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Deck Building Difficulties

Posted: Thu Mar 08, 2018 5:27 am
by Horizon Jeff
Are you encountering difficulties in deck building? Traveller, like any customizable game, will ultimately rely on a player base inspired to create new decks, share ideas and introduce meta concepts.

If you're not building decks yet, what are some of the :complication you may be encountering?

Re: Deck Building Difficulties

Posted: Thu Mar 08, 2018 2:28 pm
by Frewfrux
I selected "Other" because, while the availability of people to play *is* an issue for me, the biggest hindrance is that I don't have all the cards memorized. What I need is a spreadsheet of all the cards that lists out what each card does. Then maybe I will be able to see patterns that I can use.

I do have ideas for decks, but one of the biggest hindrances is actually the :contract / :complication cards. When a :contract first comes out you place one of your own :complication cards on it. That means that the :complication you include in your deck need to be both ones you can get past AND ones that will trip up your opponent. It would help if, when I read over them, I thought to myself "hey, I know what card combination will make this seemingly trivial :complication brutal to deal with!

Basically, I just don't know the cards quite well enough yet. I'll get there.

Re: Deck Building Difficulties

Posted: Thu Mar 08, 2018 2:55 pm
by Freeloading Phill
My other is that I'm just not going to play that often as the game is in rotation with many other games so the time investment for building just doesn't seem worth it.

I am musing over a way to make one big stack work: something along the lines of deal everyone the 60 cards for their deck and add an additional once a turn discard a card to the big stack discard for a replacement off the big stack. That way there is still the bankruptcy chance and also the chance to search for cards that suit what you're trying to do.
And I get to use all the cards in every game :vp

Re: Deck Building Difficulties

Posted: Fri Mar 09, 2018 7:05 am
by Horizon Ian
I'll look to work on a deckbuilding tips article. The first thing that comes to mind is to take one of the precons and change just a few cards, maybe leave an adventure deck alone for the moment and just mess with, say, upgrades. More of a smoothing out the play of a deck rather than coming up with a distinct deck archetype. The Scout deck, out of the box, can run into not generating enough capability tokens if it gets a poor draw, so more capability generators is a possible change.

Re: Deck Building Difficulties

Posted: Mon Mar 12, 2018 3:32 pm
by Baron_Gerry_Rail
I was thinking of just pairing up the Broadsword with the "Trouble on the Mains", and drop in one of the Merchant ship adventure Decks to see how that would go. Probably explode. The tuning would be to remove the anti-piracy cards in Trouble, and add in a couple of cards (which ones , I have no idea yet) and see how that played vs the pre-cons.

Re: Deck Building Difficulties

Posted: Fri Mar 16, 2018 7:40 pm
by Horizon Jeff
Baron_Gerry_Rail wrote:
Mon Mar 12, 2018 3:32 pm
I was thinking of just pairing up the Broadsword with the "Trouble on the Mains", and drop in one of the Merchant ship adventure Decks to see how that would go. Probably explode. The tuning would be to remove the anti-piracy cards in Trouble, and add in a couple of cards (which ones , I have no idea yet) and see how that played vs the pre-cons.
One thing we're interested in seeing as developers is how pirate-themed decks choose to build their Adventure Decks. Since they don't care about completing :contract, presumably they're going to want :complication that add the most difficulties, and :contract with either high requirements or low :vp (preferably both).

Re: Deck Building Difficulties

Posted: Sun Mar 18, 2018 8:50 am
by Frewfrux
I now have a custom deck and can't wait to test it out. Unfortunately, it required some cards from all my 4 pre-constructed decks so I don't have a second deck at the moment to "test" with.

Hmmm...okay, I also need a second custom deck. ...thinking...

Re: Deck Building Difficulties

Posted: Sun Mar 18, 2018 4:36 pm
by Horizon Jeff
Frewfrux wrote:
Sun Mar 18, 2018 8:50 am
I now have a custom deck and can't wait to test it out. Unfortunately, it required some cards from all my 4 pre-constructed decks so I don't have a second deck at the moment to "test" with.

Hmmm...okay, I also need a second custom deck. ...thinking...
I understand if you are keeping the exact contents under wraps for now (better watch out, SolomanMedici), but when you're ready we'd love to see you publish the decklist!

Re: Deck Building Difficulties

Posted: Sun Mar 18, 2018 6:15 pm
by Frewfrux
I'm actually itching to share. I would love the feedback.

One week. I should go head to head with SolomanMedici next Sunday. Then I will post *both* my decks. :o

Re: Deck Building Difficulties

Posted: Sun Mar 18, 2018 6:26 pm
by SolomanMedici
Horizon Jeff wrote:
Sun Mar 18, 2018 4:36 pm
(better watch out, SolomanMedici),
Yes, the Admiralty here is expressing growing concern at the threat posed by Captain Frewfrux's Band of Pirates. :infamy
Still, we believe that our "Alien Legion" will be able to rise to the challenge (after some additional adjustments).
Must keep the spacelanes safe! :starops :combat