Elysian AI Abuse

This deck is is heavily inspired by Wingflier's [Gauntlet] Consistency Elysian Midrange and all of the comments on that deck apply to this one as well.

This deck is not easy to play and rewards a very deep understanding of the behavior of the Eternal AI. If you have that understanding, it can achieve win rates higher than any other deck I have played in Gauntlet.

The core plan of the deck is to recur Dawnwalker repeatedly, ideally after being granted killer with Xenan Initiation. This means that unless you have a strong need right now, it is usually better to hold back 5+ attack units in your hand until they can return a Dawnwalker.

For the most part, the order of priority for early game cards is: Teacher of Humility, Dawnwalker, Lunar Magus, Dusk Raider. Berserk from Dusk Raider is very useful, but not nearly as critical as in many other decks. Don't be afraid to trade off Teacher of Humility or Dusk Raider if it can eliminate multiple opposing units or a particularly troublesome threat.

The deck really needs to hit a minimum of 3 power with 2 time and 1 primal influence to function. Unless your starting hand has 2 time influence and multiple, playable 2 drops, you probably do not want to keep any hand with 2 power.

The AI particularly hates Friendly Wisp. This means that you should only play it out without activating the ultimate immediately if you absolutely have to, or have high confidence that the AI does not have removal available. It usually is better to skip playing a False Prince on turn 3 or 4 if you are not under much pressure and you have Friendly Wisp and enough power to get up to 5 in hand.

After the early game, holding Teacher of Humility in hand rather than playing her out usually is the right course of action. She either can be swapped into the market to get something more useful, or once you hit 8 power and have Xenan Obelisk in play she can be used to recur Dawnwalker.

In most games, the first two cards you grab from the market will be Xenan Initiation and Xenan Obelisk depending on whether or not you have a Dawnwalker yet. Infinite Hourglass is usually your first pick when playing against Deep Freeze or the Highly Skilled boss. Cirso's Choice is usually going to be your first pick versus the "go wide" decks. If you can stall out the board out, the AI will usually continue to invest small units towards it and you can afford to be greedy. Equivocate is there for emergencies, such as when you end up facing large endurance or revenge units.

Beckoning Lumen and Lida's Apprentice are very much the weakest cards in the deck and are frequently easiest cards to toss into the market. Both have some valuable utility that is hard to find elsewhere.

The AI really hates Lida's Appentice and will prioritize removing it extremely highly over other threats, even if its deck does not have any silence effects. You can use this to your advantage to bait out removal that should be directed towards your stronger units.

Beckoning Lumen is one of the few 5 attack, 4 cost units in time and primal. She also provides a fairly strong draw engine if you can play her when you have life gain available. Once you are out of ways of triggering life gain, she can readily be traded off.

This list has not yet been updated to include any Defiance cards. Some strong candidates to include in the list are: Bazaar Trickster and/or Stormtamer Operative to replace Lida's Apprentice, or Thrashing Dune Wurm to replace the main deck Xenan Initiation and maybe some of the Beckoning Lumen. It also may be worthwhile to switch from Auralian Merchant to Great Valley Smuggler and move Crystallize into the market, replacing the market copy of Equivocate