Weekly One-Shot 13: Birds of Many Feathers

Ah, the Matriarch, Lady of the Two Dozen Meaningless Decisions Yes Thank You App I Just Want To Kill Birds.

Near Mint for me this time; I quickly rewound without thinking, annoyingly, though without rewind tuning my play I may have died, so, who knows.

Failed twice. First time I was close then a ****ing cohort. Second, well I bombed. I DESPISE the Matriarch

Edited for language. -Mod

Visionary was the star of the show using Suggestion to put Mask on the bottom of Matty's deck and darken the skies on top.  Did this again the next turn so for 2 rounds in a row all Matty did was hit me with the 5 birds that were already in play.  I had Fanatic take over from there using Devine Focus for 2 damage per turn and then dealing herself 4 damage to enable a 21 point Wrathful Retribution.

I'm pretty sure this is the biggest streak of losses I've had against the Matriarch.  Mostly seems to be a combination of setup issues and running into both Cohorts early.   Giving it a few more tries tonight but only Fine at best on this.

Mint!  Couldn't get rid of the mask until the third round and by then all Darken the Skies were played already.  Two early Hypersonic Assaults kept the field clear of birds with no damage.  Visionary got three Suggestions, so kept killing and suggesting Huginn (Muginn not played or in trash yet).  Visionary Enlightened Tachyon every turn so she could build up to two 21 Damage Lightspeed Barrages in about 7 rounds.  Everyone ended with HP in either high teens or low twenties, board empty of birds and Carrion Fields and Cohorts, Matriach unflipped.

I near-minted this one.  In the first game, Tachyon didn't get a hypersonic assault until very late, drawing it just as Huginn and Muninn came out. >:(.  Expatriette's first three rounds had no weapons, even with extra draws.  It was very painful.

Second game lasted a while, but when Matriarch flipped, she played one card a round until just before Fanatic got Wrathful Retribution.  With that and Expatriette having Pride and Prejudice with Hollow Points on Pride, I managed to take her down pretty quickly.

It's good to know I'm not the only one without a near mint or mint. Makes me feel less like a cruddy player.

EDIT: Finally did it. Finally. Hard. Lucked based. But did it

Lost my first match due to just horrible draws. Bunch of fowls and both carrion fields out on turn 1. The next three turns, half my team couldnt do damage since both ethereal bonds came out consecutively (with bubbles hitting me every turn as well). Both cohorts were pulled out the turn after and when i finally managed to kill some stuff, darken the sky pulls back literally everything. Got no enviro destruct until the turn i was about to lose and no hypersonics pulled to let me stall. Think i may have played an unwinnable game, especially if nearly all my damage was coming from the visionary.

I thought too late that I should use Suggestion to put the Mask on the bottom, but early Hypersonic Assualts got me through the game, and I ended it with a flipped Matriarch being done in by a Wrathful Retribution. 

Near mint for me this week, which is an improvement on the last two weeks.

First time around, I got a terrible start with most of the fowl out with both Carrion Fields and no Hypersonic Assults in sight. Fanatic got out Undaunted which kept it interesting, but eventually the swarm of birds were too much.

On the second attempt a far kinder card draw made life easy, and it didn't take long to get Lillian all pouty and upset about the unfairness of the world.

This was my first battle against Matriarch and also my first Mint! What an interesting mechanic!
It was a good game, I might have to try these ladies as a team again some time.
But also I got lucky. Very very lucky.

Matriarch pulled out Darken the Skies on the first turn and didn't pull a second until Visionary had put the mask and several fowl on the bottom of the deck.
Hypersonic Assault was definitely a life saver, as was a starting hand including a Shotgun, Hollowpoints, and Reload for Expatriette.
She and Fanatic whittled her down and Tachyon finished her off with Lightspeed Barrage.
She never had the chance to flip, and the cohorts were nowhere in sight.

THIS is why I love weekly One-shots! I've been fighting the Matriarch for years (however long its been since Rook CIty was re-released with Infernal Relics).  I never once thought to use Brain Burn like that.

Haven't tried it yet, but my buddy did. He got a Mint, but just barely; everybody down, except for Fanatic at 3hp. Here's how he described it:

Man oh man, was that a close one.  First, it was a close and tough match to begin with.  I got some help along the way from the slow-mo themed distortion that reduces damage dealt to heroes by 1.  I had Visionary go into her cocoon so she's absorb most of the hero with the lowest HP attacks and eventually the hero with the highest HP attacks.  And I had Fanatic's Undaunted, which is DR 1 if it's exactly 1, which is perfect against the fowl.  Then the negative energy distortion came into play (1 damage to the 4 targets with the highest HP) and I started whittling her down with each card.  Tachyon did her sonic, can't deal damage card to neutralize Matriarch and the Carrion Fields, then took out all of the birds.  And Fanatic (who had a huge hand) got out her discard a card to deal damage against the highest every turn, so she was whittling her down too.
  The really close call (for a mint condition) is that I had her dead to rights but I played stupidly for kicks.  Going into the last round my second hero could have finished her off but I decided to drag the game out and let the last hero take her out with the negative energy distortion.  On the last heroes turn it got down to all of the heroes and Matriarch at 1 HP and somehow I misinterpreted choosing which targets counted for the negative energy.  I thought the negative energy would damage my three heroes then Matriarch and end the game.  But how I chose them made all of my heroes get damaged!  (Just now I'm wondering if I had one hero at 2HP and I was only picking the other three.)  Anyway, it drops everyone except Fanatic and Matriarch.  I couldn't remember if another distortion would cancel the negative energy before or after it deals damage and the next environment was a distortion.  Luckily for me the negative energy deals damage first, so I stopped playing around and had it take out Matriarch.  Obviously I could have rewound and still won but I almost made myself lose the mint!

Got a Mint on my first try.  Matriarch dropped a few birds, then Huginn.  Tachyon had Hypersonic right off the bat to clear all the Birds, then Expat dropped Hairtrigger and Fanatic had Divine Focus for fodder.  Matriarch slammed both Darken the Skies on her next turn, so Expat went to town and she couldn't do anything.  Cleared the Cohort and the Mask on the next round and had Visionary Brain Burn her for 12 cards.  Poor Lillian couldn't really do much for the rest of the game as everyone just beat her down, though Muninn and both Carrion Fields did appear and I took some unnecessary damage by killing a few Fowl via Expat's Reflexes the round I went to finish the game.  I ended the game via multiple double-digit Lightspeed Barrages by Tachyon.

Mint.

Opened with both Cohorts.  I dealt with the mask, and then decided that this was stupid, and devoted my effort to digging for End of Days.  Found it quickly, didn't take too much damage from the birds that were out, and then started plugging away.  Dealt with the next wave of birds with a Hypersonic Assault, and didn't have many problems after that.  Two Lightspeed Barrages took her all the way down, and I had a third Barrage and a Wrathful Retribution waiting in the wings had the proven ineffective.

Two interactions that managed to surprise me:  The Mask is a relic and thus avoided End of Days, and Decoy Projection is a distortion, and thus gets destroyed by the Realm of Discord's distortions.

My first non-mint! I made a really dumb mistake early on (messed up the order or operations for End of Days) and never managed to recover. Three consecutive Darken the Skies didn't help either.

Mint.

Had what I felt was a pretty favorable randomized draw--the Darken the Skies came out relatively early, Tachyon had plenty of draw and Hypersonic assaults available.

The only problem came when both cohorts were out at the same time about mid-game. They stayed out for a turn or two, destroying my ongoings/equipments...but then Fanatic was able to Final Dive Muninn into Huginn and take them both out. 

That was pretty satisfying, and created a cool mental image of a winged hero grappling with and then dive-bombing one large bird into another large bird.

Fun stuff!

Near mint for me, I hit a rewind without thinking about it. No Earth shattering bad play either, just a mistake. Oh well.

I'm always so afraid I'm going to do that!  I've been so close to losing mints by accidental rewinds so many times.

Doesn't it warn you that the rewind will cost you the mint?

Mint. Love using the combo of using hypersonic and then having expat put out reflexes, just pick off those birds as the come out, but what about after hypersonic where's off? No worry. The flurry of birds ended with 2 damage and ongoing destruction all the way around. Second favorite thing was when Visionary stacked the deck so the cohorts were on bottom then end of days resent the board after they came out. Ended with the classic triple light speed barrage for 51 points of damage.

The first time I messed up a mint this way I do not recall getting a warning.

There's a warning at the top, but it's easy to tap the buttons on reflex before you register what it's saying, since it doesn't try to stop you.

I really liked this one-shot. It was challenging, but featured some really cool potential interactions. Hypersonic Assault can really shine (unless you're an idiot like me who uses it when Claustrophobic Delusion is in play). End of Days while Time Crawls and Twist the Ether are in play let me wipe literally every fowl in her deck off the board with no consequences. I used Suggestion twice in a row to keep putting cohorts and domains from her trash into her deck while all the fowl were out of commission, then on the second to last turn sacrificed Visionary to Brain Burn all 25 cards from the trash into her deck to keep her from flipping, then got the win with an unload -> Shotgun + AR + Pride and Prejudice.

This one made me use some characters I don't usually play, and as a result was fun and unique. Mint, after last week's IL challenge gave me my first near mint.

Still havn't beaten her. I LOATHE the Matrirch because she's the villain that completely undoes all of your work with just one bad turn. "Oh did you do a bunch of damage to me and put my mask away? Well Darken the Skies got me my mask and all my birds back, and I flipped so all those birds got me 2hp a bird back AND now my cohorts are in play so I do more damage and take less."

Think I'll just let this one go by and not waste my time.

Mint.  Some good luck on the initial draw -- two of the Darken the Skies came out on the first turn, so they did nothing.  However, Tachyon was surprisingly not very helpful--took forever for her multi-card draw/play stuff to come out (HUD Goggles, Research Grant, Pushing the Limits), only got one Fleet of Foot, and only one ******?? Blast (the card that takes out environment cards).  Expatriate helped some, but even by the end of the game, I only had out two guns, and no Unload in sight.  (I don't get DW Expatriette--how often can you afford to forgo an entire round of damage, and use her base power, hoping for more damage next round?).  Viz was the star--managed to get some pretty good deck control, and kept Matriarch from bringing out those long strings of fowl.  Fanatic helped some in support, and near the end, Divine Focus took a good 8-10 HP away from Matriarch.  

In the end, I got Mint only through luck.  I had managed to whittle down Matriarch with some Tactical Shotgun blasts, some Tachyon one-shots, and a lone fortunate Lightspeed Barrage, although she still had 4 HP, a bunch (10-11) birds out, my heroes were all in single digits, and I was coming up to the environment turn.  I thought I was dead, but then came....Spinning Vortex!  It hit Tach for 3, she redirected that damage with Synaptic Redirection, added a +1 for Nemesis, and Lillian went down.  

Don't give up -- a couple of tips:

1. Getting rid of the Mask is your top priority.  With the mask out, Matriarch basically goes through a massive card draw every turn, because every card triggers another card draw.  Unless you have lots of Hypersonic Assaults ready, you'll be facing huge flocks of Fowl. 
2. Visionary is your best friend here.  -- Make liberal use of her "Draw 2/Discard 1" power to look through her deck for her deck control cards (Precognition, Suggestion, Brain Burn)  And remember, they're useful for more than just putting Darken the Skies/Horrid Cacophony at the bottom of the deck:

• Once you get rid of the Mask, Matriarch only draws extra cards when a fowl card comes up.  Carrion Fields and Huginn/Muninn are not Fowl -- putting them on the top of the deck (particularly if you've gotten rid of any annoying fowl) will limit Matriarch to a one-card draw.  As long as the other one is not in the trash, dealing with a lone Huginn/Muninn is not that hard, particularly if Fanatic's sword or Sacrosanct Martyr/ExP's Tactical Shotgun are on the board
• Darken the Skies/Horrid Cacophony are also not fowl, so if you get rid of the Mask, they are also just one-card draws for Matriarch.   If you (ex:) use Visionary's Brain Burn to put all the fowl and the Mask at the bottom of the deck, then Darken the Skies does nothing.  Also , Horrid Cacophony only destroys Ongoings, and this group of heroes is not particularly Ongoing-dependent.  Tach's HUD Goggles, Fanatic's sword, and all of Expatriette's guns/ammo are not affected by Horrid Cacophony.  Put Horrid Cacophony on the top of the deck after the Mask is destroyed, and you may lose a few ongoings, but Matriarch will only have a one-card draw that turn.

1. Another great Viz trick -- make her the highest-HP hero, then Telekinetic Cocoon her.  Now you can destroy fowl with impunity, because Matriarch's damage only hits the hero with the highest HP, and all of her damage will bounce off Viz' Cocoon.  Plus, being Cocooned will net Viz 2 cards every turn, bringing her deck control stuff closer to the top.
2. More Viz -- Twist the Ether.  Put one on the Matriarch, and you halve (or eliminate if she's flipped) the damage she does when you kill her birds.  Combine that with ExP's freezing bullets, and Matriarch now does zero damage whenever you kill a bird.  Put two Twists on Matriarch, and she basically can't damage you. 
3. More Viz:  Wrest the Mind - remember that the Carrion Fields are targets.  Put a Wrest the Mind on one, then Cocoon Viz.  Every time the Carrion Fields does damage, you redirect it somewhere else (to a Fowl, maybe), but Viz won't take the 3 points psychic damage.  If the Carrion Fields are at full HP, you can kill one fowl, then use this trick as a massive chain reaction to kill five more fowls (or deal 5 points damage to the Matriarch), and kill the Carrion Fields at the end of the chain.
4. Still more Viz:  Say you've already killed 10-20 birds, and know that a Darken the Skies is coming up soon.  Have Decoy Projection out, then use Viz' Brain Burn.  You can put all the fowl (and the Mask) back in the deck where Darken the Skies can't reach them, and Decoy Projection will eat the 10-20 HP damage, leaving Viz unscathed.

Fanatic also has some useful tricks:

1. If you get Undaunted out, she's essentially immune to most of the fowl, to the Carrion Fields 1 HP damage, and the Matriarch's damage is halved. Use Divine Sacrifice to redirect damage from the Matriarch/Carrion Fields to an Undaunted Fanatic; she'll be immune to the Carrion Fields, and will only take 1 HP from the Matriarch every time you kill a bird.  If you combine this with a Twist the Ether or ExP's freezing bullets, Undaunted Fanatic becomes an invulnerable damage soak.
2. Even if you don't have Undaunted out, Divine Sacrifice can whittle down Fanatic's HP quickly.  If you get Wrathful Retribution in your hand, then let Fanatic take the damage, and use Wrathful Retribution to nail the Matriarch for about 20 HP. 
3. If the worst happens, and both Huginn/Muninn come out at the same time, Final Dive is not affected by damage reduction.  If you can whittle Huginn/Muninn down to 4 HP, then Final Dive can destroy one of them...and then do 4 HP damage to something else.
4. Zealous Offense or Chastise can take one (or both) of the Carrion Fields out of action, giving you more leeway to kill birds.  

The environment can even help here -- I was playing a practice round to warm up for the one-shot, and Time Crawls came out.  Usually, I hate seeing that, but a -1 damage reduction to *all* villain targets (a) makes all but a few of the birds useless (since most of them do 1 HP damage), (b) makes the Carrion Fields useless (since they do 1 HP damage), and (c) cuts the Matriarch's damage in half (or eliminates it, if she's flipped).  Use Viz's Prophetic Vision to put Time Crawls on top, then let Matriarch bring out all the birds she wants; they won't hurt you much, and you can kill them with impunity.

Hope that helps!

Don't give up -- I posted some tips (see above) that might help.

@Robb8888:

I haven't played a ton with DW Expatriette, but I found a couple situations during this game in particular where her innate power was very helpful:

1) If she gets hit with Ethereal Bonds... she can't deal damage anyway, so stacking up extra damage for next turn is nice.

2) When you play unload you get to use as many powers as you have guns. If you have Pride and Prejudice set up, then it only takes one power to use both of them. Using Aim as your first power buffs everything else for your current turn AND your next one. In that instance it's better than about any other base power in the game in terms of total damage.

I also hate the Matriarch. She's either ridiculously hard or ridiculously easy. Too much of her difficulty is tied up in her mask and her cohorts. I killed that stupid mask at least four times. She flipped and was regaining most of her life. It didn't feel challenging or stimulating. It just felt tedious and a giant waste of my time. I'm probably not going to bother with a near mint. I don't like her.

Got her in the end, but it was mostly due to luck. I drew really really well and she drew really, really poorly. But thanks both for the encouragement and the tips Rob, I really appreciate it :)

I ended up with an easy time thanks to some good draws. The opening brought out only one bird and a Carrion Fields, which let me start hitting the Mask right away. It was still out the following turn, but luckily all she drew was a Darken the Skies, a second bird and Muninn. The Mask died quickly after that and I brought Muninn down to 1 while Visionary put the Mask on the bottom and a Darken the Skies at the top. The Environment was very helpful (it helped that Visionary put Time Flies at the bottom first round) and Time Crawls helped mitigate her damage for a turn.

When Huginn finally came out, Tachyon's Sonic Vortex finished Muninn and Huginn joined it in the trash soon after.

Long story short, I spent several rounds taking minimum damage while I fished for the cards I needed and smacked Lillian around, then Hypersonic Assaulted away her one big bird-drawing turn...which was also the turn that Imbued Frailty came out, so only I got to benefit from the boost and it let me finish her off.

That was a long, difficult fight but I managed it in one try for a Near Mint. I rewound a few times because I figured I wasn't going to win anyways, but wanted to do the best I could.

Tachyon ended up going down due to various things, and everyone else was low (Expat and Visionary at 3, Fanatic at 1). Tachyon's incap power gave Fanatic Wrathful Retribution back from the trash for a 30 damage hit on Matriarch, and then I played Telekinetic Cocoon on Visionary in the hopes of keeping her alive while the other two would die on Matriarch's turn. I was hoping I'd either get enough cards from her I could use to finish her off or the Environment would help me out.

Then the Environment played Time Crawls and suddenly everyone survived for another turn. RPG Launcher play via Tachyon's incap, a Hollow Point-loaded shotgun blast, and a Final Dive to remove the Matriarch's mask combined to deal the 12 damage necessary to finish her off.

I still can't believe it.

The first game I could only get the Matriarch down to 4 before the birds wiped everyone out.  Birds + damage boost = trouble.  If I hadn't wasted so much damage on that Carrion Fields, I would've gotten her.

The second time around was better.  I learned my lesson and burst her down as quickly as I could.

I played this on Thursday morning and somehow missed the Carrion Field came out and I managed to kill Fanatic on the 2nd turn. So I just gave up and turned it off. I went back Monday morning and beat her pretty handily with Expatriette's shotgun and a few other big hit cards. I was setting up for Fanatic's Undaunted by wound up finishing her off with Tachyon anyway.

It was my second attempt and I got a FINE.   Why didn't I get a near-mint? Because I waited till the end of the week? I thought it was number of attempts and not time?

Then I couldn't log into the forums on Monday either. :/

Second attempt should get a Near Mint. If it was too late it would've been Good, not Fine.

Not quite true.  If you rewind during the first attempt you give up gaining mint and can only get near mint.   If you lose on that game then the best you can do is Fine while the weekly one-shot is still active. 

Also, after the end of the week, you can only get FINE.  End of the week transition was the killer here.

If you play the game after the week is up you can only get Good.

But that's not what it says.

http://handelabra.com/blog/2015/12/21/welcome-to-the-weekly-one-shot-and-more

Did you read the description of "good"?

Reading all of this he should have gotten Near-Mint.

That wasn't the case so either the description is off that they told us, there was another game counted in there possibly due to a continuation, or possibly a bug.   

Opening with both cohorts in play. So it goes! I managed a win, which pleased me, but I had to rewind to fix a mistake that would have cost me the game. Pretty happy I beat it, and the rewind wasn't of the predicting the future variety, so there's that.