Do-U-Anna Ancients Update?
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Here we are yet again on the other side of Gencon and the Ancients Online World Championship. The dust has settled, the champions have risen to glory, and it is once again time to take a look at where Ancients is at as format and where we go from here in this exciting new time for Warlord as we prepare for the Kingswood Games era. It’s always good to have the gift of hindsight after these big events to ask ourselves if there are any kind of potential problem cards that go against the spirit of Ancients and the goals we have in mind when we curate this format. As a refresher, those goals are listed below:
Most of the cards throughout the game’s history should be available.
Most turns, particularly the first, should have a relatively similar number of actions taken by each player.
Most games should be battling back and forth with each player participating.
Most games should be decided by various forms of combat and die rolls.
Cards not involving die rolls with game-winning impact should be monitored.
The format should be as fun as possible for as many player types as possible.
These goals have been the guiding hand behind curating the Ancients list over the last several years and will continue to serve us as we head into uncharted waters in the next year with new (gasp!) Warlord cards coming down the pipe. We’re just as excited as everyone else to get our hands on some new Warlords and begin rolling dice again with regularity, but I’d be doing everyone a disservice without admitting that this new format on the horizon and it’s new ruleset didn’t create new challenges for us when we look at Ancients curation. What we might have considered a clear problem card is much more manageable under the new targeting rules (those can be found here if you’re curious!) and there is no clearer example than that of Winter Warfare.
It might not look like it, but there are actually 30 adarymy decks hiding in this winter landscape.
Now, at this point Winter Warfare is old news. But earlier this summer, we were having serious discussions about how to treat it before GenCon and this year’s Ancients Online World Championship. It was clear to us at the time that Winter Warfare was giving Adarymy an edge over the competition similar to how Medusan Lord’s Might gave Xod a tool that was always a (nuclear)hammer. Add to that there were few answers to deal with Winter Warfare and you had a clear problem card that was warping the format in negative ways. Then new rules showed up and suddenly Winter Warfare targeted. Summer arrived and the war was over before it could expand to the fronts of GenCon this year. These rules are giving some cards a new lease on life as well. Did you ever think you’d actually run Fight Across the Rooftops? And with just a few events under our belts, we’re going to continue watching how the environment evolves under the new rules (and new cards eventually!) and add or potentially remove items from the current Ancients list. But that doesn’t mean we don’t see problems in the environment right now and it’s time to take these problems to their grave.
Two new cards will make their debut on the Banned List: Duanna and Baraxton’s Graveyard. Duanna at face value is a fine Chosen card but when paired up with Eresh q'Shedim drop decks she helps fuel an infinite combo that is no fun to come up against. Baraxton’s Graveyard is also the key item in an infinite combo fueld by several other cards like Malcolm Aedroud, Ramah the Cruel, Chaff, etc. etc. until eventually Rayne Blythewood wins with Supremus. The Graveyard will not be missed. Both of these cards are clear violations of multiple goals of Ancients and so they’re off to retirement. I hope they find ways to bring joy to themselves and others wherever they finally settle down at.
“AJ, wait, that’s it? Usually there are multiple cards getting what they deserve!” You are correct, fair citizen! But one of those cards was Winter Warfare just a few months ago and it seems like it’s mostly fine now. I think we should all be happy with where Ancients is at these days. We definitely have cards on our watch list, but it feels too early to yeet something that isn’t an infinite combo out into the ether. Fortunately for all of us we’ve got plenty more events to round out the rest of the year so we’ll get to play games and figure out what’s making Ancients better or worse together.