Menno - Your thoughts

[JoachimDeWett]

Menno - Your thoughts

Hi guys !



I started building a Morvran Voorhis spy deck using Menno. I'm having great fun using it, with a mix of control and value. I think Menno is an underestimated card, he routinely brings upwards of 30 value (even more with Iris) when used and turns rounds around like nothing. It also has a good body STR which makes it even good when no spies are destroyed.... Why do I seldom see Menno ? What do you think about the card ? How did you build your decks around it ?

Cheers

 

[pl91]

its a good card in a spy deck,but your opponent will see it from miles away.i personally have never faced it,but i would definetely give him a try if i had him.

 

[JoachimDeWett]

Oddly enough, since I play Morvran (with some usual suspects, such as knights and rot tossers) and not Calveit, most of the people I face don't see it coming

 

[Bl00dGeist]

Ive been wracking my brain over and over with him. I can only see him as a bonus strategy and definitely not a card worth building a deck around.

1. The obvious is to load the opponent up with spies. Try and lure the opponent into false security with the added extra points on their side and hope they even use buff cards on the spies?

2. After burning all the spies and if we make it to the next round, use our medics to fish them back out of the graveyard and benefit from the abilities again.

Thats all i can think of using him for. The only other thing i can think of why he is there is the devs wanted a unit to specifically counter spies if its a NG vs NG match or they have further plans in the future for his type of action and they are just laying down the foundation.

 

[Ugralitan]

Usually John Calveit provides a better power swing but yes for Morvran deck you could pull a nice Operator + Cantarella + Menno Coehoorn combo. He is one of the least expected cards for Nilfgaard after Assassination. Nothing can beat Assassination in rarity of appearance!

Also spy killing is a valid tactic for Nilfgaard but not widely used. For example, Nauzicaa Brigades provides good enough values when they are called by Emissary. On top of that they provide great protection against Fake Ciri, Cow Carcass and Spectral Whale.

 

[JoachimDeWett]

Ive been wracking my brain over and over with him. I can only see him as a bonus strategy and definitely not a card worth building a deck around.

1. The obvious is to load the opponent up with spies. Try and lure the opponent into false security with the added extra points on their side and hope they even use buff cards on the spies?

2. After burning all the spies and if we make it to the next round, use our medics to fish them back out of the graveyard and benefit from the abilities again.

Thats all i can think of using him for. The only other thing i can think of why he is there is the devs wanted a unit to specifically counter spies if its a NG vs NG match or they have further plans in the future for his type of action and they are just laying down the foundation.

Point 1 is spot on. It's exactly what I use Menno for. Even if the opponent does not use buffs on spies, you can still wreck round one with 30+ power swings. If you use Menno on Cantarella, De Wett and one ambassador, that's already a 30 power swing. It's very rare to get below 20 value out of him when used that way. If your opponent committed a lot round 1, you are guaranteed to have CA for the next 2 rounds.

Point 2 however, it's a good strategy, but I prefer to control out round 2 to make my opponent waste more strength and cards. I use the spies to thin my deck and power out round one so I can get through most of my deck in the latter rounds. I think the Menno=> spies is good because of the thinning, and Morvran synergises extremely well with ambassadors, De Wett and Vilgefortz, allowing for superior sequencing (because you have an idea of what those cards will get).

 

[JoachimDeWett]

Usually John Calveit provides a better power swing but yes for Morvran deck you could pull a nice Operator + Cantarella + Menno Coehoorn combo. He is one of the least expected cards for Nilfgaard after Assassination. Nothing can beat Assassination in rarity of appearance!

Also spy killing is a valid tactic for Nilfgaard but not widely used. For example, Nauzicaa Brigades provides good enough values when they are called by Emissary. On top of that they provide great protection against Fake Ciri, Cow Carcass and Spectral Whale.

having played both, I think Morvran is the superior spy leader, simply because the leader ability allows you to sequence the deck thinning of the ambassadors and other units properly by knowing what they will draw into. Calveit has bigger power swings and can easily 2-0, but ambassadors / de Wett are far more inconsistent with him. And as you said, Nauzicaa do very well in the mirror match-up, whereas Calveit gets decimated against NG control.

I don't know. I think Menno is super strong in the right circumstances, which are honestly quite simple to create...

 

[Bl00dGeist]

Now you got mouse cage rolling in my head lol.

So what if you get a bad draw of the hand? Do you burn your leader abilities to try and setup up for that particular combo? Or lets say you dont get cantarella but have just 1-2 spies you can only play? Id imagine you wouldn't want to play them since the idea is to load them with a lot of spies and a small amount wouldn't have an impact.

 

[JoachimDeWett]

It's very rare to get that unlucky and not get menno, if worst comes to worst, I use nauzicaa brigades to clear up smaller spies. My deck is frankensteiny so I have rot tossers too so I have enough options to destroy cantarella or the opponents board. I have 3 ambassadors and 3 emissaries, so if I have no spies in my hand after the mulligan phase, it means I messed up my mulligan really hard lol. As other options I can have a nauzicaa into Iris combo (or cow tosser into iris if I don't have nauzicaa) which can be pretty strong late in the round and provide a solid power swing. Stefan skellen can be used round 1 as well in conjunction with morvran, cantarella, vilgefortz (although that's overcommitting by a lot). Not getting Menno is nigh impossible, and if you don't have him there is still enough you can put out to make a decent round 1. I don't know , my deck needs further testing lol. What I know is that this deck is savage against NG control

 

[Bl00dGeist]

It's very rare to get that unlucky and not get menno, if worst comes to worst, I use nauzicaa brigades to clear up smaller spies. My deck is frankensteiny so I have rot tossers too so I have enough options to destroy cantarella or the opponents board. I have 3 ambassadors and 3 emissaries, so if I have no spies in my hand after the mulligan phase, it means I messed up my mulligan really hard lol. As other options I can have a nauzicaa into Iris combo (or cow tosser into iris if I don't have nauzicaa) which can be pretty strong late in the round and provide a solid power swing. Stefan skellen can be used round 1 as well in conjunction with morvran, cantarella, vilgefortz (although that's overcommitting by a lot). Not getting Menno is nigh impossible, and if you don't have him there is still enough you can put out to make a decent round 1. I don't know , my deck needs further testing lol. What I know is that this deck is savage against NG control

I was brain storming over it and i was thinking of the nauzicaa units as well.

Thank you for sharing your input and strategies

 

[Lexandre]

a) Menno's weakness is that you have to play him on the same round you swarm the enemy's field with spies, otherwise he's just a Geralt with -2 strength

b) moving on to deeper weaknesses we have the following: you cant rely on running Vicovaro medics in the same deck with Emissaries because if Emissary draws Vicovaro when enemy has nothing on graveyard you basically spend a turn playing nothing and playing that deck without Vicovaro medics you can end up in a situation decribed in point a) : you are very likely to end up getting very little or next to no value out of Menno if you dont have him on the right round

c) building a deck centered around a single gold card that isnt Ciri: Dash isnt going to work, also there are simply not enough good spies for Menno to kill, the only good targets for him are Cantarella and Letho, but Letho has to be shackled first and he's a gold card too, mass genocide of Emissaries and Ambassadors is good too but for that once more you need to have Menno in hand in the right moment (usually round 1), at the same time Nauzica brigade fulfills the role of killing lesser spies much better than Menno