The Wargamer, The Deck Builder, & The Role Player

[RandomCasualty]

Split off from the Wargaming Thread into its own thread.

1125533494[/unixtime]]
It basically reaches a point where people are basically telling me 'don't cast silent image and glitterdust anymore and cast fireball and lightning bolt' and that's just sad. Damn sad. Such a disgusting lack of effort.

Well, I wouldn't necessarily say lack of effort, just a different play style.

There are three basic play styles:

The wargamer: This guy just likes good tactical battles, believing combat should be like a game of chess where each side tries to outwit the other. The wargamer more than anyone tends to want a balanced game, because it gives him more to think about and increases the strategic depth of combat. Wargamers also tend to be the first people to actually pick out imbalances.

The Roleplayer: This guy just wants a quick dirty combat resolution and wants to think about roleplaying his character and advancing the storyline. The more minimalist the combat, the better. The roleplayer isn't all that interested in a combat system in the first place.

The deck builder: This guy is all about combos and character building. Most of the deck builders work happens before he steps into the game, and he's the primary creator of power builds and crazy theoretical loopholes and combos. When game time comes, all his decisions are made for him and he just cuts loose. Unlike the wargamer who constantly tries to adapt to his foe's strategy, the deck builder is usually a one trick pony who could care less what he's against. He releases his caster level 200 holy word or million damage supercombo and tears through the enemy. The deck builder is generally oblivious to imbalance since it seems like a natural part of his game. In a balanced game, the deck builder feels alienated and lost.

Right now, D&D caters the most towards the deck builder, which is actually a shame, because deck building is probably the thing I least enjoy about D&D.

[power_word_wedgie]

I see what you ae saying. However, the way I would break it down, I think that gaming companies are thinking:

Wargamer: Dedicate products like DDM, Warhammer, or MageKnight to this.

Roleplayer: Really hard to dedicate a game to that. After all, you could just play the Holmes version of D&D Basic (hey baby, it only has fifty pages to remember for the mechanics) and keep your headaches to a minimum.

Deck-Builder: Yeah, I guess that it what skills and feats are all about. That's why I always though it would be interesting to make all of the skills and feats a roll-based assignment. After all, much of life is chance, and it would cut down on the deck building.

[PhoneLobster]

That's why I always though it would be interesting to make all of the skills and feats a roll-based assignment.

AAAAH!

Have you ever seen the old edition of the Warhammer fantasy RPG.

Roll for race roll for starting class...

Hey look, Jeff rolled an apprentice wizard, he has nifty rare tough skills and is on his path to some kick ass advanced classes, sure he has to "complete" his apprentice skills first but it will be worth it!

Oh look Joe rolled a warrior dude, all his skills will see heavy use and advance quickly, he will be into some advanced fighting classes in like no time.

But poor old Donald, he rolled a boatman. His class shtick is that he owns a row boat parked in a nearby waterway. His skills, which he must complete before he can advance are all useless and won't be easily advanced because of the advance by using mechanics. And the best advanced class he is ever going to hope to qualify for is pirate, which is basically worse than the classes Joe and Jeff started with.

Yeah. Lets all roll for our feats and skills in a system where you have skills like balance going head to head with bluff and feats like improved trip going up against weapon focus.

As to random casualty's post let me propose another group of gamer.

Basket Weaver: These guys endlessly post lists of "there are three main types of gamer" thing where they falsely divide all gamers into arbitrary groups. They almost invariably manage to title one group "roleplayer" as part of an ongoing campaign to discredit everyone and anyone other than those that fall into their definition of that sub group, which almost always seems to revolve around a false pretence of superiority through disdain for actual adventure and heroics. Other groups are always labelled as cheats, or people foolishly playing some other kind of game (like magic, or warhammer, or street fighter), and usually are implied to be blood thirsty and combat/treasure obsessed.

This group has been kind enough to bring us such totally ridiculous and useless labels such as... the Munchkin, the min maxer, the power gamer, gamist, simulationist, and now the Wargamer and the Deck Builder.

These labels do not help. I know as people interested in role playing rules many of us have this deeply programmed desire to divide everything into convenient RPG like categories with catchy RPG type labels.

But remember, somewhere at some point RPG rules end and real life begins.

Even if the three categories as described weren't blatantly false on their face gamers would not be so easily divided into groups.

[Draco_Argentum]

1125556715[/unixtime]]
Basket Weaver: These guys endlessly post lists of "there are three main types of gamer" thing where they falsely divide all gamers into arbitrary groups.

Fear the burn!

[dbb]

I remember the last Warhammer (old edition) game I played in. It rocked.

I played a human laborer -- one of the most useless classes you could possibly roll (you got the Scale Sheer Surface skill for free, but only had a 75% chance of getting Consume Alcohol or Sing -- woo!), and the rest of the party consisted of an elven woodsman and an elven smuggler. Our total combined combat ability could have been fit into a matchbox with room left over for the matches. Tactics usually consisted of pushing the laborer out in front to hope he had enough Toughness and Wounds to last until one of the elves successfully hit someone.

Marvelous game. I don't know that I'd recommend it as someone's introductory roleplaying experience, but that kind of game can actually be a lot of fun with the right attitude (and the right people).

--d.

[RandomCasualty]

1125545774[/unixtime]]
Deck-Builder: Yeah, I guess that it what skills and feats are all about. That's why I always though it would be interesting to make all of the skills and feats a roll-based assignment. After all, much of life is chance, and it would cut down on the deck building.

I don't think random chance is all that great of a solution. It ends up basically making roleplayers and deckbuilders unhappy and isn't even guaranteed to please the wargamer. All random generation tends to do is increase PC suicide rates. Just like in those old computer games where stats were rolled, people just keep creating characters until they get something they want.

The idea shouldn't necessarily be to eliminate deck building from RPGs, but rather to limit its significance. The idea shouldn't be that we have to prevent people from creating build X, it should just be that build X doesn't automatically overpower build Y.

Killer builds are all about combos and combos are all about synergy. Take away buff synergy and the cleric archer doesn't look so hot anymore for instance. Take away synergies with charge multipliers and the charge builds don't own everyone anymore. And that's all you really have to do.

[Zherog]

1125421215[/unixtime]]
- Min-maxing is also necessary if you want to play a non-primary caster above, say, level 6 or so.

I couldn't disagree with this statement more if you tried.

The use of (or lack of) a player in any given game depends on a lot of things, and the rules are just one of them. In particular it depends on the other players and the DM. The DM can (and should) make challenges appropriate to his group. For example, the group I DM consists of a 9th level Marshal, a 9th level ranger, a 5 wizard/4 rogue, and a 5 cleric/3 rogue. The Marshal has a cohort who's a 7th level swashbuckler, and the group has a 5 bard/2 fighter NPC that follows them around.

Overall, the group is poorly min/maxxed. I fail to see why that's a problem, though. And I fail to see how a non-caster in this group would "fail." As DM, I cater to them, and I'm OK with that.

[Absentminded_Wizard]

Basket Weaver: These guys endlessly post lists of "there are three main types of gamer" thing where they falsely divide all gamers into arbitrary groups. They almost invariably manage to title one group "roleplayer" as part of an ongoing campaign to discredit everyone and anyone other than those that fall into their definition of that sub group, which almost always seems to revolve around a false pretence of superiority through disdain for actual adventure and heroics. Other groups are always labelled as cheats, or people foolishly playing some other kind of game (like magic, or warhammer, or street fighter), and usually are implied to be blood thirsty and combat/treasure obsessed.

Actually, I don't think that's what RC was doing. His other posts on this board lead me to believe he actually sympathizes with the Wargamer more than the Roleplayer. You are right about one thing, though. The division of all gamers into three groups ignores the fact that an individual player might have elements of two or even all three types.

[erik]

1125606111[/unixtime]]
Take away synergies with charge multipliers and the charge builds don't own everyone anymore. And that's all you really have to do.

But chargers are teh 133t! Feh. I'm feeling a little bit dirty playing a charger, and if I pick up power attack at 5th level I'll go from danged good (3d6+21 dmg) to unfair (3d6+51 dmg). That's making me seriously consider just focusing on making my mount more than just transportation (beastmaster/halfling outrider). I could just only use power attack a little bit, but there is a fair temptation to try and crit for 100 damage at level 5, just to say I dun it. It would amuse me then to try playing up to level 10 or 12 mods, but my defense has been totally sacraficed for offense and that could be a little fatal.

As for the pity-kills and holding back. One example I'm thinking of is when I was in a battle with a BBEG, I could have either A) pulled back and charged the next turn for a boat load of damage, or B) stayed and done 2/3 the damage and allow the guy with a rogue level to flank and get his sneak on for one round. Nobody resented me for letting someone else be meaningfully involved in the combat. If you do it right, people won't resent you not trotting out old glory every time. Not going all-out doesn't equate with sitting on your thumbs.

[power_word_wedgie]

1125556715[/unixtime]]

That's why I always though it would be interesting to make all of the skills and feats a roll-based assignment.

AAAAH!

Have you ever seen the old edition of the Warhammer fantasy RPG.

Roll for race roll for starting class...

Hey look, Jeff rolled an apprentice wizard, he has nifty rare tough skills and is on his path to some kick ass advanced classes, sure he has to "complete" his apprentice skills first but it will be worth it!

Oh look Joe rolled a warrior dude, all his skills will see heavy use and advance quickly, he will be into some advanced fighting classes in like no time.

But poor old Donald, he rolled a boatman. His class shtick is that he owns a row boat parked in a nearby waterway. His skills, which he must complete before he can advance are all useless and won't be easily advanced because of the advance by using mechanics. And the best advanced class he is ever going to hope to qualify for is pirate, which is basically worse than the classes Joe and Jeff started with.

Yeah. Lets all roll for our feats and skills in a system where you have skills like balance going head to head with bluff and feats like improved trip going up against weapon focus.

Well, keep in mind that the focus of the thread is what can be done to avoid the repetitive min-maxer. No, I would agree that randomizing all the way to race and class would be going to an extreme. However, I would be good to offer the option to randomize feats and skills. (or at least some skills) Now, am I saying absolute randomness to the point where fighters coll roll "Combat Casting" and wizards rolling "Great Cleave?" Heck no. In fact, it might be nice to organize the skills to attribute modifiers and roll randomly from there. (ie the character selects that they want a charisma-modifier feat and rolls to see what feat they get) Keep in mind part of the point of "using randomness and getting balance and weapon focus" is to offer an option that gets away from the MtG synergies.

Should this eventually override everything and get into the core rules? No. Show it be an option in a future book like "Unearthed Arcana?" I think so.

As to random casualty's post let me propose another group of gamer.

Basket Weaver: These guys endlessly post lists of "there are three main types of gamer" thing where they falsely divide all gamers into arbitrary groups. They almost invariably manage to title one group "roleplayer" as part of an ongoing campaign to discredit everyone and anyone other than those that fall into their definition of that sub group, which almost always seems to revolve around a false pretence of superiority through disdain for actual adventure and heroics. Other groups are always labelled as cheats, or people foolishly playing some other kind of game (like magic, or warhammer, or street fighter), and usually are implied to be blood thirsty and combat/treasure obsessed.

This group has been kind enough to bring us such totally ridiculous and useless labels such as... the Munchkin, the min maxer, the power gamer, gamist, simulationist, and now the Wargamer and the Deck Builder.

These labels do not help. I know as people interested in role playing rules many of us have this deeply programmed desire to divide everything into convenient RPG like categories with catchy RPG type labels.

But remember, somewhere at some point RPG rules end and real life begins.

Even if the three categories as described weren't blatantly false on their face gamers would not be so easily divided into groups.

Well, I think RC would agree with you. However, to get a point across a message board, you accentuate the points to make sure the point is clear. I don't think anyone thinks that there is a "pure roleplaying" or "pure min-maxing." However, I can tell the gaming sessions where one style is dominant over another.

[PhoneLobster]

The division of all gamers into three groups ignores the fact that an individual player might have elements of two or even all three types.

It also ignores the fact that each one of the categories he described is complete hooey.

1) Wargamers
Seriously if all you're interested in the game is the wargaming aspect, then why the hell are you playing a RPG? These people not only should go play a wargame instead, they DO. I've seen them, with my own two eyes. People interested only in wargames don't actually continue to play RPGs. Flat out simple. If they keep playing its because RPGs offer something completely different that they also want, like the role play bit. So this category is ludicrous its the "category of RP gamers who uh, aren't".

2) Role Players
Seriously defined by claiming role players are a bunch of combat snobs obsessed with story line. A) Combat IS role play. B) Combat advances the story line C) the idea that role play shuns combat (and that is essentially its only definition) is old news, stupidly stereotyped and out right slander.

3) The Deck Builder
Firstly the same goes for this as wargamer. If its nothing but the deck such a category of gamers WILL go and play Magic instead. But in addition hey look, some really broad obviously false statements like...

A) "When game time comes, all his decisions are made for him and he just cuts loose."
there is no basis for this and it helps discussion not one jot.

B) "Unlike the wargamer who constantly tries to adapt to his foe's strategy, the deck builder is usually a one trick pony who could care less what he's against."
Adapting strategy is in no way inherint or counter to any of the three view points described. "Deck building" does not exclusively create one trick ponies. One trick ponies are the characters most likely to care what they are up against.

C) "The deck builder is generally oblivious to imbalance since it seems like a natural part of his game."
Ah now what precisely about being a person interested in creating complex build strategies in anyway makes you like imbalance? You DO realise that games like Magic and such where "deck building" is such a big thing have wide swathes of banned cards and special tournament rules designed in an attempt to produce balance, because thats what deck builders want. Deck building is NOT about exploiting game breaking loopholes, because as any deck builder knows those things, BREAK THE GAME.

D) "In a balanced game, the deck builder feels alienated and lost."
No, the only people who feel alienated in a balanced game are either sadists or masochists.

The categories RC described are utterly typical of the basket weaver. The purist Role Player is right there with their usually "I'm better than rules and combat" attitude, which has little to do with good role playing at all. And the other categories are labelled as other types of gamer who don't really belong in role playing games. And as is typically at least one other category, in this case the deck builder (RC's obvious code for min maxer, which is a dumb enough label in and of itself anyway) manages to fit in slurs accusing them of loving imbalance and game breaking power loopholes.

I don't know how many times I will have to repeat some variation on my old "Munchkins do not exist" rant. But really. If someone likes the game, even part of it, then they do not like to break the game.

And if you are going to divide gamers into categories there are only two, good gamers and bad gamers. And the bad ones are just as likely to use ridiculous claims about "advancing the story" and purist role play to break the game and ruin everyone elses experience as they are to use the rules to achieve the same ends.

[Draco_Argentum]

But mostly the reference to a caster level 200 holy word isn't exactly subtle.

[RandomCasualty]

1125633049[/unixtime]] Deck building is NOT about exploiting game breaking loopholes, because as any deck builder knows those things, BREAK THE GAME.

FOr the most part, it is. Yes, if a certain card gets banned, the deck builder won't use it anymore, because he can't. So it's not as if every deck builder will up and quit if their DM bans shapechange or the thought bottle. But everything that is allowed is a valid "card" and the deck builder will use them to the best of his ability to create a power build.

Imbalance generally isn't a concern of the deck builder because deck builders are worried about min/maxing themselves, not game design. A deck builder will acknowledge that karmic strike is a better feat than toughness, just like he will acknowledge that black lotus is a better magic card than Holy Strength. BUt this doesn't create a huge problem in the mind of the deck builder. Unlike the wargamer, he's not going to go on a huge tirade about how over or underpowered something is. If it's underpowered, the deckbuilder just doesn't use it and if it's overpowered, you bet it finds a place in his latest build.

D) "In a balanced game, the deck builder feels alienated and lost."
No, the only people who feel alienated in a balanced game are either sadists or masochists.

You make this out to be a lot worse than it is, but it is fundamentally true. If all cards in magic the gathering were balanced and equal, then it really doesn't matter what cards you choose and the deck builder will feel out of place, just like he will in a chess game, where the peices he starts with are predetermined.

Certain games just don't favor the deck builder, because they don't cater to his style.

And this is true of all the types. A game of pure luck with no choices or strategy alienates the wargamer, and a game without roleplaying alienates the roleplayer.

The purist Role Player is right there with their usually "I'm better than rules and combat" attitude, which has little to do with good role playing at all. And the other categories are labelled as other types of gamer who don't really belong in role playing games.

In no way am I saying the "roleplayer" is better than any of the three. I'm just talking about individual styles of play. And some people can fit into multiple categories. You can be both a deck builder, a wargamer and a roleplayer.

Deck building and wargaming are still parts of an RPG, especially computer RPGs. Diablo II for instance offers nothing to the wargamer or the roleplayer and is almost exclusively a deck builder RPG. D&D tries to cater to all three categories of players in one manner or another. In fact, almost every D&D player is some part deck builder, some part roleplayer and some part wargamer. With D&D players, no category is likely to be absolute.

Though overall, I think each player has his own priority as to which of those is most important, which is why I bring up the categories in the first place. And I do firmly believe everyone has a dominant category as far as those three go. It doesn't mean that wargamer dominant people don't roleplay, it's just that they tend to prioritize strategy and game balance pretty high.

And as far as I go, I would definitely say I am a wargamer dominant gaming personality.

And as is typically at least one other category, in this case the deck builder (RC's obvious code for min maxer, which is a dumb enough label in and of itself anyway) manages to fit in slurs accusing them of loving imbalance and game breaking power loopholes.

I don't know how many times I will have to repeat some variation on my old "Munchkins do not exist" rant. But really. If someone likes the game, even part of it, then they do not like to break the game.

The deck builder doesn't view what they do as breaking the game, anymore than the guy who developed a killer magic deck to win a tournament thinks he broke magic. Deck builders simply don't see the concept of "breaking the game". To them the game doesn't break, it just adapts. When some guy shows up for the magic tournament with a killer Yawgmoth's Bargain deck, they don't go whining to the judges about how it's broken and destroys the game, they instead try to form their own deck to counter it. Deck builders never consider changing the system.

And you talk to these people all the time online. It's a pretty common attitude. You'll say something like "Quill blast is broken!" And they'll respond "No it's not, the enemy can use it too!". And this is the primary deck builder attitude. According to them nothing is broken. And it's not that they're unreasonable people, it's that they see the game from a totally different perspective.

[PhoneLobster]

What the heck do you mean they don't "see" the concept of breaking the game. Sit down with some actual gamers who play games where they literally builder decks, just once in your life, they'll tell you all about various game breaking cards or rules and why they are bad.

Have you EVER built a deck in your life, because you're looking pretty ignorant about the strategy, motivation and community of deck building gamers from here. And I'm hardly an expert or anything.

Have you played these kinds of games? A good deck is a "balanced" deck, one capable of countering a VARIETY of potential strategies and producing a win through at least one or more strategies of its own.

When a card of combo permits you to build a deck that is an automatic win regardless of the situation its not a "killer magic deck" its something that the players of these games HATE and which is promptly banned, house ruled etc...

You make out its some outside force impossing tournament rules and card banning on these kinds of players because by your entirely fantastical description of these gamers they would never do it themselves. But its not an outside force, and when there isn't one in these kinds of games then the gamers house rule game breaking cards and strategies out of the game BY THEMSELVES.

In no way am I saying the "roleplayer" is better than any of the three. I'm just talking about individual styles of play. And some people can fit into multiple categories. You can be both a deck builder, a wargamer and a roleplayer.

Whatever you may claim to be or be advocating your statements CLEARLY help to continue the myth that real role playing is anathema to rules, strategy, character building and combat, and simulataneously labels other aspects of role playing as, oddly, not role playing.

And your remarks about "deck builders" are basically the same pile of trash talk thrown about in the past under the label of the ever over hyped role playing equivalent of reds under the bed that is the munchkin.

I'm telling you its slander because it is, you are taking a vaguely defined group of gamers, labelling them and then declaring them all to be a bunch of imballance loving loonies who just can't help themselves. With precisely what basis? Why, pure fantasy of course (you sure you aren't a purist role player?)

That is bad. Get it already.

[Alansmithee]

I have to agree completely with PhoneLobster. Anyone who has played any card game competitively knows just how much players want balance. It is usually players who call for bannings/errata/restrictions far before any official body does for particular cards. They probably complain about balance MORE than D+D players because they lack the failsafe of a DM to say "nope, that's not gonna happen" when something broken arises. All I see this "deck builder" classification as is some backhanded attempt at labelling certain people powergamers without having the balls to acutally come out and accuse them of it. Especially since it has nothing to do with actuall CCG deck builders and how they opperate.

[Basorexic]

Min/maxing=> "I feel like playing M:tG. I'm going to make a deck! Let's see... this card is good, and this one balances that one just in case I play against a white deck.. and these two cards go really well together... And if I can get these two cards out at the same time, I'll be able to pull off a very powerful, yet unexpected maneuver..."

Not min/maxing=> "I feel like playing M:tG. I'm going to make a deck! Let's see... this card is cool... and so is this one even though it does almost the same thing as that first card... and I really like the art on these three...and I'll throw in these twenty randomly..."

[RandomCasualty]

1125657098[/unixtime]]What the heck do you mean they don't "see" the concept of breaking the game. Sit down with some actual gamers who play games where they literally builder decks, just once in your life, they'll tell you all about various game breaking cards or rules and why they are bad.

It takes a really broken card to get the attention of a deck builder and you bet the deck builder himself is going to use that broken card until it's banned. What causes the deck builder to complain is something the opponent is using, not something in general. It's likely a deck builder won't look over the new set of cards and start complaining right away, he won't start whining about it until it's used against him and he gets killed.

Have you played these kinds of games? A good deck is a "balanced" deck, one capable of countering a VARIETY of potential strategies and producing a win through at least one or more strategies of its own.

I've played magic the gathering and I can certainly say that aside from blue control decks, "good" decks aren't about countering anything, they're about killer combos. Take the Yawgmoth's bargain deck for instance. That's all about setting up an infinite card drawing loop with drain life, scourge familiar and Yawgmoth's bargain. Then there's the typical "green rush" deck, which constitutes a bunch of fast mana and beat down creatures that hit the opponent fast. There's the red land destruction theme which just straight out cripples an opponent by destroying his mana supply. And so on. But in all cases, almost all the cards making up a given deck are there to work towards some kind of power synergy combo.

Most of the time in high level tournaments, especially type I tournaments, very little effort is spent countering the other person (again unless you're playing blue). The fact is that tournament decks play a lot like D&D power high level power builds. They have their super combo and they play out until they set it up and then hit you with a knockout punch.

When a card of combo permits you to build a deck that is an automatic win regardless of the situation its not a "killer magic deck" its something that the players of these games HATE and which is promptly banned, house ruled etc...

In casual games, sure they are hated. And the same thing happens in D&D with power builds. If there's one thing about extreme deckbuilding it's that it can actually drain the fun out of a game fast. I've played Yawgmoth bargain decks, super blue control decks and a few other big tournament decks. And let me tell you, they're no fun to play against at all. You hardly really get to do anything before you're either locked down completely, dead or just waiting to die.

And I generally feel the same way about extreme deckbuilding in D&D. It's just not fun to play with super characters and overall, it ruins the game experience. While it might be fun to walk in there and wipe out the final battle singlehandedly in one round with a crazy nuke attack. The DM won't be very pleased nor will your fellow players.

You make out its some outside force impossing tournament rules and card banning on these kinds of players because by your entirely fantastical description of these gamers they would never do it themselves. But its not an outside force, and when there isn't one in these kinds of games then the gamers house rule game breaking cards and strategies out of the game BY THEMSELVES.

I've rarely actualyl seen a house ruled game of magic. More or less "house rules" involve people saying "I'm not playing that deck." And that's what really did happen against the power decks. People would bring them to a casual game, a few people would play them once and finally their deck got boycotted because it wasn't fun to play. So they either had to take their ball and go home or bring a deck that people would agree to play.

I'm telling you its slander because it is, you are taking a vaguely defined group of gamers, labelling them and then declaring them all to be a bunch of imballance loving loonies who just can't help themselves. With precisely what basis? Why, pure fantasy of course (you sure you aren't a purist role player?)

Not loonies. It's just a different attitude towards game balance.

And yes I'm sure I'm not a purist roleplayer. A purist roleplayer wouldn't be talking about game rules on a message board. Purist roleplayers aren't really even interested in rules all that much and would consider rules debates to be a waste of everyone's time.

[Neeek]

1125694884[/unixtime]]
It takes a really broken card to get the attention of a deck builder and you bet the deck builder himself is going to use that broken card until it's banned. What causes the deck builder to complain is something the opponent is using, not something in general. It's likely a deck builder won't look over the new set of cards and start complaining right away, he won't start whining about it until it's used against him and he gets killed.

See, you are just plain wrong. People complain about cards being completely broken often before a set is released(an example of this would be Fact or Fiction) or as soon as it shows itself to be truly ridiculous, if the card wasn't obviously broken from the outset(an example of this would be Skullclamp).

I've played magic the gathering and I can certainly say that aside from blue control decks, "good" decks aren't about countering anything, they're about killer combos. Take the Yawgmoth's bargain deck for instance.

I'd like to point out that the person responsible for designing the "best" version of the Bargain deck made sure that the deck was banned in a format before it was legal.

Also, there are roughly 5 different types of effective decks. Aggro, Aggro-control, Combo, combo-control and control are all viable strategies, depending on the sets current in use.

Most of the time in high level tournaments, especially type I tournaments, very little effort is spent countering the other person (again unless you're playing blue). The fact is that tournament decks play a lot like D&D power high level power builds. They have their super combo and they play out until they set it up and then hit you with a knockout punch.

First of all, if you are going say "high level tournaments" and "type I tournaments" at the same time, you are going to look very stupid. There hasn't been a high level type I tournament in about 9 years now. The last one was a side event at PT Dallas 1996.

Second, most tournament quality decks aren't combo. Some are, but they certainly don't dominate the way you are implying unless there are broken cards in the format, and when that happens, people call for bannings. In type I specifically, there are about 7 decks that are considered top tier, and only 2 of those are consider pure "combo".

[Username17]

Yeah, I haven't played M:tG seriously in a long time, but I did invent Creature Rush, and I can tell you that people demanding bannings and card improvements and other rebalancing is a constant din so loud that you can't hear yourself chew if you pay any attention at all to competitive environments. It's the same in Warhammer, Starcraft, or any other game that has multiple available starting positions, is played competitively, and has no Game Master controls.

In fact, the only multiple position game style that doesn't have its conversation virtually drowned out by people demanding various rebalancing to those positions is the RPG. In RPG discussions, people frequently shut out discussion of game unfairness with the argument ender that there's a damned Referee and it's played for fun so you should just let him do whatever he wants and everything will work out fine. You would never get anywhere in a Shadowfist or Warmachine discussion saying something like that. People would seriously lynch you.

Noone wants to be beaten by an "unfair" advantage, so the clarion call for game balance is loud by any standard in any competitive environment. If Black gets a Hypnotic Spectre that doesn't have a card cost (that is, you draw a card when you play it), if the Tau get a power armor set that outfights terminators for the price, if the Zerg get a speed increase in their resource gathering, if the Dragon get a Golden Comeback with a different name, people complain. A lot.

But if a Magician gets the option to split their available spirits into two entirely different directions (thereby gaining a massive utility powerup), or Clerics get a spell that is better than Acid Fog at 4th level, noone cares enough to raise a big stink. At least, not comparatively.

That's because RPG players have all bought the Oberoni Fallacy, and gamers from other traditions haven't. That's right, even Oberoni on some level accepts the fallacy that has his name on it. Sure, he'll insist that workarounds for bad rules be made and used in his presence - but you don't see him calling Andy Collins at home demanding that the bad rules be officially errataed out of existence. But you do see Shadowfist players calling up Zev at home and demanding changes to the official cards.

Don't sell wargames and cardgames short. In many ways, they are decades ahead of RPG players in assertiveness and coherence when it comes to their understanding of rulessets. RPG players, all RPG players, have still not evolved past all of the impediments left by Gygax.

-Username17

[Murtak]

It takes a really broken card to get the attention of a deck builder and you bet the deck builder himself is going to use that broken card until it's banned.

Some do, yes. Mostly because, unlike in RPGs, you can't just agree to not use the broken stuff.


On deckbuilding:
I have played both M:TG and L5R successfully in tournaments. I enjoy building decks. The deck I won the German championship with, the deck I played at GenCon and each and every deck I played to a tournament all have one thing in common: they are not combo decks.

Sure, I pick cards that work well together. That much is common sense - I want to win after all. I also pick cards because I like the art (as long as they are not too bad that is). I have won a tournament with a deck built entirely to influence the storyline.

Oh, and I also enjoy playing Battletech and have dabbled in a few other tabletop wargames.



So, what the heck am I? I like building decks, I don't like combo decks, I enjoy a good story, I enjoy fluff, I enjoy wargames. That does not seem possible according to your categories.

What causes the deck builder to complain is something the opponent is using, not something in general. It's likely a deck builder won't look over the new set of cards and start complaining right away, he won't start whining about it until it's used against him and he gets killed.

Flat out wrong. Feel free to check out any L5R forum that has a subforum for previews of new expansions. Notice how again and again especially powerful cards are complained about. Heck, I can think offhand of a couple of occurences where gamebreaking rule loopholes that could easily have been used to win tournaments where instead pointed out to the designers to get them fixed before the cards arrive in stores.

I've played magic the gathering and I can certainly say that aside from blue control decks, "good" decks aren't about countering anything, they're about killer combos. Take the Yawgmoth's bargain deck for instance. That's all about setting up an infinite card drawing loop with drain life, scourge familiar and Yawgmoth's bargain. Then there's the typical "green rush" deck, which constitutes a bunch of fast mana and beat down creatures that hit the opponent fast.

Whoa, wait a second. No, make that an hour. "Fast beatdown" is a combo deck now? What exactly is comboing with what? Maybe the current beatdown decks differ from the decks I used to know, but from what you state you are confusing a focused deck with a combo deck.

The fact is that tournament decks play a lot like D&D power high level power builds. They have their super combo and they play out until they set it up and then hit you with a knockout punch.

From back when I played M:TG:
- blue time control has no combo to set up, it just delays and whittles the opponent down
- red speed/burn has no combo at all, just raw speed
- sligh has no combo parts at all, just raw efficiency
- 5 color green has no combo parts, though it does have synergy here and there.
-4/ 5 color black has no synergy at all, much less a combo.
- Necropotence (one of the most dominant decks ever) has no central combo.


currently viable L5R decks (note that due to the sheer amount of printed abilities on each and every card every deck will have little combos built in - it is close to unavoidable):
- Crab Waterzerker - a basic beatdown deck, with the possibility of comboing for multiple provinces quite early.
- Crab Yumasu - half combo deck, half straight military
- Crane holding destruction - no notable combos
- Crane harriers - no notable combos
- Crane Dueling - no notable combos
- Crane Honor bomb - half honor runner, half combo
- Dragon Charge - pure combo deck
- Dragon Watermonk - see Waterzerker
- Dragon defensive dueling - no notable combos
- Lion swarm - no notable combos
- Lion Harpoon - several small combos, none of which are essential to the deck
- Mantis raiding - lots of synergy, but no real combos
- Ratling speed military - no notable combos
- Ratling enlightment - pure combo deck
- Scorpion Ninja Military - about 5000000 two card combos. Not a combo deck though
- Scorpion PK - no notable combos
- Shadowlands Oni Summoner - usually half combo and half personality kill
- Shadowlands Chi kill - no notable combos
- Unicorn Khol Wall Military - straight military with some notable combo parts

I am not sure how Magic looks nowadays, but I can tell you for sure that combo decks are in the minority in L5R tournaments. There is one really good combo deck (Dragon Charge) and a few decks that can combo out (Waterzerker, Watermonk, Unicorn Military, Crane honor Bomb, ...).

Also good tournament decks will always be about countering your opponent's strategy. If you do not want to be knocked out of the tournament by getting paired against a deck that can stop your plan with a single well played card while continuing it's strategy you better be able to fight back. Heck, Magic has sideboards for exactly that purpose. I also distinctly remember seeing Disenchants in tournament winning decks. If those are not counter cards I don't know what is.

When a card of combo permits you to build a deck that is an automatic win regardless of the situation its not a "killer magic deck" its something that the players of these games HATE and which is promptly banned, house ruled etc...

In casual games, sure they are hated. And the same thing happens in D&D with power builds. If there's one thing about extreme deckbuilding it's that it can actually drain the fun out of a game fast. I've played Yawgmoth bargain decks, super blue control decks and a few other big tournament decks. And let me tell you, they're no fun to play against at all. You hardly really get to do anything before you're either locked down completely, dead or just waiting to die.

That is not a problem of power decks, that is a problem of power disparity. Guess what, I have no fun playing with my lion swarm deck against some weird third-tier deck a friend of mine has thrown together on a whim. I know I will win fast and brutally and so does he - so neither of us has fun. It is however great fun when playing against the same guy's Scorpion military, which is possibly a tiny bit worse than the Lion deck. But it is close enough to have fun. Just as much fun - heck, probably more - as we have playing with two weak decks.


Again, using your deck - character analogy:
No, cleric archers, frenzied berserkers and dragon wildshaped druids in a party filled with straight fighters and multiclassed casters are not fun. But characters of equal power are fun, no matter how high their power level. Note that this does not apply to game-breaking builds, be they decks or characters. Caster level 900 Holy words in DnD are just as bad as type I "whoever goes first wins" decks in Magic are.

But apart from that you can have just as much fun with high powered decks and characters. Sure, depending on your game your fights may get shorter (DnD, L5R) but that is not necessarily a bad thing, just a matter of preference.

[Murtak]

Looking back over that post, wow, that is a lot of aimless rambling


To sum it up:
RC, your claims about how CCGs work at the tournament level do not match my experience at all. Also your three categories not only fail to fit me, they seem arbitrary as hell.

It seems to me that you are confusing problems arising in your games due to power disparity with problems stemming from power level.

[Count Arioch the 28th]

1125697939[/unixtime]]

That's because RPG players have all bought the Oberoni Fallacy, and gamers from other traditions haven't. That's right, even Oberoni on some level accepts the fallacy that has his name on it. Sure, he'll insist that workarounds for bad rules be made and used in his presence - but you don't see him calling Andy Collins at home demanding that the bad rules be officially errataed out of existence. But you do see Shadowfist players calling up Zev at home and demanding changes to the official cards.

the way you put it, buying the oberoni isn't always a bad thing.

I don't know about you people, but I really don't have time to be calling up Andy Collins and tell him that his rules suck. Quite frankly, I have better things to do.

Sure, I accept the fact that the rules AREN'T balanced. I honestly think that there is no chance whatsoever of their being a game with balanced rules, no matter how much people claim otherwise.

Simply put, buying the oberoni fallacy to small degrees means you aren't a fvcking loser who calls up game designers at home because their games have imbalanced rules. (To anyone who has done this: I honestly feel sorry for you.)

[power_word_wedgie]

Gotta agree with the Count on this one. I don't see it as a sign of weakness that the RPG players don't beat up the game designers wen flaws are detected because in essence RPGs work on a different mentality than board or card games. The board and card games are pretty much competitive, and thus imbalances that make it so one person always wins over another if they get a certain game piece stick out like a sore thumb. For RPG, the DM doesn't defeat the players if he does a TPK and the players don't defeat the DM if their characters survive a dungeon. Whether the player's characters live or die, the main goal of the gameis that everyone has fun since there aren't any "winners" at the end of the game. Factor this in with the fact that house rules have a long tradition for D&D players (to the point that many players would probably be upset if there weren't any house rules in their game - it allows them to put their own touch on their campaign), it just comes to the fact that the Oberoni fallacy has a life in this game to the point that it is an integral part of the game.

[Draco_Argentum]

1125697939[/unixtime]]You would never get anywhere in a Shadowfist or Warmachine discussion saying something like that. People would seriously lynch you.

I have seen playing for fun style arguements on the official Warhammer MB.

[RandomCasualty]

1125697939[/unixtime]]Yeah, I haven't played M:tG seriously in a long time, but I did invent Creature Rush, and I can tell you that people demanding bannings and card improvements and other rebalancing is a constant din so loud that you can't hear yourself chew if you pay any attention at all to competitive environments. It's the same in Warhammer, Starcraft, or any other game that has multiple available starting positions, is played competitively, and has no Game Master controls.

Well first, Warhammer and Starcraft tend to be wargamer games over deckbuilder. Warhammer has a bit of deck building as far as building your army, and Starcraft doesn't have deck building at all (aside from choosing your race). And as I stated before, wargamers absolutely love balance arguments. It is the wargamer who argue balance arguments in D&D too, just like he tends to argue that in Starcraft or Warhammer.

As far as M:tG goes, sure you get some complaints now and then, but I pretty much guarantee you that those complaints all come from opponents of a given deck. And that's what losers do, they tend to whine and make excuses. In some cases, those excuses may be valid. Maybe the combo that beat them was overpowered, or maybe it wasn't. But that's pretty much the way it goes, you'll always have people who lose and then make excuses about it.

No, cleric archers, frenzied berserkers and dragon wildshaped druids in a party filled with straight fighters and multiclassed casters are not fun. But characters of equal power are fun, no matter how high their power level. Note that this does not apply to game-breaking builds, be they decks or characters. Caster level 900 Holy words in DnD are just as bad as type I "whoever goes first wins" decks in Magic are.

Well, game breaking builds are nothing more than power builds taken to an extreme. The question is... where do you draw the line? Obviously the word is game breaking. What about the hulking hurler? The 1000 damage charge build? The shapechange abuser? The min/maxed druid? Where is the line drawn?

Also you've got the problem of eliminating lots of other character concepts. Since there are very few things that can match a frenzied berserker or incantatrix build for instance. So you run into a situation like M:tG where you have a very slim amount of concepts you can play if you don't want to suck.

Now in an RPG doing that is pretty devastating to the game as a whole. RPGs are about playing all sorts of different concepts and when one person min/maxes he's actually decreasing everyone else's potential options. The thing is that you can play a druid or a cleric and not be uber. But you can't play a dread pirate and make him comparable to a frenzied berserker. Ever.

So min/maxing basically sets the bar as far as what builds are allowed in. And if you set the bar too high, then everyone is playing from a small set of power decks, and that gets old fast.