Zhanna – Unaxio’s Blessing

This is a deck that I made at the very beginning of Lost Lands and have been playing off and on and tweaking as I go. Currently I’m rated 346 with it in quick match, so it’s certainly competitive – in the right meta. This deck has gotten me great compliments like “lucky top-decker!” and “Tidal wave won that game, not you!” I like being the only one playing the deck, as it makes it less likely that people will know how to deal with it, or that the meta will adapt, but people have finally caught on and started copying me, so I figured I’d post it and let you all know how it works.

Continue reading

Rethinking 4x in 40 – The Logic Behind Monster Decks.

10527868_427950174011831_4284442406351787822_nIn order to have a competitive deck – your deck needs to have the minimum number of cards possible and the maximum number of key cards. So, if you want to draw fireball consistently, you should have 4 copies of fireball in a 40 card deck. This is the prevailing wisdom in most trading card games and generally holds true for Shadow Era. But it’s not always true, and to understand those exceptions (like 80 card Garth decks) you need to first understand the rule.

Probability of drawing a single card

The math behind figuring out the probability of drawing a single card in a deck is complex (you can read about it here). The most important thing to know about it is that it is tied to deck size, number of matching cards within the deck, and number of cards drawn.

Smaller Deck = better chance of getting target card

If I have 1 Jack of Spades shuffled in a deck of 4 cards, and I draw one, then I’ll have a probability of 1/4 to draw that Jack of Spades. If I increase the deck size to 10, my probability will drop to 1/10. For this reason, if drawing a Jack of Spades will make me win, I want to minimize the size of my deck.

Continue reading

[SF 2.920] Boris “Bring out your Dead” (Twilight)

So with the recent Shattered Fates update of 2.920, Twilight Ritualist had her ability changed.

Twilight Ritualist – Ability changed to “2: If you control another Twilight ally, target opposing ally, item or ability with cost 4 or less is exiled, and Twilight Ritualist is killed at the end of your turn. (from “2: Target enemy item or ability with cost 3 or less is destroyed, and Twilight Ritualist is killed at the end of your turn.).

I wanted to make sure to test this new change out a lot as well as do research for my Twilight Guide. I went straight for Boris as my hero I think because I planned on trying them all out, but once I started playing him I found it hard to even want to try anyone else. I have been playing the following deck on the QM ladder for the past 2 seasons and is probably my best Human QM deck I’ve created.

Continue reading

Starval’s [SF] Hero Profile: Zhanna 

Zhanna has been my favorite hero since I started playing in the early days of Call Of The Crystals (COTC). In Dark Prophecies (DP) and especially in COTC, Zhanna had no autoloss conditions using a standard deck – featuring The King’s Pride (TKP), Retreat, Healing Touch (HT), and Focused Prayer (FP) while mixing in Tainted Oracle (TO), Elizabeth Winterborn (EW), and Wizent’s Staff (WS) for draw. She had no consistent way of dealing high damage (like a Mage’s Fireball) or instant death (like a Rogue’s Assassinate) to an opposing ally but the constant knowledge of Tidal Wave kept opponents at bay. The opponent had two routes – play into Tidal Wave or play single allies that get bounced by a Retreat/Banish or get locked by Jasmine Rosecult. It was a golden age for Zhanna.

Shattered Fates (SF) introduced new heroes and new cards across the board for all classes. Already difficult matches for Zhanna became even more difficult. Discard Zaladar, Wulven Moonstalker, Serena, and Homunculus Aramia are all vastly difficult for a standard Zhanna deck to compete with. The slow and steady pace of the old style of Zhanna became no longer good enough.
Continue reading

Aramia, the Lonely Chick

Aramia,The Lonely Chick

Written by Jordan
The hot summer winds swept across the plains of Balor, rustling through the small villages located at the base of Mt. Miaara, the shape shifting mountain shrouded in mystery. Next to the serene majesty of Mt. Miaara lay a surprising sight; a smoking and charred wasteland of spent supernovas and failed boomerangs.
At the base of Mt. Miaara, one could make out the outline of a massive, dull blue facility pulsing with a teal fog of ethereal energies. The occasional thwack of the boomerang and fizzling of a fireball could be heard emanating from the grandiose marble entrance which faced the mountain. The surrounding villages were built with a wide berth from the facility, for good reason. The facility was known to occasionally release giant bouts of flaming gas and waves of razor sharp boomerangs. It is said, according to a Unaxion paladin who had once gotten close as it happened, that one could hear the raging screams of Aramia as she tossed out apprentices wielding unstable supernovas and sent them flying to the wastelands to released the pent up energy. Continue reading

[SF] Shadow Mage: Drawing Capabilities

Saving my favorite for last! Shadow Mages of Shadow Era have often been consider the weaker faction because they generally relied on a later game style deck, while humans relied on a faster deck. The Shadow Mages in Call of the Crystals and Dark Prophecies typically revolved around Tome of Knowledge, Shadow Knight and Sacrificial Lamb. Shattered Fates bring lots of new toys that work really well including new Undead tribal things, Amulet of Conjuring and Flameforged Gauntlets. In additional, Gravebone received some boost with Crystal Shards and Falseblood Cultist.

SHADOW ERA

Current Expansion: SHATTERED FATES

Current Version: 2.87

HEROES:
Majiya – 4SE: Target opposing ally takes 3 fire damage. Draw a card.
Gravebone – 4SE: Return any ally from your graveyard back into play.
Raikka – 3SE: Until the start of your next turn, friendly allies have +1 attack and fire attack, and opposing allies and weapons have -1 attack.

DRAWING CAPABILITIES

Continue reading

[SF] Shadow Hunter: Drawing Capabilities

Much like the Human Hunters of Shadow Era, the Shadow Hunters have viable options in all of the categories. This creates a lot of variety in the ways you can build this class/faction.

SHADOW ERA

Current Expansion: SHATTERED FATES

Current Version: 2.87

HEROES:
Banebow – 3SE: Up to 2 different target opposing heroes or allies take 2 damage. This damage can’t be prevented by ally or armor abilities.
Baduruu– 4SE: Target weapon in your hand is summoned at no cost and gains +1 base attack.
Skervox– 4SE: All opposing allies are disabled until the start of your next turn and poisoned.

DRAWING CAPABILITIES

Continue reading

[SF] Human Mage: Drawing Capabilities

Human Mages are consistently one of the Top Decks of Shadow Era. Mainly they tend to be of the rush variant and they have tons of draw options to support this. Tome of Knowledge has consistently been one of the top draw engines for Mages for all expansions. Call of the Crystals and Dark Prophecies also used lots of Bad Santa and occasionally splashed Honored Dead as well as Treasured Heirloom. Shattered Fates brings a new tool in Amulet of Conjuring which really speed the flow of draw cards to the hand. In remains to be determined whether Amulet will remain in its current form or if it will receive some nerf as we move closer to completing the set.

SHADOW ERA

Current Expansion: SHATTERED FATES

Current Version: 2.87

HEROES:
Nishaven – 5SE: All allies take 4 electrical damage.
Eladwen Frostmire – 4SE: Target opposing ally takes 4 ice damage and is frozen (it can’t attack, defend or use abilities) for 2 turns.
Aramia – 3SE: Target item in your deck with cost 3 or less is put into play, as if summoned at no cost. Shuffle your deck.
Loest, Savior of Layar– 5SE: Target ally, item or ability is exiled (removed from the game).

DRAWING CAPABILITIES

Continue reading

[SF] Priest: Drawing Capabilities

For our (pre) Halloween release we are blessing you night with the Priests. The Priests drawing has evolved with each expansion of Shadow Era. Call of the Crystals revolved around Tainted Oracle and Wizent’s Staff, Dark Prophecies brought new tools like Forgiveness and Elizabeth Winterborn, and recently Shattered Fates brings Scriptures of the Righteous and Glass Chalice of Knowing both which seem to have replaced all the other draw options.

SHADOW ERA

Current Expansion: SHATTERED FATES

Current Version: 2.87

HEROES:
Jericho Spellbane – 4SE: Target friendly hero or ally has all enemy attachments and negative effects removed, or target attachment is removed.
Zhanna Mist – 3SE: Target friendly hero or ally heals 3 damage.
Threbin the Righteous – 3SE: Until the start of your next turn, opposing heroes and allies that enter combat with Threbin take 2 arcane damage.

DRAWING CAPABILITIES

Continue reading