We recorded this pod on Christmas Day, our present to you. We had a deck that had some strong combo elements, one sneaky towel, a secret agent and an someone who built flying saucers. Our usual spread of wins appeared again tonight, with one deck undefeated, one deck winless and the other two in-between. Another key point, Sanctum cards seemed to be a common thread among decks that won tonight, so expect to see those highlighted.

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Deck lists:
Square “Prowl Towel” Shabava
Agent Rasmussen
The Shiny Saucersmith of Tarszas
Stonemason Radia

Match results

Game 1 – Prowl Towel vs Rasmussen

One Sentence Summay: Prowl Towel filled the board with Sanctum creatures that Rasmussen could only ever answer in a temporary fashion.

Card of the Match: Staunch Knight
Both sides played this sturdy lad, and this game demonstrated how much resilience two armor and 6 power gives. Staunch Knight’s downside is that he asks you to play around his ability, but that has never seemed to be difficult. Staunch Knight always costs a disproportionate amount of resources to remove in combat and threatens to kill so many creatures.

Notable Event: A Lost in the Woods managed to get rid of some of the large Sanctum creatures that were holding aember hostage, but they eventually came back. Rasmussen’s creatures were outclassed most of the game, and there was never an opportunity to try to set up Epic Quest.

Winner: Prowl Towel
3 Keys to 2

Game 2 – Saucersmith vs Radia

OSS: Radia first shot creatures with bullets, and then shot them with healing waves of energy.

COTM: Cleansing Wave
There’s a strong chance this is the best card in Radia’s deck, and that is in part thanks to Autocannon. Cleansing Wave has been good in other games, but when paired with Autocannon, things start to get silly.

NE: An Uxlyx the Zookeeper captured a Champion Tabris who had been terrorizing the board since the first turn. That Champion had captured three aember, and as long as she stayed on the board, Saucersmith was not going to forge a key.

Winner: Radia
3 Keys to 1

Game 3 – Prowl Towel vs Saucersmith

OSS: Prowl Towel and Saucersmith lined up creatures, and Prowl Towel’s were much better.

COTM: Commander Remiel
Yep. So far each card of the match is a Sanctum card. In this game, Remiel picked up a Shoulder Armor and essentially could never be answered. He then proceeded generate value for the whole game. Remiel allowed Towel to generate aember while still fighting for control of the board.

NE: An early Control the Weak from Prowl Towel essentially forced Saucersmith to skip a turn. Events like this can shift the momentum in a game, and Prowl Towel won the game the turn before Saucersmith could reap with a board full of Martians and Crystal Hive.

Winner: Prowl Towel
3 Keys to 2

Game 4 – Rasmussen vs Radia

OSS: Rasmussen came very close to beating Radia at her own game.

COTM: Hysteria
How’d this get here? This isn’t a Sanctum card. Hysteria reset the board when it got complicated later on, and allowed Shooler to steal an additional aember and Drumble stopped a key from being forged. Hysteria isn’t good for every board state, but there are times where it is better than Gateway to Dis with the added bonus you don’t get chains.

NE: Agent Rasmussen was able to use Radia’s game plan of playing Cleansing Wave against the deck for a massive aember gain early, but spent a lot of the game locked out by Drumble.

Winner: Radia
3 Keys to 2

Game 5 – Prowl Towel vs Radia

OSS: Radia generated roughly twelve aember in one turn, but that wasn’t quite enough to beat Prowl Towel.

COTM: Champion Tabris
Sanctum retakes its place on the Card of the Match list. The Honorable Mention goes to Shoulder Armor, as the two combined for a nearly unstoppable creature. This creature just seems unfair when it is killing a creature and taking aember from an opponent.

NE: Prowl Towel played two Arise! during the game, both times getting back two Tocsins. Those Tocsins were never allowed to activate.

Winner: Prowl Towel
3 Keys to 2

Game 6 – Rasmussen vs Saucersmith

OSS: Rasmussen got lost in the fog on the way to this game.

COTM: Fogbank
This card set up a brutal series of turns, from which there was no recovery for Rasmussen. Fogbank protected a Hunting Witch and Witch of the Eye, two creatures that must be killed. This game spiraled out of control quickly after this point.

NE: The noted Fogbank turn was the pivotal point. Its possible that the correct play for Rasmussen on the following turn was to use Witch of the Eye and play nothing else since Lord Golgotha and Inspiration where in the hand. There is a chance that Saucersmith could just set up Fogbank and Witch of the Eye in perpetuity after that though and a Deep Probe could have hit Golgotha, so this line might have been moot.

Winner: Saucersmith
3 Keys to 1

Final Results

Square “Prowl Towel” Shabava – *Advancing*
We couldn’t see this Towel coming. The Sanctum in this deck worked overtime, and has proven to be quite adept at controlling the board. This deck did not blow anyone out, so there is an argument that this deck lets opponents hang around for too long to be truly great, but the record speaks for itself. Two Arise! is nothing to scoff at, and the Shadows cards are serve their purpose. Control the Weak is very good in this deck, and Lash of Broken Dreams and Miasma will stop an opponent from running away with a game. Prowl Towel demonstrates the power of consistency over explosive inconsistency.

Stonemason Radia – *Advancing*
The secret for this deck is the Autocannon, since the three Cleansing Waves make for big gains. Opponents’ Cleansing Waves can be bad news, as seen in this decks second game, but the Dis gives this deck a lot of outs versus large aember gain. The Brobnar in this deck is pretty good on its own, and fighting with your creatures in this deck also sets up Cleansing Waves. Pandemonium seems like a non-starter, until you realize the Sanctum creatures have armor. Hysteria works overtime with a lot of the creatures in the deck. This deck was barely edged out of going undefeated, so consistency is probably an issue. Decks prepared for the Autocannon will also fair a lot better than ones without it, but Radia can win a fair game on the back of its strong board presence and aember control.

The Shiny Saucersmith of Tarszas – *Eliminated*
This saucy smith played one incredible game, and was crushed in all the rest. This deck would perform so much better with some taunt creatures, since there are a lot of small and problematic creatures that need hide from harm. The two Veylan Analysts are disappointing in this deck, since there are only two Martian artifacts. The best case for these would be to Phase Shift out an artifact when you play them, and then activate it on the following turn. The Library Access was never played during these three games, and that could just be bad luck, but it would be difficult to say that it would be enough to win a game by itself. This deck has no aember control beyond a single Yxli Marauder, and so the opponent can just step on the gas and not be punished. This deck probably ended up where it deserved, but it can accomplish some pretty absurd things when left to its own devices.

Agent Rasmussen – *Relegated to WotW*
This deck could take some subterfuge lessons from the linen. For a deck with Epic Quest and Key Charge, it struggled to actually forge keys in a lot of these games. In this deck, Warsong is card with a low basement and a low ceiling and this deck is cursed with two of them. The Brobnar tries really hard in this deck to help, and is probably the least disappointing third. Lord Golgotha will always be a sweet card to target with Inspiration or Anger. Cooperative Hunting and Save the Pack always seem like a better combination in theory than in practice. There is a little bit of aember disruption here, but most of it requires creatures to fight or reap, which the opponent might be able to play around. A disappointing performance, but one that could have been predicted.

Known Errors: Static abilities like Autocannon are forgotten all the time. Nathan also has a bad habit of forgetting to gain aember when he reaps with Protectrix. Justin missed some aember from his Hunting Witch, but that was a game that was well in hand.

Meta Info: Everything was split down the middle on this pod. Here are the current totals:

Nathan – 52 Wins
Justin – 50 Wins

First – 48 Wins
Second – 54 Wins