Tuesday, May 26, 2015

R.I.P. Vs. System


Remember in Iron Man 2, when they replaced whatshisname in the role of Rhodey with Don Cheadle? No big deal, right? It was actually an upgrade. Imagine if they had replaced Robert Downey Jr. with another actor but filmed the movie as if it were the same guy. A little weird, but a good actor/director/script combination could pull it off, I suppose. Now imagine that they replaced Downey with an actress, changed Tony Stark to Tonya, inserted a bunch of retconned flashback scenes that were supposedly from the first movie but showed Tonya as "Iron Man" instead of Tony, then generally pretended that we wouldn't notice the difference. Yeah, probably would have been best not to name that second movie Iron Man 2 and call it a sequel.


That's kind of how I feel about the news that came out today from Upper Deck concerning "Vs. System 2PCG". If for some reason you read my blog but haven't kept up with the announcements, they posted an "FAQ" last week about the new version of the game. (The news about the official name actually came a couple of days earlier, when they created a Facebook page for it, containing nothing but a logo image. Come to think of it, I first saw the page when it didn't even have the logo, but I digress.) If you haven't seen it, the FAQ is here. The FAQ was something of a disappointment, in that it answered a few basic questions but left all the bigger ones unanswered. It ended with a promise of far more detailed information about rule changes in the near future, and said that this update "should be posted the week following Memorial Day." Cynic that I am, I interpreted that to mean Friday the 29th by midnight, or maybe even Sunday, with multiple delays and postponements a very real possibility.

So I was pleasantly surprised when I checked Facebook this evening and learned that they had already posted the promised update, by the end of the first business day of the week. I was far less happy about what was in it, but before I get to that, let's give credit where it is due. The old UDE was almost never this open and certainly never this punctual. I don't know if VS2PCG is a game that I will like enough to play regularly, but if it is, I now am more inclined to believe that they have learned from past mistakes in dealing with the player community and will be better caretakers of the game than they were the first time around. A modest round of applause is in order here.

Now for the bad news, at least in my estimation. This is not a tweaked/simplified version of the old game, in my view. It's not a dumbed down version of it, either. Nor is it really a reboot. It's a brand new superhero card game that took some of its ideas from an earlier game with a similar name and concept. Time will tell whether this is a good thing or a bad thing, but it is most definitely not what I (or I think anyone else) was expecting when they made their announcement at GenCon 2014 that Vs. System was back.

At the time, they said that they were going to keep the game the same, but change the distribution model from that of a collectible card game sold in booster packs to that of a playing (nay, Living!) card game sold in complete sets, somewhat like the Hellboy set, but significantly larger. They did confess that old cards would not be legal, but the impression at the time was that they were doing that just to give themselves a clean slate, so they wouldn't have to worry about whether their new 4 drop Captain America was grossly overpowered when played in a deck containing cards from MEV, MUN, et al. Until fairly recently, folks were under the impression that new cards could be played together with old ones on the kitchen table, if nothing else. Uhh, no.

The poorly named Vs. System 2PCG is vastly different from the old game. Today's update contained a section that listed the things that are the same as in Vs. System, and if you just read that list it does sound like there are lots of similarities. Rows, formations, resources, flight, range, stunned characters, recovery phase, plot twists, locations, power-ups, team attacks--so many similarities! Then you read the rest of it and you realize that the differences are far more numerous, and vastly more significant.

There is no more endurance, for example, no more counting down from 50 to 0. Each character has a Health value, and when your main character goes down from 5 or 6 Health to 0, you lose. But wait, I don't lose just because I went to 0, do I? What about my attack step? Yeah, you don't have one, at least not on my turn. There is no more shared turn, no concept of initiative, no alternating attack steps, no stun damage (per se), no breakthrough, no attacking your opponent directly. You attack opposing characters to wound them and thereby lower their health.

On my turn, I get to draw, and you don't. I get to set resources; you don't. I get to attack; you don't. It sounds like they've taken steps to try to limit the inherent advantage of going first, but it's still going to be there, no matter what. The player going second will always be playing catch up. If I go first, then on my turn X I will have drawn two more cards than you did up through turn X-1 (assuming no cards drawn due to effects), and that tips the odds in my favor. It just does. [NOTE: After I wrote this, we learned that the player going first does not draw for his first turn. Hopefully that will mitigate some of the advantage of going first.]

Does that mean this card game will be less skill-based and more luck-based than the old one? Absolutely. And intentionally so. People who knew people who knew people inside UDE back in the day have been saying for a while now that this was coming, and they were right. One of the perceived barriers to entry for new players back then was that new players could rarely beat more experienced players, even if they were given comparable decks to play. It was just too easy to make a critical mistake in the formation step, or to make poor choices during your attack step. A new player would form haphazardly, or waste attack pumps on turn 3 that they would need later to avoid being brickwalled on turn 5. He would fail to account for the cards that his opponent, playing Good Guys, was likely to already have or could get with Kooey. Or she would play all her copies of Savage Beatdown while attacking a character with evasion. Since these noobs could never win, the story goes, they would quickly lose interest in the game and move on (or back) to a game where they could lucksack their way to victory fairly often, like Yugioh.

Depending on your point of view, this was the worst thing about the game, or the best. People in the first camp didn't buy cards, unfortunately. Upper Deck wanted their money too. They already had ours.

So anyway, for me, this is the day that Vs. System 1 PCG truly died. Sure, there was a long gap between the day in early 2009 that it was cancelled, and the day in 2014 when its return was announced, and sure it seemed plenty dead in the interim. But there was always the hope of resurrection, and just last year it seemed that our prayers had been answered. Today we learned that it was all just a mirage. The game as we have known it all these years is officially dead, at least as far as Upper Deck is concerned. Now a new game with a similar name and some similar concepts has taken its place. The king is dead. Long live the king.

Having said all that, let me add that I have pre-ordered two boxes of this new game, and I don't intend to cancel my order. I will give it a chance. It might be a very good game. But it is not the game I learned to play back in 2006, not even close, so let's all be honest here. They didn't just replace the guy playing Rhodey. They replaced Tony with a chick named Tonya.


Saturday, May 16, 2015

Bizarro World and The Pool of Insanity


One of my favorite decks of all time was the infamous Bizarro World deck that took the Vs. world by storm after DC Legends was released, when the text of Bizarro World was changed to read, "Characters you control named Bizarro have all character names and identities." With a Bizarro World on the field, the already powerful 4 drop Bizarro suddenly had access to a wide range of character-stamped effects: Mystical Paralysis, Force Field Projection, Juggernaut's Helmet, Berserker Rage, Gift Wrapped, and many, many others. For a brief period in late 2007 and early 2008, Bizarro World dominated the Silver Age metagame,

The deck was built on the Checkmate location engine, to guarantee that you could have Bizarro World out by turn 4. The real key to the deck, though, was a single card from MVL that until recently had been considered binder fodder. With all four members of the Fantastic Four on the field, Four Freedoms Plaza could be activated to fetch any card in your deck and put it into your hand. All on his own, Bizarro met that requirement. Fetch a card with FFP. Activate Black Thorn to ready it, and you could do it again. Activate Ahmed to replace it with another copy, and you could do it a third time. This card was the real key to the deck: you could play 1-2 copies of key plot twists and fetch whatever you needed for that turn. Once the engine was up and running, bad draws became non-issues, because you could get whatever you wanted whenever you wanted anyway. Everyone either loved this deck or despised it; no one was indifferent.

The madness peaked at the So Cal Mega-Weekend in February. If you played at that event, you were either playing Bizarro World or playing something you thought could beat it. Or you weren't trying. Along with my son and a friend of ours, we flew from Colorado to Los Angeles for the event, which was one of the last big tournaments before the game died. Lots of great players were there, and plenty of fun people I had been chatting with online for years. It was a wonderful weekend, which got even better when I made the top 8. Of course, my deck completely crapped out on me at the point. It had been incredibly consistent throughout the tournament, but suddenly I either couldn't draw Ahmed or couldn't meet his loyalty requirements. Crash and burn. Patrick Yapjoco won with a better build than mine, though, so I had no room to complain.

UDE had had a large contingent of people at the event, to witness first-hand what they had wrought. A couple of weeks later, they responded with rule 201.8b: "Some cards check if you control more than one named character. Characters with multiple names can satisfy only one of these checks." With that, Four Freedoms Plaza was no longer playable in Bizarro World decks, and without it the deck was a shadow of its former self. I never saw anyone play the deck after that.

Seven years later I found myself missing my old deck, and I decided to see if I could build something fun to play and reasonably competitive that didn't need Plaza. After a few unsatisfying false starts, I hit on an idea that I instantly loved, a Bizarro World cocktail with an Insanity-laced twist. Whereas the old version was a model of consistency, this one would be a model of serendipity. 48 cards would form the base deck. The remaining 12 would come from The Pool of Insanity, made up of 24 cards, all of them unique. Before each match you separate all the cards into two piles of 48 and 24. Shuffle the 24 cards face down, and pick 12. These 12 then get shuffled in with the base deck to form a regular 60 card deck, while the other 12 get set aside. The result is a crossbreed of the old Bizarro World deck and an Insanity deck, since you never know which 12 cards you are going to get. I have to say, it's unquestionably one of my better ideas.
Base Deck - 48 
Characters - 24

[1 - 6]
3x Connie Webb, Knight (Checkmate)
2x Alexander Luthor, Duplicitous Doppelganger (Villains)
1x Boris, Personal Servant of Dr. Doom (Doom)
[2 - 4]
4x Black Thorn, Elizabeth Thorne (Checkmate)
[3 - 4]
4x Ahmed Samsarra, White King (Checkmate)
[4 - 6]
4x Bizarro, ME AM BIZARRO #1 (Villains/Revenge Squad)
2x The Captain, Can't Remember His Real Name (Nextwave)
[5 - 2]
1x Lex Luthor, Metropolis Mogul (Injustice Gang, Revenge Squad)
1x Talia, Daughter of Madness (Villains/League)
[6 - 2]
1x Bizarro, Bizarro World's Finest (Revenge Squad)
1x Huntress, Reluctant Queen (Checkmate)

Plot Twists - 4

[3 - 4]
4x Enemy of My Enemy 
Locations - 17

[1 - 1]
1x Doomstadt, Castle Doom
[2 - 11]
3x Brother I Satellite
2x Bizarro World
2x Checkmate Safe House, Team-Up
1x 31st Century Metropolis, Team-Up
1x Dr. Fate's Tower
1x Checkmate Armory
1x Soul World
[3 - 4]
2x Brother Eye
1x Poseidonis
1x The Science Spire
[4 - 1]
1x The Great Arena 
Equipment - 3

[0 - 3]
1x Cloak of Nabu
1x Juggernaut's Helmet
1x Captain America's Shield, Unique * Badge of Courage 
Pool of Insanity - 24 
Plot Twists - 20

[1 - 1]
1x Warp Shards
[2 - 1]
1x Follow the Leader
[3 - 8]
1x Berserker Rage
1x Healing Factor
1x Bodyslide
1x Adamantium Claws
1x Force Field Projection
1x Iron Extraction
1x Gift Wrapped
1x X-Gene Decoded
[4 - 8]
1x Concussive Force
1x Hulk Smash
1x Fury of the Amazons
1x Unstoppable
1x Righteous Anger
1x You Dare? Epic
1x Mystical Paralysis
1x From the Darkness
[5 - 2]
1x Indestructible
1x Wave of Destruction 
Locations - 2

[3 - 1]
1x Neverland
[4 - 1]
1x Genosha 
Equipment - 2

[0 - 2]
1x Muramasa Blade
1x Hulkbuster Armor
Through turn 3, the deck plays like any other Checkmate-centric deck. Connie Webb is a great play on 1, Black Thorn on 2, and Ahmed on 3. If you already have Ahmed, Alexander Luthor is also a good play on 1. Boris should be saved for later unless you have Doomstadt.

Turn 4 is where things get interesting. On this turn you always want the 4 drop Bizarro if at all possible, since he allows you to flip Bizarro World and open Pandora's Box of Chocolates. The only other decent play is The Captain. He's OK, in that you can give him the name you need to play Mystical Paralysis, or whatever, but there's no point in naming him Bizarro until turn 5, because he's not Revenge Squad.

Quick digression before we continue. Once Bizarro is face up on the field along with Bizarro World, he has all names. If you later want to recruit a second card named Bizarro, you can. Say you want to recruit a second copy on turn 5. You place his recruit on the chain, and a check for uniqueness is performed. The first one has all names, while the second one has only the name Bizarro, so there is no match on names since an exact match is needed for the uniqueness rule to kick in. The second one comes into play alongside the first, and now he has all names as well. Because of this, you can play a Bizarro on every turn from 4 on if you want.

There are LOTS of options for turn 5. The standard play is a second copy of Bizarro. If necessary, you can play Alexander Luthor, use his effect to get Bizarro, and then recruit him. Or you can play Boris and The Captain, who is a decent play once you have Bizarro World flipped. Boris can get you a good plot twist to compensate for the underdrop. You can play Lex Luthor if you need to shut down troublesome opposing characters with activated powers. You can play Talia and then discard that Boris to bring him into play for free. Or you can play a 4 drop and use your fifth resource point on Checkmate Armory to fetch an equipment. The fact that the 4 drop Bizarro has 11 ATK on his own means that you can go in any number of directions without feeling the need to curve out, especially when he is so easily given a continuous ATK boost with Juggernaut's Helmet or Doomstadt. It's not hard at all to give him 19 ATK.

Turn 6 can be a 5 drop and a 1, of course, but the normal play is the 6 drop Bizarro. His effect can make attacking a bit tricky, even if you are on your preferred even initiatives, but all the Bizarros have flight, so it's usually not a problem to have your opponent choose who attacks next. You just need to be sure to activate Ahmed before your attack step. Huntress is also an option, but normally she should be treated as a plot twist. The deck runs out of gas fast after turn 6, but most matches will end by then, one way or another, so plan accordingly.

Apart from four copies of Enemy, the rest of the base deck is mainly locations. Checkmate Safe House and 31st Century Metropolis are your team-ups, with the latter being especially good when you have The Captain on the field. Brother I Satellite is the go-to tutor once you are teamed up. Brother Eye is a reusable attack pump, and Checkmate Armory is a great card to have on turn 5 when you've just recruited Bizarro or The Captain.

Soul World can be used to get back needed character cards. Dr. Fate's Tower can fetch a Cloak for Ahmed or transfer equipment from one Bizarro to another. The Science Spire can be used to save you from a king kill, or to let you dig for cards on the final turn of the game by bouncing Ahmed or a stunned character.

The others are all character-stamped effects. Doomstadt gives all your Bizarros +3 ATK. Poseidonis gives you a way to reuse cards from the KO pile. But the best of these locations is The Great Arena, as my son proved last night when he was playing this deck against me and my Instant Replay deck. On my turn 4 init, he had Bizarro with Cap's Shield, Black Thorn, and Great Arena. In the build phase, he activated Arena to exhaust my 4, then readied Bizarro with the Shield and Arena with Thorn. He then exhausted my 3 and nuked my init entirely. We both took some burn, but I was going to KO his Bizarro if I had gotten to attack, so the game took a huge swing at that point.

The other two cards in the base are Juggernaut's Helmet, which can turn Bizarro into a 16 ATK behemoth, and Captain America's Shield (the MEQ version). As illustrated above, this card is beastly in this deck. Off inits you can use it to ready Bizarro after exhausting him for Arena, and on-init you can use it to get two attacks out of him. If it wasn't unique, I'd probably play two copies of it in the base. It is that good.

As I indicated before, The Pool of Insanity is a collection of 24 one-of cards, of which you will play half of them in any one match. Some of these, like Berserker Rage, are so good you will be tempted to move them to the base, but I really think it adds to the fun of the deck to have 1/5 of the deck be selected randomly. Anyway, these cards fall into several groups.

Hulk Smash is probably the best of the attack pumps. +8 ATK is darned good, although Adamantium Claws is probably just as good if you have a way to attack twice with a single Bizarro. Fury of the Amazons gives +4/+4 for a single attack, which can help keep Bizarro from stunning back. Follow the Leader can also keep him upright. Berserker Rage and Righteous Anger both let Bizarro attack twice, while Unstoppable lets a single Bizarro take out two characters in one attack. Late in the game, Hulkbuster Armor is better than Juggernaut's Helmet, and Muramasa Blade can turn Bizarro into a 13 ATK monster who knocks out whoever he stuns.

Lots of good defensive cards. Indestructible keeps Bizarro from being stunned by an attacker. Force Field Projection negates an attack entirely. Mystical Paralysis and Gift Wrapped let you exhaust one specific character, while Concussive Force lets you exhaust two of your opponent's choosing. If you know what character your opponent is about to recruit, you can use Neverland to force him to enter play exhausted. From the Darkness negates an opponent's plot twist. In our match last night, it may have won my son the game. I was going to play two copies of Flying Kick on Grace, The Bouncer, so she could take out both 6 drop Bizarro and Lex, but one of them got negated, so I got only one attack out of her, and he got in an extra attack that turn.

Several other cards are good for creating or maintaining board advantage. Iron Extraction lets you KO someone that Bizarro stunned. Healing Factor lets you recover him and gain endurance. Bodyslide lets you move Bizarro out of the way on your opponent's init and then bring him back to attack during your attack step. Warp Shards can be used to either move a troublesome opposing character out of the way, or to effectively recover one of yours (on the following turn).

The remaining cards are kind of a hodge podge. Genosha is a great play on the final turn of the game, or on turn 7 generally, to dig for more useful cards. Wave of Destruction can obliterate an opponent's row. You Dare is good against weenie decks, but can also be used to ensure that larger attackers get stunned back by smaller defenders. And X-Gene Decoded is a wonderfully random effect that can ruin an opponent's future plans by getting rid of key plot twists.

If you are looking for a really fun deck that is reasonably competitive, look no farther. This deck is a blast to play, and it holds its own against any deck that isn't crazy fast or wildly broken. And there is lots of room for customization. Feel free to move cards in or out of the base deck as you see fit, and to replace cards in the Pool of Insanity that you don't like with others that you do. This version may not be as powerful or consistent as the original, but it's got everything that was good about that deck and then some.