BP11: Wasteland Sword

This article is made in conjunction with JC Card Shoppe, and you can find their corresponding video here!

Introduction

Being the newest deck to be introduced to Swordcraft, Wasteland Sword is an extremely versatile deck that tends to lean towards an aggressive midrange style of gameplay. It gets to use the Mount tokens such as to help dodge certain Defense thresholds while using , , and to push more damage.

Additionally, and both add an unprecedented amount of consistency to the deck, with being able to tutor any Wasteland follower, and being able to tutor any 1-cost Swordcraft card.

Mulligan

One form of skill expression that Wasteland Swordcraft has is its mulligan, with the mulligan being extremely matchup dependent. Despite that, there are a few rough guidelines that the deck has that are matchup agnostic. Your general highest priority is finding early curve then setting up 's token, .

• : Keep
• : Keep
• : Keep
• : Keep
• : Toss
• : Keep
• : Keep going first.
• : Keep with early curve (going second with a 1 drop, going first with a 1+2)
• : Toss
• : Toss
• : Keep with a 1 drop
• : Toss
• : Keep
• : Keep, ideally with an early curve
• : Toss

General Gameplay

As most midrange decks are, Wasteland Sword defines its gameplan around the deck it's playing against, while leaning towards trying to draw resources from your opponent significantly in the early game in order to free up space to push damage with and .

You ideally want to be filling out your curve from turn 1 forward, then setting up very quickly and consistently dealing 3 damage a turn while drawing a card.

Matchups

Kagero variants and Earth Rite are the two toughest matchups for the deck, usually requiring you to respond to threats that are higher statted than the other decks. On the other hand, the mirror is a very back and forth matchup that usually resolves itself around turn 7. Finally, Dimension Shift and Spartacus both require you to play as aggressively as you can, hoping to end the game before your opponent's OTKs.

Kagero Vanguard and Kagero Dragon

Kagero variants tend to be harder for this deck simply due to the fact that their cards provide a lot of tempo, namely being able to clear three followers, summoning an extra body on its evolve turn, and having Storm, Ward, and being able to clear the board.

Matchup Specific Mulligan

• Gaining initial tempo is important, so your early curve is essential. Additionally, gains a small amount of value as the thresholds that Kagero presents tends to be out of the deck's traditional range.
• You can also attempt to snowball with an early board, ideally with into having it buffed by any of your Mount tokens.

Earth Rite

With the introduction of , Earth Rite becomes a very swingy matchup. has already been one of the deck's strongest cards, and being able to give him, or any other followers on the board Drain means that needing to clear things becomes increasingly more important.

Matchup Specific Mulligan

• becomes increasingly more important, as removing is already a difficult task for the deck.

Mirror

In the mirror, establishing an early board is extremely important. Mulligan wise, treat this as if it was the Kagero matchup.

Dimension Shift and Spartacus

These matchups are the only ones where you attempt to keep pushing damage. and both serve as ways to convert your board lead into damage, and is primarily used to keep your handsize up.

Matchup specific Mulligan

• becomes keepable with an early curve, ideally evolving her on turn 2 going second if you have on turn 1.
• becomes harder to keep, given that he doesn't gain very much tempo. At this point, mulliganing him for a card that potentially pushes damage would be more helpful.
• becomes keepable with a Neutral Mount generator such as .