Lets talk House Rules: Grade Locking

Looking for a way to remedy the intentional grade locking done by people against g-era decks. Its not against the rules, but its against fun for some and I'd rather everyone do what they want and lose, then one side playing vanillas the whole game. So I suggest this house rule to let people at least play their rearguard effects with a minor penalty. It ain't perfect and there is likely room for abuse, but if used responsibly, it does help everyone to at least have their fun. Important and often asked parts are highlighted like so.

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Stride Burst

At the beginning of your stride step, if your VG was a grade 3 since the start of the turn, and your opponent did not ride a grade 3 last turn, and their VG was not a grade 3 since the start of their turn, you may ask your opponent to choose and reveal a card in hand. Do the following based on what is revealed. Either way you cannot use Stride Burst again for the rest of the game.

<If opponent reveals a grade 3> If your opponent is a grade 2, your opponent now RIDE the grade 3, and may then draw up to 1 card. You choose 1 card in your hand and remove it from game. Effects that take place when the grade 3 is placed on <VC> are negated. Resume game as normal afterwards.

<If opponent does not reveal a grade 3> you choose 2 face-down cards in your G-zone, choose to cards in your hand, and remove from game those chosen cards. You may then perform a stride this turn as though your opponent's VG was a grade 3. Resume game as normal afterwards.

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FAQ

Things to note:

1) Only works if opponent has intentionally been holding back riding even though he has drawn a grade 3 that can be ridden. Opponent needs to
-start their turn as a non-grade 3
-did not ride that turn
-you were a grade 3 since your turn start (meaning you ride to grade 3 on your last turn)
-this also means opponent had the opportunity to ride to grade 3 and stride first, but opponent forgo it
-he reveals a card in hand when you ASK for it (not force upon them!, be polite even if annoyed)
-he choose one to reveal, and based on card revealed apply either 1st or 2nd effect.
-everything that happens is a Game State Effect, and is by no means affected by any other card effect in play, hand, drop, or bind zone. Things waiting to resolve will only begin to resolve once the whole process is done.

2) You take a minus to do this, but at least your g-break units aren't vanilla anymore and you get at least 1 break-stride skill off your grade 3 (if its that unit).

3) You can choose not to activate Stride Burst (Not mandatory) when conditions are met, so opponent can't force you to perform it unless you want to.

4) you opponent can choose to reveal ANY card (even if he has a grade 3, opponent can choose to reveal another card, should they wish so)

5) You don't have access to your stride break GB2 unless you stride a persona flip, cross-stride or Blizza. But you will activate all your other GB1 units.

6) The penalty is exactly the same as G-assisting. Reason why this has to be implemented is there are times you are forcing the opponent to ride a sub-par unit that's terrible to ride first. So instead of assisting to hit your ride, you are paying the 'assist' to enable all your g-break, which is quite a fair trade off considering you are smashing them for your stride numbers while they are grade 2. If opponent does not want to ride that grade 3, opponent can reveal something else, and proceed with next effect instead.

7) Why negate the on ride effect for opponent? Because they could have done so on their own turn, but chose not to, so I don't think they deserve to get their effects on your own turn (might result in some rule complications so this stop-gaps MOST, but not all of them). They are already getting up to a draw for the minus the ride will cost them, as well as you having to minus one.

8) For 2nd effect, only the player who initiates Stride Burst takes the G-assist penalty because most GB1 effects are balanced out as mid-late game effects, which can and will easily take over the game after 1-2 rounds. Hence the penalty is there to reduce the complete blowout (imagine staring down aurageyser and 2x 21k RG columns without paying assist cost. The grade lock deck will just roll over and die because they intentionally do so to prevent that from happening in the first place! This gives them at least a fighting chance by letting the cost weaken your defenses, granting a window to fight back).

9) This allows BOTH players to have some consent on how the game flow will become (you and the opponent). I don't want this to be something you force other party to comply to just because you want to play your way. If we do that we are no different from the person intentionally grade-locking. This is the better middle ground I can find so that everyone gets to play with the cards they consciously put into their deck.

10) This does not affect legion at all. Reason being is legion are still mostly related to their corresponding sub clans, and some of them (jewel knight, revengers, seekers, liberators) have some of the most crazy early game plays due to some of the mates plus their sub-clan attackers. Also another note is most legion bosses are not vanilla when not in legion. Many have some effect or power gain through their non-legion effect (although some like mega flare are made easier by being in legion), and therefore don't have the same problem as G-era grade 3 who do not even have an effect to work with.

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What do you guys think? do leave your comments on opinions regarding how to minimize the fun lost due to grade locking!

Speculations: Aurageyser Damned

So GBT04 is about a month or so away, so time to speculate a little what might appear. Today I am gonna speculate what Aurageyser Damned might be:

Supremacy Black Dragon, Aurageyser Damned

Stride (Released when both players' vanguards are grade 3 or greater!)-Stride Step-[Choose one or more cards with the sum of their grades being 3 or greater from your hand, and discard them] Stride this card on your (VC) from face down.

[AUTO](VC):[Counter Blast (2) & Choose a face down card named "Supremacy Black Dragon, Aurageyser Damned" from your G zone, and turn it face up & choose three of your rear-guards, and retire them] When this unit attacks a vanguard, and you have a heart with "Claret Sword" in its card name, you may pay the cost. If you do, search for up to two of grade one and below from deck and call to (RC), those units get [Power] +2000 until end of turn, this unit gets [Power] +5000 for each face up card in your G zone, and the number of face up cards in your G zone is two or more this unit gets [Critical]+1 until end of that battle.

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So how did I came to this? As we have seen from GBT03, G-SP have this thing for calling G1 and obsession with making 21k columns (night sky eagle op). Their main bosses also use retire as a cost, and usually have a critical in the middle column accompanied by huge power spikes (claret's GB2, Diablo), and i feel double crit VG suits SP in general better than restanding (Don't want to give competitive SP a restander stride) or guard restrictions (already have PBD breakride and Diablo).



Also since we no longer want the give revengers anymore op strides, so hence the 'claret sword' heart requirement, which goes in line with strides like 'nextstage' that are also going to be out in the same booster. The cost of the ability is rather simple: u swing with a RG column (hopefully with david), then retire it for cost and call a new column. The 2 CB is reasonably considering you are calling 2 cards from deck, and its very easy to make columns with this effect (eagle + anything, 10k attacker + any 7k), but you might lose a 5k intercept if you retire a G2. The full turn will take about 3 CB with claret sword, so it is quite 'fair' and cost heavy.

Is it weak to a PG? Not really, as the entire turn is VERY demanding to guard (up to three 21k column, excluding triggers), and that's assuming opponent has a PG (god have mercy on his soul if he does not) since you are expecting at least 2-3 faceup g-zone (aurageyser into this) which translate to a 41k stride with 2 crit attacking without a booster, a whooping 35k shields for 1, 40k shields for 2. You literally will bleed him of cards on the turn you stride this, which fits into how G-SP try to overpower opponents stride after stride.

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So what do you guys think? Leave your comments on your opinions of what it might be!

Random Rants: To boost or not to boost

Hi this is very random, but here is a tip for all you people who hate swordmy. This came to my attention when this was posted, but i was really surprised how many people never even considered it.

Gn vs JK RP

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He Did WHAT?!?!

Slow and Steady; that's my motto...

The highlight of the video is at 0.34. The GN player rode the PGG, and opted to NOT boost and attack the vg. This has a few very key factors:

1) The attack will not hit the VG without any triggers, so opponent will not take a damge

2) If there is a trigger, you can opt to give the booster the trigger effects, hence the attack will still not hit (6k vs 7k).

3) If there was a crit trigger, you still can give all effects to booster, and RP player will NOT have 2 CB to work with next turn.

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Where is my counterblast!?!?

So why did he do that? Because of swordmy. This card is a moronic pain in the ass to deal with early. An entire column for a lowly JK counterblast. And since your vg is only 6k, a few things are gonna happen if you hit:

1) the next turn he make a 16k column with swordmy, which means thats 15k guard, very painful

2) RP will zerg you to death, and being GN with stride support, you do not have much early game at all, and want to conserve cards for combos later.

So it was a very good move on the GN part. He still got his drive check for the turn, as well as ensure opponent does not get to do his nonsense until the GN player was more prepared. Also GN is a clan in for the long haul, so doing 1 less damage now is not gonna make a difference to them, but if opponent is given oppotunity to rush you, hell its gonna hurt your future plans.


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Porting to Other Matches

So is this applicable to other clans? Very much yes. You need to note which clans are dangerous to give CB to work with(shadow, royal, kagero are very scary examples). And particularly for clans that are really weak early (G-era clans), you might not want to give those decks the counterblast. That said, this does not apply to rush tactics as you wan him dead asap, and are prepared for all the nonsense he is gonna give you anyway.

Note that if you have same power as his vanguard, this tactic will not work that well as you cannot control if it will hit or not. However, you can control if you give him 1-2 damage if a crit shows up. You can still transfer the crit to the booster, hence only doing 1 damage. Also if you do not boost, an opponent may be tempted to just throw a 10k shield anyway to save damage, which telegraphs he does not have a swordmy.

The last possibility is not attacking. This is a very challenging option because you are taking a minus to ensure he does not have a counterblast (-1 drive check). Is it worth it though? Depends on the state of your hand. If  your hand is in good curve and cannot guard swordmy turn properly, you can probably skip a draw. If your hand is terrible and you need to find a card asap (all triggers, risk of miss-grade), I'd suggest you attack in anyway as you need to dig deeper into the deck. So its really situational

To summarize:
Early game if your opponent has higher base than your vanguard, you HAVE the option to not boost. This allows you to generate a scenario where opponent is starved of counterblast early, and cannot make full use of those effects. You still get your drive check, so you just only lost 1 damage.

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So what do you think guys? Leave your comments and opinions about this type of scenario!

Game Theory: Grade Locking

Hi all, very sorry for a really long delay between articles recently. Been really busy since a lot of stuff been happening, and had a lot to do. But now that I am back, I am going to bring up an important term that is becoming very common in our current meta: Grade locking.

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Why u no ride your awesome grade 3?!? ~ Morikawa

What is Grade Locking?

For those who have not been on the receiving end of it yet, your opponent intentionally stays at grade 2 for 1 or more turns. This is quite different from what people term as grade stuck that g-assist is suppose to help smooth out: people will intentionally stay at grade 2, and still gain benefits off it even though they lose 1 use of twin drive by delaying.

Opponent is unable to stride or Legion:
Both of these require you and your opponent to be at least grade 3, so they are unable to access to most of their game plan. This is especially brutal to newer stride-based decks, where most of their important effects are stamped with Generation Break, and are pretty much vanilla before stride. Even a lot of legion era support needs vanguard to be in legion state, or perform legion for effects, hence most of the deck effectively turned vanilla.

2)You get first stride
This is the main reason why its so common. Being the first to stride is quite brutal to your opponent. You get first triple-drive, first activation of all your Generation Break effects, and your on hit-stride are painful to guard or take at this point of the game. So letting your opponent stride first puts you in quite a bad position.

3) Rushing the opponent:
If your hand is up for it, you can just rush opponent down with your units. Due to the nature of how many people mulligan for at least a copy of grade 1-3 in hand, hence they will have at most 2-3 cards to guard with for the first few turns. That means they are quite vulnerable to rushing early barring damage triggers, and even then, properly formed columns will still wreck them with a little luck from triggers. If you are at 3-4 damage by the time your opponent first stride, and have to guard everything, you are in for a rough time and have to guard pretty much all the big hits.

4) Riding is an actual Minus
By not having to use up a card in hand to ride, you actually save hand, assuming everything in your hand is playable at grade 2. While you make full use of your entire hand, your opponent has taken a -3 to ride up to Grade 3, while you -2 just to get to grade 2. The 1 card may not seem like much, but its potentially 1 more card to guard with. The game mechanics suppose to let twin drive from grade 3 help earn back the losses from riding, but we have already established how profitable it is to get the first stride, so even if riding to grade 3 gets you twin drive first, it will cause a lot of hurt when opponents gain access to their advantage first by striding before you.


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If you see opponent intentionally
sitting on this, be prepared for
some rough early game

How to Grade-Lock?

So I have talked about why it can be a strategic means to win your card-fights. so how do you go about this as profitable as possible? Here are some of steps people usually take if they plan to grade lock:

Sub-clan units
Particularly true for effects that happen before legion/striding. The most common are grade 1 10k attackers and grade 2 12k attackers, but also effects that let you use skills prior to a grade 3. Most of them belong to the pre-legion era, and the strongest few exist during the limit break era where the vg skills tend to be slower, and rearguard effects make or break a deck.

Run 10k grade 2
People have this hate for vanillas, but they need to get over the hate, cause the way grade-lock is profitable. barring restraint 11k grade 2, 10k vanilla is the safest kind of unit to sit on while grade-locked. They cannot be punished by all those vanilla 9k grade 2, and always trump a 9k vanguad as long there is at least a 5k boost (15k will still beat a 9k with 10k shield when theres a trigger pushing it to 20k, past the 19k). Defense and offense wise, if the fight is to be grade-locked, the one who rides a 10k vanilla has the stong advantage. If they had to call a booster just so the 9k can hit a 10k vanguard, thats one less card in their hand they can use for guarding.

Rush decks
I wrote about my seeker rush here. The principle is basically the same: get as many magic columns as possible while your opponent is still reeling from the minus they experience from riding, and also being unable to guard as some cards in hand. Its not surprising to see opponent be at 3-4 damage by the time they ride a grade 3, and since you are not a grade 3 yet, they dont have access to most of their mechanics to fight back, and if you factor in they have to guard like their life depended on it, their hand is gonna be in a rough shape. Basically this strategy is valid for most sub-clans, with those with strong flooding potential being the scariest (seekers,jewel knights,revengers, liberators)

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Why this is a problem?

Although I agree this is a very legitimate strategy for vanguard, there are a few foreseeable problems. Firstly it kills most of the fun for your opponent. Many people (myself included) love the awesome effects legion and stride brings to the table, and being denied these abilities is a killjoy. Granted it is a tactical decision, I rather not do this way too many times, or way too long in casual play. Vanguard is suppose to be fun for all players, and properly interactions; something you find happening when your stride deck is sitting there doing nothing, your grade 3 stuck in hand for fear of breaking the silence, or having a vanilla slug fest.  I hope that Bushirod can figure out a good remedy for this, but unfortunately this is gonna happen a lot in tournaments cause to many, winning is everything at a tourney. Just don't be a prick and do this often to your friends intentionally to take the fun out of his games.

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/Unstuck please!

How to Unstuck

So now that I have talked about benefits and problems of grade stuck, here are my suggestions against them:

Play 10k & 8K vanillas
This is particularly true for decks with very weak early game (Gear chronicle). Vanguard's ultimate goal is to shaft six damage down your opponent's throat, and having the guard advantage by having high base numbers goes a long way to not dying. It sucks if you don't get to play some awesome skills, but if you are facing a lot of grade lock, they might as well be vanillas, so factor in this.

Guard early, and often
Grade lock turns the game into a damage race with vanillas. And if that is so, you want to take as minimal damage as possible. That means being liberal with your guarding. If opponent intends to stay grade locked, take as little damage as humanly possible, and let the twin drive overwhelm your opponent over a few turns.

Have strong early game plans
Most main clans have a lot of options early (shadow, royal are famous few), and most can operate even at just grade 2. Best advise is plan for early game interactions, be it playing vanillas, or skill that can be used early, which are commonly found in sub clan cards.

Just ride your grade 3
If your deck is incapable of grade lock strategies, don't force it. Just stick to guarding easy damage and taking the first stride attack that will be coming. If he continues to maintain grade 2, you will overwhelm him over 2-3 turns if you live that long, and you definitely need the extra drive checks to find more shields to guard with.

Play stands and draw triggers, they hate it
They will definitely try to guard for their rear guards if possible, and stand triggers will completely wreck them. Also for draw trigger, barring heal triggers, are the best thing to damage check against grade lock. More available options and the extra 5k just wrecks early rush like no tomorrow.

Mutual Agreement
Just tell your folks you hate it to the core. If they value social interactions, they will cut down the frequency it happens. That said, some house rules could help mitigate the frequency this happens. I suggest one of the following:

• If opponent intentionally miss grade and did not g-assist that turn, and the opponent was a grade 3 since the start of the turn, he has to return what the drive check back to the bottom of the deck (still get the trigger effect, but make the minus hurt a lot more)

• If a player strides first, the opponent gets to draw a card, and put a card back at the bottom at the end of the turn (to help facilitate guarding, which is downright nasty against first strides)

• The opponent who grade stuck for 2+ turns treats the other person a can drink (my personal favorite)

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So What are your guys' opinions? Let me know what you guys think, as well as your opinions on the matter.

Everyone gets a cross-breakride!

So yea I was bored and thought of possible breakride units for existing cross-rides, since PBD and Overlord got the treatment, it would be cool for these to get it as well. I will do 1 for each nation to be fair to all of them. Here are my possible suggestion to how it will turn out, and a bit of background on why I choose to make them this way.

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Blue storm dragon, Maelstrom (breakride)

[AUTO]:(LB4):[Counter Blast (1), Soul Blast (1)]: «Aqua Force» rides this unit, you may pay the cost. If you do, choose your vanguard, and until end of turn, that unit gets [Power]+10000, and "[AUTO](VC) At the end of the battle this unit attacks a vanguard, and if did not hit, and it is the forth battle or more, choose up to two of your rear-guards, [stand] them, and until end of turn they gain [power] +5000."
[AUTO](VC): When this unit attacks a vanguard, if it is the third battle of the turn or more, this unit gets power +3000 power until end of that battle.

There is too many crossrides in Bermuda, and between Cocytus and Maelstrom, I'd say more in favor of Maelstrom. This breakride is use to make glory all the more potent if they could guard it, but it does grant many of the other bosses potent final turn pushes similar to Lambros. This basically forces Reverse to hit or they are in for a world of hurt, tetra drive becomes 7 attacks if it does not hit on the 5th. The second ability is make it more incentive to get strong columns early by turning a 7k booster into a 21k VG column and help hitting cross-rides, but you still have to work in multiple attacks to get it.

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Art by Rwka

Incandescent Lion, Blond Ezel (breakride)

[AUTO] Limit Break 4 (This ability is active if you have four or more damage):[Counter Blast (2),Soul Blast (1)] When an «Gold Paladin» rides this unit, you may pay the cost. If you do, look at up to four cards from the top of your deck, search for up to two «Gold Paladin» from among them, call them to separate open (RC), and put the rest on the bottom of your deck in any order, and choose your vanguard, and that unit gets [Power]+10000 until end of turn, and "[AUTO](VC): when this unit attacks a vanguard ,this unit gains [Power] equal to the combined power of units placed on (RC) from deck this turn."

[AUTO](VC)[1/Turn][Choose a grade 3 card from your hand, and reveal it] When a unit is placed on an open (RC) from your deck, if you have three or more rear-guards, you may pay the cost. If you do, search your deck for grade 3 or more unit with "ezel" in its name, show it to opponent, then add it to your hand. Then choose a grade 3 from your hand, discard it, shuffle your deck, and this unit gains [Power] +1000 until end of turn for each rear-guard you have.. (Even if you do not use this ability, you cannot use this ability again for the rest of the turn).

United Sanctuary have MLB, Ameterasu, and Ezel that needs rework, but Ameterasu already got revival legion for herself, and its difficult to make a breakride for MLB, so I ended up with Ezel. The idea here is to give Platina more final push potential, as one of its greatest weakness is the lack of board flooding ability as Platina. It also makes Platina itself hit like a truck minus critical pressure, so it think its fair. The whole gambit requires 5 CB and 1 SB, so it takes some steps to get it going, but boy you get to see some scary numbers when it does. The second effect also lets you find your next ride or stride fodder and rewards you for using RG to superior call.

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Stern Blaukluger (Breakride)

[AUTO] Limit Break 4 (This ability is active if you have four or more damage):[Counter Blast (1), Soul Blast 3] When an «Nova Grappler» rides this unit, you may pay the cost. If you do, choose your vanguard, and that unit gets [Power]+10000 until end of turn, and "[AUTO](VC): when a rear-guard is [Rest] this turn, choose a unit, it gains [Power] +5000 until end of turn, and "[AUTO](RC) When this unit's attacks hit a vanguard, Counter Charge (1)." 

[ACT](VC)[1/TURN](Counter Blast (1): This unit gains [Power]+2000 until end of turn, and "[AUTO](VC) When this unit's attack hits a vanguard this turn, draw a card, and Counter Charge (1)."

Star gate have mostly Dimension police or Nova crossrides, so it is between Daiyusha, Asura, or Blau. Daiyusha have the revival legion, Blau needed a better breakride for galaxy, and needed support more than Asura in general so here it is. Now this quite different from the original stern. Instead of restanding itself, the breakride effect makes the galaxy turn much harder to guard as more attacks get in. It also has strong synergy with Mars. The cost is also extremely heavy for nova so that they cannot keep break riding this over and over. The second skill is a form of VG pressure, very similar to the original stern, but instead of a restand, it helps gain some advantage if it hits, but you lose the CB if it does not, giving opponent incentive to actually want to guard it.

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Art by Rwka

Silver Thorn Dragon Tamer, Luquier (Breakride)

[AUTO] Limit Break 4 (This ability is active if you have four or more damage):[Soul Blast (2)] When an «Pale Moon» rides this unit, you may pay the cost. If you do, choose your vanguard, and that unit gets [Power]+10000 until end of turn, and "[AUTO](VC): when a rear-guard is called to (RC) from the soul, choose a rear-guard, and that unit and your vanguard gains [Power] +3000 until end of turn, ".

[AUTO](VC)[1/Turn]:When a unit is placed on (RC) from soul, look at up to two cards from the top of your deck, search up to one card from among them, put it into your soul, and put the rest on the bottom of your deck in any order, and this unit gains [Power] +3000 until end of turn.

Dark Zone is between Amon or Luquier. I went with Luquier as they are in a slightly more rough shape than DI. The breakride effect mimics a combination of original Luquier + Lion. However she does not naturally call units from the soul, and you will rely on effect shenanigans to do so. It however fixes column issues that pale moon tend to have for their VG. The second effect rewards active use of RG effects to call more units; this time being a free use of Irina.

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Sealed Demon Dragon, Dungaree (Breakride)

[AUTO] Limit Break 4 (This ability is active if you have four or more damage)[Counter Blast (1)]:When a «Narukami» rides this unit, choose your vanguard, and that unit gets [Power]+10000 until end of turn, choose up to two rear-guard in opponent front row, retire them and bind them, choose up to 1 card from opponent bind zone and call them to his front row <RC>, then if there is still a empty (RC) in the front row, choose up to one unit from that column and move it to the front row. For each card in opponent's bind zone, put the top card of your deck into bind zone.

[AUTO](VC)(choose a grade 3 in your hand, and reveal it) when this unit is placed on (VC), you may pay the cost. If you do, search your deck up to 1 grade 3 with "Dungaree" in its name, reveal it to your opponent, put into your hand, shuffle your deck, choose a card in your hand, and bind it.

This is an interesting take on Narukami, by moving opponent's RG to the front row so that they are at the mercy of their front row retirement effect. I considered either Vermillion or Dungaree to give a cross-breakride, and ended up settling for the less supported one.  What the ability does is a retire effect for his front row, and increase number of bind cards for both you and your opponent, and move up to 1 unit at the back to the now open front row. You also 'pay' for how many you choose to retire by binding 1 card for each unit that ended up in the bind zone. The 2nd effect lets you hit your crossride, while also increasing your bind zone count for unlimited's LB4.
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School Hunter, Leo-Pald (Breakride)

[AUTO] Limit Break 4 (This ability is active if you have four or more damage):[Counter Blast (3), Soul Blast (2)] When an «Great Nature» rides this unit, you may pay the cost. If you do, choose your vanguard, and that unit gets [Power]+10000 until end of turn, choose up to five cards in your hand, call them to seperate (RC), choose up to five of your rear-guards, and those units gain [Power] +4000 until end of turn, and "[AUTO](RC): when a unit attack in the same column as this unit attacks a vanguard, if its [Power] is 20000 or more, draw a card, at the end of that turn, retire this unit ".

[AUTO](VC):When this unit attacks a vanguard, choose up to one of your rear-guards, until end of turn, it gains [Power] + 4000, and at the end of that turn, draw a card, Counter Charge (1), and retire that unit.

This is equivalent to a altmile in the form of a great nature breakride, except it buffs the entire field and cost at least 3 times more. Note that you don't have to hit to get the draw, and even units boosted by pumped units will grant the draw, so pumping the column will net two draw and 8000 power, but will cause the column to retire. This works in line with Reverse's calling back retired units. This provides some insane push power while enabling you have a hand to guard at the end of the turn. The second effect is basically a big berry GB1, but suits the theme of trading units for power and shields in hand, while getting even more pluses off gaining back retired units.

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So those are my take on some units I would give the 'breakride' treatment. What do you guys think? Leave some comments on what you think or would like to see get the same treatment.

Theorycrafting: Vanillas: what they mean to you in new meta

Vanillas and what they mean to you in new meta:

Today I am going to talk about something that has been overlooked by a lot of the vanguard community, which are Vanilla 8k G1 and 10k G2 units.

Math is hard
Lets be honest: vanguard is a number game. 1K can make a world of difference when attacking or guarding, and usually have an opportunity cost (not playing other units with strong skills, being a fragile attacker). It is even more valuable on defense, as most older player from crossride eras can confirm. And playing vanillas give you something similar to crossride defense, without having to ride over a specific unit. A difference between 5k guard and 10k guard tends to add up as the game goes on,

Vanilla is a good flavor too
So why might some ask we play something with no effects when you have so many other options with strong effects? Well, if you ask many of the older players, vanilla IS an effect in itself and has both offensive and defensive benefits. Here is some of the breakdown on benefits:

8K Vanilla

It discourages opponent from swarming you with 7k:
Ever had games before where you took about 2-3 damage on the first turn cause opponent rushed you with 3 G1 at the start? With a 8k, this line of play is discouraged, as the max possible damage you would take that turn is 2 damage if you 5K guard to trigger pass the vg and he checked a critical trigger, It also puts their valuable boosters in great risk of being attacked next turn, forcing them to lose more hand to guard or lose the boosters. This however does not work for sub-clan 10k atacker G1, but you will still bait out those units to be attacked next turn.

5K guard anything below 13K, 10K no pass 12K VG: This happens a lot, as most G1 are 7k with effects or 6K effects like PG. Given that most forerunners will move behind the VG to provide early center lane pressure, you expect to see anywhere from 11k-12k center column. So even with a trigger the max it goes is still only 17K, and failing to connect. If you are ballsy you could even 5k guard for trigger pass, which is impossible for a 7K or below.

Calling 8K as attackers to rush opponent: There are some merits to this. They cannot retaliate back at them with 7K G1, and even 12K attackers is only 5k to guard them, which usually forces the VG to attack them which means it saved you some damage. 8K also hits 12K with any 4K(usually G3 searcher), which is 10K against most 7K G1. 2 8K in 1 column forms 16K, which is 10K shields even for 11K VG) Later you can move them back to be boosters at relatively low risk.

Opponent cannot 5K trigger pass. Similar to the situation above, except in reverse. A 7k can only reach 12k on defense with 5K, which a 8K with 5k booster automatically trumps it at 13k,

Deletor: 
This is the only sub-clan 8K vanilla, so it is a special case. Most of the time deletors aim for completely different breakpoints, similar to old 10K vanilla G3 days. With enemy VG being 0 Power, the ideal numbers to hit are 5K intervals (5,10,15,20) and this allows for many interesting interactions with 7K boosters (15K), both their 12K attackers (20K) and their legion (30K), making guarding a really disgusting proposition.

Helps boost magic numbers: This applies for:

• VG that gains at least 2K power(most breakrides (13k becomes 21k), 
• Crossrides (13K becomes 21K),
• Legion that gains 3K power in addition to 20K legion(23K becomes 31K), 
• 11K against 9K G2 (19k is 15K guard for 1 pass),
• 10K base VG with 3K power (13K becomes 21k), 
• 10K RG can hit Crossride for 10k guard (18K)
• 9K hit 17k against most 7K or less G1 (15K guard)
• 12K attackers hit 10K for 20K (15K guard)
• Goes well with +4k power to form 21K column (9+8+4=21)

10K Vanilla

Cannot be sniped at by other G2 without help: 

As either VG or RG, they make it such that most G2 cannot hit you for free 5K shields unboosted. Defense wise this conserves hand size. 

5K guard anything below 15K. 10K to 2 pass anything below 20K.

This is very strong defense wise, particularly so in rush decks.  

Grade locking: 

This is a current trend to stay in G2 for an extra turn to force opponent to ride a G3 first, therefore letting you have the first stride or legion. This provides you with a relatively safe way to stay this way without taking too much unnecessary damage. This is extremely key when playing rush decks, as grade-locking yourself prevents your opponent from performing legion or stride, basically turning off all their cards with GB1 or legion specific, turning it into a vanilla slug-fest. And since you are playing better vanillas, you can come up on top of the hustle.

Magic Numbers: 

• Hits 16K with 6K boosters (10k guard for 11K base)
• Hits 17K against most 7K and below G1 (15K guard)
• Hit enemy's 10K unboosted
• with 4K booster can force 10K guard on 9K units.

Summary of Vanillas:

• Strong options early (both offense and defense), where hand resource is scarce and many big effects are not usable (no legion, stride).
• Hits magic numbers
• Shores up some of the weaknesses of slower clans (GC for example which is weak pre-stride)
• Cheap as hell budget options
• Safer staying at G2 to deny opponent from striding or legion compared to 9K base.