Me being an ass, that's what.
Don't worry, McBehrer. The Matriarch puts everyone in a bad mood.
Going back to an earlier post its not The Matriarch that puts everyone in a bad mood, its the mask
I love Tachyon against the Matriarch, she has the ability to hypersonic assault as previously stated, AND using lightspeed barage is a great way to one shot the cohorts even with DR. Or whatever else you need killed fast. If you play Team Leader, she also helps everyone else get set up faster and that is quite important as well.
Now my question is, does that hypersonic assault trick work? On here people seem to be using it. I asked that question a while ago and never got an official ruling so we have not played it that way since. The question being does she kill the birds before the "Can't do damage" part kicks in.
I've played it as yes, once you Hypersonic Assault someone they can't deal you damage even if they get a retaliatory strike - did it earlier against Balde when he had a Backlash Field out.
On the subject of the Matriarch, we had a pretty epic game against her at the weekend - we decided to try the game I'd been wanting to play for some time now and fought her in the Final Wasteland. First environment card to come out - a Skunk Ape. Second card? Ahhh yeah - Unforgiving Wasteland! Then I think we had Con's Bunker, and even the Library made an appearance later on. By the end of the game, Lilian's deck consisted of both Horrid Cacophonies, all three Darken the Skies, and one lonely Carrion Fields that one of us decided we may as well kill since it was absolutely no threat by that point. Suffice to say, we kinda won :D.
Just won a game against The Matriarch in The Final Wasteland. Victory had nothing to do with Unforgiving Wasteland. It was mostly a matter of Dark Visionary drawing both of her Twist the Ethers early on, and having Absolute Zero (with Coolant Blast!) in the same game. Liberal use of Turmoil on the Environment deck meant that we could make sure to kill The Mask every turn.
Frequent lurker here coming out to say thanks for the tips. I lost to the Matriarch the first 4 or 5 times I played against her. Knowing that a whole lot of birds were going to show up, I tried playing decks with multiple-foe damage like Tempest and Tachyon, and when we lost with those, I tried Rook City heroes (Fixer, ExPat). Finally we won when I played with Haka, on a team with Wraith and Tachyon.
However, I think the key was our environment. If someone reading still has yet to beat the bird lady and just wants a fighting chance, I humbly suggest following your tips, and also fighting Matriarch in the Final Wasteland. Usually environments are afterthoughts for us, but after losing with so many different combinations in Rook City and Realm of Discord, we specifically chose FW, since several of the creatures in that deck damage lowest-level targets (birds). Also... and here's the real bonus... there is a card that will give the heroes 1 HP every turn (Con's Bunker), and Unforgiving Wasteland, which REMOVES from the game any cards destroyed by environment cards. You can see where this is going.
It actually took quite awhile to get Smoke Bombs out, so we kept the birds at bay the first 4 or 5 turns with Throwing Knives and Hypersonic/Accelerated Assaults, kept revenge damage down with Ta Moko, and took a few hits along the way, until those 2 environment cards came out. Con's Bunker makes you draw an extra environment card if you want to keep it in play, but Wraith had a couple of Grappling Hooks, so whatever we didn't like we got rid of, and once Unforgiving Wasteland came out, we chipped away at Huginn, Muninn, and the Mask, until the Jersey Devils, Chupacabras, and Apes removed them from the game for good. Even after Matriarch's card flipped, Darken The Skies and Horrid Cacophony didn't do much, because many of the birds, the Mask, and Cohorts were either removed from the game or held captive by Haka's Savage Mana. By then the Smoke Bombs were doing their thing until Lightspeed Barrage showed up for about 15 damage and ended it.
Based on how their decks affect each other, I think Tachyon and Wraith could switch their nemeses and still be just fine thematically, with Matriarch being a wannabe society-type set against trust-funded Wraith, and Tachyon being a scientist paired with the chemical-freak Spite, but that's a different topic. Anyway, thanks for the tips. Just wanted to throw the Environment aspect out there if anyone is still struggling with different combinations of heroes against Matriarch.
If you have the Scholar he can tank the Matriarch with Flesh to Iron, Mr. Fixer with Driving Mantis is also really powerful, he can crush Matriarch pretty fast.
We had a game where Matriarch got a slew of fowl to start, but Fixer had Mantis and Expat had her SMG, it wasn't pretty for Matriarch that game. Frost rounds and hoist chain sealed the deal when the cohorts came out. Fixer Expat Tach and DVisionary was the team, DVisionary mostly locked down the environment deck, the others owned the fowl while Mr Fixer kept asking why she was punching herself.
As for the discussion on the character of Matriarch, I love the estranged sibling jealousy angle. Matriatch is going to come after Tachyon, and anyone else she thinks hurt her, I also see her as a bi-polar personality, one side that believes she is superior and must be obeyed and loved, and another that is spiteful, insecure and petty. Ruler of the flock healing from her birds makes sense to me, as the more birds arrive the less worried/insecure she becomes, her overconfidence of Her Avian Majesty, gone she goes after the weakest enemy she finds, and she sends her cohorts into the fray. It's only after she throws everything at the heroes and fails to defeat them that she really takes stock of the fight, almost like she doesn't belive she can lose until she flips. After seeing her cohorts likely get beat down, but regaining her own strength, she reverts back, and goes offensive from afar.
The mask has power, but its loss would be more disconcerting than debilitating, throwing off her concentration, thus reducing her control over the birds.
Driving Mantis is first time each turn. So it will only work for the first Fowl if you are clearing the Fowls by SMG.
Gah, you are correct. I never really looked closely at that card. Our Fixer fan will be sad.
I have a question about the Matriarch which I can't find the answer to. When Unkindness of Ravens deals damage, does it "lock in" the affected targets prior to dealing the damage? Or does the affected-heroes list shift as HP totals change while you work your way through the damage? EG in a 3-hero game which starts with everyone on full health, we have Scholar (29), Absolute Zero (29), and Expatriette (29). If Unkindness tries to damage every hero except the lowest, and you hit Scholar first, Scholar immediately becomes lowest, so would the Unkindness hit both of the others? Or does it always damage two heroes and ignore the one that was lowest when it started?
I always identify the lowest first, then have them damage all the others. I never really considered the alternative before, but it seems like it would create weird results. What will really challenge this is if we ever get a combo which can bring out new hero targets while it is dealing the damage. I can't think of any such combo yet though.
The first time The Ultimate Target deals damage each turn, Chrono-Ranger may use a power. That's all I got for now. If he could somehow give that power to Unity, or give it to Argent Adept who Performs a Subdominant to give acard play to Unity, then we'd be in business.
If everyone is tied for health the players decide the order of health, so in the instance given you would assign the role of lowest health to one hero and the others would take the damage.
Once scholar took damage he could not take the role of lowest health, since the ability doesn't hit the lowest health hero.
If there was a way to add a hero target mid resolution of that effect, the new ones would be hit I believe, but that is a whole bag of worms that hasn't been opened yet.
But if you then hit Zero, you're assigning Expat the "lowest health" distinction, even though she actually has the HIGHEST health during the resolution.
Not that I really want to turn the Ravens into a functional copy of the Jackdaws in this situation, mind…I'm just wanting to be sure this situation is fully explored. The idea of "locking in" the targeting makes more sense to me than your explanation, but contradicts how other cards work, so the Melvin in me is puttering around arguing with himself now.)
Choose the targets. Then deal your damage. This might be a case of overthinking a simple thing. If you want to think of it as "locking in", it probably would be appropriate in this case.
I really dislike the term "overthinking", or calling rules questions "simple". What's simple to one person is not to another. What you propose seems reaonable, but I also cannot see how it's compatible with previous rulings on target selection.
I did not mean that as a slight. Sorry if it came off that way. But lets be honest, we all tend to overthink rules and stuff at some point. I am as guilty as anyone and I'll be the first to admit it.
Edit: Post edited due to mod request. Post also now bolded for greater relevance.
Except when he dislikes being referred to by racial slurs.
Actually, it's not a racial slur - contrary to popular belief.