My Hexcellent Adventure – Limited Landscape

By Chris VanMeter

Hello fellow Entrathians, and welcome to this week’s edition of “My Hexcellent Adventure!” Last week we talked about the Winter Moon control deck that Jeff Hoogland and myself worked on for the Cup of Fate. The meta has shifted quite a bit since then, so I still need some time to play constructed and get a better feel for the format, but in the meantime I have been playing a lot of Primal Dawn draft and sealed and would like to go over where I feel the current meta is for the limited formats.

I’ve had a different experience with HEX limited than a lot of people. I came into the game at the tail end of Armies of Myth, so by the time Primal Dawn came out I was still having as much fun as possible playing Armies of Myth limited and everyone else was at the tail end of an eight month stint of drafting, building, and jamming the same decks against each other.

Reading through all of the guides on varying fan sites, I found myself getting familiar with the established archetypes quickly and having a lot of fun and success with different types of decks that I was able to cobble together.

With the inclusion of Primal Dawn, things have changed quite a bit. Drafts now being PD, PD, AoM and Sealed now being four PD packs and two AoM packs there were a lot of different things to try and figure out.

What strategies from AoM draft and sealed were going to continue to be viable with less AoM packs, and what cards from PD would help facilitate that?

What shard combinations would be more viable now with the addition of PD that didn’t have enough support before to be competitive?

What commons and uncommons from AoM could potentially become more effective with the new strategies, and were there any big losers?

Likewise, were there any new champions in PD that were going to change card evaluations, or any new cards that would change AoM champion evaluations?

As you can see, there are a lot of things to consider when going into a new limited format that utilizes a previous one, and this one was going to be even more compounded since most people had eight months of AoM limited ingrained into their minds. Thankfully, I did.

First, I took the existing popular limited archetypes from just AoM and listed out what I felt were going to be the big impacts for them with the limited pools losing a significant number of AoM packs and therefore those cards being less bountiful that they originally were.

Spiders

Blood/Sapphire spiders, headlined by the Zorzym of Korru champion was by far my favorite archetype from the previous limited format and I found myself forcing the deck in most drafts that I did. Utilizing a large number of very powerful commons (one of which I think should have been an uncommon) in addition to some hard to remove uncommons, I felt like the spider deck was the strongest thing you could be doing in triple AoM. Here are the commons and uncommons that I felt were extremely important to the archetype.



Blood/Sapphire also gave you access to some premium removal cards in the form of:When looking back at all of the different iterations of the spider deck and thinking about what would happen with access to less AoM cards, I came to the realization that the strength of this deck moving forward was going to hinge on two things.

First, were you able to get a Hatchery Cultivator and some of the slow, advantage building egg generation cards? If so, then you would be able to build a traditional attrition based spider deck. The other possibility was that you were able to get plenty of the new, high-velocity egg generating cards from Primal Dawn and take the deck in that direction.

Skitter of the Arachnid and Azure Fang Decree are the two commons from Primal Dawn that headline the spider strategy. There are a few other cards, like Eggblight Stalker, Splinter of Bokrug, Hatchery Malvoker, and Runeweb Cultivator that can also play roles in the spider deck, but for the most part I have been unimpressed with playing and playing against any type of dedicated spider strategy.

Ultimately, I feel this strategy lives and dies with your Armies of Myth cards, and most of the time you are going to strike out. Pre-Primal Dawn, I’d say spiders were insane, but now I actively try to avoid them if I can.

Ruby/Diamond Aggro

Some believed that the Ruby/Diamond aggro deck was the best with just AoM, and I can’t really argue with that. The power level difference between Ruby/Diamond and spiders was so close, and I never faulted anyone for playing either deck, and I also frequented it. Playing either Urgnock or Bryson Maplewood, you could very easily put an opponent on the back foot and press your advantage until the game was over. You could even go Knightsbane Ovo if you had a strong Shift theme. There were plenty powerful commons and uncommons that you were looking for, and they were headlined by the following:



There wasn’t much effective hard removal for this shard combination, but cards that we were generally happy to see were:This deck was ruthless. It would mow over anyone who would stumble or just didn’t respect the amount of damage that it could pour out over a few turns, but how would it change with Primal Dawn. There really wasn’t a new aggressive champion that we could use for this archetype, so it was going to be solely on the cards.

Thankfully, Primal Dawn actually adds more to this archetype than I think that it takes away. There are some very good removal cards that we get, the commons are comparable, and the uncommons that we get access to can take games over by themselves.



This archetype is flush with awesome playables, and when I end up Ruby/Diamond I find that I am either having to cut some number of cards, or realize early that I’m going to be free to hate draft things that might end up being very good against me.

Ruby/Diamond aggro is extremely strong, and I would probably put it somewhere near the upper echelon of the current limited decks.

The Blood/Diamond Madame Anana deck was very strong in the previous format. Utilizing cards like Spiritbound Spy along with your champion ability was backbreaking for a lot of decks, and we could just grind out advantage from all of our cards over the long game. Here are the important cards for the Blood/Diamond Anana deck, not counting the obvious Blood or Diamond removal cards:



Before Primal Dawn, this archetype was quite strong and was generally open to at least one drafter since there really wasn’t a lot of overlap with any of the other popular archetypes. Now that Primal Dawn is added though, I feel that this strategy lost the most. With such a reliance on Spiritbound Spy due to how insane the interaction with Madame Anana ’s champion ability is with it, trying to find something that is a replacement just doesn’t work since there really isn’t anything.

Blood/Diamond spirits is basically unplayable now.

Wild/Ruby

Wild/Ruby decks pre-Primal Dawn fell into two camps that were headlined by their respective champions, Mightsinger Alyndra and Cressida. I generally felt that Alyndra was stronger because the advantage that you would gain from the temporary resource off Cressida’s champion power really wasn’t enough to offset her extreme lack of starting health. The cards though, generally were the same for both decks and you either had some ramp with removal and a lot of five-cost matters cards, or some ramp with removal and efficient troops. Here are the important cards for Ruby/Wild, not counting the obvious Ruby removal cards:



In general, these decks were pretty competitive. They had enough beef sitting around to gum up the ground against the Ruby/Diamond aggressive decks. They could turn the corner quickly against the spider decks and could grind out other decks with the five-cost matters cards like Playing With Fire and Sylvan Performer

With Primal Dawn being added, the majority of the Wild cards in the new set are more tailored to fit the new themes, but there still are some new cards that can augment this strategy. I feel like Mightsinger Alyndra is pretty underplayed in the current limited meta, and expect her to start seeing more play as the format starts to shape up more.

The addition of awesome Ruby removal cards like Burning Tendrils, Skarnbreath, and Crimson Bolt really help in addition to Fearless Fray from Wild, but there are also some very nice troops available.



The Dawn of Primal Dawn

While a lot of these cards are pretty unexciting, Young Seer has really impressed me and the more I play with Wild in the new limited format, the more I start to like it. Some of the bomb-est rares are Wild, and a lot of the very good cards for this archetype are generally free for the taking in pack three. The big downside is that in terms of power level, I think that one of the new champions from Primal Dawn is generally better and plays to the synergy of the new cards much more.

After I’ve gone through the existing archetypes, then I start to look at and play around with the new ones that I think have potential. With Primal Dawn there were six new champions added, five different dual-shard champions and a new shardless champion. These have all pretty much brought with them a whole bunch of new archetypes that are available for draft, so let’s take a pretty high overview of them.

I’ve pretty much fallen in love with Raven Talon and the new Wild/Diamond life gain style of deck. Most of the cards for the archetype are pretty narrow so we don’t have to all-in on them too early, in addition to that most of the troops are decent sized regardless even if we aren’t relying on synergy to get us going.

Here is my list of important commons and uncommons for the Raven Talon deck, in no particular order.



Now, these are just the cards that play along with the life gain synergy. Troops being pumped when you gain life, or in the case of Ghost Howler just flat pumping your whole team each time you gain life is extremely powerful, and plays right along with Raven Talon’s champion ability. You can also just fill out your deck with reasonable sized troops and beat down pretty effectively. Removal is pretty scarce in this archetype so it’s important to prioritize when you see some.These are really the best options that we have, so it’s very important to grab some when you can, and while playing save them for the best spots and focus on building an overwhelming board advantage.

Previously, you could play Wild/Diamond with just Armies of Myth along with Mightsinger Alyndra or Sagebrush, but you really weren’t taking advantage of the synergy built into the set. Now though, with Raven Talon, we are full speed ahead.

Yotul Mogak gets my award for most powerful new champion and deck. Blood/Ruby was a pretty fringe deck with just Armies of Myth. Carrac The Scavenger saw a small amount of play with that shard combination, but that was about it. Now though, with Yotul Mogak and some of the new commons available in Primal Dawn, Blood/Ruby is an attrition filled removal machine that really just needs a few powerful threats to end the game. This is headlined by the card Cleave and just how well it works with Yotul’s champion power and that it becomes even more busted when you add in the highlight uncommon for this champion, Whirling Brutalizer.

When you use Yotul’s champion ability and then Cleave, you get to do two damage to three different targets. You can then attack with Whirling Brutalizer and do an addition three damage to those targets. We are basically building a one-sided board wipe and doing a ton of damage to our opponent at the same time. Adding on to this the sheer amount of removal available to these shards over two sets, it’s just insane.



That is a lot of removal. Once you can kill basically all of your opponents troops, you can finish the game out with a ham sandwich if you so choose, but even something like a Silver Rook or Ghostblade Duelist will get the job done.

Yotul Cleave is the combination that I have lost the most to in draft, by far.

I tried Diamond/Sapphire fliers in Armies of Myth draft and had mild success with it, but with the addition of Primal Dawn, it is a real thing. Windspeaker really was secretly one of my favorite cards in AoM and I’m pretty glad that it has a home now. There are a lot of fliers, and when combined with some bounce cards for tempo and Fiona’s champion ability to slow down counter attacks, we’ve got the makings of a real powerhouse.



That is a lot of flying troops, and there are even more in Armies of Myth. Much like the Wild/Diamond Raven Talon deck though, we are short on removal. A lot of games come down to a timely Throwback , or having access to some of the premium Diamond removal. The saving grace though, is that since we are almost 100% fliers, Quell is great and can be picked up fairly late since it’s generally pretty weak in any of the other Diamond combinations.

Ruby/Sapphire is an aggressive tempo style deck that I enjoyed playing in AoM draft, but it never really caught on. Utilizing evasion cards like Relic of Nulzann with various gems that make it difficult to block, fliers, and pump actions like Swordplay or Lunge along with Urgnock, I was generally able to just attack ruthlessly and race people. Now with a dedicated champion to the shard combination that starts with some decent health, we can play a different game.

Morgan McBombus has become very popular in constructed but isn’t as popular in limited. This is because to enable his champion ability, we have to be playing a significant number of actions. Thankfully there are a lot of Ruby removal cards at our disposal, but the evasion troops aren’t as aggressively costed and in abundance like they were in triple AoM.

Here are the important cards you will end up with if you’re planning on Bumblebot-ing people.



Overall I do like that we now have a champion for this type of deck, but I feel like it’s still missing something most of the time.

One of the most interesting champions added with Primal Dawn is Kagulichu. Finally having a champion for the Blood/Wild midrange-value decks is pretty important, and there are a lot of cards that go along with it in Primal Dawn.



Kagulichu decks are all about trading resources and gaining advantage as the game goes along with its access to the crypt as a resource. Utilizing cards that can put troops back into your deck, or into your hand from the crypt, the Kagulichu decks aim to just grind and grind until their opponents run out of stuff and eventually die.

One of the benefits of playing this kind of deck in draft is that it’s basically a “good stuff” deck. Grab decent troops and removal cards and you can end up with a deck and win any given draft.

The last champion that was introduced with Primal Dawn is actually the one that I think is the most important. As a truly shardless champion, Uzzu the Bonewalker really has almost no opportunity cost to choose as your champion. As long as you have four charges, you can unlock any threshold that you want. This is extremely powerful, and there are a lot of drafts and sealed decks that just end up as Uzzu good stuff. You can basically play all of your cards and end up with this powerful machine that’s generally two base shards splashing one or two more that you can unlock with Uzzu or something like Hextricator or Shard Prism.

There are two main camps that use Uzzu decks, one being a Chant type deck utilizing the new chant constants in Primal Dawn, or a necrotic deck that takes advantage of cards like Corpse Caller, Midnight Spiritualist, Midnight Convergence, Midnight Paladin, and the ever so busted Scion of Volosolov.

I have had success with both of these strategies, and am excited to see what Uzzu opens up for us in terms of draft and sealed deck building, and even in constructed where we are already seeing Uzzu fueled Azurefate Sorceress decks that are gaining access to gem powers that the base shards never would have before.

I hope that this broad overview of the current limited format helps you understand just a little bit more when you are drafting or playing sealed deck. Next week I want to delve even deeper into some of these archetypes and provide decklists that I have actually played and how I came about building those decks.

Until next time, may Kismet smile on your top-decks!

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With 20 years of TCG experience, Chris VanMeter brings a unique perspective to HEX. Favoring constructed decks that can either go under the competition or as far over it as possible, you can find Chris playing draft, sealed, and constructed on his Twitch channel and talking about his experiences endlessly via social media.

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