Sealed Without Starters

[eomund]

This idea was brough up in the suggestions thread back in August and was met with mixed reviews. I think it sounds like a lot of fun, and so now that I have a bit more time (last term at school was surprisingly busy for me) I thought I'd make a poll to see if it's worth pushing more for.

Currently, sealed leagues use starters in order to make sure everyone has a full, coherent deck. But it reduces the amount of variance in sealed leagues, because now you're playing one of a set number of possible decks, with a couple of good cards thrown in on top. I'm not suggesting we replace sealed with starters as the standard format. But once in a blue moon, I think it would be fun to remove the starters and have a more randomized sealed league.

The product allocation would be something like this:
Week 1: 15 Boosters, plus a few fixed cards to ensure a deck can be built (Frodo, a ring, and 9 sites for sure, and then probably a few companions. If it was Fellowship block, maybe Boromir, SoD, Merry, FotB, Gimli, DoE, and Legolas PoM).
Week 2-4: 5 Boosters per week

I've included two extra options in the poll, based on the card pool we would use. "Real sets" would be something like a Fellowship block league, while "custom set" would be a card pool designed to make this sort of format work (probably using movie block cards, due to the popularity of the format combined with the size of the available card pool). The game was obviously not designed with this sort of format in mind, and so designing a set would allow us to put more companions at common, and remove a bunch of useless-for-sealed cards.

I think either option has merit, it mostly depends on what people are interested in. A potential issue with the custom set is the fact that the new set would need to be coded into gemp; I obviously don't want to ask MarcinS to do that himself, and so it would involve coordinating with him to make sure it can be done without causing a bunch of extra work for him.

Please comment below if you have any thoughts on the idea.

[Cthulhu]

I will just quote myself when I wrote why I don't think this idea would be successful or fun:

I dont think it will work. Starters are part of LotR Sealed for a reason, they give the necessary basis you need in LotR (also thats why there are draft packs in LotR draft, unlike MtG Draft which is done only with boosters). What if you open 0-1-2 companions? What if you open fellowship cards totally scattered through different cultures (Gondor companions, Rohan possesions, Elven events)? What if you open 0 possessions and support cards for your fellowship, and only get some events that you cant use?  You wont be able to build a deck. End result will be too chaotic, and totally not fun for many people.

I can uderstand your desire to play more Sealed games, its shared by some other people too. I think adding a second Sealed League instead of the My Cards League right after the reset next month will be much more easy, logical  and more likely to happen, when people are trying to get some collections going.

[hsiale]

I think the best way for more variety and fresh experience is someone designing a set of new starters, as I did for the Movie Sealed. 3 decks available week 1, further 3 week 2, then 3 more for week 3 give really lots of possibilities - especially if you design first and second group of decks so that they have some interlocking parts and mixing them is possible. Of course doing those decks is a significant amount of work, but definitely worth it and it would be great if someone creates a new set of decks, for example for Towers Standard.

[eomund]

Cthulu, for me it's not an issue of wanting to play more sealed, it's that I want to play a different kind of sealed. I understand your worries about being able to build a deck; that's the reason for including the companions in the pack. With one companion of each culture, you should be able to pick cultures based on the support cards and/or additional companions you open.

I think your idea of having two sealed leagues after the reset makes sense, since My Cards will need some time to get up and running. Maybe this format could be used during that time, so that it doesn't interfere with the current batch of successful sealed leagues? We could even do a two-series trial of this league, and then start a two-series My Cards league to give people an extra 3 weeks to build their collection without skipping a league.

hsaile, I could be interested in designing starters for a Towers standard league. Who should I talk to about that?

[hsiale]

I think Cos and Merrick_H are current Gemp organized play admins, so you should talk to one of them.

[Eukalyptus]

I am.

[UnPapayaCoconut]

I like the idea, I'm not sure if it was my suggestion that u were thinking about, but I definitely support it