This is a “legacy” deck that’s been around for a very long time, and has been a popular budget deck choice for about as long, notably due to it’s appearance in the landmark “Stone Poor, Deck Rich” series. The name plays on the original name of Divining Rod, which was first called Instructor’s Baton. It crams a  lot of flying creatures in there to maximize the chances of getting a lot of value out of each Rod. This deck is notably “wider” in its strategy than the others, as you can see from the Obelisks and the lack of Glaives. There’s no place for Darude in this list as he’d ruin the main strategy of the deck, and Siraf (while present in some variations) is not needed either, making this a legendary-less list. Yet it has been rated tier 1 or 2 consistently in almost every tier list since the start of beta.

Note that in this article I will actually not advise you to go in this direction, for reasons which would be worth an entire article of their own, but to sum it up : Divining Rod strategies are only worth pursuing if you run the maximum amount of relevant units, which makes it too restrictive a mold for the purposes of this series (more specifically : the list is not worth running if you don’t have 4x Valkyrie Enforcer, 4x Eager Owlet and preferably 4x Tinker Apprentice too).

“Mono Justice Beatdown”

Units
4 Valkyrie Aspirant
2 Crownwatch Commando
4 Crownwatch Paladin
4 Eager Owlet
4 Silverwing Familiar
4 Valkyrie Enforcer
2 Fourth-Tree Elder

Weapons
4 Gilded Glaive
3 Elder’s Feather
4 Mantle of Justice

Spells
4 Inspire
4 Protect
3 Vanquish

Relics
4 Paladin Oathbook

Power
25 Justice Sigil

“Wait, that’s not Combrei!” I hear you saying. While that’s technically true, this deck is right in line, both on game plan and on structure, with the others above. Here we trade access to time and Combrei cards for the consistency of single faction and the power of Mantle of Justice. The plan is otherwise almost identical to that of “Combeagis” : pants up, fly over, protect.

This deck has been performing surprisingly well, making a few noted appearances in the top30, and gained popularity as a straightforward and affordable climbing deck. It’s likely to be the strongest mono-faction deck in the game right now, and well worth taking inspiration from.

Getting to the Core

So looking at the lists above, what is at the heart of a good Combrei beatdown? It’s fairly easy to see a common thread going through all of them :

Sticky, buffable units :

• Crownwatch Paladin : this monster of a card shows up again as a pillar of this archetype too. Two great keywords on a 2 drop very conducive to buffing is simply too good for any Beatdown deck to pass up.
• Silverwing Familiar : another great buff target and ball of keywords, this is one of the stars of the deck. A Glaive on Familiar will often be enough to win a game on its own.
• Awakened Student : while not quite as much of an auto include as the above two, it’s still a great 2 drop that can get out of hand quickly, demanding an answer which are already stretched thin by the above two.

Versatile weapons:

• Gilded Glaive : another repeat from the Rakano article, and one of the best weapons in the game.
• Vodakhan’s Staff : while not so flashy at first glance, it’s very solid, and the Empower is very relevant, as it lets you be a bit more liberal in its usage (since you can get it back later).

Efficient interaction :

• Desert Marshal : one of the all star cards of Combrei, legendaries be damned. It’s Ambush-speed Silence that cannot be countered. It will ruin many a deck’s day, eating attacking fliers, neutering Champions of Cunning, and many more powerful things. Getting a 2/2 body out of it is more of a cherry on top (and it’s a good one).
• Valkyrie Enforcer : yet another repeat from Rakano. While it lacks the speed of Marshal, silence is still a very powerful effect, and Enforcer’s body would be good value even without it.
• Vanquish : in a different category from the 8 silences-on-a-stick, but still a great asset. It will take care of most threats or roadblocks the deck cares about for the discount price of 2 mana.

These cards are the true core of the archetype. Luckily, only one of them is a rare, while all other are lower rarity and relatively easy to acquire. These are the cards you want to get ASAP, either through Forge and Draft (they’re all great cards in the limited game modes) or by crafting what you lack later.

Making do : Basics-only Combrei

In the most recent patch, DWD introduced new multi faction starter decks that can be obtained through quests, including one for Combrei. It will be very useful to get our deck started. Using only cards available for free from the basic decks (including the Combrei one) it is possible to make the following starter deck :

Basic Combrei

Units
2 District Infantry
3 Initiate of the Sands
2 Valkyrie Aspirant
3 Awakened Student
3 Crownwatch Commando
1 Desert Marshal
4 Temple Scribe
2 Combrei Healer
2 Scorpion Wasp
1 Valkyrie Enforcer
1 Karmic Guardian
2 Praxis Displacer
2 Towering Terrazon
2 Fourth-Tree Elder
1 Predatory Carnosaur
1 Rolant’s Honor Guard

Weapons
4 Crownwatch Longsword
2 Vodakhan’s Staff
2 Stalwart Shield

Spells
2 Finest Hour
2 Rebuke
2 Unlock Potential
1 Ancient Lore

Relics
1 Xenan Obelisk

Power
13 Justice Sigil
10 Time Sigil
4 Seat of Progress

I believe that is a fairly strong list for its cost of zero, and it will do a fine job of completing your starter quest to play 5 ladder matches. It has a few glaring flaws though. Some cards are clearly there by lack of anything better and don’t mesh well with the beatdown game plan (although some of them, like Temple Scribe and Predatory Carnosaur, are actually very strong cards ; they simply don’t belong in this particular strategy). Those have been marked in red in the list, while the ones marked in grey are weaker alternatives to cards we’re missing.

Advancing your game with Forge and Draft

Assuming you’ve tackled your first few gauntlet runs and your ladder placement games with the above list, next stop is Forge (for which you get a free entry as a quest). Remember that in Forge, you will only be given choices from two factions, based on the first picks you make. This means that you can “force” the factions you need cards in, in this case Time and Justice. Don’t be afraid to take mediocre cards over the first 2 or 3 picks if that’s what it takes, it will be worth it. Then keep an eye out for the cards you want for your constructed deck – I’ll go over them in some detail below.

After Forge, your next stop will be Draft. You should be able to afford a run shortly after getting out of Forge and doing a couple or so extra Gauntlet runs. Once in draft, remember to refer to Ben’s Drafting Guide, and while Combrei cards you want in your deck are of course a priority, do not pass up legendaries or gimp your deck too much to get them ; not every run will have Combrei cards worth making a deck out of, and performing well is more important than getting a few uncommons.

The things missing from the basic deck to look for in Forge and Draft should be easy to spot if you’ve been paying attention : only a fraction of the aforementioned “deck core” is present. The cards you will want to get ASAP are the following, listed roughly in order of priority :

• Gilded Glaive (U) : replaces Swords or Shields
• Silverwing Familiar (U) : replaces the 5+ drops
• Crownwatch Paladin (U) : replaces Temple Scribe
• Vodakhan’s Staff (U) : two already in the basic deck, replaces Swords or Shields
• Desert Marshal (U) :  one already in the basic deck, replaces unlock potential and obelisk
• Vanquish (U) : need between 2 and 4, replaces rebuke
• Valkyrie Enforcer (R) : one already in the basic deck, replaces any red or grey cards left in the list

That’s it for the core, but remember than with previous few exceptions (most notably Divining Rod), any of the cards in the decklists above that you come across would also be great picks, so go for those if you get a chance.

Experimental results : To emulate a new account, I ran 1 Forge, 1 draft, and opened 6 packs.

• The Forge run yielded  1 Stand Together, 1 Crownwatch Paladin, 1 Gilded Glaive and  1 Desert Marshal
• The Draft sadly had no Combrei cards worth noting except 1 Karmic Guardian (I ended up playing Stonescar. Don’t force a faction pair in draft if you’re not getting the cards for it, a successful run will yield better rewards than a failed run with a few useful picks !)
• Packs were pretty spot-on with the uncommons as they included 2 Desert Marshal, 1 Vodakhan’s Staff and 1 Karmic Guardian

Time for a Serious Beatdown !

After taking all the steps in the previous chapter, you should have all you need to build the following list (and enough stones to craft whatever you’re missing in it) :

Budget Beatdown Combrei

Units
4 District Infantry
2 Initiate of the Sands
4 Awakened Student
2 Crownwatch Commando
4 Crownwatch Paladin
4 Desert Marshal
2 Combrei Healer
4 Silverwing Familiar
4 Valkyrie Enforcer
2 Karmic Guardian

Weapons
4 Gilded Glaive
2 Elder’s Feather
4 Vodakhan’s Staff

Spells
3 Protect
4 Vanquish

Power
8 Justice Sigil
8 Time Sigil
2 Diplomatic Seal
4 Combrei Banner
4 Seat of Progress

Experimental results : I was able to complete this exact list (plus a Stand Together) with the spoils described in the chapter above and 4800 shiftstones worth of crafting. That amount is precisely what you should have once you’ve finished the new player quests, after only a few hours of playing Eternal – assuming you get  a little help from recycling two of the less useful Scions (I advise to get rid of Rolant and Kaleb, specifically).

I don’t claim this to be the end-all of Combrei budget lists, but it’s certainly a solid one. It’s relatively neutral in the sense that it hasn’t a clear focus like the lists we referred to earlier – it’s neither quite Aegis nor Flight, although those are both definitely strong themes here. One of the less obvious choices is to include a couple each of Karmic Guardian and Crownwatch Commando. I find both great in a meta where aggro is heavily represented, and that is precisely what you can expect in the lower leagues of the ladder. Another is District Infantry, a card that is well recognized in draft, but almost entirely unplayed in constructed ; I think it’s well worth including here, as it furthers our focus on fast aggression. He can easily get 6-9 damage in by turn 4 without any further investment, which is more than almost any 1 drop in the game can do, and he’s even more of a  pain to deal with if you give him a Staff turn 3.  It does make sense, however, to phase him out later (especially once you get access to the likes of Sandstorm Titan or Knight-Chancellor Siraf and you need to make space for them).

Once you’ve amassed more riches and are willing to spend some on improving your Combrei game, I invite you to take a second look at the lists near the top of this post, as they have all proved good enough to take a skilled pilot to the top of the ladder !

Comments