Rhajin patron spam is too cheap

AnduinTryggva

Concecutive Rhajin spam is too cheap.

I have currently a match where I now have to deal with more than 15 Bewilderment cards while most usefull cards are confined by Almalexia patrons. This is an utter troll match right now. And something to turn down any fun.

With this I have often hands that just consist of these trash cards.

Favored Rhajin patron should cost 5 gold min.

Sheezabeast

What patron did you pick to counter it? Red Eagle, to burn the cards? Hermaeus Mora, to draw and get more points? Hunding, to scry your cards to the top of the draw?

Dr_Con

I would have picked Red Eagle to counter the bewilderment cards.
Almalexia cards shouldn't have been added to the game. Rahjin deck can troll someone into not being able to get enough prestige + deletes all prestige anyone manages to get, while almalexia's deck can jail any useful ones that could prevent the rahjin deck from doing this.

Personofsecrets

Sheezabeast wrote: »

What patron did you pick to counter it? Red Eagle, to burn the cards? Hermaeus Mora, to draw and get more points? Hunding, to scry your cards to the top of the draw?

Is there much point to discussing potential counters? Afterall, player one can choose to include Rajhiin into the game as the 4th patron without any knowledge or consent from player two. Also, all players should be buying the best cards and employing the best strategies - it doesn't really make sense to talk about counters. It could have been the opponent that was at the end of Rajhiin toxic gameplay patterns rather than the poster of this thread. What difference would that have made from the perspective of wanting a more elevated game?

AnduinTryggva

Sheezabeast wrote: »

What patron did you pick to counter it? Red Eagle, to burn the cards? Hermaeus Mora, to draw and get more points? Hunding, to scry your cards to the top of the draw?

This is derailing from what I wanted to point out since
1. your post direction is based on an assumption that rhajin was picked before I could pick the last patron
2. it does not matter as spamming rhajin will kill any deck. Black Eagle will not be able to counter enough the spam if the opponent decides to spam Rhajin patron on each turn.

The thing is that reapplying patrons that already are favoring is too cheap for certain patrons. They took many patches to correct this issue for Orgnum but are still reluctant for Rhajin.

Rhajin is quite a troll patron set. OK, but as it is now to run this strategy in extreme is simply too cheap.

Sheezabeast

AnduinTryggva wrote: »

Sheezabeast wrote: »

What patron did you pick to counter it? Red Eagle, to burn the cards? Hermaeus Mora, to draw and get more points? Hunding, to scry your cards to the top of the draw?

This is derailing from what I wanted to point out since
1. your post direction is based on an assumption that rhajin was picked before I could pick the last patron
2. it does not matter as spamming rhajin will kill any deck. Black Eagle will not be able to counter enough the spam if the opponent decides to spam Rhajin patron on each turn.

The thing is that reapplying patrons that already are favoring is too cheap for certain patrons. They took many patches to correct this issue for Orgnum but are still reluctant for Rhajin.

Rhajin is quite a troll patron set. OK, but as it is now to run this strategy in extreme is simply too cheap.

Even if they started with Almalexia, and you didn't get to directly counter Rhajiin, your counter for Almalexia would have also countered Rhajiin, using the Celarus deck to move cards to your cool down, and the ability to kill Agents with gold.

Why are you so pissed off? I wasn't derailing anything. Rhajiins own cards counter Almalexia too.

IncultaWolf

No

spartaxoxo

Sheezabeast wrote: »

AnduinTryggva wrote: »

Sheezabeast wrote: »

What patron did you pick to counter it? Red Eagle, to burn the cards? Hermaeus Mora, to draw and get more points? Hunding, to scry your cards to the top of the draw?

This is derailing from what I wanted to point out since
1. your post direction is based on an assumption that rhajin was picked before I could pick the last patron
2. it does not matter as spamming rhajin will kill any deck. Black Eagle will not be able to counter enough the spam if the opponent decides to spam Rhajin patron on each turn.

The thing is that reapplying patrons that already are favoring is too cheap for certain patrons. They took many patches to correct this issue for Orgnum but are still reluctant for Rhajin.

Rhajin is quite a troll patron set. OK, but as it is now to run this strategy in extreme is simply too cheap.

Even if they started with Almalexia, and you didn't get to directly counter Rhajiin, your counter for Almalexia would have also countered Rhajiin, using the Celarus deck to move cards to your cool down, and the ability to kill Agents with gold.

Why are you so pissed off? I wasn't derailing anything. Rhajiins own cards counter Almalexia too.

Have you seen the match Person of Secrets posted with Rahjiin and Almalexia both in play? The combo can get really extreme.

Personofsecrets wrote: »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4E6LeoiQchw

Personofsecrets

It isn't even that difficult to do. Had another one of these games after the video, but the opponent conceded when they realized that I was cycling guards faster than they could remove them.

maboleth

I agree. The price should be moved from 3 to 5. At the very least. The spam is real and generally games with the Purring Liar are long, so once you start to get the troll cards, it's a slippery slope. Depends on the player of course. Some are more conscious and like to have fun rather than troll and spam. But many are not and like to abuse everything at their disposal. GMs should stop this trend in my opinion.

AnduinTryggva

Sheezabeast wrote: »

AnduinTryggva wrote: »

Sheezabeast wrote: »

What patron did you pick to counter it? Red Eagle, to burn the cards? Hermaeus Mora, to draw and get more points? Hunding, to scry your cards to the top of the draw?

This is derailing from what I wanted to point out since
1. your post direction is based on an assumption that rhajin was picked before I could pick the last patron
2. it does not matter as spamming rhajin will kill any deck. Black Eagle will not be able to counter enough the spam if the opponent decides to spam Rhajin patron on each turn.

The thing is that reapplying patrons that already are favoring is too cheap for certain patrons. They took many patches to correct this issue for Orgnum but are still reluctant for Rhajin.

Rhajin is quite a troll patron set. OK, but as it is now to run this strategy in extreme is simply too cheap.

Even if they started with Almalexia, and you didn't get to directly counter Rhajiin, your counter for Almalexia would have also countered Rhajiin, using the Celarus deck to move cards to your cool down, and the ability to kill Agents with gold.

Why are you so pissed off? I wasn't derailing anything. Rhajiins own cards counter Almalexia too.

Sorry I did not mean offence when I wrote "derailling". I am no English native speaker and I did not find another word that would say what I wanted to express. I just wanted to point out that I wanted to discuss the core issue with Rhajin spam itself.

Of course I am aware of Psijic and Red Eagle counters. Unfortunately both sets are just mostly rather complementary sets and you'd need both to counter Rhajin+Alma.

The issue is that apart from Rhajin itself and Psijic, there are only the stock kill-patron cards in the game. In another thread I suggested to increase the kill-patron card stock, maybe by 33-50% for the 1-patron kill cards and as there is afaik only one 2-patrons-kill to double its number. But this is another discussion.

TheImperfect

You can also spam it if you get it picked by another player.

AnduinTryggva

Well, I am not so much into trolling other people or drawing some fun out of it.

What you suggest is multiplaying that troll strategy usage.

I suggest to make trolling less cheap. Rhajin has potential with prestige attribution and prestige stealing and it does not need that huge focus on troll spamming its patron.

Arnoldthehawk

Rahjin just simply should get removed. There is no fun in that Patron.

Arnoldthehawk

And if someone would like to start the whole "well what isn't fun for you, it may be fun for someone else", I'm speaking objectively. Rahjin isn't fun for anyone apart from some people who likes trolling for the sake of trolling. I didn't know ESO supposed to reward toxic players just for the sake of toxicity.

AnduinTryggva

Rhajin can be fun. But only if you use it as a complementary set and not using Rhajin patron.
It is excellent for gold generation, taunting with agents and agent killing and to occasionally reduce the hand of your opponent which can be with some luck deployed tactically.
And even the bewilderment cards are ok as long as one is not spammed with it.
This spamming is what really needs to be prevented. I suggest to increase cost of activating favored patron to 5g. 3g is far too cheap.

DragonRacer

Agreed, I actually really love playing Rahjiin - the deck itself. Great agent-killing cards and getting an advantage by forcing your opponent to discard part of their hand. The prestige knockdown can get a little crazy, admittedly. But what I hate is when someone has zero interest in playing the deck and just spams the patron nonstop. It's just as annoying as Orgnum patron spam.

emilyhyoyeon

DragonRacer wrote: »

Agreed, I actually really love playing Rahjiin - the deck itself. Great agent-killing cards and getting an advantage by forcing your opponent to discard part of their hand.

Same! It's my favorite deck by far apart from the patron ability.

I've been pretty burnt out from playing for awhile now but when I was playing I always felt awkward picking Rajhin, afraid that the other person thought I was trying to grief, especially after seeing people say stuff like ''whenever someone picks Rajhin I purposely stall out the game for 45min'' etc etc.


I'd be interested in seeing any of:

-up the gold cost of the patron in general: ex. 3 gold cost flat changed to 5 or more gold cost flat at any favor status

-up the gold cost of the patron when he favors you (he's a deceptive thief, so it could make sense thematically): ex. 3 gold cost at neutral but 6 gold cost to use again if he favors you
*would help discourage spamming by one person repeatedly but might encourage both people doing it back and forth--so maybe also increase the gold cost at neutral from 3 to 4 or even 5

-change the patron entirely; I have no ideas for this


I think increasing the gold cost to at least 5 is reasonable considering that the deck has a lot of high gold generating cards (pounce and profit, slight of hand, jarring lullaby) plus its agents' actives, especially when upgraded.
https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Online:Rajhin

The focus of the deck should be the prestige removal + card discarding. The bewilderment aspect should be a tiny extra thing at most, IMO. If the rest of the deck didn't have much, then I could understand emphasizing the bewilderment aspect, but Rajhin is super useful without it and the strong economy potential makes a high patron cost reasonable.

tonyaccount

The Bewilderment cards are essential to counter combos and overall strong starts.

Most people complaining here are describing the extremely rare game where your opponent 24/7 spams the patron out of spite or cluelessness as if it was the norm. I try to include Rajhin and Red Eagle in almost every game in my core strategy, and the number of games where the game degenerates into a stalemate of two players spamming Rajhin without any other play available, are less than 1/100.

There are situations when I start giving Bewilderments early on, i.e. if I get a substantial lead or my opponent gets lots of Crows or combo cards early on. Also your opponents often make a mistake when they start spamming back the button and I happily take it if it benefits me. I don't understand why people have a problem watching your opponent make a bad play and improving your chances of winning.

I have stolen so many games where my opponent has gotten all the goods early on because I've been able to dilute his deck with Bewilderments and eventually catch up while he keeps buying random cards. This would never have been possible in your usual Pelin Ansei game.

The Bewilderment mechanic and when(and when not) to use it and is one of the deepest and most skill intensive parts of the game. Those who try to sell Bewilderment if it was Orgnum spam are just frustrated that their good start didn't earn them an autowin, or those who probably started to spam the button back as revenge instead of focusing on making the right play.

The difference between Rajhin and decks like Ansei, Pelin or Orgnum is that a good start only typically only earns you a lot of coin and nothing more. It won't automatically put your opponent on a clock and eventually win you the game without any extra effort. You have to spend the coin, know which cards to buy and which cards not to buy, adjust your strategy as the game progresses, and use the patron powers. I constantly see people make the wrong decisions in these situations and level out the playing field even after getting a God tier start.

There are tons of players who have a pretty good idea how to play turn 1 or 2 but whose vision starts to blur after that. They know to buy the Grand Larceny on turn 1, but when they draw it they make big misplays with spending the coin. Either they buy the wrong cards and bloat their deck while you catch up, or cluelessly start spamming you with Bewilderments without advancing their own play while you make writs and eventually buy 1-2 useful cards to take the lead.

Some people might not like it, but some people enjoy long skill games over the 5min skirmishes where the player who gets the good cards early on is very likely to win. Baddies already have Ansei, Orgnum and Mora that they can use to remove big parts of the skill of the game. Why shouldn't control players have their own deck that allows them to slow the game down and counter combos?

Also, at the end I have to add that if you have absolutely no chance of winning, with your deck being full of Bewilderments and the opponent having all the goodies, it's your own fault if you can't find the concede button after 10 minutes. If you let this continue for 30min and complain about your opponent trolling you, I suggest looking into the mirror.

AnduinTryggva

"The Bewilderment mechanic and when(and when not) to use it and is one of the deepest and most skill intensive parts of the game. Those who try to sell Bewilderment if it was Orgnum spam are just frustrated that their good start didn't earn them an autowin, or those who probably started to spam the button back as revenge instead of focusing on making the right play."

Sorry, tony, to say this, but this is simply not true. While Rhajin spammers are rare they do exist and some have made the Rhajin Spam + Almalexia their sole strategy. They buy a few nice cards, then start spamming Rhajin and continue to buy good cards while oneself at the receiving end struggles with killing off the bewilderment cards by either turning them into 2g cards or killing them off if possible with black eagle or the rare rhajin and stock cards. You simply cannot keep up if you have to spent 2g each turn or 3g when possible. In the meanwhile the Rhajin spammer has managed to get some Almalexia confinement cards combined with taunt agents of Almalexia or Rhajin and you are cooked because Psijic is pretty expensive and the few usefull Rajin cards in this respect are beyond your reach (remember that you have to spend 2g minimum for removing the bewilderment card that already limited your gold output of your present hand).

Personofsecrets

Going to somewhat disagree regarding the skill intensiveness of the button pressing. It can be fairly obvious to press the button over and over in certain situations. Did you just buy a Luxury Exports on the first turn and the tavern has a bunch of contracts? Okay, spam that button to victory, literally. I've done this severalt times.

There are players who misuse the button out of spite, but what uneducated players do isn't really something that informs us of how skill intensive something is.

There is also a dimension of chance regarding the drawing of these bewilderment. Sometimes they will royally screw someone over by shorting them a gold or interrupting a combo. Sometimes they won't do anything impactful at all. I wouldn't put too much emphasis on the skill intensiveness of the button for exactly that reason. Sure, there is skill. There was also skill in planning to get awesome or crappy outcomes from Piloted Shredder. It's like a minigame.

Tonyaccount is certainly right though that games with abundant power generation are inferior from the point of view of finding out skills. That said, they have some other questionable approaches to thinking about Rajhiin in some others ways. Why would we have a problem with an opponent making inferior moves? Because we souldn't wan't nor have to play against those who are of lesser skill. There is no glory in crushing people who don't know what they are doing. And why would I want to use a strategy that has the potential to steal games? I want to earn my wins fair and square. No, I don't believe that this is just semantics - it is mindset.

Winning isn't everything because games are about competition and competition is undermined in some of these thought paths.

tonyaccount

Personofsecrets wrote: »

Going to somewhat disagree regarding the skill intensiveness of the button pressing. It can be fairly obvious to press the button over and over in certain situations. Did you just buy a Luxury Exports on the first turn and the tavern has a bunch of contracts? Okay, spam that button to victory, literally. I've done this severalt times.

The situations where you get Luxury Exports on turn one and the board has nothing else of value to the extent where your opponent can't buy anything throughout the game are rare. I can remember a few instances where my opponent got a Luxury Exports or Grand Larceny on turn one and started to spam Bewilderments, and I still managed to win most of them. It's only really bad if you get extremely unlucky, and this applies to every deck and strategy. If you just don't get anything all game, the decks don't matter. This isn't a Rajhin problem.

Luxury Exports doesn't do much on its own. If you spam Bewilderments at your opponent who makes a few writs, he will eventually have more coin per turn than you. If he plays correctly he will turn most of the Bewilderments into writs and have 1-2 Bewilderments and a lot of writs in his deck while you have one Luxury Exports and 10 starting cards. All your opponent needs is one Midnight Raid or Volley and he will take the lead. If he finds an Oathman or so you're in big trouble. He will have some undesirable fluff in his deck, but he can still easily win the game.

I think your example highlights the skill element of the Bewilderment that I mentioned. Most players play poorly when they're being Bewilderment pressured. They either engage in the Rajhin spam when they have nothing in their deck, or go in desperation mode and start buying random contracts and bad cards when they draw like 4-5 coins. What they should do is try to find 1-2 good cards. If there's nothing good on the board they have to buy the cheap contracts when they draw 7-8 coins or so, and only burn the more expensive ones if there's absolutely no choice. The good news is that if there's nothing worth buying on the board, your opponent can't add good cards either.

I can remember more common situations where my opponent gets Midnight Raid, I buy something random and open up another Midnight Raid and my opponent buys it and starts spamming Bewilderments. In that case it can be difficult to win but you just have to view these games as the unlucky instances, and if you managed to get something useful on turn or two yourself you can still win it. You just have to start buying cards like the Shadows or Taunts as higher priority than usual.

tonyaccount

AnduinTryggva wrote: »

"The Bewilderment mechanic and when(and when not) to use it and is one of the deepest and most skill intensive parts of the game. Those who try to sell Bewilderment if it was Orgnum spam are just frustrated that their good start didn't earn them an autowin, or those who probably started to spam the button back as revenge instead of focusing on making the right play."

Sorry, tony, to say this, but this is simply not true. While Rhajin spammers are rare they do exist and some have made the Rhajin Spam + Almalexia their sole strategy. They buy a few nice cards, then start spamming Rhajin and continue to buy good cards while oneself at the receiving end struggles with killing off the bewilderment cards by either turning them into 2g cards or killing them off if possible with black eagle or the rare rhajin and stock cards. You simply cannot keep up if you have to spent 2g each turn or 3g when possible. In the meanwhile the Rhajin spammer has managed to get some Almalexia confinement cards combined with taunt agents of Almalexia or Rhajin and you are cooked because Psijic is pretty expensive and the few usefull Rajin cards in this respect are beyond your reach (remember that you have to spend 2g minimum for removing the bewilderment card that already limited your gold output of your present hand).

The situation you are describing is just a case of one player getting all the good cards and the other player getting nothing. It has nothing to do with Rajhin or Bewilderments. That only makes the loss slower and more painful.

The odds are you are misplaying against this strategy. The Rajhin + Almalexia players are noob trapping you. If these two decks exist in the same game, you never play Almalexia because Rajhin is the hard counter against it. The only Almalexia cards worth buying in these games are the agents, the contract agents and Mother's Mercy. If your opponent starts to buy Almalexia cards you give him a few Bewilderment cards, make writs and buy good cards such as agents or power cards.

The players who run this strategy try to create a situation where they get an agent to stick to board hope you buy all the useless Almalexia cards and they can counter it by spamming Rajhin. So overprioritize agents and power cards like Midnight Raid in these games, hit them with Bewilderments if they buy the Almalexia cycle cards, and hope the game doesn't set up unlucky "no way to kill the opponent agent" situations. It sometimes happens, which is why I would never choose this strategy myself.

And don't be afraid to give them Bewilderment cards when you are ahead. Too many people are *** with the Bewilderments and they don't use them even when they should because they want to be the "nice guy". Remember, this is what your opponent signed for. If you refuse to feed his own medicine to him he will have a good win rate against you.

If it's any consolation, Rajhin + Almalexia is a bad strategy. There's way too much luck in strategies like this where a single agent can win the game and the tavern has too many unplayable cards. I can understand your frustration, I would never play this combination myself and I know some players use it to cheese low skill wins. But this isn't really a Rajhin problem. Almalexia combined with something like Druid King that adds a lot of agents but no means of killing them, does basically the same thing. Instead of Bewilderments your opponent just lands a couple of agents and buys all the good cards while you're desperately trying to find removal.

AnduinTryggva

tonyaccount wrote: »

AnduinTryggva wrote: »

"The Bewilderment mechanic and when(and when not) to use it and is one of the deepest and most skill intensive parts of the game. Those who try to sell Bewilderment if it was Orgnum spam are just frustrated that their good start didn't earn them an autowin, or those who probably started to spam the button back as revenge instead of focusing on making the right play."

Sorry, tony, to say this, but this is simply not true. While Rhajin spammers are rare they do exist and some have made the Rhajin Spam + Almalexia their sole strategy. They buy a few nice cards, then start spamming Rhajin and continue to buy good cards while oneself at the receiving end struggles with killing off the bewilderment cards by either turning them into 2g cards or killing them off if possible with black eagle or the rare rhajin and stock cards. You simply cannot keep up if you have to spent 2g each turn or 3g when possible. In the meanwhile the Rhajin spammer has managed to get some Almalexia confinement cards combined with taunt agents of Almalexia or Rhajin and you are cooked because Psijic is pretty expensive and the few usefull Rajin cards in this respect are beyond your reach (remember that you have to spend 2g minimum for removing the bewilderment card that already limited your gold output of your present hand).

The situation you are describing is just a case of one player getting all the good cards and the other player getting nothing. It has nothing to do with Rajhin or Bewilderments. That only makes the loss slower and more painful.

The odds are you are misplaying against this strategy. The Rajhin + Almalexia players are noob trapping you. If these two decks exist in the same game, you never play Almalexia because Rajhin is the hard counter against it. The only Almalexia cards worth buying in these games are the agents, the contract agents and Mother's Mercy. If your opponent starts to buy Almalexia cards you give him a few Bewilderment cards, make writs and buy good cards such as agents or power cards.

The players who run this strategy try to create a situation where they get an agent to stick to board hope you buy all the useless Almalexia cards and they can counter it by spamming Rajhin. So overprioritize agents and power cards like Midnight Raid in these games, hit them with Bewilderments if they buy the Almalexia cycle cards, and hope the game doesn't set up unlucky "no way to kill the opponent agent" situations. It sometimes happens, which is why I would never choose this strategy myself.

And don't be afraid to give them Bewilderment cards when you are ahead. Too many people are *** with the Bewilderments and they don't use them even when they should because they want to be the "nice guy". Remember, this is what your opponent signed for. If you refuse to feed his own medicine to him he will have a good win rate against you.

If it's any consolation, Rajhin + Almalexia is a bad strategy. There's way too much luck in strategies like this where a single agent can win the game and the tavern has too many unplayable cards. I can understand your frustration, I would never play this combination myself and I know some players use it to cheese low skill wins. But this isn't really a Rajhin problem. Almalexia combined with something like Druid King that adds a lot of agents but no means of killing them, does basically the same thing. Instead of Bewilderments your opponent just lands a couple of agents and buys all the good cards while you're desperately trying to find removal.

So basically what you suggest is to use the Rhajin patron spam + agent taunt strategy that the other person is constantly using and which I argue against? That is not a solution to the problem.

spartaxoxo

Use Sorcerer King Orgnum , Crow, or Mora. Orgnum you actually get more power if they spam you too many bewilderments. And Mora just hastens the game so much and also has curse card, where things they play may end up benefiting you. Crow is iffy because Rahjiin also counters crow by breaking combos, but if you're able to get those combs off, you can draw enough cards and build up enough prestige through the combos that it doesn't hurt as much.

It's not the best counters but it's better than picking something that is more hindered by it.

AnduinTryggva

Mora only has curse cards if your opponent uses them. Also bewilderment breaks the Mora combos.

Orgnum may be usefull here. I'd try that one next time.

spartaxoxo

AnduinTryggva wrote: »

Mora only has curse cards if your opponent uses them. Also bewilderment breaks the Mora combos.

Orgnum may be usefull here. I'd try that one next time.

That's true but they have so much power that your opponent is going to want to use them. You can also use them to force Mora cards into your opponents deck using the patron

Personofsecrets

tonyaccount wrote: »

Personofsecrets wrote: »

Going to somewhat disagree regarding the skill intensiveness of the button pressing. It can be fairly obvious to press the button over and over in certain situations. Did you just buy a Luxury Exports on the first turn and the tavern has a bunch of contracts? Okay, spam that button to victory, literally. I've done this severalt times.

The situations where you get Luxury Exports on turn one and the board has nothing else of value to the extent where your opponent can't buy anything throughout the game are rare. I can remember a few instances where my opponent got a Luxury Exports or Grand Larceny on turn one and started to spam Bewilderments, and I still managed to win most of them. It's only really bad if you get extremely unlucky, and this applies to every deck and strategy. If you just don't get anything all game, the decks don't matter. This isn't a Rajhin problem.

Luxury Exports doesn't do much on its own. If you spam Bewilderments at your opponent who makes a few writs, he will eventually have more coin per turn than you. If he plays correctly he will turn most of the Bewilderments into writs and have 1-2 Bewilderments and a lot of writs in his deck while you have one Luxury Exports and 10 starting cards. All your opponent needs is one Midnight Raid or Volley and he will take the lead. If he finds an Oathman or so you're in big trouble. He will have some undesirable fluff in his deck, but he can still easily win the game.

I think your example highlights the skill element of the Bewilderment that I mentioned. Most players play poorly when they're being Bewilderment pressured. They either engage in the Rajhin spam when they have nothing in their deck, or go in desperation mode and start buying random contracts and bad cards when they draw like 4-5 coins. What they should do is try to find 1-2 good cards. If there's nothing good on the board they have to buy the cheap contracts when they draw 7-8 coins or so, and only burn the more expensive ones if there's absolutely no choice. The good news is that if there's nothing worth buying on the board, your opponent can't add good cards either.

I can remember more common situations where my opponent gets Midnight Raid, I buy something random and open up another Midnight Raid and my opponent buys it and starts spamming Bewilderments. In that case it can be difficult to win but you just have to view these games as the unlucky instances, and if you managed to get something useful on turn or two yourself you can still win it. You just have to start buying cards like the Shadows or Taunts as higher priority than usual.

Maybe a better example is Prescience/Prophesy turn 1 since those also open the door to trying to make plays like finding Scrying Globe to buy and press the Rajhiin button in the same turn.

I'm of similar experience where I only very rarely lose because bewilderments were too much to overcome fast enough. You certainly identify the correct way of overcoming bewilderment - just making writs.

I don't think that it is particularly skillful for players to make writs. It's the games most basic mechanic besides maybe buying a tavern card. But yea, many people seem to have trouble with the mechanic so maybe there is some skill there and you are right. I guess that there are even players who don't make writs in games where Rajhiin isn't giving Bewilderments. Unfortunately, I don't believe that the games tutorial teaches players how to make a writ. Instead, it teaches them how to use the Crow button on turn one.....

AnduinTryggva

Personofsecrets wrote: »

tonyaccount wrote: »

Personofsecrets wrote: »

Going to somewhat disagree regarding the skill intensiveness of the button pressing. It can be fairly obvious to press the button over and over in certain situations. Did you just buy a Luxury Exports on the first turn and the tavern has a bunch of contracts? Okay, spam that button to victory, literally. I've done this severalt times.

The situations where you get Luxury Exports on turn one and the board has nothing else of value to the extent where your opponent can't buy anything throughout the game are rare. I can remember a few instances where my opponent got a Luxury Exports or Grand Larceny on turn one and started to spam Bewilderments, and I still managed to win most of them. It's only really bad if you get extremely unlucky, and this applies to every deck and strategy. If you just don't get anything all game, the decks don't matter. This isn't a Rajhin problem.

Luxury Exports doesn't do much on its own. If you spam Bewilderments at your opponent who makes a few writs, he will eventually have more coin per turn than you. If he plays correctly he will turn most of the Bewilderments into writs and have 1-2 Bewilderments and a lot of writs in his deck while you have one Luxury Exports and 10 starting cards. All your opponent needs is one Midnight Raid or Volley and he will take the lead. If he finds an Oathman or so you're in big trouble. He will have some undesirable fluff in his deck, but he can still easily win the game.

I think your example highlights the skill element of the Bewilderment that I mentioned. Most players play poorly when they're being Bewilderment pressured. They either engage in the Rajhin spam when they have nothing in their deck, or go in desperation mode and start buying random contracts and bad cards when they draw like 4-5 coins. What they should do is try to find 1-2 good cards. If there's nothing good on the board they have to buy the cheap contracts when they draw 7-8 coins or so, and only burn the more expensive ones if there's absolutely no choice. The good news is that if there's nothing worth buying on the board, your opponent can't add good cards either.

I can remember more common situations where my opponent gets Midnight Raid, I buy something random and open up another Midnight Raid and my opponent buys it and starts spamming Bewilderments. In that case it can be difficult to win but you just have to view these games as the unlucky instances, and if you managed to get something useful on turn or two yourself you can still win it. You just have to start buying cards like the Shadows or Taunts as higher priority than usual.

Maybe a better example is Prescience/Prophesy turn 1 since those also open the door to trying to make plays like finding Scrying Globe to buy and press the Rajhiin button in the same turn.

I'm of similar experience where I only very rarely lose because bewilderments were too much to overcome fast enough. You certainly identify the correct way of overcoming bewilderment - just making writs.

I don't think that it is particularly skillful for players to make writs. It's the games most basic mechanic besides maybe buying a tavern card. But yea, many people seem to have trouble with the mechanic so maybe there is some skill there and you are right. I guess that there are even players who don't make writs in games where Rajhiin isn't giving Bewilderments. Unfortunately, I don't believe that the games tutorial teaches players how to make a writ. Instead, it teaches them how to use the Crow button on turn one.....

Making writs is basic approach.
What is happening with that extreme strategy is:
I have a bewilderment card in my draw deck and in next turn I get it in my hand. With not that much bad luck this happens already in turn 3 if I got one early on. At best I now have 4g in my hand. I spend 2g on turning the bewilderment card into a treasure. Leaving me with 2g with which most of the time I cannot do anything.
Maybe if I am lucky in the early stages to buy a card that gives some extra gold. But in the meanwhile the opponent has always given me a bewilderment card. Which means that I basically ALWAYS lose at least 3 or 4 gold per turn. Provided I only get one bc per turn.

Personofsecrets

AnduinTryggva wrote: »

Personofsecrets wrote: »

tonyaccount wrote: »

Personofsecrets wrote: »

Going to somewhat disagree regarding the skill intensiveness of the button pressing. It can be fairly obvious to press the button over and over in certain situations. Did you just buy a Luxury Exports on the first turn and the tavern has a bunch of contracts? Okay, spam that button to victory, literally. I've done this severalt times.

The situations where you get Luxury Exports on turn one and the board has nothing else of value to the extent where your opponent can't buy anything throughout the game are rare. I can remember a few instances where my opponent got a Luxury Exports or Grand Larceny on turn one and started to spam Bewilderments, and I still managed to win most of them. It's only really bad if you get extremely unlucky, and this applies to every deck and strategy. If you just don't get anything all game, the decks don't matter. This isn't a Rajhin problem.

Luxury Exports doesn't do much on its own. If you spam Bewilderments at your opponent who makes a few writs, he will eventually have more coin per turn than you. If he plays correctly he will turn most of the Bewilderments into writs and have 1-2 Bewilderments and a lot of writs in his deck while you have one Luxury Exports and 10 starting cards. All your opponent needs is one Midnight Raid or Volley and he will take the lead. If he finds an Oathman or so you're in big trouble. He will have some undesirable fluff in his deck, but he can still easily win the game.

I think your example highlights the skill element of the Bewilderment that I mentioned. Most players play poorly when they're being Bewilderment pressured. They either engage in the Rajhin spam when they have nothing in their deck, or go in desperation mode and start buying random contracts and bad cards when they draw like 4-5 coins. What they should do is try to find 1-2 good cards. If there's nothing good on the board they have to buy the cheap contracts when they draw 7-8 coins or so, and only burn the more expensive ones if there's absolutely no choice. The good news is that if there's nothing worth buying on the board, your opponent can't add good cards either.

I can remember more common situations where my opponent gets Midnight Raid, I buy something random and open up another Midnight Raid and my opponent buys it and starts spamming Bewilderments. In that case it can be difficult to win but you just have to view these games as the unlucky instances, and if you managed to get something useful on turn or two yourself you can still win it. You just have to start buying cards like the Shadows or Taunts as higher priority than usual.

Maybe a better example is Prescience/Prophesy turn 1 since those also open the door to trying to make plays like finding Scrying Globe to buy and press the Rajhiin button in the same turn.

I'm of similar experience where I only very rarely lose because bewilderments were too much to overcome fast enough. You certainly identify the correct way of overcoming bewilderment - just making writs.

I don't think that it is particularly skillful for players to make writs. It's the games most basic mechanic besides maybe buying a tavern card. But yea, many people seem to have trouble with the mechanic so maybe there is some skill there and you are right. I guess that there are even players who don't make writs in games where Rajhiin isn't giving Bewilderments. Unfortunately, I don't believe that the games tutorial teaches players how to make a writ. Instead, it teaches them how to use the Crow button on turn one.....

Making writs is basic approach.
What is happening with that extreme strategy is:
I have a bewilderment card in my draw deck and in next turn I get it in my hand. With not that much bad luck this happens already in turn 3 if I got one early on. At best I now have 4g in my hand. I spend 2g on turning the bewilderment card into a treasure. Leaving me with 2g with which most of the time I cannot do anything.
Maybe if I am lucky in the early stages to buy a card that gives some extra gold. But in the meanwhile the opponent has always given me a bewilderment card. Which means that I basically ALWAYS lose at least 3 or 4 gold per turn. Provided I only get one bc per turn.

Sure, I'm definitely sympathetic. Especially given that Rajhiin has several cards such as Pounce and the 2 gold giving agent which lend themselves to the bewilderment approach.

tonyaccount

spartaxoxo wrote: »

Use Sorcerer King Orgnum , Crow, or Mora. Orgnum you actually get more power if they spam you too many bewilderments. And Mora just hastens the game so much and also has curse card, where things they play may end up benefiting you. Crow is iffy because Rahjiin also counters crow by breaking combos, but if you're able to get those combs off, you can draw enough cards and build up enough prestige through the combos that it doesn't hurt as much.

It's not the best counters but it's better than picking something that is more hindered by it.

Crow is a horrible idea to try to counter any Rajhin strategy.

Mora and Orgnum work on a rudimentary level because they remove big parts of the skill from the game, but they are more counters against skill than any strategy. The flipside is that the potential win rate you can get with them is lower because you end up losing lots of games against weaker opponents.

If you know your opponent is going to pick Rajhin and Almalexia you need to consider whether you play first or second. If you play first you can pick Hlaalu and Red Eagle. You will be the one who gets all the key 2-4 coin cards and if there's a Grand Larceny on board you have 50% chance of being able to buy it and often you'll be able to remove it from tavern if you can't buy it. You could also just pick Pelin and Red Eagle to deny your opponent 6 coin on turn one and get to buy cards like Volley and Midnight Raid first that are great against agent strategies. However with two non-coin cards you are only going to have 5 coin on turn one about 10% of the time so your opponent is getting the Grand Larcenies if you can't hide them. I would go with Hlaalu and Red Eagle.

If you play second you have to see the obvious flaw in your opponent's strategy: He doesn't play decks that add non-coin starting cards. You simply pick two decks with powerful 6 coin cards such as Celarus, Ansei or Druid King that do NOT add a non-coin card to fill the deck with strong 6 coin cards while also guaranteeing yourself 6 coin on turn 1. Getting an Oathman, Dreaming Cave, Relicmaster or Ritecaller or Temple Arbiter on turn one puts you far ahead in the game. Don't buy the 6 coin Shadow or the bad morph of Relicmaster, they're awful in the early game.

The problem with Ansei is that it's a low skill deck and also adds good 4 coin cards, and the problem with Druid King is that it also adds nasty 5 coin cards your opponent gets a first bite at. However the combination of Celarus and Druid King adds nice playability so that would be my strategy against such players. Of course the assumption here is that you're familiar with the Celarus/Druid King combination which is quite popular.

You never want to pick Hlaalu as the second player in any situation in the game because your opponent will always have 4 coin so he gets the Luxury Exports or Customs Seizures. You'd get Oathman but you're stacking the odds against yourself. There is in fact not a single situation in the game where you should should ever pick Hlaalu as the second player.

You also have to understand that sometimes your opponent realizes that he doesn't want to give you guaranteed 6 coin on turn 1 with these decks and adjusts his strategy. In this case his second pick needs to be Red Eagle, Pelin or Mora so you only draw 6 coin 50% of the time. But in that case he cannot pick both Rajhin and Almalexia so you're kind of getting what you wanted anyway.

I shouldn't share these strategies for free but whatever. Merry Christmas.