Hello,
First, I’d like to say that I make this post just for fun and that I don’t claim to know the absolute truth about the perfect balance in Faeria. The aim of this post is not to claim a perfect balance and thus draw an exhaustive list of changes.
We’ve all been playing Faeria for many hours now and still, some cards are being left for dead and almost never used.
Pandora is not live now so it could bring back to life some cards in the future but everything here has been imagined with constructed in mind.
Here are my though on 7 changes :
1- Imperial Engineer : Gift - Trigger all your production abilities.
This card is hardly played today. It’s (in my opinion) in a state where it’s actually very hard to even imagine it being played. There’s few combinaison we can think of, such as Gabrian Cistern in order to gain mana rapidly but even there it remains accessory I feel.
Change I’d like : Trigger all your production abilities twice.
We can easily imagine interesting plays if this card triggers production abilities twice and it doesn’t seem abuse in any way. You can control creature with Devouring Plant, buff your creature with Steam Forge or even aim for Faeria gain with Faeria Tree for instance. Seems fun to me !
2- Sagami Elder : Combat - A random friendly creature gains +1/+1.
This card is hardly play today. Not because nobody found any combinaison or theory craft with it, but just because it doesn’t seem that good. The combat effect seems interesting though, especially in early game. But this card has a 3 forest requirement which makes it impossible to play early and to benefit from its combat effect, even though it cost only 4 faerias.
Change I’d like : change its requirement to 1 forest and its cost to 5 faeria.
Changing its requirement to 1 forest has 2 advantages. The first one is that you can obviously play it earlier and thus trying to snowball around it. The second one is that you can try to play it in more diverse deck whereas today it’s mostly playable in mono green decks.
3- Verduran Guardian : Combat - You gain 3 Life.
This 7 faeria-cost creature is hardly played nowadays, for two reasons : it is a very expensive and unreliable heal. Thus, its combat effect just doesn’t bring anything to anyone, unless in very specific and rare situations. Also, its stats are pretty poor compared to other green creature such as Verduran Force for instance.
Change I’d like : Combat - You and a creature gain 2 Life.
The new combat effect makes it less situational. Even if you face a non-agressive deck you can still imagine playing this card. And every time you would fight with it, you will benefit from it. It doesn’t seem amazing but overpowered, but pretty fair in my opinion.
4- Wavecrafter : Whenever a player passes the turn, set their faeria to 3.
This card is a hard one and to be honest i’m not sure about it. Today though, it can be played but it doesn’t bring anything to the game at this point, unless you try to counter an Aurora’s Dream deck (which almost never happen). More than that, it can be really punishing because it means your opponent will have a minimum of 6 faeria to play every turn, without having to fight for faeria wells and thus will be able to summon a big threat every turn. You can’t really use it defensively and an agressive blue deck is still to be built.
Change I’d like : Whenever a player passes the turn, set their faeria to 1.
The effect is pretty much the same but you set the faeria gain to 1. Now, each player will have a minimum of 4 faerias each turn and the card can be really punishing to the very-late-oriented decks.
5- Krog, the Ogre King : Combat - A random card in your hand costs 6 less.
This card is almost never played, and often made fun of. The reason for that is its poor 2 attack for its high 12 faerias cost. The combat effect doesn’t bring the huge value you could hope for such an investment (even if you could argue that 2 hit could make it free).
Change I’d like : Combat - A random ennemy land is destroyed.
Even though i’m not a big supported of random effects, this one seems really fun and game swinging and this is what you can hope for a such high cost card. We could think about lowering a little his health as well if needed.
6- Iona, Beloved by All : Flying Can’t be attacked.
This card could be pretty strong but it’s not. The reason for that is its 1 health and the fact that its not immune to spells and effects. Those, there are so many spells that could take her out, it’s too much of a risk to even play it.
Change I’d like : Protection, Flying Can’t be attacked.
Adding Protection to it makes it a pain, that’s for sure, but nothing insurmountable. And for sure, we can imagine it being played as a strong harvester (not that yellow particularly needs one though).
7- Last Nightmare : Destroy a creature.
This one is a bit touchy, so think of it as a very personal point of view. I’ve never been a fan of this card. To be honest I even despite it. That being said, it doesn’t bring any fun mechanic to the game, it’s a very basic hard removal that can be very frustrating for opponent, especially when it is top decked.
Change I’d like : Destroy a creature. You must sacrifice a creature to play this card.
Adding this requirement is clearly a big nerf and thus a cost-reduction of the card can be fairly discuss. Though, it would add a play mechanic that could involve thinking and skills and also could make this card felt less punishing.
What do you guys think ? Do you have other fun (or not) balance in mind ?
Edit : sorry can’t put pictures as a new user !
