Join Luke Marshall for a summary of his experience during the second major era of The Saga of Redemption.
Experience during The Second Era of Redemption (2009-2014; The Garden Tomb Era):
Building my deck for this era was so fun for me to think about because as I mentioned before, I was not playing that much during this time period. Sports had very much consumed my life and made me forget about playing competitive Redemption. Instead I would play some casual games with my family and with my brother’s friends. I do not think I won many games during this time so coming back and getting ready to play this format once again against a great player (Jayden) was really exciting to ponder.
The different strategies I thought about playing all revolved around The Garden Tomb. Primarily due to the fact that I boxed myself into a corner and now feel the need to prove my theory that three decks have dominated Redemption from the beginning. I looked at deck lists from this time period and tried to consume as much ‘deck building perspective’ as I could and it seemed that Garden Tomb was the best deck build during this time. However it is interesting to note that even with the statistical dominance of The Garden Tomb in National standings, it does not seem like the absolute best build of that deck was ever found for its time period. Interestingly, Redemption seems to be very unique in contrast to other CCG’s because exactly identical decks winning are almost non-existent in Redemption. (Which is a major plus for the game structure, in my opinion). Some of the different high placing builds of Tomb strategies were the Disciple Tomb, Teal Tomb, Musical Tomb, Centurion red splash tomb, and the decks roll on where it seems like the same build of Tomb never finished with high placement twice. Can this really be so? I believe this happens for a few reasons. First, we most likely do not have the raw data for enough tournaments to have great statistics of the overall meta at this time. Play groups most likely developed very ingrown metas amongst themselves. This is always a danger to keep in mind when preparing for a big tournament like Nationals. Second, Redemption has a smaller community than many other CCG’s and as a result the meta is not always ‘solved’ by the community. ‘Solved’ simply means that the best deck is widely agreed upon by the entire community. I think if we had a wider player base with more information available about completed tournaments we might be in a different world for Redemption. The third reason is that every individual card choice matters within Redemption. The same general strategies can end up using so many different cards and they are all not only viable but good options depending on your specific situation/expected meta. Unlike many other games I do not think the exact same deck will ever be able to dominate the meta because when you can expect to draw the majority of your deck every game, each individual card choice matters so much. What a strength for the mechanics of the game we all love so much!
With all this being said I am thankful that Redemption seems to be a game that remains unsolvable. Many of you might laugh at this statement as you could point out that undoes the very premise of my article series. However, I will clarify that the three era’s I argue for are deck strategies and not specific builds of those strategies. Hopefully you will come to appreciate this nuance. If you have played other CCG’s you will find that once a meta is considered to be ‘solved’ the community is ready for the next meta because everyone believes they know what strategy will win every time and most consistently. We as a smaller CCG have the opportunity to stay in the innovative deck building phase of a meta for such a long time. That makes our game even more fun than some of the games with overwhelming amounts of resources and information.
I want to again thank Jayden for continuing this stroll down memory lane. He also brought what seemed to be the only other strategy at the time that had consistently good finishes although it had not preformed as good as Tomb strategies. He played The Angel Under The Oak + Samuel. The game was a great representation of the era. Hopefully without spoiling too much about the game, I would like to point out a few things. The first is how far the game has come in balancing out play experience. I want to give major props to the design team as they have moved the game to a great place in the past seven years. It is evident in this old meta that if your cards did not match up against the opponent’s draw sometimes you would just get owned and run over. Sometimes it did not seem like there was much you could do to stop the other person and I do not feel this way in today’s version of Redemption. Maybe with the exception of someone setting up Golden Calf and The Cross against you on the first turn, but I will not be digressing into that topic just yet! The difference in today’s meta is the incorporation of so many search abilities that create consistent play patterns. Every player has to make decisions about what to take from deck and what to prioritize in your play pattern. While older games had decisions like this they did not have nearly as many and you did not always get the option for these decisions. Thank you Elder team for making our game even better as the years go by.
In the game below against Jayden I decided to base my deck primarily on the Disciples deck that won 2014 Nationals. It looked fast and efficient. The main change I made was to include extra Garden Tomb characters and work Hamans Plot into the defense to further test my theories about the meta. At this point in the game I believe that Garden Tomb was one of the most broken things you could do as an overall strategy. This is a good way to approach a new meta. Find what is the most objectively powerful and broken interaction you can develop, then find how consistently you can do that broken thing. The ability to get one free soul after another with characters that walk in for a free soul is very difficult to compete with.
Conclusion:
I hope you enjoy the game against Jayden and the ideas that come with thinking through this older meta. Also If you would like to play a game in this older meta I suggest everyone send Mr. Jay Chambers a message and ask him to hold a Retro Lackey Grand Prix that is based in an older meta. I think it could be very interesting to see the reaction of new players playing some of the original metas of this game. Just imagine sitting down to play a game against John Hendrix with a deck made of only Angel Wars cards. Just thinking about the disgust shown on his face brings a bit of joy to my mind!
Send me a message telling me how wrong about this Second Era of Redemption meta I was or if you agree with my analysis! Enjoy the game and look forward to next time for the Third Era of redemption.
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