Is There Any Trick To The Slot Machines In Borderlands 2

Since Black Flag, Assassin’s Creed has been gradually adding more RPG mechanics and part of that has been leveling. While it wasn’t too bad in AC4 where it would rarely ask you to grind a tiny bit to get a better ship, it became a bigger nuisance in more recent titles, Origins, and Odyssey. While the leveling of Origins and Odyssey are very bad, and I will go into that more momentarily, the biggest reason appears to be due to the poor definition of the genre that Ubisoft have confined themselves to.
Assassin’s Creed’s Genre at its core is an action-adventure title, which is a very broad genre to be fair. Ac1-Syndicate are all Action Adventure Sandbox titles though, whereas Origins and Odyssey attempt to be open-world action RPGs. They are not open world though. Sandbox and Open World seem very similar, and they are, but despite many people blending them together are distinct genres and styles of world design. An Open-World is the idea that your game’s world is completely open from the beginning or very near to it. While Zelda Breath of the Wild is called “Open-air” it adheres to this very well. As soon as you get the paraglider, you can go anywhere at all. There is an easier way to do things due to weather conditions, but the tools to succeed are always available regardless of the direction you go in. Skyrim, Oblivion, Morrowind, Fallout 3, and Fallout New Vegas, are a few more popular RPG examples of an Open World. After you complete the tutorial, you can go anywhere. Some areas are easier than others, but you can go anywhere.
A Sandbox, however, does restrict your movement based on narrative progress. Assassin’s Creed 1-3 all do this where certain districts and cities can’t be explored until certain points in the game. Every Borderlands does this too, with more areas becoming available as your progress narratively. Think about GTA IV how you can’t cross a bridge until certain story moments. I do want to quickly say that you may also hear sandbox be used as a way to describe weapon pools in video games, which is an accurate term, and while AC’s weapon/tool sandbox is ripe for criticism, for the purpose of this post, sandbox will only be referring to an open vs narratively linear structure.
So why am I saying that Origins and Odyssey aren’t really open world? After all, after beating the tutorial you can go anywhere on the map. This is true but only technically. During my first playthrough of Origins right after the tutorial, I turned around to head up the black mountain because I heard there was an achievement up there. On my way up a random large cat spawned from nowhere and one-shotted me on easy. The same happened in Odyssey where I was trying to explore some of Greece before continuing the main story and while I was just riding my horse down the road a random bobcat jumped from the bushes and killed me in 1 hit, on easy. The game doesn’t present physical barriers anymore to prevent travel, but instead a soft one. If you go somewhere before the game wants you to, you will be punished by characters 4 or more levels higher, because once something is about 4 levels higher than you, you literally have no effective way to combat it, even on easy. You do next to no damage to them while they do far more damage to you.
Think for a moment about other good games with similar structures to AC. Was there ever a point where you can’t progress in dark souls because of the level? No, players do Soul Level 0 all the time. What about Skyrim? Nope, enemies can be killed just as easily at level 1 vs 81, or even more so if you don’t reset your combat skills in Skyrim.
But it’s okay in Assassin’s Creed. The leveling system isn’t that bad. Just don’t explore outside the designated areas and focus on the main quest. Except that you literally can’t just focus on the main quest because side missions and PoI are required to be a high enough level at multiple points. This was especially apparent in Episode 7 of Odyssey which had a 4 level jump between sequences and was such a long grind that so many players complained it had to be patched to be fixed mildly.
The grind was annoying in Origins for sure, but it was dialed up to 11 or actually 99 in Odyssey with over doubling your max level while adding next to no extra content. After 100%ing all main content (obviously not radiant quests but all DLC, POI, actual side missions, story, etc.) I was in the mid-60s. I used boosts from the new story mode to get to level 99 which subsequently got me banned from using story modes. Oh no, how dare I try to make the most of my experience by using the tools you provide to reach max level and gain some money because it takes literally a million XP to level up and over a million of a single currency to level up some items and you need a ton of different currencies for every item and upgrade. Gotta have that 1.5 million drachmae, 250,000 wood, and 125,000 metal to upgrade a 3ft sword. Cause that economic system makes sense.
People would constantly complain about how annoying the optional collectibles for old AC games were. But they offered very little in terms of rewards if anything. You didn’t have to collect all the chests or feathers unless you wanted an achievement. But now, beyond just achievement hunting the optional bandit camps aren’t optional. In odyssey, every mission takes you to at least one of the 730+ POI. To stay leveled you’re constantly having to do copy/pasted bandit camps raiding the same camps, killing the same enemies. Now the collectibles just require a little more effort than before. This forces players to play the game for longer than they would normally because they have to do these areas to progress, allowing the leveling system to pad the game time and give Ubisoft a reason to say their game is successful. Sure players are logging 100+ hours in odyssey but a similar percent of players is actually finishing the campaign when compared to AC2, which we can get good numbers on based on the % of players with certain Xbox achievements. I just checked and Odyssey’s story completed achievement was obtained by about 26% of the players; Origins was 27%; AC1 was 27%; and (original release) Brotherhood was nearly 40%.
The unfortunate reality is that beyond good talking points for Ubi execs, the leveling system has another major issue, being that it is inherently shady and addictive. It’s clear that Ubisoft designed the leveling in Origins and odyssey to sell MTX and be addictive. You level up quickly at first and slow down a lot towards the end, which is normal at first glance until you really notice how much you slow down. By that point, the leveling system has you addicted. The bright flashing lights, loud sounds that drown out everything else, this is a regular psychological tactic that slot machines use. While it doesn’t make a lot of sound for losing, you suddenly get a big loud noise and bright colors and flashing for winning. This triggers a reaction in your brain to create a sort of happy high similar to cigarettes and alcohol. So when players see they get rewarded for completing another copy/pasted bandit camp, they care less about the quality and more about the high they’re getting from leveling up. Compare this to the far more user-friendly system in Skyrim which has a medium-sized notification below your compass but decently above your crosshair so it’s not in your direct line of sight, and a single note/tone to denote the skill level up. Dark Souls only gives a basic audio cue for leveling up which has to be done manually in menus at a bonfire where it’s very possible and easy to lose the ability to level up prior to reaching the bonfire. Instead of figuring out innovative ways to level up like in other critically acclaimed games, Assassin’s Creed decided to look towards gambling psychological tricks, and when that leveling high slows down, you can always just buy a permanent boost for actual money. What’s that, you found a way to level up fast without buying our microtransactions? Ban them from using part of our single-player game where they can only impact their own experience.
All this comes at the cost of a sense of real progression. How do you know you progressed in Odyssey? Well, ease of killing enemies isn’t it since all enemies are scaled with you. The best way to know you’re progressing is because the level of enemies is higher and the damage text you hit them with is now saying it’s over 9000 rather than that measly 8500 you hit with previously. New enemies aren’t introduced, and if anything now that grunt that you handled at level 1 is level 99 with you and hits just as hard at level 99 as he did at level 1. New weapons aren’t introduced. Armor more or less looks the same except not it has a gold background instead of purple. Oh boy, really innovative and exciting there.
In the old games, all this progression was tied to the narrative. You want better gear, kill the next target, watch Ezio’s story unravel. You get to see new factions, characters, enemies, and situations that you’re put into. Your skills progress too, with new items like a poison dart or a second hidden blade at your disposal. You feel your arsenal and everything getting stronger as you progress through the story, which makes sense due to the animus having us relive memories. It makes sense that our ancestor would get better over the decades of his life that we spend with him. In Odyssey, though our progression is based on how many bandits and mercenaries we kill. Nothing new is unlocked by progressing the story in Odyssey except more story, which is extremely padded because we gotta have more leveling and go to more forts and camps. This cheapens the narrative impact on the character development in gameplay and story which was intertwined in previous games as a cohesive unit.
I understand if Ubisoft wants to keep AC as an open-world RPG, but it needs to do that right, and completely re-evaluate the leveling system and how it ties to the narrative progression. The current system has less weight in both gameplay and story, and just pads game time rather than helping create a unique experience like Dark Souls or Skyrim do. Players should feel more powerful through gameplay and not because text is telling them they’re doing more damage, and it should scale up at a reasonable extent to not create the toxic relationship Odyssey has with its leveling system. I sincerely hope that the rumors for Kingdom are true in regards to creating a Skyrim based level system where individual skills are leveled up based on use and do not affect your ability to explore the open world.

So, here we go:
Golem: 2/2 -> 1/1.
Response: still unhappy. Someone at DWD still wants golem played, and while you theoretically can aggro down a golem deck now, aggro itself is in an awful state, with the state of 1-drops being "pray your opponent plays no blightmoths or hailstorms". DWD clearly intends for golem to remain a card in the metagame, which is better treatment than it gave HotV, Soulfire Drake, and almost any other card that got its cost increased by 1 (only worthy cause survived?). Furthermore, golem decks remove the decision points of making market decisions, and this is a route through which players can differentiate themselves in the actual game-to-game piloting. While it's good that golem was nerfed, I doubt it's gone, and I have a feeling it won't be a long time before it rears its head again when some more good 2 or 4 drops get printed. One other thing--at least this slams the door on spire shadows + merchants + golem. Good riddance.
Distillation: 6 -> 7 power.
Response: oof. I understand this was aimed at golem decks, and it wasn't coming down to 5 cost. It seems 7 was the only alternative. This is also another problem that golem creates with the game--even cost cards have to still pay the golem premium. Do I think it'll still be playable? Maybe? But we already saw it cut in its entirety from the team ET FTS list, and you can certainly imagine that while the FTS sacrifice lists won't have any trouble just replacing it with strange burglar, fairer non-golem time midrange or control decks (FTJ) just lost a vital card for sins they didn't commit. For my part, I'd love to see some sort of compensation card to the elysians, combreis, and other "fair midrange" decks of the world rather than "want draw spells? Play primal." Time is supposed to have some good draw spell, but for whatever reason, just isn't allowed to have any. One of the two nerfs that I'm kind of bummed out about this patch. I understand why it needed to happen, I'm just sad it did.
Kato: corrupt 1 -> 2, 10 units -> 12 units in void.
Response: in the context of Auralian supplier, I don't think this nerf went hard enough. Go first -> Kato on 2 -> Supplier on 3 still feels like getting getting away with something, and I would have liked to see this curve broken up. The corrupt 1 -> 2 is meaningful IMO to make completing Kato's quest harder, but the 10 -> 12 just means "play one more corrupted unit in a deck with plenty of card draw". I would have liked this number to have been bumped to 15 such that the giants were essentially a "never ever" against decks looking to pressure rather than grind out.
Unfamiliar interloper: 1/2 -> 1/1.
Response: I don't think this went far enough. Given that we saw multiple FTP/FTJ decks splashing Eremot's machinations (such as the one I played, or mgallop did), or Theovermaster playing FTS with Keelo, I would have dropped a thermonuclear bomb on this card and made sure it never saw the light of play ever again. 5F decks should not be a thing. Not sure why DWD went with such a soft touch here, because it means other cards have to pay the price. Still, something's better than nothing.
Rectifier: 3T 2/1 -> 3TT 1/1.
Response: decent change, actually. No longer blocks X/2s, and players need to work a little harder for the influence. About as much as could be asked for. Happy with this one in every way.
Eremot's Machinations: 5TS -> 6TTSS
Response: now this one is the one that I'm really sad about. Eremot's Machinations was one of my first crafts in this new set, just on the hope that it'd give aggro decks that could play it some more legs. Ultimately, I think this puts machinations into an FTS market slot at best, and renders it unplayable at worst. Simply put: how many decks can play 1-cost units and 6-cost cards in the same list? Xenan aggro, TJS aggro, TJS Alessi, and many more decks that may have one day been granted life by this card instead had their hopes dashed because of carver + Kato + Jekk. If carver got moved to 2, and Kato got moved to 3 cost units, I think that this card could have stayed as it was. Instead, the collateral damage from this is pretty massive. Like the distillation nerf, while I understand why the change happened, I wish there could have been some other way, as the card wasn't causing problems outside of this one specific archetype.
Blazing Salvo: deal 2 to an enemy unit -> deal 2 to an enemy unit and yourself.
Response: Inb4 someone winds up blasting themselves for 5 because this was the only damage spell in their hand when they hit with Acedonis. I just checked--he doesn't say "you may". What did Ace do to deserve this ?X(. Funnies aside, I really dislike that DWD keeps coming down hard on good market options. It feels like "adapting to the opponent with your lines of play" keeps getting punished in favor of "decide your matchups at registration". IMO, it's not fun when victory is often determined by who's on a team with the better deckbuilders.
Ark of Sol: 1 -> 2 power.
Response: a long time coming for this thing. Ever since expedition had its first real format, this card was a bit of a problem, and now it finally gets its proper comeuppance. Probably still played in every market that can trigger it because it still has near-zero opportunity cost in a format in which you can't hit your market all five times.
Missed nerfs:
In addition to some nerfs being too light (Kato, interloper, golem), I think carver deserved one as well. Simply, I don't think using an engine card (press-gang) to find another engine card (carver) was intended when the card was created, and I think carver's existence was the reason that machinations got slammed. If carver went to 2 (and Kato to 3), machinations in the context of FTS decks would have taken a proper hit, and the carvepress-gang package would have also been broken up.
Sidegrades:
Purgedriver 2/2 for 4JJ -> 3/2 for 4JJJ. IMO, this is a buff. This is a market J card (or maybe a 1-of Keelo card), so either way, the influence doesn't really hinder it that much, while it just got an extra point of attack. Probably an upgrade, all told.
Two-face: 2/2 corrupt 2 -> 2/1 corrupt 1. I suppose there may be a mill deck which will be happy with the coupon to mill for another 2, but in general, definitely a nerf more often than not.
Buffs:
Maiden back to a 2/4 makes me happy, but it's questionable if she'll be enough these days. Maindecking a 2-attack unit for 4 is questionable in a world of valk enforcers and control decks. Aerial Battle now...kills Sediti? Still not worth the market slot unless you're in...Hooru control? Kira from a 2/2 to a 2/3 is...nice, but her issue is more the lack of good combat tricks in general, and the lack of good card draw in proactive J strategies. Heirloom blade has me a bit concerned in light of nightmare gates. A 4/4 relic weapon on turn 2 is a big oof. I don't think anything good can come of this. Lastly, midnight gale going to 4/4 is fairly significant. Having a 3-drop die to torch or hailstorm for no value is always painful. Now no longer the case. It also survives your own hailstorm, so there may be more justification for playing higher curve Feln decks now. Lastly, staff of stories got its fifth point of armor back that it lost god knows how long ago, so there's that.
Missed buffs/reversions:
Darya/Moonstone Vanguard/HotV: would be nice to see all of these reverted. HotV no longer sees any play, Darya and Moonstone Vanguard were deleted by the Praxis Pledge nerfs half the game's history ago. Maybe it's time to let them have another chance? Also, here's a wishlist of additional buffs:
Direwood slasher: 1/1 -> 1/2. Tavia: 2/2 -> 2/3. Borderlands lookout: reverted. Rhysta: can't block -> can't block if you don't have a relic. Livia: 3/2 -> 4/3. Units with endurance can't block -> enemy units with endurance can't block. Zende: 6 cost -> 5 cost. Acantha: 9SS 7/7 -> 6SSSS 5/5 Elvish Swindler: 3/4 for 5PP -> 2/3 for 4PP. 2 cost relics -> 3 cost relics. Soulfire Drake: 6 -> 5 cost. Spellshield architect: 3 cost -> 2 cost. Steadfast Deputy: 1/1 -> 2/1 (that's the aegis dork). Makkar's Quiver: 2SS -> 1SS (so you can get it with condemn). Shavka's Lute: 3FF -> 2FF (so you can get it with blazing salvo). Stonescar Maul: 6FF -> 5FF Smuggler's Stash: 6FS -> 5FFSS Darya/Moonstone Vanguard/HotV: reverted. Scream/highwayman: reverted.
All in all: steps in the right direction, to be sure, but still some changes that made me sad, while some reversions left off the list. All in all, much better than the last patch that simply dumpstered Elysian for golem's sins. Hopefully we can have more buffs in the future.

The boxes
Legend:
Green--the deck to play in this archetype, archetype to beat. Yellow--competitive deck in the current meta with the proper tuning. Orange--not really competitive, or just worse than another variant. Red--not really playable anymore, here for posterity/historical record keeping.
TL;DR:
Aggro--combrei or yetis. Midrange: FJS carver or Xenan strangers. Control: FTJ. Combo: FTS Talir. Some 2F aggressive midrange decks are also feasible. Everything else is either not recommended, or dead.
Commentary:
COMBREI: Combrei aggro is still going to be very strong. The ECQ winner didn't need to 3+1 stand together, and teacher of humility + Aamri's choice is just some next level bullshit. If you want to curve a bit higher for something like The Great Parliament, SoU, or prideleader, those options are also available to you, but I still think aggro is probably the way to go.
ELYSIAN: community: delete golem. DWD: understood, deleting Elysian. Elysian tempo went from a really cool deck to dead practically overnight as everything along its curve got hit by no small amount (snowcrust, borderlands lookout, teacher, spellshaper, Jennev's 3+1 ability, Daring Gryffyn). That said, deadly evenhanded elysian is still a very solid deck between distillation, prideleader, and the touch of battle wipes.
FELN: nightfall berserk depended heavily on a 3/2 Jennev merchant, her ability to 3+1, one of which included a 2-cost scream. All these things are gone, so I think this deck goes down in history now. CoCu Feln or some other high-curve midrange may be marginally playable, and then your Rost gets hit by madness and you question all your life choices. CoCu Feln that curved to big Vara is there for history's sake, and I still think reanimator will at least be ladder playable in a non-embarrassing capacity by 8-smug marketing grasping at shadows. The loss of 3+1 moves it from a green to a yellow, though.
STONESCAR: I've seen some shrine aggro lists running around, but they felt a bit all-in and janky to me in a world of prideleaders. I still think SS aggro/mid can only be so bad when Chacha is still phenomenal, instigator's great, and so is warleader. The 4-slot getting blasted by nerfs absolutely hurts, though. Also, don't play volatility; it's not worth it. Means to an End reanimator is just there for history's sake.
RAKANO: Rakano aggro (I.E. sharpshooter warhelm) just feels too inconsistent at doing something on a high enough power level to really feel competitive to me, gunslingers don't really have a payoff, and onis are garbage as far as aggro goes owing to lack of health increases before 4 power. On the midrange end, a deck that can play enforcer and big Icaria can only be so bad, though this is also out of a kindness to LocoPojo. I don't think valks are super-competitive owing to a whole slew of nerfs on the interaction suite (torch, defiance, vanquish all hit), privilege of rank (gutted), and two of its threats (Sediti and Rizahn), but enforcer + Icaria do a lot to carry the deck. Answer the Call here for history's sake.
PRAXIS: Rally tokens, at this point, I think you can throw in the towel, as you just get destroyed by anything playing prideleader, or anyone else playing mandatory attachment hate because shrine to carver is insane. Maybe I'm wrong here and some daring soul will try again. On the midrange end, the HotV nerf is just too keenly felt, and if you're in Praxis, you're essentially trading away Makkar's stranger and shadow interaction for nerfed torch, Ramba, and Kairos in the market that you can't 2 or 3+1 anymore. Not a trade I'm willing to take. Praxis used to have a playable Endra deck, which is no longer the case, and death of 3+1 kills any forge decks, whether Praxis or splash P/S.
XENAN: I suppose you can play Xenan elves, and you're not just completely reliant on sunset stone like praxis tokens leans on obelisk. However, a nerf to lookout, and the loss of the ability to 3+1 machinations means what was what I'd call bottom of yellow is now squarely in orange territory. And DWD couldn't even buff Livia. Sad panda. In the midrange category, you have the premium conventional time midrange deck of the format IMO in Xenan strangers. Makkar's stranger, Grodov's stranger, cat and Tocas in whatever quantities you wish. Terrific deck is terrific; if you're a good units junkie, this is the deck for you. Talir 1.0 is here for posterity.
ARGENPORT: I ran into an Unseen Aggro on ladder and it wrecked me, but the deck hasn't been prolific at all. I imagine it makes some upgrades to the expedition variant, such as with a better power base, better removal (choice of suffocate and annihilate), and most likely Valkyrie Enforcer. A bit of an unknown quantity to me at this point, tentatively putting it at orange. At midrange, I'm putting in the AP valks grinder list that saw some play, but it's probably not too well-positioned these days. You don't want to play Makto when there's a tier 1 madness deck. Revenge Hour is here for posterity, no longer playable thanks to slumbering stone's expedition nerf.
HOORU: I saw BK try to make some sort of Hooru combat tricks/blitz deck work not too long ago. Maybe there's something there. At midrange, Uelo and Jadehorn once again give reason to look at a pledge package in Hooru. In control, the usual collection of card draw and premium sweepers Hooru has access to allows you to play a classic style of control deck, but Rost isn't something I want to play into madness, Sanctum isn't something I want to play into FTJ, and the J variant lost a lot of power from the privilege nerf. FTJ essentially scratches this same itch and packs a higher power level.
SKYCRAG: yetis are possibly the premiere aggro deck in the game right now. Lucia built an amazing deck. Going to put Skycrag dragons in yellow as a kindness to LightsOutAce (and [GC]Anyway, who was working on this archetype in discord). Ace doesn't write about garbage decks. I've run into it a few times and haven't been absolutely blown away by it, but the deck seems solid enough. In control, we have spellcrag, but between slow torch and loss of 3+1, this deck is on the verge of red tier, though I'm holding out hope that skycrag's blazing salvo market might be able to salvage it. Kennadins is here for posterity. Maybe one more good spell or dragon next to Xo, Kenna, and EoH revives it with a volatility package in the future.
JENNEV: you can try and play Jennev midrange, but despite weathering so many nerfs when all the merchants kept getting hit, eventually, the HotV + 0/3 Auralian + slow torch nerfs finally did the trick. Still, you can play prideleader and Grodov's Stranger with peak, but you're most likely just better off playing FTJ. I've seen some Jennev temporal lists around as well in the past, but they're most likely jank and certainly not recommended by now. Jenndra is here for posterity; RIP sweet princess and all your fun combo decks. Oh, I forgot to list Diogo Combo as a red for obvious reasons.
WINCHEST: Gunslingers used to be a deck, but power levels have just passed it by at this point. Moving onto midrange, FJS carver may be the deck to play in throne right now. I skyrocketed to master this month grinding Ackerman's (dead now that 3+1 is gone) and boxer's variants alike, and the deck is a great example of what DWD just happens to anoint as a winner. Carver gets an effective 8 copies thanks to press-gang, Kato's way undercosted, and Shrine just allows the deck to win games it has absolutely no business being in because LOL OPOP. Strange Burglar is also an absolutely obscene engine, but the 6 power for the first activation means it's relegated to the market. Winchest "midrange" has had to once again ask Icaria to carry the deck after a whopping 15 nerfs IIRC (8 targeted if memory serves, and some more from Stonescar collateral damage, and avigraft before all of those). You can't be a goodstuff deck if your best cards are above average, and the rest of your cards went from great to mediocre. Winchest Endra here for posterity (a common refrain).
KERENDON: welp, so much for 3+1'ing machinations. I still think if you want to goof off with 3F aggro, minotaurs has enough fixing for a very simple power base that you can technically play them, and hammer of unity is still a nifty little card. I'm fairly confident there's a Dark Alessi build out there owing to similar shenanigans to what FJS carver does (press-gang for her, revive her with shadowlands guide), and Hojan + 1-cost killer provides a unit, ramp, and a huge amount of lifegain. Nevertheless, loss of 3+1 on machinations, stand, and sword of unity is going to be a major pain, and takes the deck from bottom yellow to squarely orange. TJS control was something I saw a long time ago (was never good), and TaliGrinva is here for posterity--that deck moved to FTS now, more on it later.
AURALIAN: whether it was rat cage or the more aggressive relic aggro, prideleader essentially seals this faction up. Auralian Elves would be more playable if the rate on their cards weren't as low as it is, since Zende + sunset stone just begs to do something very cool, but costs matter. Auralian mask of torment was something I brewed up a long time ago, and the deck is as playable as mask of torment is.
IXTUN: not a single currently playable deck. Blitz was something to abuse palace in the market for free wins, FJP Plate existed before markets, DWD smashed Ixtun Garden with nerfs on torch, defiance, and garden itself, and any Endra combo present in these colors is deader than dead.
FTJ / CREATION: stand together + grenadin cards might not be so bad these days, but is stand really worth losing shrine for? Probably not, IMO. Nevertheless, the big reason to be in these colors is the format's premiere control deck, which I now call FTJ Arcanum, as that's the primary common denominator, as there are various builds. Some go with the conventional Icaria package, while others go with a volatility package, as this is the only faction combination capable of running it. No matter which way you slice it, Xo juggling, Icaria, a hideously powerful site, your first Harsh Rule on demand--it's hard to ask for more here. Maybe one more draw spell in Praxis that isn't garbage.
FTS / DESTRUCTION: so, basically, two things going on here: I remember mgallop goofing off with an FTS carver deck, with the selling point being display of destruction + shrine to carver (Karvet) being able to give a fatty like Grodov's Stranger or Azindel Revealed charge way ahead of schedule, while still getting almost all the same KarveKato/Shrine "OPOP" nonsense that FJS does, aside from press-gang (who, by the way, is also very scary when getting lategame-relevant 1-drops like Alessi or Carver). Last I checked, the deck also ran combustion cell. However, the real gem in this tricolor faction is Talir Combo. Long story short: 5 power + display of destruction on a merchant + Talir + last chance for said merchant = free Kairos from the market that draws 6 cards, including a bunch of time destiny units that either wipe the opponent's board while drawing you a full hand and giving you a full board, or killing the opponent outright. The only exception, spectacularly enough, is a reanimator list that's ALSO going off, but now that reanimator got kneecapped, this is probably the go-to deck for those looking to scratch that "do nothing for a few turns, then make fireworks happen" itch. Just a bit of forewarning: playing this deck is HARD. It's the reason that only Almost can pilot the carveKato variant, though BlackIce has a more conventional time midrange build, and I hope he'll share it on EWC soon.
JPS / PURPOSE: nothing much going on here as far as I can tell. I suppose one can play a dark Hooru control style deck which I suppose I'd put at the bottom of orange because wisdom + honor of claws + harsh rule can only be so bad, but again, if you're after this sort of effect, FTJ just does better at scratching this itch. Dark Blitz was something Almost played at one point, but at this point, the deck needs to be drawing 2 cards every turn to function with how fast it can vomit a bunch of combat tricks which might not get it lethal. JPS never really had a combo or a midrange deck of note.
FPS / MENACE: RIP Haunted Highway. While you can, once again, scream highwayman, and defiance isn't that amazing anymore, we're long past the point in throne that a charging champion of fury (that's now a 3/1) is an acceptable first play on turn 3. I've run into some Felnscar dragons on ladder, and I have to say, it's really underwhelming. I think we're past the point in the game's history that Black-Sky Harbinger is effective as a vanilla 6-drop. Felnscar Control existed at one point in set 1 (I won my only ETS with it =P), but any attempts to rebuild it have not gone well, and with maiden being a 2/3 (why she's not back at 2/4, especially in this carver meta is an endless source of frustration with DWD with me), this is just not an archetype you want to be near right now. And of course, pour one out for Endra's best combo form in the form of Endra Scream/Haunted Harpway/Screaming Endra Brigade. That she got blasted so soon is just so sad. The 3+1 market nerf AND nuking golem (instead of scream) might have made her decks tolerable. I personally didn't pilot this deck well enough to love it in its heyday, but I appreciated the fact that it existed. Now, it's a historical footnote.
TJP / TRADITION: a bunch of fringe playable decks here, though none that I'd really recommend. Maybe there's a world in which you can combine JJ flyers with majestic skies, but in the reality of getting blasted by insignia up-tempo 2F decks, you put yourself at a disadvantage playing any 3F that can't generate obscene amounts of value like carver or FTJ. Good old Temporal Control is a deck you can also potentially play, but again, trading off Arcanum and best-in-class finishers (burying someone in volatility card advantage or Icaria) for Pit of Lenekta? Not where I want to be.

Zane: Frozen Heart Infiltrator [AKA The Suicidal Mobber]
Game version: [Hotfix] September 27, 2019
Category: Mobbing in M3
Level: 50
Summary: This build was made as a Zane player who loves the cryo element, but also adored the fast-paced gameplay of a melee Zer0 in Bl2. And thus, this suicider build was born. It is based entirely around the Frozen Heart shield and the Infiltrator class mod, which allows you and your clone to become walking (or, uh, standing) ice bombs that freeze everything around you. I've been playing this build at Mayhem 3 with slight difficulty (which is to be expected at M3), but considering I couldn't make it in M3 this well with the infinite action skill build nor the kill skill build, I think this is an achievement. I don't think this is the most efficient build out there with Zane, but it sure as hell is the most fun and feels the most satisfying to play, in my opinion.
Video: Frozen Heart Infiltrator: Zane Build. I could have done it quicker without the -50% to gun damage and the other -50% to SMG damage, but I wanted to get the recording/video aspect of this post out of the way. I show off the strategy I explain in the Gameplay section of this post. My music choice is non-negotiable.
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Skills: Gearbox - bl3skills
I went for the basic cryo/Clone build. It is pretty flexible I've found, you can safely swap around whatever skills you want to fit your playstyle except the ones listed below. I've even had it working with Zoomer instead of the Barrier, but I prefer the Barrier for a few reasons: it's nearly impenetrable, it's a very quick-charging action skill (which is something we need), and it works with the anointment on my shield. Also, I prefer having the skill of the tree I go down active. It feels more powerful.
You definitely want the Clone with you. The Clone allows you to escape danger easily, it gains a copy of your shield (the base of this build), and it can hold aggro, which is something Zane needs 'cause he can get pretty squishy in the thick of things. Furthermore, we're going to be using it as a mobile ice-slinging machine that draws aggro and kills things for us. More on that in a bit.
The Skills You Need:
In the Under Cover Tree:

• Calm, Cool, and Collected: This one is pretty solid for any cryo build. Unlike other cryo builds, however, we're using it for it's shield recharging capabilities, not for infinite action skills. You want this skill to be going off as much as possible. Sometimes you will get a reset of your durations, which is great when you have your barrier out.
• Brain Freeze: This skill is to tie in with Calm, Cool, and Collected. If you have a high RoF weapon and good aim, you should be constantly freezing things. I love this skill with my Night Hawking. It can also be used by your Clone, so try to give it something with burst fire. It will freeze things on its own and proc CCnC.
• Refreshment: This skill is amazing for Zane's survivability. We have only one point in it, but even one point is enough with 8% life steal. Considering the amount of frozen enemies that will be on the battlefield, you will have no trouble keeping your health up.
• Ready for Action: This skill is very good, because we need our shield full as soon as possible as often as possible. Pop 5 points into here. I get this skill instead of Adrenaline when I start going down this tree because I feel it's much more useful.

In the Doubled Agent Tree:

• Quick Breather: This skill is great to get your shield recharging ASAP. Like I've said before, we need this bad boy at full capacity as often as possible.
• Pocket Full of Grenades: We need the grenade regeneration.
• Boom. Enhance: The reason we need the grenade regeneration. A beefier clone can stand its ground just a little bit longer for you to teleport out of danger, should you need it. It can also cause some damage to enemies and distract them while they whittle down its shield.

Skills You Don't Need, But Maybe Want (You Can Swap These Out For Anything):

• Stiff Upper Lip: I like the damage reduction, and I'm like, 90% sure that increasing the capacity of my shield with Hearty Stock means it has to recharge for longer. Which we don't want. Thankfully, I'm not 100% sure, so go for either skill you want here.
• Rise to the Occasion: Health Regeneration. We want it! But don't need it. Put more points elsewhere if you want/can.
• Futility Belt: I like that it synergizes with Stiff Upper Lip. I also hate taking elemental damage. Go figure.
• Synchronicity: I like the damage buff. Without the kill skills coming into play for this build, we're kinda weaksauce.
• Praemunitus: I don't like reloading. Not enough to play Bottomless Mags Moze. But enough to get this skill. You can replace this with Borrowed Time for longer Barrier uptime. I prefer shorter Clone duration to have quicker recharge. We want to be proccing these Action Skills as often as possible.
• Donnybrook: More health regen? Yes. More gun damage? Also yes.
• Fractal Frags: I've heard mixed opinions on this skill. Personally, I like it for getting rid of mob's shields. You might not. It isn't mandatory.
• Duct Tape Mod: I needed somewhere to shove my points to get the capstone for this tree. It rarely comes into play.
• Supersonic Man: It's fun and my class mod buffs it anyway. Trick of the Light and Like a Ghost aren't strong enough to warrant getting, in my opinion.
• Double Barrel: I like this skill. You might not. You could try putting more points into Refreshment if you'd prefer to skip this skill. It might make you even more unstoppable. I prefer the higher damage overall, and the 20% buff after teleporting is noticeable to me.

The Augments:

• Binary System: Not really mandatory, but Schadenfreude is bugged out right now, so we get the second best thing. You can replace this with Dopplebanger if you're so inclined. I dislike the long charge time on that skill, though.
• Which One's Real?: We want the heat off our backs and our Clone taking shield damage. This skill makes it so the clone will get targeted more often than you will. Awesome.
• All-Rounder: This skill is just amazing. This is a must-have with the Barrier no matter the build, in my opinion. The longer cooldown rate is not noticeable at all.
• Deterrence Field: For some staggering abilities, because we're going to be up and in people's faces. It also gives a solid chunk of shock damage to take out shields.

I have tried this Build out different ways, and this is simply my favorite.
I have also tried a version of the build like this, with the Barrier and Clone out, but with Kill Skills available. It gives more survivability if that is something you struggle with. I prefer the Clone having more power, though. This is also the version where you can swap either skill out for the Drone. The Augments for the Drone should be Winter's Drone for cryo capabilities and Static Field for shields. Either could be interchanged with Bad Dose if you see fit; for example, if you are going to be fighting enemies with no shields.
Gear:
The most important part of this build!

• [Required] Frozen Heart: This shield is the basis of the entire build. You can get this off Aurelia. When depleted, it will release a large (seriously, the radius is huge) cryo nova that deals 11,154 damage and returns 30% of that as health. Mine is Anointed Operative to start recharging whenever I place down my barrier, but that isn't mandatory. It will make your gameplay easier, though. There are no alternatives for this. This shield is what the build is based off of.
• [Optimal] An Infiltrator Class Mod: I don't really care for any skill point combinations, because the most important part of this class mod is the fact that it breaks your shield upon action skill activation. I struggled for a while to figure out what could work with this mod that isn't a Rough Rider, and I think I finally found it.
  • [Alternative]: You can make this build work with the Cold Warrior mod for Zane, especially if you are struggling with survivability. Unfortunately, it will make your gameplay a little less high-risk, high-reward, and that's not something I want. YMMV.
• [Optimal] Ice Breaker White Elephant: I'm not... entirely sure how relics work in this game, but this one grants me +33% damage against frozen enemies. It also gives me +48% cryo efficiency, as well as +18% cooldown rate reduction. It's very nice. I'm looking for a level 50 one to pump those numbers up. This relic is also applied to your clone (I've seen him attach sticky bombs to enemies that got too close with melee attacks), so he will do more damage against frozen enemies, too.
  • [Alternative]: Any relic that buffs damage against frozen enemies. You're going to be facing them a lot, so you want to be able to damage them before they unfreeze. This will also stack nicely with Refreshment, since you get health back whenever you damage frozen enemies.
• [Optimal] Flakker: While I wish I could say this build melts every enemy you come across, it doesn't even tickle anointed enemies. I keep this in my 4th weapon slot in place of a launcher, because it just destroys everything I shoot at. When I see an anointed, I pull this gun out and deal with them.
  • [Alternative] Speedloading Hellwalker: While not as deadly as a Flakker, this gun still puts in some work. Very fun to give to your clone and watch them shred everything fleshy. Be sure to strip the shields of enemies near him and he'll carry himself with this gun. If I could have 5 weapon slots, this gun would be my first pick.
• [Optimal] Arctic Night Hawking: I like this SMG because it shreds everything, even with super debuffed gun damage. I don't know what the best prefix is, but I do like the arctic one because we're running a cryo build. This is my main weapon. I love it. The high RoF is amazing for Brain Freeze since you can spam crits and freeze things right as they unmelt. It's also great on the clone because it will aim for the head most of the time and freeze things on its own.
  • [Alternative] I've heard good things about the Binary Cutsman. One downside to this smg is how slow the projectiles are and the RoF and also the charge time. It's great on big enemies, like bosses, but not so much for mobbing, which is what we're doing with this build.
  • [Alternative] Any gun with a high RoF would likely be a nice fit for this slot. I've heard good things about the Lucian's and Rowan's Call guns. Maybe you can give them a try?
• [Optimal] The Laser-Sploder: I have a shock one to melt shields. It works beautifully, especially with the explosions around to hit other people clustered nearby. Aim for the head and their shields are gone in seconds.
  • [Alternative] Any gun that you think will melt down shields quicky. Shields don't play nice with cryo damage, so you want them gone on everything around you. Your choice!
• [Optimal] The Hornet: One of my favorite guns from Bl2. I use this mostly because I needed some corrosive damage to take down shields. I also like the burst fire, since my clone will use it, too, if I have to throw him out in a hurry.
  • [Alternative]: Any gun that will deal good corrosive damage with a high rate of fire. You want to get those crits. I had a corrosive Nemesis for a while. That may be a good choice if you can't get a Hornet.
• [Optimal] Storm Front: I like shock damage to melt shields. Like I said before, Fractal Frags and Duct Tape Mod aren't necessary, so maybe you don't care about grenades at all. In that case, ignore this.
  • [Alternative]: I hear the MIRV is a good grenade, but I haven't gotten one myself. I also heard Tiny Tina's Hippity Hopper is good. Haven't tried that one, either. I am thinking a Quasar would be a fun replacement for the Storm Front out of all of those.

Gameplay:
This build is for mobbing, and it works fairly well at Mayhem 3 given 2 things:

1. You're not being spammed by rockets from an unknown location. Know where they are coming from so you can run up to them before your shield goes down and freeze their dumb faces.
2. There aren't 3-5 anointed in one area because, whew, cryo does no good against them. Pull out the Flakker and try to take them down that way.

Other than those two caveats, I've been having a blast with it. I deal a ton of damage to frozen enemies, and any enemy that would cause problems is frozen before they can get a hit off on me.
The gist of it is that you want to have full shields at all times so you can discharge them as needed. When starting combat, I rush into the most populated area and deploy my clone. My shield breaks, freezing enemies in a huge radius around me (Frozen Heart don't care about health percentages), then me and my clone go wild with the Night Hawking.
When they unfreeze, I throw down my barrier and retreat to deal damage from afar while my clone takes the brunt of it. My clone's shield will usually go off after a bit, refreezing anyone stupid enough to stand by him. At that point, my shield should be back up, so I teleport in, usually with my barrier still active. I deal damage until my barrier goes down, then wait for my shield to explode and freeze everything again, then teleport away if my clone is still up, or retreat to a safe distance until my action skills are back up, shooting the frozen enemies as I go.
Annnd repeat until everyone is dead.
It's especially hilarious against bigger enemies like Tink Tanks or Goliaths, because you don't think you'd be able to freeze them, but I walk up to them, deploy my clone, and laugh while unloading lead into their heads (or helmets- then weird skull things). It even works on Badasses and Heavy Badasses (the ones with 3 health bars). It makes dealing with them infinitely easier, since they can't spam me with rockets when they're frozen.
As for Mayhem Modifiers, I cleared out a camp of launcher-toting badasses with severely decreased gun damage (slowly, but still) without dying and, for a Zane player, that's an achievement in my eyes. The only Mayhem Modifier you really want to avoid is the one that severely decreases your shield recharge rate (I think it is by 70%?). It will completely break your build. It's possible, but significantly less fun to play with. Thankfully, that modifier doesn't seem to occur that often.
Leveling guide:
When leveling my Zane, I went down the Under Cover tree first and I'm pretty glad I did. I had basically infinite action skill uptime at that point I could get Calm, Cool, and Collected, and my clone was still dealing damage as the bad scaling hadn't kicked in yet (lol). I went for Adrenaline until I was able to get Calm, Cool, and Collected, then swapped out Adrenaline for Ready for Action. Other than that, the skills are pretty much the same. I recommend getting Brain Freeze as soon as possible and using any mods that buff it. It's a very fun skill to use, especially with Hyperion SMGs.
For the Doubled Agent tree, I prioritized Borrowed Time until I got my Frozen Heart shield. Until you get that shield, your build is basically going to be an infinite action skill build. Which is fine, but slightly less fun, since you're simply standing in a bubble with your clone and shooting at enemies. With this build, you want to take damage for half of it, and want to stay out of danger for the other half. It is very fast-paced and requires a lot of micro-management and, yet, is so much fun and very rewarding when you clear an entire room of enemies in Mayhem 3 without breaking a sweat.
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Credits: Me, afaik. I haven't seen anyone else talking about the amazing Frozen Heart synergy on my main man Zane Flynt. And it should be talked about! It's super fun.
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EDIT: It turns out this build is also stupid levels of fun with the Black Hole shield. Highly recommend.

I ran into this issue specifically with Borderlands 2, but it also applies to a lot of other games that, while possible to mod, do not support modding innately. XCOM:EU is another game that people are enthusiastically modding despite it having no support whatsoever, while Skyrim is a good example of a game that has low-hassle mod support.
My issue with BL2 is inventory size; I'm generally very reluctant to discard old items I've outleveled, doubly so if they're unique/limited availability items from specific events or quests. In Skyrim, for instance, I tend to keep every piece of old armor I've worn rather than selling it (I generally get a house as fast as possible in Bethesda games). In BL2, I feel I can't play some characters anymore just because their inventory is completely full and I'm unwilling to discard that faithful shotgun that carried me 12 levels, and that's a total game-killer.
It's possible, with save or memory editing, to change a lot of things in BL2. I looked at editing my inventory size, but I got held up when the demonstrations of the tools led to things like "Here's my modded 200-item inventory full of nothing but legendary items I got through hacking the slot-machine minigame." When I see those things done in the same step, it makes it a lot harder for me to excuse editing inventory space as "modding" while frowning at unlimited legendary items as "cheating".
The issue gets even more confusing. There are plenty of mods for mod-supporting games like Skyrim, Torchlight, and so on that are generally labeled "cheat mods" as they make the game easy or trivial, and there's a memory hack I found interesting for BL2 that tricks the game into scaling the difficulty up as it would for 2 or more players while staying in single-player.
There's not really a point to this post other than that I want to hear other people's opinions on attachments to items in games, and modding vs. hacking in games like BL2, XCOM, etc.