The Lorcana Crew Podcast
The Lorcana Crew talks all things Lorcana!
The Lorcana Crew Podcast
Attack of the Vine Deep Dive! - The Lorcana Crew Podcast
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What's up Lorcana Crew!? Listen in as Core Questers Nick G. and Josh D. dive deep into what the new set Attack of the Vine will bring just ahead of the set's release! What does the meta look like post rotation? Listen in and find out. We hope you enjoy! Find us on Instagram @Lorcana.Crew and on TikTok @LorcanaCrew
What's up, Lorconna crew? It's Mitchie and uh Josh D back once again, recording as always in the booth.
SPEAKER_02The booth Josh doing good, doing good, staying busy, staying busy. But we are that is great news. Ready for Attack of the Vine, ready for some ink ink after it drops, some pre-release events. We got tons of new cards. Got a lot of old cards are not an option now. So yeah, it's a it's a deck brewer's dream. Buy doc.
SPEAKER_00Get it out of here. Oh, so excited. Ah, but anyways, we are here to talk about some attack of the vines today and give you a breakdown of all things Viney. Viney? Viny, Viny? Weird, whatever. It'll work. So, uh, before we jump into the bulk of it, what we're gonna do today, I wanted to give you an unfortunate interaction that I stumbled upon while playing some quick games online um and just talking things through. So the unfortunate interaction comes from um what I thought would be awesome is getting draw power in green blue. Um, and so the interaction is between Mickey and Mini, the team up card, and Donald Duck. Uh, that is the green Donald Duck that says, uh, let's see here, it says uh whenever you use the boost ability of a character, you put the top card of your deck under it face down, so boost again. But the where this comes in is during your opponent's turns, whenever one of your characters, other characters is banished, draw a card for each card that was under them. Right? And so now in theory, what I had thought was going to work is you know, you go Mickey Mini, Mickey Mini, and then you quest for five, and then you have Donald out, and your opponent's like, Well, that questing for five thing can't live, I'm gonna banish it. And then I would be like, Cool, I get to draw two cards. Yeah, sounds nice. Yeah, you don't you don't get to draw two cards. Um, and let me tell you why. Um, so the reason that you do not get to draw two cards is because Mickey and Mini specifically states if this character would be banished, put them into your ink wall face down and exert it instead. So it actually just negates the whole banishing thing, um, which is a real bummer because I thought I was gonna get three ink and two cards and quest for five. You don't get to do that.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. But it does work with um retroactive retroactive blaster or whatever it's called.
SPEAKER_01The retro emulation device?
SPEAKER_02Yes, it does work.
SPEAKER_01As in the drawing.
SPEAKER_02The the the tapping to pay cheaper for cheaper, because you still banish it, it just doesn't have the discard, but you still pay the cost of banishment.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and yes, and then you banish it in instead of banishing it, it goes to your inkwell. Yeah, so that was uh the unfortunate interaction. I thought I was being very clever, and then I even wrote in. I was like, why isn't this working? And then I read the cards that explained the cards. Yeah, so oh well. Um tough break for old Nikki there.
SPEAKER_01Exactly.
SPEAKER_00But still a lot of fun. We'll talk about that here in a little bit. But we're gonna move on now to a team up recap. Last episode we talked about a lot of the team up cards. Um not all of them, because not all of them warrant our time, but uh, we just kind of want to recap here and give us you know the the best three worst three, if it were. So why don't we start here? Give me your your best team up card that you've seen.
SPEAKER_02The best team up card. The best one? Woo! I don't even get to start off with an honorable mention. Oh my goodness. Um, no, no. Best one. We'll get there later. Oh uh I'm gonna go, I'm gonna go Peter Pan and Tinkerbell.
SPEAKER_00Oh, great card, great card. Okay. Uh for those that do not know, Peter Pan and Tinkerbell is a six-drop Inkable shift four. You can shift it on either Peter Pan or Tinkerbell, as the name would suggest. And then it's a 5-4 quest for two, and it says your characters gain evasive. That's that's all it says. Characters gain evasive. Crazy card.
SPEAKER_02It's it just it says everything. Everything gets evasive. They made a whole word called alert to avoid everything being evasive. Yeah, Dumbo isn't fabled. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I guess that that synergy it does cost the same as the shift Dumbo, but we've already had that four cost. Do I play Genie? Do I play Dumbo on four? That that thought process has already been thought through last rotation, so I think it doesn't really matter too much that Dumbo costs the same as a shift, but it just is very difficult to deal with if your deck does not have a way to deal with it. That makes sense.
SPEAKER_00Oh no, yeah. Um, I mean, you know me very well, and when I draft or play sealed, uh, I am playing a different game than everyone else. Uh everyone else is drafting. I am picking cards that say evasive. So this is right up my alley. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02It's it's and it has a plethora of new shift targets as well. Uh it has a new Peter Pan, it has a new Tinker, I believe has a new Tinkerbest. It does, yep. So it comes locked and loaded and ready to go.
SPEAKER_00Um, yeah, yeah. And uh, I think what's interesting is that you know, these colors that it's in have already been starting to be on the rise, right? Red was kind of bad for a little while, but now with you know things like Scrooge McDuck and you know it got Liquidator last set or a couple sets ago, and so it's red and purple have been continuing to power up. And it's just uh good Firefly. Yeah, it's just it's very, very good. Um, I would expect to see this in a lot of different places. Um, so uh let's see here. I get to talk about one. I am gonna talk about Mickey and Mini. Um it's what I think is the best team up in the set. Um it is a seven drop for free. Yeah. And quests for five. I mean, yes, you do need you, you need to set up, right? Yes. It's uh seven drop ingable, Mickey and Mini Mouse, uh, five five, quest for five, uh, duo shift. So you may pay zero to play this on top of two of your characters, one named Mickey and one named Mini. And then the text is if this character would be banished, we already talked about it, put it into your face, put them into your inkwell face down and exert. This would include, yes, yes. Um, this would include all of the cards underneath it, so you effectively ramp for three. Um, now there are some pros and cons with this card, right? Like pros, it's free. It quests for five. It's a five-five. Um cons is we actually did kind of lose some consistency this set uh with rotation, because there aren't great Mickey targets. Um, the only like Mickey targets are the three-drop ramp Mickey, the detective. Very good in the set, right? You want to be ramping, so it's not bad. Um, and then there's a two-drop Mickey that when it quests, you put a card under it, and then when it dies, you move the card to something else. Um, so that's a little bit of an issue. You don't have the plethora of one or two drop Mickeys and minis. Uh minis are plenty. You got so many mines.
SPEAKER_02Many, many, many minis.
SPEAKER_00Yes. But um, I think the the interesting part about this card is just the fact that, like, what do you do against it, right? Because if if you kill it, great, you stopped me from questing for five a turn, but now I'm automatically at six ink, most likely, right? And that means I can play things like the snowboarding Mickey that discards a card. I am one away from a Milo thatch to bounce your stuff. Like, there's so many good high cost green and blue cards that like you almost are forced into giving me the the ink. Because if you don't, the game will end in four turns, right?
SPEAKER_02So you're welcome. There's no no, you're welcome, is no more.
SPEAKER_00No, so you there's uh put that thing back, right? You can you can put it you can put that thing back. Um that's not fun. I would not recommend it. Um, that's really bad for me. Um, but it's a good play. Um, I don't know how many decks are playing that yet, maybe they will. Um but I think for the most part, like like I said, it's it's just one of the it's one of the better uh team-ups, and we talk about less consistency for the for the shifting and all that, but in reality, it's really not that hard with the mulligan and Larcana, right? No.
SPEAKER_02You have it's been a history of I have these cards like Diablo, shift Diablo, and an action to get rid of. Um Prince John, uh Prince Philip, little Prince Philip, and um mean and scary, yeah. Those just mean and scary. Hands held high, under the sea, kita, shift kita, sing under the sea. Everything kind of is in that one, two, three, I should win now, kind of build in Larcana.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and the fact that it's a three-card combo isn't isn't terrible, right? Because two of the cards that you're actually looking for are curving, right? You're you're going, you're always playing a one-drop, you're always playing a two-drop, or you're always playing a three-drop and it ramps you, right? So, like it's the the detective Mickey's actually good in this situation, right? Yeah, it's a one-three, but that's okay. It's gonna become a five-five next turn. Who cares? Right?
SPEAKER_02So uh turn one, play potato, turn two, play mini, turn three, play Mickey boost.
SPEAKER_01Exactly.
SPEAKER_02Yep. Uh shift to potato and shift to be.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, exactly. Yes. So yeah, I'm a big fan of it. Um, I think it fits the color pairing well, and despite the earlier um grumblings of maybe there isn't enough draw in the in the deck, I think there's ways around that. Um, so uh with that being said, give us your worst team up in the set. The worst just yeah, it just hasn't quite caught your fancy yet.
SPEAKER_02I uh I I don't don't I love me some Darkwing Duck. I love Darkwing Duck. Oh no, really? I mean it's such it's it's very expensive. I mean you can feel feel free to feel free to to disagree. I'd love to hear an argument on the screen. Yeah, it it reads when you if you're a newer player and you're looking at stuff and you like dark wing, you're like, oh man, I get to attack stuff and get lore, and I can oh I can uh play one uh one last hope and re-ready and all this cool awesome interactions, and I have a warded shift target and with dark wing, and uh I have uh filter engine with um launch pad and and steel, but it's just really expensive and you're locked up.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it's a seven cost inkable, right? Uh shifts for five, uh, and it's just shift for five, so you can shift that on either dark wing or launch pad. I don't think there's a good launch pad that doesn't matter.
SPEAKER_02There's one that's if you have a if you have a dark wing, then when he quests, you can draw a card and keep it, but if you don't have a dark wing, you have to discard a card. Uh gotcha.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_00But yeah, the rest of the text here is it quests for two, it's a five-seven, and during your turn, whenever this character banishes another character in his challenge, gain two lore. So it's like a Calhoun effect, right? Um I think you kind of hit the nail on the head though, right? Um it's a little late, right? Um, we don't have two drop ramp anymore, so you really do have to commit to the bit, as they would say, right? Um even though there are some pretty okay Darkwing duck cards in Blue Steel, um, I don't know. I think you're right. I think it just kind of falls a little flat, and maybe time will change that as we get more like of a challenge heavy blue steel deck, because I know like we have the Pluto, right? Where if you play a you know that now you're you're gaining four every time, so that's kind of cool. Maybe that's there.
SPEAKER_02That is I mean there are it it has one option, it has one last hope, and that is your last hope. Yes, you are correct. And in the grams grand scheme of things, Dark Wing Duck and Launchpad will not have one last hope for its entire longevity. Uh it will be in rotating, it will be gone quicker in the same amount of time it won't be there as long as it will be there. So hopefully, I mean you have the maximus uh uh the five-drop uninkable. It's one of the the promotional cards. It's a five-drop uninkable. If you discard a card, this turn, this character gains challenger two and can challenge ready characters, but that's not giving the dark wing ability, and then you have to discard a card, and then you have to have a a way to discard, which I think is more of a green steel thing that Rapunzel is doing, which is way more synergy anyway. And I want it to be good. The artwork is so so good. Launch pad looks menacing. I can't think of the plane, the plane. Man, I didn't watch that show. Yeah, I didn't. I can't think of it right now. And everyone's gonna be like, ah, it's called the Thunder Quack or something like that. The thunderquack, yeah, that's right. Yeah, good. We get there, we got there. Oh man, the R we the artwork is just beautiful, but I don't think it has all the tools it needs just yet, if it ever does, and the same thing to be said for Mushu. Mushu never had quite enough tools to to to be there. All the attack decks with red, steel, purple, purple, red always work just close enough. Um so I think unfortunately, it is uh not the best.
SPEAKER_00Fair, fair. Well, I think I'm gonna go with one that is a little lackluster as well. Um, it is only a rare, right? Um, but it's one that I was very excited for when I saw the art. Um, that would be Todd and Copper. They're the best of Todd. Pick a Todd every time, but maybe not this one. Um just kidding. Actually, this is pretty still pretty good in draft and limited. Yeah, draft is great. Yeah, and draft or it still holds true. Pick a Todd. Um, so Todd and Copper is a four-drop income three-three, it's a shift two, and evasive quest for two, right? Um, I just kind of wish there were more words on this card. Um it's fine, right? Like, it is entirely fine, right? You are shifting for two, questing for two, it's evasive, but like it's not overstatted. You have to play it on top of one of your other todds and or coppers, which yes, there are multiple one-drops. So if you go do the dream and get this thing out on turn two, which you will pretty often, right? Because there's a one-drop Todd, one-drop copper, and all that. So, like, it's possible, it's kind of annoying, but again, it's not overstatted. It quests for two, which is fine, but it's just kind of like it's there, right? I was hoping for something a little more flashy, just because I like Todd and Copper that much. Um, if I can uh segue a little bit um really quickly, um, one of my favorite cards that I've seen people be playing in green decks is the new three-drop Todd. Um, it's uh it's uh an uncommon and it's a three-drop ingable uh one, two. And it says when you play this character, draw two cards, then discard a card. So it's um strike a good match on a body. So that's always really fun. And uh somebody played four of them in a row against me. I'm like, that's really good. So um, yeah, great limited card, maybe not so much for constructed. Um, and like I said, the enchanted artwork is wonderful, it's just not quite living up to my expectations. That's all.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, uh the copper's okay. The new copper's like a two, two for two, the quest for two. So, you know, a very solid pick. Um and sealed. Two, two for two, quest for two, not the worst pick.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Um, and I will say that I think they probably have the most consistent shift line out there because I think there's there's two different one-drop coppers, one different one like there's like you have like 16 options on what what you want to shift, which is on one and two, right? Yeah, exactly. Which is what yeah, so it's it's fine. I just don't think it quite meets the constructed quality of some of the other team ups. So nope.
SPEAKER_02Uh it doesn't, it has literally the least amount of words. Lilo has more. Yes, yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_00Um, so with uh, I'll give you I'll throw it to you. Give me one more team up that you want to talk about. It can be good or bad. Up to you.
SPEAKER_02Uh, just strictly for the artwork alone on the enchanted, the Winnie, the Pooh, and Piglet. Real quick. Oh, dude. I mean, if you're tuning in for fresh hot takes, this take is everyone's got the same take. This card is gorgeous. It's got the little the the honey wizard himself casting his honey spell to capture all of the vine sprouts, I believe is what they're called. Yep. And Piglet is is got a little balloon on his back, which is reminiscent of yeah, dude. It is it is oh my gosh, just so gorgeous. And it is a very playable card if you are playing a honey deck.
SPEAKER_00You should be able to do it. Yeah, and you know, I've been oh, you should absolutely put it in your honey deck. It's uh one of the best cards in the honey deck. Um, you know, I was kind of underwhelmed when we saw the release of the honey cards, but you know, I've been I've been kind of labbing with uh with Cubby. You met Cubby at Indy, um great guy. Um and it actually is not as bad as you think it is because at the end of the day, you do just curve out, right? You go roo Winnie the Pooh something, shift Winnie the Pooh and Piglet, like quest for a bunch of. There's one or piglet, yeah. Um, so you can you can even go you know, um piglet, poo, shift onto the to the piglet, and then quest for you know four or five. Um it you can curve out quite well and the honey cards, while they're they don't have the most words and they aren't doing like something extraordinarily broken. Um, they do provide just that right amount of value that I think it might be able to work and you might be able to find something. So very plain.
SPEAKER_02You probably pair with some like ripped purple blurple powerhouses, maybe yeah. But yeah, I think the artwork's great.
SPEAKER_00Oh, the artwork is is outstanding. Um, the honorable mention I'll give here is the Maleficent and Diablo. It's a seven drop inkable, uh, six five, purple steel, uh shift for five. So it is it's a bit expensive, but uh you may put five character cards from your discard on the bottom of your deck in order to shift this for free, which is always good. Um free is free. Yep. Um quest for two, and then during your turn, whenever this cart card exerts, draw a card, right? Um, so if you're playing a bit of a mill, a self-mill deck, which you can you can kind of get to. This actually is a lot of draw power for you, especially if this thing exerts more than twice, right? It is a 6-5 questing for two, it's a seven drop, so it can sing a lot of songs. Um, just a very solid and stable card. And as we know, there's always shift targets for Maleficent and Diablo.
SPEAKER_02So and yeah, I don't think they've made a single bad Diablo card.
SPEAKER_00No, that card that is a card that they were like, yeah, this card will be good forever.
SPEAKER_02Uh I think they made one. I think they made one purple one that wasn't necessarily bad, it was just not the best, but it wasn't bad.
SPEAKER_00Like it wasn't just you're correct, yeah. Uh it works well with Maleficent, ironically. Um, all the other ones, pretty decent.
SPEAKER_02Uh, if I may shout out one more real, real quick that I just want to own and do one thing with is the dash and violet. Before before it rotates, I will shift the dash onto a dash, and I will shift the violet onto a violet, and I will shift dash and violet onto the shifted dash and violet and cool draw four cards.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, okay. I mean, I fully support you in this. Um, yeah, uh, I'll hint at it now, but um, one of the cards that you mentioned is in one of my standouts. Cards. So we will get to talk about that here in a little bit. But yeah, uh Violet and Dash seems okay if you can shift and then shift and then shift shift, you know? Yeah. All right. Uh so yeah. Well, don't talk about removal, it's fine. Uh so we are gonna move on to more shifting stuff. It's very shifty. Um, but I want to hear what your favorite new shift mechanic is. Is it the fact you can shift on different things to give you options? Is it a combo shift? Is it temporary? Like you tell me what your favorite shift is. It could even be potato shift, you don't know.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I mean the people's favorite has to be potato shift, the people's favorite is potato shift. I like the combo shift, has been my favorite, my favorite so far. Of all the of the potato shift, item shift, combo shift, um, madrigal shift, which is technically a character subtype shift, which you've had before. Um I I like the combo shift, I think it has the most potential moving forward. I think Boo and Sully are cool. I think we just talked about Dash and Mile it. The flexibility and game manipulation aspect, where not really game manipulation, but like your board state and what do I do here, and maybe I can do this. More options for me is great. Um, I'll take flexibility over just straight up brokenness of the duo shift. I know some people might like the duo or the duo shift more. I like says free. Yeah, it says free. I like I do, but I do like the comp combo shift is I like a good card that um changes the rules, gets people asking questions, people people that might not be super concerned about rules because the game isn't overly complicated, and then you incorporate a card that once you read it, it's very straightforward. You can do one or the other or both, and that's that, but you have to have two at least. Um, yeah. Very nice.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, good. Uh, I think my favorite is the temporary shift. Um, I'm actually I'm a big fan of this one, especially because a lot of the times before all this, shifting was always like, yeah, I'm shifting, but then I'm I'm not really developing my board because it's going on top of my already existing character. But this, it's like, all right, I'm gonna shift it, I'm gonna do what the thing is supposed to do, and then at the end of my turn, you know what? I'm gonna get this back so I can still play it, either shift it again or play it as its standalone card, right? So you're not actually losing all that much value. You're you know, you are not obviously developing your board more and more, but you do get to do a presumably powerful thing because you're shifting, right? And then get it back.
SPEAKER_02So I'm not surprised the red purple player enjoys the new bounce mechanic.
SPEAKER_00Hey, you know, I like to bounce things. Um that's what I do.
SPEAKER_02Um well, assuming you know I I do I do like it's it's very reminiscent of the bounce mechanic, right? Like you're not necessarily returning the thing underneath back to hand, but you're returning the thing you played back to hand. So it has that powerful impact that the bounce mechanic had that is just presented in a different way, in a new and flashy way. Uh, and it heals, it heals. So that's really cool. Yeah, yeah. I believe for now, all for now they all the temporary shifts heal, um, if I'm not mistaken.
SPEAKER_00Fair, yeah. So, yeah, those are our new favorite uh shift mechanics. Um, those are the big new mechanics that we got. Uh so let's see here. We talked about some team ups.
SPEAKER_02We're not saying potato.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I know. I mean, look, potato shift is a thing. Yep, yeah, it is. Uh vampiric potato. Yes, you do. So all right, so let's move on here and talk about some standout cards. Uh, I will start with the first one just so I'll give you some time to think. Um, but the first one that I want to talk about, we talked about just a little earlier. It is actually Violet Par. Um, and this violet is the five-drop violet, the five-drop violet par, inkable, uh, four, four, shift for three. It has resist one. And whenever you play this or another hero character, you may draw a card, then choose and discard a code. Um this card's very fun. Very, very fun. It's a four-five on three, effectively, right? Um, questing for two is always good. And what what I really enjoy about this is it gives filtering um to every presumably every card in your deck, right? Like you allow it to dig through your deck while also developing your board, right? Um, which is something that I think they've tried to do in the past with things like, you know, Bobby and Mulan, but it's kind of been relegated to a one-drop or a weaker character.
SPEAKER_02Um Cinderella stout, not stout-hearted, but the stout hearted shift target. He's like a two-drop.
SPEAKER_00Yep. Yeah. And so this has been very much like I've been pleasantly surprised every time I've faced it, where they're like, they play the new two-drop violet, that's pretty good. It's a three-two on two with resist one. Um, and then they immediately shift the three-drop, and then it's massive, it's it's annoying to kill, right? Because it's probably gonna take out anything that you that is gonna trade with it. Um, you do it has resist one, right? So you got to put five at once into it. Um, and if you just kind of leave it there and they just get to filter every turn where they just like, oh, hero. Oh, this wasn't what I was looking for. Let's try again. We'll filter again, right? So I've been a big fan. And like you said, uh the dash and violet, you can combo shift and then combo shift again and then shift shift.
SPEAKER_02So yeah, shift shift shift, shift into shift into dash.
SPEAKER_00Exactly. Yeah, so big fan. Um, that is my first standout card. Like hit me with one of yours.
SPEAKER_02Uh, one of the standout cards that I've been very pleasantly surprised with, I'm gonna exclude legendaries, but right now the rare windstorm. Ah, okay. Uh alone, alone uh it answers the Peter Pan uh problem. Well, not the full Peter Pan problem, but like I'm giving everything evasive, cool. I'm going to do all the damage to everything now. Thank you for enabling me to be able to do that. Um because you're doing three damage to all like everything. Yeah. Dumbo out. Your pan might still live, but your Dumbo is gone. Um also paired pairs very nicely with Merida against a toy deck. Against a toy deck, it is it's not the fastest option. Um however, if you it it is just fast enough. Um I've been playing a little playing a little purple steel, playing a little blue steel, playing a little amber steel. Uh Sam does like like steel decks, and she wants to go back to steel. She was on peanut butter and jelly and she wants to go back to steel. So I've been trying to find where um thinking of where the meta might go. I think you know, a lot of people will go to green yellow toys or some sort of just like when a set drops, uh each set drops, everyone's investigating how fast each deck can go. What is the fastest fast I can fast? And a lot of times, you know, it does go quite fast. But this with a Merida is just right in the slot. If you go Merida into that uh windstorm, it kind of clears the board. They might be at 1718 ink and coming from an old Red Blue player. I'm comfortable with you being at 1617 ink. There's no goat, there's no cobra. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, you have to you're gonna have to fight for your last couple lore there. Um, and I definitely do agree. Um, taking advantage of the full value, right? Dealing one, then dealing two to each character with evasive, um, it's just it answers a lot of things. Um, three three willpower seems to be the the number that most things want to be at right now for a ballpark card. Um, and then I'll also mention that it does deal with locations pretty efficiently, too, right? So if we see a rise in locations and all of a sudden, um not only can you hit their board, but you can hit their locations as well. So big fan of that one. Uh let's see here. So my next standout is cheating. Um yeah, so I do apologize, but my uh my next one is actually three cards um because I've been pleasantly surprised with Sully and Boo and Sully and Boo. Um I was playing this against this for the first time just while I was at Disneyland, um, and actually at Disneyland, not like, oh, I'm at Disneyland. Um yeah, that my card, my hand is Disneyland. Yes. Uh and let me tell you, once you get that combo going, or you go, okay, I will play boo and ruin your life because I'm gonna banish anything with three strength or less. Um, then I'm gonna combo shift Sully and Boo on top of it, and then you have to kill this. And when you do, oh look, I get Boo back and she's readied. So you can't really talk. It's oh, it's so frustrating. It's so frustrating. It's oh man, it just grinds my gears because I worked really hard for that Lilo and Stitch shift, and you're telling me this thing just yeets it. Yeah. Bye. Yes, it's a boo. Oh, it's it's very, very annoying and it's very, very good. Um, so just to read everything off, just so people uh are aware, the Sullian Boo is a six-drop Ingable, six-five, uh combo shift for four, your favorite new mechanic. Um and when this character is banished, if any of the cards that were under them are character cards, you may play those characters from your discard for free. Um and so, you know, what I experienced was a terrible, terrible time of they played Boo, uh, rushed into my Lilo and Stitch shift, which is wonderful for everybody involved. That immediately banished my Lilo and Stitch because the boo is a three-drop uninkable zero one with rush. Um, and it says whenever this character challenges another character with three strength or lust, banish that character. Um, they then immediately played a Sully bodyguard. Um, so I could not take out their boo, um, which is no fun. And then the the Sully says when you play this character, you may return a character card from your discard to your hand, right? So even if I did manage to take it out, they drop they drop Sully, they get back boo, then they shift Sully and Boo, and my life is miserable. So those are my three. That was cheating.
SPEAKER_02So hit me with another one of yours. Uh another one of my standout cards. I think it's really, really fun. I don't I didn't think it I didn't think it was gonna work as well as it did. I thought it was very sensitive, very glass canon. Um in the green-yellow toys, Kevin and Woody. If we're doing multiple cards, I'm going for multiple cards. Woody Kevin. Okay. He kevin is a two-drop inkable. One three. When this character quests, put this card on the top of your deck. It does quest for three and is a one-three and cost two.
SPEAKER_00I see what you're trying to do here.
SPEAKER_02Yes, yes. You have a Woody, the set champ Woody. When he quests, you may look at the top card of your deck. Is a two-drop character, you may play the character for free. So, in theory, you are just taking extra steps to re-ready your Kevin. Yes, that's true. Yeah, but but Woody quests for two, you're playing a three-drop character, it has three defense, which is just right so outside of fire the cannons, uh, the new green action that does two damage and avoids resist, uh grab uh three arrows. Yeah, he kind of is very in the early stages. I mean, this this deck is is I don't know. I think it's just a spice tech piece for the green yellow toys. But when you can just go Kevin, Kevin, Kevin, Kevin, Kevin, look at that. Wow, look at hey, you know, you you can protect it. It's it's still a combo piece, but you can protect it with um Rex, and then after you get your shift Woody, and you get your Kevin, you have other uh Chief Powhatan. There's another new bodyguard. Um Pocahontas' boyfriend. Yeah, yep. Uh I believe he also quests for three, if I'm not mistaken. Cocoum, right? Yeah, Cocoum. 4-6 bodyguard quest for three. So you have this. I built this little thing where it's like incrementally bodyguarding this this Woody. Unfortunately, Firefly Swarm just wrecks the whole party, but yeah, fair. Yeah, that it that is pretty cool. It it it it surprised me actually that it did do its thing a few times.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, because you're essentially sacrificing the one card that you're drawing to always have a custom for three body on the field, which seems pretty okay, um, especially considering that deck is already going pretty fast um and wide. So yeah, big fan. All right, uh, I'm gonna give you one more here, um, and that is uh let's see here. Um, I've been pleasantly surprised with the guest spawn.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I guessed it.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah. Um, it's a five-drop inkable card character, uh 3-4, so a little understated, but it says when you play this character, you may banish chosen character with five strength or more. Um we're we're going into an era where you're either gonna be really, really fast and wide um with a whole bunch of little things, or you're gonna try to control the game with higher power things. Um, you know what this card hits? It hits Demona. That's all I need it to hit. Um and the fact that it's in yellow, and a lot of the yellow cards can support. Um, you can it's world greatest criminal mind on a body, right? So not only can you just get a body, you can kill something. It's like I said, it's I've been pleasantly surprised um the amount of times that I'm like in a yellow steel matchup or something like that, and they go, I will quest with Lilo and Stitch for three and support your dude, and then I'll drop guest on, and there goes your dude. And I'm like, wait, but I needed that to to to to to answer you, and they're like, No, thank you.
SPEAKER_02No, no, no. And then they go, Oh, world's greatest coming on mine after that.
SPEAKER_00Yes, so uh big fan. It's definitely one of the one of the newer cards that I did not expect um at face value to be anything remarkable, but it's been quite fun.
SPEAKER_02Coming coming from someone who was playing Boosty Boys before it was cool, uh, got a couple mats with it in the winter spell era, uh, where people are like, ah, it's fine, but it's not the best. Having access to that, just pass the power, get rid of it, pass or reduce the power, get rid of it. Either side of the coin is very, very powerful. And and he's a he's uh his stats aren't the best for his cost. Like three, four, for five is not the best, but his stats are very decent for the game. For yeah, just pretty good, pretty good.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and it gives yellow that extra removal piece which it so desperately needs, right? So um, yeah. Alright, hit me with one more of your standout cards.
SPEAKER_02Standout cards. Ooh wee. Said cast on. I'm gonna have to go with I don't know. I don't know. Standout, stand out. Um, stand out has already been out in the game, so I can't say that.
SPEAKER_00It's already out, you can't say that one. I'm sorry. That's gonna be uh that's gonna be a new promo though at the DLCs and things.
SPEAKER_02That's exciting. This is a rare and it's kind of cheating, but the Madrigal family is disgusting.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_02Um it's gonna be for those dale decks primarily. It is yellow blue. Uh before rotation, there was a a presence, this looming presence of this. I'm gonna return my Hades with the Cauldron and control the ultimate late game and um take over after we hit turn 20. There's nothing you can do. However, there's a little more Madrigal this time around. And before the Madrigals were very purpley, and now they're looking a little more blue, looking a little more blue. It can shift onto any uh for those that don't know, it's a five-drop inkable, uh, the Madrigal family 2-8 magigal shift three. Once during your turn, whenever you remove one damage from one of your characters, put the top card from your deck into your ink well face down and exert it. So you have some rampage here, which is what you're wanting in that blue in the yellow blue decks. You're kind of lost out on Tipo and sale. However, you're getting a lot better cards on two that can control the board in in yellow, and some cards in blue that are for I mean it's not the best card, but awarded for one in a deck that needs to buy time, will buy you a turn on turn two. So then you can get to the I know Darkwing isn't the most synergistic with the Madrigals, but hey, not in the same universe, no?
SPEAKER_00No, um, no, what I like about this card is that the the shifting is so broad, right? There are a ton of madrigals, um, specifically in yellow, right? Um, I think that one of the things that is a little disappointing is that a lot of the newer madrigals and the better madrigals are purple, and so you don't get to play those with them, right? But I still think the premise of what this card is trying to do is your madrigals that heal themselves or heal other things are in blue, right? So um that's what this thing is doing. And with Dale, this thing hits for eight. It's a menace. Um, because you could eat you could very easily go um, you know, turn three, shift mag shift the madrigal family, turn four, play Dale swing for eight at something like that's that's gross. Um so yeah, big fan. All right. So um we are gonna transition here for the last part of the episode. We're gonna talk about just a couple decks that we think are going to be um fun, prominent, um, big players in this new meta. Um, and so the first one that I want to talk about is a deck that you brought up, um, and a deck that you've been playing a lot, is that that is Amber Steel. So why don't we talk about that? Give us a little bit of like what does the core of the deck look like? What's it trying to do, and why is it good?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, um, I think there's two options. Uh, one that I'm not a big fan of, I've never been an aggressive player. Uh, there has been some Amber Steel toy stuff that has not shown a lot of promise, but has been very fast. Um, so I think that does get a little bit better. Um I I'm very much liking the Lilo. The Lilo Lilo parts.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Oops, oops, all Lilo stitch is is very stitch, turn two, uh two, three. If I'm not mistaken, two three support Lilo in Amber. That if you don't get your shift target on three, she still gives that support to your opposing character. Um, you can still banish with Gaston or uh World's Greatest Criminal Mind, which I think World's Greatest any deck that gives you access to World's Greatest Criminal Mind, this set is going to be huge, at least for the first section of this. Yeah. It it that card specifically answers a lot of problems. And with the Lilo and both the two drop and the shift, Lilo and Stitch shift, it it answers even more than what it did before. Um, yeah, it's kind of like this mid-range control-esque, but because you're getting so much lore for the control piece, it's it can be, and then you have access to aliens that quest highly. There's a four-drop uninkable alien in winter spell that quests for three. Um, there's been time there's just been some games where there's nothing my opponent can do. Um, you have access to bodyguards in Amber if you really want to go that route as well, but it's mostly just oops, all Lilo stitch. And I'm gonna play my my snowboarder stitch, and I'm gonna quest them and get some more cards. I'm gonna play best where the one drop action that says, Oh, go grab another character. Um, yep. The new BR guest, yeah. You're the new BR guest for one. Uh, you can't you have access to Ariel in that deck, so you have multiple one card draw engine is good, right? The stitch card draw engine is fine. If you get into a longer battle, you drop a uh surfing stitch, maybe if they you're going against something that's giving you ink. Um, probably a two of probably not it's mostly an ink card, you just ink. Um, if you get there, stitch is great. That's a card draw engine, other stitch is great, card draw engine and aerial. You're singing uh besties and quirls grave's kernel mind, and maybe Dela's Moon Lullaby just to reduce the attack and get a draw a card and say, Hey, guess what? That that thing does not have six attack anymore, it has five, which keeps my Lilo up.
SPEAKER_00Um yeah, um, so one of the questions I wanted to ask you about this, right, is since rotation, we actually did lose a lot of the one drop Lilo's, right? Um, how important is it that we really we only have one one drop Lilo now, and the rest of them are stitches, right? Um do you it do you see that hurting the consistency a little bit because you do kind of want to shift as soon as possible, or do you play enough of the Lilo's and the stitches that are one or two drop, maybe even a three-drop, that you can shift no problem?
SPEAKER_02Uh and from what I've seen, I have I I have the three-drop Lilo alien when you quest it give your alien plus two attack and can attack rate characters. Uh, the new one drop stitch is so good with that card, and it gives you that um yes, you don't have a lot of one drops at that are Lilo's, but this stitch, this stitch one three. I should have said it's a standout card specifically for this deck. Because if you get what you want to get, you get the one-drop stitch. Let's just say all the iterations, right? One drop stitch. Every iteration after that. You have two drop, some sort of Lilo, which is the most Lilos available. You have the new two drop, you have the one all bundled up, you have more Lilos there. Um, you're probably running all of those. Then maybe, or maybe you just drop a uh another Lilo. Um, the one drop that cares about Pudge. Uh, I don't think you put Pudge in this deck, but maybe you do, maybe you don't. I don't know. Um does say free. Does say free. However, you don't get the Lilo, you get um the the uh the alien, the alien one that I have, or it's a challenge.
SPEAKER_00The one that gives Challenger to everything on play, too. So that's also very good. Yeah, and that's actually a good point that you know I kind of realized as we were talking, right? Maybe this isn't a deck for Pudge anymore, right? Because it used to be you had so many you had such a plethora of one drop Lilos that like your pudge was coming down on turn one for free, right? Um now you just have the one, right? Um, so maybe maybe you reduce the pudges, don't play pudges. Um, but that was very interesting to me. It it's you like you said, it's more controlly and less spammy.
SPEAKER_02And it back in set one, and normally at the beginning of each set, and I I try to I try to find a I feel like Lorcon has a lot of pro patterns, and at the beginning of each rotation, or at the beginning, this is the third rotation. Well, technically not the second rotation, but third start, right? At the start of set one, you had this controlly-ish um aerial singing to either get more cards or remove stuff. Um sing, grab your sword. So it was like this where like we're not gonna go fast right away, but we're gonna set up and then we're gonna go fast, but we're gonna go one drop lilo, two drop simba, aerial. So it's fast-ish. Um then you had the angel winter spell and fabled fabled in the beginning of fabled blue blurple was your control, and uh Amber Steel was this anti-blurple that wasn't super super super lightning fast, uh, that the the the yellow purple was, but it still had like I'm gonna get rid of this, I'm gonna kind of be on the fast end of mid-range. This iteration that I've I've I don't know, people you know, there's pool is limited, so people have probably thought of it as well. But my build it's fast because of the three quest, it has some removal. You can come in and sing uh he hurled his thunderbolts. You probably don't run that many copies of it because you're probably not running too too many um things to keep you alive for a long period of time. But that's fair. It's it's fast and it's it can you can flex into fast, right? So you have like Stitch, Lilo all bundled up, some other high questing aliens sprinkled throughout that can go fast if you need to. And I I think it's I think it's a really solid choice if you're if you're looking to do it.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and it's interesting, right? Because you do get access to some of the good like Amber, I think is unanimously gonna be one of the better, stronger colors going into this this new rotation. I think everybody knows that, right? But you do also get access to steel, right? And um it's it's a pairing as old as time, right? Amber steel, right? You you get access to the angel that you can discard a card and deal two damage, right? So you have direct damage removal there to deal with things that are trying to target down your stitch, right? Um, you have the new dock, broke you broke my smolder, right? You don't get the body, which is maybe not as good, but it's it's one drop, draw two cards. Um, and so you have a lot of different control pieces. And I and so I think what's very interesting, like you were like you were saying, is you do you're switching mindsets from that. I'm gonna span the board with as many Lilo's and stitches as possible to no, I'm actually gonna set up my shift and then just kind of like world graze criminal mind you and value you out of the game, right? Um, because all the while you can't deal with my three, five resist one, right? That's yeah, you have to trade two things into it. And so if you're trading two things into it, that's great. The rest of my board is going to eat you alive, right? And so I think that's where this really, really shines. Um and you have recursion in the Lilo Rockstar, you have draw in the Stitch Snowboarder. If you think if you think you're gonna make it, you can get up there to Raging Storm, you have a board wipe. So all these options are available for you.
SPEAKER_02I think yeah, I it also if you like Raging Storm, you can build it to slow it down, right? You can put different card options in there so that you maybe you do want to have that. Oops, I didn't get there, restart, play a couple things like quests quickly underneath. Um you have access to a heavy song package. I know Red Yellow's looking at songs a lot, but you also have access to Ariel as well, and uh you're you're seeing stuff like besties. Maybe maybe you sing bet play besties and be our guest. Um uh besties isn't a song, I don't think. Yeah, it is. Is it ain't it?
SPEAKER_00No, it's just an action. Is it just an action? Yeah, but you have access to like you said, the steel removal so strength and thunderbolt, you have a cude, right? A couple is still disgusting. Um and all like you can play BR guest, it's just it's just two drop besties, right?
SPEAKER_02So yeah, and there's a lot of uh if you're lying on the aerial as part of your game plan, you it's definitely viable.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so yeah, I like I like that option. I think that's a that's a good deck to watch out for, and I think at the end of the day, I mean both of us are in a very much agreement that a 3-5 with resist one on turn three is massively hard to remove. Um, the one hard counter right now is Boo. Um, right. Um, other than that, you're kind of looking at like you're trading two things in unless you are playing red or something like that. But yeah. Cool. All right, so the one deck that I want to talk about, which we have uh maybe a couple more minutes here. Um, I did want to harp on the Mickey and Mini deck again. Um, and I know you're probably sick of it because it hasn't even come out yet, but I am already talking about this thing.
SPEAKER_02Um uh it's I get it, it's it's the best thing that Blue Green has to do.
SPEAKER_00It's exceptionally good. And I've I've I've kind of made two different builds of it, and I think the answer to solving the puzzle is going to be a little bit of a hybrid of both, right? Um, the first build is all you're doing is you're playing Mickeys and Minis and Mickey and Minnie with an egregious amount of top end stuff, and saying, you're going to have to ramp me. I will play board wipes, I will play Milos. Good luck, have fun, right? And the whole point is you you Mickey and Mini, they ramp you three. Now you're playing six, seven, eight drops, even nine drops with Phillip, right? You're and that's all you're doing, right? And it it works pretty well. It's not the most consistent, of course, because you have that disparity where oops, if you draw all top end, you're you're kind of screwed, right? But um the build that I've been liking more is a boost variant, and so um again, even though it doesn't work, right? Even though it doesn't work, uh the fact that the Donald can still provide you with enough value with cards like Pete, with Kristoff, because that that's a three-drop ramp now. Um, things like Megara. Um and one of the spicy texts is because you're getting so much ink in your app, most of the time, six ink, um, just like like that. Um, is the Prince John or the Little John, sorry, the Little John, uh six drop uninkable quest for three. Yeah, um, and you boost three and he readies himself and he can quest again, right? So you then you just have a massive amount of ink. And so it makes playing playing little john not that terrible because you can play him on turn four or five ahead of the curve, and then all of a sudden, what am I gonna do? I'm gonna quest for three, boost, he stand him up, maybe I'll quest for three again. And I'm already I've already quested for five with Mickey a mini, right? So like you're just you're accelerating the pace of the game. Um, I think um along with the Donald, right, being able to boost Pete twice for one is very good. Um, and then being able to have that upside of swinging with the Pete and still getting a value out of the Pete, right? Because Pete is very much a card that you want to quest because then you get to draw more cards. Well, it doesn't really matter if if they kill it on you on their their turn, you're drawing cards anyway, right? And so they have to answer this immediate threat. That's a 5-5 that can take out boards. Um but I say a hybrid version is gonna work better best because I think that there is gonna be some sort of um middle ground where you have to play um some board wipes like under the sea and the combo with um someone will lose their head, right? Because at the end of the day, the Mickey and Mini is a is a seven cost card that you're playing on turn three, right? Yeah, and that seems to be the standard, right? With with green yellow toys and maybe even some some green green other stuff, right? Singing under the sea on turn three is not outrageous, um, because you can shift Woody and you have a bullseye or whatnot. So um I think to keep on par, you're gonna have to play that. Um, but this deck has unique access to someone lose their head to change the math a little bit.
SPEAKER_02So if I'm if I may jump uh back to little little john is a four-five, so he avoids a lot of removal.
SPEAKER_00Yes, he does. Yeah, um, and just the fact that you can quest for three, stand him up, then quest for three again, then boost again, right? Um, that's six, that's six lore plus the five you've already gotten. And if they if they sometimes they just can't answer Mickey and Mini right away, that is true and lore out of it, right? Now you're at 16 with with the little jump, like it's pretty gross. Um and you have access to the warded stuff because there's a new Hades that it costs six that quests for three that is warded, Milo Thatch is warded and bounced some things, right? So it is all about like I'm getting low, I'm getting lore in big bursts, right? I quest for five. You answer it, that's fine. It something good happened for me, right? Um then I quest for three. Okay, you got rid of it, great. Your thing is now dead because my dude is humongous, and I will now continue now. Basically, now I'm gonna okay. Milo bounce your thing, quest for three. Milo bounce your thing, quest for three, right? Until the game's over, right?
SPEAKER_02So does that vary put that thing back to where it came from is is is probably really important in the mirror match. Cause if you're if you and I know I'm just coming up up with stuff, but if we're in the mirror match, we're playing the same deck. You send me your list and I copy it. Um I you go mini, I go mini, you go Mickey, I go Mickey, uh, or or one drop, whatever. Yeah, you be the ramp, the ramp one that gets you to five. I'm gonna put that thing back where it came from, or so help me.
SPEAKER_00Yes, because that card is very, very good. And the tempo that you do lose a lot of tempo if you can't shift um and you're setting up for the shift. So that is one thing that I will say.
SPEAKER_02Um and if you don't get the ink, you're relying on that ink.
SPEAKER_00Yes, for sure. Um, and you know, one other kind of standout card in that deck specifically is actually the new blue boo. Um, that basically it's it's an 03, it's a one-drop inkable, but it's if you have five or more cards in your ink wall it quests for for three, which again is it sounds like nothing right now, right? But because you're so efficiently getting to that five or six ink because just from playing the game, right? It's it's very, very nice.
SPEAKER_02So um it's yeah, I love I love a card that everyone doesn't like or everyone thinks it's bad. Uh and then I go, actually, you're gonna hate this card. Exactly.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. So, yes, those are the two decks I think we're most excited to be playing. Um, I think we're we're gonna call it there for now. Um, we will come back uh next week and talk about more decks that as the meta takes shapes, um, and we start to see more online stuff and as we open product. Um, because I know that you really want to talk about uh Boosty Boys. I'm probably playing Green Yellow Toys this set because why not? Um Boosty Boys is great.
SPEAKER_02I'm I'm I'm cooking with the Omni Droids as well. Uh the new OmniDroid editions, uh I think are uh I didn't bring it up because I think it's very apparent that they're very strong. Um the only thing that it's just well, we can talk about it more later. I could talk for in 45 minutes about the the curve of the Omni Droids syndrome and blue and it's it's pretty pretty good. I have been playing a lot of steel and I definitely went down that rabbit hole.
SPEAKER_00And yeah, I'm excited to hear about that next time because that that'll be a nice a nice teaser for you all. Um but until then, inks mart and quest fast. We'll see you next time, folks.