I played a proxy LoA deck (best 2 of 3) on Sunday and I beat him pretty handily 2 games in a row with my Fantastic Four Beat down deck. My FF deck is based on Thing with 2 Yancy streets and 4 savage beat downs. The LoA location control isn't as detrimental to me because those two Yancy Streets aren't an overly important aspect of my strategy, so the loss of one or both barely slow me down.

I see a lot of talk about Brotherhood decks, but to be honest I beat them all the time as well. In fact, unless I miss card pulls, I don't usually lose against whomever I play, and I've played everything from Sentinel decks to Mojo decks, to Doom decks. While comparing the new awesome DC decks to Brotherhood is fine, I'm not so sure they are the high water mark everyone is making them out to be. Looking over a lot of PCQ top 8 decks, it seems like a lot of people do believe Brotherhood is the pinicle, but I just can't understand why. They're great, but I'm not sure I'd make them the measuring stick by which to measure everything else.

I think we can all agree that Brotherhood is the benchmark deck since it is generally far-and-away the most common deck at any given tourney. The LoA stand to be very popular early for this reason. However, as I said before we can then expect a metagame shift away from decks relying on Locations (I simply used Bumper Cars as an example), which then really takes the strengths of LoA away. This would then take away alot of the reason for playing LoA which could then open the door for Brotherhood again which would then make LoA good again which would then make Location light decks good again which would then...

The DC set seems to have insured that every deck has a foil, so the key now is to either find the deck that has no answer (doubtful) or stay ahead of the metagame, ie play Brotherhood when LoA has been hated out, etc. We really should see a merry-go-round metagame in the upcoming months.

I'm going out on a limb, but with the amount of team attack cards and effects that have been released, alot in the DC set, I wouldn't be surprised at all to see a few more Titans decks than we are expecting. Alot of LOA are going to come out as we talked about but I think for the first string of tournaments all of the current Brotherhood players are going to react in a manner we haven't discussed yet. I don't think any of the decks are going to change. The Brotherhood players will stick with what got them to the dance. If LOA is going to be dominant in the metagame (and I think they will be. They better be I'm planning to make one) they have to prove it. I don't know if I would shift away from playing a deck that works due to the fear of another deck type without at least going in after it once. This may be an obvious post but I thought it should be said.

Well It doesn't look like you guys are playing against well experience B'Hood players. Of course they destroy locations, but those decks can easily do well without mass amounts of location help. Sure LoA hit's B'Hood, but everyone else hits LoA, while B'Hood can still hold its own against everyone else. It's all rock-paper-scissors in this game, and i'm loving it.

i dont think its dead, just not as strong. this is going to happen a lot as new sets are released.

well its not like anyone will ever be able to make a deck that surely defeats any other deck. every build and team will always have its match, and if UDE makes a team thats wins against every team, they will crash and burn :p :p :p :p :p :p

Well first of all, I'm a VERY experience B-hood player, so I am speaking from experience here. Secondly, I'm just curious which B-hood deck doesn't use either Genosha, Savage Land, Lost City, or Avalon Space Station? All versions of B-hood become much worse without access to their lands. Anyone who doesn't think so may be overstating their knowledge of the deck...

First of all, there isn't really anything in LoA that's gonna stop me from flipping and using my Genosha or Savage Land. Stunning your Ra's Al Ghul is no obstacle. Second, Big Brotherhood is the only good deck that uses Lost City/Avalon and it can still do ok without them because it runs so many characters and doesn't miss drops. However, again I am mystified as to how you think LoA is going to hate on locations like you say it will. Lastly, LoA would not be a viable deck even if they had a card which read "If your opponent controls a brotherhood character, you win." Yes tower of babel hoses brotherhood a little bit. However, since LoA gets crushed by pretty much everything else in the field, that is a pretty moot point. I actually think TNB still beats LoA even with tower of babel. You could just run 4 not so fast if you are so afraid of it. LoA just isn't strong enough to stand up to the pressure and their locations make them very vulnerable to Ka-Boom!. DC isn't in any way going to decrease the power of all kinds of brotherhood decks. My guess is that there will only be one or MAYBE two tournament viable decks coming from DC.


-Eric

Well I want to be curious and ask you which B-Hood player is stupid enough to fodder the LoA with all his locations? No offence to yo bro, but alot of people don't play as smart as they could be playing. Me being one of them :)

What he said.

Well, first off let it be said that I'm in no way a proponent of LoA. The fact that it "hoses Brotherhood" is a statement made by the players of the deck, not me. Second, I was simply speaking in relation to a metagame in which IF LoA is good enough to stop Brotherhood would result in a very wide and interesting metagame.

As to who would let LoA "fodder" (not sure what you mean by this since the LoA doesn't actually kill them...) their lands, I would say not being able to flip lands affects all Brotherhood decks. That's not to say there aren't ways around that, but I am going to assume that the LoA decks are going to run multiple ways to protect Ra's from being stunned. If they don't, his effect is rather moot and the deck is completely non-viable. The effects LoA will have on TNB will obviously be much less than what it has on the BB decks, which I think will be hurt more than Tostido thinks by the LoA. However, I honestly fear Ka-Boom more with my BB than I do Ra's flipping those locations back over. I know I won't stop playing my Brotherhood decks until LoA proves they can consistently stop me, and I am quite certain the Brotherhood can find ways around the foils. I just think that LoA really is only a possible answer to the current metagame, and it really offers nothing against the other tier 1 (ie, location light...) decks in the environment.

I think this is a moo point.

... sorry, had to do it with all the people using "moot point"

... and it's nice to know what deck Drizzt is gonna be running when we play our match tonight as he already knows what I play :)

ack.. what worse?

that he used a line from "friends... or that i know he used a line from a "friends"?

I don't think we can agree about that at all. Just because most people play it, does not mean it's the best. Brotherhood might offer a lot of power, but it certainly doesn't offer more power than my FF beat down deck as I beat Brotherhood with it very often. When I lose, it's usually due to poor card draws. You must also consider that a lot of people are bandwagon 'brotherhoodofiles', meaning they see others doing it, so they feel they must do it as well instead of finding a better deck. When I can walk into any local tournament and play a brotherhood player with little or no fear, that tells me something. I even have friends that won't play me if I'm playing my FF beatdown, so I've had to construct other decks to use in addition to my main.

FF Beatdown does have a good BBH matchup, it just isn't as consistent against other decks. Like Doom can give it problems (can is the optimal word), and doom rarely if ever give BBH problems. Also if FF is not playing entangles, TNB can give it some problems as well, and if they are playing entangles the BHH match and doom matchup are worse.

I am FF Beatdown player myself, and I love the deck. Just saying that is a little bit of Paper Rock Scissors. I don't believe their is a hands down best deck ever, but BBH does seem to have the most good matchs, compared to bad match ups, with FF Beats taking a very very close second, and Doom/FF right behind, and TNB somewhere in between.

Now the reason that BBH is so good is that there are no good ways to deal with locations in play right now. Kaboom can only be used in 2 tier decks right now FF Beatdown (bumper car version, the one I play, look at Origins top 8) and TNB (although relocation is probably a better choice). Relocations aren't very affective against BBH because it also plays with them. So there is really no way of dealing with its locations.

The Answer. Have a Blast, this card not any particular deck is what is going to take BBH down, or at least make not as playable. Sure Kaboom might be a better card to play against them, but not too many decks can play kaboom and it becomes a deader card in most matchups (nice new word, deader).

So now every deck can run 4 Have a Blast, it is less likely to be dead, and doesn't stop resource development, and you don't have to worry about it being relocated back. BBH starts to have problems now, since it is reliant on locations to win. I know some of you would tell me that it doesn't need to have both lost city and avalon to win, I will tell you sure it doesn't it just makes it a lot harder.

I never said it was the best, I said it's the benchmark. It currently is the most popular deck to appear at tournaments. The simple fact is that whatever deck you play needs to be designed with Brotherhood in mind. It's because of the fact that Brotherhood is so common that LoA is being so overhyped right now. I'm simply saying that if LoA can live up to the hype about slowing Brotherhood, then we may start seeing a rotating metagame. The fact that you beat your local homies with a FF is irrelevent...