Taint Thinner
Taint Thinner
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Starting Hand: Rand al'Thor I (Fixed) Characters: Elayne Trakand Troops: Andor Infantry x 3 Challenges: Cut Supply Lines Advantages: Andor x 3 Events: Healing x 3 |
I. The Taint: Rand has serious problems at the beginning of every game. First, the Forsaken is always dominant for the opening turn, and often for the second and third. Second, the Forsaken have tons of "Dark One" troops that they can recruit, and Rand has virtually no "Dragon" troops (except Dragonsworn [can't win pattern alone]). Third, the Forsaken have better starting stats than Rand, making it easier for them to recruit and win challenges. These three factors create an advantage for the Forsaken player that I call "the Taint." It is imperative that Rand overcome the Taint as soon as possible. The Hero needs to seize dominance and play a good recruiting character (I like Berelain and Wieramon) on the first turn. II. Strategy for Taint Thinner: A. Terminology: "Forces" means both characters and troops. B. The Big Deal about Dominance: When you are Subordinate you must field your forces first. Although the Dominant player won't know exactly which challenges your forces will be participating in, he can probably guess. If you aren't sending anyone to the battlefield at all then he can win the pattern challenge unopposed with one or two troops. Even reinforcement doesn't really help here because you have to field the troops before they can reinforce, which gives the Dominant player warning. Let me tell you-it sucks to be Subordinate! C. A Quick Reminder about Recruiting Troops: Unlike characters, troops MUST be recruited with symbols of the same allegiance. See Rule Book page 19. There is no 'pay double' penalty like the one for characters-you simply can NOT recruit a Cairhien troop with anything other than Cairhien symbols. This makes Berelain (whose politics symbols have all allegiances) a very useful first character to recruit. She can start picking up some important troops in your deck-Two Rivers Archers, Andoran Spearmen, Cairhien Horse, Patrol, etc. Similarly, Rand(II) [shepherd] can be a good starter because he gets to choose an allegiance, but remember Berelain's politics symbols have ALL allegiances! Another problem with Rand(II) is that he does not get the automatic "-1 ability discount to recruit" effect of Starter Rand and so it will take an extra politics symbol to get her out. Anyway, I'm going to assume that you start with Berelain in your hand and plan on playing her as soon as possible, so you are using Starter Rand. D. Strategy for Seizing Dominance: On the first turn it is not a big deal that the Forsaken has dominance--If you decide to send Rand to the battlefield the Forsaken will probably follow, otherwise this is not a big deal. But as more forces come into play it becomes essential that you know how many Forsaken forces will be in the battlefield. Being subordinate makes the Forsaken declare what forces are going to the battleground first. So, if the Forsaken is going to be recruiting with all of his characters, Rand knows this and can send a character to the pattern challenge without much risk. The bottom line: You need Dominance and you need it NOW! 1. Best Conceivable First Turn: The best possible scenario for Rand is to win a 2 Pattern Token adding challenge like Confrontation, giving him four pattern tokens and dominance. Although very very unlikely, it would work like this- Your are starting with Rand(II) with Tear allegiance. You have Confrontation, Into the Fight, and High Lord Wieramon (might be better with someone else-I haven't checked) in your hand. Either way you need 1 Politics or 1 Combat to get him in with Into the Fight; this part is easy. Rand initiates the Confrontation challenge, but does not go to the battlefield. At this point the Forsaken either thinks you are smoking crack or he knows your plan. Rand generates the needed symbols, plays Into the Fight, and then Wieramon. Wieramon reinforces the Confrontation, rolls all support, and you win 2 pattern tokens. Best of all would be if the Forsaken went to the Pattern and couldn't get 3 support, or if he stayed at home at failed to recruit. Right after Wieramon rolls his 5th support Hell freezes over. The probability of this happening is about .3%. [See my "Probability" essay in the Articles section]. 2. A Realistic shot at Thinning the Taint: Your starting hand is: Nobody declares any challenges. You generate symbols-all you need is 1 Politics to get Berelain if you play Into the Fight first. The chance of Starter Rand recruiting Berelain on the first turn is about 77.8% (14/18). If you don't make any Politics or One Power rolls, then you have to make it work next round. Lets say you get 1 Politics, or a single One Power you can use as Politics. You play Into the Fight and pay 1 Politics to put Berelain in the battleground and give her reinforcement. She goes to the Pattern Challenge. Berelain's chance of winning the Pattern challenge by herself if unopposed are 25% (4/16, at least 3 Support from 4 rolls). The chance of both Rand recruiting Berelain and Berelain grabbing a Pattern token if unopposed is 14/18 * 4/16 = 56/288 = 19.4% for Starter Rand. Not too bad really. You now have 3 pattern tokens to the Forsaken's 2. Rand has
seized dominance, has begun recruiting, and has increased his
ability to recruit in the future. Plus you can use Personal Growth
or the Angreal sometime soon to increase his ability scores.
Or you can get your Nation Capital out on the table and avoid
losing it to a "card-killer". Thus, Rand has effectively
counteracted part of the Fosaken's default advantages and has
begun to "thin the taint." The most likely result of this strategy is that you get Berelain in on the first round, and she goes to the Pattern Challenge, but doesn't manage to generate the 3 Support you need to win a token. Hey, it was worth a try! Keep hitting that Pattern Challenge so you can get The Dragon Revealed out before the Last Battle (by the way, don't hesitate to discard the first Dragon Revealed you draw if it is taking up space in your hand early in the game....you've got another one in there somewhere). 3. The worst scenario along these lines is this-The Taint Prevails: Madness and Chaos: Both Rand and the Forsaken recruit. They both use "Into the Fight" and send their recruits to the Pattern. The Forsaken's recruit kills Rand's and also wins the Pattern challenge. To make matters worse, the Forsaken is Rhavin and he rolled three One Power symbols, tagging Rand for 1 point of damage. Okay, this would suck! Your opening hand is shot and you have nothing to show for it, not to mention that you are hurt. Thankfully, the chances of this happening aren't very big, especially if your enemy doesn't know what deck you are using. More likely, your characters' damage each other a little and nobody wins the Pattern token. This is acceptable because if you hadn't sent your recruit to the Pattern, the Forsaken could have won and had an extra Token on you. III. Variations: A. Rand(II) [Tear] with High Lord Wieramon, the Tear Nation Adv., and Tear Spearmen: Even though controlling Tear will give you dominance, you should not slacken up on the Pattern Challenge. Hopefully the Forsaken will just forget about the Pattern Challenge since you will be dominant anyway. That way you can rack up extra support for the Last Battle. Obviously this is a Tear Deck and should be filled up with Tear Characters and Troops. B. Rand(II) [Tear] or Starter Rand with High Lord Wieramon, Tear, and Into the Fight: Get Wieramon in and to the Pattern Challenge on the first turn, about 35.2%. If he is unopposed he has a good chance of winning the Pattern, about 28.7%. Chance of both happening about 10.1%. Not that great, but man it would be nice. C. Less advantages and more troops/characters: Sometimes it is better to load up on forces to participate in challenges, and sometimes you simply don't have the card that Taint Thinner calls for. No problem, just throw in some mercenaries or your other favorite Dragon characters! If you like this deck and come up with a good variation, email it to me. I will include it in this text and give you credit. The Illuminator Total: 50 Cards; 4 Opening hand, 46 deck.  |
