This past November, the biggest change happened to PvP since 2010. Along with Mirage, we lost the ability to multiply cards after having card multiplication become such a large part of PvP. As KI states in the TR forums (link to image here), they only changed Reshuffle because it was a bug that they were unaware of, and they indirectly insisted that the change wasn't based off of PvP. I still find that claim strange, since the last couple of changes to Reshuffle were announced in the PvP forums (example of one here) so I don't see why this time would be different either.
Anyway, I made a thread on the TR forums that was the most agreed, viewed, and replied to topic on the official message boards during that Test Realm. The most common argument against Reshuffle staying the way it previously was was that thematically, Reshuffle shouldn't multiply cards. However, when several players (about 40) replied that Reshuffle shouldn't be changed because it would damage PvP, several players who played the game for its story and other side activities stated that the state of PvP doesn't matter enough to keep the old Reshuffle and everything should remain centered around PvE alone. I find that statement a little off, since there have been 77.5 million more PvP matches than players who completed the first arc storyline in 2014 (Source here). At the time the article was written, there had been 78 million PvP matches in just under 6 years. That's over 13 million matches a year. That averages to 35,616 matches per day. On average, that's about 25 PvP matches every minute. So is PvP really too small to have an effect on some spells' game mechanics?
Now onto my main point. On the TR forums, I stated and explained specifically the importance of card multiplication when it came down to creating win conditions (Infection multiplying) against defensive players and high heal boost. I also noted the massive increase in difficulty in taking out minions once you can't multiply your AoE's anymore and many powerful minions (Clockwork Paladin, Talos, Minotaur, Cyclops, etc.) demand an enchant be used up to take the minion out for an even pip exchange, assuming the minion isn't shielded by the time you use your attack. By the time you get to actually attacking your opponent, you'll have run out of attacks and have nothing to attack or pressure your opponent with. Back when we could multiply attacks, in a few Reshuffles we could have decks that took out minions while having enough attacks to damage the wizard as well.
If you look at the current ranked PvP meta, experienced Grandmasters and Legendaries alike have abandoned the use of chip damaging attacks and now all opt for a one shot kill strategy simply because they can't enchant and multiply enough chip damaging spells to make them effective or reliable for taking somebody out. The very fact that an attack spam meta completely shifted into a meta where nobody uses attacks anymore should be a huge signal.
Since we cannot multiply our attacks, high heal boost players and Guardian Spirit users are significantly harder to deal with compared to before Reshuffle was changed, especially at levels 50-60 where you face players using Cosmic Kris and Stellar Signet for 98% heal boost from those 2 pieces of gear alone. Before KI removed card multiplication, you would still have plenty of attacks after somebody revived from Guardian Spirit because you multiplied them in previous Reshuffles. Gradually, Guardian Spirit would get easier to deal with as the match progressed. Now, since we're limited on how many attacks we can use per Reshuffle, a lot of players don't have enough attacks to defeat somebody after they have revived with Guardian Spirit since you use attacks to defeat them before Guardian Spirit revival too. The player who revived will simply recover their health while you cannot attack and need to Reshuffle and then will put up another Guardian Spirit, and the cycle continues.
Minions Last Forever?
Like I said in the OP, minions are very difficult to take out now since we can't multiply 4 pip AoE's (Sandstorm, Meteor Strike, Blizzard) and the frequency of finding our AoE's is significantly reduced. This is really disadvantageous for schools that don't have reliable minions (Storm & Death) and it makes schools with defensive minions (Helpful Mander, Clockwork Paladin, Sprite Guardian) seriously hard to take out. On top of that, at mid level, high health low pip minions (Clockwork Paladin & Talos) can't be killed by a 4 pip AoE unless they're enchanted (Meteor Strike, the strongest 4 pip AoE, does 531 max damage with a basic Fire Grandmaster set) which makes you less capable of dealing direct damage to your opponent since you're losing enchants taking out the minion. While I enjoy minions in PvP, having them become extremely difficult to take out can provide difficult 2v1 situations for some schools.
Oh Dear! Where do I begin on this topic? Hmm..... I came on this forum for the first time ever to see if anyone has brought up this issue and I am not shocked to see that I am not the only one who feels strongly about this. Last night I decided to do a 2v2 ranked match with a buddy of mine.
MOST HORRIBLE MISTAKE I COULD HAVE EVER MADE!
We get placed against 2 Max Jades: A life Jade and a Death jade. They get first turn. Me and my buddy are level 87 with roughly 1100 Rank. Now the issue was not that we faced the jades. The issue was that it is almost impossible to control healing from these people and have enough attacks to kill them. We carry 4 infections each. NOW, what is 4 infections to 2 jades who have nothing but heals and defensive spells? You cannot stop healing sufficiently and do damage to them. If you add one infection. They heal it off. Then you hit, they heal perfectly fine. When we were able to multiply our spells, we could more efficiently stop healing because we have more infections to add some pressure at a faster pace. Not only could we stop healing but we actually had a chance to kill because we would have more hits after enchanting and reshuffling. 4 infections in a deck of roughly 64 cards or so is not going to cut it against these Jadezillas. Or even if we packed a few more each. The heal boosts are high too! They have many many more heals in there to counter our infections even if we had the max amount that our deck allows us to carry. We cannot do enough damage and stop healing fast enough enough to keep up with these Jades especially when they are max wizards and we are 87. We don't have enough room in a deck to Carry Many hits and defensive things at the same time. A jade deck is almost or entirely defensive. How can we counter it without being able to multiply things? Max reshuffles. They almost always have max reshuffles... So Please Switch this reshuffle change back! (This was the level situation for us, but may be different for others)
I said I was going to post more but I refrained myself from posting any game-balance related posts simply because I believe that game balance isn't something in KI's agenda nor will be anytime soon. Anyhow, I'll make my list on why we need to be able to duplicate cards.
Heal suppression is very limited at low-above-mid levels since we're limited on Infection usage and may cast heals make getting more than 1 infection on your opponent at a time very difficult. This is an issue because at low levels, heals heal more per pip than attacks deal damage per pip, and most players at Grandmaster level have 70% resist to 2 or 3 schools and 55% universal. Therefore, most players stick to blade stack strategies at these levels and there isn't much "strategy" involved.
Guardian Spirit is much harder to deal with. Despite the removal of card multiplication supposedly easing battles against Jades (which isn't actually the case), most decks cannot hold enough enchantments + attacks to take out a Life wizard and then have enough attacks to take them out after Guardian Spirit revives them. You cannot duplicate enchanted attacks to outweigh the amount of Guardian Spirits the Life wizard has anymore. This is an even worse case with the new Reshuffle mechanic where discarded treasure cards don't come back.
Minions are difficult to deal with. At low-mid levels, taking out a minion without using an enchantment is an impossible task unless you dedicate lots of pips into one minion. Because they demand enchants, they make attacking the actual wizard with effective damage difficult, and once again, we're limited on those. Not to mention we can't Reshuffle our discarded AoE TC's anymore.
Low card copy decks damage low level PvP now. At Magus levels, where the max card number you can carry is 4, you're very limited on important defensive resources such as shields or charms and you're relying heavily on random card draw.
Does anybody else think we need duplication back? If so, in what way?
1) I'm split between heal supression thing. Being a deaht (level 60), generally i don't have a problem dealing with high healing, but i can understand the frustration of other schools. Dealing with massive heal boosts and healing spam is one of rare advantages of being a death and giving other schools same tools would be just another reason of why you wouldn't want to pvp as death. Maybe it could work if new tools wouldn't be equally distributed among the schools; for death would get higher percent of heal supresion stat (if there would be any).
2) I can agree with that one. It's especially painful with critical guardian spirit under sanctuary.
3) Reshuffle has been fixed now, so there is one issue less and 4 pip AOE's pack nice amount of damage (or 2 pip of school mastery attack). It's been like that for a while now.
4) Technicly you're right and i would agree, but we both know how low levels play - using high level tc's to one shot opponent.
I don't really care too much about multiplication because it doesn't affect me that much. But if i had to choose i'd still disagree. Yes we're not able to multiply attacks and infections, but on the other side turtles aren't able to multiply shields and dispels as well. It work in both directions.
The Reshuffle change is a done deal, and won't change for years to come, if ever. The discarding of TC and not having them show back up after a reshuffle, has been fixed. Therefore, we need to look at what other changes are needed to balance PvP.
In my opinion, I see two areas that need to be addressed.
1. Resist, it needs to have a limit/Max value at Level 60 (?) and lower levels. 2. Heal Boost, this needs to have a limit also (at Level 60 (?) and lower levels), since we can no longer suppress it.
The reshuffle limitation has clearly generated a set of issues that need to be address in a future update.
Maybe there can be a new enchantment that puts an extra copy of an unenchanted card into the discard pile and increases damage by 100 if it's a damage spell.
Maybe there can be a new enchantment that puts an extra copy of an unenchanted card into the discard pile and increases damage by 100 if it's a damage spell.
I approve of spells designed to multiply cards as long as we don't get heal multiplying spells. There's the risk factor in having a slower cycle early game but over time your deck will improve in the situation that you're in. This alone would make low level PvP good again.
So many people talk about how this and that is cheating Well Multiplying cards is cheating too when I got to warlord in Age 2 I had no clue that there was even a way to Multiply cards so new comers would be at a disadvantage to add it back. Not to Mention privates always face warlords with their over powered gear vs basic crafted gear. Oh but if the player decides they will get jade to counter it so they are not so weak people will cry that is unfair even with less stats then warlord gear. Simply Put PvP is Has been and always Will be Unbalanced until certain changes are made.
How about no Dispels from First round advantage. How about Basic gear that everyone has or No gear at all ( this would prove skill more then anything) How about more limits on shields and heals and No reshuffles( people cry matches take too long take away reshuffle matches become shorter) How about Level locking Treasure cards ( this prevents low levels from using spells 20+ levels higher) How about No pets in ranked pvp ( while I have many perfect pets that tick people off enfeeble shatter and triple heal I wouldn't mind it my self) How about every so many rounds who goes first changes ( like when fighting Grandfather spider lets see how many people will win when they cant control the fight with First round advantage) I will be honest right now I do not care about anyone's QQ replies to this and will just lol at all the PvP whiners on how none of these would be fair fact is Most of them would
No, we don't. They're trying to solve the issue of Juju and dispel spamming. Taking out the exploit that allowed players to continually manufacture more Jujus was a step in the right direction.
No, we don't. They're trying to solve the issue of Juju and dispel spamming. Taking out the exploit that allowed players to continually manufacture more Jujus was a step in the right direction.
KI implied that they weren't trying to fix anything relative to PvP when they changed reshuffle. The one and only reasoning behind KI changing Reshuffle's multiplication mechanic was simply because it didn't make sense that "reshuffling cards" brought back more copies than the amount the deck began with.
Regardless, Juju spam didn't get much (if at all) easier to overcome since the change, and dispel spam is an issue regarding the turn advantage and the pip cost of dispels themselves, not the multiplication mechanic.
Yes, theoretically, having less Bad Jujus coming at you per Reshuffle should give the attacking player an easier time, but in a real match situation, the Bad Juju spammer is simply Reshuffling faster to get more Jujus than attacks that you carry. Unless you're a Balance wizard and carry loads of Reshuffles (sounds like nobody at max level doesn't it), you'll find yourself being overwhelmed if you don't start applying pressure right as the match begins.
Dispel spam, on the other hand, was countered by multiplying low level cheap cards (shields of your own school, 2 pip spells, blades, dispels of your own) but now is still just as hard to deal with from second.
If max level was the only level where you could PvP at, then I would agree, removing card multiplication was the right direction to take (until the meta becomes slower), but since that isn't the case and there are 89 other levels that relied on doing so, I can't say it's the right direction at all.
If you want a good picture of what removing card multiplication did, look at Grandmaster PvP and compare how many matches there are to before the change. Look at Magus, and see how TC reliant it's become. Look at Archmage and Legendary, and you'll see the higher ranked players just having a tank fest and only winning with OHKO strategies.
There needs to be some method to multiply cards, whether it's by making new spells that allow you to multiply certain kinds or bringing the old Reshuffle back.
So many people talk about how this and that is cheating Well Multiplying cards is cheating too when I got to warlord in Age 2 I had no clue that there was even a way to Multiply cards so new comers would be at a disadvantage to add it back. Not to Mention privates always face warlords with their over powered gear vs basic crafted gear. Oh but if the player decides they will get jade to counter it so they are not so weak people will cry that is unfair even with less stats then warlord gear. Simply Put PvP is Has been and always Will be Unbalanced until certain changes are made.
How about no Dispels from First round advantage. How about Basic gear that everyone has or No gear at all ( this would prove skill more then anything) How about more limits on shields and heals and No reshuffles( people cry matches take too long take away reshuffle matches become shorter) How about Level locking Treasure cards ( this prevents low levels from using spells 20+ levels higher) How about No pets in ranked pvp ( while I have many perfect pets that tick people off enfeeble shatter and triple heal I wouldn't mind it my self) How about every so many rounds who goes first changes ( like when fighting Grandfather spider lets see how many people will win when they cant control the fight with First round advantage) I will be honest right now I do not care about anyone's QQ replies to this and will just lol at all the PvP whiners on how none of these would be fair fact is Most of them would
Just because players didn't understand a basic game mechanic doesn't mean something is cheating or unfair. Newcomers are always at a disadvantage obviously, because they have inferior gear (at lower levels), less knowledge about how to PvP compared to experienced players, less of an idea about deck preparation, etc. Newcomers being at a disadvantage isn't exclusive to certain game mechanics.
With level limiting treasure cards, I can agree, but a lot of those ideas have lots of flaws. First, dispelling is a very effective way to stop your opponent from healing, no gear PvP is on Wizard101Central and is completely dominated by Life wizards year in year out, limiting shields and heals just makes PvP even more offense based than it already is, removing Reshuffle would turn the game into a passing competition, without pets you'd have 40% armor pierce vs 30% resist, and if the turn order changed then one player will be casting 2 spells in a row.
I know what you're getting at and agree with the intention of those changes, but some of them don't work the way you would like them to.
Just because players didn't understand a basic game mechanic doesn't mean something is cheating or unfair. Newcomers are always at a disadvantage obviously, because they have inferior gear (at lower levels), less knowledge about how to PvP compared to experienced players, less of an idea about deck preparation, etc. Newcomers being at a disadvantage isn't exclusive to certain game mechanics.
With level limiting treasure cards, I can agree, but a lot of those ideas have lots of flaws. First, dispelling is a very effective way to stop your opponent from healing, no gear PvP is on Wizard101Central and is completely dominated by Life wizards year in year out, limiting shields and heals just makes PvP even more offense based than it already is, removing Reshuffle would turn the game into a passing competition, without pets you'd have 40% armor pierce vs 30% resist, and if the turn order changed then one player will be casting 2 spells in a row.
I know what you're getting at and agree with the intention of those changes, but some of them don't work the way you would like them to.
"Just because players didn't understand a basic game mechanic doesn't mean something is cheating or unfair."
Well the Old reshuffle was never meant to be that way so you can not call it a "basic game mechanic" there for it is an exploit or cheat. Which does make it unfair.
"and if the turn order changed then one player will be casting 2 spells in a row."
How do you figure that, yeah Turn one both players hit round changes one of the players hits, So the way it is now is Spam dispels and make it to where you can hit multiple times before they can hit once, what is the difference at least it adds a little flair to things.
I will be honest I don't care about any changes they make to the game involving PvP, as long as it does not affect PvE anymore, people need to keep their cries for change for pvp to just that PvP Only.
"Just because players didn't understand a basic game mechanic doesn't mean something is cheating or unfair."
Well the Old reshuffle was never meant to be that way so you can not call it a "basic game mechanic" there for it is an exploit or cheat. Which does make it unfair.
"and if the turn order changed then one player will be casting 2 spells in a row."
How do you figure that, yeah Turn one both players hit round changes one of the players hits, So the way it is now is Spam dispels and make it to where you can hit multiple times before they can hit once, what is the difference at least it adds a little flair to things.
I will be honest I don't care about any changes they make to the game involving PvP, as long as it does not affect PvE anymore, people need to keep their cries for change for pvp to just that PvP Only.
Reshuffle multiplying enchanted cards was easily a basic game mechanic lol, I don't know why you're even trying to say it wasn't. No matter what you call it (glitch, exploit, cheat) it was how Reshuffle worked and stayed that way for nearly 7 years, which is almost the entire duration of how long Wizard101 has been released for. When something works for that long, it becomes known as how the spell functions. Not too difficult to wrap your head around. It's not unfair either, since anybody that's played the game past level 22 should've known exactly how the multiplying mechanic worked, if you didn't know Reshuffle worked that way then it should be a telltale sign of not having much game experience (at least at Adept or above).
By saying Reshuffle's multiplication feature wasn't a game mechanic because you could exploit it, you're basically saying that if KI changed dispels to not take away your opponent's pips because people were "exploiting" it, then dispels removing pips wasn't a game mechanic even if it wasn't intended.
As for the turn order proposal, I'll explain why one player will be able to cast 2 spells in a row once the turn order changes. Player A goes first and casts a spell, while player B casts a spell in that same turn. Now, since the turn order changes, it is player B's turn again, meaning 2 spells can be casted. This means 2 dispels can be casted on player A in a row, and player A can't do anything. This also goes for using Feint and a Shadow Enhanced spell in the same turn, and other nasty combos. That doesn't add "flair" it just adds another broken mechanic to the game.
KI implied that they weren't trying to fix anything relative to PvP when they changed reshuffle. The one and only reasoning behind KI changing Reshuffle's multiplication mechanic was simply because it didn't make sense that "reshuffling cards" brought back more copies than the amount the deck began with.
Regardless, Juju spam didn't get much (if at all) easier to overcome since the change, and dispel spam is an issue regarding the turn advantage and the pip cost of dispels themselves, not the multiplication mechanic.
Yes, theoretically, having less Bad Jujus coming at you per Reshuffle should give the attacking player an easier time, but in a real match situation, the Bad Juju spammer is simply Reshuffling faster to get more Jujus than attacks that you carry. Unless you're a Balance wizard and carry loads of Reshuffles (sounds like nobody at max level doesn't it), you'll find yourself being overwhelmed if you don't start applying pressure right as the match begins.
Dispel spam, on the other hand, was countered by multiplying low level cheap cards (shields of your own school, 2 pip spells, blades, dispels of your own) but now is still just as hard to deal with from second.
If max level was the only level where you could PvP at, then I would agree, removing card multiplication was the right direction to take (until the meta becomes slower), but since that isn't the case and there are 89 other levels that relied on doing so, I can't say it's the right direction at all.
If you want a good picture of what removing card multiplication did, look at Grandmaster PvP and compare how many matches there are to before the change. Look at Magus, and see how TC reliant it's become. Look at Archmage and Legendary, and you'll see the higher ranked players just having a tank fest and only winning with OHKO strategies.
There needs to be some method to multiply cards, whether it's by making new spells that allow you to multiply certain kinds or bringing the old Reshuffle back.
Card multiplication was an exploit that was used for a long time, just like chain stun and puppeting and other exploits. It took KI years to fix those problems, so waiting for a couple years to fix something that is being done in PvP is not uncommon when it comes to KI.
Grandmaster PvP seems to be fine -- especially when you see that there are 2000+ rank Grandmasters roaming around. PvP in general is what is waning, mainly because of the Juju spamming and dispel spamming and so forth. A lot of people are in Magus PvP, where I would say the issue is how much pierce a person can get. I would even call for Infallible to be level-locked as well as Garg (which is level locked through point of purchase, but people routinely exploit loopholes to use it anyway).
Juju spammers do have a lot of Reshuffle and going against them means you need a lot of Reshuffle too, as whoever has the most Reshuffle will probably win. One Juju spamming match took 3 days. When asked how long is a typical match, one Juju spammer said 12 hours. In one evening, the only matches in 2v2 were Jade Juju spammers, which reminds me of when there was puppeting, and there were only puppet matches going on.
When you can multiply charms, Cloak + dispel means you can keep on multiplying dispels. Each subsequent Reshuffle (and in Juju matches, there's a lot of Reshuffles), you now have twice as many dispels. If you want to keep someone from spamming dispels or Juju, then taking away the card multiplication does help.
I'm not saying that dispel spamming is not still an issue. If KI made problematic spells like GS or dispels x1 like Reshuffle, it would probably help.
And dispels spammers routinely spam 4 or more different schools. Hard to put so many low pip spells in your side deck or train 4 different low-pip spells.
Card multiplication was an exploit that was used for a long time, just like chain stun and puppeting and other exploits. It took KI years to fix those problems, so waiting for a couple years to fix something that is being done in PvP is not uncommon when it comes to KI.
Grandmaster PvP seems to be fine -- especially when you see that there are 2000+ rank Grandmasters roaming around. PvP in general is what is waning, mainly because of the Juju spamming and dispel spamming and so forth. A lot of people are in Magus PvP, where I would say the issue is how much pierce a person can get. I would even call for Infallible to be level-locked as well as Garg (which is level locked through point of purchase, but people routinely exploit loopholes to use it anyway).
Juju spammers do have a lot of Reshuffle and going against them means you need a lot of Reshuffle too, as whoever has the most Reshuffle will probably win. One Juju spamming match took 3 days. When asked how long is a typical match, one Juju spammer said 12 hours. In one evening, the only matches in 2v2 were Jade Juju spammers, which reminds me of when there was puppeting, and there were only puppet matches going on.
When you can multiply charms, Cloak + dispel means you can keep on multiplying dispels. Each subsequent Reshuffle (and in Juju matches, there's a lot of Reshuffles), you now have twice as many dispels. If you want to keep someone from spamming dispels or Juju, then taking away the card multiplication does help.
I'm not saying that dispel spamming is not still an issue. If KI made problematic spells like GS or dispels x1 like Reshuffle, it would probably help.
And dispels spammers routinely spam 4 or more different schools. Hard to put so many low pip spells in your side deck or train 4 different low-pip spells.
Like I said, KI stated that the change was not done because of anything related to PvP. If they wanted to fix PvP, they would simply make dispels, Bad Juju and Dark Pact to not be able to be enchanted. Since they didn't, and since they quite clearly stated they only changed it because it wasn't their original intention with Reshuffle, it should be quite obvious now that it wasn't to "fix" PvP. Chain stunning and puppeting can't be related to card multiplication, as neither defined an entire metagame for 80 levels in PvP.
Grandmaster PvP is not fine. There are very few Grandmaster matches a day and those that play at high ranks are part of the very small midlevel community that decided to stick around. Grandmaster PvP inarguably took a huge hit once the Reshuffle update came out. I can guarantee you if the leaderboards were reset, you would not see nearly as many Grandmasters on there.
Magus PvP is now strictly sitting on one play style; and that's getting your high level TC win condition out as early as possible. If you don't, you're playing a match where 2 players are trying to stall each other out. Grandmaster works the exact same way at the moment since you can't suppress heals well at all.
No, going against a Bad Juju spammer does not mean you need lots of Reshuffles to win; that's a horrible misconception a lot of lower ranked players have. Adjusting your deck accordingly (main and sideboard) to be able to be constantly on the aggressive, as well as having decent pip and card management to not lose pressure (discarding aggressively and not constantly dropping to 0 pips), are key factors to beating a Jade Juju early on in the match. The sooner and more consistently you apply pressure, the greater your chances of winning. With that sort of play style a match will take no longer than 30 minutes.
Dispelling 4 different schools is impractical in 1v1 and doesn't work lol. If you're losing to somebody spamming off school dispels, you need to revise your strategy.
Like I said, KI stated that the change was not done because of anything related to PvP. If they wanted to fix PvP, they would simply make dispels, Bad Juju and Dark Pact to not be able to be enchanted. Since they didn't, and since they quite clearly stated they only changed it because it wasn't their original intention with Reshuffle, it should be quite obvious now that it wasn't to "fix" PvP. Chain stunning and puppeting can't be related to card multiplication, as neither defined an entire metagame for 80 levels in PvP.
Grandmaster PvP is not fine. There are very few Grandmaster matches a day and those that play at high ranks are part of the very small midlevel community that decided to stick around. Grandmaster PvP inarguably took a huge hit once the Reshuffle update came out. I can guarantee you if the leaderboards were reset, you would not see nearly as many Grandmasters on there.
Magus PvP is now strictly sitting on one play style; and that's getting your high level TC win condition out as early as possible. If you don't, you're playing a match where 2 players are trying to stall each other out. Grandmaster works the exact same way at the moment since you can't suppress heals well at all.
No, going against a Bad Juju spammer does not mean you need lots of Reshuffles to win; that's a horrible misconception a lot of lower ranked players have. Adjusting your deck accordingly (main and sideboard) to be able to be constantly on the aggressive, as well as having decent pip and card management to not lose pressure (discarding aggressively and not constantly dropping to 0 pips), are key factors to beating a Jade Juju early on in the match. The sooner and more consistently you apply pressure, the greater your chances of winning. With that sort of play style a match will take no longer than 30 minutes.
Dispelling 4 different schools is impractical in 1v1 and doesn't work lol. If you're losing to somebody spamming off school dispels, you need to revise your strategy.
I should have prefaced my statement by saying I only do team PvP. Jade Juju and dispel spamming are not exclusive to 1v1. And it definitely will not take 30 minutes to conquer a Jade Juju match in 2v2. For one, in 1v1, you might get a reprieve when the Jade Juju needs to Reshuffle. In 2v2, they stagger the Reshuffle so that the Juju is always going on, and they also put up Sanctuary, GS themselves, and their minions, and heal each other. They dispel and weak spam as well. There is no attempt to hit you at all, other than casting a minion to do some minor hits. They have no hits. All they do is stall the match and one has said that the typical match takes 12 hours, if the other team doesn't flee. The main way of winning for them is to get the other team to flee. They usually Reshuffle very early so that they can get the GS from the Wand to apply. 4 Reshuffles w/i 30 mins.
I admit if I weren't at Grandmaster, maybe this would be easier, but as it is, I don't have enough Pierce to deal with 80% + resist, or the heal boost of the Jade set, Mandolin and Stellar Signet/Cosmic Kris set, and enough TC Reshuffles to deal with people who are just Reshuffling and spamming. I did win one match, but it took 4 hours, and we had to dispel spam Unbalance + Doom a lot, and they weren't Level 80 (it's also done with weak and dispel spamming instead of Juju at lower levels).
In 2v2, there is a dedicated spammer of dispels. In 3v3, there's usually 2 spammers. They do train off-school dispels. Generally, you'll see dispelling to all schools, but Storm, Life, Death, Balance, and Myth are most popular.
I should have prefaced my statement by saying I only do team PvP. Jade Juju and dispel spamming are not exclusive to 1v1. And it definitely will not take 30 minutes to conquer a Jade Juju match in 2v2. For one, in 1v1, you might get a reprieve when the Jade Juju needs to Reshuffle. In 2v2, they stagger the Reshuffle so that the Juju is always going on, and they also put up Sanctuary, GS themselves, and their minions, and heal each other. They dispel and weak spam as well. There is no attempt to hit you at all, other than casting a minion to do some minor hits. They have no hits. All they do is stall the match and one has said that the typical match takes 12 hours, if the other team doesn't flee. The main way of winning for them is to get the other team to flee. They usually Reshuffle very early so that they can get the GS from the Wand to apply. 4 Reshuffles w/i 30 mins.
I admit if I weren't at Grandmaster, maybe this would be easier, but as it is, I don't have enough Pierce to deal with 80% + resist, or the heal boost of the Jade set, Mandolin and Stellar Signet/Cosmic Kris set, and enough TC Reshuffles to deal with people who are just Reshuffling and spamming. I did win one match, but it took 4 hours, and we had to dispel spam Unbalance + Doom a lot, and they weren't Level 80 (it's also done with weak and dispel spamming instead of Juju at lower levels).
In 2v2, there is a dedicated spammer of dispels. In 3v3, there's usually 2 spammers. They do train off-school dispels. Generally, you'll see dispelling to all schools, but Storm, Life, Death, Balance, and Myth are most popular.
While I'm not crazy for 2v2, I can tell that there are several other issue spells than dispel spam that make it a complete stall out. The problem wasn't to do with Reshuffle's ability to multiply spells, it was with the extreme value in spamming spells like Plague, Virulent Plague, Smoke Screen, and low pip AoE's. The reason Guardian Spirit is a huge problem now is because attacks cannot be multiplied to outnumber Guardian Spirits. Eventually, attacks would overwhelm Guardian Spirit cycling.
I used to do Grandmaster PvP until a few months ago and playing against players that try to stall without attacking is a terrible situation at the moment. I personally believe that Ward pets, Charm Chopper and Fearless Fortifier are the culprits to those kinds of strategies (it isn't just Jade) but I highly disagree in making Grandmaster PvP become a high damage + pierce meta like max level is right now.
Back in the Avalon era when Jading was new, a lot of Waterworks/crafted geared players ran 34-56% damage boost and around 85-120% heal boost. The method of cracking down a Jade was to multiply spells that mitigated their heals (namely Infection and Entangle) and multiplying low cost attacks so that juiced up offensive stats weren't necessary to win against 70% resist. I used that tactic on my Grandmaster Ice & Balance in recent years as well and had great high rank success against even the most stall-based players, despite their use of Mandolin of Evermore or Stellar Signet/Cosmic Kris. Yes, they could multiply shields, but that is why you multiply DoT's or multi attacks. I seriously do not believe that juicing up offensive stats is the right way to go; look at how horrible max level is right now.
While I don't think the old Reshuffle will come back, I do think that receiving new spells that multiply blades, traps, negative charms (excluding dispels), attacks and even shields will give us more than enough tools to deal with the defensive behemoths at lower level PvP.
While I'm not crazy for 2v2, I can tell that there are several other issue spells than dispel spam that make it a complete stall out. The problem wasn't to do with Reshuffle's ability to multiply spells, it was with the extreme value in spamming spells like Plague, Virulent Plague, Smoke Screen, and low pip AoE's. The reason Guardian Spirit is a huge problem now is because attacks cannot be multiplied to outnumber Guardian Spirits. Eventually, attacks would overwhelm Guardian Spirit cycling.
I used to do Grandmaster PvP until a few months ago and playing against players that try to stall without attacking is a terrible situation at the moment. I personally believe that Ward pets, Charm Chopper and Fearless Fortifier are the culprits to those kinds of strategies (it isn't just Jade) but I highly disagree in making Grandmaster PvP become a high damage + pierce meta like max level is right now.
Back in the Avalon era when Jading was new, a lot of Waterworks/crafted geared players ran 34-56% damage boost and around 85-120% heal boost. The method of cracking down a Jade was to multiply spells that mitigated their heals (namely Infection and Entangle) and multiplying low cost attacks so that juiced up offensive stats weren't necessary to win against 70% resist. I used that tactic on my Grandmaster Ice & Balance in recent years as well and had great high rank success against even the most stall-based players, despite their use of Mandolin of Evermore or Stellar Signet/Cosmic Kris. Yes, they could multiply shields, but that is why you multiply DoT's or multi attacks. I seriously do not believe that juicing up offensive stats is the right way to go; look at how horrible max level is right now.
While I don't think the old Reshuffle will come back, I do think that receiving new spells that multiply blades, traps, negative charms (excluding dispels), attacks and even shields will give us more than enough tools to deal with the defensive behemoths at lower level PvP.
If you are set up for an offensive low pip spam, then sure, you can benefit from multiplying. But also remember they can multiply their dispels, so it seems like it would be a standstill. Also, to multiply cards, you need to Reshuffle a lot, and that would be hard if you are not carrying enough Reshuffle.
2v2, unless you are Storm, in general, does not rely on low pip garg spam. So if you go in thinking this is a normal match, you are behind in the Juju/dispel count. The only really good way to counter them is to adopt the same strategy, dispel, and stall with them, until one of you is too impatient enough to wait the day in this staller match. However, setting your deck to counter these people means you won't be very effective in a normal --- stack 5 blades Infallible and hit them with a AOE -- match. You in fact have to become a staller.
This is the same with dispel spam. The best way to counter dispellers is to dispel their dispels. It becomes a massive stall match of people dispelling each other's dispels. I think dispels are a good candidate for x1 or I would ban them entirely because of first move advantage.
What KI needs to do is change the incentives so that this type of stalling gameplay is discouraged. Either that, or institute a reasonable time limit and a Draw, but hopefully Diego doesn't decide, because Diego doesn't always make the right decisions.
If you are set up for an offensive low pip spam, then sure, you can benefit from multiplying. But also remember they can multiply their dispels, so it seems like it would be a standstill. Also, to multiply cards, you need to Reshuffle a lot, and that would be hard if you are not carrying enough Reshuffle.
2v2, unless you are Storm, in general, does not rely on low pip garg spam. So if you go in thinking this is a normal match, you are behind in the Juju/dispel count. The only really good way to counter them is to adopt the same strategy, dispel, and stall with them, until one of you is too impatient enough to wait the day in this staller match. However, setting your deck to counter these people means you won't be very effective in a normal --- stack 5 blades Infallible and hit them with a AOE -- match. You in fact have to become a staller.
This is the same with dispel spam. The best way to counter dispellers is to dispel their dispels. It becomes a massive stall match of people dispelling each other's dispels. I think dispels are a good candidate for x1 or I would ban them entirely because of first move advantage.
What KI needs to do is change the incentives so that this type of stalling gameplay is discouraged. Either that, or institute a reasonable time limit and a Draw, but hopefully Diego doesn't decide, because Diego doesn't always make the right decisions.
Every school bar Ice has amazing low pip attacks that are extremely efficient once enchanted, think Loremaster, Brimstone Revenant, Queen Calypso, Luminous Weaver, Poison, and Keeper of The Flame, every 4 pip AoE and every 2 pip spell in the game. You don't need to Reshuffle a lot to multiply cards, you just need to Reshuffle once and they're multiplied. As I already mentioned, they could just make it so you can't multiply (or enchant) dispels while you're able to with any other kind of spell. They did something similar with Mana Burn being unenchantable by classifying it as a manipulation spell (even though it's an attack); if dispels are no longer classified as charms but as manipulations, then that would have already been one problem solved.
Lots of schools rely on low pip spam in 2v2, it just depends if they're spamming single target attacks or AoE's. A school like Balance will generally use 2-4 pip attacks (with the exception of Mana Burn) to win, Fire will use 4 pip spells (Efreet is an exception), and the other schools (except Ice which is stuck using 6+ pip spells) usually play offensive or defensive support and therefore having low pip attack spam doesn't matter for them (Myth with Earthquake/Shatter, Life with heals, Death with Jujus/Doom/Plagues). That's 3/7 (Storm, Balance, Fire) schools spamming low pip attacks, 2/7 (Death and Myth) providing utility support, and Life providing heals or in some cases low pip attacks as well.
You only need to play passively against Juju spammers if your team only has one attacker and they're Juju spamming that one person to make the match fall into a 2v1 situation. This is why role congestion in 2v2 is important, if your attacker is locked out due to Jujus, make sure he can play offensive support for the player that's clear. Dispels, again, are an issue in this aspect because one player is completely shut down for the entire match, and that's again to do with dispels costing low pips and having no drawbacks.
If you are set up for an offensive low pip spam, then sure, you can benefit from multiplying. But also remember they can multiply their dispels, so it seems like it would be a standstill. Also, to multiply cards, you need to Reshuffle a lot, and that would be hard if you are not carrying enough Reshuffle.
2v2, unless you are Storm, in general, does not rely on low pip garg spam. So if you go in thinking this is a normal match, you are behind in the Juju/dispel count. The only really good way to counter them is to adopt the same strategy, dispel, and stall with them, until one of you is too impatient enough to wait the day in this staller match. However, setting your deck to counter these people means you won't be very effective in a normal --- stack 5 blades Infallible and hit them with a AOE -- match. You in fact have to become a staller.
This is the same with dispel spam. The best way to counter dispellers is to dispel their dispels. It becomes a massive stall match of people dispelling each other's dispels. I think dispels are a good candidate for x1 or I would ban them entirely because of first move advantage.
What KI needs to do is change the incentives so that this type of stalling gameplay is discouraged. Either that, or institute a reasonable time limit and a Draw, but hopefully Diego doesn't decide, because Diego doesn't always make the right decisions.
"The best way to counter dispellers is to dispel their dispels."
That or using 0 pip spells to increase pressure, and again, Reshuffle's multiplication mechanic had nothing to do with that by itself, it's with dispels being such low risk high reward cards and the fact that they were classified as charms rather than manipulation spells. I don't mind having them as x1 spells, but that makes heals at low level PvP even more difficult to shut down in 1v1.
Considering Sprites, Minor Blessings, may cast heals, Satyrs, Pixies, Rebirths, and Unicorns, having maximum 4-6 Infections in your deck (Magus = 4, Grandmaster = 5, Legendary+ =6) is by no means a viable solution to countering that many heals. This is why low and mid level PvP is congested with stall strategies, there are currently no strategies/spells in the game that can beat heal spam other than Death mastery + Doom and Gloom which comes at the expense of an important Life mastery against higher leveled players, and doesn't even work from second. Keep in mind that at levels 58+, many players are carrying 80% heal boost thanks to Cosmic Kris and Stellar Signet.
I can't see myself supporting a draw system, if you make drawing a punishment by having both players lose rank, then the player that doesn't try to stall is being punished for nothing. If you make it so nobody loses rank, then people will try to stall matches they know they cannot win. If you make it so both players gain rank, then stalling becomes even more rewarding.
If dispels and Bad Juju were simply made unenchantable instead, then we wouldn't have this heal boost or Guardian Spirit problem. In every single other level cap where high heal boost strategies were dominant (60-90), matches were won through Infection and attack multiplication. In the one and only era where you cannot multiply spells, those strategies have now become a huge problem despite the huge offensive shift the game had compared to years ago. I don't see how you can't correlate the two.
I've been playing this game and been involved in the PvP scene for 8 years now, off and on various accounts of mine over the years. I'm speaking from the background of a veteran, a ranked pvper as well as a central duelist when I say multiplying cards is EXTREMELY important to the state of PvP.
What's at stake is the ability to spam effectively, which sounds cheap to the inexperienced, but managing it, as well as keeping off enemy spam is absolutely without a doubt a skill. Without this heals are completely unchecked, and one shot kills are the only way to effectively play the game. Ironically this feeds into the style that jade juju spammers like to play. So a jade death packs 9 sacrifices and 9 jujus. You are somehow supposed to kill him with only 4-5 infections? What spam to keep off the jujus with? Max scorpions? Not that you would do that because scorpion isn't viable anymore when they can heal completely unchecked. So you can only go to one shot kills, sitting there like a private building pips for judgement, and in that time 5-6 jujus have stacked on you, he's reshuffled, and it will continue. This is game over, especially because now he can run you out of cards easier and faster.
I might be late to the discussion as this was implemented in november? However, from spectating PvP matches when I'm bored I notice 100% (literally 100%) of the death wizards are juju jade spammers. Clearly this hasn't been fixed by the reshuffle update, the only ones that have suffered are the rest of us. Please reconsider KI, I'm just coming back to the game again, and then I hear you guys taking away something that over the last 6+ years we've become not only accustomed to, but actually dependant on. The game cannot go on with this update, and you will see it in numbers if you wait long enough, assuming you aren't seeing it already
I've been playing this game and been involved in the PvP scene for 8 years now, off and on various accounts of mine over the years. I'm speaking from the background of a veteran, a ranked pvper as well as a central duelist when I say multiplying cards is EXTREMELY important to the state of PvP.
What's at stake is the ability to spam effectively, which sounds cheap to the inexperienced, but managing it, as well as keeping off enemy spam is absolutely without a doubt a skill. Without this heals are completely unchecked, and one shot kills are the only way to effectively play the game. Ironically this feeds into the style that jade juju spammers like to play. So a jade death packs 9 sacrifices and 9 jujus. You are somehow supposed to kill him with only 4-5 infections? What spam to keep off the jujus with? Max scorpions? Not that you would do that because scorpion isn't viable anymore when they can heal completely unchecked. So you can only go to one shot kills, sitting there like a private building pips for judgement, and in that time 5-6 jujus have stacked on you, he's reshuffled, and it will continue. This is game over, especially because now he can run you out of cards easier and faster.
I might be late to the discussion as this was implemented in november? However, from spectating PvP matches when I'm bored I notice 100% (literally 100%) of the death wizards are juju jade spammers. Clearly this hasn't been fixed by the reshuffle update, the only ones that have suffered are the rest of us. Please reconsider KI, I'm just coming back to the game again, and then I hear you guys taking away something that over the last 6+ years we've become not only accustomed to, but actually dependant on. The game cannot go on with this update, and you will see it in numbers if you wait long enough, assuming you aren't seeing it already
Death wizards doing Jade Juju is not because of Reshuffle or Enchantment changes. It's because it appears to be the main method to rank up with a Death wizard. Strategies that work tend to get followers.
Also, I believe most people argue that Jade Juju in 1v1 is easy to defeat within 30 minutes (See above in thread)
Death wizards doing Jade Juju is not because of Reshuffle or Enchantment changes. It's because it appears to be the main method to rank up with a Death wizard. Strategies that work tend to get followers.
Also, I believe most people argue that Jade Juju in 1v1 is easy to defeat within 30 minutes (See above in thread)
I hope I wasn't overgeneralizing anything regarding Juju Jades. While managing pips accordingly and applying constant pressure should give you a victory against Juju Jades in a manageable time, I never implied that beating them under 30 minutes is easy. I would not expect a mediocre player to defeat a well thought out Juju Jade, it usually takes well thought tactics and some deck investment to do so. However, if I had to pair equally skilled players where one is a Juju Jade and the other is a high aggro player, I would say the high aggro player has a much easier time winning the match at max level.
Since I believe Phoenix was referring to the mid-level table and I was speaking of max level vs Juju Jades, here is my experience on fighting Jujus at lower levels (Grandmaster, Legendary, Transcendent): Defeating a Juju Jade is a much more difficult task at lower levels since heals on a Juju Jade are extremely efficient compared to attacks. At max level, a Jade cannot afford to heal unless they have a series of defenses up or if you are out of pips (you will easily out-damage their heal with only 4 pips). At lower levels, this is a different story because your damage output is significantly less than the amount they heal, especially if Bad Juju or a shield is up. Without being able to multiply attacks and with low amounts of card copies at lower levels, a Juju Jade can be pretty difficult to defeat since both healing suppression and attacking pressure are needed rather than just raw damage output. And when heal suppression isn't viable anymore because the game no longer offers reliable methods to suppress heals, then you have a problem. And that problem came with the removal of being able to multiply Infections; which just happened to be the most reliable heal mitigation method.
Even though I am kinda late to this discussion, here is my input. This is a gray zone for discussion. Although multiplying cards was a bug for years with reshuffle, it created a whole new archetype for PvP and introduced a deeper level of thought when it came to these long drawn out matches, for instance, "what cards am I going to multiply first rather than others". Even though it was a bug for a long time with reshuffle, it helped the game more than it hurt it which is what I don't think KI saw when compared to the low-mid level pvp players who became accustom to it. Sometimes game bugs are better for the game. An example being with the 2001 Super Smash Bros Melee, a bug involving movement caused players to move way more rapidly, and to this day it's still used in major tournaments for the game especially with it being so old. Although KI has acknowledged the reshuffle bug and even fixed it, it would be nice for the change to be reverted maybe for PvP use only? But the chances of it being reverted are slight to none. Please let me know what you guys think about this, thanks!
