Aselia Teaches Shadowverse: PTP Rune

Aselia / August 16, 2017

Hiya, it’s me, Aselia (you know; the person who builds bad fun decks for entertainment). This time, I will be showcasing my take on a Path to Purgatory Snowman Runecraft deck – built in the second season of Wonderland Dreams. Games with this deck are pretty fun, and the deck itself does not perform too terribly. You can see the list on the right.

The list aims to establish control in the earlygame, and continuously generate Snowmen through repeated Summon Snow and Rimewind going into the midgame. Generally, this allows you to accumulate enough shadows to play PtP by turn 7-9, while also maintaining board control with powerful Rune removals.

The only new card, Mister Heinlein, Shadow Mage, is a powerful card, especially when combined with Altered Fate, as it greatly increases the consistency at which you can activate your Snowmen, as Spellboostx5 is the magic number for this deck. Rimewind, Summon Snow as well as Fate’s Hand reach maximum effectiveness at a counter of 5, while it also provides a large benefit to Fire Chain and Fiery Embrace to deal with Wide and Large boards, respectively.

In addition to these standard removals, we also run the Winter’s Caprice>Angelic Barrage combo, which is a perfect answer to sticky or wide boards, such as Nephthys on turn 8. This variant is teched against slightly slower Midrange and Control style decks, however as the win condition is Path to Purgatory, be wary of control decks that you suspect may run Bahamut, and attempt to bait one out accordingly.

Game Plan

As a PTP deck, your objectives are to reach 30 shadows and have at least one Path to Purgatory active on your area as fast as possible. Your most potent Shadow generators will be Snowman generation cards, so these should be spellboosted as soon as possible.

Generally, Altered Fate should be saved for the last few shadows needed for Path to Purgatory, but there are occasions where you will need to use it as a cycle.

When Evolve turns kick in, your main targets will usually either be Timeworn Mage Levi or Snowmen. However, feel free to use Evolution Points as liberally as you want to clear the board as you see fit. There's no problem in playing Summon Snow and evolving a Snowman to clear or force a response.

Large snowman boards will inevitably be perceived as threats. Nobody wants to take 5 damage to face, and certainly nobody wants to permit possible Conjuring Force shenanigans. The deck has enough removal tools to have Evo points to spare, so use them freely to keep the board nice and clean-- your opponent will be forced to react. You’re advancing your win condition all the way.

Removal Options

Let’s take a look at what sorts of Removal we have, since this is a key aspect of playing the deck.

I have grouped all the removal spells into five main categories; each serving a different role in the decision-making process of your turns, as you will usually want to keep the opponent's board as clear as possible.

Destroy

If you suspect your opponent runs heavy threats, save Fiery Embrace and use it only when necessary. Ex. Bahamut

Transform

If your opponent has sticky followers, use Winter’s Caprice to remove their effects. Ex. Ultimate Carrot, Mordecai the Duelist, Ouroboros.

Controlled Damage

These removals will usually be used in the early game to take out weaker units. Angelic Barrage is particularly good against Aggro Sword, Skeleton and Bat decks.

Random Damage

These are heavier removal spells that revolve around a random engine. You will usually want to play Secrets of Erasmus when the enemy area only has heavy threats. Fire Chain can be spellboosted to high damage values, enabling a powerful and flexible wide clear if necessary.

Recycle (Bounce)

Kaleidoscopic Glow can be used on Snowmen or Levi if you need to draw or spellboost. Glow and Rimewind should only be used on enemy followers that do not have a significant fanfare (or evolve) effect. Ex. Do NOT use on Demonlord Eachtar, Freshman Lou, Winged Sentinel Garuda, etc. Unless absolutely necessary. Make sure to make the best of your removal options, and use Evolves on Snowmen and Levi to keep the board clean.

There are also three spells that I tag as ‘Special’:

• Kaleidoscopic Glow – This can be used to bounce Snowmen or Timeworn Mage Levi back to your hand for either extra value, while generating a count of Spellboost and a card. Do not be afraid to use Glow in this way, but you will want to keep it against Haven, and is usually a good option for answering most Turn 2 plays.
• Secrets of Erasmus – If you feel the game is going to be a grindfest, playing Secrets of Erasmus on turn 9 with its Enhance ability grants a powerful body. This is great to punish slow opponents, as well as create a Kill-on-Sight threat. It’s a good way to get extra value while stalling out a few more turns for Path to Purgatory.
• Rimewind – This is one of your powerful shadow generators. This is best used at 4+ spellboost to cause a tempo loss to your opponent. For example, if your opponent evolved a Rahab and traded it into a 1/1 Snowman, you can play Rimewind on it to reset its stats, create a board of Snowman, as well as force your opponent to spend 4 more play points to put it back into play.

Altered Fate; and How to Use It

Altered Fate is best used as late as possible. This is for two reasons:

1. All spellboost cards immediately lose their value upon casting Altered Fate.
2. Casting Altered Fate immediately gives your opponent information on your deck.

There is a significant advantage of withholding the fact that you are playing PTP, as Conjuring Force Snowman is the immediate assumption most players will make when Summon Snow/Rimewind is played. Because of this, your opponents will likely play into your gameplan by using excessive resources to clear your snowmen and netting you Shadows.

Of course, this does not mean if you have a poor hand, you should hold off on Altered Fate. If your hand lacks options, or you do not have the cards needed for the matchup, play Altered Fate even if you are losing Spellboost value. That is why Heinlein is in the deck-- so you can quickly regain spellboost as necessary.

Sometimes you will have to play Summon Snow in suboptimal situations, but anything 3x~ summon is very solid. Do not be greedy with the deck as you have many resources at your disposal through Fate’s Hand and Altered Fate. Remember: you are effectively a control deck until Path to Purgatory is activated. Your deck can afford to go hard on removal options: you’re generating at least one shadow anyway.

Mulligan Phase

So you’ve built the deck, and queued into your first game. Now what? There are a couple cards that you want to look for while piloting PTP Snowman. I have modified the decklist to include rating tiers for your mulligan, and opening hand:

• S – You will almost always keep this card
• A – This card is usually good to keep, but may depend on matchup
• B – Matchup-specific, though if you have cards you need you can keep them
• C – You will usually toss this card, though spellboost cards are useful to have in your hand if your early plays are locked in (Angelic Snipe, Insight)
• D – You do not want this card in your opening hand.

Keep in mind that several cards are much better in certain matchups-- for example, Kaleidoscopic Glow is not a wise keep vs Dragon, but Angelic Barrage is powerful against Aggro Bat (but is a poor keep vs Vengeance).

The following cards are generally the ones you will auto-keep, aside from Summon Snow (this is your top priority). You will also want to have some Spellboost value such as Fate’s Hand, Fire Chain or Fiery Embrace as you prepare your 1/1 board floods.

Early Game

Now, you are opening the game. What is the best way to pilot the deck? Pretend you’re control. You absolutely want to be boosting a Summon Snow, and casting it on turn 3 or 4 to generate a board. Insight, Angelic Snipe, Magic Missile and Kaleidoscopic Glow are great for this purpose. Against 2 defense targets in the early game, you can choose to use your 1 damage pings on them, especially if you happen to have Angelic Barrage, though if you are going second with either Summon Snow or Timeworn Mage Levi in your hand, you may opt to go for face instead. Kaleidoscopic Glow is especially great against Haven, enabling you to bounce their Countdown Amulets to mess with their ordering.

Once the snowmen are down, you will want to boost more cards, either Removal (Fire Chain, Fiery Embrace), more Snowman generators (Summon Snow or Rimewind), or Fate’s Hand. If your hand does not look good for the future and you have Altered Fate, go ahead and use it now. However, make sure to keep track of how many Path to Purgatory you have discarded.

Midgame

By this point you should have more or less an even board, and sufficiently spellboosted removal options to answer your opponent's threats. The midgame will vary depending on your hand and your opponent. For example, if you are against Midrange Shadow, and your opponent has 3 units in their area, you will want to attempt a full clear due to the threat of Demonlord Eachtar on turn 7. Against slower decks like Haven or Dragon, you either want to generate more Snowmen, or take the opportunity to boost, refresh, or cycle your hand to search for Path to Purgatory or more shadow generators.

It is important to have a rough idea of your opponent’s game plan at this stage as well. Prepare for Rhinoceroach OTK Forest by playing Mister Heinlein; start boosting up and saving a Fiery Embrace against Dragon, boost up Fire Chain against Aggro Blood or Midrange Shadow, etc. Your decisions will greatly impact how you set up your finisher.

Endgame

At this time, you usually want to have around 30 shadows by turn 7~9, or enough cards to Altered Fate into 30 shadows. On these turns, either bait out threats or play Path to Purgatory/Altered Fate. You can bait a threat by swapping to an aggressive option such as evolving a Snowman to your opponent’s face (this usually suggests that you are preparing for Conjuring Force combos), or just go for the Path to Purgatory. Watch out for Dragon (Bahamut) and Blood (Emeralda)'s amulet removal options.

Conclusion

Post-nerf, I've been experimenting with several janky decks, and thus I came across Snowman PTP, which has actually proven decent. While the aggro matchup is generally bad, Angelic Barrage and Fire Chain can dramatically swing the board in your favor vs Aggro Sword and Aggro Bat, quickly running your opponents out of steam. Meanwhile, against Midrange decks such as Shadow, PTP can usually come out fast enough to win the game. While I would not recommend playing this deck if you wish to ladder very very quickly, this deck is rather fun in my opinion, and actually is not as bad as it seems. Give it a run if you like this sort of deck. It may surprise you.

Wonderland Dreams: Community Theorycrafting

Bagoum / June 28, 2017

For the past few days, we've been collecting some theorycrafted decks for Wonderland Dreams from community members over at the Shadowverse Bagoum Discord. Today, I'd like to showcase a few of the most interesting theorycrafts the community came up with, as well as provide my viewpoint on how these decks might function in the new meta. We have four decks here today.

Neutral Aggro Sword - Neyuh

This is the first time in about seven months that I have seen a serious Swordcraft deck without Albert. Current Sword is heavily reliant on Storm damage, but the incredibly powerful stats offered by neutral synergies in Sword may make it viable to focus on hard board gameplay. This deck currently runs 11 Sword cards, and while this is an optimal number for card counting interactions like Beauty and the Beast, it may be less necessary for this sort of deck, where the only major counting interaction is Strix.

In the end, though, I do think that all Sword decks are better with 3x Albert, and I would imagine that an optimized form of this deck would cut Goblin Princess for Albert. Some players may want to take this build in a more faction-specific direction, but any more than 14 faction cards makes Strix questionable. One could replace Strix for Jeno, but 4/5/5s are incredibly strong, and any faction cards beyond that would make Alice questionable as well.

Neutral Tempo Haven - Unna Forte

This deck is intriguing mostly because it so greatly refuses to abandon class synergy for neutrals, even while incorporating the neutral powerhouse Lion of the Golden City. From my perspective, it's not clear whether these faction synergies can outpower the potential of an early Lion-- would you rather hold the threat of Snow White into Heavenly Hound, or the threat of a 4-5 mana Lion on Beastcall?

Regardless, this deck does strongly resemble Storm Haven, and I imagine that it will likely be played in the same vein, except with a greater emphasis on board control with Snow White/Hound, Teatime, and Lion. As such, I would strongly support the inclusion of Dark Jeanne in this list, replacing most likely Whitecat Sage and Ancient Lion Spirit. In addition, it should be noted that Lion is an incredibly powerful play even when not boosted, and is in many respects simply better than Garuda (since you do not need to pay for the amulet). I wouldn't worry too much about ensuring Lion synergy, unless you want to go really hard (deck by Bagoum).

Neutral (Actually Tempo) Tempo Forest - kowoyoshi

Last expansion, some of the most well-known streamers in the community hyped up the power of Beetle Warrior, a card they declared would bring back the days of RoB-era 6pp Forest lethals. Yet for all that, Tempo Forest saw absolutely no play in TotG, and the question now is whether more powerful curve options for Tempo Forest can make it worth playing over Roach OTK.

We will need to test the archetype extensively, and the list here provides an example of how one might build a Tempo Forest deck with Neutral synergies. However, excessive reliance on Looking Glass (as Forest cannot afford to cut much of its faction package) hinges much of the new neutral synergies on draw luck, and I suspect that a more direct faction-heavy Tempo Forest, reminiscent of DE, will provide more consistency. Consider, for example, the classic Tia and Cynthia, as well as the TotG powerhouse Aerin.

Aggro Carabosse - Just Lurking

Carabosse is certainly one of the least understood cards of the expansion, and we currently don't have a proper idea just how powerful it will be. This deck seeks to take advantage of Blood's incredibly powerful tempo-removal options in the form of Knuckle and Sabreur to aggro down the opponent, but tops with Carabosse and Sabreur to provide powerful refuel into the midgame.

It's not clear that Carabosse is more optimal than more early-game consistency for Aggro Blood, but if WD brings a resurgence in midrange decks, then Carabosse can effectively counter them by providing a source of DoT burn that few factions can sustain. Otherwise, I'd advise you to keep your eyes on Disagreeable Demon and Knuckle-- these two cards, while only Bronze, may end up being some of the most oppressive cards of the set, both within and without Aggro Blood.

Closing Thoughts…

I am in part excited for, and in part wary of, the many new archetypes that will see play in the new expansion. In large part, I anticipate that we will see a surge in value-based midrange decks (much like Daria in RoB), with Abyss Blood joining Aegis Haven and Nephthys Shadow as the major control decks. With the way things are going, I don't have much hope for combo decks. Is it finally time for Roach to go? Find out next time on Community Theorycrafting :11:

Sheep Coachings Episode 1 - Control Sword (ft. stolz) - March Update

OnionSheep / March 9, 2017

This time, we'll dive deeper into tournament preparation and take a closer look at a class people claimed to be dead at the start of "Rise of Bahamut."

We are trying to find a fine deck to play in tournaments and one recommendation I can give is Control Sword.

Control Sword - Why play it?

Albert, Levin Saber is fairly straightforward. It is effectively an Imp Lancer which costs one less play point, and it also has an Enhance effect which is your primary win-condition going into most matches-- bursting 6-10 damage starting from turn 9.

Frontguard General was never a bad card to begin with, but back in the DE heyday of Midrange Sword, a more offensive build than Control Sword is now, Sword's curve topped at 6pp. It simply did not fit in the archetype and was not contributing enough towards the win condition. Not to mention, Roaches weren't everyone's biggest nightmare.

Sword in Rise of Bahamut has suffered primarily from all the board clear additions to several classes, as well as Bahamut itself. To name a few: Breath of the Salamander, Ancient Lion Spirit, Bloodhungry Matriarch, etc. It also used to have the strongest board throughout all classes with Sea Queen Otohime and Floral Fencer. Recently, Tempo Rune consistently builds up a bigger board than Sword is able to, which forces Sword into the defensive and into control.

Card Breakdown

Without further ado, I will give a brief explanation of the cards in the deck. There are a couple cards which I will discuss at greater length later.

Unicorn Dancer Unica

Widely used anti-aggro card. Control Sword, to my surprise, performs rather poorly against aggro, primarily due to only having wards to stabilize later on. It can easily get burned to death due to the lack of healing. That is why you need to tech against aggro to survive the early game even though it diminishes the value of your deck.

Veteran Lancer

The best defensive 2-drop in the game. 2/2 stats with Ward is very good on turn 2 but even later on it forces awkward trades, and Wards save lives!

Maid Leader

This is a filler card, but the directed draw must be kept in mind at all times to your advantage. It has at least a 50% chance of drawing a Ward. Keep track of how many Commanders you have in hand and in your deck.

Whole-Souled Swing

You are playing reactively-- you want as many of these as you can. It is so strong against 2/2s, and even post-evo, you can finish off 2hp followers. Offers a big tempo swing.

Healing Angel

It fulfills the same role Unica does, and a 2/3 body is a good statline for 3-drops.

Novice Trooper (Removed)

This card does not do enough for a control deck, especially compared to Blitz Lancer and Jeno.

Blitz Lancer

Very underappreciated card, although it's seeing more and more play. For details, see below.

Giant Slayer (Added)

Tsubaki is a card people will play around, Giant slayer is not. You are really happy if they shrink down their board to play an 5/6 Ancient Elf or you have an easy answer to opponents evo Albert on t5. Also it trades 1:1 with Bahamut while giving you 7 additional pp to play around with. The cheapness of this removal gives it flexibility and makes this card shine through many scenarios, rarely is it a dead card because even vs aggro you can hit evolved Veight and Imp Lancer or Shadowreaper / Cerberus. Since this is card is actually completely forgotten, the surprise element is also always on your side.

Jeno, Levin Vanguard

One of the backbones of this deck, a fast card that also works well on turn 6-- flexible and strong.

Amelia, Silver Paladin

It is better than Jeno going 2nd, and very strong versus aggro. If they have more than 3 followers this feels similar to a Floral Fencer on steroids.

In the update, we added a third Amelia. Very good vs 4/5 or even 5/5 bodies-- can evolve into a Goblinmount or Feena without dying-- and sets up Cyclone Blade to an extent. The reason to stock this up to 3 is to improve the Daria-matchup.

Aurelia, Regal Saber

Sometimes a win-condition. Crucial vs aggro and decks with Storm, such as Shadow and Forest.

Monika, Cloudhall Admiral (removed)

Replaced by Amelia. Having the consistency and predictability of which commanders you pull with your maids is more valuable than this card. You basically have a 75% chance to draw a ward when this card is removed. Also, the 4 drop is incredibly important in the tempo game.

Albert, Levin Saber

The card to carry sword-- I think Sword would actually be dead if it were not for Albert.

Cyclone Blade

Sword can get outswarmed-- especially Control Sword-- and now with Tsubaki and more Amelia (potentially 0 cost Gelts) this card’s value has gone up. As such, the deck now runs 2 Cyclone Blade.

Alwida's Command

Call of the Alwida, the versatility of this card make this the get-go 6-drop. It can trade, it can push for lethal, it blocks off the counter engage-- basically the most versatile of Sword's reactive high-drop.

Tsubaki (Added)

Useful in the current meta-- notably vs Daria or Bahamut-- even though I like Fangblade more, you might die before Fangblade gets played.

Frontguard General

This card is critical in walling off your opponent. Apart from Pixie Mischief, I don't see Forest breaking through this. If you are worried about White Wolf of Eldwood, avoid playing this into their turn 8; just play Alwida’s instead and they will despair.

Fangblade Slayer

Overlooked by many, right now the real strength of this card is that nobody plays around it. People always play around Albert as best they can, but this additional 3 damage catches the opponent off-guard. Some players choose Dragonewt Charlotte over this card, however Charlotte cannot go for chip-damage and 2:1 at the same time, because if you go face, you don’t control the board, and a 4/7 body is actually less pesky than a 3/x with bane. If they play a hard removal on your Charlotte you might simply die because they still have their strongest minion on board, where it would be gone if you'd played Fangblade instead. And with regards to the update: What's better than one Fangblade? Two Fangblades.

Dark Angel Olivia (Added)

It is not just Albert that is your ultimate win condition, but rather Albert + Evo pt. Having evolve points left is really strangling for your opponent. The highest pressure of remaining evolve points is Sword at the moment-- this is why Olivia is really important in Sword.

Bahamut (removed)

Sword’s strength is not in grinding but rather bursting and you cannot outdraw other control decks. You can still opt to go for Bahamut if it’s your style of play.

The deck presented is a variation on stolz' original Control Sword. These are the changes that were made in the most recent iteration (older list here):

1. On Unica: Unica was a soft taunt, thus a generally worse Veteran Lancer; there are very rare cases where Unica would be better than Veteran Lancer, since it has to survive for 2 or more turns to be actually better.

2. On Blitz and Novice: Most of the time, I use Novice Trooper to hit a follower, like a Fairy, a Goblin, or even a 2/2, but Novice can deal with neither Yurius/Snake Priestess nor Clarke/Healing Angel, and there are also cases where Blitz Lancer deals more face damage than Novice does. For example, if the opponent plays 2 fairies on turn 2, you Blitz/Novice one of them and they Ancient Elf the following turn. If you answer the Ancient Elf with Jeno you actually get to push 1 additional chip-damage and the 3/1 leftover body is significantly better than a 2/1; it does not get traded for free by Fairy-evo, and Elven Princess Mage-evo leaves behind a 4/2 which dies to Whole-souled Swing. Furthermore, turn 8 Blitz Lancer + Cyclone Blade clears far better than the Novice Combo can.

3. The times I found Novice Trooper useful are the games against control decks to push for chip damage, or against Daria if they miss their Clarke trying to race them, but in times where they place a turn 3 Ogler or 3/4 Ancient Elf, Art of the Ninja/Jeno are the only cards which can effectively answer such a threat. Due to the nature of Ambush, Art of the Ninja also provides some savage damage (14) going into turn 9 in conjunction with Albert.

4. On Tsubaki: Tsubaki was initially cut in this list, but has been added back for more Cyclone potential, as well as its great strength against Daria and Bahamut.

5. On Fangblade: A lot of times I experienced difficulties closing out the game, mostly with the opponent at 11 or just barely out of reach. Fangblade is able to fix that problem with the additional face damage it provides while at the same time conserve your evo points even if you are behind. The leftover body is not to be trifled with, since it has Bane. The downside is, of course, its cost, but there were many times I would have played Fangblade over Odin. Additionally, Fangblade kills minions below 5 attack whereas Tsubaki, a similar consideration, does not.

General Mulligan Guide

The general outline of how a game progresses depends heavily on your opponent, this deck mostly wins between turn 7-9. Your early game tries to go on par with your opponent and you aim to overwhelm them in the mid-game and close out the game with burst. Albeit counterintuitive it is not right to mulligan for as much early game as possible, especially in open decklist encounters.

Going 1st you want Jeno, and going 2nd you want Amelia. Blitz Lancer is really good and all your 2-drops are insanely good vs aggro. However, vs control you only want Maid Leader as your 2-drop and mulligan for your mid game tempo swing cards (the deck is rather reactive and you lack draw). In general cases Fangblade is better than Tsubaki vs Control Blood and Seraph Haven.

Thought Process

When you reach a certain threshold in tournaments, you have to stay unpredictable, this is what all the one copy cards in this deck are about. It is not simply a game where you play the board, it will become a psychological game as well. It’s the same as in Poker where your strategy sometimes fails against new players, because they do not follow through the same thought process as you do. But when we’re talking about high stakes tournaments, this deck performs exceptionally well in the high-end spectrum of a tournament-- particularly if decklists are open, with the amount of bluffs you are able to set up. Meanwhile it does not lose the power of a strong consistent deck.

Tournament Meta

I think most will believe me, without having to back it up with data, that Tempo Rune has had the most 1st place finishes in recent tournaments. It is safe to say that at the moment the viability of any decks in tournaments boils down to their ability to beat Daria. This deck however shines in its match-up versus the very popular Forest Roach Combo deck, which gets shut down by wards. Following these 2 decks there are many Aggro Bloods and Seraph Haven to be seen around. So taking the meta into account, I sat down for an interview with stolz, a strong and consistent control player (who placed 7-8th ExG 3rd Dec, 3rd ExG 21st Jan, and won the ExG Take Two Tournament on 7th Jan) to give us a deeper insight on why he chooses Control Sword and how he has success with it.

Why did you decide to run Control Sword in the last tournament?

Roach and Daria are the most picked tournament decks and Sword has a fair game against both of them. One just has to close out the game quickly against Daria.

In the last ExG tournament, weren't you using a more hybrid midrange build?

I've slightly updated the list and here is the list I would play now. (the list covered in this article)

I feel Bahamut was never much needed in the deck, and Maid + Cyclone has bricked my hand multiple times.

Bahamut can be played as a failsafe against Rune when you get into the late game and they topdeck a Daria to refill the board. Both 1 Maid and 1 Cyclone have been removed since you absolutely do not want to have 2 Cyclones in your hand. Hand size is usually pretty small as Sword because there are not too many good draw mechanics.

After it's initial teaser, most people looked down on Blitz Lancer, saying it would never see the daylight again after the release. People were like: "Arena card, next!"

Yurius, Clarke.

Floral Fencer?

It requires an evo point, otherwise it's just a Goliath.

Odin vs Fangblade?

Seraph is annoying, but by forfeiting Odin’s your deck’s overall strength and consistency rises. Your wincon is racing Seraph by having a strong t7-t8 where the opponent cannot afford to Drop seraph.

How do you plan out your game and what is the base idea when you are executing the deck?

The general idea is you answer their 2-drop with your 2-drop/3-drop, then you answer their 3-drop with your 3/4-drop. For example, going second, you Whole-souled Swing their 2/2 and Blitz Lancer their 3-drop and Jeno their 4-drop and so on.

Which Cards are the weakest link in this deck?

The only flex points for me are Tsubaki and Amelia, really.

Which cards are worth considering as substitution?

Fangblade Slayer, Lucifer, Art of the Ninja, Whole-souled Swing, Blitz Lancer, Jeno.

Who do you want to be the next Swordcraft Leader if neither Erika nor Latham were good enough?

Alexander, this guy never gets love. He is the Conqueror!

Any suggestions you have for the players who are about to netdeck you?

Curving out with the deck is important, make sure to mulligan accordingly for it. Since there is basically no draw you have to keep up with your opponent every turn of the game and edge out card advantage by 2 for 1 or 3 for 1 with your high value cards. Now have fun beating up some Darias and Roaches!

Where is my Waifu?

Some of you might ask: Where is Otohime? One issue with Otohime's Bodyguards is they guard absolutely nothing. The new board clear, Cyclone Blade, has so much synergy with Otohime that you can use it afterwards on Otohime to kill off your useless guards. Jokes aside, in a deck where I play no Sage Commanders, no Wind God, and literally not a single card in the deck to buff cards already in play, Otohime does not generate a significant threat. She is going to hurt you more than she will help you, either by giving the opponents multiple targets to Piercing Rune or by board locking you vs Roach Forest, thus giving them 1-2 additional turns to have enough pp to OTK you. There are more cards with the ability to 1:1 Otohime than ever. If I'm not mistaken, it used to be only Themis's Decree that cleared it on a consistent basis. Nowadays, Ancient Lion Spirit and Breath of Salamander clear flawlessly, whereas Matriarch punishes with at least 4 face dmg adding salt to the wound.

I want to thank stolz for contributing with his decklist and the interview and Bagoum for letting me using this awesome portal to display my content. My name is OnionSheep and I'm a dedicated TCG/CCG player. I started playing card games competitively with Hearthstone and recently I placed 5-6th in ExG EU/NA 10th Dec; 3rd in the ExG SEA/OCE 14th Jan and 2nd in the ExG EU/NA 21th Jan respectively. My favorite classes are Forest and Rune, since those were the most complex decks to play when I started out Shadowverse during Darkness Evolved. This series is targeted at an experienced player base but I tried to keep it as simple as possible. If you have any questions or suggestions, including on which decks you want to learn next, feel free to contact me at koksriecher@gmail.com. You can follow me on twitter (@Bronionsheep) and on Twitch. You can also find me in the ExG Discord channel.