Hi there, as winner of the third Duelyst open and a grandmaster, I thought I would stop by to give you some feedback on your deck. I know you get a lot of criticism from some of the discord people so I won’t be too harsh, and I absolutely love how you’re able to forgo some of the “basic rules” of Duelyst for your own idea of a deck, and make it work. Because you’re so far from the meta I expect none of your opponents have any idea how to play against you, and their decks are not prepared for it, which is amazing!
That said, there are reasons why some of these “basic rules” are in place. Not having two drops means that if you start as P1, you have no play. More importantly, on your second turn your best play is going to be throwing down a 3 drop, and neither of your 3 drops are particularly strong on their own. I would HIGHLY recommend trying Silverguard Knight over Dragoon because it has 1 extra HP off the bat and provoke, as well as slotting Lancer in there somehow. This has the side effect of giving you stronger turn one P2 plays. If you are forced to use a removal spell on your second turn, then your opponent is still going to have the initiative and also all the mana tiles, which you’ll have a hard time coming back from.
With that said, I can definitely see how your deck can win. With a million points of healing and all the removal it will easily punish face aggro decks. Against more midrange decks, you will rely on them playing into either Holy Immolate/Sunriser or Decimate to get value and stall the game. Eventually, you will play Ironcliff or Excelsious, either onto an empty board or a board full of their minions. In both scenarios, you hope that they have not been playing smartly and holding removal. If they don’t answer your Excelsious, you win. If they do, you hope to drag out the game and grind them out of resources.
That said, I think your deck has many weaknesses and a good player will be able to properly exploit them. Your midgame is INCREDIBLY reactive and relies on having the proper removal to answer the situation. Your proactive plays are very weak. On top of that, many of your answer cards are situational. It is easy for the opponent to play around Holy Immolation since you have no cheap minions to combo it with. Decimate is likewise easy to play around for a smart player. Additionally, if you spend your turns doing nothing but playing removal, a good player will expect large minions and will ALWAYS be holding a Fox/Thumping Wave/Punish/Repulsor/OBS/Entropic to deal with your Ironcliff. Coupled with your weak early game a good deck should be able to ride the tempo generated by answering your Ironcliff to victory. The deck is too slow and reactive and relies on having the perfect answer to be strong in the current metagame, as your opponent will always have the first ~4 turns of the game free to do whatever they want.
That said, I think the deck is awesome and I can see how it will easily crush those who are unprepared, as you typically find in gold. (Worth noting that I recognize none of the players you beat.) It looks great at punishing those who go all in on face too soon, and those who do not hold removal or play around your own. However, a good player with any midrange or control deck should have no trouble.
As far as deck advice goes, I would consider the following cards (keeping the spirit of the deck):
- Silverguard Knight
- Sunforge Lancer
- Agis Barrier (this should be key and is the only way your deck will work at higher ranks)
- A proactive 4 drop
- Possibly a low cost minion to combo with your Holy Immolation
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It’s working for me, and it doesn’t need to work for anyone else in the world.