Today I wanted to look at some of my draft decks that have hit seven wins so you can get an idea of what makes them tick. Let’s start with this Rakano deck that is highlighted by three Torches.
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2 District Infantry
1 Fearless Nomad
1 Inspire
1 Oni Ronin
3 Torch
1 Valkyrie Aspirant
1 Argenport Soldier
2 Ornate Katana
1 Piercing Shot
1 Pyre Adept
1 Assembly Line
2 Brightmace Paladin
1 Granite Acolyte
1 Loyal Watchwing
1 Oni Quartermaster
1 Rebel Sharpshooter
1 Silverwing Familiar
1 Guerrilla Fighter
1 Morningstar
1 Steelfang Chakram
1 Soulfire Drake
2 Valkyrie Wings
8 Fire Sigil
7 Justice Sigil
1 Emerald Monument
1 Granite Monument
The structure of this deck is a little strange. It starts out with perhaps the most aggressive cheap unit in the format, District Infantry, but tops out with a couple of six drops in Valkyrie Wings. The reason I opted for the Infantry in this deck was a lack of other options for early units. I would definitely play some off faction two drop Strangers in their place given that my deck does have aims of going to the late game and the Strangers block better. Nevertheless, you can have some strong openings starting with District Infantry into Ornate Katana.
Aside from the excellent removal of three Torches and a Piercing Shot, this deck has some solid weapon combos. Brightmace Paladin, Rebel Sharpshooter, Loyal Watchwing, and Silverwing Familiar all love to pick up weapons and this deck has some premier ones including Morningstar and Steelfang Chakram. The Valkyrie Wings aren’t necessarily at their best here, ideally you’d have stronger and more four and five cost bodies for them, but they are so good on a Brightmace Paladin that they are certainly worth playing. This deck has an Oni Quartermaster that is great here, especially with two Katanas. Soulfire Drake is a great card in general and a great thing to equip with weapons.
Luckily we came away with two Monuments, which easily allows us to play 17 Power without fear of flooding despite all of our cheap cards. The worst cards here are probably Guerrilla Fighter, Pyre Adept and the District Infantries. The rest of the deck I am certainly happy to be playing.
1 Copper Conduit
1 Predator’s Instinct
1 Bold Adventurer
1 Combrei Stranger
2 Elysian Stranger
1 Secret Pages
1 Static Bolt
1 Teleport
1 Tundra Explorer
1 Yeti Snowslinger
2 Amber Acolyte
1 Cobalt Acolyte
1 Dispel
1 Eye of Winter
2 Scaly Gruan
1 Skysnapper
1 Wisdom of the Elders
1 Ancient Lore
1 Champion of Wisdom
1 Aerial Ace
1 Explorer Emeritus
1 Towering Terrazon
1 Windshaper
1 Hatchery Raider
1 Carnosaur Behemoth
8 Primal Sigil
9 Time Sigil
This deck’s power comes from a handful of cards: Eye of Winter, Explorer Emeritus, and Hatchery Raider. The rest of the deck is more or less filler, aside from some key support cards. The deck has a number of ways to generate extra cards: Secret Pages, Tundra Explorer, Amber Acolyte, Wisdom of the Elders, Ancient Lore, and Explorer Emeritus. These all enable the Hatchery Raider to be an absolute game winner. Often I would transform four or more weak cards into 3/3 Fliers. Eye of Winter can be a game winner on its own, locking down either the opponent’s best unit, or if you are attacking, locking down two blockers. Windshaper is a cute way to make the Hatchery Raider tokens even better. Other important finishing cards include Copper Conduit, Champion of Wisdom, and Towering Terrazon along with Cobalt Acolyte to give these units Flying. Teleport and Dispel are key role players that can break up suited up units or shut down key opposing Fliers respectively. Scaly Gruan is certainly not a very exciting card, but it is decent here to buy time to draw extra cards and deploy the Raider. The half-faction Strangers played a key role in blocking opposing Lethrai Rangers or Oni Ronin.
Taking a look at the power-base, I started with 17 sigils, bolstered by Secret Pages and two Amber Acolytes. Without these extra ways to search up sigils, I would have to consider playing 19 power in this build to reliably cast the expensive cards in this deck. While there are certainly upgrades that could be made with this deck, there are no cards I am truly unhappy to be playing. The worst card is probably Carnosaur Behemoth and I don’t mind playing it when I have this many power sources. Aerial Ace is nothing special, but it gets a little better with Windshaper and is just fine on its own, though I wouldn’t mind replacing it with another four cost card like Jorrall Frostkin.
1 Direfang Spider
2 Levitate
1 Suffocate
1 East-Wind Herald
1 Elysian Stranger
2 Lethrai Ranger
1 Static Bolt
1 Violent Gust
1 Beastcaller’s Amulet
1 Cobalt Acolyte
1 Desperado
1 Lethrai Nightblade
1 Plague
1 Scaly Gruan
2 Trickster’s Cloak
1 Xenan Destroyer
1 Back-Alley Bouncer
1 Deathstrike
1 Jarrall’s Frostkin
2 Nightsworn Chieftain
1 Whip Chain
1 Araktodon
1 Mistveil Drake
2 Fire Sigil
6 Primal Sigil
6 Shadow Sigil
1 Amethyst Monument
2 Feln Banner
1 Stonescar Banner
This is an excellent example of a solid Feln Deck with a well-executed splash. The keys to this deck are the infiltrate cards along with two Levitates, two Trickster’s Cloaks and the Cobalt Acolyte. Curving Ranger into Cloak can be a devastating opening for many decks. Beastcaller’s Amulet was hugely important here too, especially in combination with Lethrai Nightblade. This is roughly what you want your Feln decks to look like in shape, four to six infiltrate cards and a similar number of solid ways to enable them. This deck also gets fancy and splashes two Nightsworn Chieftains off of three banners and two Fire Sigils. The Feln Banners actually enable this splash by safely allowing the two Fire Sigils to be in the deck. The Chieftains are just solid units on their own, but they combine especially well in this deck with the number of evasive units present. East-Wind Herald, Cobalt Acolyte, Nightblade, or Mistveil Drake are all great things to target. Another very important synergy in this deck is Levitate/Cobalt Acolyte combined with Violent Gust. By giving your opponent’s units flying, you can then take them out with the Gust.
Taking a look at the power-base, you see 18 total power with no additional ways to draw cards or search up sigils aside from the two Levitates. The Levitates sort of add up to half a power here, which is right where this deck wants to be. Given that there are five expensive cards, and handful of important four cost cards, the deck wants at least 18 power. Without ways to draw extra cards, I would certainly consider 19.
The weak points of this deck are the Scaly Gruan and the Araktodon. They are clearly playable, but are not much more than filler here.
2 Combust
1 Dark Return
3 Direfang Spider
1 Oni Ronin
1 Suffocate
1 Dark Wisp
1 Lethrai Ranger
2 Obsidian Golem
1 Ornate Katana
2 Stonescar Stranger
1 Bloodrite Kalis
1 Execute
1 Pit Fighter
1 Ravenous Thornbeast
1 Rebel Sharpshooter
1 Xenan Destroyer
1 Outlands Sniper
1 Recogulator
1 Stonescar Magus
1 Obliterate
1 Horsesnatcher Bat
1 Worldpyre Phoenix
8 Fire Sigil
9 Shadow Sigil
1 Stonescar Banner
This is a great example of a Stonescar deck capable of stalling the game and winning with a large flier. Three Direfang Spiders, two Obsidian Golems, Pit Fighter, Recogulator, and Stonescar Magus are all very difficult for ground units to attack into. The deck has plenty of removal such as Combust, Suffocate, Execute, and Obliterate to deal with units that might otherwise be able to attack. What makes this deck really win effectively is Horsesnatcher Bat and Worldpyre Phoenix. This deck does such a good job of stalling the game, but otherwise would have a hard time actually punching through for a win. The fliers are critical to getting this job done. Bloodrite Kalis was an experiment. It did win one game that otherwise would never have been possible, but it was stuck in my hand too often to be worth recommending under normal circumstances.
Given how important the six cost fliers are to this deck, I believe 18 power with a couple of cards that draw an extra card is the right mix for the power-base. It would be ideal to have a monument or another expensive card to put extra power into, but this deck worked quite well as is.
Hopefully this article helped you get an idea of the structure of successful Eternal draft decks. Check out my video later this week where I put some of my draft theory into action!
Thanks for reading,
Ben
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