealing the opponents spells and minions.
Back in the old days of magic you had Bribery, which let you play your opponents best creatures from their deck. And you had Treachery, which was gain control of an opponents creature, while untapping your mana you used on the spell.
There was also effects like Pestilence, which let you drain mana into a repeating ability which effects all creatures more each time you use it again. But would go away when the board was empty.
Another thing could be a way to use mana as a creature and not have to use your cards each turn as a character.
Gaining control of opponent objects is a strong effect because it is basically removal with an upside. In that sense a control archetype would like it, yes :D
I have a deck very similar to the zig-zag deck but in Axiom. However, in certain match ups, I play it like a classic control deck, just stalling until getting Rare Hive. It does pretty well, though. I've been getting around 4-2 in the Swiss tournaments I've been participating in, so it doesn't seem terrible, although it does have some problems that hopefully get solved in future sets.
Dear sir/Madam, do you have the zig-zag list for reference?
Thanks for sharing your experiences!
One forgotten Problem: you can't wait until opponent has played all His cards and react Afterwards. You have also Play cards...so IS manilulating opponents final Board stat very hard
This is such an important video, gonna have to share and react. There is potentially a conversation to be had about what control COULD look like in Altered versus What it SHOULD look like. but all your points are very good. a friend and I are trying to do Kojo Control and the comment about the zigzag akesha strat is similar to what we came up with.
I hope the designers peek this and its helps inform some design for sets 4+ since 1-3 are probabaly already designed at this point
Good thinking! That archetype works well with Bravos too, yes
I wonder as to if they’ll expand upon removal options in the next set. But that aside, I feel like they wanted to encourage sort of the “normal” play they’d set for Altered, where it’s all about having the better stats in an expedition, and for now or maybe still going forward are refraining from flooding the game with control pieces. Also have to keep in mind how there’s no instant speed, which definitely hurts control in this game.
Definitely true about the "normal" play patterns!
Control needs overstated creatures with defender and gigantic and maybe even tough. Basically a boardwipe that blanks out progression on both exbiditons without actually wiping the board
That's a very good idea I think. Another comment brought up this point too that in Altered you have the special case that removal spells don't need to be noncreature, they can be characters with defender. Kind of what Gulrang tries to do. It would be very interesting because if your boardwipe is a character, then removal that your opponent has can counter it, which sounds like a cool play pattern.
I think control players will get additional pieces and I actually hope that this looks at being able to take out 0 and 1 cost cards (maybe 2 or less). At present most strategies seem to revolve around having 0-3 cost cards in the deck and nickel and diming for wins on a side. You rarely seem that many 4+ cost cards and are incentivized from playing them because creating advantage from 'free' tokens and low cost value cards is the best way to go. Robin Hood is the main counter to this as playing lots of cards will add one per card. However Robin is not fun for anyone to play against, so a better solution is required.
I would like the meta to have at least one "big" deck, be it ramp or control or turtling or whatever. This current trend of small small small feels a bit, idk, same-y to me.
I think Equinox's design philosophy is to try not to make too much control in the game so you don't feel too bad about not playing your game. This was the reason cited for looking at nerfing Robin Hood. Hand hate is also negative interaction and I was suprised when they revealed Baku as its a feel bad card.
It's true. Altered development is modern in this sense (in that they try to not lean into unfun things even if they're established in other TCGs).
One thing, Altered works completly different.
Control means you dominante the Board with your toolset. In Magic you have counter and removal.
At the end IT doesn't Matter you dominante an Expedition with 1 or 10 Power.
You have to Control 2 Boards (both expeditions) create more Content in your Side and BE Higher than opponent to Stop His movement.
That are really really many Things you have to do.
Also Style of playing one Card per round ISn't easy to act as full Control.
I think IT IS important to define control for altered in an other way...also Play in different way
17:40 But both are turn 2 plays :P Also starting hands are way smaller than in MTG, discard is exceedingly handicapping.
Interesting video but I don't know... does altered really need the aggro/control/combo archetype thing ?
It not so much about needing this classification, rather that the classification naturally arises. I really like the point about starting hand sizes though, that's a real argument against cheap hand hate. Thanks!
By traditional control you are talking about MtG control and to be frank I'm glad that it doesn't exist. The way Altered is set up the whole design of the game is different and leads to very different decisions in how gameplay works. If I wanted to play with that kind of control in the game then I'd have stayed playing MtG. The Altered GDs have to come up with untraditional ways of control, such as things like After You. Now I'm not saying that they got it 100% correct and seem to have erred on the side of removal being a touch weak, but I am glad they did. Too effective mass removal spells for instance would make the game feel very different and a lot more feel bad.
They definitely made the right decision playing it safe with control cards in the first set. Would be pretty anticlimatic if the meta deck was hardcore control right out of the gate.
Altered won't truly be good until I can make a game go long enough that the decks run out of cards and need to shuffle their discard pile back in.
Please make a deck build or guide for sigismar
I will think about it!
What about Celebration Day + Grand Endeavor?
The Problem with Celebration Day is that it's so expensive, so you can't play it late in the round even with After You. You have to play it early so your opponent won't commit much to the board, so it ends up not trading very well. It's a shame cause I love the artwork of the card, being a Kojo enjoyer you know xDxD
@@KojoMain yeah, the artwork its really cool!
ive seen a waru deck playing celebration + Grand endevor. The decks always try to go control until like 16 Manas, then its all of a mix of issiqot, and the other two cards. I think, i'll try It in the future.
nice video btw
@@jonathaniso Thank you :D
I don't fully agree.
The fundamental misconception some players make is that one part of the control plan is to be reactive instead of proactive, and usually wins through exhaustion, a thing you could totally do in Altered, as at some points characters will not draw enough cards per turn.
Control CAN use bodies. In Altered you can - or could - deny your opponent's plays by playing matching stats for a lower cost, essentially with characters with "Defenders".
But these characters are poorly stated (turtle/archivist) and cannot really contest expeditions.
A classic removal like fatal push would then be like a 2/2/2 with defender for 1/1 that conditionally get 2 boosts.
As you pointed though, there are not much alternative win conditions yet, or they are a bit too much expensive and/or easy to break.
I also think that the core mechanics of the game favour low-costed characters and that playstyle is not really punishable in the first set (except with Robin).
In that sens Gulrang would be the ultimate control hero. (And generally Ordis and not Yzmiz which is more supposed to be tempo oriented)
I'd like to add to this that, stax/prison is a proactive style of control where countering is reactive. Stax gets AHEAD of or skews any game action your opponent could take or strategy they could implement (rule of law/god-pharoh's statue) Wehee Control RESPONDS to game actions the opponent takes. the former allowing response with different removal pieces and the later requiring good player knowledge and decision making.
@@GageTheMage2003 Yes, you are right. My point *was* that a reactive playstyle is not necessarily control.
@@kaba9926 totally agree with that.
I really like this interpretation of "removal spells in Altered" being characters with defender. If more such cards are introduced (or better ones), Gulrang could develop into a very cool "stalling the game" kind of deck, maybe with some powerful topend like Endeavor.
Nice video. I mean, control might get annoying but it will never reach MTG level of annoyance with free spells and instant interaciton.
I agree, the developers will make sure to not let it go overboard. Free counters especially are something we'll hopefully never see xD
`Goff you go is probably just about okay. I think Teamwork Training is strong and that is not terrible up against it. Wraken's Krath is busted however and not a spell I want to see. It completely breaks the principles of the game and not something I'm keen to see. Footh Tairy is another card I don't want to see. Way too strong for the effect. You are getting double value for the same cost. Discarding a card is worth 2 mana. Sabotage is worth 1 mana. Plus you are getting a 1/1/1 on top of that. Too strong, sorry. Baku is not overcosted. Badigir is fine. I think that wouldn't cause any issues, though I suspect they wouldn't put it in Yzmir 🙂. I would have the rare ability make it cost 5 at common at 4 at rare though.
Waru is the controle archetype of set 1
I would say Waru is an aggro-stax deck that hinder your opponents tempo asymmetrically while stacking value. not quite the same as the proposed control analysis kojo was making.
but to your credit can certainly feel that way on the recieving end with the lack of interaction tools
I think there is a miss concept related to altered, altered is not a value game, altered is a control game. Put a character in play is a controll decision not a value decision because the character are removed from play, there is no value that remains in play. You are constantly trying to counter your opponent. E.g. Put any character counter other character.
The exception of this are permanent, they can create value because they remain in play. And i think they are really balanced. If play in the right moment they can create a snow ball effect.
The effect of discard cards from play or game are super strong in this game, because a card can be play multiple times, so you cant compare it with magic, maybe a closest game will be you gi oh, where card has a rol of resource too but yugi also dont have hand discard effects.
What you are talking about or want to say in your video is find a way to play using only spell instead of character. But thats not control is just play spells.
Related to ideas of "controll" card, it could be a card that create a token that have the same statistics that opponent character plus one, but it has defender. This card could be a low cost card to "control" the game and wait until play the win card condition, but the game is on a early state and us as player need to learn to count first
Finally i think the prison strategy is also really bad for the game, we are watching it with robin hood and his +1 cost effect, in altered this kind of startegic are difficult to implement because in your turn you have just a few action you can take becouse hand size and resource limits
In other word is really difficult to make that a game persist for many turn
Finally,
Regarding of what a say here, is a really good video that give an start point to try to understand altered
Thanks for your work and effort
I'm glad you liked it :D
I'm just here to say that "Counterspell" is horrible design, please don't add this mechanic in this game otherwise it will be ruined.
Valid opinion