KeyForge Vault Tour UK – My Experience (featuring the new Age of Ascension set!)
I attended the UK Games Expo to participate in the UK KeyForge Vault Tour event. I’ve been enjoying playing the game for some time, mostly casually, and this was an opportunity to see more of the competitive scene in person. And, handily, located just 25 minutes from the in-laws…
The main event was running the sealed variant which suited me fine, as it meant that crazy decks (courtesy of eBay…) were less likely and it would be a much more even playing field. The day was also notable as it would feature the new Age of Ascension set, with all sorts of fun changes featuring.
Now, officially, that set launched on the day, but as we have seen from social media, seemingly EVERYONE has got hold of pre-release decks and all the cards were spoiled before we even got started. I’ve got to admit, I found this really distasteful, and I deliberately stayed away from looking more into it. I’m here to have fun and learn by discovery. I’m the opposite of a gaming try-hard.
The day kicked off with everyone ending up with three randomised sealed decks. We then had thirty minutes to choose the one we wished to use for the competition.
This was really hard. As mentioned, a lot of the cards and mechanics were new, and I have not really practised ‘sizing up’ a deck in the way that is required to do well at this sort of event. In the end, I selected the ‘Matthias’ deck. This proved to be a bad decision.
Decks:
- Isla, Duchess of the Conniving Undercity
- Z. Baku, Beast of the Still Tomb
- Matthias “Dame No Thumbs” Placebo
Now, two of these are rated as Below Average (or worse) via the SAS system. Matthias, in particular, scored an impressive (!) 65. At the time, I was swayed by the ‘Legacy’ cards which were featured (this is a rare situation), and the ‘key cheat’ feature of Chota Hazri. I should have chosen Isla.
I won 2 games and lost 4. Games were of varying lengths (I didn’t get the impression that the new set has lengthened games, which is a comment I’ve heard online a bit) – it all felt just like my KeyForge experiences to date. The ‘Matthias’ deck was definitely VERY dependent on draw order. In particular, Radiant Truth was very powerful when faced with a large opponent battle line, and Soldiers to Flowers worked very well late-game when I had a large number of Untamed sitting in my Discard pile.
Cards or situations from opponents that caused me trouble were:
- Cards that prevented reaping, or made reaping harmful in some ways.
- Those cards being hidden behind creatures with Taunt that were strong, and I didn’t always have effective ways of dealing with that. These situations are more common now that ‘Deploy’ lets them be engineered far more easily!
- Cards that forced house selection.
You live and you learn!
I did gain enough aember to pick up this snazzy playmat:
And I quickly went to grab a box of more decks. The pricing was VERY good and it also enabled me to quickly enter a follow-on ‘sealed survival’ event.
In this variant, you get two sealed decks, and use both of them. However, you have to pick one to start with. You keep using that deck until you lose. Then you switch to the other deck. Lose again, and you are out.
I ended up with these two:
Luck definitely not with me on this day: ‘Babu’ became my new official ‘Worst Deck Ever’ (58 SAS), and Arún tying with ‘Matthias’ ! Ouch!
I went with ‘Babu’ first, as initially I felt it was stronger. It got pretty much stomped into the ground.
‘Arún’ did better, and I won the following game. It was also one of the most tight and enjoyable ‘back and forth’ games I had on the day. All sorts of interesting cards and interactions in there, even if they don’t necessarily fit together that strongly. I don’t have a lot of decks with Logos in, so that was a learning experience in itself.
I mean, here’s an example of a card which just does something REALLY FUN!
I dropped from the event after those two games: It was getting late, and I had a family to return to!
Overall, very enjoyable, and has got me even more enthused for the game. I really feel the game has evolved really well with the new set – it has made KeyForge even more interesting to play than it was before. Let’s also hope that the huge amounts of promo that FFG were doing at the Expo in general brings even more interest to the game!
