[Finished] Mutual Disarmament

You lose 2 cards, your opponent loses 1. Even if yours is chosen and your opponent's isn't, that's still not a good deal.
I'm not sure I've ever seen anyone use this thing.

I formerly used it in my power deck, whose idea is to set up solar panels, clockworks, and Iridith Kingdom to make draw spells hilariously cheap and thereby net so much card advantage that I would win the game through a mix of Stonehammer and low costing utility spells.

As a hand wrecking card, this card is a miserable failure - by the time you have enough of a card drawing engine to be able to justify casting it on your end, your opponent has either emptied his hand if his deck is aggressive, or probably has several cards he doesn't really mind losing if not. Most of my limited success with the card came in the form of having the ability to Roman Cancel a spell of my own that went wrong, or in an emergency, hoping the opponent's spell would happen to get Roman Canceled. But, of course, Roman Canceling is scheduled to be terminated...


The obvious balance solution is to remove the extra discard by the caster and make the discard by the opponent not random to compensate. If Solar Flare is balanced (which it may not be), probably add a 1 or 2 cost as well.

I've seen people use it. Particularly in conjunction with cards like Mind Burrower. It's also decent in mana-heavy decks that use mainly expensive monsters since you don't need cards as badly as your opponent and it can slow your opponent down a bit. But yeah, for the most part it's not that great. I'm just not sure that the few niches it has aren't enough to keep it balanced.

I was personally holding off for until NGC so that I could propose that it let you choose a card from the opponent's hand to discard.

(12-08-2012 10:36 AM)xX Crow Xx Wrote:  I formerly used it in my power deck, whose idea is to set up solar panels, clockworks, and Iridith Kingdom to make draw spells hilariously cheap and thereby net so much card advantage that I would win the game through a mix of Stonehammer and low costing utility spells.

As a hand wrecking card, this card is a miserable failure - by the time you have enough of a card drawing engine to be able to justify casting it on your end, your opponent has either emptied his hand if his deck is aggressive, or probably has several cards he doesn't really mind losing if not. Most of my limited success with the card came in the form of having the ability to Roman Cancel a spell of my own that went wrong, or in an emergency, hoping the opponent's spell would happen to get Roman Canceled. But, of course, Roman Canceling is scheduled to be terminated...


The obvious balance solution is to remove the extra discard by the caster and make the discard by the opponent not random to compensate. If Solar Flare is balanced (which it may not be), probably add a 1 or 2 cost as well.

Then it wouldn't really be mutual disarmament. Maybe if you discarded 1 and they discarded 2 (either at random with an appropriate cost, or of their choice and remaining free).

(12-10-2012 01:25 PM)Blue_Elite Wrote:  I was personally holding off for until NGC so that I could propose that it let you choose a card from the opponent's hand to discard.

First, NGC won't include a UI update so that's actually one of the few things it won't be able to do (I know, I know, I've said it can do anything, but I suppose I meant "anything that doesn't require new UI").

Secondly, it'd still suck as it'd still be two cards for 1. It'd just suck less.

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Meanwhile, a card that makes the opponent discard two cards and costs 0 is kind of sick, even if you're losing two cards too...

The problem here is that the card tries to represent a flavor that doesn't work well in a card game. Either the flavor or the playability will have to be sacrificed.

Specifically, it's kind of lame if, to draft a mutual disarmament treaty, you have to already have been less armed than your opponent to begin with (since your ink paper took up place in your armory that could have been used for a weapon instead).

(12-10-2012 01:56 PM)Norlaan Wrote:  

(12-10-2012 01:25 PM)Blue_Elite Wrote:  I was personally holding off for until NGC so that I could propose that it let you choose a card from the opponent's hand to discard.

First, NGC won't include a UI update so that's actually one of the few things it won't be able to do (I know, I know, I've said it can do anything, but I suppose I meant "anything that doesn't require new UI").

Secondly, it'd still suck as it'd still be two cards for 1. It'd just suck less.

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Meanwhile, a card that makes the opponent discard two cards and costs 0 is kind of sick, even if you're losing two cards too...

Even if it's 2 cards of their choice? It's a perfectly symmetrical card. You lose 2 cards of your choice, and they do the same. You lose 0 mana, and they do the same.

What if it made the opponent discard two random cards and you discard two cards of your choice? So it would be a three for two trade, but the fact that you get to choose your discards might make up for that. While you'd probably be discarding spare gens or something your opponent has a good chance of losing an important card they've been saving.

(12-10-2012 02:11 PM)Milo Wrote:  The problem here is that the card tries to represent a flavor that doesn't work well in a card game. Either the flavor or the playability will have to be sacrificed.

Yup!

What if it was a cantrip? Then you'd both discard a card, but you wouldn't end up 1 card behind your opponent.

Both discarding and drawing is suspiciously Remembrance-ey, even considering that you'll only be getting one card rather than two.

It should probably at least get some sort of mana cost, if it's going to let you filter your deck without losing card advantage.

Yeah, a cost of 1, just like remembrance. It would be the same thing, except instead of you drawing a 2nd card, your opponent would discard one.

Oh Gods...

Are you trying to make a spell more broken than Remembrance or something?

What if the discard was chosen, instead of random? Still too strong?

I'm pretty sure it would be, yeah, at least in the current meta game. Discard is viewed as more powerful/worth more than draw at the moment. So they couldn't (or at least shouldn't) have identical costs with that small a difference if effect.

I don't know how much I agree with that, especially with non-random discards.

Drawing a card in any capacity with this is a terrible idea.

You discard one, the opponent discards two (chosen) could work if you threw on a price tag of 3 (or maybe 2, but that feels dangerous to me). Although I don't understand why the card is grey in the first place.

That's pretty expensive for something that gives you absolutely no card or board advantage at all Crow. Maybe if it was random...

(12-11-2012 01:18 PM)xX Crow Xx Wrote:  Although I don't understand why the card is grey in the first place.

That's a good point. The concept of mutual disarmament is very flavorwise, although discard isn't usually mechanically.