kpr_ep14_consistency

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Cold Open

Did you know, I was once gifted a shirt that said Mister consistency on it. So, you know, you can rely on me for this topic regarding KeyForge. But if anyone tells you that I got the shirt because I only ever went three and three at high level organized play events, just ignore them. I mean, they're not lying, but you should ignore them. Besides it was all sealed. Let's get sweaty.

Introduction to Consistency

Today, we're taking a look at the concept of consistency, so that you can understand this concept and apply it to yourself, playing the game. We're going to be talking a bit higher level about what is consistency, especially in trading card games. How that applies to KeyForge with KeyForge is paradigm shifts. And then how do you apply this knowledge? How do you actually take this knowledge about how KeyForge is working? Right. This is something we've taken a dive into before looking at how KeyForge works. What are the mechanics of the game, [00:01:00] so that you can understand them on a deeper level and start to make informed decisions about how you're playing about what you're playing to take the most advantage you can, of these mechanics and your knowledge of them. So we're going to look at what does consistency look like in a competitive card game? Why do people want consistent performance? And what does that look like in traditional TCGS, which is what KeyForge came out of. Richard Garfield created this game as a response to kind of all the net decking; not that there's anything wrong with that kind of a meta, but that wasn't the kind of game he wanted to play. That wasn't the kind of game he wanted to put out there. He started this kind of thought with things like Spectromancer his mid two thousands digital game that he published through three donkeys, his company. And he started playing around with this random deck idea. So it wasn't just with KeyForge, but he, he looked at the consistency and other schemes and said, let's turn up the variance so that we can apply our skills so that the expert advice has to be more generalized, right? It's not, you're going to play this exact [00:02:00] deck. You're going to be in these exact match-ups. The expert advice has to be more generalized, which is why here on KeyForge Public Radio, we are kind of talking in generalizations because I don't have the time to walk you and neither do you to walk through every single possible situation you could have seen every single possible matchup. Heck, in one of my games at uh, the Philadelphia Vault Tour. I was up against a great mass mutation deck. And I knew about most of the deck. So I generally knew the matchup and then the dude drops the sting and I go, he know, I never practiced much against the sting. I'm sure I've played a game or two against it and with it, but like this game, this artifact warps the game so much. I don't really know what to do here. Absolutely bonkers. So we're looking at consistency in competitive card games. What does it look like in the context of KeyForge and KeyForge is a dual paradigm shifts and we'll cover what those paradigm shifts are from other card games and how consistency changes or what it looks like inside of that context. And then how does our understanding of consistency in [00:03:00] KeyForge help us become more informed KeyForge players who can make more informed decisions leading to better results?

Playing simply with this knowledge to become better at the game to become more skilled at the game to try to grow over time, which will yes. Result will result in more wins, but improvement is the goal, right? Improvement and winning are the goal, but not winning at any cost improvement over time and becoming better.

Why Consistency is Important for Competitive Performance

So in a competitive card game, when you go to a tournament, you want consistent performance from your deck. In a competitive card game when you go to a tournament. You want consistent performance from your deck. You want to know what the deck will do within an acceptable range of variance. So why do you want consistent performance? And this is, I will admit, generally the preference from a kind of a competitive mindset. Okay. I want to win. Winning is the goal. Yes. I want to have fun, but I'm going to take it very seriously to try to win. Right. If you've ever been a fan of a sports team and followed them, There are teams that are going to be [00:04:00] consistent, whether they're very good or very bad, right. And one of the best ways to get your fans yelling at you, if you are, if you're inconsistent and you're all over the place, maybe you perform well, one game you show the promise that your team has when things go well for you. When you get a lucky break. But then another time you just completely fall apart. Your team doesn't execute, your coaching staff. Doesn't make some good calls. And you're just not consistent. And what you want us that consistency. So you know what to expect, so you can plan better, play better and react better to what's going on. And it's the same thing and competitive card games, right? Your deck of cards, whether it's, you know, in Flesh and Blood, Magic: The Gathering, Pokemon or KeyForge, your deck of cards is your team and you want consistency from that team because you want to know what to expect and how to pilot it; how to, you know, give direction if you're a coach in many different situations with consistent performance, you know, you can rely on your players to get this done. You want to know, you can rely in your cards to get that done. Right. So, [00:05:00] uh, you want to know what it's going to do with an acceptable range of variance, and there's always going to be variance, right?

Decks of Cards as Vehicles of Variance

Because that's the nature of card games. You take a whole bunch of cards and you shuffle them together. And that's the variance. The people don't really play with that whole lot in card games. There are some that have tried, right? You can pick the order your deck goes in, but I haven't seen any of those games take off. Maybe they were great. Maybe some people really enjoyed them, but it takes away a lot of the variants and a shout out to ashes here where you choose your starting hand, which is a very interesting variant, interacting with, variance. Right. So, but looking at kind of a baseline example, here is a 52 cards traditional deck, like in poker, right? Uh, four, four suits, that kind of thing. That is consistent because it's the same 52 cards every time. And the variance comes from what order they're drawn and what order they're dealt in. So you have perfect knowledge of which cards are in that 52 card deck. Now, remember in KeyForge we have in, in open deck list formats in Archon and Alliance, you have [00:06:00] perfect knowledge of the 36 cards in their deck.

So remember to take advantage of that. And then looking at deck building games, right. There was collectibles, there was traditional card games, then Richard Garfield said. Okay, well, let's take the concept of trading cards and then let's take an actual game and put them together, right. And use that variance. At least traditional deck building games usually allow three or four copies of a card when you're putting your deck together. And most of the deck will be made up of your maximum allowable copies. Whether it's Netrunner, which was a living card game. I played in a while back. Magic: The Gathering, Pokemon, Flesh and Blood. You are often taking the maximum allowable number of copies if you want consistency in that card.

Now, of course, there are reasons to go less than that. Maybe you have a car that can search. For a card or you have enough consistency, you have enough speed. You have enough card draw that, you know, you only need one of a card, or it's limited to a one of as well. Right? So there's some variance there, but typically it's allowing three or four copies in a deck. And most of the deck is going to be made up of [00:07:00] cards that are in a group of maximum allowable copies or three or four, right. So the randomness, the variance is introduced in both instances, the 52 card deck and the deck building game through shuffling and then drawing from the deck. Right. Whether it's just to, for poker and then, you know, you play the cards up to the table and forgive me, I'm not. I'm not a poker player might not get that terminology. Right. And then deck building games, your drawing your hand. And that's the same with KeyForge, even though it's not mostly a deck building game, except for a little bit with Alliance. So that randomness, that variance keeps it from being the exact same over and over again, like chess or go. Classic games. Those are examples of perhaps some of the more consistent games that you would play. And they're still a lot of different things that go on there.

Various Expressions of Variance in Trading Card Games

And then you have a different levels of variance in things like flesh and blood, Magic: The Gathering of the Pokemon trading card game. Looking at these, you will have more variance than chess or go, right? Uh, but you might have a reduced variance in the number of different kinds of decks. People bring in the number of archetypes [00:08:00] of decks people bring; and what cards, what staple cards that everybody includes are in those decks. That you're going to see as you play the game in whatever context you're playing of it. And then looking at the mechanics of each game, the variance will still sometimes affect you negatively. And that variance you play with that variance differently in each game. Each game does this differently. Going through a couple of examples. In ashes, like I mentioned before you choose your starting hand. Very cool way to, to switch that up a little bit. Flesh and blood simply through its design philosophy and how it applies and how it applies that to the mechanics of the game and the cards that are printed flesh and blood is very high consistency. If you want to generally like, know what you can do and, you know, have razor thin margins of error and, you know, Play a, an algebra game disguised as a fantasy setting, then play flesh and blood. It's it's a great game. It is also math and a fantasy skin. I look at things like, you know, Magic: The Gathering has at 60 card decks for many formats, but look at the most popular one commander it's a hundred single copies of different cards. You can't [00:09:00] repeat a card. I wonder why that's the most popular format by a long shot. There's a lot of variance there. There's a lot of fun. Right. There's a lot of great experience to be had in commander. So variance is introduced in a lot of ways in these card games, especially like how do they handle resources. Flesh and blood, the resources are on the card. So it really tightens up the consistency. That way the resources are included, you know, on the card, you can pitch cards instead of using them for something. Uh, commander has lands, right? So your variance, especially in something like in magic, the gathering is tied to tied to those resources and when you see them or when you don't. And a newer card game, out of New Zealand, Sorcery, uh, also gives you, you know, your resource from lands, except you have two different decks. You have a deck full of your spells, right? Your actions, your creatures to cast, and then you have your Atlas, which is your deck of just your lands. And so it reduces the variance by giving you two different directs to draw from in some ways to interact with them.

KeyForge's Paradigm Shifts

And so what our KeyForge is paradigm shifts from all of these other card games. Now a lot of these [00:10:00] other card games. Um, often innovate in really great ways. They often iterate in, in cool ways that are lovely and rewarding and are good and they become popular for it. But how does KeyForge change some card game paradigms? So two things of course, and you know, this, if you're listening to KeyForge Public Radio, you already know this, the decks are unique and algorithmically generated, right? They're not built except of course, in Alliance. And you're going to get less variance there. But so you've got the paradigm shift of a unique deck. Algorithmically generated deck list is locked in. And then you have the paradigm shift of house selection. Instead of traditional resources, all cards and KeyForge are free. Once you call their house. And remember because of opportunity cost all cars and KeyForge are free and no cards and KeyForge are free. So you have house selections that have traditional resources, right? So unique decks, how selection, right? So, so they've changed quite a bit of how you play the game, how the mechanics restrict or [00:11:00] free you up to be playing and interacting with the game state.

KeyForge's Variance

So where does, where did these things introduce variance? There is huge added variance in KeyForge relative to a traditional trading card game due to fewer repeating cards. A high variability deck in KeyForge may play completely differently across several games. You might have a few decks in your collection where you have no doubles, right? And like no single card is repeated and all the cards do maybe wildly different things. And so that deck is going to play totally differently a lot of the time. And that can be a lot of fun. It's great for locals and heck if you're brave and you're like, Zach, I don't really care. I'm skipping this episode. You can go ahead and play that and Vault Tour and see how the heck you do. And then write to me at podcast at KeyForge Public Radio.com and let me know. Okay. And let me know. Now there is some reduced variability in KeyForge due to drawing up at the end of your turn. Now this isn't a paradigm shift, ShadowFist, a classic card game did this, earlier, but this is not a big [00:12:00] enough, this is not a big enough change in variability to balance the nature of the random decks, but it rewards playing and discarding cards that rewards keeping the game, moving forward, playing the cards, hitting out of your hand to go, go, go.

And so the pace of the game, the game continually changes what's in your hand, what's on the board and it rewards you for doing that. So we get a ton of variants added due to fewer repeating cards. And then we have reduced variability due to drawing up at the end of the turn right now, if you noticed you can actually find decks. Uh, with different kinds of reduced variants because they are repeating cards, repeating effects, but we're going to count up, talk about that a little bit later. When we talk about what exactly a consistent performance looks like an KeyForge tech, why do you want it and what it looks like? Cause there's a few different ways to get a consistent performance.

Many decks are not going to have consistent performance, right? That's something so many people enjoy about KeyForge in the large number of casual games, local games, online on TCO games that you play. And because [00:13:00] a game of infinite variety is one of the marketing taglines, currently a game of infinite variety. And that's really, really good. Every time you sit down to play KeyForge, you're going to still see situations and have to make decisions simply based on your skill and knowledge, instead of a specific exact path of action that took into account every card in the matchup already in every variable. You're going to be seeing different situations. It's gonna, it's gonna get wacky. It's there's going to be effects combining that you've never had to consider before. Um, and there's just, there's just really no ceiling on experiencing all that KeyForge has to offer with how decks interact, especially as we get more and more sets and cross that play to me is just so brilliantly interesting. It's so brilliantly interesting.

In KeyForge when you're picking a deck for a competitive event, whether you and your friends are just getting sweaty or you're playing in. Vault Tour, right? You want the deck to be consistent and performing? Well, now we've talked about this. This is an assumption. If you want to take a high variability deck to a Vault Tour, see how you do do it. Write me an email. Tell me your thoughts. Uh, we're always learning more and more on this ride. I'm just presenting all the knowledge I've [00:14:00] accumulated so far in five years of playing and thinking about and making content for KeyForge.

Three Kinds of Consistency, #1: Draw and Archive

So when you're picking a deck for a competitive event, There's three versions of consistency that you could go look for in your decks. Right? So there's draw and archive, right? Drawing cars, archiving cards to an amount which reduces the number of games lost because you didn't draw what you needed because you didn't draw your control when you needed it to respond to your opponent. Drawing and archiving, just getting you more cards in hand. Uh, you're already playing cards for free. Remember quotes around free there because every card in KeyForge is free and none are free. And so draw an archive really helped with that drug, getting you up to free archive, putting away until you call it later. Very powerful, very, very good to stash your outs for later your responses for later your cards to really turn up the beat down, you know, the beat down dial to 11 on. Right. So draw an archive are great for that. That's why we've seen Logos in so many top decks in Archon [00:15:00] and in Alliance, there's so much Logos for that draw for that archive. It gives that consistency. It gives that consistency.

Three Kinds of Consistency, #2: Similar Card Effects

Now there is also consistency in card effects. Consistency in card effects. Now what I mean by this is different cards, having similar, having similar things that they will do across, you know, different named cards and having those repeated differently across your deck. So one example here, a Sydnie Steele host of Help From Future Self, if you don't listen, please go subscribe right now. Fantastic show over 200 episodes and dear friends of mine, all the hosts there. Sydnie has been building Alliance decks and has been doing quite well. She made top four at the US Nationals. She has been building Alliance decks with her team, team SAS, a top performing team in KeyForge. They are the people to beat, and she has been helping them build Alliance. And she's very good at it.

Something she did with her Martian Generosity, Key Abduction Age of Ascension deck that she made top four at nationals with is that she found consistency across a [00:16:00] number of different cards. So in her deck, she has Nature's Call. It's got a pip, it's an Untamed card, which says play: you may return up to three creatures to their owner's hands. She also has over in her Mars, pod a rare called Total Recall. This is a Mars cards that you, where you gain one aember for every friendly, ready creature. Then you return all friendly creatures to their owner's hands. And so you get those all back into your hands. So they work a little bit differently, but they're going to have a very similar effect because, because Sydney in that deck wants to be taking a creature with the play effect up and then playing it back down, and then taking that creature with the play effect up and then playing it back down.

Right. Especially something like helper bot. So helper bot nature's call. Total recall she has been building similar effects across different cards. Now, of course, these similar effects across different cards can be an archive like we talked about before. Right. And some of the consistency you might see in your winds of exchange decks is consistent token making, especially in one [00:17:00] house.

That's something you're going to really like. That is one kind of effect, right? Making tokens. If that's a game plan you can execute on, with membership drive, martyrs end, uh, just reaping out, right? All this kind of thing. Mass buyout. If you make tokens consistently, whether or not you have your, Mk. 2 Generator, you have your Nyyon Outpost, whether you see your space invaders, all these are Mars cards. Right? Uh, whether you can consistently get out your Katarina the Summoner, right? These are all ways to consistently get tokens out onto the board, across a variety of cards. And so that's one of the key things that you'll see consistency in, right, in a winds of exchange deck is okay. I can consistently make tokens. I can expect to make tokens. Every game because I'm consistent in these card effects. Now that might be something and winds of exchange where you don't have a ton of draw, but maybe you have, uh, some removal like ready and fight, or, you know, just regular board control action cards in every house, maybe you have a little bit of aember control on every house and, uh, you know, in a couple of creatures that can stick to the board [00:18:00] in every house. And so that consistency is simply through. It's going to be a bit tougher to see you have to know your cars and see how a deck plays. Right. As you look at the list. But your decks can be consistent simply through all those effects lining up towards a specific game plan. I even have some non winds of exchange decks that have really cool, consistent game plans. I have. Uh, a deck with two grump buggy, which increases key costs for every creature of five power or higher with a double too much to protect double Ronnie Wristclocks and double Exhume. And so what's consistent about this deck, even though it doesn't draw or archive, is that I'll always be getting five power creatures out. I'll always be playing grump buggy, and then stealing the extra aember with all those other cards. So there's no speed in it. It's just all the cards point towards a specific game plan.

It has a ton of support and other cards there as well. So the ways we've got consistent performance. So we have draw and archive right. Often a logo's house, something like that, or prospector, maybe. [00:19:00] From winds of exchange, we have consistency in card affects, right? So maybe you don't have. Or archive, but everything you draw is going to be working towards a specific game plan and there's enough similar effects that work towards that game plan that you're always going to get to do that effect, whatever it looks like. And then there's something that has consistently high performance, but it's high variance. And I think this is kind of related to the previous one. The deck is really good, but can win differently in several different ways. It could win differently in several different ways. Now this is, uh, I will not swear that this is a competitive kind of variance or a real kind of variants as much as I will. The first two, right? The first two I'm completely sold on for my experience. I have a debt called Bon aggrieve Andrew of the. Muzzle Liam. This is a Wednesday exchange deck with prospector. And here's the thing when I'm playing this deck, I don't really know. How exactly it's going to win. It has out to close out the game in every house now it's a prospect or deck so what it wants to do is get a couple of prospectors out and i can get at least [00:20:00] three four or five out real easy And then just start reaping out with them and say hey come get me i'm going to get to check most Ekwidon turns uh if not all of them if you don't stop me right Now if this deck doesn't just win on reaping out that's when things get crazy that's why i'm playing mass buyout, that's when my opponent is blowing up the board and giving me a ton of card draw And this deck has aember control in every house in Ekwidon and Ekwidon has a trade secrets where you discard Ekwidon cards kind of one for one and steal one for each Ekwidon card discarded Uh it has shrewd investor who can capture uh, three really in spirit over and Saurian it has Faust, who can exalt and there's a bunch of different ways to exalt with Faust so i can pump up that key cost to either stop them from forging the last key or tax them for the first or second key and then over an unfathomable there is Covetous Hema and crushing deep crushing deep typically not very good but for their on check for their third key i'm doubling their key cost and then maybe capturing three with covetous Hema. so very good for just [00:21:00] delaying them for a turn while i use Abyssal Site or. or something else to try to get across the finish line myself. So what happens when this deck starts to draw a ton of cards Is that i don't know what out i'm going to draw And they're all totally different right like trade secrets and generous offer take a totally different Uh setup and interact with the board totally differently than faust with a bunch of exalted creatures right and that's completely different than crushing deep and covetous hema right which is it still works i've won games with that but it's perhaps one of the weak routes depending on the situation also if they can wipe the board again i don't really want to be exalting unless i'm getting across the finish line myself right So it's it's fascinating because it's it's random i'm going to get a strong out and i'm going to get a big hand of cards i just don't know which it's going to be and here's the thing The deck is really good i get at least one offer a week uh, or one inquiry i should say a week about selling this dang deck which has really just driven me to practice it more and crack it because I've learned some ways i wasn't [00:22:00] playing the deck well so that i can adjust and push towards being the best possible pilot for this deck. i have not hit the ceiling yet I've not hit the ceiling and i recently started to use the NARP process notes antagonists recall play if you haven't listened to that episode from just a few go go ahead and do that . what did we take from this one when we're going home or we're thinking about KeyForge cause we'd like to play this game what what what do we do with this knowledge? Know how your deck is variable. Know how your deck is variable one that you're going to take seriously even if you just want to practice it if you're going to NARP it just for the joy of knowing this deck even if you know it's high variability right know how your deck is variable this this applies to any KeyForge practice because even a deck that delivers consistent performance will have two things you need to learn to master the variance in this game. Even a deck that delivers a consistent performance in KeyForge will have two things you need to learn to master the variance in this game. Number one: what exactly the deck is doing and can do when it's not performing the way you want it to. So if [00:23:00] the deck is kind of going sideways you're getting a weird draw you want to have experience with that weird draw specifically what can you still do if you're getting a draw you don't like if you're just getting a bad roll, if you're getting stuck in a 2, 2, 2 hand what are the possibilities you've seen this various before because you practice you NARP'ed it, you've got a bunch of plays you took notes you reflected Now you're a really informed KeyForge player about your deck. But here's the other variance right? The variance brought to each game by the other deck you're playing against and the other player. This isn't a solo game you'll never play in a vacuum and even at a high level you're going to face up against situations that you may not have ever practiced against. Even at a high level you might be facing off against situations that you had not practiced against. Shout out to early in the episode when i talked about uh the sting in the philadelphia Vault Tour i took that card with borrow and i was like i don't really know exactly if this is the right call And i nearly won that game by the way but i wasn't super confident i was just playing Right without any expert advice or practice from myself i was [00:24:00] saying okay i kind of make the best call i possibly can right now And also the philadelphia Vault Tour like we talked about in our recap episode Whirlpool showed up as a really strong archetype over in alliance and how cool was that some of the top players were going oh crap i got to practice against the whirlpool matchup and i did not anticipate this being so present there's 25% of the top cut Is whirlpool whirlpool type decks with cleric That is awesome So know how your deck is variable so that you can know exactly what your deck is doing if it's not if it's not performing really well right so if you're if you're not getting what you need no all of your outs right we're going to be talking about playing your outs two weeks very excited about that so know all of your outs even if you're getting some bad variance. But then also knowing exactly what is happening across the table what's the variance that they are going to introduce to you not necessarily is their deck performing like it should, or it shouldn't; But what variance is being introduced are they keeping your creatures down and off the board way more than you're used to are they hitting your hand and discarding [00:25:00] random cards more than you're used to How can you get your card saved from that can you archive can you keep things out of the line of fire

Look at how you're being affected by your opponent, which is huge in KeyForge. Huge in KeyForge. So that's it for KeyForge Public Radio today. Thank you so much for joining me while we chat about consistency and what it looks like in this game, right? And why you might want consistent performance in a deck you are taking seriously or just how to learn about a deck, whether you're learning it to compete or just because you love to get to know that deck.

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