Foreword
Decks in card games generally fall into a few broad archetypes: Aggro, Midrange, Control, and Combo. In this article I explain the intricacies of these archetypes specific to Epic.
For historical context, I have included links to similar articles for 10 different card games – Magic: the Gathering, Hearthstone, Eternal, The Elder Scrolls: Legends, Shadowverse, Game of Thrones, Star Wars: Destiny, Solforge, Duelyst, and Android Netrunner.
Magic is the originating game. Hearthstone is the new juggernaut. Eternal has a particularly well-written article. If anyone has a link to a similar article to an unrepresented game, like Spoils, let me know, and I’ll add it.
Overview
“Aggro” decks are aggressive, try to win early, and focus on converting their gold to damage.
“Control” decks are defensive, try to win late, and focus on making their cards and gold worth more than their opponent’s.
“Midrange” decks are persistent, try to win in the mid game, and focus on applying consistent pressure.
“Combo” decks are ticking-time-bombs, try to win when precise conditions are met, and focus on exploiting explosive synergy between cards.
These archetypes are high level descriptions, and many decks fall somewhere between two or more.
Aggro
If you reduce your opponent to 0 health, you win.
Aggro decks attempt to take the quickest and most direct path to victory, reduce your opponent to 0 by any means possible, regardless of what else happens. To achieve this, aggro decks tend to favor hard to answer blitz champions or cards that do direct damage. The quicker an aggro deck can kill an opponent, the less time the opponent has to build up to kill the aggro deck or draw efficient answers like Drain Essence.
Burn is a subset of aggro decks that try to win primarily through direct damage, such as Flame Strike.
Aggro Cards
Below are a few examples of card types that work particularly well in aggro.
Repeatable Sources of Direct Damage
These cards are powerful for aggro because
- They immediately deal some unpreventable damage when played (assuming you activate the triggers)
- They threaten additional damage every turn they are left in play
- The 1-cost cards can fairly reliably get 8+ damage in before being removed (if played when the opponent’s gold is down)
While these aren’t guaranteed to do as much damage as pure burn events, they are much better to play early because your opponent must spend resources to remove them.
Big, Hard to Effectively Block, Blitz Champions
These cards are powerful for aggro because
- They can attack for 8+ the turn they are played
- They have abilities that make them hard to block, such as preemptively removing blockers
Efficient, 0-cost Damage
These cards are powerful for aggro because
- Brave Squire is +5 damage to an unblocked attacker while protecting the champion from break-based removal
- Dark Knight is 5 damage each turn, unlikely to be mitigated the turn it is played
- Rage can effectively deal up to 17 damage if used on a blocked Rampaging Wurm
- Fireball is either 3 direct damage or removal for an ambushed in blocker
Direct Damage
These cards are powerful for aggro because
- The only way your opponent can prevent the damage is to already have The Gudgeon in play (some like Fires of Rebellion dodge The Gudgeon as well)
- These don’t care how far ahead your opponent is on the board or in handsize
- If your opponent spends their gold first on their turn, you can spend 2 gold on these back to back before they can spend another gold
Generally, you want to save these burn events until you can finish off your opponent. Playing them early allows your opponent to get ahead on the board uncontested and/or gives them time to gain back health.
Aggro Weaknesses
The main weakness of aggro decks is they can run out of gas and be unable to close out the game, if they don’t win in the first few turns. Since the majority of an aggro deck’s cards focus on dealing damage to the opposing player as efficiently as possible, they generally aren’t great at drawing extra cards or controlling the board. Generally weak to control.
Health Gain
Health gain is frequently critical in allowing decks to survive the onslaught of aggro in Epic, since it is impossible to prevent direct direct damage (except The Gudgeon). As an extreme example, 2 Flame Strike + 2 Fires of Rebellion is always lethal against a deck that can’t heal or kill in one or two attacks.
Drain Essence is incredibly common because it can remove an aggro threat while also negating more than a Flame Strike worth of damage. Inner Peace (less common) is great because it more than negates a Flame Strike as well, and it usually returns to hand for multiple uses. Cards like Avenging Angel and Angel of the Gate are great because they usually gain some health, and unless removed by a 1-cost card, they will continue to gain that player health.
Discard Effects
Discard effects can further exacerbate the problem of running out of cards in hand. This can make it even harder to hit loyalty and might lead to lost gold opportunities. Psionic Assault forcing an aggro deck to discard two burn cards, for example, just cost the aggro deck upwards of 16 potential damage, for 1 gold.
Faster Combo Decks
Aside from healing over or discarding aggro, you can also outrace aggro with faster combo decks. For example, triple 0-cost blitzer into Reset and replay can deal 30 damage in one turn. Courageous Soul into Secret Legion is 22, add another Courageous Soul for 42.
Other Card Considerations
In order to address some of aggro’s inherent weaknesses, different versions run different support cards.
Efficient Card Draw
Efficient card draw can help you play a longer game. Lesson Learned targeting Ancient Chant draws 4 cards. The downside of returning an opponent’s champion to hand with Erase is lessened by the fact that you want to win before they can hopefully replay that champion for value. Unanswered Muse is crazy, and the rest give you a bonus in addition to the card draw.
Tech Choices
If playing against a lot of other aggro decks (the mirror match), Drain Essence can give you the extra turn to seal the game. Avenging Angel can function as a blitzing damage dealer while simultaneously helping you stay alive. Amnesia/Guilt Demon and other discard pile banish effects can help against Inner Peace, Psionic Assault and other recursion tricks (Final Task -> Thought Plucker or Lesson Learned -> Drain Essence).
Example Decks
Hampus Eriksson’s Combo Burn list (I lost a lot of games to Hampus and this list)
Andrew Trebing’s 3-0 Worlds Wild Burn
Anthony Lowry’s REEL STEEL
Control
If you safely run your opponent out of resources, you will inevitably win.
Control Decks in Epic focus on doing everything possible to not lose until they eventually win. To achieve this, control decks tend to favor removal with extra effects, off-turn board clears, low-board-impact high-card-advantage cards, and health gain. The longer the game goes, the more opportunities control decks have to slip attacks through or build to their potential alternate win-condition, such as Kark.
In general, control relies on cards that can gain multiple gold/cards worth of value.
Control Cards
Below are a few examples of card types that work particularly well in Control.
High Value Removal
These cards are powerful for control because
- Each of them can remove at least 1 card of the same cost
- Each of them leaves behind a body that requires at least the same cost card to be used to remove it (aside for Angel of Death)
- In other words, for 1 gold Sea Titan, Palace Guard, Kong, Medusa, and Reaper all remove one 1-cost champion. Then, your opponent must spend one 1-cost card to remove the remaining body left behind. Your single 1-cost card effectively counters 2 cards and 2 gold of your opponent
- If not answered, these leftover bodies can attack on your turn. Even if your opponent can block or remove these champions 90% of the time, that 10% over a long enough game can be enough to reduce your opponent to 0 health
- While ahead with one of these cards in play, control can spend their gold to increase their card advantage or gain more health. Both of these options make it harder for your opponent to ever win
Board Clears (Particularly Off-Turn)
These cards are powerful for control because
- A board clear can remove multiple cards and multiple gold spent by your opponent for just 1 card and 1 gold
- Control decks generally don’t have too many champions in play, and they usually don’t care too much about losing them to board clears
- If you board clear off-turn, you can only be attacked by blitz champions played afterward. (Conversely, if you board clear on-turn, your opponent can play an ambush champion and attack you with that on their next turn.)
- Zombie Apocalypse and Wave of Transformation not only remove your opponent’s champions and replace them with 2/2s, but they can also give you blockers for any non-airborne blitz, non-Pyrosaur/War Machine champions champions played after
- Banish and transform effects are particularly potent because they prevent your opponent from retrieving those champions from their discard pile. Banish and transform also makes it harder for your opponent to recycle
- Most of these board clears have the option to draw 2 when the board clear effect is not needed (such as when you are ahead on board and/or have multiple board clears in hand)
Low-Board-Impact, High-Card-Advantage Cards
These cards are strong for control because they generate the most card advantage with the least gold.
- For example, when you play Psionic Assault, you lose 1 gold and 1 card in hand while your opponent loses 2 cards in hand; if you are able to recall it, you lost 0 to their 2. In order to begin countering this, your opponent can spend 1 gold on a draw 2 in order to net gain 1 card in hand. Assuming you recall Psionic Assault, the net change is your opponent lost 1 card in hand. If this pattern continues, your opponent will eventually run out of cards in hand, even if they spend every turn drawing. (This can be countered and offset by ally recall cards, discard pile removal, and Ancient Chant Recall.) Thought Plucker works similarly.
- Spending a gold to recall Ancient Chant is a net gain of 2 cards in hand, 1 from getting Ancient Chant back in hand, 1 from the draw when it leaves your discard pile. No other card can immediately net +2 cards in hand. When you combine this with Lesson Learned to draw 4 or Frantic Digging for a 0-cost draw 2, this card can be gross.
- A Muse that sits back and continually draws cards allows you to spend less cards and gold drawing. This lets you play more Sea Titans, Wave of Transformations, etc. without running out of cards.
Health Gain
These cards are strong for control because
- They move you further away from losing due to health loss
- Drain Essence uses a gold to remove an opponent’s gold champion, while also gaining more health than a single burn event can remove
- Unless banished from your discard pile, Inner Peace can always turn a gold into 10 health, effectively countering any burn event
- Avenging Angel also does damage while forcing your opponent to spend a gold to remove it so they can attack
- Brand can gain health, remove a small blocker/allow a smaller champion to trade with a larger opposing champion, and then either chump block or get incidental damage through
Alternate Win Conditions
These cards are strong for control because they allow control decks to focus on drawing cards, gaining health, and removing enemy champions, instead of winning traditionally with attacking and direct damage.
- Chamberlain Kark is the alternate win condition for control decks, especially control v control mirror matchups (both players playing Kark Control). This card allows extreme control decks to do nothing besides gain health, draw cards, and efficiently remove its opponent’s champions. Kark Control won Worlds 2016, the first chance qualifier immediately afterwards, and was the only 2 decks in the Origins 2017 qualifier finals. Needless to say it was effective in the meta. It was also a major factor in 3 control cards getting banned (Ceasefire, Blind Faith, and Fumble). However, as one of the few Epic Midrange players, I consistently did well against it.
- Drinker of Blood is a combo finisher in multiple control decks. Eventually, the control deck plays Zombie Apoc/Wave of Transformation off-turn, the opponent can’t Flash Fire/Wither away the tokens first, so the control deck can go to their turn, drop Drinker, and Wither for the win.
- Soul Hunter is the best card you never want to play. In order to get it in play, Control decks relied initially on either A) opponents forcing them to discard it or B) discarding it to handsize after a 4-card Lesson Learned Ancient Chant. Now, they also have Frantic Digging.
- If you would draw a card and your deck is empty, you win (aka “Decking Out”). While this is almost impossible in Constructed, it is a viable strategy in limited formats, particularly Dark Draft, assuming you are the only player with a mass-discard pile banish card: Amnesia, Heinous Feast, Erratic Research, and/or Grave Demon.
Non-Interactive, Efficient, Defensive Cards that Draw Cards
These cards were so powerful at completely preventing your opponent from doing something while also drawing cards that they were banned in full constructed (still legal in all other formats). WWG explaining the ban.
Control Weaknesses
Control frequently relies on high-value effects that they can play before the opponent spends their gold. This leaves them vulnerable to any champions that can dodge their highly efficient removal and immediately apply pressure. They are particularly vulnerable to evasive champions (airborne, unblockable, breakthrough) or champions that draw cards. Generally weak to Midrange.
Ambush Champions (Especially Efficient or Evasive Ones)
Ambush champions are excellent to play after an opponent spends their gold on their turn, usually to play a high-value slow champion (Sea Titan) or board clear (Divine Judgement). They allow you to start your turn with a champion that can immediately attack and apply pressure without needing to spend your gold. This can frequently force your opponent into spending their gold first on their turn, giving you a window to play and attack with a blitz champion they can’t immediately use a gold to remove. Cards like Rift Summoner are particularly valuable because they even partially dodge cards like Drain Essence.
Blitz Champions (Particularly Efficient or Evasive Ones)
Blitz champions are great to play after a control deck uses an off-turn board clear against you. Now that their gold is down, it is less likely your opponent will be able to stop your new blitz champion from hitting them.
Discard Pile Removal
Since control decks are trying to extract as much value as possible out of everything, they all include ways to exploit their discard pile. Some examples include Psionic Assault/Inner Peace/Bodyguard, Soul Hunter, Lesson Learned, and Necromancer Lord. Kark decks rely particularly heavily on their ability to recycle frequently (or at least they did pre-ban). By attacking control deck’s discard piles, you weaken one of their ways to gain value.
Other Card Considerations
Below are a few additional cards that can help mitigate some of the weaknesses of control decks.
Efficient/Recurrable/Fast 0-cost Blockers
These 0-cost champions are able to jump in front of a blitz champion when your gold is down without costing you significant resources. They can either return to your hand, replace themselves, or survive to block again next turn. Be wary of your opponents who adapt and start bringing fast, 0-cost removal/breakthrough though:
Example Decks
Derek Arnold’s Origins 2016 winning Four Color Control
Thomas Dixon’s Gen Con 2016 winning Soul Hunter Control (misattributed on Foundry)
3 Different Successful Control Kark Lists
John Tatian’s World’s winning Kark
Gabe Costa-Giomi’s Nashville Kark
Thomas Dixon’s First Chance Qualifier Kark
Midrange
If you consistently apply pressure, while preventing your opponent from winning, you will eventually win.
Epic Midrange decks focus on aggressively controlling the board (champions in play), in order to create and exploit unopposed gold-opportunities (turns where your opponent spends their gold first), to establish and maintain immediate/recurring sources of champion-based damage.
To achieve this, midrange decks tend to favor cards that have 3 of 5 primary functions: 6+ toughness champion, fast (event/ambush champion), draw a card, blitz, and/or removal (secondary functions: make tokens, deal direct damage, gain health, discard pile removal, airborne). Midrange decks win when they exploit X gold-opportunities (X depends on opponent’s deck); this involves surviving against aggro or maintaining handsize with board pressure against control.
Midrange Cards
Below are a few examples of card types that work particularly well in Midrange.
Ambush, 6+ Defense Champion, and…
These cards are powerful for midrange because
- They provide an immediate benefit when played or soon after (for example: draw a card, gain health, or deal damage)
- At 6+ defense, the only 0-cost card in the game that can immediately remove them by itself is Vanishing (Smash and Burn can incidentally remove them though, so 7+ defense is ideal)
- If played on your opponent’s turn when their gold is down, these champions can attack at the start of your next turn, before either player spends their gold
- If played when your opponent has no champions in play, you generally don’t need to spend another gold until your opponent spends one first
Blitz, 6+ Defense Champions/Removal, and…
These cards are powerful for midrange because
- They are either A) only removable by Hasty Retreat if played when your opponent’s gold is down on your turn and/or B) provide immediate removal and threaten additional damage/removal if unanswered
- When played in a deck with ambush, 6+ defense champions, and… cards (see above) and establishing cards (see below), you are likely to be able to play these when your opponent’s gold is down on your turn
- They allow you to threaten damage immediately after an opponent off-turn board clears or otherwise disrupts your champions already in play
- If after playing this your opponent has no champions in play, you generally don’t need to spend another gold until your opponent spends one first
Fast, Removal, and…
These cards are powerful for midrange because
- They can immediately remove most 1-cost ambush champions your opponent could play on your turn, before they can be declared as blockers
- They provide an additional bonus like card draw, health, or a 6+ defense champion
- Many of them can also be played off-turn with a bonus as well
- They work particularly well to support 0-cost blitz champions too
6+ Defense, Card Draw/Token Produce “Establishing” Champions
These cards are powerful for midrange because
- They are strong to play to an empty board when your opponent’s gold is up (going first is a lot less punishing)
- They gain you immediate resources
- Your opponent can’t use a single card to remove them and get universally ahead on your turn (Surprise Attack -> Sea Titan is pretty nasty though)
- If not answered, they threaten to deal damage and/or provide additional removal
Midrange 0’s
These cards are powerful for midrange because they either have multiple important effects or are incredibly efficient at negating gold.
Midrange Weaknesses
Midrange’s strength comes from sequencing its cards/gold in a precise manner that allows for a consistent stream of mid-sized, almost-unanswerable threats. When this stream is disrupted, the deck can falter. Due to this, I would say these decks require the most aggressive mulliganing. They are also generally weak to aggro that can kill them before they get rolling.
Big, Removal Champions
These cards are devastating against midrange decks because they
- Immediately remove one or more champions
- Put a big body into play
- Are too big for Drain Essence or other damage based-removal
- Win in combat against mid-sized champions attacking alone
Sea Titan is particularly brutal because, in addition to everything above, it is untargetable. So, a Sea Titan held back for defense can only be removed by Winged Death (Will of Scara in the next expansion, Pantheon), combat damage (frequently requiring multiple champions and/or buffs), or board clears that remove your champions too.
Hyper-Efficient Card Draw
Midrange decks utilize “draw a card” champions more than any other decktype. This allows them to maintain a stream of mid-sized threats without having to play “draw 2s” as often as other decks. In order to mitigate this advantage, some decks run hyper-efficient card draw cards like Muse or Frantic Digging/Lesson Learned -> Ancient Chant. An unanswered Muse, for example, means the non-midrange deck draws 2 cards on their turn; this enables them to play a powerful, non-draw, 1-cost card every turn, largely cancelling one midrange strength.
Direct Damage
If you lose all your health, board and handsize advantages are irrelevant.
Other Card Considerations
In order to mitigate some of the weaknesses of midrange decks, here are a few more cards to consider.
Efficient Muse/Thought Plucker Answers
An unanswered Muse is arguably the most powerful anti-midrange card in the game, and it is/was incredibly popular. Therefore, including multiple answers to deal with it immediately is/was essential. Many of these can also effectively deal with Thought Plucker, another popular problematic card. (For Thought Plucker, it is also important to have discard pile removal to prevent Final Task and/or Necromancer Lord.)
Miscellaneous
Aside from some of the core midrange cards, the rest of midrange decks are fairly open. The 4 cards above are almost always strong and give you some health gain, efficient back up card draw, some board clear if your opponent has a string of strong plays, and some discard pile removal.
If you want to build the deck more defensive, Angel of the Gate and Spore Beast can be nice additions. For a more aggressive build, Strafing Dragon/burn and Juggernaut are worth considering.
Example Decks
Combative Humans (my full explanation / core-only version)
My World’s Pyrosaur Deck
Combo
If you combine cards a, b, c, and d with specific game state x, you essentially win.
The “purest” form of combo works by surviving until it assembles multiple key cards and crafts an acceptable Game State to use them. (Game State refers to exactly what is happening at a specific time: such as champions in play, cards in discard piles, players’ current health, etc). Then, the combo deck uses those key cards with the crafted Game State to immediately win, usually by reducing an opponent directly from their full starting health (30) to 0.
For example, you survive until you draw Zombie Apocalypse, Drinker of Blood, and Wither. In addition, you wait until both discard piles have a combined champion count of at least 15. Then, on your opponent’s turn you play Zombie Apocalypse, putting 15 zombie tokens into play. On your turn, you play Drinker of Blood followed immediately by Wither. This breaks all 15 zombies, creates 15 Drinker of Blood triggers, deals 30 damage to your opponent, and wins you the game.
While flashy One-Turn-Kills (OTKs) are the hallmark of combo decks, any deck that combines 3+ cards for one incredibly powerful effect can be considered to have a combo aspect. Combo decks are generally built around supporting/enabling one (or more) of those combination(s). Due to this, combo decks vary widely in how they are constructed and when/how they try to win.
Combo Cards
Below are a few examples of card types that work particularly well in Combo. In this section, I am going to stay relatively high level for anyone that wants to figure these combo decks out on their own. For more detailed examples, check out the section after this one.
Combo Cards
These are a few of the cards that, when built around, can win the game in a single turn. One way to identify these cards is by their “unbounded” effects.
- Drinker of Blood triggers every time a champion breaks
- How many champions could you possibly break with this in play?
- What ways can you break multiple champions, while not breaking Drinker?
- Army of the Apocalypse brings back all champions in discard piles
- How many champions could you get back by playing this card?
- Can you get more value than your opponent when you play this?
- Are there any champions that work well if brought back together?
- Time Walker returns any number of champions in play to hand
- Can you use the champions you returned to hand for anything?
- Can you benefit from filling your hand past 7?
- Secret Legion puts 6 blitz attackers in play and gives all humans (not just human tokens) blitz
- Is there a way to make 6 small attackers better than 1 big attacker?
- Are there other human champions that benefit from gaining blitz?
Cycling/Efficient Draw
These cards are powerful in combo because they help you draw into your combo pieces quickly.
Board Clears
These cards are powerful in combo because they buy time until you can assemble your combo. Some of these cards are also combo pieces themselves.
Discard Pile Recursion
These cards are powerful in combo because they let you
- Get back combo pieces used earlier to stay alive
- Refill to launch a second/third combo if the first doesn’t win outright
However, discard pile recursion is much weaker if you don’t draw your combo pieces in the first place.
Combo Weaknesses
Combo’s main weakness in Epic is its inconsistency. If you are an aggressive combo deck that doesn’t draw its combo pieces early, you can get run over by more consistent aggro decks. If you are a control combo deck that doesn’t draw its combo pieces early, you can get pressured out by midrange. Control decks can also heal over a combo decks lethal range if given enough time.
The second major weakness of combo is targeted counterplay. If an opponent knows what you are trying to do, they are more likely to be able to disrupt it. In our Drinker of Blood example, a knowledgeable opponent could make sure they always hold onto a Flash Fire/Wither to use after you Zombie Apocalypse, before you can go to your turn and spend another gold to play Drinker.
The surprise factor can make combo particularly strong in the first game of a match, especially if the combo is brand new, but that strength fades in later games. However, if your opponent doesn’t have cards that can counter your combo, it can be difficult to stop. (Many of these combo “counters” [ex. Amnesia and Wither] are strong enough that decks want to include them anyway.)
Each combo deck has its own specific counter cards based on what it is trying to accomplish.
Discard Pile Removal
Discard Pile Removal is strong against combo because
- Multiple combo decks rely on their discard directly for the combo
- It slows down recycling
- It prevents combo pieces from being returned from the discard pile
Example Combo Decks
Below are some example combo decks with brief explanations. The first four have seen high-level competitive play (at least a top 8 at a qualifier and/or played at Worlds).
Drinker of Blood Combo
The most popular combo deck features the Drinker of Blood combo.
Example: James Moreland’s – Control Drinker Combo
These decks utilize off-turn Zombie Apocalypse into on-turn Drinker followed immediately by Flash Fire/Wither to win the game. Drinker decks are frequently control decks that try to stave off the opponent until it can go off. If the first combo doesn’t win the game, the health gain can be enough to let it stabilize for long enough to go off again.
This version is heavily dependent on Drinker combo to win. Therefore, mass discard pile removal shutting down Zombie Apocalypse (and Necrovirus) can be nasty. Flash Fire and Wither are particularly strong counters if saved until immediately after Zombie Apoc, before the combo deck gets the gold on its turn to play Drinker.
Time Walker Combo
Time Walker decks attempt to make destructive use of the board clear bounce effect. A common way to achieve this is to play and attack with a bunch of 0-cost blitzers (Guilt Demon, Dark Knight, etc.), followed by Time Walker, and ending by replaying the 0-cost blitzers to attack again on the same turn.
Example: Gabe Costa-Giomi’s – Value Time Walker Combo
Gabe’s specific deck has the 0-cost blitz combo package in it, but it also includes a lot of powerful tribute/loyalty champions and powerful recursion.
This specific version seems weak to 0-cost removal such as Spike Trap and Lightning Strike. One sided damage based removal effects seem like a problem as well: Hurricane and Draka’s Fire. The deck is low on draw effects, so if you can prevent value gained by Time Walker bouncing powerful loyalty champions like Medusa, you can run them out of cards, in theory. Discard effects, Thought Plucker specifically, seem quite potent too.
Fire Shaman + Brachiosaurus Combo
Fire Shaman x3 + Brachiosaurus x3 + Flame Strike = 44 damage.
Example: Hampus Eriksson’s – Combo Burn
This is an aggro combo deck. Hampus combines significant card draw with a lot of burn to setup for this combo. Even just 1 Fire Shaman + 1 Brachiosaurus + 1 burn card can do significant finishing damage.
Health gain is essential for surviving and ultimately beating this deck. Big champions are also hard for this deck to deal with if it doesn’t draw Erase (big untargetable champions basically can’t be removed at all).
Kark Combo
Combo Kark control decks can gain over 20 health from 0-cost cards (Second Wind/Brand, Rebel Fighter/Consume/etc) and Kark‘s Loyalty X ability for a surprise win.
Example: Nashville’s – Off-turn Overdraw Kark
In addition to 0-cost health gain cards, Overdraw Kark can utilize Ancient Chant + Lesson Learned/Frantic Digging to overdraw to 10+ cards at the end of its opponent’s turn (since you only discard at the end of your turn). Then, when Kark is played next turn, ally-recall cards like Inner Peace and Bodyguard can swell the handsize even further for a massive Loyalty X reveal.
Many iterations of Kark are vulnerable to discard pile removal because they rely on recycling a lot. In addition, removing Ancient Chants prevents the Lesson Learned combo and decreases the number of cards that can be drawn for a big Kark reveal described above. Consistent pressure is essential for defeating Kark. Champions like Strafing Dragon and Pyrosaur can slow down the turbo, combo Kark openings as you ramp up your consistent pressure.
Army of the Apocalypse Combo
Army of the Apocalypse decks are frequently built around the idea of champions with inherent blitz. Fill your discard pile with these champions (Juggernaut, Citadel Raven, Winged Death, Avenging Angel, etc), play this, attack. Amnesia beforehand means your opponent gets nothing. Crystal Golem provides card draw to minimize the risk of a blowout, if played when your opponent’s gold is up (since you can break Crystal Golem to draw 2 immediately after playing Army, before your opponent can play something).
Example: Derek Arnold’s – Core-Only Army Drinker Hybrid
Derek’s deck focuses more on bringing back cards that synergize particularly well over pure blitz power. Check out his explanation of the deck on his blog in the link above for more information.
Discard pile removal is devastating against this deck because its best plays involve Army and Drinker. Consistent pressure from 10+ defense champions can also be a problem.
Human Token Combo
Insurgency/Secret Legion + Revolt/Paros, Rebel Leader/Courageous Soul = 20+ blitz damage. I was terrified of human token decks when the game came out, but they have yet to have a successful competitive showing.
Blind Faith and Ceasefire were particularly strong against combo tokens, but Wither, Flash Fire, etc. remain strong post full-constructed ban. Targeted discard pile removal can prevent multiple small combo assaults by preventing Lesson Learned/Reusable Knowledge -> Insurgency assaults. Aggro is particularly nasty (at least against my iterations) because if you don’t start going-off with Insurgency turn 1, you’re in trouble.
Other “Interesting” Combos
Derek Arnold’s Promo Drawout OTK:
Conclusion
Understanding the basics of deck archetypes (how specific decks try to win and why they use specific cards) helps both when building your own decks and deducing what other cards your opponent might have in theirs. That being said, almost no deck is a “pure” representation of a single archetype. Some aggro decks lean midrange and vice versa; all combo decks have a secondary archetype attached, etc. This is merely a guide. Build what you want, and expect to see some crazy stuff.
The fundamental cards I wanted to build around were Murderous Necromancer, Reaper, and Spawning Demon. Murderous Necromancer is a card you can play on your turn while your opponent’s gold is up, and they usually can’t do something significantly better in response. (Surprise Attack -> Sea Titan/Kong isn’t too back breaking, nor is Thought Plucker, and Rift Summoner is in Uprising.)
Reaper is repeatable removal on a 7+ defense body that your opponent can’t incidentally remove with Smash and Burn, Lightning Strike, etc. (although it can be removed by Draka Dragon Tyrant + Feeding Frenzy). Your opponent must spend a gold, such as Kong or Drain Essence. Reaper also benefits from a heavy Evil deck that can consistently play off-turn 1-cost cards either for their effect (Final Task, Drain Essence, Medusa, Demon Breach) or just as a draw 2 (Apocalypse, Plague, Raxxa’s Displeasure, Zombie Apocalypse).
Plague, Guilt Demon, Raxxa’s Curse, and Plentiful Dead largely fall into this category too.
and the card that just feels like it wins the most games is Raxxa’s Displeasure. Using this to full-clear your opponent while leaving you with demon tokens is incredibly strong, especially since this can be used in combat, after your opponent ambushes in blocker(s). However, its true power is when used in conjunction with demon cards like Raxxa, Reaper, Medusa, Guilt Demon, and Spawning Demon. (Reaper does have a bit of an anti-synergy though because your opponent’s champions turned into demons survive.) Due to the fact that this is also an Evil draw 2 makes this a 3-of in the deck.
Another benefit from going 51 Evil cards to support my Reapers and Spawning Demons is the ability to run 3 Unquenchable Thirsts. The more Evil cards you can get in your discard pile, the stronger this card becomes. That being said, running 3 might seem like (and might actually be) too many since you aren’t likely to get many big uses out of it. I’m trying 3 because of how it interacts with control and aggro in different ways.
Avenging Angel is a non-standard inclusion in this deck. I want it specifically because it can repeatedly gain me health, it can’t be removed by a single 0-cost card, and Inner Peace requires multiple 1-cost Good cards to reliably recall (making it weaker in this deck). I can also bring Avenging Angel back out with Necromancer Lord. In this deck, Avenging Angel should basically never be played while your opponent’s gold is up (if they have cards in hand). Gold Dragon was a very real consideration because the extra 2 defense allows it to dodge a Smash and Burn trigger, but I’ll see if my Guilt Demons and Heinous Feasts will be enough to mitigate that problem.
I also included Second Wind and Heinous Feast for a bit of extra health gain. Both can also draw cards/replace themselves. Against control, Heinous Feast will probably be used as a draw 2 more often. Against aggro, Heinous Feast will probably be used to gain a bit of health, hit a recall card, and starve my opponent’s ability to recycle at a critical time.
Raxxa is included as another way to get tokens that can attack my opponent. It is also nice for the 2 damage to all opposing champions to break Muse/Thought Pluckers. Playing this after a Zombie Apocalypse or Wave of Transformation is quite strong as well.
Zombie Apocalypse, Apocalypse, Bitten, Heinous Feast, and Demon Breach were all included as card draw. Board clears are always nice, if needed, especially off-turn ones. Off-turn targeted removal is nice if I’m ahead on board and my opponent tries to slam an airborne blitz champion against me.
I really want to fit a single Soul Hunter in the deck because it can carry the game against some decks. It is particularly potent with my 3 Reapers because, if I have Reaper in play, I can play Soul Hunter and use Reaper’s ally trigger to immediately break that Soul Hunter, deal 5 damage to my opponent, get my Soul Hunter in my discard pile, and put a demon in play for me. That being said, I do not want to remove any of my splash cards (non-Evil), and I do not want to remove any of my card draw cards (including recall cards like Plentiful Dead and Demon Breach and treating Surprise Attack as half a draw, I am at exactly 30).
This only leaves Angel of Death, Murderous Necromancer, Necromancer Lord, Raxxa, Reaper, Drain Essence, and Medusa. Of those, the only cards I would consider cutting (at this point) are Angel of Death, Necromancer Lord, and Raxxa. I like the singleton Angel for Final Task/Necro Lord shenanigans (off-turn full board clear is nice) and Raxxa is one of my few threats. Necro Lord is the only one of those I seriously considered cutting because I don’t have a ton of targets for it in my deck. However, 2 Necro Lords is much stronger than 1 because you can Necro Lord back your Necro Lord. It is also amazing with Surprise Attack because if it triggers twice it is hard to beat.
