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After you play a spell that has the Arcane trait, you may examine the bottom card of your deck; if it is a spell (□ or an ally), you may put in on top of your deck (□ or add it to your hand; discard the top or bottom card of your deck if you do).(I'm unsure whether the top or bottom would be better; they both have their merits) This way Radillo still keeps her hand size large while she's playing her spells and can still have the sam type of feel, but she must be cautious and not kill herself.
That feels painfully expensive. 99% of the time it isn't worth throwing away a random (potentially better) card from your deck just to get another card from your deck that you would have gotten eventually anyway. I still think that making Spell recharging step 1 of hand resetting fixes this without any change to her powers. And closes the exploit for all of the other Wizards as well. The only negative ramifications I see is that it makes the Wizards slightly more squishy, but they're Wizards. They are supposed to be squishy. And if a recharge of a spell card mid-turn was the only thing between you and death, you shouldn't have been exploring.
99% of the time it isn't worth throwing away a random (potentially better) card from your deck just to get another card from your deck that you would have gotten eventually anyway.
You're kidding, right? You don't think discarding a card from your deck to draw a card can be frequently good? Admittedly, you'd want to be careful and probably have a healer around, but seriously. Getting cards in your hand at no expense to your hand is crazy good. Certainly better than discarding a card to draw a card.
But that isn't to say that you're not correct about the cost being too high.
I don't think that changing the core rules just to fix Radillo is a good idea. I still think one of these two would be best.
Once per turn, after you play a spell that has the Arcane trait, you may examine the bottom card of your deck; if it is a spell (□ or an ally), you may put in on top of your deck (□ or add it to your hand).
After you play a spell that has the Arcane trait, you may examine the bottom card of your deck; if it is a spell (□ or an ally), you may put in on top of your deck (□ or discard a card to add it to your hand instead).
The problem is that Radillo isn't the only broken character in this way. She's just much easier to exploit. Ezren & Melindra are also broken in a very similar way. Basically any mechanic that allows you to cast a spell to draw a spell presents this exact problem. That was the fundamental problem with Restoration: You could cast, recharge, cast, recharge, etc forever. You can do the same thing with Ezren with smart deck & hand management. It is just more challenging. But fill his deck with Detect Magics, Auguries & Scries and boom. He can spend his turn looking through any one deck fully, finding villains or henchmen, seeing if the boons are worth it and leaving the one bad guy you want to encounter on top. Nerfing Radillo doesn't fix the underlying issue.
IF that's a big enough concern to fix (and I'm not saying it is or isn't), I still think the correct way to go would be errata-ing the cards, not the base rules. It's a matter of power level, not one of rules ambiguity, so the problem is in the cards, not the game.
You could easily change Radillo's power to be "When you play a spell that has the Arcane trait, after you attempt the check to recharge it you may examine the bottom card of your deck; if it is a spell (□ or an ally), you may put it on top of your deck (□ or add it to your hand)." But that actually only makes it worse. Now it becomes "Play Augury. Recharge Augury. Examine bottom card, it is Augury. Add Augury to my hand."
Ezren and Melindra I don't see as a problem, unless I'm missing something. Their power is always effecting the top card of his deck, which is very hard to control. The only way to guarantee it to be the card they wanted would be to discard/bury/banish lots of cards so their character deck was really thinned out, thus probably really risking death. I don't consider anything an exploit if it gives you a serious risk of dying.
RPG Superstar 2011 Top 32
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Yeah, I think the issue is really specific to Radillo because of the ease of controlling the bottom card of your deck. You can control the top card through card counting and manipulating discards/buries, but that takes a heck of a lot more effort, whereas recharge effects are common and thus controlling your bottom card is trivial.
That's what i thought about Ezren and Melindra as well.
And Hawk, I also think that change would be worse. Imagine Scrying if you could make it so you don't fail the recharge (Cat and Robe of Runes?). That ability would turn scrying into more or less "Sort all the location decks as you see fit."
Let's go back a second to the idea of shuffling before examining. Orbis, you said the issue would be that Radillo could guarantee she'd get a spell (or ally), if I understood you right. Let us assume she isn't going to risk death. She keeps her hand size at 6 and takes two upgrades to her examine/draw power. She puts all card feats in spells and allies.
So, now she only has 2 items and 3 blessings. If she eliminates those by discarding/burying, she'll be guaranteed to get to top deck or draw the card she examines, even after shuffling. But she won't have anyway to control what it is that I can see. Plus it will only leave her 4 cards in her character deck to draw. That is a bit risky for death isn't it? She just has to loose a few checks or non-check-to-defeat damage and she might kill herself. Of course, he turn might not end assuming she could cycle enough with some Haste, Augury/S crying and Teleport.
So, first am I figuring that right? Second, does it really sound too powerful?
Let's go back a second to the idea of shuffling before examining. Orbis, you said the issue would be that Radillo could guarantee she'd get a spell (or ally), if I understood you right. Let us assume she isn't going to risk death. She keeps her hand size at 6 and takes two upgrades to her examine/draw power. She puts all card feats in spells and allies.
So, now she only has 2 items and 3 blessings. If she eliminates those by discarding/burying, she'll be guaranteed to get to top deck or draw the card she examines, even after shuffling. But she won't have anyway to control what it is that I can see. Plus it will only leave her 4 cards in her character deck to draw. That is a bit risky for death isn't it? She just has to loose a few checks or non-check-to-defeat damage and she might kill herself. Of course, he turn might not end assuming she could cycle enough with some Haste, Augury/S crying and Teleport.
So, first am I figuring that right? Second, does it really sound too powerful?
Well, you need to remember that she's going to get card feats. With each one she gets further from death with only spells and allies in her deck. Also, while she needs to empty her DECK of items and blessings, she can keep some of them in her hand, leaving even more room in her deck for cards.
As to whether or not it's too powerful, I guess that depends on your opinion of Ezren and Melindra's power, although she has one less card that she can't draw in her deck than they (she can draw allies and spells, they can only draw spells, putting her at 5 "dead" cards and them at 6).
What if she said
After an encounter during which you played a spell that has the Arcane trait, you may examine the bottom card of your deck; if it is a spell (□ or an ally), you may put in on top of your deck (□ or add it to your hand).
This limits it to one card per encounter and no augury/scrying shenanigans.
Seems to me that it works exactly like intended* but cuts out giant turn causing loops.
*The exception is that, if you play a spell like Frost Ray to kill the monster, that same Frost Ray is the card you draw, instead of the card you recharged before that (because it happens after the encounter, which is after the recharge check).
Well, you could just go with "If you play a spell during an encounter that has the Arcane trait, you may...." that would put it back to being the previously recharged card because you'd do it before a recharge check, but also require it to be a card during an encounter.
Well, you could just go with "If you play a spell during an encounter that has the Arcane trait, you may...." that would put it back to being the previously recharged card because you'd do it before a recharge check, but also require it to be a card during an encounter.
If you play a spell during an encounter that has the Arcane trait, you may examine the bottom card of your deck; if it is a spell (□ or an ally), you may put in on top of your deck (□ or add it to your hand).
Ah, excellent. You can still trigger on multiple spells per encounter with this wording (clouds, multiple combat checks), but you can't loop other cards like Augury, Haste, etc. because your hand size drops every time you play them - it will only replenish itself off of spells played DURING the encounter (usually combat spells, although you can still draw the other spells).
I really like this. Elegant, simple, and it changes very little about her and how she plays.
That's a very elegant solution. The best I have seen thus far.
You're kidding, right? You don't think discarding a card from your deck to draw a card can be frequently good? Admittedly, you'd want to be careful and probably have a healer around, but seriously. Getting cards in your hand at no expense to your hand is crazy good. Certainly better than discarding a card to draw a card.
I'm guess our difference of opinions is partially down to player count. In my RotR game we always had a healer. But it was a 6 player game so she was good for 1 or 2 heals every 6 turns, at the expense of explores that were needed to close locations. And with 5 other characters, one person couldn't count on getting those heals. Healing was good but not good enough to just throw random cards away without a very compelling reason and there are few, if any Arcane spells that I wanted in my hand that badly.
You're kidding, right? You don't think discarding a card from your deck to draw a card can be frequently good? Admittedly, you'd want to be careful and probably have a healer around, but seriously. Getting cards in your hand at no expense to your hand is crazy good. Certainly better than discarding a card to draw a card.I'm guess our difference of opinions is partially down to player count. In my RotR game we always had a healer. But it was a 6 player game so she was good for 1 or 2 heals every 6 turns, at the expense of explores that were needed to close locations. And with 5 other characters, one person couldn't count on getting those heals. Healing was good but not good enough to just throw random cards away without a very compelling reason and there are few, if any Arcane spells that I wanted in my hand that badly.
Ah, that could be it. You put a much higher value on healing / higher detriment to daking damage than I (because of that).
I don't think the game is balanced at 5 or 6 players, although it still works. Same with one player. I think the game works best at 3 players, second best at 4 players, okay at 2 players, and poorly at any other number. At moderate numbers there is a higher level of strategy and more turns per character (making them more involved), among other things, I feel.
If I was organizing an OP event, for instance, and six players were there, I would organize two games of three players, all other things being equal.
I'm guess our difference of opinions is partially down to player count. In my RotR game we always had a healer. But it was a 6 player game so she was good for 1 or 2 heals every 6 turns, at the expense of explores that were needed to close locations. And with 5 other characters, one person couldn't count on getting those heals. Healing was good but not good enough to just throw random cards away without a very compelling reason and there are few, if any Arcane spells that I wanted in my hand that badly.
Have you ever played with Seoni? She essential has a more restrictive (in terms of spell selection) and weaker (compared to high level attack spells)but more reliable version of this power and she uses it all the time.
Have you ever played with Seoni? She essential has a more restrictive (in terms of spell selection) and weaker (compared to high level attack spells)but more reliable version of this power and she uses it all the time.
I'm guess our difference of opinions is partially down to player count. In my RotR game we always had a healer. But it was a 6 player game so she was good for 1 or 2 heals every 6 turns, at the expense of explores that were needed to close locations. And with 5 other characters, one person couldn't count on getting those heals. Healing was good but not good enough to just throw random cards away without a very compelling reason and there are few, if any Arcane spells that I wanted in my hand that badly.
I can see what you're saying. Discarding a card to create an attack spell is similiar to discarding a card from your deck to draw an attack spell that will be recharged.
But Seoni's would be worse for your reasons and because her hand size would drop, unlike this proposed version of Radillo's (which I don't like near as much as the encounter idea, that one seems really solid to me).
I agree that seoni's is way worse. My point is that it is way worse AND Seoni uses it all the time. In other words, yes, it really is good.
This is what happens when I try to agree with you ;)
I think Seoni's power is better for a few reasons:
1. Seoni picks the card to discard from her hand. To me that is always preferable to a random card from my deck. You'll never accidentally discard a better spell/item/ally than you want to. And you'll be able to use weaker boons you acquire which Radillo wouldn't be, without first discarding then healing then getting lucky and having that card on top/second from bottom of her deck.
2. It is always available. If she explores and hits a monster without an Attack spell she still has a shot. If Radillo does the same, she's screwed, unless the explore was triggered by a haste. And even then she'd have to be lucky enough to have a good attack spell on the bottom of her deck.
Plus Seoni still gets those better spells. I agree that Radillo cycling them back into her hand is better than Seoni recharging and waiting for them to come back up, but Radillo will eventually fail that recharge on higher level spells and then it would end in her discard along with the rest of the spells and items and allies she discarded cycling it into her hand. And since those are from your deck they are better cards on average than the acquired cards Seoni discarded.
Eh, unless the devs decide to go with that fix (which I doubt) it's a moot point anyway.
I agree that seoni's is way worse. My point is that it is way worse AND Seoni uses it all the time. In other words, yes, it really is good.
This is what happens when I try to agree with you ;)
I knew you were agreeing with me. I was backing up your backing me up with expanded arguments. :P
Anyone have anything new to add?
And what do you guys think about the encounter solution (seems to be good) being applied to Ezren and Melindra? I know some are concerned with them having a power similiar to Radillo's.
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I'm really confused on Ezren and Melindra. They don't have anything like Radillo. They can get their top card, they can't stack their top card or anything. Why is anyone trying to change theirs? They're Wizards, they have card draw. So what?
I may disagree with modifying Radillo at all, but I can see why people want to. With Ezren and Melindra, I really don't see it. It seems to me like people are just trying to change things that sound like they might be almost kinda sorta similiar sounding to something else they want changed.
The theory is that they can reduce their deck to just spells and turbo on.
I don't think it's that big an issue, personally. RotR Ezren has been out for a year now and it's never come up.
That being said, would it be that big an issue if they DID apply this to Ezren and Melindra? I don't think it would.
Personally, though, I just want to see a change to Radillo. For now I'm totally fine with Ezren and Melindra.
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I'd say they already have a cost -- they have to knock out half their deck to do it.
Yes there is an issue. Not with the gameplay, but with the fact that it'd be Paizo making unnecessary changes because a handful of people complained about something that isn't even an issue, and never had been before.
I'd say they already have a cost -- they have to knock out half their deck to do it.
Yes there is an issue. Not with the gameplay, but with the fact that it'd be Paizo making unnecessary changes because a handful of people complained about something that isn't even an issue, and never had been before.
No one's complaining, but rather voicing a concern that Ezren and Melindra could perhaps go bonkers like Radillo can now. Radillo DOES need a fix, and some people were voicing the fears that Ezren and Melindra are fairly similiar, if not as good at it. For all we know (without testing), Ezren and Melindra can be ridiculous if played this way, just no one ever thought of it before. It could happen.
No one is demanding Ezren and Melindra get fixed. We're asking that Radillo get fixed and wondering if that means that Ezren and Melindra should be too. IF it's unnecessary, then Paizo shouldn't make the changes. But what makes you so sure it's unnecessary?
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Please don't take this wrong, I'm sincerely asking. Why is it such a big deal to you if Paizo issues power level errata instead of just clarification errata? You *seem* (I could be misreading) to have this mindset that asking for a power level errata is insulting in some way, whether to other players or to Paizo, or who else I don't know.
Again, I'm not trying to come off as rude. I'd like to try and understand your viewpoint, and correct any misconceptions I probably have.
To me, power level errata for this type of thing (Radillo, Restoration) and not just strong characters (like Lini's d4+x to all checks) is nothing but healthy for the game. I don't see why you wouldn't want any.
My apologies if I'm coming off as insulting or offensive in any way.
Oh, and not just Andrew K - if anyone else is reading this and hates this type of errata, please, speak up. I don't get it.
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I'm all for power errata, if it's needed. Restoration required such an exact deck listing that it wasn't really something that needed a change in my opinion. For Ezren and Melindra, we've had the power for a year, I doubt no one has tried it. The fact that it took a year for people to bring it up tells me it probably isn't much of an issue.
My issue with Radillo is that people are trying to change her before OP has even started. How about we use her in her intended play mode first before we start calling for such a big change. If it causes a problem, I'll be all for a change.
It's not the find it insulting, it's that I find it unnecessary and some of it (like Restoration and Ezren/Melindra) a complete waste of Paizo's time when they could be doing something to actually improve the game. And, if I remember correctly, they specifically said they would't change Restoration --- then they did. That really did upset me because nothing had changed between them saying they wouldn't, and then doing it.
I'd say they already have a cost -- they have to knock out half their deck to do it.
Yes there is an issue. Not with the gameplay, but with the fact that it'd be Paizo making unnecessary changes because a handful of people complained about something that isn't even an issue, and never had been before.
The real culprit, if you want to call it that, is Augury. You can cast it without any potential downside, so long as you know you can recharge it. So, theoretically, Ezren could whittle his deck down to one Augury and have another one in his hand. Cast Augury, draw Augury, recharge Augury. If you throw in a Haste, Ezren can encounter a card that he wants and then return to the Augury cycling.
In a horribly inefficient way, you could examine all the cards in the deck and get the ones you want to acquire or defeat. Meanwhile, the other players wander off and Ezren is near death at the end. So a fix here would maybe be overkill. Radillo can do the same shenanigans without thinning her deck.
I know I'm repeating what other people said :)
By the way, we're still monitoring this thread. Sometimes if we don't reply, we're in the data gathering mode ourselves. But we are listening.
I'm all for power errata, if it's needed. Restoration required such an exact deck listing that it wasn't really something that needed a change in my opinion. For Ezren and Melindra, we've had the power for a year, I doubt no one has tried it. The fact that it took a year for people to bring it up tells me it probably isn't much of an issue.
My issue with Radillo is that people are trying to change her before OP has even started. How about we use her in her intended play mode first before we start calling for such a big change. If it causes a problem, I'll be all for a change.
It's not the find it insulting, it's that I find it unnecessary and some of it (like Restoration and Ezren/Melindra) a complete waste of Paizo's time when they could be doing something to actually improve the game. And, if I remember correctly, they specifically said they would't change Restoration --- then they did. That really did upset me because nothing had changed between them saying they wouldn't, and then doing it.
Ah, okay. Thanks for sharing.
On Restoration - I understand not needing it at first (before Robe of Runes was brought up), but I don't think Resto, Robe of Runes, and Staff of minor healing is that specific of a deck... My main reason for bring it up in the first place was because of the fear of limitation it put up on design space. If they ever made a card like Robe of Restoration (which they did), then the original Restoration would be a problem. (Well, that, and I also posted it as a curosity - just something to talk about. That was the main reason behind the posted decklists)
On Radillo - Perhaps this is just a difference between us, but I see no reason whatsoever to wait for OP to start. I also think that there's not even a need for playtesting here (I know you and even Mike disagree with me here) because I can tell just by looking at it that it works (although I do feel Ezren/Melindra would need playtesting). I am happy to wait for those who feel the playtesting is necessary, but I don't see why we should wait until OP to fix the problem. I think things go worse than this but even at the level of augury and detect magic Radillo is crazy the way she is and makes the game no fun to play whenever a Radillo player gets both in hand and auto passes the recharge checks. The only reason I could see to wait for OP is if there was some difference in the OP rules that invalidated this (there isn't), and even then I would want it changed for non-OP play.
I'd say they already have a cost -- they have to knock out half their deck to do it.
Yes there is an issue. Not with the gameplay, but with the fact that it'd be Paizo making unnecessary changes because a handful of people complained about something that isn't even an issue, and never had been before.
The real culprit, if you want to call it that, is Augury. You can cast it without any potential downside, so long as you know you can recharge it. So, theoretically, Ezren could whittle his deck down to one Augury and have another one in his hand. Cast Augury, draw Augury, recharge Augury. If you throw in a Haste, Ezren can encounter a card that he wants and then return to the Augury cycling.
In a horribly inefficient way, you could examine all the cards in the deck and get the ones you want to acquire or defeat. Meanwhile, the other players wander off and Ezren is near death at the end. So a fix here would maybe be overkill. Radillo can do the same shenanigans without thinning her deck.
I know I'm repeating what other people said :)
I think it goes beyond augury, personally - if for no other reason than that it limits design space. There are so many spell possibilities that wouldn't be viable to add to the game just because of Radillo if she's left the way she is.
By the way, we're still monitoring this thread. Sometimes if we don't reply, we're in the data gathering mode ourselves. But we are listening.
Good to know, thanks for informing us!
I don't think Ezren needs any changes. I've played him successfully through RotR once as Illusionist and I'm up to adventure 4 with him as Evoker. His draw power can be awesome, but make his deck nothing but spells is too risky (plus there are some great items and stuff you'll want anyway).
Radillo, on the other hand, I think could be a problem, even without people TRYING to spam her powers. The Augury/Detect Magic cycle would be pretty easy to stumble upon.
I do agree with the sentiment thought that the best way to know whether something actually happens or not is to test it out. Mike actually asked earlier if anyone had tried it yet. So probably the most helpful we can be is to actually try her out. Just build a location or two, draw her hand size and play for a bit. How long before you get Detect Magic/Augury both in your hand? Does anything stop you from cycling them? Give a try and see what happens.
And yeah, if we are going to suggest solutions, we should also be willing to test them out. Which I'm still hoping to do this weekend.
Also, just want to say, I still love all these characters and all the awesome things they can do and how they are all different but similar in their class. Great job on this. I can't wait to actually get the physical products.
Radillo, on the other hand, I think could be a problem, even without people TRYING to spam her powers. The Augury/Detect Magic cycle would be pretty easy to stumble upon.
Why are you so much better at wording this stuff? That's exactly my point on some of this, when I'm talking about people not trying for it or whatever. It's very easy to simply have Radillo & +3 Int & Augury & Detect magic or any divine caster & Resto & Robe of runes & Staff or S&S Lini + Toad & Resto. It's easy to just stumble upon it.
Radillo, on the other hand, I think could be a problem, even without people TRYING to spam her powers. The Augury/Detect Magic cycle would be pretty easy to stumble upon.
I do agree with the sentiment thought that the best way to know whether something actually happens or not is to test it out. Mike actually asked earlier if anyone had tried it yet. So probably the most helpful we can be is to actually try her out. Just build a location or two, draw her hand size and play for a bit. How long before you get Detect Magic/Augury both in your hand? Does anything stop you from cycling them? Give a try and see what happens.
And yeah, if we are going to suggest solutions, we should also be willing to test them out. Which I'm still hoping to do this weekend.
It's not that I'm unwilling to test them out (I know you weren't necessarily aiming that at me), I just don't feel it's necessary with some combos (I don't, which isn't relevant to the game devs). But that doesn't mean I won't try them. I usually can't until the weekends though. And this weekend I probably won't have time.
My lack of desire to see playtest evidence could just be me having so much experience with working out combos in various card games even just in my head. It's kind of a hobby, actually. I've spent so much time just brainstorming about card games... And it is seriously trivial to get combos in a 15 card deck compared to a 40+.
...I do a lot of rambling on these forums, don't I? >.<
Radillo, on the other hand, I think could be a problem, even without people TRYING to spam her powers. The Augury/Detect Magic cycle would be pretty easy to stumble upon.Why are you so much better at wording this stuff? That's exactly my point on some of this, when I'm talking about people not trying for it or whatever. It's very easy to simply have Radillo & +3 Int & Augury & Detect magic or any divine caster & Resto & Robe of runes & Staff or S&S Lini + Toad & Resto. It's easy to just stumble upon it.
Radillo, on the other hand, I think could be a problem, even without people TRYING to spam her powers. The Augury/Detect Magic cycle would be pretty easy to stumble upon.
I do agree with the sentiment thought that the best way to know whether something actually happens or not is to test it out. Mike actually asked earlier if anyone had tried it yet. So probably the most helpful we can be is to actually try her out. Just build a location or two, draw her hand size and play for a bit. How long before you get Detect Magic/Augury both in your hand? Does anything stop you from cycling them? Give a try and see what happens.
And yeah, if we are going to suggest solutions, we should also be willing to test them out. Which I'm still hoping to do this weekend.
It's not that I'm unwilling to test them out (I know you weren't necessarily aiming that at me), I just don't feel it's necessary with some combos (I don't, which isn't relevant to the game devs). But that doesn't mean I won't try them. I usually can't until the weekends though. And this weekend I probably won't have time.
My lack of desire to see playtest evidence could just be me having so much experience with working out combos in various card games even just in my head. It's kind of a hobby, actually. I've spent so much time just brainstorming about card games... And it is seriously trivial to get combos in a 15 card deck compared to a 40+.
...I do a lot of rambling...
Yeah, that is fine. I'm not saying YOU in particular are or aren't doing anything. Just that if we want to help, a great way to do that is testing things out.
We are all rambling because we are going through PACG withdraw. Over use of forums is one of the symptoms.
I did a short game of "Aproach to Thistletop", the Scenario after gaining your first Power-Feat, using two Copies each of Augury and Detect Magic.
To get a Copy of both on my Hand took me 6 Rounds, in which i closed the first Location.
Closing the second Location took me 11 Augury/Detect Cycles with the first three Cycles each removed a Boon.
The third Location had the Villain on top, so now new insight from there. I just spend another 10 Turns to get a second Damage-spell back from my Discard-Pile.
For the Risks of the Cycle you start with a 20% Failure- Chance to recharge Augury, even with both Skill-Feats in Intelligence which will stay around until Adventure-Deck 2 (in RotR). My exeptionally bad Dice-Luck made sure I had to use both Toads to keep the Cycle running.
I don't see any Cards breaking the Cycle, since you only interact with Cards of the Deck you want to.
My Problems with this are:
First you start with precious little Spells left to deal with Villains/ Henchmen so you better have someone to take care of that.
Second I wanted to know how many cycles it would take to bring the Villain/ Henchman to Top. So I made a simple Ten-Cards Deck and simulated using Augury over and over to search for Monsters. After almost 20 times shuffeling, with seeing the same 8 Cards I decided I could finish a Location faster by regular means.
Maybe I run a few more abstract Tests to see how long it takes on average.
While a single abstract and ingame Test make for poor Information, I got the feeling that this Cycle works reasonable well but is timewise really unreliable and will probably be really boring even to the Player who tries it.
If I would have to make a Change to Radillos Power, I would probably add the Card to the Players Hand before he resets it instead of directly after he checked it.
We are all rambling because we are going through PACG withdraw. Over use of forums is one of the symptoms.
So much this.
I will also try to test Radillo in a few games this weekend.
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Ah, okay. Thanks for sharing.On Restoration - I understand not needing it at first (before Robe of Runes was brought up), but I don't think Resto, Robe of Runes, and Staff of minor healing is that specific of a deck...
I must be misremembering then, I remember you giving a full delay,almost all of which was vital. I still don't necessarily agree that telling people they can't make the game boring for teammates is better than telling them they shouldn't. I'm not a fan of functional erratas, but I do understand they have a purpose. My beliefs of when they have a purpose though are much more limited than others'.
I do agree with the sentiment thought that the best way to know whether something actually happens or not is to test it out. Mike actually asked earlier if anyone had tried it yet. So probably the most helpful we can be is to actually try her out. Just build a location or two, draw her hand size and play for a bit. How long before you get Detect Magic/Augury both in your hand? Does anything stop you from cycling them? Give a try and see what happens.
Just to elaborate on this a bit: Let's say, hypothetically, that the designers and the players all knew that a complex thing should be changed. That would not be the end of the investigative process. When we know how likely a problematical thing occurs, we can know the severity of the issue. We can know specific points at which the game suffers, such as whether it occurs more often early in the game or late. We can know whether other people enjoy that the problematical thing occurs, and what the consequence of removing it is.
So even if you know for sure that something should change, play it and tell us what happened. Then we'll know what we need to do to address it.
So even if you know for sure that something should change, play it and tell us what happened. Then we'll know what we need to do to address it.
Mike, I just want to say that I'm impressed that you're following and responding to threads like this one during PAX Dev and PAX Prime. I know you've got a pretty busy itinerary (Heck, I just finished watching you on the Thornwatch Panel thanks to Twitch TV), and I've got the sense that you're keeping pretty busy. So that's pretty rad and all, but if you decided you needed to take a holiday for the rest of the long weekend, I *think* most of us here would understand. :)
I'd say they already have a cost -- they have to knock out half their deck to do it.
I believe that it works with only a couple cards in the discard pile. See my deck list above. I intend to try it when I have my cards available. Ezren should be able to solo 8 locations in 10 to 12 turns. With Teleport it would be 3 to 5 turns.
For Radillo, it is important to get her in the final state before OP begins, preferably with errata included in the first OP adventure. What would happen if someone officially took a feat that no longer exists?
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Mike, I just want to say that I'm impressed that you're following and responding to threads like this one during PAX Dev and PAX Prime. I know you've got a pretty busy itinerary (Heck, I just finished watching you on the Thornwatch Panel thanks to Twitch TV), and I've got the sense that you're keeping pretty busy. So that's pretty rad and all, but if you decided you needed to take a holiday for the rest of the long weekend, I *think* most of us here would understand. :)
I am not familiar with this word "holiday" of which you speak.
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I'd say they already have a cost -- they have to knock out half their deck to do it.I believe that it works with only a couple cards in the discard pile. See my deck list above. I intend to try it when I have my cards available. Ezren should be able to solo 8 locations in 10 to 12 turns. With Teleport it would be 3 to 5 turns.
For Radillo, it is important to get her in the final state before OP begins, preferably with errata included in the first OP adventure. What would happen if someone officially took a feat that no longer exists?
I'm pretty sure you have to give up your character and start with Valeros. :-)
I guess the question to address when asking if Ezren/Melindra or even Radillo need to be errataed is what is the reason for the errata. If the errata is being issued because something is potentially too powerful in a way that will be boring to the rest of the table, can't that simply be handled socially? Is it easier to just ask someone to not be a jerk than to errata the card? The game is non-competitive so it isn't like one player has an advantage over the other. The exploit is really time consuming and boring to exploit meaning that during OP the other players would simply ask you to stop. And if you refused, that is covered by the "Don't Be a Bully" rule.
As far as home play goes, it is VERY easy to just NOT exploit Radillo's power. If you exploit something like this in home play, you're just making the game less fun for yourself. If a player can't avoid doing that, then the problem really isn't Radillo, but is the player.
If, on the other hand, we accept that it is too easy to exploit this power and it needs to be errataed because a malicious player could ruin the fun for other players at the table, that same malicious player could build an Ezren/Melindra deck in OP to accomplish much the same goal, with a little more work. It never happened before simply because nobody had thought to try it because it isn't a fun way to play the game. I imagine most Ezren players were dumping their Detect Magics for better attack spells that seemed more useful for actually completing adventures rather than trying to find ways to exploit the game and suck the fun out of it. It didn't hurt that Detect Magic had the 14/4 misprint that would keep anyone who wasn't reading the errata far away from it.
Anyway, I really need to go pickup my RotR from my friend's house so I can try Ezren to see how well this works...
I did a little bit of playtesting. I skipped right to AP 4 towards the end - I added her in to my other game I was solo-ing (S&S Lini, Amaryllis, Flenta) and built her deck with cards from the box that matched cards I had already acquired as much as possible, and I did a little trading before the scenario. I also gave her the same feats as if she had played through the game with the party.
I wanted to see how bad I could get things. So she had Haste, Scrying, Scorching Ray and Frost Ray, Robe of Runes, a Cat, and misc other things. Her skill feats were all dumped into Intelligence until it was maxed.
It was terrible.
At one point I had two Incendiary Clouds going with a Robe of Runes in hand and I was looping Haste, [attack spell], and Scrying as necessary. I pretty much auto killed everything I ran into at that point. Thank goodness that Haste and Teleport say end of turn.
With an Incendiary cloud to back up her combat spells, she fears no monsters except the one I ran across that was immune to fire and the Ghoulbats or whatever they're called that make you bury magical stuff. the Immune to fire one is only problematic if you have incendiary cloud up and the Ghoulbats are no problem if you have more than one attack spell.
EDIT: Oh yeah, and things like the Siren or Satyr are annoying, but you have a party with you to bless and stuff... Make sure you have Ring of Protection if possible (or Mirror image) for Enchanters and stuff.
Once she doesn't fear combat (d10+9 is dumb), the player can simply scry for barriers and explore into anything else.
The game took me an hour worth of game time on Radillo's turns alone, but only took 13 turns total.
EDIT2: It should be noted that the Lini in my party had two top-decking toads and a Restoration, so it might normally take a few more turns than my game did...
We are all rambling because we are going through PACG withdraw. Over use of forums is one of the symptoms.So much this.
I will also try to test Radillo in a few games this weekend.
I played through five games with Radillo at deck 4 with the Arcane Collector role. I kind of cannibalized my deck from Ezren that I have in the same AP to make sure that I had reasonable to acquire cards, adjusting for the cards that Radillo has available. I had two Auguries, and switched in two Detect Magic as well. I mention all of this because it essentially doubled my chance to get these cards, but this is not at all unreasonable to obtain by deck 4 if you are set on making this combo happen.
Also of note is that I played with two characters the other of which was Valeros.
In 5 games, I was able to get this combo going every time. Once it is going, it is ridiculously easy to filter through the decks to drain it of the items that you want and set up the henchmen and villain for Valeros to mop up. Once the combo was set, I never ran into risk with Radillo other than the mandatory "at this location" powers from the locations, which are not that difficult to mitigate. You just need to wait in a safer location until the combo is ready, then move in and devastate the location without ever starting your turn there. Once you have it cleared of good stuff, set the henchman and Valeros sweeps in to finish the deck and close it before your next turn even starts.
The longest it ever took me to win a scenario was 16 blessings off the blessing deck. The shortest was 5 (Val encountered one henchman on his own in that run, closing the deck without Radillo needing to go there). The other runs were 8-10. In the longest run it took Radillo 4 turns to get the cards for the combo. Turns 3 and 4 were spent thinning the deck and hand to make the cards show up, but even though the deck size was minimal, she was never in danger because I never had to encounter a card. The closest thing to danger was the location that makes you encounter a bandit henchman at the start of your turn, and she Would set up the deck right after moving there and let Val finish it off.
The only location that wasn't "easy" to set up was the Mountain Peak. With the henchman/villain, there were 7 banes, so the combo engine takes a while to get the three boons. Most often I settled for just setting up the henchman/ villain in this location and letting the boons get banished. You can get them all if you are persistent, but its a long and boring process. Better to milk an easier target, especially with the bury/banish/ draw from the box power in the Arcane Collector role to work with.
Interesting note: The Mountain Peak bury a card at the start of your turn actually works for Radillo when using her role and this combo, because it lets you bury cards to thin your deck and get the cards you want and those buried cards add to your check for later boons.
I would have tested more, but after 5 runs I am kind of burned out on the combo. So much so that while I think Radillo is neat in concept and theme, and I had some interest in using her in a group, I just can't bring myself to actually play her now. Either the combo stays and is potentially boring (I can't imagine being another player waiting on someone else to resolve all of these shenanigans) or it gets fixed and I will just remember what she used to be able to do. Hopefully it can be fixed in a way that can still be exciting and fun without being so horrendously broken.
Will this work solo? Maybe, but you have to rely on spells to attack which could very easily disrupt your combo and will certainly put you at extreme risk if you thin your deck to get the combo going.
Will it work in a larger group? Most certainly. The other characters may have to spend some time playing as normal until you get the cards for the combo, but it is almost a given that it will happen.
Will it work at lower deck levels? Probably. The Arcane Collector and multiple copies of the cards help, but the relatively low risk and easy to acquire cards for the combo make it only a matter of slightly longer time to execute (note, I have not tested this part, so this is only conjecture from me based on what I have tested).
Is it fun? Absolutely not. Well, maybe the first time just to see that it works. After that, its not fun to execute and I am sure is not excruciating to to wait for someone else to execute. With proof of concept in place, after its done on the first location you could save time by just pulling all of the boons from all of the decks and rolling for them, then putting all of the henchmen and villains on the top of the locations and letting people try to beat them. It comes to the same thing and at least you don't have to wait for the repeated shuffles and draws to be executed. Or in other words, don't do this in actual play. It breaks your social contract with yourself. Its not fun. Its not a game anymore, its a given.
What if the power only applied to a subset of spells, such as "When you cast a spell with the Attack trait" sort of thing?
Or if the power was once per turn? "The first time you cast a spell on your turn..." or maybe "The first ([]and second) time you cast a spell on your turn..." if you need a power for it?
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What I'd really like to know, is if this is changed, would Paizo be willing to reprint Radillo's character cards and give them to people who have the current ones (I assume a change to printing can't be made for this first run). Fixing typos and such is one thing, but modifying what a power does, or it's triggers, etc., really needs to be on the physical card and not an errata in a FAQ somewhere.
What I'd really like to know, is if this is changed, would Paizo be willing to reprint Radillo's character cards and give them to people who have the current ones (I assume a change to printing can't be made for this first run). Fixing typos and such is one thing, but modifying what a power does, or it's triggers, etc., really needs to be on the physical card and not an errata in a FAQ somewhere.Not sure I agree with that. I think the number of people using the physical card vs PDF printout will be very, very small.
Errata and an update to the PDF is all that is needed really. Marking on the card just seems silly.
We just sleeve the cards and use wet/dry erase markers
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Yes, most will be using the character sheet, but that's irrelevant. There are people who don't, and they should not require an FAQ because their character is changed and the card is now flat out wrong on parts. If there were a guarantee everyone used the sheets,I'd agree,but that simply isn't how it is. Even if it's a card we can get ourselves from DriveBy or whatever the site is called that they're using to sell erratad RotR cards, that'd be fine. But a correct version of a card that is modified in a way that actually changes how he plays, needs to be available.