Eredan's World

Couple choices...Mercenary priest supporting another deck = use cards for other classes.

Zil priests become Mage/Marauders (now they can cast those Shadow Spells and use daggers too!).

Nomads become Warrior/Marauders (benefit from specific theurgies, and all those lovely Nomad weapons and rare actions).

However, I think the most powerful play is Runics become Craftsman/Warriors, AND all get the attack +2 effect (for being priests). I'm thinking Coranthia + Sanquinam + Sapient. Suddenly you have all three running around with Master Craftsman, Resistance, and their choice of Bigblades, Tridents, or Runic Slicers? With as defensive and healing as Runic priests can be, the potential for awesome is boundless, I think.

The final set of tweaks made the board much more balanced. I saw each guild reach the top end of the Elo and ranking, and there was a lot of position changes. While some tweaks to each deck may still be necessary, I think you guys have come really close to realizing the goal of balanced starters! I'm really excited about this

Fail, and this is not the reason. Either have the starter contain specific upgraded versions that are chosen to make the deck playable, or X amount of Cor and Y amount of Nox included with the deck itself (so that after you get xp on the cards, you have the runes) and allow the player to decide from multi-pathed upgrades. Peace/War, War Cry, Runic Power, Ceremonial, and Blessing of the Pantheon are all commons that provide Rune interactions and would allow for either chose of rune-granting. So, what's the REAL reason? Those cards, along with just about any of their uncommons, are ahead of the power-curve that is currently acceptable in starters. A SINGLE Runic Power might be acceptable in the deck, along with a single Peace/War combo and a Ceremonial. But anything that consumes Runes comes out too far ahead, and card-recycling isn't something that looks acceptable in a starter deck. So it came down to a bunch of bad choices, the least evil of which was to simply leave them out.

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I only respect opinions that come from the same reality the players exist in. When one deck has a particularly high loss ratio compared to the others, and has easily identifiable problems that keep it from being as competitive, there is a gap between ideal and reality. Guess how far down the Elo list in the tournament you have to go to find a Noz deck? Currently searching, and I find the first one at position ~435, with less than 10 games played. Oh sorry, he lost a game and dropped, the next comes in at ~485...also with less than 10 games played. Any Noz that has played more than 10 games is relegated to barely above 1500 Elo, or worse than rank 750. I realize that part of the reason for running these tournaments IS to tweak the balance, but seriously! I'm not arguing that the Noz are THE weakest, since other guilds are currently facing similar woes, but they are clearly on the low tier of the current balancing act.

Oh, and if the actual performance of the deck wasn't proof enough, here's the current problem set:
-Sylphide can only be played by Pythia, activates at the end of the turn, and does not chain.
-Eglantyne has exactly two chaining options: Double or Quit, which can backfire horrifically, and the SPECIFIC combination of Pen -> Sword.
-Scepter of the Border activates at the end of the fight and does not chain. Congratulations only allowing one to two points of healing in a typical match!
-Burn In Hell only makes sense if there is another one in the deck...it is actually WEAKER than including another Smoked Arrow (or almost any other damaging spell).
-Illusory Reflection is incredibly weak in this deck, contrary to its typical play.

The changes listed by Sapphon are strong improvements to each deck that should help keep them competing better, and address two of the three issues above. Illusory Reflection should still be replaced by another card (even more Fog or Martial Magic!).  Are Power and Temporal Paradox excluded because of Act restrictions? They are both commons that have been around for a while and would up the power of the deck.

Zurga, I love you. But you have to be honest with yourself if you have any chance of being honest with us.

This a great tournament, and I'm only sad I haven't had the chance to join in the first of the set! Really like that you guys are tweaking the decks based on results from the tournament as well.

I have only been able to obtain the Sticky Voracious One once, and don't have copies of Zil Jacket or the new tracker yet. That said, I've beaten each of the doors twice, without a loss in any of the dark tower missions yet, DURING THIS EVENT. The door to the great hall is still locked. I have tried refreshing the web-browser, clearing the cache, and using different browers. No luck =/

And honestly, I fail to see why having the items would be a requirement...you are not guranteed one upon victory, and that would lock out MANY players simply because of bad luck and/or not being able to farm the doors.

This was the key to victory for me. Even a crappy discard deck stands a decent chance!

I can see why a Quickdraw deck would work if you keep the deck thin [and have 3x Quickdraw...], but how does an Eclipse deck do it? I have 3x Burning Soul, the event-trophy that is Burning Life Lite (foe HP - your HP), Time to Die, Assassinations, and even enough copies of I Hate Mystics, A Warrior's Fury, and Six Feet Under (better than Smart Ass or Weapon Dance) for fairly reliable chaining, but even with level maxed characters I always wind up with all characters (Kararine, Mouktar, Djamena) dead and a loss by points (between 3 and 15). Should I be tossing in Theurgy Heals, or what?

Testing shows the Zil beatdown is not really viable even with antimagic...it becomes hard to remove his items (mainly Chimera) and keep them off. By comparison, other decks with good removal stand a much better chance because they cut down on his healing.

I currently have a Zil beatdown deck which, while not completely uber yet, I'm glad I've invested in. It can reliably plow through all of the "Values of..." campaigns to their first seven missions (although the spell heavy rounds almost require a quick Stone Heart), and has over 80% win rate against the Sap Heart Deer. I have yet to try it against the other bosses, but am wondering if modding the deck with even more anti-spell (Magic Shield, maybe General Fray) would beat the Noz Spirit?

Yes, WHAT were they THINKING? Clearly, to represent a fresh start, they should have taken the hottest babe from each guild and had them chatting like friends in a spa, with lots of towel wraps and water-level bust style shots. The ideas of politics being overcome across guild boundaries has NO place here. Silly devs...silly artists...

The 'Cards Available In This Booster' is definitely bugged and should be fixed. Even after closing, clearing cache, and trying a different browser, it's not just showing the cards included and their old evolutions, it's showing a lot of cards not in the booster AT ALL.

Namely:
-All level 1 Legendaries except for Anti-Magic Glyph
-Everything in the Newcomers Booster
-And a whole lot more! Like the level one of nearly every card in the game available from a booster, period

I have the sudden urge to get off my lazy bum and learn a foreign language...sorry Saph, I'd love to help, but my lingual skills are not up to the test.

No, no, judging is his excuse to watch Coranthia be all sweaty and heavy breathing. He's older, not DEAD, you know

In all seriousness, though, I love the idea of a crafting competition and an excuse for the battles to move away from the theme of the others...which seemed to be viciousness more than camaraderie. Yeah, sure, the mechanics of the card-game mean you're fighting each other, but it's a different feeling...sparring to improve vs fighting to the death. Would love to see more in this vibe. And would love to see the older guild-specific craftsman get an update.