Podracing

There is a lot of talk on the Decipher listserve about podracing, and quite frankly, not much of it is positive. Theer are a lot of anti- podracing people out there.
Some dislike it due to what they call the "uninteractive" style og it, while others complain that the rewards and penalties are too huge.

What are your thoughts?

 

I'll say here what I said on the listserv: I like Podracing.

It is a new mechanic, and new is always good. It is fun and exciting to race, because no matter how well you build your deck around it, winning the race still requires a bit of luck. The payoff is good, but not a game breaker if you lose.

The naysayers biggest complaint seems to be it is uninteractive. I don't agree with that at all, I think people who say that are grasping at straws. You're both racing; whether you choose to interact is your own choice. But every game is like that. BHBM is uninteractive if LS doesn't deploy Luke. Hidden Base is uninteractive if DS doesn't come up in space to probe your systems.

So those are my thoughts. I like Podracing, and I hope it is here to stay.

 

I have mixed feelings on Podracing. Personally I love it and think it is a cool SW game mechnic. On the other hand, the game mechanic has forced several players in my area--and I'm talking high-ranked players who have played the game since the beginning--to leave the CCG to focus on L5R, RAW Deal, whatever until the release of an expansion that will balance it out (which hopefully Politics will do).

Also, from my experience, it really CAN be a bit lopsided since there is just no way you can win if you don't include a racer in your deck. That means that opponent gets a free 11-card Force loss while retrieving the cards you've had him lose for the last 5 turns. That's a 22-card swing in favor of the Podracing player and I think that may be a bit much. I think that it would have been better to just have the retrieval instead of penalizing a player for 11 cards just because they don't have a Podracer. There are a lot of decks out there where every card slot is important and that player just can't get a Podracer into it. Also, have you seen any lpayer use any other racer OTHER THAN Sebulba's? There's just no variety and it's the same old thing: Sebulba's Pod, first turn-"flash", and off we go. It would be cool to see people actually trying out the other Pods too.

So the bottom line: Cool mechanic, but it's too much of a gamebreaker.

 

The race can be lopsided if you don't have a podracer, but the game is not necessarily so.

There are options. Light can play It Could Be Worse to reduce the damage, and Aim High makes them pay 11 to retrieve. Also, Joh Yowza is pure podrace tech. If Dark draws Palpatine as a race destiny, Joh can "jam" and store that card whether Dark wants to stack it or not!

Dark can play Secret Plans of course (and since the race is won during Dark's turn, Dark is really in the driver's seat -- pun intended -- as to when Light retrieves). Frustration makes them lose I Did It, and Imbalace makes them lose half of what they just won.

Sebulba's Podracer is the best Dark racer, of course, but if you don't have the card slots for some serious podracing tech, try Teemto Pagalies instead. He's destiny 5, so he is tough to damage. If you draw a card you don't like, you can stack it, and then next turn use one force to try to replace it. And he still adds a healthy 2 to each race destiny. That's enough to keep Anakin on his toes, not letting him rest for a few laps until he's built up a good pile to retrieve. And if your opponent isn't racing, hey, it's another destiny 5 card in your deck!

So I think guys who are quitting the game just because of podracing are a bit premature. I think podracing may have shaken up the game, sending a lot of people back to their collections looking for cards that can help counter it (you should have seen how hard I tried to get Aim High!) and I think that is a good thing.

IMHO....

 

I have no problem with a game being shaken up. Like I said, personally I like podracing, but stepping back:

It Could Be Worse- Uh, several of the better DS decks I've seen pack It's Worse in some form so I wouldn't gamble on that.

Secret Plans/Aim High- Great cards, except that the DS decks don't have much a problem activating and using that much (many have a lot of Force activation just for the possibilty of the above).

Joh- Doesn't really stop them from winning the race though..

Also, most of the DS Podrace decks use Hunt Down and there is so much Force loss from Podracing, the drains, and Visage that it's very difficult to keep up with it all. And the battles aren't much better since there are plenty of high destiny floating around.

As for the players who "left to Dagobah", they stuck around long enough to see what podracing would do and when they felt it wasn't worth competing with they left. Do I support that decision, not neccessarily. But when there's a good third of the players in the community crying "foul" on this you can't just push them aside and say "live with it". When there's a 22-card swing strategy it needs to be dealt with. Decipher said that players who didn't want to Podrace wouldn't get hurt too badly for it and it seems to me that they are. How many times have you seen someone without a pod win a podrace? If the chances of winning without ANY podracing tech were a little more balanced (at least a 1:3 chance) then I would shrug it off. But that's just not the case. It is an issue that Decipher will hopefully address--hopefullt Politics will be the solution.

 

Well, let me make one last reply in this dialogue....

It's Worse: Cancelled by It's A Hit! (which should be pretty popular in Hidden Base and EBO decks) and Sense of course.

Aim High: Sure, DS can activate enough force to get his retrieval of eleven, but he won't be able to deploy or draw up much that turn.

Joh: Sure, doesn't necessarily stop them from winning the race, but it does slow them down (if you WANT to slow them down). And if DS doesn't race, Joh is still a good card.

HD Podracing: Well, that's just a good deck design! No law against that...


You mention a "22-card swing strategy", and I'm simply pointing out there are ways to mitigate that. You mention no one ever wins a podrace without a pod. Maybe, but a lot of people have won games without a pod, even when their opponent was podracing. If you're playing Profit or MWYHL, all you have to do is flip your objective, and you're back in the game. If you're playing You May Start Your Landing or That Thing's Operational or Tatooine/Cloud City/Rebel Base Occupation, you can make your opponent lose all of the force they retrieved in two or three turns.

And here's one other thing I like about podracing: it is cheap to play. In contrast look at HDADTJ: you need at least 3 rare cards just to deploy the objective. To actually make the objective viable you need at least how many more rare cards? How many Vaders? Look at BHBM and TIGIH and MWYHL. How many rare cards do you need to pull those off? Look at the "Dark Surgeon" deck on Decktech. Six Emperor Palpatines?!?

And then look at podracing. You only need 2 or 3 rare cards total. The rest are all common or uncommon. Relatively speaking, it is cheap to play. That may be a big reason why I like it.

Ok, I think I've said enough....

 

I haven't seen much of podracing in my area, mainly cos the games take place on the other side of the city on a weekend and my car is always shot, but what I have played with my friends is that it is becoming like circle of protections in magic, one guy i know won't play unless I get rid off anakin from my deck.

Things like that can really cramp the variety of decks in the area. If you have to take out one - four spots for the game mechanic it can be like playing with a 56 card deck (like the old sense and alter wars in the early days, those were fun, I cancel your interrupt, I cancel your sense, I cancel your alter, I cancel your sense, so on and so on ).

 

At my last tourney, I only had to face one Podracing deck, but it was that deck that cost me the tourney. If I had only packed an Anakin's Podracer in my deck, I would have won that game, and possible the tourney itself. As it turned out, I came in third. I'm packing Podracers in both of my decks from now on.