Psycho Duel Chapter 47: The Metagame Clock

Walt’s mother fell asleep in the recliner in the den, but before she dozed off, she seemed to be blissed out in her own personal heaven with both her kids in the same room as her. At one point she asked “when is their father coming in off the lake?” and they played along, Janice replying, “Any minute now.”

“Good,” their mother had said. “But he better not be dragging any mud in with him. I’ll ring his neck if he dirties the kitchen floor again.”

Walt shared a look with Janice and Rick, and they just smiled.

“Alright momma,” Janice said, “I’ll warn him.”

“That’s my girl.” And then she fell asleep shortly after.

Walt picked her up out of the recliner, wrapped in her quilt, putting her arm over his shoulder and his other arm underneath her legs. She barely stirred as he carried her to her room and laid her on the bed. As he tucked her in, he was surprised to hear her voice. “Walter.”

He looked up and saw that her eyes were open. She grabbed his hand and held it tight. “I’m proud of you, bud.”

There was clarity in her eyes. Her face no longer had a mask of confusion on it. It was his mom and she was here. “I always knew you were special, even when I was still carrying you inside me. I used to tell your father that this baby was going to change the world. And look at you now.”

Walt knew then that he must have been mistaken. He had fucked up his chance to change the world. Now, the world was on the brink of collapse. His mother’s mind was still stuck in some liminal space of dreams, memories and actual reality. A few marbles knocked loose from her brain injury. She smiled at him.

Then she sat back and fell back asleep, letting go of his hand. Walt wiped cheek with the back of his hand and turned off the light as he left the room.

#

“Imagine a clock,” Walt said. “Actually, hold on.” He fished out a pad of paper and a pen from one of the kitchen drawers and then returned to Janice back in the den.

Rick was sitting across from them, Walt’s HAM radio on the coffee table next to him. It was set on Richard’s frequency should the old man come within range. Walt’s brother-in-law was studying the device.

Walt drew a clock face on the paper and wrote down the numbers. At twelve o’clock, he wrote the word Aggroabove it.

“So, if Aggro is at twelve,” Walt continued, “then Combo would be at four o’clock, and Control would be around eight or seven.” He wrote the words next to each corresponding time on the clock.

Janice got closer to look at it. She traced her finger from Control to Combo to Aggro. “Each one beats the thing immediately before it. Combo beats Aggro. Aggro beats Control.”

“Right,” Walt said. “So, most noobs quit before they understand this. They just want to play the cards they want to play because they think they’re cool. When it comes time to adapt and deal with decks that beat them, they get frustrated and drop the game.”

“The most people wouldn’t survive our current predicament,” Janice said.

“Not for long at least.”

Walt added two more deck types to the drawing of the clock. At two o’clock, he wrote Midrange. And at nine o’clock, he wrote Aggro-Control. “So, same rule still applies. The deck type ahead on the clock beats the archetype before it.”

“Midrange?” Janice said. “What’s that?”

“Here,” Walt said. “I’ll give you a hint.” He shuffled through the Mythiccards and found the one he was looking for. He held it for his sister to see.

Janice squinted at the card and read its name and description out loud. “Heaven’s Wrath. All creatures in play are destroyed.” She leaned back and blinked. “So, it just deals with Aggro all out. Interesting.”

“What do you think the difference between Control and Midrange is?” Walt asked.

She thought for a moment. “Control tries to stop threats one at a time,” Janice said. “Midrange stops them all at once.”

Walt nodded and smiled. He pointed at the other deck he added to the clock. “So, want to take a guess what Aggro-Control would be?”

Janice sorted through some cards in a control deck she had built. She was looking at the removal spells. “I’m going to assume it also has counterspells to deal with combo decks.” Then she noticed how beefy her creatures were in her control deck, ones that had a high cost. “Instead of big creatures to play in late game, Aggro-Control has smaller creatures at lower cost to play in early and mid-game. It’s faster than a normal Control deck.”

“Yep, literally in the name.” Walt tapped the clock. “This is what’s known as the Metagame Clock. Each thing on the clock beats whatever lies up to a half an hour before it, and loses to whatever lies half an hour after it. Put it to memory.”

Janice stared at the clock. “Easy enough.”

A moment passed. There was some warbling static from the HAM radio.

“So have you figured out what the point of this is?” Walt asked.

Janice took a step back from the table and took in all the different types of cards. “The idea is to get ahead of my opponent on the clock. If he tries to play a lot of guys, likes he’s playing at twelve o’clock, then I play at two o’clock by wiping his board. And if he tries to combo by playing at four, then I play at seven and counterspell his combo.Whichever way he goes, I must stay ahead of him.”

Walt smiled, teasing her. “So, you’re smarter than I thought you were.”

She punched him. “We have the same genes, dumbass. I may not be some prodigy, but I’m no slouch either.”

“So, show me,” Walt said. “Build three decks. Then we play. We have lots of work to do.”

#

Janice had performed decently for being so new at this, but she still hadn’t survived past turn five against him yet. She still had a lot to learn, but she was showing signs of progression. She needed a few more days, if not a few more weeks, to get to the point where he would be comfortable letting her have a card gauntlet. He just hoped they had that long.

Janice had retired to bed shortly after midnight, leaving Walt and Rick run of the cabin. Walt had figured Rick would join his wife in bed, but he expressed he should stay up a few more hours to keep watch. Walt tried to tell him that he didn’t have to do that, that “Elrich was on duty” but Rick said he was restless and couldn’t help it.

“Hard to relax when you’re responsible for the safety of your loved ones, isn’t it?” Rick said. He went and sat in a chair by one of the windows, staring into the darkness.

Walt shrugged. “I feel you but you can trust my minions. It’s not just Elrich out there. I have other cards on night watch.”

“No offense, but I’m still getting used to this whole ‘magic card game creatures are real reality’ I’ve found myself in. Gonna take a little bit of time for me to trust them.”

Walt didn’t argue with him. Instead he sat next to the HAM radio and went through Shae’s deck. Perhaps there would be something he could use or at least dust.

Shae Jordan’s (aka Flame of the Silver Tongue) Deck

Thaumaturgist

22 Cards

Scrollkeep the Immortal (1 Vigor Stone)

Mage Hand (1 Vigor Stone)

Arcane Focus (1 Vigor Stone) (2)

Arcane Bolt (2 Vigor Stones) (2)

Transmogrify (3 Vigor Stones) (2)

The Reflective Arcano (4 Vigor Stones) (2)

Arcane Missile (4 Vigor Stones)

Heat Wave (5 Vigor Stones) (2)

Arcane Strike (5 Vigor Stones)

Avalanche (6 Vigor Stones)

Drexl, Arcanologist (6 Vigor Stones)

Arcana Drake (6 Vigor Stones)

Mage Lord Magistrix (7 Vigor Stones)

Arcane Keep (7 Vigor Stones)

High Magus Streya (8 Vigor Stones)

Arc Inquisitor (9 Vigor Stones)

Disintegration Domination (10 Vigor Stones)

Her entire deck seemed to be of the Arcanist’s Keep set, which was only usable by Thaumaturgist’s. There were a few Legendaries that caught his attention.

Drexl, Arcanologist. Minion. Set: Arcanist’s Keep. Rarity: Legendary. One of the top scholars in the arcane arts, Drexl is something of an innovator in the art of arcane spellcrafting.

Whenever you cast a spell, add an “Arcane Missiles” spell to your hand.

Arcane Wand: 10 Attack, Cooldown: 10 seconds

Health Points: 18

Cost: 6 Vigor Stones

A spell generator card. Also perhaps her win condition. If she played this card and was able to cast low level spells, her hand would fill up with Arcane Missiles spell cards which she could have used to blast him down. Good thing he defeated her on Turn Five, otherwise he’d be the dead one.

Arc Inquisitor. Minion. Set: Arcanist’s Keep. Rarity: Legendary. Former professors at the Keep who have transmuted their physical forms into pure arcane energy in service to the Keep.

War Whoop: For every point of damage you’ve dealt with your Hero Ability this match, deal that amount of damage to the Enemy Hero.

Arc Lightning: 10 Attack, Cooldown: 10 seconds

Health Points: 20

Cost: 9 Vigor Stones

Another lethal card, which synergized with the Thaumaturgist Hero Ability. And if she didn’t use her Hero Ability prior to playing this, it was still a beefy minion that did a considerable amount of damage.

Walt made a mental note. The Thaumaturgist class, at least in this iteration, gravitated towards control with finishers dependent on the amount of spells they used. He organized the deck into cards he would dust and cards he’d hold onto until his sister chose a class, just in case she decided to go Thaumturgist.

Next, he loaded up the Slaynami Shop to browse and see if any ideas would come to him about how to use the credits Catheryne sent him. He was scrolling through the menus and came across a section he didn’t notice before.

[Gauntlet Upgrades]

He mentally clicked on it and another menu appeared.

Card Codex Storage

Onslaught System

He figured Card Codex Storage was exactly that, extra space for storing more cards. Which meant the gauntlet had a limit. But what was this other thing?

Onslaught System. Want to be able to practice dueling in realistic conditions but don’t want to actually die when you lose? Then upgrade your gauntlet with the Onslaught System, Slaynami’s own personal dueling simulator! With the Onslaught System in the power of your gauntlet, jack into Slaynami Holo-Space, where you can practice your duels without fear of bodily harm! It’s the best experience available outside of a Battleboard Barrier! Comes with Onslaught Link so only one upgraded gauntlet needed to practice with your friends! Purchase The Onslaught System today!

It cost four thousand credits.

He couldn’t afford it just yet. He was short five-hundred credits. But if he won another duel, and it rewarded him the same amount of credits from his victory over Shae, which was five-hundred even, then he would have enough to get the Onslaught System upgrade. He could use it as the next phase for Janice’s training. Not to mention, it would probably be a great thing to have to keep his own skills sharp.

Next, he decided he should go ahead and start building multiple decks to have in queue for when the next duel arrived. Wouldn’t hurt to be prepared with some options to have ready on the fly. Because these duels seemed to have a way of catching him by surprise. And one of these times he might not be in a good enough head space to throw together a deck on the spot.

His system dinged with a notification. He checked the HUD.

Dryder Hounds have detected incoming activity…

Elrich Ehrmantraut has detected intruders…