Build: a failure?

[tsevech]

No offense meant to the designers of the mechanic, but I’m really curious: is there any Build minion which actually sees competitive play?

I have tried putting some of them in my decks and they never seemed to work. I have (stupidly?) crafted 3x Gates for my Abyssian decks, because I love the concept underlying the card, but they are horribly slow and most of the times they get removed despite the use of accelerators.

So, yeah, please share any successful experience with Build. In particular, if you have any working Gate Abyssian deck, please let me know so that I can check it…

[epicflygon]

the ledendary magmar one is p-good apparently and void talon Is quite good in aggressive lists.

[buddybluebomber]

Build minions were secretly a buff to Grimes; working as intended

[excogitator]

Oh gee, I wonder what gave you that impression. Something sure is a failure right now, but I’m pretty sure it ain’t build.

[tsevech]

Yeah, Build minions are clearly inspired to amulets in Shadowverse. However, amulets are a special types of cards there, which need very specific removals to be dealt with, hence they are a more reliable way to trade tempo for value. Giving 0 attack to structures makes them too vulnerable to existing removals.

At the moment, it seems Build minions are not worth the risk of playing them. They are supposed to generate value on the long run, but they don’t stick and are too hard to defend. The reason why Void Talon sees play as mentioned by @epicflygon really is Build: (1), the fastest possible option

[whyb0t]

Void Talon, Biomimetic Hulk, Penumbrax and Gigaloth all seem strong enough to see play, although none of them are particularly meta defining. That expensive Vanar one could be good but I haven’t seen it in action.

Don’t act like you’re surprised or disappointed, we knew from the start Magmar would be a hard counter and guarantee that structures will never be meta. In fact, I’m happily surprised Build is as strong as it is.

[oranos]

magmar is too strong for build minions to be good

once magmar gets nerfed and people start playing other factions, it will be better

wont be meta defining, but it will be playable

[galaxydueler]

I’ve seen the vanar one, I nat selected it and went on my way

[mmf]

They’re actually pretty good…in gauntlet that is

im just kidding, build (1) structures are great since they’re pretty much a free minion if your opponent isn’t Magmar.

[epicflygon]

from my testing Eyolith is really meh, it won games but that was on the second day of the expac.

[sbdjango]

I’ve had fun with the vet obelisk with build, but I don’t think its really that competitive.

[cloudfrog]

met a bunch of Gate lists in my climb. I think they’re ok.

[dru67]

I still see a few trying to get gates rolling but it’s just too slow.
I play that talon. The best one

[alv1n]

How about making Plasma Storm “Destroy all non-build minions with 3 or less attack” and Natural Selection “Destroy a non-build minion with the lowest attack”. Or maybe make some build minions be immune to spell effects until they are built.

[buddybluebomber]

Yeah I don’t think anyone would complain about that, but I think they would need to remove ramping the build time in response to less counter play

[oranos]

abyssian is the only one that plays all their in faction build minions

this deck is what i use, but its not very good

[gate]MTozMDEsMzozNDEsMzozNTAsMzozNTMsMzoxMDk4MSwzOjExMDg4LDM6MTEwOTgsMzoxMTEzNywzOjExMTM5LDM6MjAwNDksMzoyMDA1NywzOjIwMDU5LDM6MjAyMDEsMzoyMDMzNA==

[calebtenrou]

I play Rescue-RX in my Maehv deck and it works great. Gives me a delayed heal for five that lets me play fast and loose early on. If they remove it that’s one removal spell down for a 2-drop which I’m fine with. If not I get 5 health back. Win-win.

Everything else seems a little slow though and not particularly interesting. Biomimetic Hulk for instance seems insane but even with accelerators seems like way too many resources for something that slow. Gate looks like a lot of fun but once again, verrry slow.

[tsevech]

I don’t think the culprits are Plasma Storm and Natural Selection. Sure, those two cards are perfect counters to Build minions, but it turns out that most factions have just as good cards to easily deal with Build, ranging from Punish to OBS.

In a tempo-based game like Duelyst, playing Build minions is already a massive disadvantage. Most of the times, you are spending your full turn to play something which will only give you a reward in X turns, where X >= 2. In the meanwhile, your opponent is developing his own board and taking the tempo.

I think Build minions should not be targetable by standard removals, though a slight reworking of the abilities, the counters and the stats might be needed to balance this out. But at least those minions would have hope to see play.

This is not something unbelievable, most experienced players knew it way before the expansion hit

[baharoth]

I played a Ragnora deck similar to TM25mds Dinosaur Rawr deck (you can find the vid on youtube) about a week ago. Went 9-5 with it. The decks goal is to simply overpower the opponent with value from Hulk, Gigaloth, Progenitor etc. Isn’t going to be meta anytime soon but really fun and can easily overload the opponents answers, even Magmars.

[project2el]

None of them are Great and a lot are pretty bad. I Like void talon in aggro decks and ironcliffe monument+aegis win games. As a songhai lover i dont understand why they give penumbraxx build 2 instead of 1