Defence against Slaughterhouse?

Hi guys, looking for a little advice. One of my opponents has started playing a slaughterhouse deck, basically based on having MMPAs (with parthenon) and a deck full of Slaughterhouses , and also using Zygodat , combined with Scrying of secrets to destroy my library... I used all of my 4 sudden reversals last night just trying to stop him getting the slaughterhouses/parthenon, but by the time the game was in full swing I was burning 6 library every turn... I conceded when I had 10 cards left in my library, the other two players had ~50, surely I shouldn't have to bloat my deck with sudden reversals to deal with this? What am I missing?

This seem extremely slow and defenceless. Your grandpredator was not very efficient, wasn't he ? More to the point, you can use location hate, but the best thing to do is ignore him and oust fast and hard. Maybe helping your grandpredator a bit.

Did that player win the game? What was your pool / in-play cards situation when you gave up? Usually, Slaughterhouses decks rely on Dia de Los Muertos + Brinksmanship + Daring the Dawn to win - they're not harming pool or blood. What if his predator had Arika ? As a general comment, if your predator is dangerous, weaken him. If he's too dangerous, then maybe ousting him is for the best. Of course, there's the rather expensive option of playing with Ashur Tablets. Option C is to play Shambling Hordes. option D is to burn the locations (Arson, Conceal, Goblinism)

Rampage Disputed Territory Arson Haunt Conceal Goblinism Minion obliteration (he can't play Slaughterhouse if he doesn't have a Harbringer...) Retired Baron of Sydney, Australia, 418

Slaughterhouse decks generally don't win, they just make sure their prey doesn't win either. The player of said deck will likely figure that out soon himself.

ignore it. IMO it's one of the easiest predators to have. He' not harming your pool nor your minions and usually is not blocking your actions as well. All you have to do is to focus on ousting your prey. The case when you can have a problem is when you are playing slow ousting deck. To sum up: 1. oust fast 2. you can play a deck little bigger than usually 3. play suddens but only if it didn't hamper your deck. They're good against other decks as well and very good when playing offensively (canceling villeins) 4. Don't play cards which only focus is destroing locations. They are very weak and cornercase

> alek wrote: > 4. Don't play cards which only focus is destroing locations. They are very weak and cornercase > It's not that true. A lot of powerful location exist ; it's a gamble on whether they will be played or not. The one who are versatile, like Loss or Goblinisme, are of course the one you should most often play.

Loss cannot burn Slaughterhouses. > > Loss > > 1 > Burn an equipment or location on a minion controlled by your predator or prey. > Bleed at +2 bleed. >

This Gehenna event may also help destroy Slaughterhouses: Name: Conquest of Humanity [Gehenna:R] Cardtype: Event Gehenna. Do not replace until your next discard phase. Requires at least two other Gehenna cards in play. During each Methuselah's untap phase, he or she may choose a location controlled by his or her prey. The chosen location is burned unless its controller burns 2 pool. Artist: Joel Biske V:EKN Website Coordinator

There is also Jericho Founding and Can't Take it With You, both of those votes can really ruin someones day who is running lots of locations (so can be useful against other decks also)

> Damnans wrote: > This Gehenna event may also help destroy Slaughterhouses: > > Name: Conquest of Humanity > [Gehenna:R] > Cardtype: Event > Gehenna. Do not replace until your next discard phase. > Requires at least two other Gehenna cards in play. During each Methuselah's untap phase, he or she may choose a location controlled by his or her prey. The chosen location is burned unless its controller burns 2 pool. > Artist: Joel Biske > Ooh, thanks for that one. I guess it gives me room to build a "bulk" version of my library (it's quite slow and a little small (60 cards at the moment) so I can just add another 20 of my key cards and ignore him perhaps.

Yeah if you play a 90 card deck then you should have about ran over the table before you run out of cards with slaughterhouse deck behind you, unless your deck is either really slow or burns through cards at high speed even without 'help'.

> tarantulus wrote: > One of my opponents has started playing a slaughterhouse deck, basically based on having MMPAs (with parthenon) and a deck full of Slaughterhouses , and also using Zygodat , combined with Scrying of secrets to destroy my library... > > I used all of my 4 sudden reversals last night just trying to stop him getting the slaughterhouses/parthenon, but by the time the game was in full swing I was burning 6 library every turn... > If you're really annoyed you could start playing the Parthenon yourself (and contesting it) and make him handjam with Master cards.

> Klaital wrote: > There is also Jericho Founding and Can't Take it With You, both of those votes can really ruin someones day who is running lots of locations (so can be useful against other decks also) > If you are passing votes, disputed territory is good as well. Steal his parthenon/slaughter house and use them or give the slaghter house to his predator. Disputed Territory is almost always useful so it is not a waste if you are not playing against the slaughter houses..

As others have pointed out, deck depletion doesn't usually lead to wins. Sometimes I have seen players "sac up". this means they do not transfer they do not do anything but sit until the game changes or until the predator is ousted. It is not fun, but sometimes it is the best thing you can do. Instead of conceding you may try to force him to oust you. While he is trying to bleed you out the rest of the table will be building and will pretty much be too strong for the deck depletion trick to work.

I've ousted a Slaughterhouse deck as my predator in a four-player simply based on permanents in play. Put enough minions in play, such as Embraces, and maybe some combat permanents and cards in hand becomes far less relevant. But, mostly, just hope the player eventually realizes that decking people doesn't actually have anything to do with winning and switches to something else. Traveller Card Game

I have to agree with everyone else here. I built what I thought would be a brutally effective Slaughterhouse deck - MMPAs to get the Slaughterhouses in play, three copies of Dia de los Muertos + Brinksmanship + Daring the Dawn for the oust, and then loads of defensive cards to stop from being ousted - and I only barely managed to oust my first prey towards the very end of the game. And then we realized that, even had everything worked perfectly, there would have been a very easy way for my prey to remain in the game: simply stop playing cards from his hand. If a HoS player's prey maintains a hand of seven cards, s/he can't be ousted. Slaughterhouse is a terrible strategy.

now now, the slaughterhouse player can play the game any old way he likes. 1. ignore the slaughterhouses, and just stop the Parthenon to cause master handjam. well, this applies to every deck that uses Parthenon actually. 2. some players think they have to conserve cards, but the opposite is true. you want to speed through your library and get to the best stuff before it disappears forever. I once had my library emptied early on by a slaughterhouse predator, yet I managed to get a full table sweep with just the 7 cards left in my hand. because they were the right 7 cards I needed. 3. slaughterhouse does no harm until your library is completely gone, don't get discouraged by the discards you see. instead, count them and figure out the ratios of what's left. (this is what I do when I play slaughterhouses, it's like extra scouting information)

> DeathInABottle wrote: > And then we realized that, even had everything worked perfectly, there would have been a very easy way for my prey to remain in the game: simply stop playing cards from his hand. If a HoS player's prey maintains a hand of seven cards, s/he can't be ousted. > all you have to do is play Revelations at basic. problem solved.

I should have added, he was also burning my ash heap and I'm pretty sure there were revelations in his deck too.

When playing against Slaughterhouse, until your library is actually empty, it's REALLY important to not worry about what's being sent to your ash heap - pretend that those cards were just on the bottom of your library anyway. You can peek through the burned cards as a way to better know the ratios of your remaining library, but don't let those cards get you down. Heck, don't even give your predator the satisfaction of announcing each burned card and your pained reaction - just count out the X cards from the top of your library, and flip them over into your ash heap in a nice neat stack. If they're curious what got burned, they can ask to see your ash heap.