Even Cultists Get the Blues
This deck took me to
Rank 15 in Masters during Chapter 17, and is a revision of an
earlier deck that I used to Rank 150ish from just past Diamond I.
At heart this is a Xenan deck, but a splash of Primal helps to fill in a few gaps and open up some powerful combos. With a little luck,
Call the Ancients combined with
Dark Return makes it possible to find yourself holding a 2-cost multi-faction 9/9 Flying Elemental
Titan with Endurance, Aegis, and Killer.
If you don't happen to hit one of your Ancient Elemental Titans,
Black-Sky Harbinger makes another excellent target for both
Xenan Initiation and
Accelerated Evolution.
The same can be said earlier in the game for
Ayan, the Abductor and
Reliquary Raider. Each of these units do more for you than just deal damage when attacking and/or defending, and with
Dark Return you get double the benefits of your Time and Primal buff spells.
Madness,
Devour,
Teleport, and
Xenan Initiation make up the Xenan Madness package detailed in a
previous write-up. Each are included x4 here in the absence of any kill spells, which means you must rely on combos - but the upside is that these cards each serve double duty.
Along with
Beckoning Lumen and
Temple Scribe,
Devour is a fairly reliable source of card draw. And when not abducting enemies as part of a
Madness combo,
Teleport protects your own units as well as returning Killers to your hand for another strike.
Late game, one or two copies of
Madness can also serve as a powerful finisher when your opponent is at low health and doesn't have enough defenders to block their own strongest unit(s).
PS - For anyone who may be wondering,
this is why I play Teleport instead of Equivocate.
Call the Ancients
x4
1
Dark Return
x4
2
Accelerated Evolution
x2
2
Devour
x4
2
Teleport
x4
2
Temple Scribe
x4
2
Vara's Favor
x4
2
Xenan Initiation
x4
3
Ayan, the Abductor
x4
3
Madness
x4
3
Reliquary Raider
x4
4
Beckoning Lumen
x4
6
Black-Sky Harbinger
x4
Primal Sigil
x1
Shadow Sigil
x3
Time Sigil
x3
Crest of Cunning
x4
Crest of Wisdom
x4
Seat of Mystery
x3
Seat of Wisdom
x3
Xenan Banner
x4
View Deck on Shiftstoned
As for Call the Ancients: It is one of my favorite cards. Most people will also tell you It is not very consistent or competitive.
My take is that whether or not you craft it should depend on a couple of things: How much shiftstone do you have? And what is more important to you for your personal collection: owning the cards you want or owning the cards that are the most competitive?
What does the ideal opening hand look like? How many power? What are your best and worst match ups?
As for ideal opening hand - the earlier you Call the Ancients, the sooner you can start drawing them. So I like to see Call the Ancients plus Seat of Wisdom and an undepleted sigil whenever possible. It feels unusual (but nice) as a slower midrange deck to have a solid play on turn 1.
Beyond that you are looking for Temple Scribe, Vara's Favor, Ayan and Raider. It is nice to be holding a power source for each color, but you want to prioritize Time and Shadow.
Unless you have Call the Ancients, you won't need Primal until at least turn 3 - and even then only if you have a unit to buff with Accelerated Evolution. Otherwise you can go without Blue until you are ready to play Harbinger.
I think about Scheme, but instead of what?
And what shell i do with spam decks?
By spam decks, I assume you mean tokens (?), which are very popular right now. You could consider reducing the number of Madness and/or Initiation in favor of some sweepers. I might suggest Lightning Storm over Hailstorm - even though it is not as powerful. With this 3F deck you have a better chance of hitting single primal influence early, rather than PP. Devastating Setback is another option
I was seeing a lot of Icaria Blue and Chalice, and I think it maybe it is favored against those. Also played versus a lot of FPS scream, and that is not a bad matchup either (especially if you can Madness their Gorgons ;) )
I haven't played it as much during the current season, but it doesn't surprise me that this list would not do well against a midrange heavy meta. If I were using it right now I'd probably try to find room for some more hard removal.
From my short experience with the deck, I feel the deck could use a little bit of removal, but I'm not sure what to cut exactly.
FWIW, I found that the more I played with the cards, the more I learned ways to make those moving parts work on their own.
For example: popping Aegis on an enemy unit with Accelerated Evolution, or executing a blow-out using Teleport to remove one of two double-blockers. These plays may seem obvious to people who have more experience than I do, but they definitely helped me to squeeze out a few extra wins.
One the other hand, if your Skycraggro opponent has favorable draws there is not much you can do - and that is true of any deck really. Skycrag Aggro may be one of the weaker matchups for this deck in a Best of One setting.
In a tournament or Best of 3 setting you bring in Annihilate, Banish and Devastating Setback from your sideboard and your odds against Skycrag and other aggressive strategies go way up.