Hello,

it’s been a long time since I have written articles about faeria. For those of you that don’t know me you can find me on discord by the name Nightingale, I have written a few articles for beginners on Faeria, streamed for a while (will try to get back to it in next year) and am team captain of Team Equilibrium. Now I just need to live up to my teammates, as my performance wasn’t really satisfactory in monthlies which embarrasses me… Ehem, Let’s get back on the topic. My reason for writing this article was pretty spontaneous – one guy on discord asked me whether I had a monoblue deck that I could share with him. One thing after another and I somehow ended up with 9 pages of text… Yeah, I sometimes get way over enthusiastic about random things.

Anyways you are here for the primer itself and not the story of how it came to be. At least I hope you are?

Back to business – after the change to the Dream Reaver it became one of my favourite cards in the game (2nd to be exact, before the change it was on the opposite side of the spectrum, right above zealous crusader). Even more exciting for me is that it has good synergy with my most favourite card – Gabrian Enchantment. Adding to the fact that another new blue card – Forbidden Library – is strongest advantage engine in the game, it became obvious what list I would be trying out. After some grinding and testing, this is the list I have ended up with:

This deck has quite a few moving parts and depending on the metagame a lot of them can be changed – for example despite the initial popularity of green, I have found myself facing red more and more, so 3rd ancient herald instead of Failed Experiment seems like a one of the changes that could be good.

After writing down all the cards that are in the deck and why they are there, I realized that for less experienced players it is just as important to list cards that are NOT in the deck and reasons for their exclusion. And that second list became quite a bit longer than the first one. So despite title saying that this is “deck” primer, it would be more correct to describe this article as “archetype” primer where I will describe MY opinions on cards for the midrange monoblue reaver decks. I will leave out the 7+ cost archetype, event disciple-lists and different beefy aggro lists, but even now this guide became much longer than I intended it to be and probably longer than it should be, so I will leave the aforementioned archetypes for the other time.

Before describing the cards themselves you might notice that my deck has some unusual numbers for the cards, so here are the criteria for selecting the number of copies I want to play:

1 is random. When the effect is good but you NEVER want to have 2 of these in your hand or don’t want to use the effect more than once.

2 Is when you want to sometimes see it, but rarely more than one in a game.

3 Is when you want to see the card as often as possible.

*Necessary disclaimer: The opinions presented below are my own and anybody is free to ping me on discord to try to convert me to Krog faith or explain the cuteness of the Yaks. I will be glad to discuss them and even agree on some (especially about the yaks), though please remember that the cards are never in vacuum and that many cards become good or bad depending on the other decks that are being played. Because of this don’t forget the most important rule of borrowing decks/net decking:

Understand how the deck works Playa few games to understand the deck better Swap cards to suit your playstyle/metagame

The number 3 comes AFTER numbers 1 and 2. I have seen so many people netdeck, change half the cards in the deck before even playing it and then complain “the deck doesn’t work” that it’s not even funny anymore.

Also – even though I did get to god rank with this, it is not the best deck right now. So if you are hoping to pick “a deck that beats everything without any trouble” then turn your sights to mono-red variants, yellow rush and monogreen. This is simply a deck that I find interesting, enjoy playing and that I feel has a good enough game against the decks that are out there. And it CAN be tuned to beat anything, but not everything at the same time… At least to my knowledge. If somebody found a configuration that can, please send it to me, I would be really happy.

Cards in the deck and reasons for including them:

2x Falcon dive –

Good utility card. You generally want those when you have card draw (the more card draw you have the more cheap utility cards you can use). 3 feels like too much, except in decks with a LOT of draw effects, we’re talking 3x libraries + lore thieves… Which this kinda qualifies as, but the impact is still not that big, so I opted for running 2.

2x Gabrian Enchantment –

One of the most utilitary cards in blue’s arsenal. Helps shrinking opposing creatures if you can’t kill them and deals with some of the red’s stuff (fire elemental and king’s faithful are best targets). Also nice combo with aurora’s trick. Main use in this deck is to allow Dream Reaver to kill opponent with one hit, though it’s generally not necessary and you shouldn’t feel pressured to save it (but you should if you can).

1x Healing Song

You don’t really want these as when opponent hits you, he usually has big dudes. So 5 health might buy you a turn, but won’t save you. The card is mainly for to compensate for life loss from library. With dream reavers you already have healing to compensate library, so the compensation isn’t that needed at all, but I like having one for insurance. Having 2 feels a bit too much as you don’t want to be drawing into a second copy and would rather do something about the board

1x Failed experiment

This is one of the more techy cards in monoblue. This allows for cycling with lore thief and free land movement with prophet as well as random phantasm effect for 4f. The problem with the card is that it is generally a card disadvantage and you don’t really want to see more than one of these. I could see builds running more (though that would force me to run more lore thieves and prophets), but in my version I find myself slightly flooded with cards, so I run experiment to utilize extra cards a bit better

1x Shifting tide

A mobility trick and a decent one. In a meta with a lot of aggression you want business spells instead of mobility, but if you run colossus or Luduans you need to add all the mobility you can get. This deck relies on winning with one hit with reaver, so I want to run 2 mobility cards that would allow me to get through (libraries and thieves provide so much cycling that it is quite easy to draw into them)

1x Prophet of Tides

This is really squishy, but now that Triton banquet was nerfed to the ground, this is probably best option for mobility in blue. The downside is that you can’t normally move opponent’s blocker out of the way of your dream reaver. I could see myself running more of these, especially now that blue is getting more popular than green, but currently I feel like having one-on-one split with shifting tide is good for this build of the deck. Though for any deck that wants to be running blue colossi, I would instantly add three prophets to help harvest enemy wells. It also has to be noted that this has really good synergy with failed experiment, so I would want to be running these in FE decks as well.

1x Sturdy shell

One of the best harvesters in the game. The problem is that it is kinda useless on later turns. With phantasms and enchantments, it becomes slightly useful even then, but unless you run 3 enchantments and enchantresses to add to that, I don’t think I would advise running 3 shells. On 2 shells, I would want to be running 3 enchantments to make it worthwhile, otherwise you risk being left with a 0/5 that triggers opponent’s combat effects and doesn’t cost anything for your opponent to kill.

3x Battle Toads

Really efficient harvesters that work well with phantasm. Nothing much to say here. Quite often these are used to swarm opponent’s creatures so that they can’t move. A bit worse with slam now, but still extremely useful and strong card that I don’t see myself cutting in this deck.

2x Ancient Herald –

With 7 valid targets (+heralds themselves) this card is basically a 4 Faeria 5/6. Considering that other decks usually play big creatures, having herald to deal with them is a good option. This cards also allows you to kill opponent quite quickly if you get it near his face, though in different metagame this could be not as strong. I have found myself liking this card and could even see running 3 of these, but since you have to pay 6 upfront, you don’t necessarily want to run a full set of 3 heralds since having too much expensive stuff might mean you end up with hands that have expensive stuff and nothing to play on empty board. For this reason I ended up using 2.

2x Lore Thief

With no unbound evolution to evolve them, thieves are now much weaker and with libraries doing the drawing, the card is not really necessary, but the card is still good Mirror Phantasm target and a decent harvester early. If you are running Failed Experiments, these are kinda mandatory but otherwise I don’t think you want to run 3x of these anymore. I have been liking running them as a 2-of, to dig deeper for the singletons and cycling the deck, but could see myself cutting them for other stuff like prophet of tides.

3x Mirror Phantasm

2 is good amount, but with Lore Thieves, frogs and shells, you have enough targets to consider 3rd. Though even with all those targets you would normally still run 2, but the current meta is infested with green decks that run big guys so you want stuff that can deal with that. Frogify and to a lesser extent Humbling Vision can fit a similar role, but Mirror Phantasm has more synergy with your small stuff against other decks.

1x Aurora, Myth Maker

Not much to say here that hasn’t been said. Though it has to be noted that you actually have to be running small stuff for this to be good, so if you cut all lore thieves, sturdy shells and battletoads then suddenly the card is much worse than it is normally… Though as cutting battletoads is a mistake in most blue lists, you are pretty safe auto-including this.

1x Baeru, the First Wave

Kinda obvious inclusion. The only problem is that it is costing 8 faeria and you don’t always have that available, but it is still good strong enough to add and it randomly screws monogreen and multicolor decks over (and can help you with the reaver).

3x Forbidden Library

The card is really strong (and kinda broken) with new version of dream reaver that can heal, life loss is mitigated. Running these is kinda mandatory in blue lists and starting with them can win the games on it’s own. With all that said, you need to be careful about playing more than one out at a time as life loss can stack up really quickly. Against decks without burst damage playing 2 might be fine and if you are running more than one healing song in addition to reavers, then it would be slightly less risky to play 2 simultaneously. Though you have to remember that if you have one on the board, it means it is drawing you new cards constantly and that means you are likely winning, so drawing into extra copies won’t hurt you much. On the other hand if opponent kills your library you will be glad to have more of them to play.

3x Water Elemental

The card was always decent, but now that we have 6L Dream Reaver, it is mandatory to synergize with that. Probably the only card that could be called “necessary” for any dream reaver deck as a 3-of.

3x Dream reaver

The core card that the deck is built around. With enchantment this card can kill your opponent in one hit (I won’t say OTK, as that is reserved for another deck and since you actually have to wait a turn until you can hit). Normally you set your opponent to 10 and dash it in front of his face, though there are situations where you can’t do that. Sometimes you can’t get past taunts or the land placement is not good, so you would need land movement cards and other times you are below 10 health, so you want to heal yourself up, so you use first one on yourself and then next turn, when reaver can finally attack, try drawing into a second one to set his life total. It is notable that against red decks you want to play enchantment on reaver immediately after playing it, as otherwise your opponent might burn him down a bit (hence denying 10 damage). This is true for all colours, but more for red than for others.

Cards not in the deck and why they matter for monoblue decks:

Aurora’s Trick

Originally I was running 2 in this deck, but that was at the time the metagame was infested with rebel slingers and blood singers. I have since cut to one and now that green is everywhere and midred is popular enough, you don’t have enough targets for the card. It has good synergy with Frogify, enchantment, and humbling vision, but unless yellow and blue decks get more dominant, it’s unlikely to find room in the deck.

Forbidden Tower

This is still strong, but the goal of this deck is to hit with Dream Reaver, Shifting Tide fills that purpose better. For decks with blue colossus, tower would work better, though more than one is probably still too much.

Frogify

Without Unbound Evolution synergy this is starting to see more and more play as Mirror Phantasms became worse. Considering big guys in green and red, this is good card to have in the deck, though running 3 is generally too much. Finding room for one or 2 feels like good idea right now.

Wavecrash Clossus

5 faeria 7/7 slam is strong, the problem is getting there. Harvesting enemy well is not always easy. If you run colossi, you have to build around it with mobility effects like prophet, sunken tower, shifting tide and to lesser extent Triton chef and triton banquet (start with 3x prophet and add cards depending on your taste). The issue is that against aggressive decks you will still find it difficult to harvest enemy wells with that, at least to get colossi to manageable cost. For this reason I would avoid running him in metagame where you expect to see midred and yrush (against green rush it is a bit easier to pull off). Though if games go a bit longer, he becomes quite a strong card to use. It also has to be noted that card provides nice synergies with 7+ cost synergies so could a strong contender for them. With the new gabrian commander it is also easier to harvest the enemy wells.

Luduan

Basically same deckbuilding prerequisites as colossus and if it can live to harvest, it might get away with the game. The problem is that after recent nerf to the card making it 1/3 and with library released, the card is just not worth it right now. It might find room in some heavy mobility deck that runs enchantments, but the main reason to even try luduan is that you are afraid of lifeloss from library.

Gabrian Enchantress

The card is used when 3x Gabrian Enchantment is not enough. In decks with multiple sturdy shells, Wandering Monks and otherwise cards that need enchantments, this is a good addition for redundancy. As you can often use it to reduce opponent’s creatures card is rarely useless. It also has uses with Failed Experiment, so the card is definitely good enough to see play. It’s just that it has to built around, as it is a bit too expensive on it’s own. To put it in perspective, it’s like paying around 4 faeria for a 2/5 body with 1+ faeria effect attached (drawing card from enchantment is worth a bit less than 1f). It might seem decent on paper, until you start calculating how much above the curve other stuff is – 6f 6/10, 4f 5/6, 8f 8/10, and then there is phantasm and7f 5/5+5/5-1 3f for 2/5 is stat line is 1 stat more than faeria cost would allow it (2+5=7-> 3 faeria is worth 6 stat points)

Wandering Monk

With all the draw available this card is more interesting and has a lot of nice uses. There is also the synergy with enchantment and the lack of land requirements that make him good harvester early that quickly becomes a threat. There are 2 main problems with the card – it needs mobility (2 cards is not enough at least 4+) and time to grow. Against aggressive decks the latter might become a problem (though 5 health does mitigate the issue). Either way the card is really strong and should be considered whenever building blue decks. The reason I am not running it is that I feel that reaver is enough for killing opponent, and prefer stuff that is good by itself/immediately. I just don’t think I have that one turn to let him grow against aggressive decks. Though I won’t be too surprised if I will have to retract that statement in close future as I definitely haven’t played enough with the card and there are plenty of ways to build a deck with him… In fact I am starting to foresee Modgnik trying disciple OTK with these for additional win con…

Humbling Vision

Card left in obscurity, but with gigantic creatures from green and potential to synergize with creation, it could be interesting tech-choice… Though I would still prefer to run frogify.

Royal Judge

With the nerf to the banquet, this is the best option to get that protection. The issue is that even with all the utilit it’s still 5 faeria and with no way to utilize the small body (with UE gone), it’s not as useful anymore. There is still Phantasm synergy, so it’s not completely dead and it does provide good utility (and experiment also makes it more interesting). I would normally try to avoid it as it requires you to actually have big creatures on board (and people tend to try killing them fast or die to them), but the effect IS powerful, so the card is definitely a strong candidate. Especially for lists that have event synergies.

Aurora Creation

There are not enough targets in monoblue to justify running it. If splashing red for garudan or some other colours, it becomes an interesting card, but in monoblue it is generally left hanging in your hand. Again – this is a good card to remember, but not one you are likely to play.

Wavecrafter

After the last nerf the card is bad, but it should still be kept an eye on as the effect is unique. If the metagame goes towards slower Doomsday-stormspawn decks, it might become a good tech choice.

Ninja Toad

Interesting card to enable colossus. But otherwise it is a bit too expensive as it dies after attacking nearly always and harvesting doesn’t make up for the 4 cost and 3 lakes (MP transform also makes it lose the haste). To be fair now that you run reavers, it might be easier to cast, but there is also the issue that 3 damage is not necessary to kill most of the stuff.

Tale of the Old Turtle

Not sure why it’s here… Anyways, the card is playable mainly when you have a LOT of creatures and close to no events, but with forbidden library, I am not sure you would be willing to run this even then.

Tyranax

Ancient Herald lookalike. I could see it in a same deck with tale or otherwise “big blue guys” lists, but there is not much going on for the card. If meta shifts it could be good (for example against yellow) but against green guys it doesn’t do much and most of the time I would prefer to use snowstorm lancer in that same slot because of mobility and potentially higher attack.

King’s Guard, Queen’s Guard

In the metagame infested with yellow rush these become really good. 3/6 taunt is really difficult for that deck to get past and synergy with the ancient herald also helps. The problem is that they are poor against green deck, so I don’t think they should be in the deck until kodama+huntmaster is nerfed a bit. It also doesn’t help that slam (and dash to some extent) make normal taunt creatures more awkward. The choice between which to use is trivial one, but with all the libraries and lore thieves I currently don’t think you need any more draw, so queen’s guard seems like a more useful choice, though in a world without library I have found myself more often on the king’s side.

Court Jester

In a way this is recent tech choice. Buffing up your reaver means you don’t even need enchantment for it to hit 10. It can also harvest quite well, provide taunt and be a body for the Mirror Phantasm, and be a decent target for the Experiment. Overall the card is slightly costly but it has a lot of utility. The reason this is not in the deck is similar to the guards in that taunt feels kinda awkward with all the slamming going around and even with all the utility it’s only +2/+2 to the creature you may play later on, so you aren’t getting that much value from it.

Yak Attack

This is the standard “gotcha” card, as nobody ever expects the yaks. 3x hasty 2/2s is nice and can provide board presence, so the effect is good, but the issue is that you are normally harvesting from approximately 2 wells anyway, and it is hard to get the “discount” from haste for more than 2f. The problem with the cuteness of the yaks is that this cuteness comes as a set with squishiness and it is really hard to make them stay alive. The best use of yak attack is when you are behind and harvest 3x wells, but for the most part those cases include losing the game already as it means you have no board presence. Overall I feel that the card just slightly not strong enough for this deck, but because it is so rarely seen, the surprise factor gives it just enough value to make it worth consideration. In 7+ blue lists and event lists there is enough synergy with the card, so if I wanted to play the yaks, I would focus on them.

Triton Chef/Triton Banquet

These are also good options for mobility that are better in the late game than prophet and tides. The issue with them is that banquet is over costed. In case you seriously need that extra mobility in the form of jump, these become decent options (or when you need more event synergies disciple), but other than that I would recommend staying away and using more efficient options.

Snowstorm Lancer, Aurora disciple, Spellwhirl

Event focused blue lists have been on the decline with the reaver. Lancer us could probably see play, but if overall they aren’t good enough for this deck. Because of reaver, the event focused lists have been on the decline, but they are largely unexplored so between new (nerfed) triton banquet (and by extension chef), failed Experiment and forbidden library there is a lot of unexplored potential in that archetype.

Gabrian Warden, Gabrian archon, Gabrian commander, Spring Mochi

These cards are for 7+ cost archetype and generally not worth it anymore in decks with dream reaver as they don’t want to be playing enough expensive cards. Still with buff to the commander the deck should have multiple interesting variations.

Windfall

This is separated from other 7+ cards as with library you can find yourself with 10 faeria and could be casting the card. Still – it is not reliable enough and I would advise against running it normally, but there is potential with libraries and thieves to convert the card advantage into faeria advantage.

General Mulliganing Guide:

Mulliganing is not that hard. Of course there is some specific stuff in case you know opponent (library becomes much less exciting if you know you are playing against rush), but here is what you want to have in hand and what to mulligan away (at least in my opinion).

First of all you need something to play by turn 2 and that would preferably be something that can harvest, though library is so strong that even if you don’t you still don’t want to mulligan it away. So you need to have at least one of these, otherwise you need to mulligan all 3 cards:

Forbidden Library, Water Elemental, Sturdy Shell, Battle Toads, Ancient Herald, Lore Thief and lastly Prophet of Tides (you want to mulligan him if you have any of the aforementioned cards as you don’t really want trick in first turns and rather have something else).

These were sorted approximately in order of importance. If you count the total number of copies, you will notice that they will cover 15/30 cards. In other words half of cards in your deck are good in opening hand, so you can be pretty certain that you will nearly always have something relevant to play early.

Now if you already have one of the aforementioned cards, there is some simple stuff to keep in mind concerning the hand composition:

You want to keep Mirror Phantasm and Aurora if you have something to use them on: toads, shell, lore thief, water elemental and to a lesser extent Prophet. If you don’t have any of those, Mirror Phantasm and aurora have to go.

Even with how good the forbidden library is, you still want creatures to do stuff, so you never keep more than one in the opening hand and mulligan everything that is not part of the aforementioned list.

Never keep healing song, reaver, experiment or Gabrian enchantment. Falcon dive and shifting tide are decent enough that you can keep them if other 2 cards are on the list (otherwise you want to dig for something better). Same for Baeru – you want to keep him if you have something that will reliably harvest, but it would be awkward to keep him alongside herald or mirror phantasm, as your hand will be too expensive in that case

Tips for playing the deck:

Forbidden library gives a ton of faeria and pulls games on it’s own. Usually it is worth protecting, though against rushes you need to be careful with them. When racing don’t forget to account for life loss from them. Be careful with multiples. They will put you on a fast clock and against decks with burn that is not a good idea.

Try to play libraries on prairies if you can, as battloads take up a lot of lakes, and you might find yourself without a lake to plla a creature sometimes. It is also recommended to play libraries as away from combat as possible. Sometimes I find myself playing explore/lake on right/left of my orb simply to place library there as it is farthest place from enemy creatures.

As usual it is nearly always correct to play Mirror Phantasm on your own guys, but quite often slam creatures are so dangerous that it is correct to preemptively transform them. Board control wins games, so don’t be shy to use them even if you do get bad value (MP->Water elemental to kill Earth Elemental) as long as you deny opponent board presence and harvesting.

The deck needs 6 lakes to play reaver, so you need to plan your land placement around that. Most often you will play lake in front and go along one side (like midred). But you need to remember that you have Water Elementals and that you generally have time until you need those 6 lakes. Usually, I have found out that in the early game you have time to do double prairie on one of the turns to get a profitable trade or to get that one extra faeria from harvesting.

The only exception when I don’t play lake in front is either when I am starting with battletoads (when you have explore you still want to lake in front) or with sturdy shell. In former case you will play lake on both sides->toads->2x prairie to double harvest. In latter case you want lake to the side for sturdy shell and then lake in front and to other side for whatever else you play.

Remember that baeru gives you lakes if he survives, so with you can create multiple prairies around it to quickly ramp your lakes.

Against fast decks you want to swarm your small guys in defense to prevent your opponent’s creatures from getting to you, so that you get time for creating lakes. Reaver kills in one turn and that is really hard to race.

Mobility is there for reaver to get through, but don’t be shy from using it early. All of the utility cards are meant to give you value. Even without all of them, reaver still kills in 2 turns.

Board control is the gameplan. You have reaver to kill him quickly, but you don’t want to be focusing on it too much. If you can do it, then do it, but otherwise you play this as any midrange deck trying to keep board control.

With reaver you can sometimes get free wins if you go opposite side of opponent and to face. Though this requires you to draw 1-2 water elementals.

Well, that’s it. Quite a wall of text here. I hope you enjoyed reading it and found it useful. I will be glad to hear people’s opinions and comments for this. At least the good ones. The bad ones I won’t enjoy, but they will be useful to hear, so critique is also welcome.