I dislike the randomness of some Summoning

[Math Mathonwy]

This is something that has been brewing for a long time in my head but was sparked by the GG18 beta test's Summoning discussion. I made a separate thread since this is a separate issue and no matter how the GG18 ends up, it won't fix this problem.

My problem is that a good (or lousy) starting hand or hands for the first and the second turn can have a giant impact on the game if you're playing a Summoner.

A Nico that Summons two Hanged, a Student, a Kentauroi, and a Doxy during the first two turns is a lot different from the Nicodem who Summons two Belles, and a Punk Zombie on the first two turns. One brought over 40SS worth of stuff and the other got less than 20.

And the earlier you Summon, the more AP you get out of the things you Summoned.

The hand on the first turn is usually not all that important if you're not doing Summoning. I mean, you might have Snipers or you might need to defend against Snipers or you might have a way of ramming Yasunori into the opponent's deployment zone for five Attacks or whatever but those are either somewhat rare or not as significant.

And the big difference between Summoning and a Sniper (or defending from one) is that you can try Sniping even without a god hand. You can do it, you can top deck good stuff, you can succeed. But no one is going top decking for a Hanged (well, there was actually this one guy who did it twice in one game but that's not normal!).

And this isn't all Summoners. It's just the ones that have the biggest variance in their Summoning. Somer, for example, is very reliable in his Summoning but he isn't such a problem in this sense (him being or not being OP is a different topic). But those with big Summon pools like Nico or Dreamer, or Ramos with his ability to change the number of things he Summons that are IMO problematic. If their hands are good at the beginning they are super powerful, if the hand cards suck, they will be in trouble.

And note that this isn't just about playing against Summoners but also playing with them. I essentially posit that luck plays a sadly big part with some of the Summoners (bigger than with the other Masters) and I dislike this effect.

What do you think? Have you similar thoughts?

[Adran]

You are largely right. Models with actions that have a TN are more subject to the vaguarys of luck than those that just need opposed duels to do their stuff.

But If you build your list to hope you get a good hand on the first turn, then I think that is bad planning.  have a plan b. It might be that mine and my main opponent often play very aggressively, but we find that we often need the good cards on the first turn to do some form of attack. But if I get a bad hand, I can adapt how I play the turn. 

Its one of the weaknesses to playing a summoner that a lot of people don't notice because it doesn't happen often. But when it does happen it can ruin your normal plan. 

[Math Mathonwy]

35 minutes ago, aquenaton said:

I do not play summoners (at least not summonin from them), but the player usually is prepared to deal with the hand he has (reserving stones to get better cards, hiring models only to farm the deck, etc) so when they play, they will get some good cards (from undertaker, those are not ours, phillip, etc),  and had paid for them when they created the crew, at least most of the times.

Maybe it is me that never count on a card to win something. The list should function if luck is with you or if not. A player that relies so much on luck is going to suffer the most from this.

Even with all the card draw that Nico is usually played these days with, there's still a large difference between getting two elevens vs getting two thirteens as your highest cards in hand.

And (though this is somewhat to the side of my main point) some of the other Summoners have far less impressive card draw engines (well, I'd say actually that no one has a better card draw engine for this than Nico). I suppose Ramos could take Myranda with Imbued Energies but that's not a very common approach, I don't think?

[WWHSD]

Games where I'm burning stones with Ramos for the first couple of turns just to get two spiders is painful. It's even worse having to do that after spending stones to try and draw something useful.  

[Math Mathonwy]

6 hours ago, aquenaton said:

I do not consider very intelligent to rely on getting the cards you want. Of course a surprise can be a huge boost, but if the player relies so much on luck, he may commit some serious mistakes.

I do agree. Saying that your loss was due to having a bad hand on the first turn is a bit disingenious in that you probably actually lost because you relied an having a superb hand on the first turn. But the swing can be huge if you get that dream hand vs getting a lousy hand and implementing plan "B" even if plan "B" is sorta solid. And this swingyness annoys me  

[daniello_s]

Summoning mechanic in Malifaux is kind of problematic. As Math said when you have good cards you are on fire and your opponent can only cry (I remember to this day my first game against Kirai when friend of mine summoned two Hanged in single turn and won a game with that), but when you have mediocre or poor hand then you are in deep s**t unless your master can buff his crew as well (like Dreamer).

I suppose GG18 is about to 'neutralise' case 1 when your hand is on fire but I'm afraid it will completely forget about case 2... And people advocating GG18 axe on Summoners will simple advise you 'take a risk or don't play summoner'...

[DXXXVIII]

Hmm, yes... there is randomness in drawing cards and having a good hand in turn one and two is better than having a bad hand turn 1 or 2.
I dont really see the point. This does'nt only affect summoners.

[Jafar]

2 hours ago, DXXXVIII said:

Hmm, yes... there is randomness in drawing cards and having a good hand in turn one and two is better than having a bad hand turn 1 or 2.
I dont really see the point. This does'nt only affect summoners.

Yes, but if play Von Schil (outcast) and if have 2x 13 card (any suits). Mostly I can only try to sniper some model. With summoner mostly I will bring two good models. 

And in case when my best card is something like 7, summoner may bring one model or none, and Von Schill won't do remarkable things as well. I think, that the point was that summoners can do more with two good cars at turn 1 then many other masters.

[DXXXVIII]

VS with freikorps trapper and double focus will remove 1-2 models with 1-2 good cards.

[Adran]

3 hours ago, DXXXVIII said:

Hmm, yes... there is randomness in drawing cards and having a good hand in turn one and two is better than having a bad hand turn 1 or 2.
I dont really see the point. This does'nt only affect summoners.

Models with actions involving TNs are the models most affected by a bad hand. Justice is still able to hit enemy models when her hand is full of 1s and 2s. And its still worth her making the attacks. If you are Zoraida and need an 8 to cast obey, and your hand is full of 1s and 2s then Obey is a very risky action to take. (see its not just summoners)

Vonschill and the trapper still have a decent chance to remove those models with a bad hand. Nicodem summoning a hanged with a bad hand is very unlikely. 

[Dogmantra]

5 hours ago, DXXXVIII said:

Hmm, yes... there is randomness in drawing cards and having a good hand in turn one and two is better than having a bad hand turn 1 or 2.
I dont really see the point. This does'nt only affect summoners.

Well I think Math's point is that the step down in effectiveness for drawing a card one number lower is much higher and more binary for a summoner than a non summoner. You either get the card you need for the model you want or you don't. If Ulix doesn't draw a 12+ on turn one, he doesn't get a War Pig (unless you topdeck it with excellent luck as I have in the past...) and is screwed much much harder than a sniper who ties rather than beats on their focused attack and so gets a negative damage flip.

[daniello_s]

5 minutes ago, Dogmantra said:

Well I think Math's point is that the step down in effectiveness for drawing a card one number lower is much higher and more binary for a summoner than a non summoner. You either get the card you need for the model you want or you don't. If Ulix doesn't draw a 12+ on turn one, he doesn't get a War Pig (unless you topdeck it with excellent luck as I have in the past...) and is screwed much much harder than a sniper who ties rather than beats on their focused attack and so gets a negative damage flip.

^ this

[WWHSD]

8 hours ago, DXXXVIII said:

Hmm, yes... there is randomness in drawing cards and having a good hand in turn one and two is better than having a bad hand turn 1 or 2.
I dont really see the point. This does'nt only affect summoners.

If summoners don't get their momentum on summons going early they have problems later on when they need cards for their summons. Most of the time when I play a non-summoning masters I end up carrying my best cards into the second round unless combat started really early. 

[WWHSD]

10 hours ago, daniello_s said:

I suppose GG18 is about to 'neutralise' case 1 when your hand is on fire but I'm afraid it will completely forget about case 2... And people advocating GG18 axe on Summoners will simple advise you 'take a risk or don't play summoner'...

I think that people are over estimating the effect of GG18 on summoners. Getting a great hand that allows multiple powerful summons is still going to be a big deal. Those models just aren't going to be able to directly score in a couple of strategies. They'll still be able to affect scoring in strategies and there's no effect for schemes.