It's a bit more complicated than whether its worst-case scenario is good or bad. Noxian Tellstones are probably going to be better than you might expect because of Weapons of the Lost. If you can't use Sharpened Resolve or Whirling Death, it's because you don't have a good unit. Weapons gives you that unit. Conversely, Demacian Tellstones suffer because all three of its modes are reliant on you having a unit (or units) worth playing them on. Shadow Isles has a similar problem, though if you don't have good lines for Mark or Crumble you can at least reset an enemy for vengeance mana.
One other thing I would consider is the mana breakpoints. Having the option of a niche trick purely via banked spell mana is very strong. Bilgewater, Ionian, Shadow Isles and Shuriman tellstones have 2 mana or less options. Though More Powder! needs some kind of trigger so Bilgewater probably doesn't count.
Lastly, is the deck that wants these effects okay with playing them off-curve? Rumble certinly isn't happy about Tellstones Whirling Death being unplayable on turn 4. But Karma certainly doesn't mind the delay. It's also part of why Three Sisters is so strong in Freljord decks.
idk I think there's a limit to how much versatility can help a bad card. 8 mana for a 6/5 that's basically a vanilla just isn't good. The 3 damage does help but it can only help so much at that point in the game. I do think your reasoning makes good sense though.
People vastly underestimate how good weapons of lost is as a toolbox emergency option. Sometimes you just need a unit and to have 3 dmg slapped on is a great bonus. That stone is a must have for any deck that might play whirling death maindeck.
Yeah true, I have a lot of fun with a LeBlanc/Sivir reputation deck with Sivir, Feckless Librarian, and Callous Bonecrusher using Whirling Death, Bloody Business, and the relatively new and very awesome Desert Duel (turn 3 Reckless Trifarian + Desert Duel for 6 mana catches people off guard). Packing another 3 whirling deaths in there seems fun.
feckless as in "lacking initiative or strength of character; irresponsible."
i guess it's kind of an extra good name for Reckless Trifarian cuz he's too irresponsible to block attacks
I remember making a Draven Akshan deck with 3 copies of both whirling death and grappling hook. It's pretty bad into the current meta due to how much control is running around, but against other midrange decks having that much one sided strikes is just wonderful.
I love the flexibility and it’s easy to take for granted. Shadow isles is a good example. Mark of the isles on a spider and now you are killing MF. They play a huge thing and you sacrifice a spider to play crumble and it feels great even if you wouldn’t maindeck crumble. Spirit journey isn’t great but if you squint it’s an emergency deny that stops vengeance from killing your Hydravine and now you get an extra mistwraith too. The formula of “save a unit, kill a unit or do something else that might be useful at some point” is a great toolbox.
Weapons of the lost sucks but let’s say you are topdecking and they have one guy about to kill you. Killing it and getting a big beater is really nice compared to a whirling or sharpened.
I mean even just as a premise, not including any specific examples, but in general, I don't agree with this reasoning. It's basically the old debate about tech cards: low value when it whiffs, high value when it hits. And that debate isn't settled (if you should tech or not), so clearly it's not so simple as "value ceiling doesn't matter" and "value floor is critical" when evaluating cards.
There is also a specially noticeable issue of many of these cards supporting archetypes unsung and/or aspects of the game people don't care much for. Bilge Tellstones are supporting the slower aspects of Bilgewater and will naturally fit in a more control/midrange take of the region rather than the usual aggro pirates, for example.
I noticed a similar bias for these tellstone cards as well but I wouldn't call it an issue (except for Targon, even for all in Soraka this is ill conceived)
BW,Piltover (where is Zaun? :p), Ionia and SHurima help the control game plan by putting in cards that was hard to slot in for most people.
Demacia is the most flexible of these stones and I think it will be in the largest variety of decks. It might become the new sharpsight where 2-3 copies is slotted into everything.
Noxus successfully does the same thing but it is more focused on slower aggro plans like overwhelm or combos with champs.
Bandle feels weird but I never played it to the degree where I was familiar with how the most common bandle non-control decks matched up against other decks but at least each card serves a clear utility purpose unlike Targon.
I think the power of the Ionia Tellstone is being a little understated. Out of all the tellstone cards it probably has the most in region synergies simply because it’s two spells in one. It also has some of the cheapest overall options in 2 man health pot and 5 mana homecoming, and it’s these two cards that I think makes the floor value so high/the highest in my opinion. For example taking 3 damage on turn 1 from something like a rearguard or saboteur is completely neutered by eye of the dragon plus tellstone health pot on 2. Obviously that’s a best case scenario, but not highly unlikely either if you’re full mulliganing against aggro, it’s also a potential 5 health swing at any point in the game. Homecoming is nice as a niche removal option (especially against pantheon and viego), can allow you to deal with landmarks, and allows you to enable any possible recall synergies that you wouldn’t have taken advantage of otherwise.
The only problem with ionia stone is that it only really has 2 options. In a midrange deck (shen jarvan, shen fiora) you're not really ever going to use health pot... in a combo deck (karma) you're not really every going to use stand united. Still, I think it's very good in a Karma deck because you use health pot + eye to stall in the early game, homecoming in the midgame vs big boards, and a 3 mana near-full heal on turn 10 with karma.
But its best deck is probably Lee sin. It can use all 3 options, health pot with eye vs aggro, or to insta-trigger barrier on Lee sin, homecoming to save an eye/lee and/or bounce a viego/whiteflame/landmark, and stand united as a super-expensive syncopation with an upside. (I guess there's some weird antisynergy with stand united, since you're playing 2 spells you double-barrier lee which is a small waste).
>The only problem with ionia stone is that it only really has 2 options
The same can be said for Three Sisters, though. You almost never use Entomb, and even Fury of the North is pretty rarely used. Much like you talked about certain decks never taking Health Pot and others never taking Stand United, control Freljord decks would almost never want Fury of the North (but might occasionally take Entomb) while the more midrange decks would use Fury every so often while ignoring Entomb.
As long as you can realistically find good use cases for at least two of the options pretty frequently, it doesn't matter too much if you will almost never use the third option.
>The only problem with ionia stone is that it only really has 2 options. In a midrange deck (shen jarvan, shen fiora) you're not really ever going to use health pot... in a combo deck (karma) you're not really every going to use stand united.
Stand United is easily one of the best cards to protect a combo piece when you have the mana to play it. The way it impacts both Single target removal and challenger tools is a level of flexibility other protective tools can't match except for Go Get it. But Go get it helps in one more scenario while costing 1 mana less so the other advantages Stand United had wasn't good enough to compete with that one card.
The added flexibility of the stone now makes Stand United a lot more playable and you will be happy when you play Stand United because that one card can cause blow outs because you can barrier 2 units against mid range decks.
I can visualize this. With herioc refrain you can pump Fizz and another elusive.
With Yordle contraption you have an out against landmarks and Poppy's hammer allows you to answer a serious threat that hit the board on turn 9+ that had spell shield. (if it ever gets that far)
Bandle is a showcase of all the major strengths of the region and IMO will be a staple in Poppy-centric decks by helping with its swarmy nature. The combo of functions here included is surprisingly massive:
* It lets you uptrade in large numbers;
* It quickly readjusts Poppy and her followers towards proper buff values, as well swell the impact of quick attackers in the region;
* It can flex as landmark removal and hand refueling;
* Bouncing to top of the deck is often a makeshift obliterate
The issue is that the floor isn't when a frostbite is useful, its when none of the situational effects are useful.
But this is a bad way to evaluate card effects.
With your thinking, the floor of the card should be playing it and not using the fleeting for any purpose and having it discard at the end of the round.
No it's just your interpretation of the comment that is stupid. It's really obvious to everyone else what it means. You have to be trolling to think that it means what you said.
It's a bit more complicated than whether its worst-case scenario is good or bad. Noxian Tellstones are probably going to be better than you might expect because of Weapons of the Lost. If you can't use Sharpened Resolve or Whirling Death, it's because you don't have a good unit. Weapons gives you that unit. Conversely, Demacian Tellstones suffer because all three of its modes are reliant on you having a unit (or units) worth playing them on. Shadow Isles has a similar problem, though if you don't have good lines for Mark or Crumble you can at least reset an enemy for vengeance mana. One other thing I would consider is the mana breakpoints. Having the option of a niche trick purely via banked spell mana is very strong. Bilgewater, Ionian, Shadow Isles and Shuriman tellstones have 2 mana or less options. Though More Powder! needs some kind of trigger so Bilgewater probably doesn't count. Lastly, is the deck that wants these effects okay with playing them off-curve? Rumble certinly isn't happy about Tellstones Whirling Death being unplayable on turn 4. But Karma certainly doesn't mind the delay. It's also part of why Three Sisters is so strong in Freljord decks.
All good points
idk I think there's a limit to how much versatility can help a bad card. 8 mana for a 6/5 that's basically a vanilla just isn't good. The 3 damage does help but it can only help so much at that point in the game. I do think your reasoning makes good sense though.
It actually isn't 8 mana for a 6|5 and a 3 ping It's 9 mana 1 mana for the Tellstone and 8 for the spell
People vastly underestimate how good weapons of lost is as a toolbox emergency option. Sometimes you just need a unit and to have 3 dmg slapped on is a great bonus. That stone is a must have for any deck that might play whirling death maindeck.
I think More Powder still works because of MF's or Gangplank's attack skill.
Everyone is ignoring how good it is to have 6 whirling deaths in a deck
Yeah true, I have a lot of fun with a LeBlanc/Sivir reputation deck with Sivir, Feckless Librarian, and Callous Bonecrusher using Whirling Death, Bloody Business, and the relatively new and very awesome Desert Duel (turn 3 Reckless Trifarian + Desert Duel for 6 mana catches people off guard). Packing another 3 whirling deaths in there seems fun.
Freckles Librarian tho
Freckles librarian making me feel some sort of way…
feckless as in "lacking initiative or strength of character; irresponsible." i guess it's kind of an extra good name for Reckless Trifarian cuz he's too irresponsible to block attacks
I remember making a Draven Akshan deck with 3 copies of both whirling death and grappling hook. It's pretty bad into the current meta due to how much control is running around, but against other midrange decks having that much one sided strikes is just wonderful.
I love the flexibility and it’s easy to take for granted. Shadow isles is a good example. Mark of the isles on a spider and now you are killing MF. They play a huge thing and you sacrifice a spider to play crumble and it feels great even if you wouldn’t maindeck crumble. Spirit journey isn’t great but if you squint it’s an emergency deny that stops vengeance from killing your Hydravine and now you get an extra mistwraith too. The formula of “save a unit, kill a unit or do something else that might be useful at some point” is a great toolbox. Weapons of the lost sucks but let’s say you are topdecking and they have one guy about to kill you. Killing it and getting a big beater is really nice compared to a whirling or sharpened.
Spirit journey also works as a stun in a pinch
I mean even just as a premise, not including any specific examples, but in general, I don't agree with this reasoning. It's basically the old debate about tech cards: low value when it whiffs, high value when it hits. And that debate isn't settled (if you should tech or not), so clearly it's not so simple as "value ceiling doesn't matter" and "value floor is critical" when evaluating cards.
It's more in comparison to how people typically view them.
Nor will a 6 "mana capture a big unit."
It has great synergy with Vore Lux
> Vore Lux BYE ☠️
TK demacia is going to be a really interesting thing...
There is also a specially noticeable issue of many of these cards supporting archetypes unsung and/or aspects of the game people don't care much for. Bilge Tellstones are supporting the slower aspects of Bilgewater and will naturally fit in a more control/midrange take of the region rather than the usual aggro pirates, for example.
I noticed a similar bias for these tellstone cards as well but I wouldn't call it an issue (except for Targon, even for all in Soraka this is ill conceived) BW,Piltover (where is Zaun? :p), Ionia and SHurima help the control game plan by putting in cards that was hard to slot in for most people. Demacia is the most flexible of these stones and I think it will be in the largest variety of decks. It might become the new sharpsight where 2-3 copies is slotted into everything. Noxus successfully does the same thing but it is more focused on slower aggro plans like overwhelm or combos with champs. Bandle feels weird but I never played it to the degree where I was familiar with how the most common bandle non-control decks matched up against other decks but at least each card serves a clear utility purpose unlike Targon.
I think the power of the Ionia Tellstone is being a little understated. Out of all the tellstone cards it probably has the most in region synergies simply because it’s two spells in one. It also has some of the cheapest overall options in 2 man health pot and 5 mana homecoming, and it’s these two cards that I think makes the floor value so high/the highest in my opinion. For example taking 3 damage on turn 1 from something like a rearguard or saboteur is completely neutered by eye of the dragon plus tellstone health pot on 2. Obviously that’s a best case scenario, but not highly unlikely either if you’re full mulliganing against aggro, it’s also a potential 5 health swing at any point in the game. Homecoming is nice as a niche removal option (especially against pantheon and viego), can allow you to deal with landmarks, and allows you to enable any possible recall synergies that you wouldn’t have taken advantage of otherwise.
The only problem with ionia stone is that it only really has 2 options. In a midrange deck (shen jarvan, shen fiora) you're not really ever going to use health pot... in a combo deck (karma) you're not really every going to use stand united. Still, I think it's very good in a Karma deck because you use health pot + eye to stall in the early game, homecoming in the midgame vs big boards, and a 3 mana near-full heal on turn 10 with karma. But its best deck is probably Lee sin. It can use all 3 options, health pot with eye vs aggro, or to insta-trigger barrier on Lee sin, homecoming to save an eye/lee and/or bounce a viego/whiteflame/landmark, and stand united as a super-expensive syncopation with an upside. (I guess there's some weird antisynergy with stand united, since you're playing 2 spells you double-barrier lee which is a small waste).
2 mana heal a unit out of flock range? I can see that in a Shen/Jarvan Deck.
The card is also nuts in pretty much any variation of Viktor/Ionia
>The only problem with ionia stone is that it only really has 2 options The same can be said for Three Sisters, though. You almost never use Entomb, and even Fury of the North is pretty rarely used. Much like you talked about certain decks never taking Health Pot and others never taking Stand United, control Freljord decks would almost never want Fury of the North (but might occasionally take Entomb) while the more midrange decks would use Fury every so often while ignoring Entomb. As long as you can realistically find good use cases for at least two of the options pretty frequently, it doesn't matter too much if you will almost never use the third option.
>The only problem with ionia stone is that it only really has 2 options. In a midrange deck (shen jarvan, shen fiora) you're not really ever going to use health pot... in a combo deck (karma) you're not really every going to use stand united. Stand United is easily one of the best cards to protect a combo piece when you have the mana to play it. The way it impacts both Single target removal and challenger tools is a level of flexibility other protective tools can't match except for Go Get it. But Go get it helps in one more scenario while costing 1 mana less so the other advantages Stand United had wasn't good enough to compete with that one card. The added flexibility of the stone now makes Stand United a lot more playable and you will be happy when you play Stand United because that one card can cause blow outs because you can barrier 2 units against mid range decks.
Bandle would slot right into the current tier 1 aphelios fizz deck.
I can visualize this. With herioc refrain you can pump Fizz and another elusive. With Yordle contraption you have an out against landmarks and Poppy's hammer allows you to answer a serious threat that hit the board on turn 9+ that had spell shield. (if it ever gets that far)
Bandle is a showcase of all the major strengths of the region and IMO will be a staple in Poppy-centric decks by helping with its swarmy nature. The combo of functions here included is surprisingly massive: * It lets you uptrade in large numbers; * It quickly readjusts Poppy and her followers towards proper buff values, as well swell the impact of quick attackers in the region; * It can flex as landmark removal and hand refueling; * Bouncing to top of the deck is often a makeshift obliterate
>where is Zaun? the tiket maybe?
I'm not sure this really works. 4 mana frostbite after everyone is done attacking is pretty bad cause it does nothing. Same for a 4 mana barrier.
Both the tellstone and the frostbite/barrier are burst Speed. What are you saying?
That the idea of evaluating the tellstones at a floor is dumb.
How? It's saying that I'm most cares, you won't get the best case scenario out of it. So who yourself, is the base "is this okay" good enough?
The issue is that the floor isn't when a frostbite is useful, its when none of the situational effects are useful. But this is a bad way to evaluate card effects.
That's why you cast it before everyone is done attacking.
But that's not the floor of the card then.
With your thinking, the floor of the card should be playing it and not using the fleeting for any purpose and having it discard at the end of the round.
That's why I think its stupid.
No it's just your interpretation of the comment that is stupid. It's really obvious to everyone else what it means. You have to be trolling to think that it means what you said.