Author: Tom Sorenson

Draft

Spreadsheet: Slow Champions
Category: Establishing Draw (C-Tier)
Internal Category Tier: E-Tier

Spreadsheet: Card Draw
Category: Slow Champion 1-Draw (C-Tier)
Internal Category Tier: E-Tier

Constructed

Tier 5

Finding time to play a slow, 1-cost, 5/5 champion, whose board presence relies on having other Wild champions in play (especially a lot of Wild champions and/or Breakthrough champions) seems effectively impossible to me, even with the card draw attached. Further, even if you were able to play it, your opponent can immediately end the effect by removing this card, primarily with Scarros or Smash and Burn trigger (also potentially Lightning Strike, Draka’s Fire, Whirlwind, Hurricane, Kong, other re-establishing cards). That being said, since it doesn’t need to attack, it is effectively immune to combat removal and Spike Trap-esque effects. While it might be slightly harder to get rid of than I was originally thinking, it seems so hard to fit it into a required Wild shell.

The fact that this and most 0-cost Wild champions (wolf tokens) gets swept up by Scarros, Draka + 0-cost 2-damage effect, Draka’s Fire, etc. is devastating. You invest a bunch of time an resources into setting this up, and then your opponent incidentally stomps it all out doing what they want to be doing anyway, brutal. Further, against fast Wild decks, if you spend a turn doing nothing immediately impactful like this, you’re dead. Against control, they’ll usually be able to board clear you before you can gain significant value, although the card draw effect helps offset this, against Kark and eventually Scara’s Gift, you still don’t have the time to waste. Finally, Wild just doesn’t have other synergistic tools for extending the game long enough to potentially extract value from this. For instance, all of its in alignment board clears clear this too. Great with Hunting Pack though.

All of this being said, this has been played against me multiple times, and it has felt oppressive and terrifying. But, I won all of those games. … (I think. Correct me if I’m misremembering.)

Okay, so after I finished this and wrote up my rating for Howl dismissing the idea of a wolf deck, you can probably guess what happened. I made a new wolf deck. Got to say, deck has some legs (about 258). But in all serious, deck might have potential (if I could find more human opponents to test it against). I finally caved and put it in a Raging T-Rex, Brach, Smash and Burn shell, and the deck as a whole has felt solid so far. Boosted constructed tier from 7 to 5.

Draft

Spreadsheet: Other
Category: Burn (B-Tier)
Internal Category Tier: A-Tier

Constructed

Tier 4

This is a Flame Strike that trades 1 damage for the 1-cost Fireball effect as an Or. Reasonable for clearing out non-demon tokens and other 3-health champions or finishing off the opponent. If I had to draft between this and Fireball, I’d take the Fireball because 0-cost removal is great as is 0-cost 3 damage on top of a 1-cost burn event to extend your reach. If you’re drafting an aggressive deck, this seems solid, reasonable in a midrange deck, underwhelming in a control deck, unless you think your opponent is going tokens.

For constructed, this actually would be a pretty decent choice for aggro Wild if you are afraid of aggro-combo human tokens. Human tokens are a terrible matchup for Wild generally speaking, so including another 1-cost card that can save you from an early assault is valuable, and unlike Hurricane etc., it can still go face for 7 instead. Is this better than Whirlwind for specifically that roll though? No, I’d say they are pretty equivalent, and Whirlwind has greater applications. However, against other aggro Wild decks, not taking 7 damage yourself might make this worth it. This card just doesn’t fit my preferred playstyle.

Apologies for missing my Tuesday/Thursday posts, but I have a solid chunk queued up after this one.

Draft

Spreadsheet: Slow Champions
Category: On-Turn Punisher (C-Tier)
Internal Category Tier: D-Tier

Constructed

Tier 9

Worse Rampaging Wurm.

The literal only times this is inherently better than Rampaging Wurm

• Your opponent blocks with Brak, Fist of Lashnok
• You block Burrowing Wurm

Neither of those are real things that would feasibly happen.

The lower offense means this can’t break Kong/Sea Titan/Steel Golem/etc, it hits face for less, and it can’t block Brak/Steel Titan. The difference between 14 and 17 defense is also fairly trivial (outside of potential buffs) because no non-combat effect does more than 13 damage currently. It does protect the cyclops from 1-3 damage 0-cost effect + either Kong effect or attack which might be relevant at some point though.

A plain (vanilla) blitz champion with less than 15 offense is a card that I absolutely agree should be in a simplified Duel deck product. I also like that it is the biggest champion in Duels, with the ability to break and survive any other Duels champion in combat. That being said, it currently adds no value to Epic cardpool as a whole.

Draft

Spreadsheet: Card Draw
Category: Draw 2 Ands (S-Tier)
Internal Category Tier: A-Tier

Constructed

Tier 2

This card is one of the best cards in Duels. It is a Draw 2 And ambush champion. The fact that it is a champion is enormous. It means that you can grab it with Tier 1 card Mist Guide Herald. You can also replay it if bounced, unlike Urgent Messengers or Flanking Maneuver. Finally, unlike the other Draw 2 And champions (The Gudgeon, Raging T-Rex, Garbage Golem) you can inherently play it off-turn to draw 2.

In draft it is a bit worse than some of the other Draw 2 Ands because its And is a bit less impactful.

Draft

Spreadsheet: Card Draw
Category: Board Clears (A-Tier)
Internal Category Tier: D-Tier

Spreadsheet: 0-Cost Cards
Category: Tech [Draw 2] (A-Tier)
Internal Category Tier: Tech-Tier

Constructed

Tier 4

This is technically a board clear, but it can only be played on-turn and returns all of your opponent’s champions to hand. So, if they were swarming you with a bunch of 0-cost champions, they can just replay them. If they had strong Tribute/Loyalty or Blitz/Ambush champions, they can just replay them for value. Strictly as a board clear, it is pretty much only reasonable if your opponent has a bunch more 1-cost champions in play than you do, or they have a bunch of tokens. The reason why similar card Reset is so much better is because that one can be played off-turn to disrupt any 1-gold assault, especially token (Insurgency) or untargetable/unblockable assaults (Steel Titan).

However, you don’t bring this primarily to clear your opponent, even though it does tack a discard onto your opponent as well, you bring it because it lets you return your own champions to hand. For example, play a bunch of 0-cost champions with Blitz (Dark Knight) or Tribute/Loyalty effects (Javelin Thrower), attack with the blitzers, play this, replay your 0-cost champions, gain double value. Combine this with Time Walker and Reset for redundancy, and you have a base for a deck. The fact that this returns your opponent’s champions to hand is more of a bonus effect that buys you time against non-blitz, non-burn champions.

The discard frequently won’t be super relevant because bounce and discard effects generally have anti-synergy. If you are returning a bunch of non-token champions to your opponent’s hand, they probably will have plenty of cards that they don’t mind discarding one. They might even have a Markus, Soul Hunter, or Smash and Burn to gain value out of the discard effect.

Draft

Spreadsheet: 0-Cost Cards
Category: Other (A-Tier)
Internal Category Tier: A-Tier

Spreadsheet: 0-Cost Cards
Category: Small Removal (A-Tier)
Internal Category Tier: B-Tier

Spreadsheet: 0-Cost Cards
Category: Burn (B-Tier)
Internal Category Tier: C-Tier

Constructed

Tier 2

Only have three 0-costs slots and you can’t decide if you want Vanishing or Hasty Retreat? Why not both? This. This is both. More importantly though, breaks Muse/Thought Plucker.

I honestly don’t have much more to say about this card. If you want to be able to return a champion to hand for 0 or deal 2 damage, take this card. The fact that it doesn’t have card draw on it does make it a bit harder to fit into decks as opposed to Hasty/Vanishing, but if you already have solid card draw, the versatility of this card is much greater than either. Further, you can finish people off with this card.

The discard a card from your hand drawback can also be exploited with cards like Soul Hunter, Noble Martyr, etc., and, if you wanted to, you could even play this on your opponent’s turn when there are no champion in play just to discard a card from your hand.

Card is great. … …

…

… …

Okay fine you all know I can’t leave any interesting card like this with so little analysis. The main decks that would want a 0-cost card that can return champions to hand are exceedingly quick decks like Aggro-Burn/Blitz-Kark and/or tempo based decks like my Untargetables deck revolving around Sea Titan/Kong and gold-punishers. Essentially, decks that don’t care about giving your opponent the possibility of gaining additional gold value, either because you want to end the game before they can reasonably spend another gold to replay the card, and/or because you can destroy them if they spend their gold first on a turn. This card is great at removing: an ambush potential-blocker during an attack, an off-turn gold-punisher like Angel of the Gate, or an on-turn gold-punisher like Draka (all without needing to spend a gold).

This card can even return one of your own champions to hand to replay, like Brand Rebel Fighter, possibly even after it has blocked something (either before damage if Brand would break or after if Brand would do the breaking). Tricks like this enables Disappearing Act to help blunt attacks by Untargetable champions that it normally couldn’t. Similar to Spore Beast, it is also great for removing one big defense champion after it solo blocks your breakthrough champion, to push through all that sweet damage.

Draft

Spreadsheet: Card Draw
Category: Single Champion Removal (A-Tier)
Internal Category Tier: B-Tier

Constructed

Tier 7

Solid single target removal for limited. When played on-turn, it gives a slight advantage, particularly helpful against aggressive, burn-heavy opponents. That advantage can also be gained on turn 1, unlike No Escape, so it can effectively function as removal for your blitzing 0-cost champion against Master Zos, etc. Further, since my playstyle generally isn’t trying to burn my opponent out, the off-turn downside is practically non-existent in most drafts. Sure they gain 5 health, but they can’t (directly) affect the board with that.

Constructed almost never wants single target removal, unless it has a major upside that can be gained off-turn (Erase/Drain Essence) or a massive body attached (Kong/Sea Titan). Single target removal is just too unimpactful by itself for an entire turn’s gold in constructed. That being said, it is an Evil Draw 2 which has value—due to the power of their Ally effects and cards like Zannos Corpse Lord, Unquenchable Thirst, and even Herald of Scara. I think I experimented with this a bit, and it was okay enough that I don’t rule it out as a constructed possibility.

Draft

Spreadsheet: Card Draw
Category: Board Clears (A-Tier)
Internal Category Tier: S-Tier

Constructed

Tier 3

One of the best off-turn board clears in the game, possibly the best in limited generically? It most circumstances, you will be able to clear off all of your opponents’ relevant threats and leave them with next to nothing, since incidental tokens are so common/powerful. Further, since you know you will want to be playing this, you can maneuver your board to be nothing but worthwhile champions, by trading off your tokens for instance. Stand Alone wishes it was this card, especially since this is strictly better in the situation where you only have a Sea Titan in play. You need to be aware of this card’s existence so you can play around it.

Because this card is so powerful that people need to be aware of its existence, if you play in such a way to apparently set it up, your opponent might play around it, such as not blocking that weird human token attack of yours. However, this does open a potential bluffing avenue. Good…Sage stuff.

There are also ways to guarantee your opponent will have a token in play (Invoke Pact, Necrovirus, etc.) so you can play this, but I view building for that potentiality as largely just overkill. Soul Storm is strong enough on its own.

Draft

Spreadsheet: Slow Champions
Category: Re-Establishing Single Target Big  (S-Tier)
Internal Category Tier: B-Tier

Constructed

Tier 6

This is a re-establishing card, yet I don’t actually like it that much. While it can block all tokens, which is important, it at best trades with all relevant 1-cost airborne champions and loses to most. It can still fly over non-airborne champions to break a board stalemate, but at 4 offense for a 1-gold card, it isn’t all that threatening.

The other main reason why I don’t value it higher is the current state of the limited meta: 0-cost champions. If my opponent is destroying me with 0-cost champions, targeted removal probably isn’t going to save me, which is why I value cards like War Machine so much higher as re-establishing champions. Kong and Sea Titan stay relevant though because they’re also enormous threats. I’ve even demoted Palace Guard and Reaper&& to B-tier alongside this. Still perfectly reasonable cards, but I would rather commit my slow champion slots to other cards.

I tried this in my Airborne demons deck, and it did stay in for quite a while, but at the end of the day, the targeted removal and 4 offense were just too unimpactful. Further, the demon type currently only benefits from Raxxa’s Displeasure, and Raxxa’s Displeasure doesn’t synergize great with a lot of targeted removal.

Draft

Spreadsheet: Other
Category: Ambush Champions (B-Tier)
Internal Category Tier: A-Tier

Spreadsheet: Other
Category: Health Gain (B-Tier)
Internal Category Tier: B-Tier

Constructed

Tier 6

I stopped doing my reviews in alphabetical order for this card. Initially, I thought it was a pretty strong Dark Draft card but a mediocre constructed card that I could effectively dismiss. A 7/7 airborne, ambush champion that kills small things and gains some health is almost all of the things I want in limited; bundle them together for a gold and you’ve got a happy Tom. However, offer that to me in constructed, and I’ll disgustedly raise my eyebrows at it. The main reasoning behind this dichotomy is the radical difference in deck composition between the two formats.

In limited, the current meta dictates that you flood your deck with 0-cost cards and use your 1-cost cards to draw more/support them. Establishing/Re-establishing 0-cost champions that you can play when both golds are up are particularly strong/popular like Thrasher Demon/Shadow Imp and Javelin Thrower/Forcemage Apprentice. Dark One’s Apprentice is great against those cards. You can reasonably play Dark One’s Apprentice either while your opponent’s gold is up, to immediately remove that threat before it can finish attacking, or when their gold is down to incidentally remove it while gaining some health and putting a sizable evasive threat into play off-turn.

Spending your gold before your opponent is frequently a terrible idea if it can be avoided, but a Dark One’s Apprentice played in the right circumstance is an exception (especially on the first turn going second). At minimum, you guaranteed-remove a small-threat card and gain three health. If your opponent responds with a re-establishing card like Kong, they’re probably down two cards in hand to your one, and you draw a card to replace it on your turn. If they respond with an on-turn, 1-cost, blitzing gold-punisher, you have at minimum a hard-to-remove 1-cost, 7-defense, airborne chump-blocker that can block practically anything if absolutely necessary, or, generally better, a 7/7 airborne champion to attack and race with for next turn (your opponent is also still probably down two cards to your one). Frequently more likely on the first turn, your opponent will just draw 2 cards and can’t apply more 0-cost pressure because your 7/7, immune to Raxxa’s Curse, airborne champion blocks almost any of them. In a format so dominated by 0-cost cards, favorable card-in-hand trades can frequently be more important than gold-for-gold trades.

In constructed, I initially assumed it didn’t do enough since constructed is so streamlined to not allow reasonable Jack of All Trades cards. It doesn’t immediately deal damage/apply pressure or remove particularly relevant targets against Kark, and it’s both too small and provides too little health gain against Wild. I did have a eureka moment though, where I remembered both this and similarly initially-underwhelming Herald of Scara are demons. I thought I might be able to build an airborne demon deck that relies on token chump-blocking (Plentiful Dead) to stall my opponent’s attacks long enough to blow them out with Raxxa’s Displeasure (or to outrace them in the air). Preliminary testing showed promise, and by the time I finished my monthly constructed run I realized Dark One’s Apprentice is actually … fine … to mediocre.

It was an okay off-turn threat, but I was frequently in situations where I wanted an off-turn threat, but I couldn’t get real value out of the tribute. Rift Summoner would have probably been better in most of those situations. The best I could frequently do was play it into an attacking airborne champion to trade and gain 3 health; so, a worse Drain Essence that I could pull from Mist Guide Herald and return from my discard pile with Scarred Cultist. The only spot where it was decent was to clear out potential chump-blocking Mist Guide Heralds when I needed a threat. I did end up cutting the Raxxa’s Displeasure to shove in The Risen and Demonic Rising to have more play against Kark, only to proceed into a tournament with no Karks. Overall, I still view it favorably for draft, and if you include it in your constructed deck I’ll only raise my eyebrows questioningly, so progress.

(I did bump The Risen up to tier 4 from 5 and Herald of Scara up to tier 5 from 7 due to the mentioned Evil deck.)