Hi there!
So ever since they spoiled
Aniyah, Master Sleuth and
Trickshot Ruffian I've had the idea of building a tempo deck in Hooru. This is the most consistent version of the deck so far; currently I'm at rank 57 and 8-2 with it in masters. However, this is early days of the new set and I'm probably facing some jankier builds so don't go off and craft this immediately unless you like the idea of unit-based Hooru.
Card Choices:
Aniyah, Master Sleuth: enables
Bring to Justice, protects from transform effects like Decree, Feln discards, and comes with a 3/2 aegis body. Carries both
Vanquisher's Blade and
Master's Blade really well.
Chinwhip Bludgeoner: There are 16 dual influence powers in the deck, so this can easily attack as a 4/4 regularly and the aegis protects it from removals like
Defiance. Synergises with
Maveloft Huntress as you can attack with the 4/4, imbue it, use the 6/5 killer and keep the 6/5 threat.
Hojan, Crownbreaker: this is a 2-drop that you don't usually want to play on 2 if you don't have to. You know the drill. It's worth mentioning that
Blightmoth dumps on this, and that if you do the big renown attack and then imbue with
Maveloft Huntress you have some ridiculous stats in play.
Maveloft Huntress: Removal, fixing and a beatstick to boot. Worst case, this trades with some x/2 (and this is very rare). Medium case, you imbue it with one of your 3/2's, remove/eat a blocker, and you have a 5/4 which if it dies gives you your 3/2 back. Best case, this can be an 8/7 that stuns your probably-irrelevant Hojan after its renown attack.
Rime Conclave Smuggler: The onslaught trigger turns on
Bring to Justice, you want market cards of both factions and the body is better with Huntress as a 3/2 than a 2/3. Also can attack into 3/3's vs Stonescar or MonoF.
Valkyrie Enforcer: the silence can be fairly relevant, esp. vs Vara, Vengeance Seeker, this deck's nemesis, and the evasion allows this to attack when the ground is clogged up by silencing opposing flyers.
Sheriff Marley: the only super important parts of this card are 4/4 aegis. However, it's not particularly hard to get tribute with this deck and the deputies can act as market fodder or bodies to get
The Throne Room activations. Best 4-drop we can run.
Jotun Feast-Caller: draws us more gas once we curve out, carries both Vanquisher's Blade and Master's Blade well and sticks with the incidental aegis tribal theme. Usually once this attacks for the second time you're very happy.
Bubble Shield: one cost protect is good. But one cost protect that blocks
Ice Bolt on Hojan and switches on
Bring to Justice targeting their 2 drop is busted. (He conceded).
Bring to Justice: do I need to explain why 0 cost kill a unit is good? At best, this is a 0-cost kill spell, and between Aniyah, Smuggler, Bubble shield and
The Throne Room that's what this is most of the time. At worst, this is a 0-cost
Rebuke, and with Master's Blade you can still get rid of the unit for good.
Silverblade Intrusion: Allows you to make multiple favorable trades in one go, saves units from damage removal, and if you hit 5J (Which usually happens by T4/5) it also gives you market fodder and plays a 3/3 flyer! The only situation where this is worse than
Finest Hour is for pushing lethal, but we can do that fine with our market options.
Vanquisher's Blade: pumps most of our 3 attack units to 5 attack, which trades with most other units, and can provide additional removal against bigger midrange decks running
Tasbu, the Forbidden or
Grodov's Stranger. The void hate can be relevant vs
Prodigious Sorcery or Revenge/Entomb effects like Zicaria's.
The Throne Room: adds more ways to turn on
Bring to Justice, and adds more lategame value in the form of
Daraka, Queensguard, which usually comes down once the opponent is out of good removal. Can also act as removal on 6 with spellcraft, although it has only come up once and when it did I was like "wait this has spellcraft?."
Market:
Trickshot Ruffian: serves 2 purposes: it allows you to easily stabilize against aggro, gaining you 4-5 life in a big swing and providing a body to eat x/1's, and it gives you reach, adding upwards of 5 or 6 damage (and as much as 10) in the lategame for a final swing. Was once maindeck, but drawing multiples early is sad so it works better in the market.
Royal Decree: used to hose some key cards like Vara, Vengeance Seeker or the new sweeper
Equalize. If you don't have anything better to get, this is usually good.
Pristine Light: this is a questionable slot, and could be swapped for
Vision of Austerity to deal with things like
Martyr's Chains or
Worldpyre, but it can be good into Combrei/Shadow midrange decks and it can rebuy your merchant in those cases.
Master's Blade: this can pump most of your creatures enough to get mastery in 2 swings, and kills Grodov's Stranger. Can also kill things that have been silenced with Bring to Justice or Valkyrie Enforcer. Can be used with Huntress to trigger the mastery immediately, but I have yet to do this in game.
Crystallise: used to end the game against unit-based decks. There is very little endurance around in the current meta, and locking the enemy board down for 2 attack phases is usually lethal.
Influence:
The deck wants to hit 3J 2P by turn 3 or 4. To this end, I'm running a lot of duals and the new
Hooru Vow which is basically seek power in the powerbase itself. Once you hit the third P, you want to farm J influence for
Silverblade Intrusion and
Trickshot Ruffian.
Pros:
-The deck is incidentally full of aegis units, so control decks will have a rough day against you.
-The deck is full of synergy and incredible tempo plays, which allows you to overpower most other decks.
Cons:
-Vara, Vengeance Seeker
-Occasionally influence can be an issue, but this is uncommon if you play properly (unlike me)
Thanks for reading my wall of text, and I hope the deck does well for you!
https://imgur.com/r5qm1xx
Edit:
I've made the following changes to get the deck running more smoothly:
-4
Sheriff Marley +4
Minotaur Platemaker: I completely forgot that Platemaker was a card. Much better as a mana sink than Marley in the late game, allows us to turn our 2/2's and 2/1's into relevant threats, dodges Jekk on 4 and can hit in for up to 8 damage the turn it attacks.
-1
The Throne Room +1
Valkyrie Enforcer: Drawing a second Throne room is bad, so having only 2 prevents this. The extra enforcer can turn some threats like Warleader or Jekk into bold adventurers, which makes the SS matchup much better.
-3
Seat of Order +1
Hooru Vow +1
Primal Sigil +1
Crownwatch Standard: Smooths the powerbase out significantly.
Market:
-
Master's Blade +
Inquisitor's Blade: Since you basically always spellcraft Master's Blade anyways, this is strictly better as it offers evasion, a larger buff and it can come back, which has won me a game.
-
Royal Decree: +
Wardwielder: this was suggested by Camat0 on his stream, so I tested it and it is very, very good. Being able to imbue this with Huntress the turn after you fetch it, as well as using bubble shield to both protect and enable it make it all the more valuable.
That's all from me. Good luck hitting Masters!
1) Vara the Vengeance seeker is on board first and Aniyah enters after?
2) Aniya is on board first and Vara the Vengeance seeker enters after?
3) a player tries to pop Aniyah's Aegis?
4) a player tries to pop another of your unit's Aegis while you have Aniyah in play?
2) all aegis is gone
3) the Aniyahs aegis is gone
4) then the aegis of the unit is gone amiyah keeps it