Jump to content

Battleforge PvP deck overview - by Hirooo & RadicalX 


RadicalX

Recommended Posts

This is a fantastic resource for people who didn't PvP that much back in BF. Especially if one were to get into actual meta decks, not the ungodly mess of decks I was using. XD

Looking forward to building some of these and trying them out. Thanks for the great overiews! ;)

Edited by curious
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...
On 9/28/2018 at 5:24 AM, Loriens said:

Very very nice guide.
And what about twilight deck? It's completely useless?

What do you mean by twilight? Fire Nature? That's addressed; it's a good deck :)

 

Let me go on a a lecture about naming conventions for a moment :)

We name decks based on the first 2 orbs. Pure decks are easy. Just "Pure" + the orb type.

"Fire Nature" and" Shadow Frost" are named like this (instead of twilight and lost souls). That's because in PvP, fire and shadow are the most common t1, so saying it like this communicates the orb order. Same goes for Fire Frost and Shadow Nature, which don't have names (except for Amii phantom, which makes people sometimes call shadow nature "amii")

"Stonekin" and "Bandits" are usually named like this (instead of frost nature/nature frost or fire shadow/shadow fire) because there are disagreements about which t1 to use. (Actually, I think most bandits players would use fire first, which is why you might see fire shadow).

 

Fire and Shadow are very equal t1s. They are classic, strong, and frequently used.

Nature and Frost both have unattractive drawbacks (too expensive vs no swift). They are viable, but if you can choose a fire or shadow t1 instead, 95% of players would choose fire or shadow.

Loriens likes this
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 5 weeks later...
On 10/1/2018 at 4:46 AM, Eirias said:

What do you mean by twilight? Fire Nature? That's addressed; it's a good deck :)

 

 

Hello. Sorry for long answer. I mean Twilight transformation deck.
I found only one video with this type of deck on youtube.
Was there at least one player who achieved good result with this deck?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

8 hours ago, Loriens said:

Was there at least one player who achieved good result with this deck?

No :( The transformation effects are weak for the cost at which they come, so situations where they are effective are very rare. In a twilight deck you'd also have to rely on units that are way weaker than their non-twilight counterparts. (mauler > slaver, ghostspears > twilight minions, skyfire drake & burrower > any twilight T2 units). So you cold only achieve good results if you regulary get matched with oponents that are weaker than you.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

23 hours ago, SunWu II. said:

No :( The transformation effects are weak for the cost at which they come, so situations where they are effective are very rare. In a twilight deck you'd also have to rely on units that are way weaker than their non-twilight counterparts. (mauler > slaver, ghostspears > twilight minions, skyfire drake & burrower > any twilight T2 units). So you cold only achieve good results if you regulary get matched with oponents that are weaker than you.

Actually, there was one player...I'm probably mixing things up, but I think his name was MutantFischeCZ or something like that. Of course he didn't use only twilight minions, but he did use several twilight creatures in t2 and t3 instead of more optimal units. He was about on my skill level; I often won but he beat me enough to keep me frustrated at losing to his garbage deck :)

@Loriens if you want to see a deck in action with twilight, I played this game with 4 twilight minions: 

 

Loriens likes this
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Remember him, but ,,succesfull''? I have him in mind as a player that played relatively good nature T1 without treespirits but gave away some ELO by playing the strange T2. I think that's just a mild case of ,,beijingguyism'' where a player choses a deck wich isn't mainstream and in the end trades ELO for fun/recognition. I've seen Hirooo make werebeasts and sunken temple work but unless he does it vs other primes regulary i wouldn't say there's a succesfull sunken temple player.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think saying that his Twilight deck works is like saying my Pure Shadow no-t3 deck works. Sure, it got to me to 12th on the ladder, but the deck was reliant upon an obscure gimmick with Shrine of Greed that become obsolete once everyone understood it. 

There was a similar case with Aaaaaabama's annoying Church of Negation deck. Once you figure out he isn't good at T1 and T2 and is just trying to stall for his strong T3 the deck becomes sub-par and he is ELO fodder on small maps where rushing is possible.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 10/31/2018 at 10:51 PM, SunWu II. said:

Remember him, but ,,succesfull''? I have him in mind as a player that played relatively good nature T1 without treespirits but gave away some ELO by playing the strange T2. I think that's just a mild case of ,,beijingguyism'' where a player choses a deck wich isn't mainstream and in the end trades ELO for fun/recognition. I've seen Hirooo make werebeasts and sunken temple work but unless he does it vs other primes regulary i wouldn't say there's a succesfull sunken temple player.

haha, yeah if you count only primes as successful....idk, there's like 4 successful decks?

The person I'm thinking of didn't play nature t1, afaik. You might be thinking of GreatKudi, who plays nature t1 for fire nature? But idk if he played any twilight units...

 

(Btw, there is one very small advantage that twilight units have, which I'm considering trying to exploit in a super cheese deck....)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think we mean the same player - ,,mutantenfisch''. I remember him playing nature T1, perhaps he played another deck before or later. Wasn't his only twilight unit deathglider? Still a no for me when it comes to successful twilight deck players. Onseet showcased a real twilight deck once. Eventhough it's kind of a strange match, the move at 2:20 is probably the best use of a twilight transformation i've ever seen in a pvp match:

 

Edited by SunWu II.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, Eirias said:

haha, yeah if you count only primes as successful....idk, there's like 4 successful decks?

The person I'm thinking of didn't play nature t1, afaik. You might be thinking of GreatKudi, who plays nature t1 for fire nature? But idk if he played any twilight units...

 

(Btw, there is one very small advantage that twilight units have, which I'm considering trying to exploit in a super cheese deck....)

I think there were players for all 10 basic colours, that managed to hit rank one at a given time. But this isn't exactly how I'd define success.

A deck is being used successfully from my perspective if the deck has actual win conditions and the players ends up winning, because he is using these win conditions. I will give a very simplified example: Take a look at 2 of the most popular matchups Fire Nature vs Shadow Frost. There are 2 simplified win conditions: The Fire Nature player has the upper hand in mid/late T2 while Shadow Frost is superior in T3. Let's say T1 goes even and so does early T2 the Fire Nature player has to use supported Burrower spam to beat the equally skilled shadow frost player. A perfect Burrower spam is very hard to defend without any disadvantage at higher void levels. If the Shadow Frost player managed to reach T3 though he ends up winning unless he's down 3+ wells. 

This is why alot of people don't like Bandits, because the deck doesn't have a clear win condition in some matchups. It lacks individual strength, but even that deck has some combos (Skyfire + Lifeweaving; Windhunter against pure Nature) and a very strong T3 to play around. 

I don't see any win conditions for a Twilight deck though, which is based on transformations. And I haven't seen a player win games due to using them. It just looks like a handicap and it seems to be all about having a deck, that looks cool.

You could even say Abaaaama played his deck to success, because while his micro was terrible, he managed to annoy alot of decent players (especially in 2v2s). If his T1 ended up being better, he would've been much harder to beat, because his deck at least has a clear win condition in his T3, used to be quite a big one pre church of negation nerf. 

 

Edited by RadicalX
SunWu likes this
Link to comment
Share on other sites

14 hours ago, RadicalX said:

This is why alot of people don't like Bandits, because the deck doesn't have a clear win condition in some matchups. It lacks individual strength, but even that deck has some combos (Skyfire + Lifeweaving; Windhunter against pure Nature) and a very strong T3 to play around. 

I don't see any win conditions for a Twilight deck though, which is based on transformations. And I haven't seen a player win games due to using them. It just looks like a handicap and it seems to be all about having a deck, that looks cool.

You could even say Abaaaama played his deck to success, because while his micro was terrible, he managed to annoy alot of decent players (especially in 2v2s). If his T1 ended up being better, he would've been much harder to beat, because his deck at least has a clear win condition in his T3, used to be quite a big one pre church of negation nerf. 

Slightly offtopic: I think comparing Twilight to Bandit is a bit unfair. Apart from Windhunter and Warrior's Death, "Bandits" mostly consist of Fire/Shadow which has terrible synergy (unlike Fire/Nature). Also, Vileblood was quite popular before it was (over)nerfed and Twilight Brute is a decent unit as well.

As for the strong Bandit T3, that mostly came from Sandstorm and Soulhunter. However, Sandstorm was nerfed into oblivion and Soulhunter was also popular for Lost Souls players who went for a fire orb in T3.

I think most Twilight units could become viable (and potentially incredibly strong) with some small changes. On the other hand, Bandit T2 cards have catastrophic weaknesses, are bugged or have their role overshadowed by other cards.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, ImaginaryNumb3r said:

Twilight Brute is a decent unit as well

Eh...twilight brute is an M/M melee unit in t2. Those are terrible because t2 is filled with amazing M counters. At least twilight minions are S/M (and have exactly the same stats). And even they are exactly like ghostspears except without the ability to counter S units...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 11/2/2018 at 10:06 PM, SunWu II. said:

Sofynn played twilight brutes, he did well with them - i wonder how he had the slot - probably no mauler. They are good against nature splashes, can still get rooted, but at least not hurricaned.

I mean...I guess it's possible you can replace ghostspears with twilight brutes....They really lose to enforcer and nightcrawler, but they beat scythe fiends and don't get hurricaned? So perhaps it's a useful tech against fire nature....but idk.

It might be useful in 2v2....their special can combo with nasty surprise...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Twilight Brute was used in Fire Nature mirrors and against pure Fire, because both do have attack patterns where Ghost Spears do end up struggling at certain power levels. Especially Scythe Fiends + Wildfirespam in late T2 are insane and Twilight Brute was offering more reliable dps against that. Not worth the slot for me personally though. 

 

@ImaginaryNumb3r I wasn't exactly referring to the twilight units itself, it was more about the transformation ability. 

I mentioned the strong T3 as Bandits can cut a big amount of deckslots in T2 to play 4-5 card T3s. The T2 stays bad even if you invest more slots into it ...

Soulhunter is an important tool to crack current Timeless One defences. If Shadow Frost goes Fire in T3 you are at an advantage because disenchant + aura is a reliable XL counter that Shadow Frost lacks since Sunreaver got nerfed. In addition to that Shadow Frost T2 doesn't require Life Weaving so the slot efficency is awful when going for Fire T3. Bandit Lancer & Vulcan do have top notch dmg/power values and shred through attacks while Giant Slayer is empowering your attacks by a wide margin. Since alot of these cards are cheap, motivate makes a big difference

I don't play Rallying banner in bandits anymore, but if you do so Cultist Master + Evocators Woe may end up being super strong. Combined with Shadow Insect and Fallen Skyelf that is a very strong T3 too, that requires 100+ APM (sounds easy, but is a really high value for Battleforge) and low latency to be played effectively though. Soulhunter remains as a potential finisher. This T3 is more effective when playing Fire T1 because it isn't motivate reliant like the first one. 

Timeless One T3 still remains stronger, but Bandits can close out games once you are ahead. That's something alot of T3's in this current meta can't do ... and I guess that's something ... at least.

 

In the meantime Twilight transformation will never give you an advantage. I mean the passive effects of transformations are useless and the only meaning of this ability is to spawn a small unit and transform it into a large one (Twilight Minions -> Vileblood) to bait out wrong counter units. That said most T2 S counters in this game (Darkelf Assassins; Scythe Fiends) are useful as allround counters so this strategy simply doesn't work at all since it is expensive (you have to invest like 170 power to get your vileblood and can't transform at the enemys base if he defends proactively)

Edited by RadicalX
Loriens and ImaginaryNumb3r like this
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 11/5/2018 at 12:07 PM, RadicalX said:

Twilight Brute was used in Fire Nature mirrors and against pure Fire, because both do have attack patterns where Ghost Spears do end up struggling at certain power levels. Especially Scythe Fiends + Wildfirespam in late T2 are insane and Twilight Brute was offering more reliable dps against that. Not worth the slot for me personally though. 

 

@ImaginaryNumb3r I wasn't exactly referring to the twilight units itself, it was more about the transformation ability. 

I mentioned the strong T3 as Bandits can cut a big amount of deckslots in T2 to play 4-5 card T3s. The T2 stays bad even if you invest more slots into it ...

Soulhunter is an important tool to crack current Timeless One defences. If Shadow Frost goes Fire in T3 you are at an advantage because disenchant + aura is a reliable XL counter that Shadow Frost lacks since Sunreaver got nerfed. In addition to that Shadow Frost T2 doesn't require Life Weaving so the slot efficency is awful when going for Fire T3. Bandit Lancer & Vulcan do have top notch dmg/power values and shred through attacks while Giant Slayer is empowering your attacks by a wide margin. Since alot of these cards are cheap, motivate makes a big difference

I don't play Rallying banner in bandits anymore, but if you do so Cultist Master + Evocators Woe may end up being super strong. Combined with Shadow Insect and Fallen Skyelf that is a very strong T3 too, that requires 100+ APM (sounds easy, but is a really high value for Battleforge) and low latency to be played effectively though. Soulhunter remains as a potential finisher. This T3 is more effective when playing Fire T1 because it isn't motivate reliant like the first one. 

Timeless One T3 still remains stronger, but Bandits can close out games once you are ahead. That's something alot of T3's in this current meta can't do ... and I guess that's something ... at least.

 

In the meantime Twilight transformation will never give you an advantage. I mean the passive effects of transformations are useless and the only meaning of this ability is to spawn a small unit and transform it into a large one (Twilight Minions -> Vileblood) to bait out wrong counter units. That said most T2 S counters in this game (Darkelf Assassins; Scythe Fiends) are useful as allround counters so this strategy simply doesn't work at all since it is expensive (you have to invest like 170 power to get your vileblood and can't transform at the enemys base if he defends proactively)

Thanks, that was insightful. I thought it was unfair that bandit T3 cards were so easily available to everyone but I never saw it from the LS player's perspective. 

Actually, there was also a toxic tactic in T2 where you could reliably bring down a well once it reached a certain HP threshold. Summon a NC with Rallying Banner, frenzy it and cast Warrior's Death. Nothing is gonna kill that NC and it will deal 1500 ATK. Only works against non frost splashes, though. It's not much, but I considered it worth mentioning.

Naturally, I agree on the transformation. I don't even think it was designed for pvp, I see the transformation as a pure pve mechanic as it essentially is a diet version of breeding grounds. I mean, potentially it could be interesting for pvp too, but first it requires Twilight units to be worth a slot. Personally, I still like to play Fire/Nature and I find the Twilight Minion transform ability really alluring (damage bonus for nearby units). Perhaps it would be worth playing if Minions costed 50 (42 power to transform).

Another thought I find interesting is changing a unit like Minions into a Deathglider (assuming both would be good cards and you need an s-counter). You can easily re-purpose units and gain a void power advantage. This is just speculation and the example is an edge case, but I find the concept really interesting.

Edited by ImaginaryNumb3r
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...
  • 2 months later...
  • 1 year later...

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

We have placed cookies on your device to help make this website better. You can adjust your cookie settings, otherwise we'll assume you're okay to continue. Terms of Use