Meta Monday – Diversity

On

On last week’s Meta Monday, we analyzed what appeared to be an Alessi driven metagame, and the ramifications of the balance patch. Fast forward to this week, and 0 copies of Alessi broke into this week’s ETS top 8. Today, I’ll be breaking down this weeks top 8, trends and what to expect in the upcoming metagame.

 

One of the game’s very best, Childroland, took down these week’s ETS with a interesting take on Elysian Midrange. This list features many interesting choices including: 3 copies of Unseal, 2 Channel The Tempest and 4 copies of Hailstorm. These choice’s targeted a specific metagame, and clearly payed off. Although Elysian is something many have not seen for along time, I would expect to see more of it in the coming weeks as it has solid matchups into most of the field. Congratulations Childroland!

 

Krizalio picked up a second place finish this week, with Charge Rod. This list is more standard then list we’ve seen in previous weeks, but Charge Rod continues to put up results. Interestingly, Krizalio opted to play zero copies of Heart Of The Vault, and instead played four copies of Rizahn allowing him to have more ways to interact with more aggressively built decks. Overall, Charge Rod continues to be a strong choice in the current metagame, and I expect this deck to only become more popular in the coming weeks.

 

Sunyveil brought our only deck with 2 copies in the top 8, Praxis Tokens, to a top 4 finish. This version, brought the more popular Auralian Merchant as its merchant of choice, allowing for more consistent Xenan Obelisks and flyer hate. Praxis tokens continues to impress week after week and is slowing becoming the most dominate deck in the metagame. If you aren’t already playing Praxis Tokens, you might want to pick it up. This deck attacks from so many different angles, and until Hailstorm becomes more popular I do not expect this deck to stop performing.

 

Thedamn brought their version of Rakano Valkries to a top 4 finish this week. Interestingly, they brought 2 copies of Scale seeker; A card we have not seen almost any of sense the release of The Fall of Argenport. Although many have underestimated Rakano Valkyries we continue to see it make a push into our top 8 week after week, and this trend will likely continue.

 

Dderk brought a new innovation to his top 8 Skycrag Aggro list, in Longbarrel. This innovation allows Skycrag Aggro to push through even more damage, and snowball even harder in aggressive matchups. I’ve tested Longbarrel myself, and can confirm that this card has earned a spot in Skycrag Aggro in the right metagame. Dderk also brought Ixtun Merchant to give himself more late game options, and a payoff for going wide in Rally. This list was well thought out, and is a very strong way to build Skycrag going forward.

 

lllserbll brought a relatively new deck to this top 8, TPS Control. This deck has many familiar cards you’d see in Feln Control, with a splash for Vara’s choice, Banish, Ayan and Auralian Merchant. These cards help sure up some of Feln Control’s tough matchups, and allow it to take a more aggressive approach if needed. Overall I definitely like this deck more then Feln Control, and could see it playing a role in our metagame for weeks to come.

Trumpets brought Icaria Blue yet another top 8 this week. This list featured some unusual cards such as lightning strike and unstable form, I suspect these were for the expected Alessi heavy metagame. Icaria Blue continues to surprise me, as I claim it is a weaker version of removal pile, but these results seem to differ. I think Icaria blue is slowly becoming a deck in many people’s eyes, and will likely continue to put up impressive results if the metagame doesn’t heavily shift.

 

Rounding out our top 8, IamMonstrum, the newest member of Team Rankstar, took our second copy of Praxis Tokens into the top 8. This time, sporting 2 Censari Brigands  and Ixtun Merchants to field a more aggressive build and market for Praxis Tokens. This build allowed IamMonstrum to snowball games even harder, and showing another side of the tokens deck, prove that even Praxis Tokens still can be more refined.

 

This metagame continues to shift, but we are starting to see many familiar decks making top 8’s:  Praxis Tokens, Icaria blue and Rakano Valkyries consistently stand out. I’m excited to see what will emerge next week! That’s a wrap for this week’s Meta Monday! Thanks for reading, and I hope you enjoyed. You can often catch me streaming at http://www.twitch.tv/notoriousghp. Until next time, Keep brewing!

ThatResolves video of the week:

*Deck created by Zyreth

3 Seek Power (Set1 #408)
2 Suffocate (Set1 #251)
4 Torch (Set1 #8)
4 Back-Alley Delinquent (Set4 #200)
3 Learned Herbalist (Set4 #63)
2 Purify (Set2 #176)
4 Quarry (Set1001 #15)
3 Amber Acolyte (Set1 #93)
4 Auralian Merchant (Set4 #70)
4 Sandstorm Titan (Set1 #99)
3 Stirring Sand (Set3 #86)
4 Grasping at Shadows (Set1 #292)
4 Heart of the Vault (Set2 #183)
4 Great-Kiln Titan (Set3 #49)
2 Lavablood Goliath (Set1 #62)
3 Fire Sigil (Set1 #1)
2 Shadow Sigil (Set1 #249)
3 Time Sigil (Set1 #63)
3 Crest of Chaos (Set3 #268)
4 Crest of Impulse (Set3 #251)
3 Crest of Mystery (Set4 #266)
4 Seat of Impulse (Set0 #54)
3 Seat of Mystery (Set0 #61)
————–MARKET—————
1 Banish (Set2 #207)
1 Scorpion Wasp (Set1 #96)
1 Stirring Sand (Set3 #86)
1 Pillar of Amar (Set1 #122)
1 Crest of Mystery (Set4 #266)

-NotoriousGHP and ThatResolves

Check out Team Rankstar streamers: HeyWhyYou, Magikarp, NotoriousGHP, PlatypusKing, SifuDanny and y0ttabyte. ThatResolves, who makes all of the videos for Meta Monday, can be found here and Patreon here!

If you are looking for some tournament “Best of Three” practice, Kaelari has set up a really great resource that is open 24/7 here as well as a Tuesday night tournament here.

Every Friday, The Great Parliament hosts “Casual Friday” tournament now, too!

The new season of the ETS is live! Be sure to sign up or tune in ever Saturday for the highest level of Eternal competition!

Don’t forget to let us know what you think via our contact and recruitment page or in our Discord!

 

Trail Stories: Ilya K

Ladies and gentlemen! My name is Mantid Man, and I am not only a member and representative of Team Rankstar, but also an advocate for the entirety of the Eternal Community! As such, I wanted to bring you insight into individual members of the community. Not only personalities and champions, but also streamers and everyday active members of the community.

Trail Stories is a casual interview setting, and is pretty straight forward. I suck up to the subject of the interview a little bit, I ask some questions, and then they get the floor in an to answer any way they see fit. As always, I am looking for input from the community. There are tons of people we can hear from and since we are aiming to do this series weekly, there will be plenty of opportunities. Before we get to the interview itself, I want to start each trail stories with a set of quickfire questions. These are easy and will give you a taste of where the interviewee is coming from in a bit of a structured format:

Age: 31

Birthplace: Kiev

Team Affiliation: OND – Owls and Dragons

Most Notable Eternal Achievement: Week 2 Worlds

Highest Chapter Ladder Rank: 1

Playing Since: July 2016 (closed Beta)

Favorite Deck Archetype: Whatever is currently winning

Favorite Card: Torch, it allows so many other cards to exist

Most Disliked or Damaging Card in the Game: That’s a tough one. I do think teacher of humility is the most egregious one, though the combination of Alessi, Crownwatch Press-Gang, and Stand together combined can be really frustrating to play against.

One Eternal Wish: Sideboards! Anything else seems small in comparison.

Personal Mantra: “Play to Win”

If you could have a custom Eternal Card what would it be:

Now that the quickfire is out of the way, lets get to the meat!

MantidMan – Ilya, thanks for taking some time to talk to me! This is a new series that I am starting up, I want people to know some of the personalities in the Eternal Community. I would love to get to know you a bit more just as a person, to start with. Can you tell me and the DOZENS of people who will stumble across this about you as a person, maybe a little background?

Ilya K – Hm, okay, so I’m a veteran Eternal player–I’ve been playing since closed beta, and have accomplished, let’s just say, a lot of what there is to accomplish in Eternal. 10,000 PvP wins, finished rank #1 on ladder twice, played in the first yearly community tournament world’s tournament, and generally finish in the top 100 of constructed master, and as of recently, top 100 draft master as well. By profession in the real world, I’m a “quant”, of sorts. I use statistical programming to try and find ways to make money in the financial markets for various people.

MantidMan – Wow, an incredible Eternal resume for sure. I will come back and touch on a few of those points for sure. Until then let’s take just a quick step back and jump into your profession from a surface level. “Quant” , statistical programming, financial markets, money… these are all words that are foreign to a lot of people, myself included. How do you get into something like this? A fan of numbers and data I would assume?

Ilya K – Correct. I’ve liked numbers for a long time, and I always wanted to know how to use them to make money. As for how to get into something like it, well, it starts with a technical master’s degree from a university, and then, I can’t speak for others, but I got there by being publicly visible with blogging about systematic investing.

MantidMan – Sounds intense and I wish you as much luck as you need in that. So if you made yourself publicly visible in that space too I would say that you have a knack for it. It would not be a far cry to say you are a bit infamous in the Eternal Community as it stands, never afraid to speak your mind. Before Eternal hit the scene were you into any other TCGs or CCGs?

Ilya K – Famous or infamous depending on who you ask. The CCG I played before Eternal was called Alteil, but it died due to a horrific business model. That was quite a few years back. Prior to Eternal, I was playing some Path of Exile, and found out about the game thanks to Brian Weissman.

MantidMan – I heard little wisps of information on Alteil when it was around but never got into it myself. But, you bring up an interesting point: the survival of a game not based solely on community or even the gameplay but rather the foundation it is built upon. Can we touch briefly on your “outside-looking-in” opinion of Eternal and how it is progressing forward? Especially with the advent of Twitch Drops and this new Prime bundle they have announced?

Ilya K – So, let me say this loud and clear: when it comes to creating a welcoming environment as far as card acquisition goes, Eternal is the most welcoming F2P game I’ve ever played. While I’ve certainly played the game more than most people, even after having cut down the amount I play by a very large amount, I find that just doing my daily quests and spending the gold cautiously on limited allows me to have immense amounts of resources for building whichever competitive deck I want. The Twitch Prime promotion is similarly terrific from a new player’s perspective. 35 packs is worth around $30, give or take, and should be enough to get new players experiencing the game of Eternal in short order. If I recall correctly, there are guaranteed legendaries involved as well. In any case, from this promotion alone, new players may be able to get close to crafting a single competitive deck with a couple of legendary cards in it if they’re careful with how they spend their shiftstone (crafting currency). Additionally, after having recently tried some Magic: the Gathering programs online, even MtG Arena–Wizards’ latest offering to try and bring magic online, I realized just how much better Eternal is as an online card game than its competitors. While Magic has a storied history, full of phenomenal metagames, and famous mistakes that somehow happily coexist in various formats, Magic has yet to make a good online transition. In contrast, the actual playing of Eternal is a very smooth experience, with some very innovative mechanics that can only be done in a digital space, and with the computer taking care of a lot of the minutiae of the game’s mechanics to make for a much smoother game flow experience than Magic brought online. It does make one appreciate just how the human mind is able to shortcut so many tasks while playing a game of paper magic, but that does not translate well online.

Beyond the generosity and the game flow, however, my opinions are more mixed.

Eternal’s developers have a very particular vision for how they wish their game to be played. Eternal places a very heavy emphasis on gameplay that revolves around units/creatures/minions (called units in Eternal), and the board state generated through playing and removing them. If this is the type of experience you seek, Eternal will offer you a vast array of options as to how to play units of various sizes and interact with your opponent’s units in a myriad of ways. However, if you’re the type of player that likes to go off the beaten path, and play something more novel, such as a prison control deck, or a hyper-aggressive deck, you’ll quickly find yourself stymied. The track record for unconventional strategies in Eternal is fairly poor, and some decks such as Reanimator (generating a tremendous advantage by playing a large unit for cheaper than normally casting it by summoning it from the discard zone, called the void) suffered severe nerfs that rendered past versions unplayable. Tools to combat highly reactive decks are also exceptionally strong as to discourage that style of deck.

Lastly, I am not quite sure of just how far Direwolf intends to raise the skill ceiling in Eternal. In many different card games, in a tournament setting, both players have the ability to remove cards bad for the match-up from their deck and bring in more specialized cards. While the first year of community tournaments used this process, called sideboarding, Direwolf never supported it. With the release of set 4 (Fall of Argenport), Direwolf intends for the market mechanic to be their answer to sideboards. You access the markets by playing a unit that you can first normally play on turn 3 (absent some ramp), and exchanging a card in your hand with a card in the market that shares a color (called a faction in Eternal) with the merchant. However, the element of timing introduced by these units causes them to be used to further push a deck’s proactive plan, rather than react to the opponent’s plan, in many cases. As the market can only contain five cards, this means that there is very little space to put more specialized answers, and that more conditional cards suffer. This may lead to a greater incidence of matchups decided by which decks players are playing, as opposed to how they play those decks, which does not bode well for a competitive experience, in my opinion.

However, this last set has given me some confidence in Direwolf’s ability to improve things going forward. But at the current point in time, my opinions are mixed.

MantidMan – I am a silver linings kind of guy, if that has not been plainly obvious from my other submissions to the Eternal Community. I have to say that even though you tend to come off harsh or cross sometimes, you do so from a place of extremely detailed knowledge, insight, and some would even say, passion. I commend you for that! You did just give me a lot of insight into your thoughts on the game as a whole (obviating a couple of questions), but lets be honest, that just makes my job easier here. Right now the competitive scene (outside of Chapter Events and the Ladder) is exclusively community driven. We all know that Dire Wolf Digital and the Eternal team (henceforth DWD) is working on the competitive side of the game. If you could make a single recommendation to them, what would it be?

Ilya K – Well, in a word, sideboards. Now while the conventional implementation may not work particularly well with the market mechanic (i.e., imagine every opponent just had that 1-of silver bullet for your deck in ever match because they have 4 or more chances to fetch it with merchants), a way for more reactive decks playing more conditional cards to remove them for different conditional cards based on their opponent would be nice. That is, imagine the control player, who expecting some number of aggressive units, played some number of cards dedicated to the early game, only to be matched up against another player playing a similar strategy, but who has the advantage in the match-up without being able to do these substitutions. One player will be looking at a hand full of completely inapplicable cards, and that’s a miserable feeling. I’m of the opinion that the more strategies any one player can adapt and counter-adapt to, the more diverse of a metagame Direwolf can allow to exist. The more diverse the field of viable strategies, the more types of players that Eternal can welcome. What if you’re not the kind of player that likes to play a unit-heavy deck? Are you simply unwelcome in DWD’s game? I don’t think that’s a great policy.

MantidMan – I can get behind that sentiment, it would be interesting to see how they would implement that if DWD took that to heart. Well, Ilya, it has been a pleasure discussing the ins and outs with you. I know I learned some and I hope our readers have as well. There is a lot on the horizon for Eternal and the Community as a whole that I cannot wait to see. Before we call it, is there anything else you would like to say, to the community directly?

Ilya K – Not at this particular moment in time. I’m sure I’ll come up with something in the near future, however.

MantidMan – I am sure you will!

It was very eye-opening for me in doing this interview with Ilya K. I really enjoyed it and I look forward to the next one. If you have any suggestions for who you would like to see in future editions of Trail Stories, let me know on my Twitter!

Meta Monday – Post Balance Patch

Last week, we received the first balance patch since the release of The Fall of Argenport, and it definitely shook things up in the fourth ETS of season 3. Although there were similar themes among decks, 8 different approaches to archetypes made up our top 8 this week. This top 8 was made up of 2 Icaria control decks, Praxis tokens, Charge rod, the apparently not dead TJP Berserk, Xenan midrange and 2 different Alessi Control decks.

Mouche took down their second ETS of the season, this time with Combrei Alessi control (?), a deck that nobody had on their radar. The deck uses Alessi, various controlling spells and a crazy power base to support Alessi and friends in grinding out opponents. This deck truly showcased what Alessi can do, and I expect to see innovations on this archetype in the future. Although this deck is quite hard to pilot, it’s probably a deck worth picking up if you like to grind. Congrats Mouche!

Another person on a rampage, Team Rankstar’s own Aetherllama came second with their own verison of Alessi control, this time with the support of fire cards and moment of creation. Aetherllama managed to 6-0 during the swiss rounds, leaving them with an impressive 8-1 finish with another relatively unknown archetype. This is probably the weirdest deck that made the top 8, but a commonality with Mouche’s deck is Alessi + Crown Watch Press-Gang is a terrifying pairing, and I believe the best deck using this combination will sit at the highest of tiers.

Another familiar name to the ETS, Aromanova finished third place with Praxis Tokens. Although this deck isn’t overly popular right now, it continues to show promise with fantastic tournament results two weeks in a row. Interestingly, they have included two Cinder Yeti in his 75, allowing him to gain more card advantage and push damage, and although this innovation has been seen before, I think it should be a main stay. One card not featured in this list is Amaran Stinger, a card that has become more popular as of late that I have enjoyed in tokens. I expect this deck to get more and more popular in the coming weeks.

Droilcheck has now top 4’d the last two ETS’s, both with Icaria Blue. Regardless of what anyone says about the deck, Droilcheck seems to always perform with it and continues to pilot it. I personally believe this deck is slightly weaker then the more popular Icaria control deck, Removal pile/FJS Midrange, as it can struggle with time-based midrange, an archetype that didn’t perform overly well this weekend.

Sabriel brought their take on Xenan midrange this week, our only copies of Sandstorm Titan are featured here. Xenan’s a deck a lot of people thought was going to improve with the release of The Fall of Argenport, but it has underperformed thus far. Sabriel brought a interesting list, straying away from Auralian Merchant and Predatory Carnosaur for Kerendon Merchant and Thundering Kerasaur, not something I was expecting to be saying. These innovations brought Sabriel to a fifth place finish this week, and may be the way to go moving forward.

Therocke took sixth place with TJP Blitz this week. I’m not sure this was ever supposed to happen as the deck was targeted with two nerfs this week. TheRocke has added some Strategize and Hooru Pacifier to make up for the loss of Levitate and nerf of Accerlated Evolution, which worked out great for him. I think this deck may still be alive post nerfs, and these are some interesting ways to combat them. As long as Gift of Battle remains unchanged, we will likely be seeing it in various strategies.

Fuzzyfrog took 7th place this week with Removal Pile. This has been an all star since the release of The Fall of Argenport, and that likely will not change. This list is very standard, but does not include a card many have speculated on, Wyatt, Junk Collector, which may have a home in removal pile. I do not see a world in which this deck becomes bad as the meta game advances, and I suspect we will see many more top 8’s from this deck.

Finishing off this week, Grimfan took 8th with their baby, Charge Rod. Interestingly, his list includes no copies of Bulletshaper or Priviledge of the Rank, which facilitate the fastest draws. Charge Rod is a deck I’ve spoken about extensively, and I expect with its worst matchup in TJP Berserk being nerfed, that this deck will continue to put up numbers and become even more popular.

To cap off this week’s Meta Monday, I wanted to discuss the balance patch we received and my thoughts on it for constructed. First of all, I think everyone would agree TJP Berserk was a problem and nobody should be surprised it got nerfed. However, I am disappointed in the nerf of Levitate, as it was a fantastic tool in primal-based control to dig, and pop aegis, and I think there probably could have been a better target. Also, Accelerated Evolution is likely only playable in TJP Berserk anymore, as the nerf made the card way too inefficient. Two cards I believe should/will be changed, however, are Teacher of Humility and Alessi. I expected Teacher to receive a nerf, and I believe DWD made a mistake not nerfing it. Many can argue that it isn’t oppressive, and the reason for it is because the decks that it destroys (such as Unitless control, Scream) have completely disappeared from the meta game. I think Teacher creates too many un-fun games and will be changed in the future. Alessi is a card that people will start complaining about, as it’s featured in many decks and makes many archetypes possible. I think Alessi may be slightly too good of a card, as she is currently the best 1 or 2 drop in the game.

That’s a wrap for this week’s meta Monday! Thank’s for reading, and I hope you enjoyed. You can often catch me streaming at http://www.twitch.tv/notoriousghp. Until next time, Keep brewing!

-NotoriousGHP

4 Combust (Set1 #392)
4 Dark Return (Set1 #250)
4 Grenadin Drone (Set1 #5)
2 Permafrost (Set1 #193)
4 Torch (Set1 #8)
4 Devour (Set1 #261)
4 Haunting Scream (Set1 #374)
4 Quarry (Set1001 #15)
4 Gorgon Fanatic (Set1 #375)
4 Madness (Set1 #267)
4 Nocturnal Observer (Set3 #173)
4 Rindra, the Duskblade (Set3 #277)
4 Torgov, Icecap Trader (Set2 #126)
4 Amethyst Waystone (Set3 #201)
3 Cobalt Waystone (Set3 #151)
4 Crest of Chaos (Set3 #268)
4 Crest of Cunning (Set3 #267)
4 Crest of Fury (Set3 #266)
2 Diplomatic Seal (Set1 #425)
4 Granite Waystone (Set3 #1)

Use the code “TRS12” to get 12% off your order at InkedGaming.com and support Team Rankstar directly!

Check out Team Rankstar streamers: HeyWhyYou, Magikarp, NotoriousGHP, PlatypusKing, SifuDanny and y0ttabyte. ThatResolves, who makes all of the videos for Meta Monday, can be found here and Patreon here!

If you are looking for some tournament “Best of Three” practice, Kaelari has set up a really great resource that is open 24/7 here as well as a Tuesday night tournament here.

Every Friday, The Great Parliament hosts “Casual Friday” tournament now, too!

The new season of the ETS is live! Be sure to sign up or tune in ever Saturday for the highest level of Eternal competition!

Don’t forget to let us know what you think via our contact and recruitment page or in our Discord!

Dumpster Decking: Birthright

Last time we brought the magic with Brenn, Chronicler of Ages. It was fun, it was punny, it even had a couple of Backstreet Boys references. Brenn was an interesting card, had some real meta application for a time, and was fun as a whole to see built upon. but that was the past, this is the now.

Everyone who follows me on Unexpected Results: THE Eternal Podcast, or Twitter, even catches my comments on the Community Discord knows that I am a big fan of the lore of Eternal. This iteration of Dumpster Decking has got a little bit of a lore spin to it, which makes me pretty excited. So here is a little lore crash course around Birthright:

We all know Kaleb, he was The Uncrowned Prince. He then made a Choice to follow the clues of his mysterious birth to try and find his mother. This led him to fight Reflections of, not only his father, but himself. This conflict, both internal and external, lead to him becoming Reborn. At some point in the near future of the story line, Kaleb will journey back Argenport to confront his Father’s widow, Eilyn, for what he considers his Birthright… THE ETERNAL THRONE.

Now that we have all of that out of the way, we get to this card itself and how it ties, in my mind, into the story. Birthright depicts Kaleb and Eilyn in a confrontation, possibly a mortal one. Kaleb has the royal blood in his veins, and Eilyn has the throne currently. Meaning they BOTH have incredible power. This card reflects that: before each player’s turn even starts the top card of their deck is played. It can make for some interesting scenarios and interactions. All cards MUST be played, and not all cards (when forced) are good for the player that controls them.

Check out SifuDanny’s video on the winning deck on the Team Rankstar YouTube page after you read this article. (Don’t worry I’m there too)

Our winner this time around was BlastodermMan. He came up with some really interesting concepts, and has actually given us the shell of a deck that could be edited into something fantastic. But, fantastic is not the point of this challenge, rather to take trash and try to turn it into treasure. Take a look at his deck HERE and follow along.

So BlastodermMan calls this deck inspired Birthright, and rightly (see what I did there) so. Inspire as a mechanic, is incredible. Units you play, that have inspire, have a lasting effect on the game as a whole the longer they stay in the game. Things like reducing the cost of other units, giving them new keywords, and even combinations of boosts and keywords. However minor these buffs may seem, they quickly add up and spell certain demise for your enemies. Especially if you are playing things for free. BlastodermMan’s deck capitalizes on the fact that both players get free cards by having a deck that has really strong cards in their own right, like Alhed, Mount Breaker, but that also increase the power of any other unit drawn by an order of magnitude. In simpler terms: both players are getting free stuff, but BlastodermMan is banking on the fact that his stuff his better and makes all of his other stuff better too.

There is not a lot more to say about this deck, but I want to focus on one more card a little bit more. I feel like it has some real impact, not only on this deck, but it could become a serious contender for a meta-shifting card if applied correctly down the road (and by someone much more skilled at deck building than myself). Magus of Celerity seems to be a very strong card. It is already in the sweet spot when it comes to power and cost: a 3/3 for 3. It’s influence constraints are easily managed thanks to Seats, Banners, and Crests. Moreover, it has that inspire keyword, giving any unit drawn the most aggressive battle skill: Charge. In the words of the late great Billy Mays “But, wait! There’s more!” It also has scout. So we are talking about a card that is a minor threat on stats alone, has a keyword that makes your other threats more dangerous, AND it has the ability to set up those upcoming threats a bit better. Whew!

BlastodermMan’s deck may not have done exceptionally well in the testing video, but what it did do was inspire(hah) some really great discussion among the contributors and judges, it explored some cards  (outside of the required Birthright) that we had not seen as much of, and it was a hell of a lot of fun to play.  And, if nothing else, it won him a $25 Steam Gift Card. Be on the lookout for the next Dumpster Decking challenge and come have some fun with SifuDanny, myself, and all of the Team Rankstar community!

-MantidMan

 

Meta Monday – Wide Open

The third week of the ETS season 3 was on Saturday, the top 8 deck lists can be found here. There was a lot of diversity in the top 8 and a wide variety of decks seem to be viable. Over 20 different types of decks appeared in the tournament, TJP was the most popular with 11 copies of TJP Alessi and 5 copies of TJP Fliers.

Tobboo won with his Big Rakano Valkyries deck featuring Amilli, Rizahn, and Icaria. Rakano Valkyries was fairly popular in the first week of set 4 but had dropped off since then. There were no other Rakano decks in the tournament, others are playing Icaria in either FJS or FJP. Tobboo decided to cut some of the Valkyrie synergy cards like Rolant’s Intervention, Sower of Dissent, and Valkyrie Spireguard for Whirling Duo and Harsh Rule, which are more powerful stand-alone cards. Icaria, Valkyrie Captain can buff all the Valkyrie in hand and is the only remaining Valkyrie synergy card. It can be a bit awkward playing Harsh Rule in a deck with so many units, but the deck can fall behind in the early game and has enough powerful threats to regain control in the late game if it can last until then. Overall, its a well-balanced deck with a solid chance in every matchup.

The only deck with 2 copies in the top 8 was Praxis Tokens, a very good performance as only 3 Tokens decks entered the tournament. Tokens was one of the best ladder decks before set 4, but it used to do worse in tournaments because of sideboarding. With markets replacing sideboards in the ETS, Tokens improves quite a bit in tournaments, so it was a great choice this week as players were skimping on sweepers and relic removal.  There was a midrange variant with Auralian Merchant piloted by Robotdinosaur (2nd place) and an aggro variant with Ixtun Merchant piloted by IAmMonstrum (5th place). Its difficult to say which list is better. I prefer Auralian Merchant since it survives Hailstorm and can get Xenan Obelisk from the market, but I like the aggro variant’s Praxis Displacer and Obliterate over the midrange variant’s Arcanum Monitor and Humbug Swarm. Either one of these decks or even some hybrid version should do well on ladder, especially while the meta contains relatively few Hailstorms and relic removal. IAmMonstrum and Robotdinosaur both lost to one of Tokens’ lesser known counters: Rakano. I sympathize with them as I’ve also had my ETS top 8 run with Tokens ended by a rogue Tinker Drone Dropper deck.

Drolicheck got 3rd place with Icaria Blue. This deck has plenty of removal, which should make the TJP Alessi matchup favorable. It even has 8 relic weapons to deal with aegis units. Big Time decks could be pretty difficult to beat since a lot of the removal deals 3 or 4 damage and the only answer to Dawnwalker is Bring Down. Icaria Blue sometimes plays Throne Warden or Rizahn, but Drolicheck decided to only include Icaria and Winchest Merchant as his units. FJS Icaria decks were more popular in this tournament, but Drolicheck outperformed them all this week.

The other 3rd place went to DrPringles with his Feln Berserk deck. Its a bit strange to see Haunting Scream without Gorgon Fanatic, but this aggro deck prefers to have the high damage burst over extra card draw. Who needs cards when they’re dead anyway? The combination of Rapid Shot and berserk can lead to some very high damage out of nowhere. Nightfall will usually benefit this deck more than the opponent because its cards cost less and the extra card draw can help assemble a combo burst turn.

Lv13david brought Xenan Killers. This version is slightly different than the other Xenan decks I’ve seen. Most notably, Lv13david included Trail Maker and omitted Dawnwalker. Temple Standard is another interesting inclusion, I thought this was the weakest of the standards, but it can be used to save your units from removal and even reset killer. Blistersting Wasp and Scorpion Wasp seem well positioned to deal with TJP Alessi. Alhed has a lot of sweet synergies in this deck. Dark Return allows you to trigger his inspire right away. He buffs Auric Interrogator to get the card draw engine rolling. You can even ultimate Alhed to reset the killer on one of your other units. Overall, this is an interesting take on Xenan and seems to be decent in the current meta.

TheRocke was the only one of the 16 TJP players to make the top 8. His version of TJP Alessi includes 3 Valkyrie Enforcers, which is the standout difference from Mouche’s deck that won the week prior. TJP is really strong, it has so many great cards that you can’t fit them all in one deck, but it doesn’t perform that well when it has a target on its back. TheRocke managed to top 8 in a hostile metagame, but on average TJP performed much worse than expected.

Darkhannds made top 8 with his FTP Moment. Draft all-star Wurmcalling makes its ETS debut here. I didn’t think this card was constructed playable, but maybe its an upgrade over Trailblaze, which was part of the set 3 Moment deck. The only other difference since set 4 is the addition of Auralian Merchant. There is even a Wurmcalling in the market, quite an endorsement from Darkhands. I will have to try it out in Alessi Moment as a potential improvement.

I played Sentinel Reanimator to a 3-3 finish this week. Its a lot of fun and has been doing pretty well on ladder. Being able to play Stirring Sand, Grasping at Shadows, and Auralian Merchant adds a lot of consistency to the deck.

The meta is wide open. Play something you enjoy, there are plenty of options!

4 Levitate (Set1 #190)

3 Permafrost (Set1 #193)

3 Seek Power (Set1 #408)

4 Torch (Set1 #8)

4 Strategize (Set3 #165)

4 Vanquish (Set1 #143)

3 Hailstorm (Set1003 #11)

3 Jennev Merchant (Set4 #169)

4 Wisdom of the Elders (Set1 #218)

2 Auric Runehammer (Set1 #166)

4 Harsh Rule (Set1 #172)

4 Rizahn, Greatbow Master (Set4 #246)

4 Icaria, the Liberator (Set1 #329)

1 Sword of the Sky King (Set1 #186)

2 Fire Sigil (Set1 #1)

4 Justice Sigil (Set1 #126)

2 Primal Sigil (Set1 #187)

2 Crest of Fury (Set3 #266)

4 Crest of Glory (Set4 #243)

4 Crest of Order (Set4 #253)

3 Seat of Fury (Set0 #53)

3 Seat of Glory (Set0 #56)

3 Seat of Order (Set0 #51)

1 Starsteel Daisho (Set1 #328)

————–MARKET—————

1 Vision of Austerity (Set1002 #17)

1 Hailstorm (Set1003 #11)

1 Thunderstrike Dragon (Set1 #243)

1 Eilyn, Clan Mother (Set3 #263)

1 Hooru Banner (Set2 #216)

–Aetherllama and ThatResolves

Use the code “TRS12” to get 12% off your order at InkedGaming.com and support Team Rankstar directly!

Check out Team Rankstar streamers: HeyWhyYou, Magikarp, NotoriousGHP, PlatypusKing, SifuDanny and y0ttabyte. ThatResolves, who makes all of the videos for Meta Monday, can be found here and Patreon here!

If you are looking for some tournament “Best of Three” practice, Kaelari has set up a really great resource that is open 24/7 here as well as a Tuesday night tournament here.

Every Friday, The Great Parliament hosts “Casual Friday” tournament now, too!

The new season of the ETS is live! Be sure to sign up or tune in ever Saturday for the highest level of Eternal competition!

Don’t forget to let us know what you think via our contact and recruitment page or in our Discord!

Eternal Optimist Volume 3: Intro to Eternal (with bonus deck list)

Magikarp’s Intro to Eternal

I’ve always wanted to create a sort of a primer for new players but I’ve never sat down and really thought about it. With my third column of Eternal Optimist I felt like it would be the perfect opportunity to write down some “do’s and don’ts” of Eternal.  My goal with this article is to keep it short, sweet, and simple so that content creators and streamers can link this article when a new player asks the questions we all love to hear (seriously, I love getting new players in Twitch chat), but maybe we don’t have enough time to answer them as extensively as we would like to. A few reasons why I felt like this would be a good time to write something like this:

1. Set 4 is out and in full force: Ladder looks healthy, draft is my favorite limited format of Eternal so far, and there are plenty of decks to build into. In the last 30 days we’ve seen an increase in player base of 18.5% (per steamcharts.com).

 

2. Dire Wolf Digital has announced tournament support with cash prizes: This is a huge one for me and many others on Team Rankstar. We have diligently waited for this to happen and I would guess that we’ll see a pretty good influx of players after the actual tournament announcement is made by Dire Wolf.

 

3. I stream a few days a week and I am asked by new players quite often about deck choice, what cards to craft, and pretty much just what should you be doing when logging into Eternal. I know that part of the fun of a new game is figuring it out, but if you’re looking to play this as “free to play” you’re going to not want to burn all of your gold figuring out how to draft a format. 

 

Part 1:  So you’re done with the tutorial, what’s next?

After the tutorial you are taken to the main menu screen. The menu has 8 buttons at the bottom and I’m going to give you an overview of what to do first.

Campaign: There are a bunch of campaigns behind this button.  Feel free to unlock them as you go. There are some pretty good, constructed playable cards that you can unlock. The campaigns cost a bit of gold and they are not immediately vital to building a lot of constructed decks. I HIGHLY recommend completing all of these in due time.  The only reason I wouldn’t have the goal of unlocking these is if you are looking to get into tournament play ASAP.

Puzzles: I haven’t even done all of these.  Don’t get me wrong, they’re fun. But, if I’m going to be logged into Eternal I’m going to be brewing and hitting up ladder.  I do a couple from time to time. That being said, this is an AMAZING place to learn some awesome mechanics and interactions. I recommend trying some of these in your spare time. They’re free and you get a little gold for completing them.

Gauntlet: So this is where the very important spots start. Gauntlet is a FREE constructed event where you register a deck and try to defeat increasingly difficult AI opponents.  If you defeat all of the challenges you will be rewarded and “rank up.” I highly recommend doing the gauntlet until you have ranked up to Masters level in it. Even then, it’s a great place to have chill, relaxing matches vs AI opponents with some pretty good prizes. If you ever need help finding a good deck for this, feel free to head to my personal Twitch discord channel (post in comments for a link) and I can help you brew up something competitive.

Forge: Same concept as gauntlet except that it costs 2000 gold and is a limited (draft) format. You are given three choices of cards, you select one, and three more choices come up (IMPORTANT: THE FIRST TWO COLORS YOU CHOOSE LOCK YOU INTO THOSE COLORS FOR THE REST OF THE FORGE).  You get to keep these cards and you also receive rewards based on how many bosses you defeat. For new players without a card game background it is very important to select cards with low cost all the way up to high cost (we call this a curve). Try to have more lower-costed cards than higher in your final deck. DO THIS UNTIL YOU REACH MASTERS.
Part 2: PVP

Moving over to the right side of the menu, we are now entering the “Versus Battle” territory.  Anyone you play over on this side will be a human trying their best to defeat you. Don’t worry though, there’s a matchmaking system that pairs you up with people of a similar skill level.  Once you have started beating people at the initial “Bronze” level, you will eventually rank up into the higher ranks (Bronze, Silver, Gold, Diamond, Masters).

Event: This tab contains a few things, including one sealed deck event per month and other events that usually have a stipulation to them. Once you have become comfortable with Eternal, I highly recommend doing the sealed deck event every month. It rewards quite a bit of packs and gives you a large amount of games to be able to hone your limited (draft/sealed) skills.  I RECOMMEND SAVING YOUR GOLD ALL MONTH AND ENTERING THE SEALED EVENT EVERY TIME. DO THIS BEFORE YOU ENTER DRAFTS.

Let’s recap so far: Grind Gauntlet and Forge until your eyes bleed, hit up some puzzles, and do the sealed event once per month.  Pretty fun stuff. Let’s keep going.

Casual: The casual room is a place where many people head to when they are testing new ideas, new combos, or just having a good time playing against other people without the worry of losing or gaining ranking.  I do not recommend this too much since the prizing is a little less good than ranked play and since you’re playing people at a similar skill level in ranked, there is no need to worry about getting matched up against our world champion, Camat0, or something.  If you’re someone that would not prefer to have a ranking attached to your name, feel free to hit this up. But the best bang for your buck is…

Ranked: This is the crown jewel of Eternal. Construct your best deck and pit it against your opponents for the largest amount of rewards possible. You receive one booster pack for your first win of the day so I highly recommend taking advantage of that perk while growing your collection. You receive a silver treasure chest for every third win (up to a certain amount of wins per day). Those chests contain around 250 gold (as opposed to the standard 50 gold). This, in conjunction with receiving a new card for every win, can increase your collection pretty quickly. DON’T BE AFRAID TO PLAY RANKED. You’ll do fine. Again, if you ever need help with a deck, there are so many amazing people in this community. I’m sure you’ll find support out there pretty easily.

Draft: Draft is similar to Forge or the sealed deck event, except that you are drafting an entire deck. I would become very familiar with the game before diving too deep into draft. It is very hard to go “infinite” in draft. That being said, I would ALWAYS play at least one draft per month (if you can afford it). This way, you will be placed into a league and receive an end of the season reward for participating in it. I don’t want to talk you out of drafting, because trust me, it’s so much fun. I would just take it slow and dip your feet in a little at a time until you become comfortable with the game.  There are very experienced players playing in the silver and gold leagues just waiting for a new player to gobble up.

Part 3: Plan of Action

Plan of action in order of focus:

• Gauntlet and Forge grinding: Do these to masters rank.

• Ranked/Casual rooms: Try to get AT LEAST one win per day.  A booster pack is awarded for your first win everyday.

• Event: Try to get to a point where you can register for the sealed deck event once a month.  This is higher value than draft for the gold you are spending.

• Campaign/Puzzles: Check these out.  They’re not the most important things, but you should complete the campaigns eventually (Tavrod and Crimson Firemaw are in there, among other constructed playables).

• Draft: Stay away from draft early—learn to love it at a later date.  I LOVE draft, but if you want to be free to play exclusively you’re not going to be able to do drafts all day and come out ahead.

I hope this little overview wasn’t too much.  Joining new card games can sometimes be overwhelming. Based on my experience, and the experiences of others, I feel like this is a pretty solid plan of action for people wanting to have fun with the game but still maximize their potential to get the most out of their time spent playing Eternal.  

Thanks for reading!

 

Bonus content:

Here’s the new version of my Praxis Tokens list. If you’re looking for something to play with the release of set 4, I recommend something like this. It is relatively inexpensive, has been tested in top 100 masters, and I’ve taken it to a couple tournaments recently and enjoyed the play of it. There are even more budget builds of this version and feel free to ask me personally for suggestions. (Just CTRL+C the entire deck text and import the deck from clipboard in the Eternal client. This will import the entire list into your inventory so that you can check to see how close you are to building the whole deck.)

4 Grenadin Drone (Set1 #5)

4 Initiate of the Sands (Set1 #74)

1 Seek Power (Set1 #408)

4 Torch (Set1 #8)

4 Teacher of Humility (Set4 #67)

4 Temple Scribe (Set1 #502)

2 Trail Maker (Set3 #65)

2 Amber Acolyte (Set1 #93)

4 Assembly Line (Set1 #29)

4 Ixtun Merchant (Set4 #21)

3 Rally (Set1 #33)

4 Marisen’s Disciple (Set1 #104)

3 Praxis Displacer (Set1 #100)

4 Xenan Obelisk (Set1 #103)

1 Obliterate (Set1 #48)

2 Heart of the Vault (Set2 #183)

4 Crest of Impulse (Set3 #251)

2 Fire Sigil (Set1 #1)

4 Granite Waystone (Set3 #1)

4 Praxis Banner (Set2 #171)

4 Seat of Impulse (Set0 #54)

7 Time Sigil (Set1 #63)

————–MARKET—————

1 Purify (Set2 #176)

1 Rally (Set1 #33)

1 Jawbone Greatsword (Set4 #33)

1 Obliterate (Set1 #48)

1 Flamestoker (Set2 #32)

Meta Monday – ETS Changes in FoA

With the new Market mechanic in full swing, the ETS has announced some changes to its format. This means sideboards are out, and markets are in! The community voiced a wide array of opinions regarding this announcement, but it is the clear future for the game, so time to get excited!

This weekend was the second week of the ETS’ season 3! Mouche’s TJP Alessi took the event down, proving Alessi to be one of the most powerful cards in the set. Overall, FoA is pretty top heavy as far as playables go, so its refreshing to see a deck maximize use of a non-legendary card like Alessi, making the deck very accessible to players. Speaking of accessibility, Pupicitus decided “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”, bringing TJP Mid featuring 0 cards from FoA. While this deck does not showcase all the new toys we got this set, it does showcase how a powerful strategy can persist unchanged. This is partially a product of Pupi not playing as frequently anymore, but still very much shows the power in the archetype, even without markets. I would feel fairly confident taking this list on ladder as its game plan is very consistent, but there is room for optimization!

Dunkelwerk’s favorite archetype got a facelift in FoA, which we discussed in depth last week: FJS Midrange. Walloittaja brought a version of the deck that dropped the Vicious Highwayman, added Statuary Maiden, and is only playing Winchest Merchant. I like this version because it doesn’t lean as heavily on the Market, and its toolbox feels just as potent, without diluting the game plan at all. This is the list I think I would take to ladder if I were seeing more Time or Reanimator decks.

People often equate a lower power level with a mono colored deck. Bryce proved them wrong with their Mono Time Midrange list. Mono Time is arguably the only faction that can do this, because of its big scary creatures, plus the addition of Teacher of Humility. While I have not played Teacher myself, the card is just nuts. I forecasted it as being one of the strongest cards in the set and still believe that to be true. I would expect multiple versions of this deck to pop up, but this list feels pretty tuned for being so early on in a set.

Paradox is an amazing Praxis Mid player. They championed last season’s invitational with the archetype. They also decided that the list did not need much tuning, which I believe is absolutely correct. Add your Market toolbox and Teacher of Humility and call it a day. Bruisedbygod took a slightly different direction with the deck, adding Alhed, Mount Breaker and Thundering Kerasaur too. My guess is this comes down to personal preference, as I think the decks would probably perform similarly overall. There are some flex slots in the deck, which make Praxis Mid a nice consistent ladder deck that can be changed based on your pocket of the meta. Both of these lists can be used as a reference point for anyone looking to explore this archetype more post FoA!

If you lean toward a “Timmy” or “Johnny” play style, AirHater’s Charge Rod is the deck for you. I am no stranger to this archetype, as it has proven to be one of the funnest high rolling experiences I have had playing Eternal. Naturally, you can whiff on Divining Rod, and when you whiff, you usually effectively lose the game on the spot, so be prepared for that. It does a pretty good “play big creatures and hit them in the face” plan B. Play this deck if you have a bunch of Shiftstone you don’t want any more and you sort of miss Hearthstone.

Finally, Theovermaster brought something a bit different than what they are known for this week, in Aggro Combrei. There was a lot of discussion this week about what lists to bring, and this deck ended up toward the top of the list. It has a very straightforward aggressive gameplan and keeps the pressure on your opponent to make moves. It then effectively reapplies pressure after the move they made falls short.

The video this week is from Sifudanny, who hosted an interview with IlyaK. We are working on a few different ideas and hope to have more interviews like this coming down the line. Please let us know your thoughts so we can refine and develop the idea!

2 Dark Return (Set1 #250)
3 Gift of Battle (Set4 #146)
4 Permafrost (Set1 #193)
3 Snowcrust Yeti (Set2 #105)
4 Twilight Raptor (Set1 #379)
4 Annihilate (Set1 #269)
4 Dusk Raider (Set4 #153)
3 Haunting Scream (Set1 #374)
4 Rapid Shot (Set1 #259)
4 Territorial Elf (Set4 #210)
2 Bloodscent Avisaur (Set3 #301)
4 Jennev Merchant (Set4 #169)
4 Midnight Gale (Set1 #378)
3 Rindra, the Duskblade (Set3 #277)
6 Primal Sigil (Set1 #187)
3 Shadow Sigil (Set1 #249)
4 Amethyst Waystone (Set3 #201)
2 Cabal Standard (Set4 #193)
4 Diplomatic Seal (Set1 #425)
4 Feln Banner (Set1 #417)
4 Seat of Cunning (Set0 #62)
————–MARKET—————
1 Gift of Battle (Set4 #146)
1 Changeestik (Set4 #152)
1 Haunting Scream (Set1 #374)
1 Rindra’s Choice (Set4 #261)
1 Rindra, the Duskblade (Set3 #277)

Use the code “TRS12” to get 12% off your order at InkedGaming.com and support Team Rankstar directly!

Check out Team Rankstar streamers: HeyWhyYou, Magikarp, NotoriousGHP, PlatypusKing, SifuDanny and y0ttabyte. ThatResolves, who makes all of the videos for Meta Monday, can be found here and Patreon here!

If you are looking for some tournament “Best of Three” practice, Kaelari has set up a really great resource that is open 24/7 here as well as a Tuesday night tournament here.

Every Friday, The Great Parliament hosts “Casual Friday” tournament now, too!

The new season of the ETS is live! Be sure to sign up or tune in ever Saturday for the highest level of Eternal competition!

Don’t forget to let us know what you think via our contact and recruitment page or in our Discord!

Unexpected Results: THE Eternal Podcast #12: Gifted Berserker

We discuss the results of The Great Parliament / Kaelari tournament and all things related to Set 4: the Fall of Argenport.

Catch the show LIVE every Sunday at 8pm Eastern @ twitch.tv/ThePlatypusKing

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