Foreword
I’ve been primarily playing my Core Epic Humans deck and my Core Sky Force deck on Epic digital. Currently, my Core Sky Force deck has been dramatically exceeding my expectations with only 1 loss. Core Epic Humans has also been performing well but has a few more losses prompting this update.
Interestingly enough, I’ve been doing better in constructed than limited overall, but this is partially due to Wasabi kicking my butt all up and down Dark Draft. (I’m going to need to update my Dark Draft article and Card Ratings…)
+ Board Clears
Reason for Change/Change Idea
While the deck is able to create and maintain a lead better than most decks, multiple sequential turns of Kong and Sea Titan (especially with Surprise Attack) are able to get so far ahead against the deck that it can’t come back. This can also occur against decks with a lot of huge Wild champions. Even though I can drive these opponents out of cards by forcing them to keep playing non-drawing cards to survive, I can’t beat those cards after they hit a critical mass on the board. To address this, I am stealing the Apocalypse + Plague package from my wildly successful Core Sky Force deck. I’ve done a bit of testing with this package, and while I haven’t needed to board clear yet, at minimum, the board clear package hasn’t disrupted the deck significantly. Plague to clear out Thought Pluckers has been nice though.
The complete additions were (+7 Evil): +3 Apocalypse, +2 Plague, +1 Wither, +1 Guilt Demon
The complete subtractions were (-1 Evil, – 6 Wild): -1 Drain Essence, -3 Sea Hydra, -1 Pyromancer, -1 Flash Fire, -1 Lash
Sea Hydra had been consistently underperforming my expectations. It isn’t a big enough threat by itself, the 1 Gold: recall is too slow, I haven’t had a single big unbreakable turn with it yet, and other cards in the deck do basically the same thing it does but better.
Drain Essence hasn’t been necessary in any of my games as Angel of Light + Priest of Kalnor have kept me healthy enough while my Good core has either outraced my opponents or kept them consistently on the back foot, except for a few extreme cases which these changes are meant to address.
Pyromancer has surprised me with just how much I like it. Ambush really is that big a deal, so is the 4 damage. Lash has also been great, and it is definitely correct over Rage for this deck. It helps deal with Pluckers and I have spent my gold to recall it on multiple occasions. That being said, Surprise Attack and Kong are more powerful so I had to cut 1 Pyromancer to fit in the board clear package. I also went down to 2 Lash and 2 Flash Fire because both are great in different roles. I don’t want to decrease my Muse answers because Muse can easily negate a significant amount of the pressure this deck applies if unanswered. Immediately answering Muse can also devastate decks that rely on it for its incredibly high raw power.
New Distributions Breakdown
Below are the break downs for each of my distributions based on my Epic Constructed Process article.
30+ Cards that can Draw/Recycle/Recall/Etc. (31.5)
Reliable (28): 3 Apocalypse, 2 Plague, 3 Final Task, 3 White Knight, 3 Noble Unicorn, 3 Resurrection, 3 Faithful Pegasus, 3 White Dragon, 3 Surprise Attack, 2 Flash Fire
Unreliable (7 x 1/2 = 3.5): 3 Angel of Mercy, 2 Pyromancer, 2 Lash
20 0-cost Cards (20)
1 Guilt Demon, 3 Wither, 3 Brave Squire, 3 Faithful Pegasus, 3 Priest of Kalnor, 3 White Dragon, 2 Flash Fire, 2 Lash
20- On My Turn Cards (12)
Champions (15): 3 Lord of the Arena, 3 Palace Guard, 3 White Knight, 3 Kong
Events (0):
33+ Primary Alignment Cards (36)
3 Lord of the Arena, 3 Palace Guard, 3 Resurrection, 3 White Knight, 3 Angel of Light, 3 Angel of Mercy, 3 Angelic Protector, 3 Noble Unicorn, 3 Brave Squire, 3 Faithful Pegasus, 3 Priest of Kalnor, 3 White Dragon
3-9+ On-Turn Gold-Punishers (9)
3 Final Task, 3 Lord of the Arena, 3 White Knight
3-9+ Off-Turn Gold-Punishers (24)
3 Final Task, 3 Angel of Light, 3 Angel of Mercy, 3 Angelic Protector, 3 Noble Unicorn, 3 Resurrection, 2 Pyromancer, 3 Surprise Attack
1+ Mass Discard Pile Banish (0)
Same as above**
3 Drain Essences or Comparable Health Gain (7)
Reliable (6): 3 Angel of Light, 3 Priest of Kalnor
Unreliable (3 x 1/3 = 1): 3 Angel of Mercy
3-9+ Muse/Thought Plucker 0-Cost Answers (6)
Reliable (5): 3 Wither, 2 Flash Fire
Unreliable (2 x 1/2 = 1): 2 Lash
Honorable Mentions: 2 Plague, 2 Pyromancer
Anti-Sea Titan/Bounce Plan
In addition to everything above, 3 Apocalypse and 2 Plague allow me to clear out Sea Titans when I fall significantly far behind.
Thoughts/Concerns
As mentioned above, Sea Hydra underperformed for me, but Priest of Kalnor, Brave Squire, Pyromancer, and even Faithful Pegasus have overperformed. While I don’t think I’ve sent in a Lashed unbreakable untargetable champion yet, I have secured wins and big advantages with the Priest.
My favorite Priest play was against an opponent who turn 1 Fire Shaman Lightning Stormed my faced. After attacking with my ambushed in Noble Unicorn on my turn, I threw down White Knight with loyalty, immediately Priest of Kalnored it, and attacked. My opponent then proceeded to Erase my expended Unicorn since my White Knight was untouchable. The 4 health was also quite nice. I like this card.
Playing with Brave Squire again has reminded me why I used to love it and value it so highly. It is great. In so many situations you are able to trade a 0-cost card in hand with either an opponent’s 1 cost or 0 cost champion in play, while also protecting the champion you targeted with it. The human is also a relevant chump blocker in multiple situations. I’ve even created super 14/5 unbreakable White Dragons to break Kongs (with the help of Lash). This is one of the cards that you really can only understand just how powerful it is by playing with it.
While Faithful Pegasus has done work transporting my Epic Humans like Lord of the Arena safely past potential chump blockers, even as just a 2/2 airborne, blitz, tribute -> recycle it has been solid. That little bit of hard to disrupt pressure can push me to that win, and the tribute -> recycle helps me get to the cards I need when I need them.
Finally, while not unexpected, the Noble Unicorn + White Knight draw engine + threats has been working quite well. Those continuous mid-range threats that let me apply pressure while digging into all of my best cards are great. Going second Noble Unicorn off-turn followed by White Knight on turn leaves you with a 6/6, a 9/9, and 7 cards in hand. It is straight up gross if your opponent has an evil champion in play you can break with White Knight.
Final Task + all of the unbreakable shenanigans (Lord of the Arena, Angelic Protector, Priest of Kalnor, and Brave Squire) has been quite fun as well. I plan on continuing to play with this deck as it is a lot of fun.
As a side note, I’m not sure if the 3 Final Task, 3 Apocalypse, 2 Plague distribution will be final. I love Final Task in the deck and it does work, but I might want that 3rd Plague. Or, I might swap the 3rd Apocalypse for the 3rd Plague, we’ll see.
Deck List
Evil (12)
Slow ()
Fast (8)
3x Apocalypse
3x Final Task
2x Plague
0-Cost (4)
1x Guilt Demon
3x Wither
Good (36)
Slow (9)
3x Lord of the Arena
3x Palace Guard
3x White Knight
Fast (15)
3x Angel of Light
3x Angel of Mercy
3x Angelic Protector
3x Noble Unicorn
3x Resurrection
0-Cost (12)
3x Brave Squire
3x Faithful Pegasus
3x Priest of Kalnor
3x White Dragon
Sage ()
Slow ()
Fast ()
0-Cost ()
Wild (12)
Slow (3)
3x Kong
Fast (5)
2x Pyromancer
3x Surprise Attack
0-Cost (4)
2x Flash Fire
2x Lash