Which of these cards is in the greatest need of a buff/rework? (November)

[raqyee]

Some of these cards are just awful, but the only one which I think needs a rework is Winterblade.

It just makes no sense from the design perspective. Why would you ever want to use an artifact, a very expensive one at that too, to stun enemy minions rather than kill them? It doesn’t even have a special kind of mechanic that makes the card work, like making it not lose durability if you stun enemies on your turn without killing them or whatever of that sort. But no, it functions like a normal, overpriced artifact. It goes against the very philosophy of artifacts.

I guess I could also argue how ranged pets go under this same “makes no sense from design perspective” category due to them moving before attacking but I’ll let it slide for now because they obviously want all pets to act the same. Even though that could easily be fixed by slightly altering the pets keyword and behavior to a mechanic where they check are they in range before attacking.

Anyway, list is heavily incomplete and I don’t see on what grounds were these specific cards chosen to be a part of it. As such it really makes the whole thing lose a lot of value. Even though I guess it never had any value in the first place and just served to emphasize some discussion for the sake of it.

[snowwy]

Im surprised Lkian or Spelljammer isnt on this list. Those two are kinda the reason fast decks are so prevalent atm.

[raqyee]

You shouldn’t be surprised as Lkian and Spelljammer are strong cards and this thread is dedicated to the weak ones. Also, Lkian unlike Spelljammer was never run in aggro decks.

[tsevech]

Crusader: great art, horrible card. I think it can be fixed by introducing an Astral tribe with internal synergy, so that the same effect applies to the tribe. Other members of the tribe may have similar effects.

Shadow Nova: too big tempo loss for the effect. What if we added “your creeps deal 3 damages this turn”?

Storm Kage: awesome card, but it’s too hard to get value out of it. The spell should be able to target generals or it should be easier to get (every time it gets damage?)

[snowwy]

Aggro decks dont, but the fact that it’s a neutral drop that refills your hand without downsides is kinda the problem. Played vs magmar and Lyonar, even vanar sometimes, primarily magmar and layonar, those factions have bad in faction card draws are able to refill their hands with Lkian, or spell jammer. The problem with that is that Lyonars have high tempo plays and minions, tempo decks are supposed to run out of steam after some time, by restricting their card draw options. If the decks can constantly pump out high tempo plays turn after turn without running out of steam it’s just plainly overtuned (Songhai).

Same with magmar, that faction has very bad card retention. The power from that faction comes from the fact that playing on curve every turn is almost a guaranteed victory. But you need to rely solely on reasonable draws. However, with Lkian, they can sometimes compensate for not on curve plays (playing multiple things per turn by burning their hand) and still be able to refill their hand with Lkian/ Spelljammer.

[raqyee]

Why are you making a big post? I never had intention of discussing the card. I just pointed out how it’s factually incorrect how Lkian is run in aggro decks and how this thread isn’t the place for the discussion of the card as once again, it’s about weak underreprested cards rather than about strong ones.

[snowwy]

I dont know, figured out I have to explain why I put it in because I kinda clump high tempo and aggro decks in the same “fast decks” category. As for the weaker cards needing a buff, cause I see these cards require a greater priority on reworking than the others.

[raqyee]

What you find to be a priority doesn’t matter. Stick to the topic or go to the other thread where strong problematic cards are discussed. It’s at the top of the front page, shouldn’t be hard to find.

[dewize]

Starhorn needs else a total rework, or he should stop giving a card to the other player. Make it cost 2 mana, whatsoever, but I don’t want to give cards to my opponent.

[tsevech]

I think “draw a card, takes 2 damage” would work. I know, it’s copied from Hearthstone but it’s not going to be too problematic here, since BBS is not available every turn.

[raqyee]

I honestly think his BBS is fine as it is, all he needs is actual good cards to support it. Currently, the support cards we have and the ability for starhorn to use the cards from his BBS first isn’t enough to compensate giving enemy cards as well. Same concept applies to ziran, you don’t see people complaining about how her BBS is weak. It’s not, it’s the support cards being lackluster.

Just got to wait what does CPG has in store for them in the next expansion. Shimzar helped a bit but wasn’t nearly as enough and I hope said results will give them enough incentive to not hold back as much when helping those underrepresented generals.

[eternamemoria]

Winterblade IMO. It has a great lore, looks scary, belongs to a scary looking General… and has a completely negligible effect. If it also had: “Your general takes no damage from counter-attacks”, I could see it being run much more yet not getting too out of hand, as it is not like Vanar had one-(wo)man-army potential.

[karsticles]

It’s your bias, not mine.

[destroy666]

Definitely Starhorn since it’s a general nearly unplayable in Gauntlet due to the nature of his BBS. Even if you draft a perfect aggro deck, there will still be even faster Faies which your BBS also fuels. Just look at the duelysthub stats - noone even bothers picking him and people that do end up losing terribly. So while you can take advantage of his BBS and buff it with new cards, it will still be terrible in the 2nd mode. Similar thing applies to Cass, except that she’s top tier in constructed and doesn’t need a buff, rather rarity balacing. CP really needs to start thinking about assigning rarities when it to comes to Gauntlet and realizing that one common threat (Abyssal Juggernaut) that synergizes with BBS isn’t enough, otherwise it’ll end up with card bans like HS did.

Then there are ranged battle pets - why their behavior hasn’t been changed yet? Noone except CP knows. Ofc making them smarter won’t make them playable since Battle Pets are terrible and the only 3 I still see played regularly are Pax, Ooz and perhaps Gro, but at least they’ll be pickable in Gauntlet.

There are many other cards that don’t make much sense - Sand Burrower, Flaming Stampede, Winterblade, Aerial Rift, Koan of Horns, Fountain of Youth, Echoing Shriek, Dark Seed, Mesmerize, Wind Stopper, etc. Also underpowered (no/low value most of the time) ones - Truestrike, Artifact Defiler, Mask of Shadows, Polarity, Prophet of the White Palm, Bastion, Soboro, Artifact Hunter, Tethermancer, Firestarter and so on or slow ones that will probably wait endlessly for a meta slowdown, mainly 7+ mana minions.

[karsticles]

Reposting from last month since my votes stayed the same:
I think that expensive legendary cards ought to
be faction-defining cards that have a huge impact on the game. Storm
Kage almost never has this effect. Today I played 15 matches with a
deck entirely designed to make Storm Kage work…and he was redundant. I
replaced Storm Kage with Bloodrage Mask, and the deck was better in
every way. He offers absolutely nothing to Songhai because:

1. He is
   a 7-mana minion. This just is not something Songhai does. Even
   Grandmaster Zendo, a card that would be played heavily in any other
   faction, is rarely used in Songhai. The faction aims to use high
   utility minions combined with spells to control the board. A big bulky
   cannon doesn’t fit the faction.

2. Kage Lightning is largely pointless in a large number of matchups.
   Songhai does not need more nukes to kill minions - it doesn’t win by
   clearing the board. It wins by clearing the enemy general (har har).

3. Kage Lightning’s animation needs a rework.

Storm Kage is my favorite card in Duelyst - thematically. I love
value minions, and I love burn. If a Storm Kage deck were viable, it
would be the only thing I ever played in this game. To make Storm Kage
viable, I think he should be reworked to something like:
5 mana.
4/5
Whenever a spell you cast deals damage, add a Kage Lightning to your hand.

Kage Lightning:
2 mana
Deal 1 damage to any enemy.

So it’s mana-inefficient, but massive value.

Alternatively, Storm Kage could add a Kage Lightning to your hand at the end of every turn.

My other votes:
I voted for Ace because he is objectively one of
the worst cards in the game. In an entire expansion based on Battle
Pets, it’s flat-out anger-inducing that Songhai doesn’t even have two
good pets. Xho is already questionable in value, but Ace is just
horrendous. They could simply make Ace immobile (he’s a turtle…moves
slow!) and it would be an improvement to a card. Is there any other
card that you can legitimately say that? Removing movement as an option
is a buff? I would love to get a viable Ace. If he can’t be ranged,
then make him melee - just make him usable.

Mesmerize:
This card is almost amazing. Make it amazing so Faie has something more than Hearth Sister to combo with in-faction.

If I had a fourth vote, I would vote Starhorn - he is a special kind
of terrible, and as a general, that deserves special attention. He can
only be viable by Counterplay Games shoehorning him in through cards
designed solely to benefit from him drawing excess cards, and it will
never go well.

If I had a fifth vote, it would be Mogwai, just because I really want
him to draw cards from spells that move him. He would be a great boon
to Backstabhai and what some are calling Movehai. He’s almost a great
card, and even as a great card he wouldn’t be too good. He would just
be another card draw option, and this game really does need more of
those.

[ezekeel]

I voted for Starhorn, Truestrike and Phalanxar.

Starhorn’s BBS is just rubbish except for extremely specialized gimmick decks.

Truestrike and Phalanxar are basic cards new players have to rely on when building their decks and they are both terrible and considering how important the new player experience is for the long term survival of any game these should be a priority over obscure legendaries.

Phalanxar is the worst basic faction 2-drop in the game and as a new player makes it really hard to build a Magmar deck with enough decent 2-drops, especially now that Shroud is nerfed.

Truestrike is one of the only basic Lyonar removal tools (the other being Martyrdom which also sucks and should be in that poll IMO) and it does too little compared to other basic 2-mana removals like Phoenix Fire and Chromatic Cold and also Lyonar’s own Lasting Judgement.

[excogitator]

More heals and Small minion removal.

Right now, cards that are good against Aggro are not bad per say, but are extraordinarily weak compared to the aggro cards themselves and cards that punish big minions.

Cards like Plasma Storm, Stars Fury, Breath of the Unborn and Emerald Rejuvinator, while not useless like some of the above listed cards, do little to counter aggro and are underpowered compared to the cards that they are supposed to fight against.

The small minion removal and heals that Counterplay does introduce are mediocre at best. Echoing Shriek failed spectacularly and Azure herald was not nearly enough. Powerful anti-aggro cards like Keliano and… Keliano are the exception rather than the rule while powerful aggro cards abound.

I chose Echoing Shriek not for what it does, but what counterplay wanted to do by printing it; provide a viable counter for aggressive minions.

[ballbagg]

Pantheran should really have been added to this list. It’s an unusable card with really nice artwork which is a shame. It sees play less than MANY cards on this list.

The number of people who actually play this card must be astronomically small. I’ve not seen it once, which is on par with only 4 other cards in this list (Oserix, winterblade, Crusader & Ace)

[orthoceras]

I’ll give my motivations for each pick:

• Zir’An: The BBS is fine in my opinion, what this General lacks is a strong proactive play that can’t be abused in a better way by her counterpart Argeon.
  Obliterate, Spectral Revenant, Spiral Technique, Elucidator+Thumping Wave, Makantor Warbeast, Bounded Lifeforce, Saberspine + Argeon’s BBS + Holy Immo, Saberspine + Wailing Overdrive, Mechaz0r + Spirit of the Wild; those are all highly proactive cards or two cards combos that can end or turn a game around on the same turn they are played.
  Zir’An currently lacks a powerplay on par with those others.

• Mogwai: Currently the weaker of the other four 3 mana card draw neutrals. Sojourner has a strictly better body, Blazehound has an immediate effect, and Spelljammer has both of them at the same time. The effect only procs if the minion itself moves, and not when it is teleported by spells or minion effects, a shame given that synergy with Kaleos BBS or any other positioning effects could have been a thing.

• Truestrike: A card that’s currently keeping hostage two cards at once: Sun Sister Sterope and itself. It’s a worse Phoenix Fire without any in-faction spell power synergy, the possibility of targeting the enemy General’s face or even removing a good vanilla 2 drop, and the fact that it doesn’t cantrip while others 1 mana spells like First Wish or Sphere of Darkness do does not help.

[maelrawn]

Not having seen something != it doesn’t get used.

As for Pantheran, there were some people using him in a list posted on these forums like a week or two ago, and having success. You have to keep in mind that even though something might be good, it can also just not get used because it’s alternative to the mainstream archetypes for a given faction. Pantheran exemplifies this because not only does he cost 1050 dust for a playset, you also need 2700 dust’ worth of cards just to enable that one other card in your deck, on top of being in a deck that doesn’t work the way most vet decks do, a leap of faith I don’t think anyone except very longtime players would be willing to make.

This game has a smaller community than similar games, as far as I can tell, and there is undoubtedly a whole load of as-yet uncreated archetypes that will remain so until someone has the disposable crafting materials and idea to experiment with them.

My vote went to, first and foremost, Astral; “card that is good if you don’t play it” doesn’t really work or make much sense. Maybe the buff could apply to all of the Astral Crusaders in your deck? I think that’d be awesome, simple enough (in a player-understanding sort of way), and solidify replace as a tier 2-1.5 deck.

Winterblade is just plain bad the way it is, (not killing something and wasting an artifact charge on it is pretty poor and likely disastrous for your life total), and Artifact Defiler is too situational to include, ever.