I looked at Secret Oath usage and win rate

[LimitedPower]

I looked at data from games played on BGA in tournaments and made a write up in G-doc...

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1f1P ... sp=sharing

[lostlivio]

I believe this sentiment mostly comes from newer players (myself included early on). Like most card drafting game, knowing which cards work well together takes time. This allows you to not only play offensively, but defensively. If someone gets Secret Oath and Arcane Secrets comes on the board, in most cases I pick it up (if I can), especially early in the game.

There is a small possibility that Secret Oath, Arcane, and a discard card (Sneaky Deal, Silent Support) comes out on each of your opponent's turns early in the game with no way for you to counter. This usually leads to a loss for me against an experienced player (but not always if the card gods favor you!).

That being said, I still find the game quite enjoyable. Fast-paced and fun combos that I'm still learning after 300+ games.

[RGNRK]

Respectfully, I have to disagree with your conclusions.

As a disclaimer, I am basing this on my own experience with the game. I am by no means an expert, and I don't consider myself a truly analytical player. I generally play instinctively, but having played 812 games and generally sitting in the top 5 all-time ELO, I don't feel out of place giving my anecdotal comments.

I spent some time as a Secret Oath apologist - I thought playing around it was a a matter of practice, experience, and awareness. I've come all the way around on it, to the point where I am considering pausing my play of this game until either their is a custom option to remove the card or the second standalone set comes out.

Simply put, there is no other card that warps the game as fundamentally as Secret Oath. If it comes out early and your opponent gets it, it's bad - lots of time for it to proc and force you into inefficient play. What I feel has been underrepresented in the conversation is how much worse it is when it comes out in the mid-game, when you have a board state of 3-4 spells and you can't pivot them out until all the way after you get your 6th spell.

I see there being two pools of spells that Secret Oath impacts - those whose utility is fundamentally changed by the existence of Secret Oath and those that are made considerably stronger/weaker depending on who has Secret Oath. In the first category is Reckless Attack, Growth, Shared Power, Toxic Gift, Possessed, Puppet Master, Power Hungry, Friendly Truce, and, of course, Arcane Tactics. In the second category I put Trap Attack, Shadow Attack, Aftershock, and Energy Reserve - not unplayable if your opponent gets Secret Oath, but definitely not as good.

No other card so radically alters the board state as Secret Oath. Sure, there are combos that can be drafted into and there are definitely cards that can hurt if they come out at the wrong time. A card that comes to mind is Stone Crush - if you're sitting on 10 mana cards and it comes out, that can be a huge blow, but you know that card exists and holding that many mana cards is a known risk because that card exists. You can choose to play conservatively around the risk of Stone Crush, or not. Secret Oath doesn't invite preemptive counter-play other than devaluing a large percentage of the cards in the card pool.

I really don't want to discourage anyone from playing this game. It's absolutely excellent. This is why I have remained silent on BGG and Reddit when this topic keeps coming up. However, I feel like an option to exclude it from the card pool is warranted for those players who wish to play that way.

Finally, I acknowledge that maybe after 800+ games I am at the end of exploring the current card pool. I can accept that and I eagerly await the next set. The designers have done an excellent job and I have every confidence in the game as a whole going forward.

[Mr Zee]

I just want to echo basically everything that RGNRK said. Very well articulated.

I love this game. I've ordered a physical copy so that I can remove Secret Oath when I play. After this week's tournament ends, I'm done playing on BGA until the card is addressed.

[MGoulet]

The publisher (Cole and Joe) decides to remove Secret Oath from newly created games in the BGA implementation.

[Ceaseless]

The publisher (Cole and Joe) decides to remove Secret Oath from newly created games in the BGA implementation.

What does this mean? As in any new variant won't have it, it's been removed from the BGA variant atm, or something I didn't say yet?

[LimitedPower]

Respectfully, I have to disagree with your conclusions.

As a disclaimer, I am basing this on my own experience with the game. I am by no means an expert, and I don't consider myself a truly analytical player. I generally play instinctively, but having played 812 games and generally sitting in the top 5 all-time ELO, I don't feel out of place giving my anecdotal comments.

I spent some time as a Secret Oath apologist - I thought playing around it was a a matter of practice, experience, and awareness. I've come all the way around on it, to the point where I am considering pausing my play of this game until either their is a custom option to remove the card or the second standalone set comes out.

Simply put, there is no other card that warps the game as fundamentally as Secret Oath. If it comes out early and your opponent gets it, it's bad - lots of time for it to proc and force you into inefficient play. What I feel has been underrepresented in the conversation is how much worse it is when it comes out in the mid-game, when you have a board state of 3-4 spells and you can't pivot them out until all the way after you get your 6th spell.

I see there being two pools of spells that Secret Oath impacts - those whose utility is fundamentally changed by the existence of Secret Oath and those that are made considerably stronger/weaker depending on who has Secret Oath. In the first category is Reckless Attack, Growth, Shared Power, Toxic Gift, Possessed, Puppet Master, Power Hungry, Friendly Truce, and, of course, Arcane Tactics. In the second category I put Trap Attack, Shadow Attack, Aftershock, and Energy Reserve - not unplayable if your opponent gets Secret Oath, but definitely not as good.

No other card so radically alters the board state as Secret Oath. Sure, there are combos that can be drafted into and there are definitely cards that can hurt if they come out at the wrong time. A card that comes to mind is Stone Crush - if you're sitting on 10 mana cards and it comes out, that can be a huge blow, but you know that card exists and holding that many mana cards is a known risk because that card exists. You can choose to play conservatively around the risk of Stone Crush, or not. Secret Oath doesn't invite preemptive counter-play other than devaluing a large percentage of the cards in the card pool.

I don't think this necessarily goes against anything I wrote (maybe reinforces it to be honest with you) and I acknowledged some of these as deficiencies in the data I looked at. I said before in my first video that SO was the single strongest card because it combos with so many cards and counters so many strong one as well without any true counters. All of which i still think is true. The numbers don't lie though, it didn't correlate well with actually winning. If you want to argue I used bad data or looked at the wrong games, I'm open to that, but as I said in the write up, looking at specific combos, draft position, or players ELO/arena rank could change the win rate but this was looking at it from a very high level position.

For my play style, I will die on the hill that Stone Crush is the worst