Jankyard | Fortress Maximus!!
Greetings Cybertronians, Autobot AL of Team PTSD reporting in. Fortress Maximus has been sighted on the battlefield! I repeat, we have a sighting of Fortress Maximus on the battlefield! As of the release of Titan Masters Attack, Fortress Maximus is the third Titan to be featured in the game.
I'll start with a simple introduction of new features from Wave 5.
Titan Master Characters: Mix and match heads and bodies to customize Titan Masters to fit your play style. Head characters give bonuses to the body, and when the body is KOed, the head deploys as a separate bot mode character.
Hybrid Icons: A introduction of characters' trait icon working together with battle pips.
Stratagem cards: This completely new card type lets players customize characters on their team. Stratagems in Titan Masters Attack can modify characters from this booster release or from previous releases.
Titan Master Characters have two categories - the head master (head) and titan master (body). Players can mix and match heads and bodies to customise Titan Masters to fit different play styles.
Head characters give bonuses to the body and start as a character with both stars from the head and body stack together.
Every head master must go along with another titan master. When the body is KOed, the head will deploys as a separate bot mode character into the battlefield.
All the upgrades on titan master are scrapped when they are KOed unless they are upgraded with Escape Capsule.
When head master is deploy on the battlefield, they are usually very fragile and easily taken out. The additional attack from head master is very critical.
There are a few unique rules apply to titan master and head master, titan(body mode) master cannot work alone without a head.
Card like I Still Function cannot be targeted at titan master while you can target a bot mode of a head master. Head master cannot be flip when he is in bot mode, players cannot switch head to different titan master on the battlefield unless you have a Swap Heads Stratagem.
Stratagem cards are completely new card type lets players customize characters on their team.
Stratagem usually cost 1 to 2 stars and they begin on the battlefield at the start of the game. They are unique card that can only play 1 of each kind on the battlefield.
The next new mechanic Wave 5 have to offer is the the hybrid icon. As we played Transfomers TCG so far, traits has be part of our concern for our composition of deck. We have to consider our team lineup, characters' ability and battle pips of each card inside our deck composition. More over, with the new hybrid icon, deck composition will push further within our 40 cards deck.
Master Of Metallikato, a very great card filled with 3 different colors of battle pips and trait icon combine together.
Hybrid Icon only affect the battle flips based on the traits the character is working with. But when comes to the triggering effect of this card, the effect will still consider trigger.
Master Of Metallikato may filled with a good numbers of battle pips, but a great disadvantage it has as battle pips it possess can be null by both Infiltrate and Jam Signal when play as an action.
Combination of hybrid icon is very unique and interesting. It might be possible a deck filled with hybrid icon can make a unique deck where a character responsible for attack using orange battle pips while another character using the same card of battle pips responsible for defending. If this is possible, the strategy for Transfomers TCG will change greatly as more wave coming in.
With the basic idea of wave 5 titan master and stratagem introduce, its much easier to introduce the unique titan size Fortress Maximus.
Deck Building
[Characters]
1 Fortress Maximus - Great War Veteran
1 Cerebros - City Commander
1 Flintlock
Fortress Maximus, Great War Veteran(14 stars) is a Titan master with Cerebros, City Commander(7 Stars) as it Head master while Cerebros itself is also a Titan master which make it very interesting. With Fortress Maximus and Cerebros taking up 21 Stars count, left with 4 stars count for the remaining head master for Cerebros.
Fortress Maximus's body mode ability when it attack, it flip a Orange and Black Pips. Do 2 damage to each enemies and flip Fortress Maximus to Alt mode. With a base attack of 8 and dealing 2 to each enemies on trigger, Fortress Maximus can be very powerful destroyer. If focusing on an aggro build, Fortress Maximus can be easily destroy. So by focusing on defensive build, its can survive to fight again.
Alt Mode ability of Fortress Maximus is when Fortress Maximus defend and flip a White and Blue pips, do 1 damage to the attacker.
The initial deck composition is to make use of Mining Pick to set up Fortress Maximus's body mode ability by planting Wedge Formation or Lose The Initiative on top of the deck while running on heavy blue pips for survival.
With the Orange, Black, and Green pips on them I can trigger and exchange them back after battle, quickly I realise that soon I will be running out of hand size to exchange them back.
I decide to use another approach, using Secret Dealings and Data Pad to resolve my problems with hand size. Both cards allow me to draw 1 card and Plan 1, this way it will help me to maintain my hand size without decrease them.
Cerebros is only playable with Fortress Maximus, the initial head master for Cerebros is actually Emissary which gives Cerebros a +2 Focus to assist him to trigger his ability.
In order for to trigger the ability of Cerebros, I felt that having a Tough 3 to throw out more cards instead Focus ability and it helps with defending too. So I have Flintlock to work with Cerebros.
Depend on the deck composition, it is much easier to obtain Bold than Tough, having the Flintlock as the third head master Flintlock, Cerebros definitely increase it's survival chance.
The only problem with Fortress Maximus is the very low health pool of all 3 characters combine. This makes Fortress Maximus very hard make it for a competitive appearance.
During compositing of the deck, I wanted to make use of Master Of Metallikato for Plan on attack and Battlefield Report for defending to trigger Cerebros's ability. Although, I only require a white pip to trigger, the chances of triggering have to depend on the deck and scrap pile. The triggering is not a 100% for the commitment.
Deck Composition
I am running a total of 42 battle cards instead of the minimum 40. This is made up of 21 Actions and 21 Upgrades. There are 7 Orange pips, 27 Blue pips, 10 Green pips and 10 White pips.
Legend
B - Blue
O - Orange
W - White
G - Green
K - Black
* - Pips will be account for battle flips when working with a certain trait
Upgrades
1 Metal Detector (KG) 3 Data Pad (W)
3 Adaptive Plating (B) 2 Force Field (W) 1 Sparring Gear (OG) 1 Reflex Circuits (BG)
3 Unflinching Courage (KB) 2 Energon Axe (B) 2 Sturdy Javelin (W) 1 Paralyzo Box (W*G) 1 Noble's Blaster (BG) 1 Enforcement Batons (OG)
Actions
3 Master Of Metallikato (*K*O*B) 2 Wedge Formation (KOG) 3 Reclaim (B) 3 Hidden Fortification (B) 3 Security Checkpoint (BB) 3 Battlefield Report (B) 2 Secret Dealings (WG) 2 Sabotaged Armaments (B)
Side Board
1 Clobber
3 Belligerence
3 Supercharge
3 Grenade Launcher
1 Force Field
The main board consist of 27 blue pips and 7 orange pips. The side board consist of 9 orange pips and 1 white pips. By swapping out 9 blue pips for 9 orange pips, this would increase the orange pips from 7 to 16 and blue pips will drop from 27 to 18 instead. This would change the entire deck composition to a mix pip combination for a much aggro play style. Having Clobber as my side board character swapping out with Flintlock, I can increase the damage output together with Belligerence.
This exchange is mainly to deal with aggro play which has lesser to none defensive capabilities.
The concept is having to lose the first round, exchange for much aggro build and try to KO a enemy on the very first turn considering that Fortress Maximus has a base damage of 8 along with the Bold 1. Hoping with the trigger effect and high base damage, I could take out 1 enemy on my very first turn.
Belligerence is a good card for mixed pip deck. Belligerence is 1 of my favourite card among the wave 5. The exchange can go against very defensive deck provided your opponent deck composition is rather low on damaging factor. Using Belligerence, mixed pip deck can increase it offensive and guaranteed a good amount of damage against blue control players.
I hope that you guys have had a good read on my thoughts in this article. Thank you for reading till the end, and do share with us your own creations. Autobot AL, out!