Hey everyone, I’m back again with yet another oldie but a goodie from the earlier days of beta. Overwhelma-rod, or as it was once known Overwhelmaton. I’m also going to writing a bit about the history of the deck and its sister decks Double Cheat and Flight School. (A Divining Rod/Grasping at Shadows deck designed by the one of the quiet geniuses behind some of Eternal’s earliest decks, and a Flier Based Tempo Oriented Rod deck originally designed by That1Guy.) Essentially what these decks aimed to do was out value the opponent with Divining Rod (and in some cases Dawnwalker) while leaning on either the powerful, inevitable late game of Knight-Chancelor, Siraf or the exceptionally explosive Reanimation chains powered by Vara and Champion of Cunning.
While all of these decks have many overlapping strategies and cards, they thrive in distinctly different stages of the game. The aggressive fliers of Flight School allow them to close games quickly with curves backed either by cards like Vodakhan’s Staff or Xenan Obelisk. Rod is a card that puts them over the top and causes huge swings in card advantage and allows them to put such a quick and effective clock on the opponent.
Flight School is closest to the distinct cross-game cousin of Divining Rod decks, Bant Company. (While this comparison is useful, it is ultimately a trap as both decks exist in separate game systems and in distinctly different formats.) Both decks play the most efficient evasive threats and use a single card to generate large bursts of card advantage and power advantage that they translate into a victory. Having access to these high impact cards allow them to thrive even in the late game, solidifying them as equally if not more resilient to control strategies than other aggro and tempo variants in the metagame. All of these factors snowball into a well-tuned, aggressive evasive unit based strategy that can go toe to toe with most members of the metagame, although they will struggle against some of their faster go-wide counterparts such as Jito Queen. Flight School was the first Divining Rod deck and showed us what the card could really begin to do.
Flight School – That1Guy
4 Desert Marshal (Set1 #332)
4 Eager Owlet (Set1 #144)
4 Tinker Overseer (Set1 #138)
2 Vanquish (Set1 #143)
3 Siraf, Crownwatch Hero | Knight-Chancellor Siraf (Set1 #335)
4 Scorpion Wasp (Set1 #96)
4 Silverwing Familiar (Set1 #152)
3 Stand Together (Set1 #334)
4 Valkyrie Enforcer (Set1 #151)
4 Vodakhan’s Staff (Set1 #336)
4 Karmic Guardian (Set1 #341)
2 Xenan Obelisk (Set1 #103)
4 Divining Rod (Set1 #109)
2 Silverwing Commander (Set1 #175)
8 Justice Sigil (Set1 #126)
7 Time Sigil (Set1 #63)
4 Amber Monument (Set1 #420)
4 Combrei Banner (Set1 #424)
4 Seat of Progress (Set0 #58)
—————————————-
3 Slow (Set1 #70)
2 Vanquish (Set1 #143)
4 Combrei Healer (Set1 #333)
2 Decay (Set1 #95)
1 Dispel (Set1 #91)
1 Siraf, Crownwatch Hero | Knight-Chancellor Siraf (Set1 #335)
1 Stand Together (Set1 #334)
1 Auric Runehammer (Set1 #166)
Our second variant of Divining Rod deck is the second evolution of the archetype. Bringing it into a Combresian shell centered on Overwhelm units, Overwhelma-rod aims to generate massive board advantage by cheating large and powerful units into play. This variant was borne out of further testing of Divining Rod, with Overwhelm offering the most powerful units to cheat into play and the most power in the form of Talir, Who Sees Beyond. Common targets include Cirso and Copperhall Elite, although the deck can reach its Talir based end game as early as turn four. If you aren’t defeated by the robust curve of large Overwhelm units, you will eventually fall prey to a single Baton hitting a few units and recurring a slew of Dawnwalkers ready to attack the opponent. With access to both Stand Together and Instructor’s Baton as ways to combat the effectiveness of cards such as Harsh Rule, Overwhelma-rod shores up some of the flaws in other mid-range strategies in Eternal. This late-game inevitability combined with the explosive nature of Divining Rod decks allows the deck to turn the corner in the second stage of the game without sacrificing the effectiveness of the vast majority of their cards in the late-game. This archetype is a personal favorite, at one point during a previous ranked season I had a roughly 65% winrate with the deck across more than a hundred ranked games.
Overwhelma-rod – Babam
4 Initiate of the Sands (Set1 #74)
2 Friendly Wisp (Set1 #82)
2 Lightning Storm (Set1 #206)
2 Secret Pages (Set1 #81)
2 Amber Acolyte (Set1 #93)
4 Dawnwalker (Set1 #86)
4 False Prince (Set1 #356)
4 Siraf, Crownwatch Hero | Knight-Chancellor Siraf (Set1 #335)
2 Stand Together (Set1 #334)
4 Copperhall Elite (Set1 #340)
3 Sandstorm Titan (Set1 #99)
4 Cirso, the Great Glutton (Set1 #362)
4 Divining Rod (Set1 #109)
4 Squad Strategist (Set1 #344)
2 Striking Snake Formation (Set1 #112)
2 Talir, Who Sees Beyond (Set1 #124)
3 Justice Sigil (Set1 #126)
2 Primal Sigil (Set1 #187)
6 Time Sigil (Set1 #63)
2 Amber Monument (Set1 #420)
2 Elysian Banner (Set1 #421)
3 Seat of Order (Set0 #51)
4 Seat of Progress (Set0 #58)
4 Seat of Wisdom (Set0 #63)
—————————————-
2 Desert Marshal (Set1 #332)
2 Stand Together (Set1 #334)
2 Healer’s Cloak (Set1 #98)
3 Marisen’s Disciple (Set1 #104)
2 Steward of Prophecy(Set1 #97)
3 Harsh Rule (Set1 #172)
1 Marshal Ironthorn (Set1 #174)
The third and final variant, and most interesting Divining Rod deck is a deck known as “Double Cheat” so coined by brew genius LocoPojo. In my eyes it is the best designed Rod deck in that it takes advantage of every single aspect of the card to the fullest. The deck uses deadly units to try to cheat a Vara into play as early as possible, while also having access to the reanimation packages common in the OTK Champion of Cunning Reanimator decks. The deck tries to cheat on power costs in two ways, either by abusing Divining Rod on deadly units or reanimating key targets such as Vara or Champion of Cunning with Grasping At Shadows. Instructor’s Baton fits perfectly in a reanimation strategy as not only another way to cheat units into play, but it also can dump units such as Dawnwalker and Scourge of Frosthome into the void. While Loco’s current iteration is not playing a Champion of Cunning/Dawnwalker package as of late, it is still a worthwhile inclusion to consider.
Double Cheat – Locopojo
2 Blind Storyteller (Set1 #192)
1 Excavate (Set1 #71)
4 Seek Power (Set1 #408)
2 Backlash (Set1 #200)
3 Herald’s Song (Set1 #196)
4 Sporefolk (Set1 #262)
2 Whispering Wind (Set1 #202)
4 Scorpion Wasp (Set1 #96)
2 Torrent of Spiders (Set1 #272)
4 Steward of the Past (Set1 #287)
4 Divining Rod (Set1 #109)
4 Grasping at Shadows (Set1 #292)
1 Lumen Defender (Set1 #115)
4 Snowcrush Animist (Set1 #384)
4 Vara, Fate-Touched (Set1 #307)
4 Scourge of Frosthome (Set1 #248)
2 Primal Sigil (Set1 #187)
6 Shadow Sigil (Set1 #249)
3 Time Sigil (Set1 #63)
4 Feln Banner (Set1 #417)
4 Seat of Cunning (Set0 #62)
4 Seat of Mystery (Set0 #61)
1 Seat of Wisdom (Set0 #63)
2 Xenan Banner (Set0 #52)
Divining Rod will always be a card to keep your eye on as long as it is in the card pool and will only get better with time. One of the first things I know I’ll be doing when looking at any new cards added to the game is asking “Does this fit into a Rod Shell? If it doesn’t, does it enable a new Rod archetype to exist?” I’ve definitely raised concerns about the scaling power level of Divining Rod, and it has come to light that the Rod has already influenced the design of a card by making it prohibitive to give that card a certain Battle Skill. Now, we can only wait and ponder just what they could print to truly break Divining Rod in half.
Eternally innovating,
Peter “Babam” Golightly
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