Balance Thread

Dethstrik Eradicator: 2-3 power needed to attack, can keep ability to 4 power requirement.

Stellar Pack: Attach to "entity" like all the other packs.

Exhaust Port Torpedo: Very limited: make A speed or have it include "devices" too.

Xagar: As said it works well in stall decks, particularly Autogun or Banisher where you don't need to actually take your turn to deal damage (making the 40% risk worth taking).

I've been playing an autogun deck, and I have to say it's weak. It's too expensive to get out quickly, which you want to do so that you can start shooting people, but if you do get one out quickly, you probably aren't getting out another one and they are not actually quick killers. Moreover, the turn skip really hurts, so it's stuck as a late game card because you have to get a bunch of allyers out first. But if you are going to have 7 allyers on the field, then Autogun's not really necessary.

Armormail's still overpowered. 21 x 12 hits means you pretty much have 252 damage over the course of its life, and I net 811 from having a Laser Surgeon and Radioactive Battery out. It's a Raddlifer, so it should be scaled down. Maybe 8 life?

I could see 21/8 on Armormail.  Not so much because of the damage, but because of Battery abuse. I'd make him a bit cheaper, though.

And yeah, I figured Autogun was probably weak, just because 39 damage a turn for ~15 mana seems kind of puny, especially when you have to give up your turns.  It's odd enough that I wasn't 100% sure, though.

Just out of curiosity, does Ribbon + Replibots cause their ability to fail, or does it make them broken?

Does milling cause death by decking?

i imagine it'd cause the ability to fail (since there would be no valid targets)
Edit: I think milling does cause death by decking.

just thought i would say this as i have nothing else to do

warp gate. (is that what its called cudnt be bothered to cheak) anyway, target entry returned to your hand.

it costs 2L 2G

i think it should be 2L 1G

Reasons for this.

1) like lucky save, wouldnt be used much.

2) Compare to Blur Effect. costs 3G. FMV costs 2L . . . one mana increase. So keep the same for Warp Gate. That is all.

This is a long shot in the dark, but is there any way that when radd-lifers block they absorb only 1 damage and the rest goes through (halved due to interference by a monster I'd imagine).
I've been wanting this as a general balance for radd lifers, and figured with Armormail still being balanced now would be the time to throw it out there.


On a side note: Graviton Sword is now worse than Decelerator in all respects. I'd recommend something like 5-10% chance to dizzy target added (ruled out doing 5 damage due to it being able to target effects) or that it be made a zero cost card with 1/1 sac.

I've already put up a chance for Graviton Sword - it's mana-activated instead of dizzy activated, so it's reusable.

Whoa, Graviton Sword doess not want to be free with 1/1 sac. Even if it were unique, it'd act as a bonus minibucket that you could use in addition to existing mana cards. Plus it'd have an ability too.
Because I'm not a fan of tiny random chances of stuff happening on a low cost card, I'd be against the % of dizzying.
It could probably do 5 damage - I'm sure webrunner could code it to not reduce the life counter on effects. I'd be against it doing 5 damage though, as the ability is reusable. Even if it only done one damage, that's a 1/1 effect that can repeatedly miasmascrew monsters.

I'd maybe make it cantrip like Decelerator. Or maybe give it Speed Summon instead?

Reclamation makes it still too easy to disrupt your opponent. 1) target a modded entity, 2) target something with zero sac 3) target something big and expensive that they had as a finisher, which they probably don't have another copy of.

masamunemaniac Wrote:Whoa, Graviton Sword doess not want to be free with 1/1 sac. Even if it were unique, it'd act as a bonus minibucket that you could use in addition to existing mana cards. Plus it'd have an ability too.

Minibucket? A Magic Orb or Skull still provides more mana (at least technically) than this card. And do you really consider a 2-speed drop to be that devistating of an ability; especially in early play where it'd be most useful?
My case-in-point: I neglected to take into account using multiple swords as sac, but given the low return per card and that it doesn't combo with sacsite, it'd be very difficult to abbuse.

Then again I guess this is all moot considering web has already made it reusable via a cost per use.

I'd possibly up the cost to 44, being that it targets entities rather than just monsters. Considering the speed and drawback compared to FTMC/VOIP I wouldn't suggest higher than that for now.

Edit: At zero cost and 11, it or multiples could be played in addition to an Orb/Bucket, providing mucho mana for turn 2. In fact it works out pretty much the same mana gain as an Orb, except without the initial cost to slow it down.

azulknight Wrote:Reclamation makes it still too easy to disrupt your opponent. 1) target a modded entity, 2) target something with zero sac 3) target something big and expensive that they had as a finisher, which they probably don't have another copy of.

So it's only as (or nearly as) useful as Fire the Main Cannon in fairly specialized situations.  I still think seven mana is fair, considering that more often than not it will be giving your opponent the target's casting cost or greater in mana as a side effect, which is usually a pretty significant drawback.

As far as Graviton Sword, it's useless, but yeah, making it free with sac is not the way to fix it.  Frankly, though, I don't really see it becoming useful unless you attach another ability to it, like "If target entity has a speed of E, it is dizzied.  Otherwise target entity's speed is reduced by two ranks."  And maybe make it speed C.  Then you could actually justify its original 22 casting cost (keeping in mind that you wouldn't be able to dizzy a vanilla beatstick).

masa: Point taken.

Tamdrik:

I'm guessing this is your reference. I like it as it's flavorful.

Side note: I may just be paranoid (actually I know I am, but in this instance I "think"), but does Accelerator and Decelerator remind anyone else of Shuryou's NPCs?

Fewer suggested changes in this one than in previous posts, since a lot of the glaring issues have already been addressed:

Crystal Atomaton
I really like this one.  In my opinion, this should be a model for the expected utility of low-cost monsters in CMC.
Recommendation: Unless there's some kind of nuclear reference, fix spelling of "Atomaton" to "Automaton"

Nadri Megus
Probably balanced, though on the slightly weakish side.  One extra mana over Skelebird for a fairly minor ability and an even more minor drawback (plus low sac value).
Suggestion: 43 sac
(EDIT: Fixed!)

Axion
Seems pretty nifty, maybe too much so.  If your opponent doesn't have a counter (which includes a sniper of any sort), this works out to basically a 68, two card wipe opponent's field (with a bonus creature thrown in).  That does work out to be pretty expensive and brittle, but the effect is also incredible.
Suggestion: Change to "destroy all other monsters" (including your own).  Not sure how flavorful that is, since it kind of looks like Axion might be from the Kid Radd comic that I'm not familiar with.
(EDIT: Fixed!)

Blood Armor
Slightly more expensive than Winged Golem for a slightly better statline.  Okay, fair enough.  But it's also zero sac with a rather painful maintenance cost.
Suggestion: 42, fix spelling of "Maintanance" to "Maintenance".
(EDIT: Fixed!)

EY-12 Spy Sattelite
Not too bad, I guess.  At that price, the biggest concern is probably taking up a monster slot, but late game, you can sac it to get your mana back.
Suggestion: Fix spelling of "sattelite" to "satellite"
(EDIT: Fixed!)

EY-40 Censor Station
Ok, less than useful.  For 5/5 you can get a Cloaking Field that makes everything you play face-down, even if you play multiples in one turn.  And that may even be overpriced.
Suggestion: Cost/sac to 23, Fix spelling of "sattelite" to "satellite"
(EDIT: Fixed!)

EY-554 Comms Sattelite
Kind of fun to build a deck around this to generate massive amounts of mana, but it's too slow to be particularly powerful.  Which is okay, I guess.
Suggestion: Fix spelling of "sattelite" to "satellite"
(EDIT: Fixed!)

Cosmos Dragon
Strikes me as kind of useless at that price, particularly if 'killed' monsters also go back to hand.
Suggestion: 44 cost/sac
(EDIT: Fixed!)

Singularity Cannon
Well that's an interesting fix.  It used to be a really expensive, weak, limited Chook Xao, but now... well that could be amusing for all those "let's see how big we can make a creature" loonies.  Need to try it out sometime.

Wormhole Striker
A little expensive for what it is, assuming you can't exploit it to break certain 'dizzy a creature' abilities, since it's so fragile.
Suggestion: Cost/sac to 55
(EDIT: Fixed!)

ZFF Officer
Kind of nifty, I suppose.  Really only has a place in a heavy Allying deck, though.  No suggested changes.

Ensign Redshirt
Huh.  I imagine its utility is somewhat mitigated by its lack of any sort of way to achieve the element of surprise or protect itself.  I suspect it could be a little cheaper.
Suggestion: 22 cost/sac
(EDIT: Fixed!)

ZFF-01 Drone
Another nifty low-cost creature.

ZFF-09 Hawk
Meh.  Allying 9 is pretty brutal to set up.  I think its cost can be safely knocked down a notch.
Suggestion: 33 cost, 44 sac
(EDIT: Fixed!)

ZFF-11 Ecto
Simply coming into play face down just isn't that big a deal for a plain-jane beatstick.
Suggestion: 33 cost/sac
(EDIT: Fixed!)

ZFF-15 Mirage
Nifty ability, but still really, really expensive for a <strike>36/36</strike> 46/46.
Suggestion: <strike>&nbsp;4 </strike>&nbsp;54
(EDIT: Tweaked)

ZFF-24 Hermes
Too expensive.  Its stats are about what I'd expect for a creature of that cost without a drawback (and with some sac value).
Suggestion: Cost to 87
(EDIT: Fixed!)

ZFF-90 Zeus
Obviously only useful in a Power deck, but that ability *probably* justifies the massive cost and Power requirements.  If I were to design it from scratch, I'd probably make it cost 1010 instead, though, which is still enough to play a Kilothi Cruiser and Legend Hawk.
(EDIT: Fixed!)

Captain Navis
The ability is nice and all, but it's still a 34/34 without any sort of defensive mechanism, so 55 seems kind of steep at first.  That said, if it were a spell that said "all your space ships gain quick hit until end of turn", how much would that cost?  This seems a bit better than that.  It would be nicer if there were some more reasonably-priced good-attack space ships available.
(EDIT: Fixed!)

Stellar Clockwork
(see Diamond Clockwork, earlier post)

Nuclear Plant
That is incredibly scary to use in a deck that relies at all on monsters.  I think you could get away with even sac on it.
Suggestion: 22 sac

Accelerator
Ergh... speed tweaking is just such a minor effect in the vast majority of cases, that it's hard to make a card useful if that's all it does.  That said, a 11 card that sacs for gain and cantrips is about as low-cost as it gets, so this is probably okay, albeit a cipher in the grand scheme of CMC.  One of those cards that you are afraid to pull as your rare from a booster.  Blue Elite brings up a good point, though-- these could be the reincarnation of the 2 sac NPCs of old, so maybe a sac tweak is in order.
Suggestion: Sac to 12.  Rarity 100.  We don't need many of these in the world.

Decelerator
See Accelerator.
Suggestion: Sac to 21.  Rarity 100.

Warpwell
The cost tweak to 5/5 makes it more playable than before, though it's still pretty pricey, considering it will take about four turns to make its cost back.  You could look at it as 50% more productive as Crossover, or you could note that Crossover gets you the mana you actually need.  If it were priced right, this would be quite generally useful in a relatively large number of decks, so I don't think the supply should be constricted too much.
Suggestion: 44 cost, 61 rarity
(EDIT: Fixed (sac bump)!)

Transporter Pad
A pretty useful ability, though the price seems awfully steep.  I could go for a cost and sac drop.  It's also not a high-utility card that everyone needs a dozen or more copies of.
Suggestion: 44 cost/sac, rarity to 60
(EDIT: Fixed!)

Torpedo Launcher
So niche it hurts.  Given that you can't exactly predict when your opponent will play a Space Ship deck, and that torpedoes are probably somewhat useful against other stuff, this is begging for a significant re-working.
Suggestion: Target ship or effect has 25% chance of being destroyed.  44 cost.
(EDIT: Fixed!)

Cosmic Rift
Blah.  Only useful at all in a lockdown-type deck, and then it's still only every 5 turns.  Maybe it's okay, given that it's no longer insanely expensive.
Suggestion: Rarity 85

Tractor Beam
Seems really useful.  Maybe too useful, actually.  At that price, I think I could find a place for it in just about any deck.
Suggestion: 33 cost, Rarity 86
(EDIT: Fixed!)

Atomic Energy
Better than fountains, certainly, though that could be interpreted as d@mning with praise fainter than a white dwarf in the night sky.  It's probably fine as-is, and reasonably useful.

Gravity Mine
Hm.  Fog.  We know how much play those cards got in MtG.  Still, it's cheap enough that it's probably reasonable.

Stellarite Ore / Cosmerium Ore
See Glowerite/Financium Ore (earlier post)

Solar Crystal / Cosmic Crystal
Ugh.  Those drawbacks are really painful.  Too much so.
Suggestion: 10 life / 25% chance opponent draws a card (respectively)
(EDIT: Cosmic Crystal is better than before.)

Spacial Lens
See Shade Filter (earlier post)

Dimensional Disrupt
Me likey much better than the Horror version.  Still of somewhat limited utility, but at least it's not ridiculously so.

Fortune or Bust
Much improved over its earlier incarnation.  I still think it's not particularly useful, but at least it's somewhat interesting.

Life or Death
Seems fair, though First Avrillian will probably need a sac nerf.

Cruelty or Mercy
Painful, that attack-doubling thing.  Still, it's cheap enough to throw at annoying, weak ability creatures, I suppose, though I wouldn't argue if it were made a bit cheaper.

Time Coin
I guess it's somewhat useful in an Autogun deck, assuming Autogun were reasonably priced enough to be worthwhile, or some other hard lockdown/extreme defense deck.

Target the Engines
At 1/1 cost, it's cheap enough to be used as a mana-screwer, possibly making a mana-denial deck actually viable for the first time.  Hopefully not too overpowered.
(EDIT: I really didn't give enough consideration to the card draw aspect.  With that, a mana denial deck becomes too viable.)
Suggestion: Change card draw to "gain 15 life" or maybe one gray mana.

Deregister
Cute, but so limited in effect, that it had to be a cantrip, and it can't really be made much cheaper without getting into weird infinidraw concerns.

Mind Swap
Um... yeah... this seems like it could be abused pretty badly, but at that cost, you'll never be able to guarantee getting it off at all, I suppose.  I can't shake the idea of some ridiculous deck with 65 Nova Crystals, 65 Dark Obelisks, 65 Memory of Traumas, 65 Magical Academies, and 65 of these.

Crossed Wires
So expensive that it's of dubious actual utility, scary though it may be.  Still, I'm reluctant to make it any cheaper.

Stun Grenade
I suppose that's reasonable.  One more Vendor-NPC-Killer.  I suspect its most dangerous use is not defensive, but rather dizzying your opponent's entire field right before your turn.

Targeting Malfunction
Kind of nifty if you can get the attacker to plow into something unpleasant like a Vendor NPC or something, but otherwise it's less useful than a FMV.  That said, the hilarity of luring monsters to attack a Skeletal Warlock, then guiding them into the gaping maw of Mount Mason is probably worth the extra couple of mana.

Invisible Paint
Meh.  Affords some limited amount of protection for something while it recovers from summoning sickness, I suppose.  The low cost seems reasonable.

Hyperspace
Could make for some annoying Minefield decks, but otherwise pretty limited.  Can't beat the price, though.

Stellar Distances
Could be a pretty potent stall card, more useful than Stone Maze, given that you can litter your field with as many ability creatures as you can eat.  With that in mind, it's possibly as good as The Dark Quadrant.
Suggestion: 64 cost

Spacewarp Drive
The thought of using this on Vendor NPC is mildly disconcerting, but generally speaking, it's expensive enough that its powerful ability is probably adequately offset.

Stasis Field
I like this card.  A bit like Reclamation, but doesn't work on things whose abilities are passive in nature.  (or things with modifiers already attached)

Personal Teleporter
Hm.  Kind of like Entrenching and a weak Spell/Ability Immune.  Sounds like a lot, but I'll have to experiment more with it.

Stellar Pack
See Plasma Pack (earlier post)

The Shields
So what was wrong with "Stellar Forcefield"? *shrug*  Seems a little too expensive to me, although this is another one that could do some scary things with Vendor NPC (i.e. make him almost immortal), but not much more so than Exo-Suit.
Suggestion: 34
(EDIT: Fixed!)

Trader Ship
Seems really expensive to me.  Basically like a souped-up Melrak Channeler, who is himself of questionable utility.  Roughly the stats of a 5-mana creature, mediocre ability.
Suggestion: 333 cost, 444 sac
(EDIT: Fixed!)

G Lens Laser
Crossover's baby brother.  Given that you're spending a card and a slot on it, I think making it simply cost half as much for half the utility isn't necessarily sound.
Suggestion: 111 sac value

Power Cell
While I wince at the thought of spending an effect slot on this, I can't really argue with 1/1/1 and cantrip for cheap power.

Ultracell Battery
This probably isn't a bad play for the big Power-hungry super-cards.  Go nuts with the Zeus like it's 2099, and by the time the Ultracell dies, the Zeus (or your opponent) probably has, too.  Less useful for things like the Clockworks and the 1-power stuff.  Probably a decent tradeoff with the Power Cell.

Hydrogen Cell
While that's a useful effect to have around, I think it could stand to be slightly cheaper.
Suggestion: 444
(EDIT: Fixed!)

Shell Game
Now that's a fun card, and very versatile.  Too bad it's so expensive.  7/7/7 is really an incredible amount of mana, especially since I think there should be less of a 'discount' for multi-color spell costs, because I'd argue that there's less benefit in 'rushing out' a spell than a large creature.
Suggestion: 555
(EDIT: Improved)

Symbiote
Haven't had the chance to play it or see it played yet, so for obvious reasons, I can't feel very comfortable trying to make any intelligent comments on its balance.  <strike>That said, looking at the various "Symbiotic ______" cards using getcard, the possibility of using Symbiote on a Dragon Whelp to get a 99/99 ability creature makes me shudder.</strike> 30% damage on Symbiotic Golems does seem a little over the top compared to the other abilities.

Those are just the base token stats. Merging a Symbiote with a creature will add 30 to its life, not give it those stats.

Also, Symbiotic Golem is kinda nuts. Maybe 50% damage instead of 30%?

I dont really want to change rarities unless it's particularly nessisary, just to let you know.

Tamdrik Wrote:Axion
Seems pretty nifty, maybe too much so. If your opponent doesn't have a counter (which includes a sniper of any sort), this works out to basically a 68, two card wipe opponent's field (with a bonus creature thrown in). That does work out to be pretty expensive and brittle, but the effect is also incredible.
Suggestion: Change to "destroy all other monsters" (including your own). Not sure how flavorful that is, since it kind of looks like Axion might be from the Kid Radd comic that I'm not familiar with.

Axion is actually based on a conversation I had in a chat channel. It's a fake series of SHMUPS (hense the screen-clearing bomb and such.) The art is from when I made a mock up of it a few months ago.

Tamdrik Wrote:Symbiote
Haven't had the chance to play it or see it played yet, so for obvious reasons, I can't feel very comfortable trying to make any intelligent comments on its balance. That said, looking at the various "Symbiotic ______" cards using getcard, the possibility of using Symbiote on a Dragon Whelp to get a 99/99 ability creature makes me shudder.

The stats of the created creature are that of the existing creature and the symbiote added together. The stats on the cards are just baseline ones (although save pointing them will bring them back to it)

Axion has nothing to do with Kid Radd. It is a homage to old 2D space fighter games where your ship had the power (through power-ups) to destroy all enemies on the screen.
The 1-hit comes from the same source I believe: normally all it took was 1 shot to kill you except for if you got a shield or forcefield, in which case you could take an additional hit before being destroyed.