Congrats to Mads from YOUR Destiny Podcast for winning Star Wars Destiny European Championships 2018!

He was piloting the same deck he made top 2 of worlds with – Stairs. Here is his Worlds 2018 list for reference, his Euro list only had two changes: +1 Force Misdirection, +1 Hidden Motive, -1 Alter, -1 Caution.

Nothing too crazy. The deck is very solid and doesn’t have too many bad match ups but it does have some. I know that Bobby had no problem playing against it while playing Sabine Ezra and while I was playing Vehicles I thought it was favorable although there are some CQA draws that can be pretty killer. It’s obviously weak to Kylo as well. Let’s take a look at the rest of the top 32:

4 Boba/Seventh

4 Obi/Maz

4 Kylo/Anakin

4 Rey/Aayla

2 Bala/Talzin/FO

2 Drive-by-Shooting

2 Sabine/Ezra

2 Yoda/Hondo

2 Thrawn/Talzin

1 eYoda/eEzra/Rookie (dif. Version)

1 eRose/Wedge/Hired Gun

1 QGJ/Aayla

1 Zeb/Yoda

1 Palpatine

1 Yoda/JarJar/Jedha

Going into this week I saw Obi/Maz as being well positioned in the meta. It has a solid match up vs Kylo/Anakin, Hondo and Sabine Ezra. I thought it would usurp Sabine/Ezra as the main Big/Little deck. Based on this performance I can see that being the case moving forward. I think it is a little behind vs Boba/7th which showed up in a big way and the middle/middle match ups can get Obi if they have good rolls/draws. Overall it has certain Maz’s Vault/Hyperspace Jump draws that can be devastating and it can god roll with the best of them. I figured a good Obi/Maz player was in a solid spot if they had sufficient reps.

I’m slightly surprised by the amount of Boba/7th in top 32 but its good vs Drive by Shooting and some other decks that showed up. It’s pretty bad vs Hondo and Stairs and those decks are played quite a bit. It has some powerful CQA draws that can randomly play fun police vs many of the deck and its starting damage output is high. It is better vs Kylo/Anakin than Stairs which means it isn’t necessarily a worse middle/middle choice, especially if people aren’t playing Yoda/Hondo.

5 die villain is picking up some steam and its a better version popularized by JMag. He bubbled at worlds coming in at 17th at x-2 but its certainly tier 1 in my mind. Its very powerful and has great match ups vs the three character decks like vehicles and drive by shooting. If it draws a timely Free for All vs two character decks it can also finish them off before they have a chance to recoup. It plays the powerful On the Hunt which can be devastating vs many of the shield decks in the format like Stairs and QGJ decks.

Drive by shooting is pretty good vs an open field and Yoda makes it super consistent. However, once you have to play vs 5 die villain, Boba/7th and Stairs in order to win a tournament you’re going to have a bad time. This top 32 was actually much rougher for DBS than worlds and if the meta stays like this its going to have a hard time claiming the top spot at a tournament.

Kylo/Anakin is still playing format fun police for many of the mono blue decks. With the performance of stairs you are going to have a lot of players intrigued by very favorable mono color match ups. If you are planning on playing a mono color deck make sure you understand that you will probably play against this and be unhappy about it.

Rey2/Aayla is obviously still a strong choice but I don’t feel its in a tier of its own. The performance of this deck is more of a product of a good player then the deck being busted. I’m not dismissing it but its a deck many of us stayed away because it does struggle against Sabine/Ezra, vehicles and Kylo. We’ve had conflicting reports about how it performs vs Yoda/Hondo and Obi/Maz – I haven’t played those match ups too much and I can at least say that you should have reps vs them to at least be familiar with what they can do.

That 32 looks pretty close to the worlds top meta except for a few outliers. eRose/Wedge/HG is a flavor of Hero Vehicles that ended up losing to the champ, you can check that deck out here. Using Hired Gun lets us have a bigger HP yellow character which lets us keep your spot yellow cards around for longer. As a vehicles proponent I explored that combo of characters using Jedha Partisan instead of Hired Gun although I did mention HG as a possible replacement in my exploring vehicles article.

Yoda/ Hondo performed well on day one of worlds but not so well on day 2. We all felt pretty prepared vs it and one of its best match ups in Boba/7th wasn’t as present.

Its cool to see the Emperor still hanging around. I can’t imagine many people played him and he still seems reasonable vs two character decks although the person who made top 16 ended up 2-0’ing a 5 die villain which makes me think that it does have some hope vs those decks. You can check out that write up here.

Rounding out the 32 we have Qui-Gon Jinn/Aayla, Zeb/Yoda and Yoda/Jar jar/ Partisan(Mill). Our patron Brygmann brought the QGJ deck, shout out to him for a solid showing. I’ve tested the combo and preferred the Yoda version. In the end the proof is in the pudding and in my eyes QGJ isn’t a better partner than Hondo mostly because Yellow cards are really impactful. Zeb/Yoda is a deck that has been knocking on the door for a while and I’d be interested in seeing that particular list but this one I found on the DB seemed to have performed well recently and it looks fine. And finally Yoda/Jar Jar/Partisan mill… its a mill deck for sure. I’m sure its great vs most of the things mill is great against and still bad vs stuff like Sabine but if people go away from Sabine…maybe its time to dust off those Rieekans. I’m solidly on team Rieekan for mill because of speed and C-3PO.

In summery the metagame is in a good spot and there are plenty of checks and balances built into deck selection that prevents the metagame from getting too unbalanced. Kylo will be playing fun police vs people playing Stairs and Sabine Ezra. This will keep Stairs from becoming super dominant. 5 die will keep the format from becoming super 3 wide heavy while still being decent vs 2 character shield decks. Drive by shooting will probably be the default value three character deck although pure vehicle decks might be better vs aggressive 2 character Force Illusion decks because they don’t need to resolve modified dice in order to do damage. Obi/Maz will probably be the dominant Big/Little deck if people keep playing Kylo. Be prepared, test and hope for some good and fun match ups.

I hope you enjoyed this and let me know in the comments or on social media what you are thinking. Good luck and as always…

When in H E double hockey sticks is Way of The Force going to be released?

@NJCuenca

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