[Suggest] Replibot Hive

(12-08-2012 01:00 AM)Santa Squid Wrote:  

Replibot Hive was only ever really balanced in 5+/30- decks. If your deck isn't small enough with enough redundancy, there's simply no way to reasonably draw them and all the requisite combo pieces early enough. 5 card combos are horribly hard to put together, and they became even harder when we switched over to a 4/40 format in all official tournaments.

Do we want it changed so it's usable in 4/40 format, or are we OK with a card that's only usable in casual games?

Disscustion

Random thought: what about spiking all your other replibots instead of dizzying them? That way you could still actually do stuff with your spare replibots (assuming you have anyway). Just not stuff that involves making more replibots.

And this wouldn't stop the undizzying combo either, since you'd have 2 non-spiked replibots to work with after making another (it wouldn't spike itself or the one it makes, so... 2).

Not that I'm not necessarily suggesting this as the -only- buff, mind, just tossing the idea out there.

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I'll read the thread again and add comments about it later. Probably way later... as in close to a week... but I'll do it.

I'll again restate my opinion that this would be better if it was less instant-win and more utility that can be instant-win if your opponent doesn't do anything about it much like The Unspoken. Something that can help you win a match in the more traditional sense but can also win it in a non-traditional way if your opponent doesn't stop you.

Something along the lines of gaining counters equal to the number of Replibots you control, needing 20+ counters to instantly win, and knocking the Replibots up to 20/20 would probably work as an example.

(02-05-2013 02:01 PM)Blue_Elite Wrote:  knocking the Replibots up to 20/20 would probably work

Given that Langoria creates very french 20/20s for 2 apiece, for Replibot Hive to do that for free, even with a limit of one in play at a time, would probably be close to balanced if you removed the victory condition entirely. Without vastly increasing the play or activation costs, having Replibots at an easily killable 10/10 is a necessary evil.

Langorian Elves actually have a really useful ability when you use them with Langoria because you don't need to protect your elves for a turn while they undizzy. So I wouldn't really call them french vanilla. Which I guess is to say, I wouldn't put Langoria in a deck without fully intending to make use of the RPG World summoning ability.

With that in mind, I think you could just increase the Replibots' stats by 10/10 without making the win condition harder.

(02-05-2013 06:10 PM)masamunemaniac Wrote:  

(02-05-2013 02:01 PM)Blue_Elite Wrote:  knocking the Replibots up to 20/20 would probably work

Given that Langoria creates very french 20/20s for 2 apiece, for Replibot Hive to do that for free, even with a limit of one in play at a time, would probably be close to balanced if you removed the victory condition entirely. Without vastly increasing the play or activation costs, having Replibots at an easily killable 10/10 is a necessary evil.

To be fair, Langoria costs less than half as much, and the elves have a much better ability.

But that ability has a cost amounting to 6 total mana per use. After 1 summon you'd pretty much negate the benefit of having paid less up front compared to Replibot Hive.

I'm not certain anymore. How good is Greybeard's Sextant? Replibot Hive is basically that with a 20/20 monster instead of a 70/1 and with an instant-win condition.

Graybeard's Sextant is a bit overpowered, but I've never cared enough to do anything about it. Though I will say that it's significantly more expensive than Replibot Hive.

(02-05-2013 02:01 PM)Blue_Elite Wrote:  I'll again restate my opinion that this would be better if it was less instant-win and more utility that can be instant-win if your opponent doesn't do anything about it much like The Unspoken. Something that can help you win a match in the more traditional sense but can also win it in a non-traditional way if your opponent doesn't stop you.

Something along the lines of gaining counters equal to the number of Replibots you control, needing 20+ counters to instantly win, and knocking the Replibots up to 20/20 would probably work as an example.

My first thought was "hey, I like this. The counters are kind of the "exponential growth" part that the replibots are lacking (it's closer, anyway. The replibots in the hive don't replicate, just the ones out of it), and then once it gets 20 counters, BOOM, the hive errupts and grey goo.

But I don't know if it needs the stat boost."

My rationale for that was "it's a win in optimal onditions in 6 turns (1/3/6/10/15/20). Surely there are decks that can protect the bots for 6 turns and win.

Then I remembered that, in optimal conditions (not counting dizziers), Replibot Hive currently wins in 5 turns, and isn't considered useful at all.

So I dunno anymore.

(02-06-2013 12:38 PM)Norlaan Wrote:  My rationale for that was "it's a win in optimal conditions in 6 turns (1/3/6/10/15/20). Surely there are decks that can protect the bots for 6 turns and win.

There aren't. That's an amazingly tall order, protecting each and every one of your 5 10/10 monsters for 6 turns. I like it too, and think 20/20s would be fine.

If people don't like how much focus this takes away from its instant win condition or think it's unbalanced to create free 20/20s even if you only get one at a time, how about making the replebots invincible 0/1s with (Can't Block)? You no longer have to protect them, but instead, you have to protect yourself and your Replebot Hive while some or all of your field is taken up by 0/1s. Probably with more than 20 counters required.

@Bugle: At the same time, if someone messes you up right now you have to start all over. That wouldn't be the case with the 20 counter system. Sure it might take more than six turns, but even if your opponent messes you up, unless they destroy your hive, it probably won't take more than ten turns. Whereas right now it is very easy for your opponent to keep messing you up so that you can never really meet your win condition. I would be willing to even have the win condition require 25 counters if it means the Replibots could have 20/20 stats. I think the Replibots being half-decent without the win condition is kind of important if we want this card to be balanced. Just because it's really easy to over or undershoot how easy the win condition should be to obtain, so if we purposefully undershoot it and then give the Replibots some stats to compensate we're much more likely to end up with a useful card that isn't overpowered.

So long as the replibots are positively worthless 10/10 monsters with the most tempo-killing activateable ability ever, the hive's only use is going to be as the win condition of a non-interactive combo deck. Even if the hive had to pay mana to bring out the progenitor (4/4 base effect cost, 1/1 mana activation cost?), increasing the replibots' stats is would be a step in the right direction.

I'm sure 15/15 stats with generating a free Bot as a stepping stone wouldn't hurt.

Conversely to what I stated earlier with the comparison to Greybeard's Sextant, Slime Valley produces free 5/10 monsters with Speed Summon, no cap on the number you can produce through Slime Valley itself, AND a sac value. All for 4, the same into play cost as Langoria. So maybe a 20/20 Bot would in fact be fine.

Really, I think the biggest problem is that a single counterspell or dizzier is enough to destroy all of your progress in one go. Simply dizzying all of your Replibots should be enough of a cost; buying an extra turn for 1-4 mana is a good enough deal for the opponent, they don't need to buy five.

I think that's a giant problem, yeah, but it's not enough to fix these guys. Why do they all dizzy anyway? That makes absolutely no sense. If one replibot takes one turn to build one replibot, why does it also take 4 replibots one turn to create one?

A little thing called balance.

masa, you know such a thing has no place in the balance forum.

So, we'll be changing this a little bit. The instant win's still going to be there, but it'll be harder to combo your way to victory instantly with it; at the same time, the Replibots themselves will prove more useful.

More Specifically, the hive will have a activation cost, but the bots will be 20/20s, spike all of your replibots on a successful use, and on failure, on the one making a new bot will explode.

• Undizzying no longer lets you get in quick wins (though it can speed up the first activation, or help recover after a counter).
• A counterspell no longer wipes out all of your Replibots.
• A successful activation no longer dizzies all of your Replibots (or the opponent's!), letting you attack or defend with the rest if you so choose.
• They still die to a stiff breeze, just not to a gentle breeze.
• The activation cost is on the Hive only, to prevent it from being a free-to-use Langoria.