Countering Cantarella + Calveit combo

[Esmer]

Countering Cantarella + Calveit combo

Hey guys, do you have any suggestions how to play around Operator -> Cantarella ->John Calveit combo?

You can't lock spies (they still have the spy property and are stolen by Treason/Calveit), you can't weather them down, you usually can't Scorch, because NG has bigger units such as Impera Brigade, you can't even GIgni, because one of the Cantarellas is usually bigger cuz she was decoyed.

You can Decoy one of the Cantarellas back to the opponent.
You can discard your Cantarella (or play her the next round).

You can also pass in the mid of his combo to get a card advantage and make his hero ability almost useless (he can still use Vicovaro to resurrect Ambassadors and Emissaries and steal them back) next round. However, if you pass, you have to usually deal with 20+ str Impera Brigades next round, and your opponent simply passes right away.

Anyway, all of the above still makes you lose the first round and struggle in the second.
So, what am I missing? How else can that combo be countered?

 

[Bl00dGeist]

What factions are you playing or go with most?

 

[arz0]

Spoiler

 

[panerola]

Esmer ,as Lim3zer0 said, monster consume is a good idea (Ekimaras get hungry with Cantarella). For NG you can play Menno Coehoorn, Vilgeforz (in your side Cantarella) or Letho. NR can promote Cantarella to put the opponent things difficult. ST can play Milva and Scorch any Cantarella on the field, and SK faction I think is the one that have it more difficult, the option that comes into my mind is Kambi and nuke all the field, although I agree it is not the best solution. Typically Cantarella+John Calveit is a single round tactics (it is not repeatable once you are over the Cantarella's), so try to dodge this round in particular and win the other two. And as soon as you see John Calveit leader you know the oponent will use this tactics.

 

[Esmer]

Yeah, consume is pretty obvious, but to specify, I meant general counters (i.e. with neutral cards). Sorry that wasn't clear.

Also, losing that one round and winning the other two is another obvious solution.

But any other ideas?

Scorching is not the ideal solution since one of the Cantarellas usually gets decoyed. And, as I said, there's usually Impera Brigades in the way. Even if you can scorch two times (three if you play Aglais and GIgni), that won't be enough, because a smart opponent will play another Impera Brigade after you scorch for the 1st time.

 

[frbfree]

Neutral cards only? Honestly, it's pretty rough under those circumstances, but I think the cheapest way is Blizzard Potion -> Impenetrable Fog. Once all three Cantarella's are out, one potion does the trick. Plus the fog will hit the Operator as well.

 

[Esmer]

Nobody plays Blizzard potion, and nobody will to counter only this combo.

 

[Frontovika]

I was very surprised when I came across this combo initially, but have been able to defeat it with a Voorhis Control Deck.

The only catch is that you have to force his hand (play Cantarella & JC) during Round 1, as it would be nearly impossible to beat it during the final round.

I didn't use weather on the Ranged row, but constantly controlled the board by removing as many of his cards as I can while retaining the numerical advantage.

Just focus on getting the combo out of the way before it comes to the final round.

 

[panerola]

Then, only with neutral cards I guess Villentretenmerth will kill some of the cantarella's +Brigades. You will put things in a difficult way for the opponent, at least for this round. You can help with scorch and Gigni. And Myrgtabrakke can help you level points in order to scorch more things.

 

[MadMaximoff]

Currently running Discard Bran deck what I tend to do is force the Cantarella play in round 1, build a lead by dropping pirate, discarding raiders and mork and armorsmithing mork. At this point they tend to Cantarella for card advantage and for the Calveit power swing

so I drop Birna on them which usually results in a confused pass and 2 card advantage for me.

Expecting an insta pass from them, I udalryk to steal an engineer then D Bomb (Cantarella is silver so udalryk can't steal her)

now here's where it gets fun.

since I know they'll be Vicivaro medicing to steal from my Graveyard, I play Yen con first, then Sigfrida to rez udalryk to steal from their graveyard again. Boar down the Spies they rezzed and bounce one back then decoy udalryk to steal from them again.

by this point they usually forfeit as you keep robbing their graveyard to power up your own side while denying them their own power by rezzing it for yourself

Udalryk is a fantastic counter.
​​​​

 

[arz0]

Just on a basic level.

Monsters - Consume, nom nom nom.
Northern Realms - Promote, and in a lot of cases can over-power the combo.
Scoia'tael - Scorches, and is probably the best faction suited to run blizzard potion.
Skellige - Probably one of the tougher match-ups, but again, probably the solution is to over-power. Weather as well (for brigade and such)

---

(Cantarella is silver so udalryk can't steal her)

Yes Udalryk can:

Resurrect a random non-Gold, non-Permadeath card from the opposing graveyard.

 

[Codexhel]

You don't always have the tools in hand to deal with that swing, so it's helpful to analyse the deck idea. The reality is that his ability to throw spies at you, then pull them back, makes it fundamentally a combo orientated approach to winning one round hard. Then they use big units carried over to take another round, exploiting the effect of resilience. This means that there are two core components to their gameplan that you can directly target: the spies being pulled back by Calveit, or his resilient units.

Since the Calveit card is fundamentally a combo, you can combo break it by passing the turn before you think he will Calveit. This means that he will have to expend an additional card in order to win Round 1. This will go some way to mitigate the strength of Calveit, and give you more options to fight on in Rounds 2 and 3.

Then you need to ensure that his carry over isn't too threatening: Scorch, Geralt: Igni, Mardroeme are amongst a few cards that are really really good at stunting Calveit's plan of taking a second round through big resilient units.

This is of course assuming that you don't have a way to win Round 1. Some archetypes are fantastic at just out powering a Calveit, for example Henselt. In these cases you're quite incentivised to simply 2-0 a Calveit, or force them into a situation where they have to get greedy with their Impera Brigade keep because he's lost Round 1, opening up a sweet Geralt: Igni later on. This is because any deck that runs resilience is mathematically invested into more rounds, so their point potential is stunted in any particular round that resilience is played (think about how Combat Engineer, Mahakam Defender and Yarpen Zigrin have very low face value for their colour.) So pressure the Calveit or break up his dream Calveit combo with a timely pass, and play appropriately according to his resilient units.

Oh and Scorch, Gini, Mardroememe. (Yes, Madroememe)

 

[Guest 3973540]

3 things:
1) Just as against ST ambush buff, never concede a round unless the opponent has used up his nuke (Calveit on Cantarellas or buffed ambush, respectively). Take the initative. In my experience, card advantage is usually less important than this rule.
2) Have a counter against Impera Brigade - Frost, Aeromancy, D-bomb, Igni/Scorch with some leveling like Myrgtabrakke etc. Calveit does not have a lot of power outside of Imperas and his leader.
(But he will try to play his Engineer on your Cantarella (the one you got from his Operator). So with a control deck, play the Cantarella back earlier, then pound it with spells. With a combo deck, go on with your combo - remember, you are usually going for round 1 win).
3) Correct positioning is really important because of Letho and D-bomb: buffed units should be as far apart as possible. Also remember Letho banishes the cards, you won't be able to rez them. Also, as Calveit, I played Letho on my own units a couple of times to spoil opponent's last card Aeromancy/Scorch.

 

[Esmer]

I just thought that another valid counter is to play your own Cantarella (copy by Operator) in one of the next rounds. For instance, in the second one, if you play to win in the first round.

 

[Tir_na_Lia]

Calveit with Operated Cantarella is similar to Henselt Gold.
If he wants to win a particular round, he will, regardless your efforts.
The power swing is just too big, no point in trying to counter it.

But since you need 2 rounds to win a game, you can start thinking when and how to concede one as soon as you see the Leader pic.
Make sure he has to use his Calveit to win, and make him bleed.
Use all your spies when it's clear he's about to pull the combo.
Use your copied Cantarella when he uses his, or it will become a problem later.
(Also, I met this crazy guy who Cahired an already used Calveit to f*** me and my kept Cantarella in the following round; the outcome of the match I will keep a secret, though...)

You have one advantage, that you perfectly know what he's about to do, so you can play accordingly.

 

[Anen]

Hey guys, do you have any suggestions how to play around Operator -> Cantarella ->John Calveit combo? You can't lock spies (they still have the spy property and are stolen by Treason/Calveit), you can't weather them down, you usually can't Scorch, because NG has bigger units such as Impera Brigade, you can't even GIgni, because one of the Cantarellas is usually bigger cuz she was decoyed. You can Decoy one of the Cantarellas back to the opponent. You can discard your Cantarella (or play her the next round). You can also pass in the mid of his combo to get a card advantage and make his hero ability almost useless (he can still use Vicovaro to resurrect Ambassadors and Emissaries and steal them back) next round. However, if you pass, you have to usually deal with 20+ str Impera Brigades next round, and your opponent simply passes right away. Anyway, all of the above still makes you lose the first round and struggle in the second. So, what am I missing? How else can that combo be countered?

What factions are you playing or go with most?

he is monster. just eat that spies and you will fat.

 

[zhiphius]

Just a note about ST and scorch, if you scorch them while at your side, chances are the opponent will just vicovaro them back?
It's an annoying opponent to fight, but not unbeatable

 

[NlelithZ44]

Just a note about ST and scorch, if you scorch them while at your side, chances are the opponent will just vicovaro them back?

Vicovaro can't resurrect silver units.

 

[Alts-Gamer]

Hello There. I am playing this combo because it kind of fun and can be really powerful. I can share you my own experience since I know what counters me.
As guys said in this thread, monster devourers and scorches are good to counter this tactic.

But one more interesting moment was not mentioned here. While playing those Elven deck you have multiple opportunities to play cantarellas back. Like: leader that returns card on your side to your hand, golden unit that "returns the strongest unit on your side to your hand". This means that if you have both + Cantarella that was given to you by the enemy operator you can play cantarella 3 times too. This means you draw 3 cards as well as the enemy. If you have the decoy you can try to play them 4 times

After that you have two major ways out:
1) try to scorch them out once used;
2) just pass and let me win this round. You countered one more strong point of that combo: number of cards. You did same. Well done.

 

[zhiphius]

Vicovaro can't resurrect silver units.

Thanks for that clarification, then scorch is one way to neutralize their caretaker + cantarella combo