Gods Unchained PTR is back for us to test the next changes before they go live.
I love this approach and encourage everyone to do test, is your opportunity to provide feedback before changes go live.
And lets be honest, allows you to test all those decks you couldn't before, would be so nice if this mode would always be open to players, to test stuff before buying cards, but that is a topic for another day.
Cadence of the Infinite Sands
Cadence of the Infinite Sands (Cadence from now on), had several changes and seems that GU really wants to see it in play and this last one seems to be huge and not in a good way (in my opinion).
While discussing the changes and testing it with @flaviusgu this weekend, we agreed that changing Cadence from this
To this
Will turn the card into a super OP card for control decks, completely broken.
We tested it with Magic and Death mostly, but is any control decks really, since is a neutral card.
The ability to send the biggest opponent creature back every turn alone is something crazy in my opinion, there is so much value there if Cadence sticks on the board.
Just think that you can't put any creature in the board that don't have blitz or an effect, like Moramag, to kill it or send it away.
You need to kill it with spells or relics, no one wants to use a relics on a 8 strength creature and spells are hard to come by for most of players at that point in the game.
Nature, by mana 8 probably already spent all removals, light doesn't have that many options, can only remember order+divine judgment, can't think much stuff from War to deal with Cadence besides Carnage Sweep or multiple blitz creatures, still big cost to deal with one creature.
Only Magic, Deception and Death might have an "easier" time removing cadence if they haven't spend the removals already by then.
So, the first part alone is already broken in my opinion, since it prevents you from putting most creatures on the board since they will go back before you have a chance to use them.
The second part is the cherry on top for an instant gg, by mana 8 you probably already played some big 7 mana creatures, like...
and of course...
some more than once
And then you always have some big 8 mana creatures that often show up in control decks, creatures like...
Now imagine not only having to deal with cadence, because you really need to deal with it, but also deal with something you already destroyed like the ones above.
It can get worst!
Now, some synergies we tested.
Control Magic
Alastrina with Cadence and Helian on hand.
Drop Alastrina at mana 6, reduce both Helian and Cadence cost to mana 7, next turn play Helian. If your opponent kills Helian somehow, following turn drop Cadence, his biggest creature, if any after Helian, goes back to his deck, your Helian comes back, now at mana 7 your opponent needs to deal with Cadence and Helian, Cadence first, otherwise Helian will keep coming, and here Cadence is behind Helian, making it even harder to do.
to make easier to find Alastrina I even added The trial Begins.
On top of all this, you can use metamorphisis, trade your helian for a bigger creature and get it back at the end of the turn. (I went insane with the Cadence possibilities using Magic since is a very affordable deck 😄)
Control Death
I haven't tested Cadence a lot with Death, but was super fun playing Casino Death with ramp and Cadence, it can spin out of control super fast.
Talking a bit more serious, and using HPain deck as an example.
Adding Cadence in here will make it impossible to win, if you are able to ramp and hold your ground until mana 6.
There are 4 ramps, plus half life for another 2 (or card draw), so mana 6 is easy to get to and from there you just stall until mana 8.
At mana 8 drop Helian, next turn Cadence and if by a miracle your opponent can remove both, you have Trial of the underworld and if needed you can easily add Raise dead and Khopesh to this deck.
I didn't even explored the Over the Line option, but I can see it work as well.
Honestly I really hope this change doesn't go through like this.
How to fix Cadence
We need to move it from BROKEN to Above average/Average
(Above average, in my opinion, should be where Legendaries should be, since you can only play one of each and are harder to come by)
First: Add Roar to the text
Instead of every turn sending your opponent biggest creature away, make it a single time use with Roar.
Second: Add Ability to the text
This way your opponet will be able to drop a creature next turn and can always put Candence to sleep (or silence) so it can't use it's ability, giving options to who your facing.
Even if Cadence dies, you still get a lot of value from the Roar and from all the spells and creatures spent to deal with Cadence and more for each turn it is able to activate the ability.
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Especially since they're nerfing Aggro decks in the same patch!
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I agree that it's over-tuned. So much so that basically everyone that plays with it (or against it) immediately recognizes it. In normal circumstances, I don't think it makes it out of PTR to live play. Now, though, they are releasing multiple shakeups, and one of the driving themes is to tip the balance back towards slower decks. They may let this one go live only to then nerf it in one of the subsequent patches. Who knows?
As is, in the balance patch notes, I really hope not, otherwise I will continue playing deception to steal it. I really don't wat to go mirror control match to who gets cadence first 😆
Besides this one only Armory Heist worries me, but wasn't able to test that one.
Yea, armory heist is going to be killer against a lot of decks.
Lots of people arguing that it won't be that great but it straight up destroys the decks with 1 durability weapons, that try and generate infinite value.
really good analysis and eye-opening threats with cadence 👌
Thank you!