The deck
This is a midrange dice-rolling deck that aims to line up multiple rolls for mid-game tempo turns with cards like Kadigiran Mage-Dancer (F). To close out the game, it attempts to go All In! (C) on either an anchored character or an already large character to make an expedition difficult to contest.
Martengale (R) feels like the most important card in the deck. Preventing the failure case of Nevenka & Blotch’s hero ability enables you to use it on turns you otherwise wouldn’t be able to. It’s great as an unsuspecting All In! target.
I tested going up to 3 copies of Lyra Thespian (C) because Ouroboros Trickster (C) is the deck’s cheapest dice-roller, so you’ll almost always keep one if you see it.
The Ouroboros, Lyra Bastion strikes me as far too expensive to be worthwhile, though I haven’t played with it outside of the starter deck. Spending a turn to not affect the board will often lose you two expeditions. You can pay 1 mana less for the rare, but it’s hard to justify rare slots on a card you’re only happy to see in the early-game.
I cut Paint Prison (C)s at the last minute, worrying they might be too situational, especially considering that spending cards from reserve is a real cost in this deck.
Uniques
Lyra Navigator (U-3254): 6/7
2 boosts per die roll is huge. It’s solidly above rate after a single use of Nevenka’s hero ability, and any dice rolls after that make this absurd. You can take advantage of its hand cost of 3 with support abilities like The Hatter (C)’s.
Lyra Navigator (U-4260): 4/7
A 6 or 7 water stat on a 3-drop is devastating in a water region, even ignoring dice-rolling synergies.
Kadigiran Mage-Dancer: 5/7
It’s super cool that the built-in die roll makes this one give fleeting immediately when played from hand. Landing the high-roll on an Aloe Vera (F) or a character that scales with dice rolls is a huge deal. The main point against it is that it replaces a Mage-Dancer (F), which is especially rough given the limited card pool.
The games
Round 1 (2-1): Basira & Kaizaimon boosts
I kept an excellent hand of Martengale (R), Kadigiran Mage-Dancer (F), and The Sandman (R). The 1-drop into 2-drop let me apply the Nevenka boost in the expedition that I needed to go 2-0. We traded on the second day as they got a second boosted Bravos Bladedancer (C) into reserve.
On T3, I was preparing for them to play out one of their two Bladedancers from reserve. Fearing a Helping Hand, I put The Sandman (R) into reserve to hold onto a Cloth Cocoon (C) and a 2-drop Lyra Thespian (C). To my surprise, they played a Chiron (C) and a Sun Wukong (R) from hand, leaving me with my Cloth Cocoon stranded in hand and no way to spend 3 mana. They had to discard down to a Bladedancer and Sun Wukong in reserve but didn’t care about card disadvantage thanks to the infinite Sun Wukong.
This was the moment that I realized cutting my Paint Prison (C)s was a mistake, as the only cards I had to deal with Sun Wukong (R) once in play were a 1-of A Cappella Training (C) or my 2-of Tanukis. From this day onwards, I would continue to lose at least one expedition to Sun Wukong plus a Basira boost.
Tied at 2 regions away from victory, they played on both sides while I kept an Asmodeus (R) and an All In (C). I was behind by enough that I specifically needed a giant anchored Asmodeus to trade on one day, which would free me up to dedicate my resources to the other expedition on the next. I rolled for Asmodeus: anchored. They dropped Sun Wukong (R) to contest and boosted it. I went All In! and rolled… a 1, not even close. My opponent took both expeditions for the G1 victory.
G2 saw a more awkward start for me and my opponent, so we traded in the early-game. I groaned when they played out their Sun Wukong (R), but a top-decked Tanuki (R) saved the day on the following turn as the first player.
Aloe Vera (F) looked pretty good in the mid-game when I found a day where I could anchor it without losing much tempo.
We were neck-and-neck, looking to trade on the penultimate day, but a lucky anchor on Asmodeus (R) when I didn’t need the stats left me with a huge advantage on board. My resource advantage let me win both sides to close out the game.
In G3, another 1-drop + 2-drop start put me at a 2-1 lead. My opponent advanced into a water-only region right off the bat, which was incredibly lucky for me, as I saw both of my Lyra Navigator uniques. When they played to that side, I shut it down with the die-roll-on-enter Lyra Navigator (U-4260). The following turn, I returned the Navigator to hand with Hathor (C)’s support ability to play it out again. They sabotaged it as soon as they could, but I had the Aloe Vera (F) to anchor and continue to block them on water.
Sometimes I advanced on the other side, sometimes I didn’t, but for the entire game, I ensured that my opponent couldn’t move out of the water-only region.
When my hero and companion were adjacent, I low-rolled on an Asmodeus (R) to guarantee one side’s progress for the win.
Round 2 (0-2): Afanas & Senka control
I got off to a slight lead in the early-game. My opponent drew cards with Baba Yaga (R) while I set up for a dice-rolling turn with a Martengale (R) and Ouroboros Trickster (C) in reserve.
With two Kadigiran Mage-Dancer (F)s in hand, I was prepared to drop them both on T3 with the reserve Trickster for two die rolls. Brutally, my opponent hit my Trickster with a Spy Craft (C), so I pivoted to drop an anchored Aloe Vera (F).
My opponent played to the same expedition with the Baba Yaga (R) from reserve, putting them up 3 to my 2 on forest in a region where it mattered to them. I considered for a second, then targeted the Aloe Vera (F) with Nevenka’s hero ability for a 2/3 chance to block. This ended up being a disaster: I rolled a 1. They had a play on the other side, so the die roll took me from going 1-2 with an anchored 2/2/4 and incoming resupply to going 0-2. I’m still not certain the gamble was wrong, but I didn’t really stop to think whether letting them have that single advancement would have won them the game, because rolling a 1 certainly lost it for me.
Now slightly ahead on expeditions, they had no trouble playing a control game, deploying two Baku (C)s in a row to pick off my Kadigiran Mage-Dancer (F)s. When I tried to land a large Asmodeus (R), they had no trouble deploying a Banishing Gate (C) for the win.
We both got off to a pretty fast start in G2. On one turn, a particularly good Beauty Sleep (C) let them win an expedition that I thought I had locked down. Losing that expedition the next day didn’t look so bad for them, since they just played to the other side.
There was a critical turn where I had a Martengale (R) on board and could use my hero ability to either go 2-1 or 1-0 on the day. I opted to go 2-1, fearing that my midrange deck would struggle against late-game Afanas with tons of mana.
Nearing the end of the game, we were tied at 2 advances away each. I had set up a nice turn consisting of dropping a Martengale (R) with an All In! that I could cast two times, either on the Martengale or the previously anchored character on the opposite side.
They led with a Spy Craft (C). The sabotage hit a character that wasn’t part of my plans for the current turn, and their resupply was a Small Step, Giant Leap (C). I wasn’t too worried since I felt pretty confident I could win both sides that turn, barring extremely unlucky dice rolls.
What I wasn’t counting on was a second Beauty Sleep (C) from hand. Suddenly my quintuple-boosted Martengale (R) lost to a seemingly irrelevant character, and I didn’t have any other characters I could play. They took one side and would be able to cast Small Step, Giant Leap as the starting player next turn before I could even draw for a way to sabotage it.
Round 3 (bye)
This was a small event with an odd number of players, so I drew the bye for the final round.
Takeaways
I came away after the games feeling like the card pool doesn’t have enough payoffs for dice-rolling or cheap cards that roll dice.
As a consequence, dice-rolling abilities on unique characters that normally don’t have them are at premium, even more so than for the average deck.
A fair midrange deck like this one needs some way to deal with things that can’t be hit by Cloth Cocoon (C). For Lyra in particular, it’s important to consider cards like Athena, Hua Mulan, and Sun Wukong that can lose fleeting. Cutting Paint Prison (C) without replacing it with another form of interaction felt wrong.
While Beauty Sleep and Small Step, Giant Leap are more situational than I’m comfortable with, they work very well in combination. Beauty Sleep promises a large swing today but puts you in debt; Small Step, Giant Leap ensures that debt never comes due.
Overperformers
- Aloe Vera (F): This carries boosts as well as Coniferal Coneman (F) or an anchored Asmodeus but boasts a flexible cost and a resupply.
- Studious Disciple (F): It felt great when this enabled an anchored Asmodeus (R) plus All In! (C) turn on 7 mana. Martengale (C) could have done the same, but it’s so critical in the expedition zone that it never stayed in my reserve for long.
- Martengale (R): As good as advertised.
Underperformers
- Kadigiran Mage-Dancer (F): It’s not that this card isn’t strong, but it didn’t feel quite strong enough to build a dice-rolling deck around. Though a 1-mana 3/3/3 at best, it was more often a 2-mana 2/2/2.
- Asmodeus (R): This did feel strong when it dodged removal, but I’m not certain it earned its rare slot. It was compelling for its dice-rolling synergies, but its high cost made it hard to play alongside dice-rolling payoffs. If I keep the rare, it’s so that I can more easily dump an All In! on it when it gains anchored.
- Coniferal Coneman (F): Probably not worth the rare slot if it’s not getting boosted, and there were too many situations were I wasn’t willing to gamble with Nevenka’s hero ability.