The Book of Judge Fire

[Tornado]

Thanks TrollBrute.

[Yodaking]

You have been the closest to this whole dark judge faction T and I trust you here to make the right call. If you are comfortable going forward then you have my support.

[Tornado]

Thanks Yodaking.

I would be more than comfortable with raising Fire 10-30 points if we lower Death the same amount.

Would love to hear from the playtesters. A little Playtesters Forum.
@fret_gurglo
@Arkham
@Ronin

I am not against more playtests but this guy has been in the oven for awhile now.

[Yodaking]

Originally Posted by Tornado

I would be more than comfortable with raising Fire 10-30 points if we lower Death the same amount.

I already know it won't be a popular idea but I'm in favor of these common sense type of fixes. If after 2 years (?) it has become obvious the Judge Death is overpriced by those who use him most often then rather then try and make up for it by under-pricing his latest partner then just lower his price and call it a day. Each card needs to stand on it's own when not played together.

30 points sound like way too big of a swing though. Drop death by 10 points, add 10 to Fire and lets move on to a new faction. It is always hardest doing that first member of a team since you know they will eventually benefit from being part of a team but you don't have the other members done yet to know exactly how much of a benefit it will be. Now that we are at the end point, it seems to me that Fire is more of the lynch pin in this group with his ability to move everyone into place. So the 'group' cost bump should be on his card.

[Ronin]

Fire is the guy holding the team together, which is why dropping Death and packing in extra Undead goodies is a stronger strategy. Definitely agreed that he should be up 20-30 points. Bringing Death down that much would be fine for the purposes of a Dark Judges build.

Unfortunately, Death is still viable outside of his more thematic synergies (thanks, Fire Ants), so I don't think you could get away with just nosing his cost downward. He'd really need the full Reevaluation process. I know we haven't hit anybody for Reevaluation due to being underpowered yet, but I think this thread makes a pretty good case for getting Death into that queue. The Dark Judges have been tested as a unit pretty heavily here, and he's coming up short.

[Tornado]

The thing is they already are competitive at 800.
They are already paying a Judge Death tax.
By raising Fire you now have a group that costs more than the Wrecking Crew but nowhere near their power level.
So the end result is never play Judge Death with them which is not exactly ideal considering he is supposed to be the leader.

[Ronin]

I am in favor of raising Fire's cost and lowering Death's to keep them at 800, I just think the Reevaluation process is necessary for that second part.

[Tornado]

If the Dark Judges were in the Inner Sanctum like TMNT, Death could be changed at will.
Since he is released I suppose he is chained.

[Arkham]

Dropping Death by 20 and raising Fire by 10 seems reasonable to me.

[Viegon]

Originally Posted by Ronin

Unfortunately, Death is still viable outside of his more thematic synergies (thanks, Fire Ants), so I don't think you could get away with just nosing his cost downward. He'd really need the full Reevaluation process. I know we haven't hit anybody for Reevaluation due to being underpowered yet, but I think this thread makes a pretty good case for getting Death into that queue. The Dark Judges have been tested as a unit pretty heavily here, and he's coming up short.

Outside of wording and minor changes for ruling/clarity cases, we avoid making changes to designs once released; but for designs that need it, the reeval process is set up for just that. I'd be fine seeing Judge Death go through the process, though I agree with Ronin that his use outside of Dark Judge builds could make it tough to actually change his cost.

[Ronin]

Fwiw, I don't think Death's other synergies are so good that a 20-30 point drop would be a crazy boost, but I think you need to go the extra mile and take him through the whole Reeval process to make sure.

Even if his other synergies were too big an issue to lower his points as he stands, putting him through Reeval would give you a chance to make a couple power tweaks to get him where he needs to be. I know you're not totally satisfied with how Death turned out, so it seems like that would be a good opportunity for a little refurbishing.

[Arkham]

I think adding some sort of mechanic to sort of force the opponent into attacking Death rather than allowing them to ignore him, would solve everything, much like how Jason works. What that mechanic is, I'm not sure, or if it's even something you could thematically justify.