So I've been playing my collective bg alot lately and i was sold immediately on its power level. The bg is a blast to play and i even made a split variant for each faction (will be posting those in the proper forum when i get the chance). So was just wondering what you are guys are playing in your collective bgs. Couple questions on my part: 1 or 2 of each of the namesake runes? Does your bg struggle when not drawing The Collective early? Glowing Slider or Doomball? What spell set you running? And anything else you want to add!
Just a few pointers for my take on collective bgs. I would run one of each. Both units present low benefits of having 2 out. Including two just to improve your chances of drawing them is inefficient bg wise. Collective bgs usually don't have much free space. You should think of the collective as a buff and build your bg around units that would benefit the most of this buff, but not completely rely on it. If you don't draw it early, it's still a good way to scale in late game. With that said, no, it do just fine. Imo glowing is optional, you have other decent sources of healing. Doombringers on the other hand should be 1/2X auto. Even though collective buff will only affect the first champ of a said race, some champs are so good that you want to have two out or the ability to deploy another in the case of the deployed one dies. And doombringer is one of those imo. So while it's fun to have as much of a Highlander bg as possible, don't be tied to the one of each clause. I'm sure @Flyingfinn and @GoldTiger could give you alot more input into this.
Depends on the rune. I run 2 firk mindshredders because they are OP asf, likewise 2x marsh song, 2x pygmy hippo stampede etc. Generally highlander isnt very good. No. If your BG does then it isn't built properly imo. Both. Even though they both share the 'beast' race, doomball has race mutant, so their races won't interfere. If you put doomball out first he will receive the buff but glowing slider won't, which isn't really a problem since you didnt need the stats on him anyways. https://poxbase.com/deck/c8ycxnczQC...cd0ct5civs6=s6Ts7wsqS1gs8HS5Bs54rNr1=rWr3Mr2a The weakness of the BG is not enough tanks. I think if I dropped gekaal (not that great imo) and added an enforcer the BG would be a lot better. But you can't run slick, kartch, moog and leave out gekaal so the BG will forever be mediocre :/ Fair trade off to me.
Pretty much what @GoldTiger said. I myself find using only one marsh song. I like twisted emerald too much, it has a nice surprise aspect to it. If you happend to own a FS Harbinger, definitely run it with collective.
Its not that, I'm just against the idea that all runes that are best early game should have preordained. Not getting it revealed early is a big risk you should have to consider when building the BG.
Not all runes. If there's a thing with multi-races in FS, why not make it more sophisticated? I really don't see a reason for it to not happen. Runes shouldn't be a lottery.
The line has to be drawn somewhere. To me, this is where. A rune has to have a really really compelling argument for having preordained IMO, and the collective doesn't have it.
well either it has preordained or it gives its bonuses upon deployment. The latter is probably more balanced, since you won't have the boost right off the bat.
The Collective forces you to play somewhat highlanderish and give any form of race synergies you would have been able to. To put it in perspective, Chained Fae has preordained and allows a bunch of synergies to be explored, even stacking things like boost, commander, etc.. So why really The Collective should be different?
In my eyes, this is for a couple of reasons. Primarily, chained fae didn't really see any play before she had preordained - whereas the collective does see successful play. Also, drawing chained fae early is far more important than drawing the collective early. She has a greater upfront cost and gives a worse buff. She does ofc gen you Nora - but that's only really useful if you get her out early. The collective can be played much later in the game and still be worthwhile. Basically she's much slower and requires more investment.
+5 nora is really that big of an investment, considering you get a champion that can move, kind of attack and generate nora in the long run? And I don't follow that the collective can be played much later and still be worthwhile. How is she "much" slower? Because of the +5 nora? Really???
If you don't draw collective in the first couple of rounds you generally don't drop it at all (or until you have a very good reason to). The reason is because in the middle stages of the game tempo is so huge when it comes to mid font (not so much for stall outs but that isn't very often). If you skip a deploy/spell you're going to feel the pressure. 25 nora for 0 stats (because the champ you just deployed is doing nothing) is really rough. 25 nora can turn your deploy from Moog to a poison ele, and while it may not seem much on paper in certain match ups this is huge. Imagine if every turn in any game you could for free upgrade your poison ele in to a moog or 1 marsh song in to 2. This continues to go on for the rest of the game (kartch vs shredder, fishkisser vs x, deploy vs no deploy vs no spell) until finally collective is down and youre already winning. It's why backfire boon isn't anywhere near as great as it sounds, EVEN when you deny their spell. Even putting down marsh song isnt all it's cracked up to be in certain cases, and you should really only try to use it when the tempo loss isn't that bad. Anyways a cool way to make collective not matter so much when you deploy it is to make it similar to the 'stat boosting relics' (bridge to nowhere, phalanx marker etc) and have it in a radius yet be instant while still permanent. Doesn't immediately jump out as broken, although it does promote a phalanx style which is pretty trash for FS at least.
Is it true that if you deploy a champ that shares a race with another champ (but they both have a second unique race of their own), that the first champ loses the Collective benefit when you deploy the second champ? If so then The Collective does not work as described.
No. E.g. Swamp doombringer (beast mutant) is deployed for the collective benefit.. Then Swamp thing (mutant mirefolk) is deployed. It will also get the benefit.