Here is the list of cards by booster pack that I got from my box of Empire of Evil:
Pack 1
Willow Warriors
Street Racers
Difficulty at the End of Things
Fingertip Razors
Street Doc
Desperate Measures
Superior Tactics
Tattooed Man
Tentacles of the Squid
The Alabaster King
Pack 2
Cocktail Waiter
Unholy Legionnaires
CDCA Spies
Suicide Squad
Data Mining
Bending Chi
Thingshot
Uncertainty Spirit
Weeping Willows
The Alabaster Palace
Pack 3
Ancient Stone Arch
Arcanowave Feedback
Back in Black
Bamboo Forest
Combat Engineer
Bandolier of Throwing Knives
Wriggling Skin Suit
36-Legged Horror!
Abomination Serum
Alexandre Chen
Pack 4
Blue Meditation
Brave Villagers
Bending Chi
CDCA Spies
Cocktail Waiters
Compromised Security
Abysmal Behemoth
Andy Di
Auspicious Thermite
Baron Volund
Pack 5
Consuming Darkness
Data Mining
Desperate Measures
Diffuculty at the End of Things
Echo Spirit
Fingertip Razors
Awesome Presence
The Blood of Heroes
Blue Master
The Shangshu Mansion
Pack 6
Escalation
Fire Engineers
The Great Wall
Prefect's Guard
Imperial Sycophants
Mirrored Lake
Bonebow Army
Mars Program Executive
Delaying Tactics
The Becoming
Pack 7
Mountain Monastery
NeoBuro Field Medic
Netherworld Librarian
Nomad Army
Origami Handguns
Out of the Barrel
Drowning in Blood
Dr. Hans Wulfjaeger
Embrace of the Snake
Damon Winter
Pack 8
The Price of Progress
Red Tape Assault
Spartan Warriors
Stoic Wanderer
Stolen Thunder
Street Doc
Endless Corridor
Explosive Motorcycle
Fire Falx
Dao Biotech Headquarters
Pack 9
Street Racers
Tunnel King
Suicide Squad
Under the Knife
Unholy Legionnaires
Vitality Shunt
Hell Hound
Heroic Converts
Hunger of the Jackal
Darkness Golem
Pack 10
Underworld Contacts
Equal Opportunity Butt Kicking!
Willow Warriors
Wisdon of the Owl
The Withering of Souls
Withering Touch
Martyr's Tomb
Synchronic Beam Emitter
Meditative Flight
Gnarled Annihilator
Pack 11
Out of the Barrel
Mirrored Lake
Origami Handguns
The Withering of Souls
Back in Black
Whelps
Paradox Archives
Potemin's Brigade
Preserving Chi
Hiroshi Kata
Pack 12
Whelps
Zen Ritualist
Echo Spirit
Spartan Warriors
Stoic Wanderer
Imperial Sycophants
Mountain Hermit
Mountain Sanctuary
Overzeolous Assassins
Hanging Gardens
Pack 13
Echo Spirit
Escalation
Fingertip Razors
Fire Engineers
The Great Wall
Prefect's Guard
Abysmal Behemoth
Alpine Squad
Andi Di
Commandant Barkhorn
Pack 14
Imperial Sycophants
Mirrored Lake
Mountain Monastery
NeoBuro Field Medic
Netherworld Librarian
Origami Handguns
Auspicious Thermite
Awesome Presence
The Blood of Heroes
The Petrified Man
Pack 15
Nomad Army
Out of the Barrel
The Price of Progress
Red Tape Assault
Spartan Warriors
Stoic Wanderer
Blue Master
Bonebow Army
Mars Program Executive
Platinum Upgrade
Pack 16
Stolen Thunder
Street Doc
Street Racers
Suicide Squad
Tunnel King
Under the Knife
Delaying Tactics
Dr. Hans Wulfjaeger
Drowning in Blood
Shihong
Pack 17
Unholy Legionnaires
Vitality Shunt
Underworld Contacts
Equal Opportunity Butt Kicking!
Willow Warriors
Wisdon of the Owl
Embrace of the Snake
Endless Corridor
Explosive Motorcycle
The She-Wolf
Pack 18
The Withering of Souls
Whelps
Withering Touch
Zen Ritualist
Echo Spirit
Spartan Warriors
Fire Falx
Hell Hound
Heroic Converts
The Spirit of Kongxiangsi
Pack 19
Stoic Wanderer
Imperial Sycophants
Out of the Barrel
Mirrored Lake
Origami Handguns
Back in Black
Hunger of the Jackal
Martyr's Tomb
Synchronic Beam Emitter
Underworld Coronation
Pack 20
The Withering of Souls
Whelps
Vitality Shunt
Ancient Stone Arch
Zen Ritualist
The Price of Progress
Meditative Flight
Mountain Hermit
Mountain Sanctuary
The Wireless
Pack 21
The Great Wall
Mountain Monastery
Consuming Darkness
Under the Knife
Blue Meditation
Tunnel King
Overzealous Assassins
Paradox Archives
Potemkin's Brigade
The Wrath of Kong
Pack 22
Compromised Security
Red Tape Assault
Nomad Army
Escalation
Brave Villagers
Bandolier of Throwing Knives
Preserving Chi
Probability Shift
Resistance in Numbers
Xin Ji Yang
Pack 23
Prefect's Guard
Withering Touch
Arcanowave Feedback
Stolen Thunder
Equal Opportunity Butt Kicking!
Netherworld Librarian
Secret Warrior Training Base
Shadow Seductress
Skin and Darkness Hunter
Yuan Chonguan
Pack 24
Combat Engineer
NeoBuro Field Medic
Underworld Contacts
Wisdom of the Owl
Fire Engineers
Bamboo Forest
Smoke and Mirrors
Spy Network
Strength of the Land
Akamatsu Mitsusuke
So first impressions: Good distribution of commons (2-4 each), uncommons (1-2 each) and no duplicate rares. This seems all good. This is great if everyone is buying by the box. The problem is in the details. The cards are with some deviations in alphabetical order. If display boxes are opened for purchase or draft events, the card selection can be predicted with some accuracy. If there is a specific rare that you want, buy the top booster in the box. Open it up and look at the rare. Count down the necessary number of boosters and buy the rare you want (or common or uncommon). With drafting, you will have an idea of the other cards that will be available for draft for yourself and your opponents.
This shouldn't be too big of a problem since almost all sales will be via Z-man or Potomac Distribution by the box. Draft events are mostly for fun without significant prizes available, so the advantage someone gets from knowledge of the card pool really will not make much difference in the long run. And with some forethought, draft organizers should randomize the boosters from a box before handing out packs.
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
Thursday, November 5, 2009
Echo Distortion
Echo Distortion
Event
Cost: 1 [Pur]
Provides: [Pur]
Copy a Site's rules text to target Site until the end of the turn.
Here is my list of ideas for using or abusing Echo Distortion:
Copy City Hospital on to a Proving Ground. Play a 2 cost character. Attack and get smoked. Unturn the Proving Ground and repeat. Good in faction characters for this would be Children of the Sharp Knives, The Voice of the Unnameable, Christine Winter, and Morphic Spirit if you multifaction. Add some card drawing such as The Forest of Fallen Banners and you can go to town.
Copy your own Nine Dragon Temple on to itself to get 6 power when you lose it.
Copy a Battleground site on to another site you are going to seize to get power, or copy it onto itself to get lots of power. Or copy the City Hospital onto a Bandit Hideout along with the Proving Ground so you can get 1 Power with each attack.
Copy a Nexus Tower to turn a non-winning attack into a winner. Unfortunately Echo Distortion is not a [Mag] event.
If you are playing with Whispers in the Dark (which there is no reason not to be), copy an Arctic Fortress to any other site to foil an attack. There are a lot of defensive sites that can foil an attack or just prevent a site from being taken: Big Red Barn, Maze of Stairs, Diamond Beach, Ancestral Tomb, etc.
Copying a Temple of the Angry Spirits can ruin anyone's day.
Here's another janktastic combo: Family Restaurant, Scrappy Kid, ID Chop Shop and Echo Distortion. Slightly easier would be replacing the Kid and Chop Shop with Ninja Six.
A Mountain Fortress with some damage on it can make for a beefy wall of defenders if you copy City Hospital on it.
Copy your Festival Circle or other non-healing site on to an opponent's site in response to a healing effect.
Copy Turtle Island or Auspicious Termites to a site to prevent a burn.
Copy a Kinoshita House of Pancakes on to another Unique site to force an auction. Be careful if you are playing the KHoP with Misery. You might force an auction with yourself.
Event
Cost: 1 [Pur]
Provides: [Pur]
Copy a Site's rules text to target Site until the end of the turn.
Here is my list of ideas for using or abusing Echo Distortion:
Copy City Hospital on to a Proving Ground. Play a 2 cost character. Attack and get smoked. Unturn the Proving Ground and repeat. Good in faction characters for this would be Children of the Sharp Knives, The Voice of the Unnameable, Christine Winter, and Morphic Spirit if you multifaction. Add some card drawing such as The Forest of Fallen Banners and you can go to town.
Copy your own Nine Dragon Temple on to itself to get 6 power when you lose it.
Copy a Battleground site on to another site you are going to seize to get power, or copy it onto itself to get lots of power. Or copy the City Hospital onto a Bandit Hideout along with the Proving Ground so you can get 1 Power with each attack.
Copy a Nexus Tower to turn a non-winning attack into a winner. Unfortunately Echo Distortion is not a [Mag] event.
If you are playing with Whispers in the Dark (which there is no reason not to be), copy an Arctic Fortress to any other site to foil an attack. There are a lot of defensive sites that can foil an attack or just prevent a site from being taken: Big Red Barn, Maze of Stairs, Diamond Beach, Ancestral Tomb, etc.
Copying a Temple of the Angry Spirits can ruin anyone's day.
Here's another janktastic combo: Family Restaurant, Scrappy Kid, ID Chop Shop and Echo Distortion. Slightly easier would be replacing the Kid and Chop Shop with Ninja Six.
A Mountain Fortress with some damage on it can make for a beefy wall of defenders if you copy City Hospital on it.
Copy your Festival Circle or other non-healing site on to an opponent's site in response to a healing effect.
Copy Turtle Island or Auspicious Termites to a site to prevent a burn.
Copy a Kinoshita House of Pancakes on to another Unique site to force an auction. Be careful if you are playing the KHoP with Misery. You might force an auction with yourself.
Critical Shift Purist Cards
So now I'm working on a Purist deck as the next in my playlist. I have Purist cards available from Dark Future, SSG, and now I'm adding Critical Shift.
Let's take a closer look at the Purist Cards from Critical Shift and see if anything comes to mind.
True Believer and Symphonic Disciples are good foundation which I need. Up to now, I've only had Purist Initiate, Purist Aspirant, and Arcane Scientist available. Since the only out of faction Purist cards in my card set are the Architect Purist and Rhys Engel, the Purist Initiate basically has no text. So it will be nice to have a 1 cost magic provider that does something, even if it's not much. The Symphonic Disciple will usually be better than the Aspirant. In my metagame, the Aspirant is not usually around when his ability would be useful.
Christine Winter is a 2 for 3 which is OK, and when she is smoked can be returned for the sacrifice of a 1 cost character. Again this is OK. If I mix Lotus for stealing other characters it can be better. I, however, don't want to build a deck around a 3 Fighting character.
The Blind is 3 cost for usually at least 5 Fighting and sometimes much more. Since the Art of War is common in my metagame, it could be 7-8 Fighting fairly often. Not bad, but not exciting.
Keeper of the Echos is another variable Fighting card. It can be really good, but to do so, you have to toss two hitters from your hand. Without the ability to recycle smoked hitters, this could be a major liability in a deck. If you aren't discarding big cards, you will only see fighting 4-6 which is OK, but kind of bland.
Probability Soldiers look like they can be fun to abuse. See how many times you can get one to unturn. My first thought was Occult Kung Fu to copy their ability on to a hitter. Add LaGrange Four and unturn the hitter to see how many additional attacks you get. I'll have to keep this in mind for a possibility.
Impossible Men look like a good control card. If it could get Superleap somehow, it would be very strong. Someone already pointed out the Tracer Implant combo, which is strong. The only real problem, it that at 4 for 6, I really like Mutator. And I don't see where the Impossible Men replace them.
The Gray looks like a strong character. A 5 for 7 is a little below the curve, but it will probably be a 4 for 7 or better because someone is going to pay to cancel his ability. I just don't see his as often hitting the board and being a threat to go for the win. Good, but not great.
Mystical Cosine is a card for various tricks - Twisted Horror, Netherworld Vet, Violet Meditation - but I don't have most of these cards in my card set. I'll shelve this card for now.
Temporal Anomaly could be good. I don't have any edges in my play set that look like naturals for recycling, but getting to play an opponent's Shield of Pure Soul for 1 power after my Symphonic Disciples get rid of it could be worth it. A high opportunity cost though.
Delay the Inevitable seems like a good card to either go for the win or stop a winning attack, but since it is only a delay, I don't have a strong feeling for it.
Echo Distortion looks like an expensive version of Chi Syphon. For the same cost, you copy a site for only one turn. But as I think about it, it has two huge advantages. One, it is an event so is much more flexible for a surprise factor. Two, the original text of the site remains. So copying a Feng Shui Site with a good ability when it turns on to a City Hospital which can unturn itself can be very good. This is the angle I'm going to work on.
Let's take a closer look at the Purist Cards from Critical Shift and see if anything comes to mind.
True Believer and Symphonic Disciples are good foundation which I need. Up to now, I've only had Purist Initiate, Purist Aspirant, and Arcane Scientist available. Since the only out of faction Purist cards in my card set are the Architect Purist and Rhys Engel, the Purist Initiate basically has no text. So it will be nice to have a 1 cost magic provider that does something, even if it's not much. The Symphonic Disciple will usually be better than the Aspirant. In my metagame, the Aspirant is not usually around when his ability would be useful.
Christine Winter is a 2 for 3 which is OK, and when she is smoked can be returned for the sacrifice of a 1 cost character. Again this is OK. If I mix Lotus for stealing other characters it can be better. I, however, don't want to build a deck around a 3 Fighting character.
The Blind is 3 cost for usually at least 5 Fighting and sometimes much more. Since the Art of War is common in my metagame, it could be 7-8 Fighting fairly often. Not bad, but not exciting.
Keeper of the Echos is another variable Fighting card. It can be really good, but to do so, you have to toss two hitters from your hand. Without the ability to recycle smoked hitters, this could be a major liability in a deck. If you aren't discarding big cards, you will only see fighting 4-6 which is OK, but kind of bland.
Probability Soldiers look like they can be fun to abuse. See how many times you can get one to unturn. My first thought was Occult Kung Fu to copy their ability on to a hitter. Add LaGrange Four and unturn the hitter to see how many additional attacks you get. I'll have to keep this in mind for a possibility.
Impossible Men look like a good control card. If it could get Superleap somehow, it would be very strong. Someone already pointed out the Tracer Implant combo, which is strong. The only real problem, it that at 4 for 6, I really like Mutator. And I don't see where the Impossible Men replace them.
The Gray looks like a strong character. A 5 for 7 is a little below the curve, but it will probably be a 4 for 7 or better because someone is going to pay to cancel his ability. I just don't see his as often hitting the board and being a threat to go for the win. Good, but not great.
Mystical Cosine is a card for various tricks - Twisted Horror, Netherworld Vet, Violet Meditation - but I don't have most of these cards in my card set. I'll shelve this card for now.
Temporal Anomaly could be good. I don't have any edges in my play set that look like naturals for recycling, but getting to play an opponent's Shield of Pure Soul for 1 power after my Symphonic Disciples get rid of it could be worth it. A high opportunity cost though.
Delay the Inevitable seems like a good card to either go for the win or stop a winning attack, but since it is only a delay, I don't have a strong feeling for it.
Echo Distortion looks like an expensive version of Chi Syphon. For the same cost, you copy a site for only one turn. But as I think about it, it has two huge advantages. One, it is an event so is much more flexible for a surprise factor. Two, the original text of the site remains. So copying a Feng Shui Site with a good ability when it turns on to a City Hospital which can unturn itself can be very good. This is the angle I'm going to work on.
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