Board Thread:Game Discussion/@comment-11165765-20130810130524/@comment-9890645-20130828162714

I think the ultimate issue here comes down to one of economy of BC which directly translates into economy of money/time. I'll illustrate with an example.

Take two equally-powered decks that have the same damage potential range. One deck seeds an L8, throws two cubes, and takes off 48% of the hit points. The second deck throws two cubes and snares the MVP on the snipe. This seems equal until you consider that the sniper gets one of those cubes back. The first deck did the "heavy lifting" - spent energon to find the boss and spent cubes to put enough damage on it to ensure it drops. The second deck did nothing but bottom-feed and got lucky.

When you ally with someone in game, the expectation is that you assist each other in meeting your goals, not use them to look for opportunities to advance yourself at their expense. This goes double or more for "teammates" as we have here in the chat.

Since I had a dominating deck this episode, I responded to allies who stole my MVPs by stealing theirs. I will say that, after spending Saturday and Sunday routinely screwing these jerks out of their close MVPs, they were all expending extra cubes to keep myself (and others) at bay.

My issue is that, when I have a high DP/rank, my allies WANT me to seed them with the biggest bosses possible. However, to make it profitable for me (getting the MVP) and profitable for them (giving them a chance to get in there, and ensuring the boss drops), it's not as simple as "just do 50% or more loser"... If I three-cubed a DS8 or DE8 last episode, either I killed it outright or left so little damage that only one or two allies would be able to have the time to attack it at all. However, my two-cube would occasionally come up short (especially on the DE8s) by a few million. Throwing a third cube at that point is really just a waste of a cube, since there is a reasonable expectation that 45%+ damage done retains MVP. However, the value added by the return of a cube via snipe makes the exchange patently inequitable and biased towards the sniper, not the seeder.

When I top tier, I am helping my allies by seeding the big bosses more than I am helping myself. To have your allies feast on your seeds then stab you in the back for your generosity makes me never want to seed a big boss again, with any number of cubes.

The two rules I play by when dealing with (respectful) allies:

1. If it's clear that the seeder invested more than one cube yet came up short, I do whatever I can to ensure the seeder retains his MVP bid, even if that means NOT tagging a boss I could easily kill. On bigger bosses, especially, it is patently OBVIOUS when someone has invested more than one cube in a boss without knowing a thing about his deck construction. (If >200M damage was dealt, you better believe it was not one-cubed!)

2. If I can kill a boss on snipe for a little bit more than what my ally has done for MVP, I sit and wait until his MVP is secure before moving in for the kill. If that means I lose out, so be it. I'm here to help myself, but I'm also here to assist my allies in meeting their goals, and I try not to lose sight of that.

However, if you don't respect my investment of time and money, I will not show you that  respect at all, and I will take great pleasure in robbing you of your MVPs at every opportunity.

If you wash my back, I'll wash yours, and smile doing so. If you stab me in the back, vengeance will be mine. End of story. ;)