kpr-ep26-mainhouse

[00:00:00] In the early days of KeyForge we had the strategy podcast, bouncing death, cork the sunset of the podcast just a few years into the game, but not without leaving behind some fantastic strategic tidbits. That I think deserve a revisit now and a deep dive into what they, what their strategy tips look like today.

And KeyForge is current environment. This is a revisit of the main house concept from bouncing death. Quirk here on KeyForge public radio. Let's get sweaty.

Welcome to your listener to KeyForge public radio. My name is Zach Armstrong and I was a podcast fan long before I was a podcast host.

One of the first podcasts I was listening to on a regular basis. [00:01:00] Was bouncing death quark the strategy podcast by Kiera mode and co Damron who have since disappeared off the face of the crucible, but not without leaving behind a pretty solid strategic podcast that gave us a lot of language for understanding this game with a whole lot of paradigm shifts, right?

A whole lot of new systems that you can't just transfer your understanding to from other card games. And one of the things they left was house rules, main houses, support houses, and burst houses. And so we're going to dive into what they meant. By that and hash that out. Drag that out a bit. Unpack that for what is that looking like in KeyForge today? Across the many sets that have come out since they coined these terms and how they can help us as we see the mechanics in board states and KeyForge expand. And diversify. And a whole lot of ways, because here at KeyForge public radio, we want to help you. Be a better. [00:02:00] KeyForge player much like bouncing death, quirk did.

But Hey, I'm not them and they're not me. So let's do it our way. This time. So, remember it to be following the podcast if you're not so that you hear these episodes as they come out, as they drop into your feed. Every Wednesday. So what, what does it mean to have a main house? Well, we'll cover the support in burst houses later, but what is a main house?

What is a main house role? So something they mentioned on these old episodes. Is that repeatability is the key to a main house. What are cards you can play out onto the board? That will hopefully stay on the board and you can get value from them. Turn after turn. A few of the examples are cards, cards that let you get repeatable repeatable effects instead of one time effect.

So looking at some winds of exchange cards, This would be things like a brick nasty, which gives you an Amber. After every time, a [00:03:00] friendly Brobnar creature fights that can repeatedly get you Amber turn after turn that continues to reward you for calling Brobnar turn after turn. And that would be brick nasty instead of let's say the card Smith, which was reprinted in Wednesday exchange, which has an Amber PIP.

And it says if you have more friendly creatures than there are enemy creatures gain to Amber, that's a one-time effect for three Amber. So it's a great burst. It just knocks out that three and then goes to the discard pile. But of course, brick nasty has a creature. It's going to stay on the board and continually reward you for calling Brobnar.

So that would be, that is one key to a main house, right? The example they use from called the Arcons was do ferry, not dust pixie, dust pixie being the one power creature with two Amber pips on it and untamed and call the Arcons. And then do ferry is a two power elusive creature with reap. Gain one, which of course means you're gaining two total for that reap.

So that is repeatable. Instead of the ducks pixie, just being a one and done. As far as this Amber pips are concerned. Now, of course it can [00:04:00] reap, but over time, if you call the house multiple times, Do ferry will end up being. Better. Although of course, untamed wants to burst strategically for a number of reasons, but that's outside of the scope of just thinking simply about a main house. Another, another point they made was artifacts instead of action cards.

So artifacts of course, are going to have a similar dynamic where those artifacts stick on the board and then get you that repeated value. Turn to turn. oNe of the untamed cars that I believe is coming back in grim reminders, that was an old cult VR cons card was ritual of balance, which has action.

If your opponent has six or more, Amber steel, one. That as soon as that's on the board, that's always on and always available to continue getting you value turn after turn. Once you've made the quote-unquote investment of playing it out and it getting ready and then calling. Untamed again, and action cars.

Of course they have one effect, usually pretty strong, but then they've moved on. So the idea is that you want cars that give you long-term benefits that stick on [00:05:00] the board and that you don't want to a main house is a house where you don't have to play any cards from your hand to be happy about your turn, where those cards from the main house have gotten onto the board.

They've stuck on the board. And you can call that, that house just for what's on the board and have a really productive turn. Advancing your game state. Now, of course, there's an opportunity cost for not calling house. That's going to let you cycle your hand, but if you've got a really good developed board state, that's going to help you push to check maybe most turns or get most of the way they are caused some repeatable disruption. Then that is a successful main house.

So another point they made is that any house can really serve as a main house. It just depends on what the makeup of the house in that particular pod, in that deck. Is right. Every house could serve as a main house. If you have enough creatures that are going to stick on the board, whether through elusive or being powerful, having a lot of power or having Amber excuse me, armor. [00:06:00] Having armor. Ma'am or other ways to protect, right?

Like ward. Think about if you played winds. Excuse me, if you played. Worlds collide. There was a lot of ward. And the sarin house, where you can get to place that war token and prevent the next instance of damage or leaving plague. From that creature. There was a lot of that in how sorry. And winds of exchange, making them a fantastic main. House. They've also made the point that a board wipe is a great tool. A great tool in a main house, actually, because you, you want to be leaning into the main house and maintaining that board.

You want the board wipe in your burst or your support house. That's going to come in to help. Once that main house. Is interrupted. Because once your opponent responds to your main house and is evening out the threat or has blown up some of your creatures. And then when the math says, okay, it's now an appropriate time to go ahead and play my board wipe.

You want to be switching into a different house. [00:07:00] So that you're applying those new cards from hand that you've been building up or have built up in your hand over those turns that you were calling your main house, just mathematically without drawing and KeyForge works. You want to be looking, you want to be playing that board white from a house where you're going to get to play some other cards to start to cycle your hand.

Once they've responded to your board and you're punishing them with that board wipe. So, looking forward. So we've been playing winds of exchange. For, for some time now, at least here in the U S as, as winds of exchange trickles into our KeyForge friends. In, in other countries over the past few months, and we're looking at grim reminders. And so what, what does thinking about a main house?

How does knowing that these are the traits of a main house and just placing. Placing these labels, these, these frames onto how we play KeyForge. How does that help us think about these most, these current sets and also just how we're making decisions. So one thing to recognize is a [00:08:00] one you can see in how it, what it helps you analyze, how a deck might want to work.

When you're looking at, when you're looking at a deck list, the most simple way to think about looking for a main house is looking at. A number of sticky creatures and a number of artifacts. What house has enough of that? Where if you draw into those early enough, say you have an opening hand with three-year maybe even four of these creatures and artifacts that you think that you have a good chance of that.

Being a really solid opener, a really solid. Early game play to start to build out that board. And force a response as you reach out or get some repeatable. Good. Affects right. So what, what house in your deck? Wants to be a main house. One way this has been affected by winds of exchange is with tokens.

For instance, token flood decks. I've seen a number and I have a great one myself of token flood decks that can just flood,

Especially something like grunt. Where, the three power. Just a Martian soldier, token creature without any other [00:09:00] special abilities, but it's relatively sticky because it can take, it can take a few hits and still live. And it, it can really turn into a main house. So when you get enough of these to just reap out and hit the rule of six with them, You have cards like space invaders, where you can turn any creatures from your hand and to token creatures, which was amazing for efficiency in house cheating and full tokenizing knowledge. Absolutely fantastic car.

Do you have a mark two generator, which generates one token creature. You have neon outpost, which you trade a creature on the board for two token creatures. And you're able to really push the number of creatures you have on your board and get to a point where you can simply reach out with Mars or whatever. Whatever board of creatures you have, you can just call that house reap out and be happy about that turn.

Maybe you've got some fight effects. Or some other control effects. That are handy in that house, but its main purpose is simply pushing you forward. Towards victory. Faster than your opponent. So tokens, really pushing to [00:10:00] that main house idea a lot. And it's, it's less about just how many creatures are on the list in that house.

And it's about what your token creature is, what else is going on in that house and how many token makers you have in what houses, for instance, with a grunt deck that is of course a Martian. tOken creature. So when you have cards like space invaders and neon. L post, you can be continually replenishing your supply of grunts as you call Mars, make more and rebuilt with them and use other marsh and tricks as you go along. And one thing, one thing that I think that points to with main houses that we've seen, that is really advantageous that we've seen. And that we saw with falafel Saurus in worlds, collide Sariann, which has after reap. Look at the top three cards of your deck, add one to your hand archive, one discard the other. And then we have things like old tinker, which I haven't seen be that powerful and, and it's a very, it's a very good main house card in [00:11:00] Ecuador and winds of exchange.

It says after reap draw a card, discard a card from your hand, that's a very good main house card. It just takes a certain setup for Ecuador to really want to be a main house instead of a support or especially a burst house. And in winds of exchange has a couple setups where old tinker really helps.

And what old tinker does or what falafel source does. Is it gives you hand filtering. In your main house where you can be reaping out, you can be fighting and then you have a few cars. That let you be filtering your hand and drawing cards so that while you're taking advantage of your main house and repeated back to back turns. You are preparing for whatever the next move is.

Now, if your opponent has some creatures, they're getting ready to fight into yours, right? Maybe they're getting a crim torch to the right with. Seven power splash, four, they're getting ready to fight with that. The new they're digging for that board wipe. While you're taking advantage of your board.

You can be preparing to respond to their response because you're putting the pressure on. And if you're ahead on that board and they're about to [00:12:00] have a turn where they tried to wipe and set up something else. You can be crafting your hand to respond to what's going on there. Maybe they're going to capitalize on the fact you have a ton of creatures with something like Lorius view, which was reprinted in wins of exchange, where they gain one for the difference between, friendly and enemy creatures, if they're behind on that.

And so you've got some burst hate that you're digging for and holding on to. So being able to craft your hand and even craft your deck with things like nigh on that post, putting your friendly creature on the bottom. Like we mentioned earlier, right? Is a really powerful trait to have in a main house, because you can be crafting your hand when in, in other, in other sets when you didn't have some hand filtering and draw like that in something that could be a main house. You'd mostly be calling your main house and not playing any cards from your hand.

Now, sometimes it's fine to just hold onto those cards because they're still good cards. There's going to have good effects. And so you can just hold onto them while you reap out the benefit of having a big board. But sometimes you say, in this matchup or in [00:13:00] this situation, I don't see this card being useful.

I would much rather if I'm able to, while I'm calling my main house, discard this card, that's not going to be useful so I can draw into something else. Maybe draw into more main house. Carts. So a few of the situations, it's going to be looking looking at pods to include in a sealed Alliance format.

Saying what could have main house potential, especially if you're doing winds of exchange, as we'll definitely have some more ones of exchange events. If it goes, galaxy really delivers on having these awesome. Store championships in, in Q1. As we go forward into the new year here. I'm going to have some winds of exchange. Two. What is the exchange where you're going to want to see the main house dynamics, especially with token makers to figure out. What could I, what could I token flood?

Birst is of course a strong, strong strategy. And with either a lot of pips or a lot of burst cars in winds of exchange, a token flood is also a good archetype to go for just making as many tokens as [00:14:00] possible, especially if it's a sell a token and you can control the board and rebound and demand that they have a board ripe at the right time, or you simply win. So looking at what token you'd pick, what is making those tokens, especially if it's something in Mars. Can you sustain a house where you can just keep calling it back to back and reaping the benefit of it and having a really successful turns? Even if you're not drawing any cards, you're not playing anything from hand. Artifacts are good here.

Of course. If you get artifacts light. That's just a bit of a low role with an artifact, right? It's going to be a bit less effective, but as long as you're getting out on your first, go through the deck. If you are going to flip through your deck and, turn your discard pile back into your deck on flip. You're at least getting those artifacts out. Onto the board so that you don't have to play them again.

You're seeing all the action cards or destroyed creatures. That you went through. The first time. So I think main house really applies well to really applies well to winds of exchange because of tokens. And so think, think about that as you play more winds of exchange [00:15:00] or you evaluate decks where you want a strong board presence,

or we see a lot of, of crushed X, I believe was the term coined by, I think the Nordic KeyForge seen crushed decks, especially in mass mutation that just continually cheat out creatures, get creatures of many of the houses out. Cheating with a subject Kirby, captain Val Jericho, right? Letting you play cards off house as you go all these sorts of things and just absolutely flooding the board with these and demanding you board wipe.

And then they just come right back. When's the exchange does its own. Version of that. And that with grim reminders, what we're seeing, I won't spoil any specific cards. For you here. But w w what we're seeing with grim reminders is that you'll be discarding a lot of cards from the top of your deck and from hand.

So anything you get onto the board, there's going to be things that discard from your deck, that discard from hand. That, when you play those, when you use those, so you could get a board where you're constantly disrupting your opponent's hand, you're constantly disrupting discarding, choosing what disco cards to [00:16:00] discard from your own hand to get haunted, make some effects, more powerful than maybe stay there.

And that's going to be a situation. Where, if you want to get haunted and stay haunted and filter your hand, you're going to have a main house set up in really many of the different houses I've seen can do this. I've seen a lot in Brobnar. I've seen a lot in Geistoid. That we'll be able to accomplish this. Where you have a good number of creatures out, you have some very helpful artifacts and you can just keep calling Brobnar or Geistoid over and over again, where your getting and staying haunted, and then your effects are getting a bit more powerful because you're haunted now. And then you can mostly keep yourself there.

You're not going to want to be burning through your deck real fast after that. If you can just sit in the event of being. Haunted and take advantage of the cards on your board. So that main house set up. I think very much the spirit of a main house is going to be there. With perhaps other houses in, in grim reminders as well.

And it's definitely going to be there with [00:17:00] Brobnar. It's definitely going to be there. With Geistoid as far as getting cars onto the board controlling the tempo of the game and being able to just call these houses back to back until your opponent responds and disrupts them. In some way. Especially when you get to turn on haunted, stay haunted and have all your effects.

Be a bit more powerful. When you are haunted and a lot of these are are two-sided. A two-sided. Or excuse me, optional, optional effects. Where if you, you can discard cards from your deck or you can discard cards from your opponent, DECA lets you pick the player so you can be discarding your own stuff from hand and deck until you're haunted and then just be hitting your opponent to disrupt them as you keep yourself haunted without moving quite. As fast. So keep an eye out for main house, the main house mechanics, and how you can keep calling that back to back a house back to back to press your advantage, recognizing that you are the beat down, right?

You are the beat down your though. You are the one with the advantage to press you are the one demanding an answer from your opponent or you win. Don't get that analysis [00:18:00] paralysis and just try to control them. You say, wait, I have, I'll take whatever you can throw at me on the chin. I have a bigger threat to percent.

Here we go. I demand an answer or I win. I demand you have this kind of an answer. Or this kind of play, or I'm just going to steam roll this game. So I think we're going to be seeing that in from reminders. I am jealous of a, well, of course, we've got plenty of amazing play testers. Who've been helping groom reminders get to the best it can be.

And then everybody at KeyForge celebration got some great reminders deck. So yeah. Let me know, let me know if you're seeing what kind of main house mechanics you are seeing in grim reminders. As we go. So, I remind her that every house can serve. As a main house, right? It's a house that you want to continually call back to back and you feel good about pressing your advantage, calling it back to back.

Maybe you're going to have bigger creatures creatures with armor creatures, with award creatures, with a beneficial fight and maybe healing effects, right? Skirmish for sure. Maybe elusive keeping creatures [00:19:00] on the board in a way you can continue to call it back to back along with perhaps some artifacts to support.

And you're in a really great position. If you can do some. Some hand filtering to craft your hand for whatever the next phase of the game is. And of course, a shout out to all those cards. I mentioned for Windsor exchange before, especially things like space invaders and neon outpost. I have had games where turned one.

I opened with space invaders. I on at postmark one mark, one generator or mark two generator, excuse me, and some other things. And man, I go straight to having four or five creatures on the board. Right off the bat and I'm already reaping out getting to check most turns and I go straight to a strong main house.

So keep an eye out for stuff like that. Keep an eye out for stuff like that. It's very exciting to two. I think it's really important. And I want to thank bouncing death cork. Now, not that I know if either of those guys will hear this. But I want to just thank bouncing death cork for giving us a good framework to think about and understand KeyForge there was a lot different about [00:20:00] KeyForge when it launched.

We've had, I think it was a major part of evolving design. Thinking, especially with regards to resources and some other things we've seen a few of these patterns that KeyForge uses. And And star wars unlimited. And shout out to some old car games that did some, did a little bit of paradigm shifting in some ways, not everything that KeyForge did like shadow Fest. Earlier, as far as resources and cars is resources and opportunity costs because I think a main house support house and burst house. Our fantastic and good frames of reference to understand KeyForge so we can talk about it so we can understand how things are working so we can all understand how to be better.

KeyForge. Players. This has been KeyForge at public radio tune in next week and the week after for more house roles for more house rules, episodes support. And a burst. We're going to be looking at what that meant when bouncing death cork talked about it and what it has meant, especially for winds of exchange and [00:21:00] for grim reminders, and then keep an eye out.

I have signed on a second act. One of the amazing hosts over at the weekend key warriors podcast for a 2023 minute review episode. I'm very excited to dive into that with him. He is a fantastic analyst and strategic player himself. So I can't wait to dive into all the info about the 2023 meetup. With him.

So keep an eye out for that episode. As well, this has been KeyForge public radio. My name is Zach Armstrong. Of course find everything blog posts and all that sort of thing on the website. KeyForge public radio.com. Thanks, of course, to all of our amazing Patrion supporters who help keep the show going, couldn't do it without you.

And a special thanks to our AirWave advocate listeners like Paul. Road runner. Make sure you are subscribed to the podcast. If you are not, it can import us on Patriot if you are so willing. And I would, of course deeply appreciate that. Remember, the KeyForge public radio shop is at shop dot KeyForge public radio.com.

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