I really like this battle box so far! Here are my long-awaited ideas.
1)–
Deadly Recluse slows down games. A lesson from my box is that deadly recluse can't effectively attack but is also hard to attack into effectively. This means that it can cause a board stall. You're already running the version of this card that remedies the issue that I'm talking about,
Thornweald Archer, so you could just cut recluse without
2)–
On the subject of Vanilla Creatures. I had some questions regarding a couple of your vanilla creature choices, but I think you answered them in this exchange with sigh pretty well:
(below card is just representative) I really liked the "Theriad" series that Theros flavor texts had. Really neat little integrated world-building.
I also love these. I crammed as many as I could into a beginner-friendly battlebox. I think a new player would be really intrigued when they learn that there’s more than 1 Theriad flavor text, and be inspired to hunt for more. That’s the hope, at least.
But I think it may be possible to optimize these slots more. One important factor in choosing vanilla creatures for a beginner battle box is making sure the cards are interesting game pieces despite their simplicity. New players don't want to use bad cards, and Vanilla creatures feel a lot worse than their friends with abilities. I cannot properly convey how annoyed I would get opening my 6th
Silent Artisan or 15th
Fellhide Minotaur in my Theros packs as a kid. I think playing vanilla creatures that are strictly worse versions of other cards in the box might be frustrating. Take
Traveling Philosophers. This card has interesting lore, but it's strictly worse than
Fledgling Griffin and usually worse than
Stormfront Pegasus. I think if a new player ends up getting stuck with
Traveling Philosophers and
Fellhide Minotaur while playing against something cool like
Serra Angel, they might be unhappy. Another example would be the event in which one player has a
Queen's Bay Soldier and the other has a
Vermin Gorger. This problem may not end up being an issue for you since I think your primary audience is of a different age demographic than mine, but it's something worth thinking about in a broader sense.
If you do wish to remedy these particular cards without losing the juicy Theriad lore, I think there are a couple of easy swaps you can make. Two things I have done to ensure my Vanilla creatures are interesting is to make sure they have unique stats in their slot and to make sure they have fun lore. For example,
Swordwise Centaur is the only two-mana 3/2 creature in the Battle Box. Meanwhile,
Pensive Minotaur has humorous art and lore that makes it feel unique despite the fact that it's probably the worst three drop in the box.
Catacomb Crocodile has both unique stats and fun lore, which makes it feel like an incredibly impactful game piece despite it's simplicity.
Again, you may not want to make changes here, but if you do, I think you have a lot to work with.
3)–
More Flying Interaction. You mentioned on Discord that fliers are a bit of an issue in the Box right now. I think the best remedy for this issue would just be to add more fliers. I run about 20 creatures with Flying in my Box whereas you only run about 10. While dying to fliers can still be an issue in my environment, the fact that there are about 20% fliers in the box coupled with about 25% removal means that anything big that needs to die usually can. Adding some
core set reach and
flying creatures with reminder text could be helpful here. You could also give your flying creatures smaller base powers, using cards like
Concordia Pegasus over
Stormfront Pegasus.
Unfortunately, WOTC only put reminder text for flying on creatures from 9th Edition and 10th Edition, commons from M15 and Origins, and supplemental cards in M19 and M20. Still, there's plenty here to work with if you're inclined. You could even play
Storm Crow!
Other than that, I think this is a very cool and well-constructed Battle Box, and I am excited to see how it progresses in the future!
Thanks,
GT
