Greetings and salutations once again, my fabulous FAB friends! Welcome back to another installment in the #FABDad series! Today we’ll be discussing something that will absolutely take your game to the next level! Today, we’re talking about Flesh and Blood teams.

The Benefits of Team Play!

In my Magic and Yu-Gi-Oh! days, I had a group of friends that I always played with and rode with to events. We called ourselves “Team Pickle.” (It’s a running inside joke that we were almost “Team U-Turn” based on how often we got lost on the way to said events.)

My old Team Pickle friends are the main thing I miss about Magic: the Gathering these days, but we weren’t exactly breaking any formats or topping the tournaments we played in. We were a bunch of nerds playing cards together. While I enjoy playing with the friends I’ve made in Flesh and Blood (my siblings in cardboard), and FAB is just a better game in my opinion, the memories I made with my old team back in the day are very dear to me.

Technically speaking, I’m not on any Flesh and Blood team at the moment. Several players in my local area seem to be continuously grinding for major events and I do my best to support them however I can in testing and theory crafting, but there isn’t an official “team” we all belong to. However, there are several high-level players in the game that have produced content on this same topic. The consensus amongst them seems to be that focused testing teams consistently show results by putting players into the elimination rounds at major events.

But If You’re Not On a Team Yourself, How Do You Really Know It’s Worth It?

Fair question, and easily answered. As a constant observer and consumer of Flesh and Blood coverage and content, I see players who are on professional/sponsored teams consistently performing well at event after event. Brodie Spurlock, Michael Feng, and Michael Hamilton are all well-known members of The Wolfpack and have publicly credited the team to helping give them an edge over the rest of the field.

At Pro Tour: Baltimore, we saw The Wolfpack place several of its members into the top eight of Flesh and Blood‘s highest level competitive event and they eventually won the whole thing. The team dynamic helped push those players to the cutting edge of where their decks needed to be for the event. Having access to strong testing partners provided the “perfect practice” they needed to attack the rest of the world’s best. More recently, at the 2023 World Championship in Barcelona, Team Blue Pitch managed to claim multiple slots in the Top 16 and Top 8, cementing themselves as another group to watch.

If team testing works at the highest level, it can and will work for every level of competitive play.

How Exactly Does the Team Thing Work Then?

What it basically boils down to is a group of players testing for an event in a coordinated and organized way. You don’t have to be officially sponsored or even really claim to be a team to reap the rewards of cooperative play.

You’ll need a core group of people that have the same goals as you for their Flesh and Blood experience and a medium for sharing ideas. Usually, that means everyone is in a common group chat, like Discord, WhatsApp, or Facebook Messenger, and testing focused games happen either in person or through an online client. The benefit of a larger team is that there are more people to bounce ideas off of and more testing partner availability. But even players with a smaller team have a competitive edge over players with no team at all.

Alright, Let’s Hear About Some Specific Benefits to Team Play Then.

“There is no such thing as a stupid question.” -The Empress of Volcor, Mara Faris

One of the primary benefits of having a testing team is the ability to try out as many different ideas as possible with real games. Mara Faris wasn’t on any of the major teams until recently when she joined The Wolfpack. Before that though, she credited her core group of friends and partners that helped her prepare for the events she’s participated in. Her work in creating the “Empress Dromai” list was the result of a lot of games of testing and a lot of theory crafting where she was able to try out whatever idea she happened to come up with.

Her testing process eventually led to her finding the golden nugget of the Breaking Point tech for PT: Baltimore and crushing the Lexi dominated field with Dromai, Ash Artist.

For some people, having a team to bounce ideas off of is only the beginning. It’s impossible to try every single potential combination of cards by oneself or even to get through a majority of potential deck configurations alone. Having multiple partners you trust with your ideas will help streamline the testing phase of deck construction. Several people can gather data on what works and what doesn’t much more efficiently than a single player.

How valuable would a single partner be if you were able to eliminate the ideas that don’t pan out at twice the speed of your regular solo testing? What about gathering data on an idea three times faster? Or four? You get my point.

Yeah, I Do Get Your Point. Having a Testing Team is Good. Where Do I Start If I Don’t Have a Team Though?

Assuming you’re not already an internationally known player and being scouted by the top teams, the best place to start is your friendly local game store where you already play. If your local scene is anything like mine, there are probably other players there who also want to get as much of an edge as they can and would equally benefit from focused testing. Just strike up a casual conversation with a couple of the other Johnnies and/or Spikes around you and see if they’d be open to the idea. It’s potentially that easy to get a testing team started.

If you happen to be the lone player in your area that wants to aim higher though, you’ll need to work a little harder when you go to events above Armory level. Due to the nature of the events, players who show up for Road to Nationals or Pro Quests are often more likely to be interested in gaining a competitive edge. Making good connections at those events can produce a great testing team. (And some great friendships as well.)

Social media is another way to find like-minded individuals that share your goals. Facebook has a few large FAB groups and I’ve met some great people through Discord. Thanks to some of my Discord connections, I’ve seen improvement in my skill level and helped others find some small improvement too. Several of the servers I’m in have a “Looking for a Game” style channel where you can find others needing testing. And, while I’m not a fan of Reddit in general, creating a thread looking for a testing group there could also yield results if you’re desperate.

What If All of That Fails Though? Am I Just Doomed?

Not at all. A competitive testing team provides an edge, but not having access to a team doesn’t mean you have to just write off your dreams of making it at the highest level. It just means you’ll have to work that much harder by yourself. I’ve talked about Juha Saarnilampi’s testing process for Pro Tour: Baltimore before, but to recap, what he did in preparation for the event was to grind games on Talishar at every opportunity. As a fellow #fabdad, he didn’t feel like he had time for other testing methods and felt like his best chances laid in testing alone. It paid off for him in the form of a Top 4 finish.

I See… It’s Worth it to Seek Out Teammates, But Not All Hope Is Lost Without Them.

Correct! You should strive to surround yourself with players who are as good or, preferably, better at the game than you are and seek improvement together. But failing that, take in as much information as you’re able to get and work at your goal at your own pace.

I may never reach the dream of playing in the big leagues myself and my home/work life doesn’t support a lot of travel right now anyway, but I do want to see my own testing group succeed. With that in mind, I’ll continue to work on supporting them in any way I’m able, as often as I can. A rising tide lifts all ships, after all, and I know I’ll be better for the experience one way or the other. Whether that’s by helping my friends reach their full potential and finding success or by taking steps towards my own, only time will tell.

“I’m not the smartest fellow in the world, but I sure can pick smart colleagues.” -Franklin D. Roosevelt

Do you have a team of consistent playtest partners? Are you a solo grinder like Juha? What would you name your team after you gather them? I’d love to know and, as always, I’m available on Discord or Twitter/”X” as Dracohominis87! Want to listen to me and my fellow nerds geek out about the latest FAB News? Check out our Siblings in Cardboard Podcast!

Further reading:

How I Got 28th Place at the Flesh and Blood World Championship

Is Flesh and Blood Worth Playing at a Casual Level?

The Competitive Edge of Specialists in Flesh and Blood

Donnie K.

Donnie is an enthusiastic nerd and family man who grew up playing TCGs, starting when Pokemon cards were the hottest thing on the playground. After playing Yu-gi-oh and then Magic the Gathering for years, he found Flesh and Blood in December of '22, sold all of his other pretty cardboard rectangles, and dived into FAB head first where he discovered a deep love for go-wide strategies involving the use of Ninja cards. Be Like Water is his current favorite card, because he gets to do a terrible Bruce Lee impression every time it's played. (Much to the annoyance of his brother who hears it a lot.) Donnie has been married to his lovely wife since Halloween 2008 and has two beautiful daughters that he couldn't be more proud of.