Yagn’s Mechanical Skeleton in particular, which reads:
“Goods • Bullet Bonus +2 • Influence +1
Weapon • Attire • Horse • Gadget • Difficulty 9
This dude gains the Gadget keyword and has +3 value.
Opposing cards cannot boot or move this dude.”
This cards hard-counters many tools that high-pull Eagle Wardens can bring to bear, including:
Mariel Lewis
Red Horse’s Tail
Speaks-with-Earth
Flight of the Lepus
Point Blank
Which, in a meta that includes Yagn’s (as Hellstromme may very well drive), makes this an extremely difficult card to play around within this archetype. Suggestions!?
That is absolutely right. Yagn’s and Robo are some of the only things that kinda hard counter Eagles Fortress and their shenanigans.
I’ve played a lot against @Suzy309, who went undefeated in Birmingham with gadgets, where I played a version of the Warden Blockade deck. SiyE and unprepared are some of the only options there is. Else you need to isolate the mech and shoot straight
Here are my thoughts - I’ve used a variety of these strategies against the Skeleton when piloting my Spirit Fortress decks (yuck!):
Seconding @Benni’s excellent suggestion of using Unprepared.
Send home dudes that don’t have the Skeleton, leaving just a few dudes with Skeletons and tie/win the shootout. You’ll be getting rid of your opponent’s influence and if you’re playing high value EW you may well be only discarding Ancestor Spirits/Nature Spirits. If your opponent leaves out the dudes without Skeletons that’s fine - you’re left with just a bunch of dudes you want to take out and EW high value should win wars of attrition thanks to tokens & Lydia Bearhands.
Similar to the above, Point Blank the other dudes.
Use “It’s Not What You Know” instead of Flight of the Lepus. Or use “The Winning Agenda” as slightly weaker cheatin’ punishment seeing as we’re discussing a post Epitaph environment (hooray, great to be discussing this with people at last). I prefer INWYK, but both suggested cards are on value for high value EW.
I’m pleased that a high quality deck (EW high values) has a tough match-up against an archetype that used to struggle (Gadgets). @Neramoor was 2nd at Edinburgh’s “2016” Sheriff with such a gadget deck.
Hope not to face gadgets, which used to be a viable strategy at the top table in tournaments! Less reliable now (a good thing), but still perfectly possible and most decks have some bad match-ups. You can still make the cut if you’ve got one bad match-up.
Edit: just saw motosenn’s reply posted at almost exactly the same time. Great minds think alike/fools seldom differ.
Takin’ Ya With Me’s are underrated, in my opinion, and I think really good for dealing with Yagn’s dudes. .
Red Horse’s Tail, Point Blank, and Flight are all good for sending away the non-Yagn’s dudes. As long as you can force a shootout that goes to resolution, if you have to take casualties, say with any of your token dudes (which may be harrowed or not), you can hit back with TYWM to try to knock out a casualty or two for those opposing key dudes (with or without yagn’s). Plus it’s a high value card and helps those pulls
Difference in metas, wow. TYWM is a big deal online, I’d say in a near 3 way tie with No Turning Back and It’s Not What You Know.
Most have listed the major silver bullets for going in for the attack. Another tool EW has strength in is movement. Simply out maneuvering can have a huge impact on what opponents have when you do engage.
Pinned Down & Takin Ya With Me is a nasty combo. More generally Phantom Fingers can turn off the Skeleton for a turn and draw you a card. Get Sammy Cooke to steal it, or a Faithful Hound to bite its leg off?
I think Spirit Chess is a real sleeper decktype that might see more play following Tales From the Epitaph, if not before. I’ve still not put much thought into what I’d like to play at the Euro Championships but it’s definitely on my list
I’m less worried about TYWM when playing skeleton decks than I am with most shooters but I run heavy bullets in my skeleton deck to get use out of Outgunned and abuse regulators with high bullet draws.
Like most gadget decks skeleton decks tend to need some set up time so you may want to consider putting some early pressure on their economy before forting up to try and choke them off.
While it doesn’t help if you only run high values, Faithful Hound is probably the best counter to OP goods. Maybe run 9-10-Q with Faithful Hound as an off value sidekick?
Wardens can grab Bramble easily if Francisco Rosales runs his job, so maybe Hellstromme Yagn’s decks will give a meta-boost to Sidekick Wardens decks.
As an avid skeleton player, Id not trust rushing against the Yagns decks. It is quite possible to get a skeleton for free first action and then having a rampaging shooter with a handfull of shootout actions. Unprepared is good especially to counter Outgunned as their Hand rank manipulation and Forcefield if they have those. TYWM is always a good counter for playing badly but a real problem with that is that most skellie decks backs a whole pouchful of bullets (except for Irving but he might take the ornithopter home if I see your Takin’ Ya With Me coming).
The best counter to the deck that I have played against is probably attrition (spirits and sidekicks). Always be aware of their flamethrowers though as they have a nasty habit of giving extra casualties!
Without wanting to put to fine a point on it skeleton decks may just be something that a traditional fortress deck has to take on the chin. If anything I think the upswing in these kind of decks is a direct reaction to spirit fortress and other similar concepts which defend and then vote for Nick.
Without wanting to encourage other different NPE’s have you considered showboating? putting all your control points onto a black elk with crafty hares and lots of movement is very hard to deal with,
but a real problem with that is that most skellie decks backs a whole pouchful of bullets (except for Irving but he might take the ornithopter home if I see your Takin’ Ya With Me coming).