[Faithful Reader]

It's Wednesday! We're more than halfway through the week. Since we are over the hump, let's look at a question!

Last Week: Trading Cards: Timeless/Nemesis
2-8-23 Algebra!
2-1-23 What we Fifties Behind
1-25-23 Back to the Fifties
1-18-23 Pick a Promo: Story Voting
1-11-23 Vintage Archive
1-4-23 Pick a Promo: Tell me a Story (or Nine)

When looking at decks using cards from Timeless, I ran across this deck. All four non-headquarters missions have Exobiology which is great for skill overlap and optimizing Laas, Rejoining the Link, but vulnerable to Agonizing Encounter.

What are your thoughts on that dilemma? On one hand, you could have four (or five!) stops. On the other, that dilemma is costly and can be used a handful of times per game, unless there are shenanigans afoot. Is this the Sword of Damocles hanging over your head or is is something you can brush off.

Let us know in the poll below and give us your thoughts here. Have you ever had four missions with the same skill in this post Agonizing world?

[jadziadax8]

Let us know in the poll below and give us your thoughts here. Have you ever had four missions with the same skill in this post Agonizing world?

All the time. If I see someone playing Agonizing and I get hit with 4 stops, I give them the slow clap and move on.

[monty42]

It never bothered me at all. The advantages of having a tight skill selection to focus your personnel choice on far outweigh the occasional multi-stop.

[Armus]

When it was everywhere in the meta I was aware of it, and got pretty good at optimizing for a tight skill set with an AE number of 2. 4 cost for 2 stops is basically par, as there's lots of dilemmas that give you that.

It's never stopped me from playing Vintner/Tain/Kmtar/etc. if that was the deck I wanted to roll with.

Every now and then I'll toss it in a dilemma pile and catch people napping with it for a 3- or 4-stop. That's fun.

And I'll never forget the look on Len Neidorf's face at Masters in Maryland 2014 when he realized I had an AE number of ONE. That was big fun!

[GooeyChewie]

I always consider how my deck will deal with Agonizing Encounter, but that risk-reward calculation often comes down on the side of "worth it." Even if all I get out of it is a tighter skill matrix, it's often better to accept the occasional mission failure than to throw your own deck balance askew.

Or to put it another way, if your opponent stops an attempt with Agonizing Encounter, but you were only able to make that attempt because your deck has a tight skill selection that ensures you have what you need early, you've still come out one overcome dilemma ahead.

[The Guardian]

I always consider how my deck will deal with Agonizing Encounter, but that risk-reward calculation often comes down on the side of "worth it." Even if all I get out of it is a tighter skill matrix, it's often better to accept the occasional mission failure than to throw your own deck balance askew.

Or to put it another way, if your opponent stops an attempt with Agonizing Encounter, but you were only able to make that attempt because your deck has a tight skill selection that ensures you have what you need early, you've still come out one overcome dilemma ahead.

An interesting corollary discussion would be to ask thoughts about Agonizing itself. If it were made today, would players complain that it doesn't do enough to accomplish its goals, complain that it was bad for the game because it disrupts too many decks, or laud it for finding a nice middle ground that you can play around while it does its job?

[Danny]

And I'll never forget the look on Len Neidorf's face at Masters in Maryland 2014 when he realized I had an AE number of ONE. That was big fun!

I've been on the other side of this. Played a game against Will Hoskin where he was running Stooges (each with 4 different skills), an Agonizing number of one, and Alpha 5 Approach (with the intention to solve with the aforementioned Stooges). V. cool.