Patch Notes 1.5.4
This patch focused on leaning into the identity of the new decks and trying to implement some of the changes that got into Red and Blue into Green and Purple as well.
Note: This is a collection of changes from both 1.5.3 and 1.5.4. I didn’t do patch notes in 3, and it’s easier to just combine them at this point!
Core Mechanics
Boost Tokens
Boost tokens are now removed during the Cleanup phase of each turn. This allows them to be added to more things and be more powerful, while still allowing for some counter-play. This also allows them to be a proxy for all factions to use as a temporary power gain for a lane. The intention is to allow for boost decks to be more combo and mid-game timing focused, instead of just building up to an enviable win.
Decks
All the decks below are not playable in ScreenTop and have a similar power to cost ratio. There are still some abilities that may be stronger than intended, but will need more playtesting to verify that.
Caldor’s Brigadeers (Red)
- Infantry Discard
- Aerial Destruction
Cybernetic Collective (Blue)
- Drone Swarming
- Satellite Network
MMC (Green)
- Basic Shift
- Mercenary Bounce
Endracor (Purple)
- Corrupt Transfer
- Infiltration Weaken
Faction Changes
Caldor’s Brigadeers (Red)
New Cards
- Scrap Heap 2c/1p - Deploy gain 2 crystals for each card in your discard
- Ground Cannon 8c/4p - Deploy destroy a card with power 2 or less
Changes
In general the balance changes are focused around providing some options around low-mining, while making the decision to not play any cards in Production more of a trade-off instead of just the default plan. You’ll see most of the 0p cards now cost a production to address this. A few targeted reductions in power to some low cost high attack options were also needed to prevent aggressive red decks from just destroying slower decks with no way to prevent it.
- Field Hospital, 2c/0p -> 3c/1p
- Recruitment Office, 2c/0p -> 2c/1p
- Mining Expedition, 5c/0p -> 3c/0p. Once per Round Discard a card to gain (5 -> 3) crystals.
- Temporary Barricade, 0c/0p -> 1c/0p. End of Round Discard this card.
and draw a card
- Drill Sergeant, 2c/0p -> 4c/1p, 1/1/1 -> 1/2/2
- Field Promotion, 4c/0p -> 4c/1p
- Reinforcements, 5c/1p -> 4c/1p, 2/3/3 -> 1/2/2. Deploy: Draw (2 -> 1) card.
- Frontal Assault, 5c/1p -> 9c/1p. Deploy: Discard up to two cards in play to add a temporary (+3 -> +2) attack for each
- Base of Operations, 4c/2p -> 6c/2p. You may discard a card to reduce this cards cost by (-2 -> -3) crystals.
- Paratroopers, End of Round: Draw (3 -> 2) cards.
- Targeting Sensors, Deploy: Gain a temporary +1 attack (max: 6) for each card in your attack lane this turn
- Control Tower, 1/1/2 -> 2/2/3
- Bombing Run, 3/5/4 -> 6/7/5. Deploy: You may destroy a card with power 3 or less.
in opponents matching lane
- Missile Silo, 6/6/6 -> 8/8/8
Cybernetic Collective (Blue)
Overall I tried to lean into the idea of Satellites being a high production, late-game deck. You’ll see a lot more defensive options, and I’ve removed the discounts from most of the Satellites to prevent the snowball effect of everything becoming free. To compensate for this, the abilities on Satellites now gain power when more Satellites are present.
Drones have also been re-worked to play with the temporary nature of boost tokens now. The Swarming number is now a limit on how many boosts each drone can add, to avoid having a late game cheap drone add massive amounts of power to a lane.
New Cards
- Strike Drone, 12c/3p, 4/5/4. Swarming 4. Deploy: You may disable a card for target player with power equal to or less than the number of Boost tokens on this lane.
- Orbital Mining Rig, 5c/0p. One per Round: You may spend 3 unused Production to gain 5 crystals.
- Transference, 3c/1p, 2/2/2. Deploy: Shift 1.
Changes
- Shield Generator. Once per Round: You may spend 2 unused Production to block (3 -> 5) damage this turn
- Repair Facility. Once per Round: You may spend (3 -> 1) unused Production to gain 2 hitpoints.
- Planetary
Defense Assault Laser, 6c/0p -> 6c/2p. Once per Round: You may spend (3 -> 2) unused Production to block 5 damage do 3 damage to target player this turn.
- Unexpected Breakthrough, 3c/1p -> 2c/1p. END: Add a temporary (+2 -> +3) Boost tokens to your Production lane this turn.
- Material Replicator, 3c/1p -> 2c/1p.
- Laser Miner. Deploy: Add a temporary
+1 Mining for each card in your Production lane +2 Boost tokens to your Mining lane this turn.
- Collector Drone, 5c/2p -> 8c/2p. Swarming (1 -> 3). NEW ABILITY: Deploy: Gain crystals (max: 8) equal to the number of boosts on your lanes.”
- Seeker Drone, 5c/2p -> 4c/2p, 1/2/2 -> 2/2/2. Swarming (1 -> 3).
- Hunter Drone, 3c/2p -> 2c/1p. Swarming (1 -> 2). NEW ABILITY: Deploy: Search 2.
- Attack Drone, REMOVED. See Strike Drone above.
- EMP Blast, 10c/2p -> 4c/3p, 3/4/3 -> 2/3/2.
- Jamming Satellite, 1/1/1 -> 2/2/3. NEW ABILITY: Deploy: Disable a card with power equal to or less than the number of Satellites you control.
- Recon Satellite. NEW ABILITY: End of Round: Search 1 for each Satellite you control.
- Research Satellite, 5c/3p -> 8c/3p. NEW ABILITY: Deploy: Add a temporary +2 Boost to your Production lane for each Satellite you control.
- Defense Satellite, 4c/4p -> 8c/4p, 1/2/2 -> 4/5/5. NEW ABILITY: Deploy: Reduce the damage you take by 5 (max: 20) for each Satellite you control.
- Drone Commander, 9c/4p -> 12c/5p, 4/5/4 -> 6/7/6. Swarming (1 -> 5). REVERTED ABILITY: Deploy: Basic cards count as drones for this turn.
- Thermal Imaging Satellite, 10c/4p -> 4c/2p, 5/4/3 -> 2/2/3. End of Round: Gain 2 crystals (max: 8) for each Satellite you control.
- Orbital Drop Mech, 14c/5p -> 16c/5p, 7/7/7 -> 8/9/7.
- Hive Network, 25c/6p -> 24c/6p, 10/10/10 -> 12/12/12. Cost (5 -> 2) less per Satellite you control.
MMC (Green)
While the end of turn costs on Mercenaries have been working really well, with the power creep in the other decks I’ve relaxed the costs a little on some of the cards. Lower End or Round costs should mean it’s more common to have play options the turn after you used a Merc card, instead of paying all your Mining and then having not enough the turn after.
For the Basic deck, I’ve tried to add some more synergy around having Basic cards in play, while also limiting the power of having Shift Work adding a huge amount of power per turn, especially when multiple copies are played.
A lot of core cards have completely new abilities to better match the new style of play for both decks.
New Cards
- Fissure, 10c/3p, 5/5/4. Deploy: Return a card from target players Mining lane to their hand.
- Weapons Upgrade, 5c/4p, 3/3/3. Deploy: Add a temporary +1 Boost token (max: 8 boosts) to your Attack lane for each card in your Attack lane. Pay 2 crystals per token added this way.
Card Changes
- Long Term Contract, 10c/0p -> 6c/0p
- Basic Training, 5c/0p, 3c/0p. NEW ABILITY: Once per Round: You may reduce the cost of a Basic card by 1 crystal.
- Shift Work, 4c/0p -> 4c/1p. NEW ABILITY: Once per Round: Whenever you Shift one of your cards, you may spend 1 unused production to add a Basic trooper card in the lane it came from.
- Field Lab. NEW ABILITY: Deploy: Add a temporary +3 boost tokens to your Production lane.
- Ore Hauler. NEW ABILITY: End of Round: Gain 2 crystals (max: 8) for every card in your mining lane.
- Merc Squad, 2c/1p -> 4c/1p, 1/1/1 -> 2/2/1. NEW ABILITY: End of Round: Return a target players card with power 1 or less in its lane to. Pay 2 crystals or return this card to your hand.
- Armoured Transport, 5c/1p -> 8c/1p, 2/3/2 -> 2/2/2. NEW ABILITY: Deploy: You may Shift 1 of your cards, or add a Basic card to this lane.
- Hired Mercs. End of Round: Pay (5 -> 3) crystals or return this card to your hand.
- Autonomous Logistics. ADD: (Does not stack with similar effects)
- Third Party Research, 3c/2p -> 4c/1p. End of Round: Pay (5 -> 2) crystals or return this to your hand.
- Tunnel Network, 6c/2p -> 7c/2p, 2/3/2 -> 3/3/2.
- Mobile Unit, 5c/3p -> 5c/1p.
- High Tech Operations, 7c/4p -> 7c/3p, 1/4/2 -> 4/3/4.
- Warmachine, 5/7/5 -> 6/9/7. End of Round: Return a target players card
in the Attack lane with power 3 or less in its lane to their hand. Pay 5 crystals or return this card to your hand.
- Deep Core Drill, 8/6/6 -> 8/6/7. END: Gain 2 crystals (max: 14) for each of your
Mercenary Basic cards in play.
- Seismic Manipulation, 10/10/10 -> 12/12/12. CHANGED ABILITY: End of Round: Starting with you, each player takes damage equal to double the number of cards in your mining lane (max: 16 damage). All players may pay 1 crystal per damage to reduce the damage they take.
Endracor (Purple)
Previously there was only one deck for Endracor, this patch adds the Infiltration type as well as leaning in to the Shift for opponents cards. Similar to the Satellite synergy, the more Infiltration cards you play the more powerful your abilities get. The Shift mechanic is very strong when used early, but has the down side of never letting you remove power, just to change where it’s allocated.
New Cards
- Network Hack (Infiltration), 1c/2p, 1/1/1. “Deploy: Shift 1 of your opponents cards with power 1 or less to another one of their lanes.
- Heist (Infiltration), 12c/5p, 8/7/7. Costs 1 production less for each other Infiltration card you control. End of Round: Look at target players hand. Choose a card for them to discard.
- Temporary Pardon, 6c/2p, 2/3/2. Deploy: Corruption tokens do not effect this lane, this turn.
- Suspicious Malfunction (Infiltration), 8c/3p, 5/4/4. Deploy: Add 2 Corruption tokens to target players Production lane.
- Collections Agency (Permanent), 4c/1p. Once per Round: When a Corruption token is removed or transferred, gain 2 crystals.
- Coordinated Maneuvers, 2c/1p. Once per Round: When you Shift a players card, you may also Shift one of your own cards.
- Toxic Environment, 3c/0p. Once per Round: During your deploy phase, you may Corrupt 1.
Changed Cards
- Corrupt Policies, 3c/0p -> 1c/1p.
- Arms Dealer, 3c/0p -> 2c/1p. NEW ABILITY: Deploy: Corrupt 1. You may deal 2 damage (max: 6) to target player for each of your lanes with at least one corruption token.
- Trade Embargo, 5c/1p -> 3c/1p. Deploy: Corrupt 2. Disable a card for target player with power 2 or less in its lane.
- Illegal Marketplace, 5c/1p -> 6c/1p, 2/1/1 -> 2/1/2. Deploy: Corrupt 2. End of Round: Gain 2 crystals (max: 10) for each corruption token on your lanes.
- Strife, 6c/1p -> 8c/1p, 2/2/2 -> 2/3/2. Deploy: Transfer up to 1 corruption token from your lane to your opponents lane, (or draw a card.)
- Bribery, 10c/1p -> 6c/2p, 2/3/2 -> 3/2/2. NEW ABILITY: Deploy: Shift 1 of your opponents cards with power 3 or less to another one of their lanes.
- Research Grant, 2/2/2 -> 2/2/3.
- Corporate Espionage. Deploy: Disable a card for target player with power 3 or less in its lane. (If you control at least 2 other Infiltration cards, you may disable a card with 5 power or less instead.)
- Invisible Hand. Deploy: Shift 1 of your opponents cards with power 3 or less to another one of their lanes. (If you control at least 2 other Infiltration cards, you may shift a card with power 5 or less instead.)
- Master Plan, 4c/4p -> 4c/5p. Deploy: Reduce target players attack by 5 this turn. End of Round: If you have the highest attack power this turn, gain 5 crystals. (Otherwise, add a Basic trooper to any lane.)
- Spread Dissent. Deploy: Transfer up to (5 -> 3) corruption tokens from your lanes to target opponent(s) lanes, (or discard any number of cards from your hand, and {bold: draw} that many cards.)
- Sleeper Agents, 7/8/7 -> 10/11/9. NEW ABILITY: Deploy: Disable cards for target player(s), with total power equal to or less than the number of other Infiltration cards you control.
ScreenTop Fixes
- Added Counters to all lanes to help track your lane values
- Cleaned up some permissions on 3-4 player board with player tokens
- Increased the height of the Production tracker to allow up to 12 production