Palatinus' OverPower Forum

For the last few days I've been trying to construct the best hand in OP.  The scenario:
(1) It is the beginning of a battle.  You have a full team (of your choice) with no hits.  You may have any heroes or a battlesite. You may choose to use a homebase.
(2) Construct a hand of any eight cards you want.
(3) You have an empty draw pile, no dead pile, and no power pack.
(4) You and your opponent have both ventured 4 for the win.  Hence, no conceding and no New Universe shenanigans.

Can you construct an eight card hand that guarantees a win over any other eight card hand?

Some notes: You can use events, but you don't get to draw to replace them (because you have no draw pile).  Any cards you play will end up in the appropriate discard piles (so things like Web Headed Wizard are not useless).  When competing against other teams/hands: (i) battle once with you getting to attack first and once with the opponent getting to attack first, (ii) assume you know your opponent's hand, and (iii) assume optimal play from both players.

Just to get you started, here are some samples:
1/  Spawn, Heroes for Hire, Sentinels, Morph (R).  No specials event, 8E FS teamwork, 8S FE teamwork, 8E, 7F, 6S, 5M, 4M. 
2/  Professor X, The Ray, Onslaught, any 17 point in reserve.  No teamworks events, 8E, 7E, 6E, 5E, 4M, 3M, 2M. 
3/ Spawn, Invisible Woman, Reyes, Spider Woman (R) with Asteroid M battlesite.   Spawn AD, Invisible Woman AD, Reyes KR, Reyes EE, Any Hero: Guardian Angel, Any Hero: Confusion, Blob Activator: Blubber Block, and Quicksilver Activator: Mutant Momentum. 

Regardless of who goes first, team 1 beats team 3 (b/c of event), team 3 beats team 2 (b/c of Invisible woman), and team 2 beats team 1 (b/c of event).  This is a nice rock-paper-scissor set up, but there are surely teams that can beat them (maybe using the KO event?).

If it was the best hand in OP, you wouldn't have a rock-paper-scissor scenario. It would have to be a hand that can win against all other perfect/optimal hands.


bamf!

QuoteIf it was the best hand in OP, you wouldn't have a rock-paper-scissor scenario. It would have to be a hand that can win against all other perfect/optimal hands.

Agreed.  I put those samples in because they  represent three different ways one might consider trying to win (no specials, no teamworks, and all defense+win off inherent ability).  But, as I pointed out, each sample isn't the optimal hand because there exists another hand that can beat it.  Hence, its an open challenge to try to come up with an unbeatable hand.

I have been pondering this question for a while now and I think the team/hand would be:


Team:

Using Dep H as Home Base:

Wolverine
Omega Red
Alpha Flight
Sabretooth (R)

Hand:

No Specials Event
8 F (I/E) TW
7 F (I/E) TW
Homebase Aspect (PC's are +1 for venture total for remainder of game)
8 F PC
7 F PC
6 AP PC
5 M PC

It seems to me the best hand would be made of the no specials event, with Dep H inheritability of tw's being +1, that makes the 5 a 8 to block, then it counts as a 6 for venture purpose. Just a thought, but I would certainly put this hand up against any others.

First observation of the post above mine. I don't think the best hand in overpower only has 7 cards in it. lol (EDIT: Dammit! I just noticed the rules say you have no draw pile to replace for the event. Well played sir, I thought i was being clever. FAIL)

Seriously though, i'm not trying to pick on you OldDirtyBastardJosh, but this question has no correct answer, its a trick question. Like someone said above, its a Rock/Paper/Scissors thing. For example. I can construct a hand using a deck with some of the most terrible characters i can think of that would demolish the hand in the post above this one easily. For example, how about:

Dracula - 3-5-6-8
Doomsday 4-6-8-1
Mandarin 7-4-3-5
HENRY PYM (Reserve) 3-4-3-7

Missions: Seperation Anxiety
Homebase: Omniverse
Battlesite: Spawn's Alley (Just cause, who wouldnt want to fight in Spawn's Alley?)

The Hand:
Card 0 - Event: Imprisoned for Science - No cards with a fighting icon may be used to attack this battle (for obvious reasons, makes it so the only card he can use offensively is his 6AP)
Card 1: 8STW E/I
Card 2: 8ITW S/E
Card 3: 8A
Card 4: 7A
Card 5: 6A
Card 6: 5A
Card 7: A-Next

Here's how this game plays out, with him going first since i'm a nice guy:

Turn 1 (Him): Plays Aspect.
Turn 2 (Me) Plays 8S TW (blocked with 6AP), followup with 8A (hits), followup with 7A (hits)
Turn 3 (Him) Pass
Turn 4: (Me)  Plays 8E TW (blocked with 7F), Followup 6A (blocked with 8F), followup 5A (hits)
Turn 5: (Him) Pass
Turn 6: (Me) A-next (blocked with 5M)
Turn 7: (Him) Pass
Turn 8: (Me) Pass

Venture Totals:
Me: 20
Him: -1

Henry Pym wins. But wait, were not done. Rule 2 of the original post states we have to play this again with me going first, lets see how the results vary:

Turn 1 (Me): 8STW (blocked with 6ap), 8A Followup (hits), 7A followup (hits)
Turn 2 (Him): Plays Aspect
Turn 3 (Me): 8I TW (blocked with 7F), 6A Followup (blocked with 8F), 5A followup (hits)
Turn 4 (Him): Pass
Turn 5 (Me): Anext (blocked 5m)
Turn 6 (Him): Pass
Turn 7 (Me): Pass

Venture Totals:
Me: 20
Him: -1

There you have it, Henry Pym wins again! So as you can see, this is a trick question. No matter what hand you have, there is always a hand that can beat it. There is no hand that rules all others, unless possibly if you could get a Obfuscate of Legacy Regression in play the battle before you drew your perfect hand.

Thanks for the submissions you two. 

drdeath25: I didn't intend for this to be a trick questions. I am genuinely interested in knowing if there does exist a "best" hand, and if not, what are some very good hands.   The question came up because I was trying to come up with unbeatable (or very strong) hands that could be set up using Thor's Viking Pyre and Lex Luther's Art of the Deal. 

I think the No Specials Event + 2 teamworks + power cards hand is a good hand. I'm just not sure if there exist better hands. 

well if you had a deck involving this beforehand it could create a higher venture potential.

dupe your 8's
or if you play this event?

use people in front row with 9/10/11 specials for more venture hits?

obviously you can always make a hand that would either meet or exceed a hand that is "open handed" the thought is, you wouldn't know the other persons hand until after the battle began, correct?

Quote from: MHC on October 15, 2014, 11:23:12 AM

Some notes: You can use events, but you don't get to draw to replace them (because you have no draw pile).  Any cards you play will end up in the appropriate discard piles (so things like Web Headed Wizard are not useless).  When competing against other teams/hands: (i) battle once with you getting to attack first and once with the opponent getting to attack first, (ii) assume you know your opponent's hand, and (iii) assume optimal play from both players.

odb, it would be more interesting that way, but for this challenge i was following the rule above.

I see, totally overlooked that.

I may have found two hands that are better than any listed above:
Eye of the storm (do not discard duplicates event) + 7 Wundagore Mountain: Knights of Wundagore
OR
Eye of the storm (do not discard duplicates event) + 7 Fall's Edge Compound: Quarantine

Wundagore has the advantage that it can play defense, which I think makes it better against most other hands.  Fall's Edge Compound has the advantage that it can win by forcing all of your opponent's front line into the reserve (which is an instant win).  With either hand, losing front line characters is not a major loss since the aspect cards can be played by any character. 

Quote from: MHC on December 08, 2014, 09:58:40 PM
I may have found two hands that are better than any listed above:
Eye of the storm (do not discard duplicates event) + 7 Wundagore Mountain: Knights of Wundagore
OR
Eye of the storm (do not discard duplicates event) + 7 Fall's Edge Compound: Quarantine

Wundagore has the advantage that it can play defense, which I think makes it better against most other hands.  Fall's Edge Compound has the advantage that it can win by forcing all of your opponent's front line into the reserve (which is an instant win).  With either hand, losing front line characters is not a major loss since the aspect cards can be played by any character. 

Are you adhering to inherent abilities on homebases, if so, Wundagore only allows the player to venture two.

The Fall's edge tactic wouldn't work. When all three have hit, you'd have at most 18 points. Meanwhile you are leaving yourself with no defense, guaranteeing that your opponent will land his hits. Assume they are high in value, it's more than likely they'll beat your maximum 18 points.

The Wundagore tactic is possible, though (assuming you're ignoring the venture limitation), because those aspects are worth 7 apiece, and can be used to defend when necessary. But I wouldn't say it's a guarantee.

QuoteAre you adhering to inherent abilities on homebases, if so, Wundagore only allows the player to venture two.

My goal was to find a hand that would guarantee the win for a single battle.   I had not thought about adding the requirement that it also have the possibility of winning the game through KOing your opponent's team or being able to venture 7.

Quote
The Fall's edge tactic wouldn't work. When all three have hit, you'd have at most 18 points. Meanwhile you are leaving yourself with no defense, guaranteeing that your opponent will land his hits. Assume they are high in value, it's more than likely they'll beat your maximum 18 points.

I thought there was a rule that you automatically win venture if your opponent has no front line characters (either through KO or because they were sent back to the reserve).  Is this not the case?  If I am correct about the rule, then the hand can win pretty easily against a number of other hands since the other hands won't be able to land hits and defend every aspect card.   

I should point out though that I just realized the win isn't guaranteed since the FEC hand cannot beat a deck that has one character with a "May not be attacked for remainder of battle" card. 

Quote
The Wundagore tactic is possible, though (assuming you're ignoring the venture limitation), because those aspects are worth 7 apiece, and can be used to defend when necessary. But I wouldn't say it's a guarantee.

You are right about it not being a guarantee.  After thinking about it a bit, there is an obvious counter-hand: the same event + seven 8-level power cards would win.

The rule is that the game ends when there one character loses his final front line character, but that doesn't mean you win. The round simply ends, and you total venture as normal.

The exception to that, is when you remove your OWN last front line character, in which case you automatically lose the venture.

I see.  Thanks for the clarification. 

In that case, the Fall's Edge Compound hand is pretty bad.