Yesterday in the achroma store in Poole, and at BASH (Derby), we kicked off the Salum Spring Season, and began battling for the fate of Curdle Hill. I went down to Poole for the day, and planted my flag firmly on the achrom side, running 3 achrom decks that I flitted between for the day: Occultists, Pixies, and Brisgavi (with my apologies to the Drakes, but you’ll get your time soon enough).

We had our eyes on the achrometer over the course of the day, and despite my best efforts, chroma seems to have taken an early lead. This is how it was sitting on the first evening:

Games had an extra element of chaos, provided by the Narrative Cards which were on the tables during the day.

Every round, a new card was revealed, and its effects resolved. Some of these effects were game changing, some less so. Here’s a picture of all 20 cards:

The biggest game changers seemed to be the Achrom Eclipse or Chromatic Empowerment events, which doubled drain/steal and halved gain, or vice versa, as they almost always affected the game irrespective of the boardstate. I got double Salum Springed during an Achrom Eclipse, resulting in an 8 steal, and I saw on discord that fellow achrom player Lewis played double Full Palette during a Chromatic Empowerment for a casual +24 (traitor!). Other effects tended to bring balance, negatively affecting the player with the strongest boardstate the most, which was nice.

I am normally a 1v1 player, but I played a bunch of fun multi-player games. One of my favourites were probably a 3 achrom/1 chroma game in which myself and fellow achroms turned on each other a bit too much in the early game, and the chroma player took the win. I think there’s a lesson in there, but I’m not sure what it is.

My favourite multiplayer game was a 2v2 format, in which pairs shared a shard bank but not canvases, using the heroes format of starting on 15Δ and aiming for 40Δ. It’s a really great format for a multiplayer, and one I’d recommend others trying out.

Near the end of the event, Charles aka Viridian proposed an impromptu mini-battle, with 7 achrom players taking on 7 chroma players. 4 players from each side sat down across from each other, and when a player was defeated they were eliminated and another not-yet defeated player from their team took a place at the table. At the end there was myself (achrom) left undefeated and one of my achrom teammates defeated the last chroma player. Victory for achrom in Poole (though I believe the chroma had the strongest showing in BASH).

A fun rule imposed was that a chroma win would go to the chroma player, even if it was the achrom player who achieved the chroma win. One of my fellow achrom teammates accidentally suffered this defeat. Rather controversially the final game was an achrom win by the chroma player.

The day was so much fun. It was nice to just play games for the sake of playing games, rather than the higher pressure (but still very fun in a different way) Grand Tournament. The feeling of being part of a team really added a flavour to the day that made it that much more enjoyable, and I look forward to the next time I can make it down to Poole (or even up to Derby one day). Kudos to the team for not only creating the concept of the season, but supporting it with this event and the narrative cards which really spiced up the games.

If you want to see the 3 achrom decks I took to the event, check out my deck review article, Salum Spring Achrom Decks.