If you tuned in to yesterday’s promo preview, then it should be no surprise that we’re printing the other community created card as a promo this year too. An all new version of Paul is coming to clay decks everywhere!
In case you missed the process, we had a two way tie when the community voted to choose the card we would create together. When we held a second round of voting to decide between The Watchman and Paul, the winner was decided by a single vote! Clearly the people wanted both!
As the process continued the version of Paul the community created together looked like this:
In our testing that version of Paul turned out to be extremely powerful and extremely splashable. Being territory class meant that he was like an Artifact or Fortress with legs. Being CBN meant that nothing was going to stop him. That’s a combination that we found was simply too powerful.
One of the best uses I found for Paul in his original form, was to answer to some of the BoM decks most common counters. Cards like the “Punisher” Lost Soul and Hezekiah’s Signet Ring give the BoM problems. Paul takes care of both and doesn’t get negated by Moses! And since many of the Enhancements in that deck are half clay he can use them all!
It doesn’t seem right that Paul would be as good or better splashed into an O.T. offense than he would among his fellow missionaries and clay Heroes. We looked as a number of options to remedy the situation. We considered requiring all your Heroes to be N.T. for him to work. We also looked at using variants of some of the other abilities submitted by the community during the voting.
In the end we decided to keep the ability as close as possible to what the community chose. The best way to do that was to remove territory class from Paul all together. The scriptures paint a picture of Paul being a very active and engaging man, so requiring him to enter battle to use his ability also feels more in line with who Paul was.
The version of Paul we settled on looks very similar to what the community created:
Without the territory class we made a slight modification to the draw ability to make it function correctly. Those with a keen eye will also notice a new identifier on Paul that we haven’t seen used in the game before. That foreshadows things yet to come…
Join us tomorrow for a sneak peak at the new State Promo!
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Jonathan Gomez
So awesome, I’m really excited for this card. Now I gotta go dust off my Paul’s books and parchments… lol
Derek
I’m very much looking forward to having a new Paul to use in the game; the older one simply required too much prep. So you bet I’ll be hosting quite a few district tourneys this upcoming season! The only thing I wasn’t crazy about when the special ability was finalized was Paul’s ability to negate his own artifacts (such as Miraculous Handkerchiefs and the letters to the various churches); it seemed counter-productive/thematic to what Paul did. However, now that he’s not territory class I think that will help keep those specific artifacts’ abilities active. And some of them will still work even if Paul enters battle because a few of them resolve in the prep phase. Really looking forward to the new set and this coming tourney season!
RedWing
The blanket negation of neutral cards (including you own) has to be there to prevent Hidden Treasures shenanigans.
Benjamin campbell
I REALLY like the idea of having a new Paul. Paul is obviously a giant among heroes of the faith. But honestly is this that much better than the old Saul/Paul? I understand the situational use of negating neutral cards and protecting some lost souls, but without it being territory class I don’t think it is all that playable. He’s 10/10 so he will never have initiative, You have to band him in to benefit from his draw 2 ability further losing initiative. This representation doesn’t seem worthy of being Paul. I’d argue that this is less useful than the old variant. I am not looking to be critical, I just really do not think this would have been what the community would have chosen if they knew it wasn’t going to be territory class. I would never have voted for this special ability. The strength of the ability was in the fact that it was territory class. Again, I’m really not trying to be critical at all, but I just want to have a card that is worthy of carrying the name Paul.
What if it stayed territory class but you removed the Cannot be negated status? That would make it really good, but wouldn’t work with BOM.
If it isn’t going to be territory class I think the draw two should be changed to something like Draw x (x being the number of NT clay heros in play: limit 3).
Justin A.
Unfortunately the TC simply presented too many challenges. Consider the following combo. Activate Burial Shroud with Paul in territory. Shroud is negated so you can attack. After your rescue attempt, set Paul aside. He leaves territory so now Burial Shroud is not negated and you cannot be attacked. That’s just one example. Trust me, Paul is going to be awesome in the various church decks. 🙂
RedWing
The new Paul is strictly better. With all the fantastic clay banding cards (Claudia, Philemon, Epaphras, Watchful Leaders, Ephesian Mentor, Faith of Samuel, Paul’s Books and Parchments, ect), Paul basically gives you a guaranteed +2 every turn. Clay also has plenty of interrupts and without having to worry about soul shuffling initiative is entirely unnecessary.
Four Corners
Would making it TC and just adding while in battle negate neutral cards make it better? He still could protect N.T Lost Souls and have a handy draw or is there reasons that it still would be too powerful?