Hello friends!
The current meta operates under the shadow of the Second Front plus B-26 Groupe Bretagne combo. This means the viability of decks is judged by their ability in this particular matchup. The good news is that people have shown admirable adaptability here, highlighting one of the more important aspects of card games. The bad news is that the meta is kept in a straightjacket that gets frustrating in the long run. From a balance perspective, it is important to keep in mind that once the Second Front menace is dealt with, a lot of strong decks will emerge from its shadow. So the meta is likely to shift very drastically and any balance changes need to take this into account.
With this in mind, let us take a look at what balance changes we have in store for you. We have a total of 10 card changes, 5 nerfs and 5 buffs. Let’s go through them.
Nerfs
KANGAROO TRANSPORT
Old: Give a British infantry Blitz and +1 Heavy Armor. It counts as a tank.
New: Give a British infantry Blitz and +1 Heavy Armor.
First up we have Kangaroo Transport, which now no longer gives the move+attack capabilities of a tank. This reduces the explosive nature of the Buffs deck quite a bit, as its ability to deploy Buffs and immediately threaten the enemy backline with Kangaroo Transport is now impossible. This change also makes Tactical Withdrawal a lot less potent. The core component of the deck - building a huge unit with a string of buff cards - is still intact, but is now more reliant on their Plan B of Frontier Forces, Chain Homes, etc. to jump over the finish line.
RAF MUSTANG
The aggressively statted Raf Mustang comes with a hefty downside of making your non-British cards a lot more expensive. However, in practice, the downside is often irrelevant as the Mustang is so good at closing out games fast. So we are adjusting the stats slightly by making it 4k. It is still a potent threat, but not the insane finisher it is today.
SECOND FRONT
Old: Bond. Remove a friendly unit. Return it at the end of the next enemy turn, then duplicate it.
New: Remove a German ground unit. Return it at the end of the next enemy turn, then duplicate it.
Second Front thrust B-26 Groupe Bretagne into the limelight and quickly became quite the menace in the meta. Since its arrival, players have found various ways to combat it, whether by going under it with aggro decks, disrupting it with the British or German control or going bigger for instance with Soviet/Italy. Still, the existence of the deck does stifle the meta quite a bit, which is not good in the long run, so it is time to change it.
The changed version retains the powerful duplication ability and the units still enter on the enemy turn, ready to be used on your own. The big difference is the greater restrictions on what can be targeted. Germany has many powerful ground units, so there is still plenty to play around with, but the OTK potentials are severely limited. Note that there is no longer a restriction on targeting a friendly unit, so in theory you can use this on an enemy unit. Will we see a second coming of Second Front? Only time will tell.
2. MARINE DIVISION
Old: Shock. Once per turn, deal 3 damage to the enemy HQ when you play a Navy card.
New: Once per turn, deal 3 damage to the enemy HQ when you play a Navy card.
Navy Burn is one of the decks that operates currently a bit more on the fringes due to the Second Front-Bretagne deck lording it over the meta. It is one of the decks that will benefit of Second Front being nerfed, so in anticipation of its stocks rising again we are giving a very slight nerf to 2. Marine Division. The loss of Shock does not affect its primary purpose, but makes its board presence a bit less threatening.
SHIFTING DOCTRINE
Old: Intel 1. Shuffle a random card in hand into your deck, then draw 2 cards.
New: Shuffle a random card in hand into your deck, then draw 2 cards.
Another couple of decks chomping at the bits at the downfall of Second Front are Jintel and Shuffle. In both these decks, Shifting Doctrine plays an important role, so we are preemptively nerfing these strategies by removing the Intel 1 from it. This mainly hurts Jintel, but on the whole the card is significantly weaker now so we will see if players will shift away from intel and/or shuffle doctrines in the future.
Buffs
THE POLAR BEARS
Old: Bond, Fury. Deployment: Gets +1+1 for each British infantry you deployed last turn.
New: Bond, Fury. Deployment: Gets +1+1 if you deployed a British infantry last turn.
The British sub-theme of triggering effects if you deployed a British infantry on the previous turn has seen some success, mainly through the new Valentine and Forward Observers. The Polar Bears however are not part of that success and have struggled seeing play. We are streamlining the effect a bit, the text now reads the same as on the other cards in this sub-theme. To compensate it now has 1 higher base attack. It is a bare speculation that the Bears will bear arms into more future battles, but if they do, then beer all around.
40. PANZERGRENADIER
We were intentionally very careful with the bounce/remove from battlefield themes of Germany and Japan in Homefront, as such strategies can quickly become very frustrating to face. While we do not want to see these strategies in Tier 1 decks, we still want to support them enough to be viable. With that in mind we are improving one of the cornerstone cards in this strategy in 40. Panzergrenadiers. Its deployment effect is very powerful, but its stats were a little bit lacking. Now that it carries a bigger threat it should bounce into more decks.
M3 LEE
The buff units in deck strategy has seen limited success in cards like The USS Sullivans and The Professionals. To some extent, the archetype is kept down because of Second Front, so it now has a better chance of flourishing. Still, the M3 Lee has proven to be a bit on the slow side, so we are reducing its cost. This also makes it a potential inclusion in decks like 4-attack matters, for instance alongside 12th Guards Mechanised.
USS YORKTOWN
The Brewster deck is alive and well and exists in various forms. We feel though that too few of these forms include the iconic USS Yorktown. We want the sun to shine on it a bit more often, though only time will tell if the sun is rising or setting. It is likely that we will start to see more control decks post-Second Front nerf and USS Yorktown is very strong in rebuilding after board-wipes. In any case, the Brewster deck should continue to thrive.
COASTAL BATTALION 7
The final change is to one of the new Finnish cards in Homefront. Finland offers some strong options for the Soviet Soup deck and we want to foster this fragile alliance some more. The Coastal Battalion has a very strong ability, but statwise it was lacking a little bit. It now has a bigger bite, making the soup a bit more spicy.
That is all for this balance patch. As always we will continue to monitor the state of the meta and your feedback and make adjustments as needed. It should be noted though that we generally want to allow the community to adjust to meta shifts before stepping in. Some may feel this results in us reacting too slowly, but if we step in and nerf things the moment something starts to become popular, we are removing one of the fundamental features of card games. Card games by their nature are a tool box, where people can switch tools in and out based on their needs/strengths at any given time. We do not want to remove this agency from players and only step in once those adjustments have run their course and the meta is under a threat of becoming stale. See you on the battlefield, Commander!