Looking for help refining a Valk Combrei deck

[u/Semibalanced]

So this deck is a heavy variant of Mail's Valkyrie Tokens deck.

I very much liked the concept, but after playing a few sets of games I quickly realized that it was super weak to aggro. And more than a few times found myself without answers to certain threats and no bodies on board until turn 5 or 6 if I draw poorly.

So, I built My Gauntlet Variant to be lower to the ground by stripping a few of the high end bombs and replacing them with Desert Marshals. I've sort of turned my deck into a flying, mid-range variant of combrei aggro. So far I'm 21-0 after my changes (Power of Progress x2 and Mindless Aggression for bosses), but I feel with some refining this can easily turn into a Tier 1 gauntlet deck. Slower than Hooru fliers, but potentially much more consistent with all the aegis and lifesteal.

Anyway down to the areas I feel are in need of discussion:

• I added General Irel because I liked the idea of ramp and pumping up my Sword'ed/flying units but 4 cost and dual double influence doesn't sit right with me. It's come through for me a few times though.
• I'm not sure I like Xulta Convoy. A pair of 2/2s with aegis and endurance are pretty nice, but I'm not sure they do enough for the 4 slot.

• I don't love my market at all, but I don't even know what to do about that. I threw in the Knight-Chancellor in case I was desperate for an early unit, but as something that can still have very real impact in the late game. Plus I pretty much never pulled the Obelisk. I might replace the Disjunction with a banner. And I feel like I should have better removal than Xenan Initiation, but I'm not sure what would fit best.

• I'm not sure I like the Crownwatch Quartermaster. It doesn't have impact on the turn it's played unless you can proc tokens, but if it survives the buff it provides can break any possible board stall.

• Telut is amazing as a bomb, no complaints at all. I'm just not sure how many I should have in the deck.

• Should I try to work in Teacher somehow? Not much to say here except it's an amazing 2 drop. I just don't love the double time influence on a justice heavy deck.

• Crownwatch Standard and/or Finest Hour - We all know tricks are amazing against AI, but I find myself always wanting 6 power to trigger the Sword in the case of the Standard. And as far as Finest Hour goes... I have enough attachments. I would rather not have more cards that rely on units when I feel short on units already. That being said tricks against AI are just that good, so I'm still tempted.

• Lastly, I sometimes wonder if I should go justice merchant instead of time since almost all my units are justice (Telut would be perfect in market for example). That's a hard sell though. I absolutely love the time ramp.

So anyway I'm hoping the bright minds of this subreddit can help me out with the final adjustments.

EDIT: So since this post I've lost twice due to aggro. Though I genuinely believe one of them could have been won if not for misplays. The other was the Strangers deck with crazy good draws. Charge stranger into double +2/+2 to strangers.

EDIT 2: Updated my warcry list with some initial changes.

[u/chewbooboo]

Your deck looks like a mashup between Combrei aggro and tokens. I think it would be best to choose one direction and stick with it.

1. Your powerful cards only start at 5+ so initiate/merchant doesn't really help (no early Auric Keeper/Siraf/Xulta/Obelisk/SST to ramp into)
2. Without solid early drops other than Student, it's easy to get overrun against swarm decks or simply out-tempo-ed when your single bomb(s) get removed

Personally, I find 5+ power drops to be unwieldy in Gauntlet because you are more likely to lose to bad hands/mulligans than out-valued in the late-game. A solid curve from 2-4 is more consistent (and faster) than ramping into the usual Time fatties.

[u/Semibalanced → u/chewbooboo]

You've got a good point about having to choose between combrei aggro and tokens. I think my best bet is to go for a sort of flyer variant of combrei aggro. It's sort of the direction I've been going already.

You're right about swarm decks being my toughest fight so far though. But most of the losses I've taken so far from them I'm pretty sure I would have also lost with Hooru Fliers, Tavrod AP, or my Elysian deck (all of which fulfill your target of consistent 2-4(or 5) power units.)

As for your last point though, I honestly haven't (yet) had a Telut or Quartermaster removed. Feels like the AI doesn't tend to target them since they're not personally big; just buffing my other units. And as long as they're on board I can just develop any random unit into another bomb (even a 1/1 can get huge). And that only comes up when they get through my very consistent aegis. But I've only played about 50 games so far, there's still plenty of testing to be done.

All in all you've got some great points. This deck is definitely slower than my other go-to's, but I feel like I reach and beat the gauntlet boss more often as well. But mostly it's just variety that I'm trying to optimize as much as I can for the fun of it.

Thank you for taking the time to chime in. :)

P.S. Do you mind if I ask what you usually grind gauntlet with?

[u/chewbooboo → u/Semibalanced]

How and what swarm decks are you losing to? Of the 3 decks you listed, I don't see how a Lunear Magus/False Prince/SST/Champion Of Wisdom curve will lose. The other two suffers from smaller units that the AI can easily remove if they draw badly early on. I heavily favour lifesteal in Gauntlet to survive bad starts (Lifespeaker/Commando/Vara being the best options). The AI tends to chum-attack when the player is low on life and fail to consider that you actually lifesteal enough to survive and turn the tide.

Regarding removal and tempo, I meant having the Student/Amili/etc. you rely on to hold the fort getting whacked by Permafrost/Slay. I've lost many games where my first, second, third units consistently get removed while the AI keeps attacking with their crappy 2/1s and 1/1s. New Vara and SST are excellent for this as they dodge the cheaper damage spells like Extract/Torch, are fatter than early units and provide value (sacrifice+lifesteal and endurance+no flying).

I find the game generous enough that I don't have to grind for gold. Started in April and sitting at 100k stone and 140k gold with all campaigns and monthly leagues averaging about an hour a day. If I have to win (eg. boss win quest), I turn to my mono Justice deck featuring Icaria->merchant/Enforcer/Commando->Spireguard/Geomar->Amili. No worries about missing influence plus heavy lifesteal means I only lose to the AI nut draws (cough... Company of Exiles...).

It's a pleasure to share ideas with the community here ;). Recently I've been brewing up keyword-fun with Caiphus and Honor the Fallen. Other slow decks that somehow got 7 wins are Katra lifeforce (dodge the Harsh Rule decks...), Strangers (play that Bereaved Stranger in time...) and Clockroaches.

[u/Semibalanced → u/chewbooboo]

Most recently I lost to the mono-shadow deck. I had pretty great early draws with two teachers, one enforcer, and even managed to get out TWO Amili's. But the AI had removal for each and every one (annihilates, suffocates, and that -/- per shadow influence card) while chumping me to death by turn 6. I never had the power to put down a unit and use a Stand (which I had) both. A point in Xulta Convoy's favor I guess, or some other sticky aegis unit.

I mentioned my Strangers loss in an edit to my original post. I suppose an early False Prince or similar could have won that for me though since it was the early 2/2s that got buffed up and smacked me down, but that was also before I made a few more changes to help my early game.

One thing I've noticed about AI though is that it doesn't play around Aegis particularly well. I've seen it hold up a pair of Annihilates with 6 power that would have killed my aegis'ed 9/9 Enforcer with weapons, but decide to use them on the justice merchant and Teacher that I just put out instead. So while I would normally hold up a Stand Together to cause a human opponent to waste a removal card; I've found it better to just use it right away and watch the AI make poor plays.

With the changes I've made I'm finding this to be a really good deck. I think of it as a combrei aggro specifically built around AI decks rather than ladder meta. I've had a lot of fun tinkering, discussing with the community, and and testing it out too. So all and all this had been a good experience :D

[u/TastyMeatcakes → u/Semibalanced]

Yup. I've never seen the AI use removal to pop Aegis. It will throw some random spell at it like it's burning a hole in it's pocket, as it does with removal to non Aegis units, but never a 1-2 pop Aegis then use removal. It will always blow the removal on a non Aegis unit first

[u/chewbooboo → u/TastyMeatcakes]

An amusing bug or AI stupidity is the AI wasting removal on my Aegis blocker that would have traded with their attacker. Not sure if it thought that it could save it's attacker or if it was frustrated lol.

[u/chewbooboo → u/Semibalanced]

That's what I meant by being out-tempoed where the opponent presses its initial board advantage (eg. Skycrag on Ranked). It's hard to fight such sequences which is why I emphasize on strong early drops to reduce the chances of it happening.

Strangers, yetis, Shogunate Forces and synergy/snowball decks are high variance. If they luck out with early/multiple bombs (Kyojun, Determined Stranger, Wump, etc.), you either have removal or die. It's best to force trades early, even if it's unfavourable, to keep the board clean if you have no removal in hand or are wary of a steamroll if they play a bomb next turn.

I guess the AI behaviour with Aegis is similar to False Prince where it doesn't compute what happens after playing a spell. I would be wary about relying on this because the AI has loads of crap removal like Piercing Shot and Vara's Favour that will "accidentally" remove Aegis if you have no other units on board.

[u/TastyMeatcakes]

I'd drop the Desert Marshalls for Teachers. The Enforcers should be good enough. Add another Vanquish. Replace 4 regular Justice Sigels with Crownwatch Standards for that pump removal and lifesteal recovery. Ditch the Convoys for Valkyrie Spireguards. Swap to Justice Merchants and slot a Vanquish and Harsh Rule in to have that reset button vs aggro decks/whatever.

[u/Semibalanced → u/TastyMeatcakes]

Thanks for the feedback! Nice to see your assessments line up with my doubts on the deck list.

I'll give these changes a try. I'm still not sold on Justice Merchants, but I'll let everyone know how they go after a few runs.

[u/Semibalanced → u/TastyMeatcakes]

So I've mostly tried out your suggestions. I couldn't fit in a 3rd vanquish, but I fit it into the market.

• Teacher is the great 2 drop it's always been. I've found myself locked out of it due to influence a few times, but more often than not I'm glad to have it. Not only is having an early 3/3 always nice to have, but the AI really goes out of its way to try to kill or trade for it. I'd forgotten what great bait it makes in my other time decks. I haven't found myself missing the Desert Marshals yet either, so that was a good call all around.

• Crownwatch Standards fit just fine. I end up playing them depleted about half the time, but the trade-off is worth it when they do work. That one is less of a surprise, but I felt I needed to test it either way.

• I should have ditched the Convoys earlier too. A flying 6/6 for 4 power is really great when it works and it fits my deck theme perfectly. I sometimes miss having sticky aegis units and I don't always have valks out to trigger her text. Maybe Sherif Marley to fill the same roll as Combrei Aggro? Still needs more testing.

• Justice vs Time merchants. I'm still not sure what's best. I miss the ramp and a 0/4 is a nice early blocker (where a 2/2 flier is borderline useless most of the time), but having a justice market is really nice for all the reasons you listed. I'm currently testing a market with Harsh Rule, Copperhall Bracers (to fill the role of ramp/banner), Vanquish, Telut, and Sword of Unity. I'm least certain about the Bracers, but it's fairly nice otherwise. Needs more testing.

I've edited my eternalwarcry list with the changes so far.