Building Blocks: Opportunity to improvise

In Building Blocks we have closed a cycle of introductory articles that cover from the basics of the game to the way a metagame is developed. If you are new to Deviants Factions we encourage you to take a look at them before continuing with today’s reading.

This week Copper and Bronze tournaments open for the first time for Faction trainings. In this article we briefly review what they consist of and then share with you my personal experience about it.

Changes in the tournaments

Next Monday 2 new tournaments enter the scene and with this the whole panorama has more than one change. On the one hand the structure of some tournaments changes and on the other hand the set of envelopes that are given out.

Underground Silver Rework

From now on the entry conditions for Underground silver tournaments are as follows:

• Standard
• Min 6 NFT
• 30 xDEV
• 68 VOL
• Min 7 Players to go.

In addition, the prize ladder is as follows:

• 1st: 114 xDEV and 2 Singleshot boosters from Echoes 1.
• 2nd: 65 xDEV and 1 Singleshot booster from Echoes 1.
• 3rd: 36 xDEV.
• 4th: 15 xDEV.

Playground Daily Rework

From now on the entry conditions for Playground Daily tournaments are as follows:

• Playground Daily Pass Ticket
• Standard
• Min 0 NFT
• 45 VOL
• Min 2 Players to go.

In addition, the prize ladder is as follows:

• 1st: 8 xDEV, 1 Playground Weekly Pass Ticket and 2 Singleshot boosters from Outbreak.
• 2nd: 4 xDEV, 15 VOL, 1 Playground Weekly Pass Ticket and 1 Singleshot booster from Outbreak.
• 3rd: 80 VOL and 1 Playground Weekly Pass Ticket.
• 4th: 55 VOL and 1 Playground Weekly Pass Ticket.
• 5th: 35 VOL.
• 6th: 10 VOL.

Playground Weekly Rework

From now on the entry conditions for Playground Weekly tournaments are as follows:

• Playground Weekly Pass Ticket
• Standard
• Min 0 NFT
• 200 VOL
• Min 4 Players to go.

In addition, the prize ladder is as follows:

• 1st: 22 xDEV, 1 Playground Month Pass Ticket and 2 Singleshot boosters from Outbreak.
• 2nd: 14 xDEV, 1 Playground Month Pass Ticket and 1 Singleshot booster from Outbreak.
• 3rd: 8 xDEV, 100 VOL, 1 Playground Month Pass Ticket and 1 Singleshot booster from Outbreak.
• 4th: 4 xDEV, 223 VOL and 1 Playground Month Pass Ticket.
• 5th: 158 VOL.
• 6th: 99 VOL.

Playground Midway Rework

From now on the entry conditions for Playground Midway tournaments are as follows:

• Playground Weekly Pass Ticket.
• Standard
• Min 0 NFT
• 250 VOL
• Min 4 Players to go.

In addition, the prize ladder is as follows:

• 1st: 28 xDEV, 1 Playground Month Pass Ticket and 3 Singleshot boosters from Outbreak.
• 2nd: 18 xDEV, 1 Playground Month Pass Ticket and 2 Singleshot boosters from Outbreak.
• 3rd: 12 xDEV, 100 VOL, 1 Playground Month Pass Ticket and 1 Singleshot booster from Outbreak.
• 4th: 28 xDEV, 266 VOL, 1 Playground Month Pass Ticket and 1 Singleshot booster from Outbreak.
• 5th: 172 VOL.
• 6th: 116 VOL.

Playground Monthly Rework

From now on the entry conditions for Playground Monthly tournaments are as follows:

• Playground Month Pass Ticket.
• Standard
• Min 0 NFT
• 450 VOL
• Min 4 Players to go.

In addition, the prize ladder is as follows:

• 1st: 36 xDEV and 1 Silver booster from Outbreak.
• 2nd: 30 xDEV and 3 Singleshot booster from Outbreak.
• 3rd: 24 xDEV, 150 VOL and 2 Singleshot boosters from Outbreak..
• 4th: 18 xDEV, 250 VOL and 1 Singleshot booster from Outbreak.
• 5th: 12 xDEV, 448 VOL and 1 Singleshot booster from Outbreak.
• 6th: 6 xDEV and 298 VOL.
• 7th: 211 VOL.

Brand New Copper Factions Trainings

These new tournaments are added to the menu and their entry conditions are as follows:

• Awaken/Entropy/Inhuman/Owner Monofaction format.
• Min 4 NFT
• 20 xDEV
• 20 VOL
• Min 6 Players to go.

In addition, the prize ladder is as follows:

• 1st: 2 Singleshot boosters from Echoes 2.
• 2nd: 34 xDEV.
• 3rd: 20 xDEV.
• 4th: 12 xDEV.

Brand New Bronze Factions Trainings

These new tournaments are added to the menu and their entry conditions are as follows:

• Awaken/Entropy/Inhuman/Owner Monofaction format.
• Min 5 NFT
• 40 xDEV
• 30 VOL
• Min 7 Players to go.

In addition, the prize ladder is as follows:

• 1st: 2 Singleshot boosters from Echoes 2.
• 2nd: 68 xDEV and 1 Singleshot booster from Echoes 1.
• 3rd: 40 xDEV.
• 4th: 22 xDEV.

Factions Training Rework

In addition, all other Factions Training tournaments give out Echoes 2 boosters instead of Echoes 1.

My own red carpet

Hopefully these changes will bring more people to the tournaments and we will finally see more players experimenting with single Faction decks. I’m sure I will be one of those players since I have stayed away from Faction tournaments because I have few NFTs, as I’m sure many players do.

I take this opportunity to open my collection for you to see how I face the decisions that will lead me to participate in the faction tournaments to come.

Red Pool

The inauguration of these new Faction tournaments will be under the Owner banner. This means that I will face players with 100% red decks. This means that the only card that can break our Technologies is Scarlet Strainer and that the only way our opponents will be able to alter the table order is by sending one of our Characters to the first Slot. Both factors suggest that the use of at least 1 Technology in our decks will be correct.

For sure we will see a high level of violence in the first Slots and I will have to be prepared.

My NFT Pool

HQ Options

I start by creating 3 decks, one per HQ and put in them only the NFTs that could make sense with the respective HQ.

OS Ares

Reinhold: It is the only tank I have.

C-14: It is the red technology with the highest RES and therefore the one that can take advantage of the HQ Trigger. It also provides endurance and attack to the loader. Both things that will be especially necessary in this Format.

Scarlet Strainer: Thanks to the HQ it enters with 3 RES. Thus C-14 is the only Technology that could hold its siege naturally. We expect to use Technologies and this is the best HQ to try to do something about it. In addition, its +60 HP delivers value to the table every time a Character assigned to this dies and another takes its place.

WPD Comms Inc.

Ariel Briones: This deck is sure to include some of the cards that make Obey every round. That and the eventual regrouping of enemy troops presents us with the opportunity to get the best out of Briones.

The Unifier

My first impulse when building with Unifier is to throw in all the Characters that have synergy with the HQ.

On board the aircraft carrier

I think I can go deep into any of the HQs. But it is Os Ares that allows me the most flexibility, given the NFTs I have.

For the NFT I have left to include I can recruit one or two of my Blast Attack Characters, the duo of Alia and Joanne to reinforce my offense or even a combination of 2 of these 4 Characters. Also, if with the pre-registration testing I see that Scarlet Strainer is not doing the damage I expected, I can change him for another of my Techs or even change him for Ariel Briones and use one of my free Slots to bring Mother to the list.

After playing around with the Deck Builder I came up with the following lists.

My Copper Aircraft Carrier

The plan is to put a tank in the first Slot and G&F in the second. That is why I included Three Fists in the equation.

Tadashi provides a substantial attack bonus to the deck’s star Blaster and should take the Tank role only in case of emergency (since he usually breaks the Technologies he carries).

Finally, I included Dudek and Bennet to reinforce both aggressively and defensively the first slots, as well as allowing G&F to get more attack if his Kill ability is triggered.

My Bronze Aircraft Carrier

I think the best way for me to approach the choice of card to be my fifth NFT is to look at the 4 free space cards I have and see which of them I can replace with one of my NFTs.

• Adding a third Technology is not an option.
• None of the 4 Characters I have left do well with the first Slot.
• Tadashi and Dominika are excellent damage outputs.

It was tough, but I decided to let Isabel Bennet go. Frankly I was thinking about replacing her with Alia Oz or Joanne Quickhand, I decided to go with Alia because she can take Tadashi’s damage if there are no more Women left on the table. But if in testing I see that I’m lacking firepower on the left or that Alia can’t handle the damage she takes, I’ll give Joanne a shot for sure.

We hope you found this article useful, don’t miss the next chapter of Building Blocks. I for one will be practicing with red lists of 4 and 5 NFTs to see what I show up with for the tournaments coming up next week.