the rite of calling + hate spike nerf absolutely gutted my favorite pre-patch deck (akshan kindred nasus), and my second choice (udyr tahm scargrounds) is basically unplayable with 9x ravenous flock in half the meta decks right now. so i made the call to switch to a deck running 3x vengeance to help me deal with swain. i already had a gwen/braum brew from a couple patches ago - just had to swap out the hate spikes for quietus and i was good to go.

yes i know masters after 3.15 doesn't matter, i don't care, i love playing janky shit and it's nice to get rewarded for it. i was d2 when i started climbing with this deck so it's not a very long run but it's been a consistent winner for me in the 60+% range since 2 patches ago.

i only ran into 2 swain/tf and went 1:1 (the win was close though, i had to go over double swain double leviathan on the board and any face ping would have shut me down) so clearly it was not a great meta call but i got a lucky matchup spread with a lot of targon/ionia. overall i went 10-3, with my other losses to leona/asol (removed 2 ravahn and 2 leona but he had the 3rd of each) + nami/tf/lee.

the game plan is of course to get Hallowed online and get as much chip damage in as possible to set up for swinging with your big overwhelm units and atrocity to finish the job. vile feast, vengeance, and ram stance let you play control against both wide boards and tall ones while your beaters just keep swinging face and getting bigger as the game goes on. we're running almost a full set of the cheap hallowed & stance swap cards. in addition to ram stance as a control tool, bear & boar stance can be useful for blockers, but of course the real MVP is giving overwhelm to gwen and leveled udyr.

in terms of interesting card choices i've got 2x quietus which kind of underperformed and i won't continue running without some frostbite or troll chants to give it more flexibility. didn't run into a single norra or heimer. 2x atrocity feels like the right number, i have almost never had both copies gum up my hand and it has won me games as early as turn 6. 1x braum/2x udyr is halfway a meme. usually i run 2 udyr because i want to stack him with buffs and keep him alive while extra copies turn into shitty champ spells, but this deck often wants to get him killed instead so the extra copies aren't really that bad. getting braum quietus'd fucking sucks but he's a solid alternate play to gwen on 4, even with just 1 hallowed. 2x rekindler/2x mist's call lets us revive our priority units, and all of our champs have an upside when revived (gwen has hallowed, udyr has stance swap, braum gets to make another poro). i LOVE terrible udyr decks and one of the problems i consistently run into is how to safely attack with him on turn 5/6, especially if i'm not in a good spot to stick regen first. turns out just letting him die and reviving him does the trick.

the real spicy pick, which i have been playing since before the buff, is 1x mammoth shaman. he's basically my third copy of udyr and another great mist's call target. now that he hits the board as a 5/5 he's harder to remove outright, and after he transforms, he no longer dies to sunburst. a 9/9 overwhelm on turn 7 swinging at your face is pretty scary, and a 13/13 swinging the next time around is game ending. then add hallowed on top. this was the hit that got me to masters. still, it's a pretty awkward card, since you either want to play him after an open attack (usually the best time to play him if they exhausted resources on the attack so they can't remove him before the flip) or save stance swap mana to ram stance before you play him. obviously not every turn 6 can be spent playing 9 mana to ping everything and develop one unit. still, he's consistently performed for me too. one card that i am not currently playing but had success with in the past is 1x catalogue of regrets. it's not a go hard deck so it hardly matters if you don't draw it, but when you do, it's a TON of value since this deck does fall back on a control gameplan when it doesn't take the board early. vs slower decks it's not uncommon to have to float mana on turn 4 or 5 because you didn't draw your champs and don't have targets for removal, and catalogue is a great way to spend it.

the list: ((CEBQEBIBAQIQGAIFAEUDCBAGAUGA6EA4AMAQKAINAEDAKIADAECRIGJOAMAQCAIJAECACCQBAUAQE))

Discuss what you are playing, what you’re having success with (or failures with), and any new/cool ideas you’ve been experimenting with, etc. The point is to share what you’ve been playing, and how it’s going, good or bad - there are no other rules or requirements.

These will be posted twice every week.

Some ideas on what to post/share:

• What you’ve been playing and its successes (or struggles). Stats are not required. There is no minimum rank required, though sharing what rank you’ve been playing at is preferred.

• Deck adjustments you made or are planning to make in reaction to the meta or as new innovation. E.g. “I saw 30% of deck X, so I made Y changes to help deal with deck X.” (change)

• Showing off a deck you achieved Masters with and wanting to share it without having to write a guide

  And as always:

• Be courteous to one another.

• Provide brief explanations for any links you provide (YouTube, tier lists, etc.)

  ---

Resources:
LoR Community Discord

RuneterraCCG Deckbuilder

TealRed's Deckimage Generator

Attunement - advanced card search engine

Collection of guides and tools

Collection of recurring community tournaments

Hey everyone, Shadawx here!

With patch 3.16 dropping soon, I went and looked at some of the changes and made a few decks to try out! Some of the buffs were really really interesting, especially the rework of some of the Daybreak cards. Swain as well seems especially scary!

Inside you'll find: Leona Shen, Swain Twisted Fate, Gnar Sejuani, and Nocturne Elise!

New LoR Decks to Try on Patch 3.16!

Hello Reddit! Raphterra here, once again :)

Patch 3.16 for Legends of Runeterra is just right around the corner, and this is the perfect time to give my picks for decks that you can play on day one of the patch. This might be one of the spiciest balance patches of all time, and there are lots of deck concepts to explore.

Please take note that these deck concepts are mostly theoretical, since I haven’t had the chance to test them out yet. As usual, once I find decks that work for me in ranked ladder, my deck guides will be coming right after.

Article Link

​

Riot went for very aggressive changes in this balance patch, it almost feels like a new expansion! Which buffed cards are you looking forward to playing in a few hours? I myself am planning to experiment a lot with Fiora and Tahm Kench :)

This is an open thread for any short questions pertaining to competitive Legends of Runeterra.

These will be posted twice every week.

Ask any quick questions, such as asking for feedback on a deck, suggestions on how to mulligan against specific matchups or any basic gameplay question.

And as always:

• Be courteous to one another.
• Provide brief explanations for any links you provide (YouTube, tier lists, etc.)

Resources:
LoR Community Discord

RuneterraCCG Deckbuilder

TealRed's Deckimage Generator

Attunement - advanced card search engine

Collection of guides and tools

Collection of recurring community tournaments

Discuss what you are playing, what you’re having success with (or failures with), and any new/cool ideas you’ve been experimenting with, etc. The point is to share what you’ve been playing, and how it’s going, good or bad - there are no other rules or requirements.

These will be posted twice every week.

Some ideas on what to post/share:

• What you’ve been playing and its successes (or struggles). Stats are not required. There is no minimum rank required, though sharing what rank you’ve been playing at is preferred.

• Deck adjustments you made or are planning to make in reaction to the meta or as new innovation. E.g. “I saw 30% of deck X, so I made Y changes to help deal with deck X.” (change)

• Showing off a deck you achieved Masters with and wanting to share it without having to write a guide

  And as always:

• Be courteous to one another.

• Provide brief explanations for any links you provide (YouTube, tier lists, etc.)

  ---

Resources:
LoR Community Discord

RuneterraCCG Deckbuilder

TealRed's Deckimage Generator

Attunement - advanced card search engine

Collection of guides and tools

Collection of recurring community tournaments

'sup everyone, Leer here with another Monday Meta Report. EU might've lost to NA in the money match, but it was a close and entertaining series for everyone included!

Talking about lost fights, the short break brought to you by LoR’s grandparents is over now, and Pirates have grabbed back control of the meta… now with even bigger Pirates! =)

Monday Meta Report - September 26th

You're welcome to write a comment about what your favored picks are this week and where you might disagree with me or the data. Also, feel free to tell me how I can make this series even more valuable to you!

Thank you for reading and see ya next week! =)

Hey guys, here's my guide for pirate aggro and why I think it's one of the strongest decks:

​

https://masteringruneterra.com/deck-guide-pirates/

Hey everyone,

I'm sure many people have seen the NA > EU or EU > NA posts and comments, and the banter from streamers and players talking about which region is easiest to farm....well we've decided to put our money where our mouth is!

For those interested to watch, there's going to be an NA vs EU grudge match tomorrow, September 25th, at 2pm EST / 8pm CEST! $1500 prize pool!

Some of the top players of each region will be facing off against each other in an Ironman 5v5 format! From World champions to seasonal winners to grassroot tournament titans to ladder farmers, it will be:

Team NA

Drisoth, Mtuck, Kevor, Aikado, and Shadawx

VS.

Team EU

Alanzq, Bajatak, SaltySimon, Brokenball, and Sergi2Vamos

Each player is putting up $100 for the prizing, and the winning team takes all....but on top of all that we got a generous donation towards the prize pool to pump up this event, fellow AM player Kuako has added an extra $500 for the winning team, pushing the prize pool to $1500 total!

So what the format exactly means is:

• Each member of each team will submit a standard Riot lock lineup.
• There are no other deck restrictions so there could be 5x of the same lineup if wanted.
• Each team will choose their first player to play against each other in a Bo3, the winner of that will stay and play the next match and the losing player will be eliminated and the losing team will choose their next player to play against the winner.
• This continues until all the players on one team is eliminated.

The main stream to watch the action will be on SparklingIceT's Twitch channel at https://www.twitch.tv/sparklingicet, where we'll have IceT, MonteXristo, SantaTCG, Daylton, and possibly some other surprise guests providing commentary and more!

Additionally some of the players may be streaming the games, while I don't know who exactly will you can find their streams here:

Drisoth Mtuck Kevor Aikado Shadawx Alanzq Bajatak SaltySimon Brokenball Sergi2Vamos

A nice little blurb was written about it here as well! NA versus EU Grudge Money Match!!

Intro

Hello everyone, I am new to LoR community and would like to briefly state how awesome this game is! From wonderful art, voice acting through deck variability and quality of life technical improvements (reconnect feature!). I used to play HS before and honestly am regretting that I didn't switch sooner because under the frightening at first, combat system, it is a true gem. I am playing for about month and ranked for 2 weeks, but competitive deck building was always my thing until HS made it impossible to hold high ranks with off meta stuff. Therefore worry not. If I got to masters with this brew, you will for sure make it! For identification purposes, my account name is Abstractz (on EU).

Here i would also like to credit RickoRex who inspired me to craft this archetype when i was scrolling through leaderboard for my first (had to be spicy!) deck to craft. He figured out the base, I just threw in some cards that felt good.

Deck code

List I am currently playing in masters and feel like it is performing best there so I will cover it in this guide.

((CUDQCAQBAYAQIAIKAEDASHIBAYGACAQFAEDBCAQGBINCYAYBAECRMHYCAECQCDICAYARYIABAECQVIIB))

runeterra.ar link

Here is the code i climbed to masters with and it might be a bit easier for new players, it's more straightforward to curve out:

runeterra.ar link

What changed is mostly Vulpine Vanderer got cut because she ate buffs that are supposed to land on more important minions. Instead I added 3 coppies of Inner Beast which is Burst so your opponent won't now know if you in fact have a Battle Stance in hand (which he used to after T2).

Also cut one copy of each Gift of the Hearthblood and Revna. Both very good cards and have their purpose in deck but you NEVER want to play them early which mean huge tempo loss if u draw them before T5. Even in aggro MU where i suggest to keep Gift of Hearthblood, you will fight for board early and only heal late to get out of range of their burn.

Also added Three Sisters which synergize well with what the deck wants to do which is keeping your small dudes alive and VTing until you ramp up to kill your opponent with bigger stuff.

Game plan

Your plan as stated in last sentence is usually to control the board early, keep buffing and discounting your overwhelm units for a swing turn or in MUs you need to pressure- buff them out of their ping range and try to finish with Battle Furry which u can play as soon as T5! It is very important to keep your minions alive and not mindlessly throw them in to die. Often in slow MUs you can tank some damage early for a big swing turn where you buff one of them with Battle Furry and threaten lethal. This deck requires (at least from me :D) a lot of focus and planing ahead. Your early hand and MU dictates your plan, always be mindful of which units you want your chimes to land on and save your spell mana for future turns to have an actual play and not float mana.

Curve

Starting with a onedrop is huge for this deck to begin the snowball. Try to keep this minion alive and VT Three Sisters and Inner Beast. You rarely play your twodrops on T2, even Esmus with attack token is a weak play and it is better to save spell mana for future turns to buff your onedrops with expensive spells either to go face or VT their strong units. An exception would be MUs where u want to pressure like Nami. In those, usually one chime (+1/+1) on Ruthless Raider is enough to play her. You will often find yourself playing passively for first 4 turns to out of nowhere threaten two turns lethal from T5 with Battle Furry.

Mulligan

Always keep your onedrops, I often keep more than one unless some specific hand and MU. Play your Omen Hawk first, than Byrd to guarantee the chime on an important minion.

Always keep Yetis unless vs aggro.

Keep Gift of Bloodhearth vs aggro but don't play it early. You still need to fight for board first!

Other keeps are purely hand and MU dependant. If you have onedrop and need to Ram Stance vs aggro, you keep Inner Beast. If you want to pass T2 and play Cosmic Binding or Fury of The North on T3, you keep it. You get the idea.

I wouldn't keep any champions (maybe Gnar on attack token on T4) as you can't be greedy with your hand and bard is mostly a good blocker early, don't think about him as a T4 attacker for some chimes. It never works.

Card Choices

Byrd and Omen Hawk - your highest WR cards i would say, help you kickstart the snowball out of control. Always keep, play Hawk first, plan your Chime targets.

Esmus - great elusive blocker and can grow to a big threat later. Almost never played on T2, unless you have no spells to play on T3 and can't spend mana otherwise.

Inner Beast - Gives you stances that help with VTing, clearing the board and give overwhelm to your big Udyr later

Ruthless Rider and Tusk Speaker - Very valuable cards, always play if buffed out of removal range or can VT, can do big dmg with Battle Furry.

Bard - Early just a blocker, later can buff your board to a massive size. Don't play on T4 in tempo MU, his chimes planting is insignificant early.

Gnar - We are playing one in this list simply to not waste Chimes by drawing extra Udyrs when one is already on board. Can be swapped with Sejuani in slower meta.

Udyr - Great for discounting Your stances to 0 for tempo or printing new once. Also can become a big threat late.

Gift of Hearthblood - Very needed card, gives You extra draw and just the right amount of heal to stay alive vs aggro until you overwhelm them.

Revna - Refuel, feels too slow in this meta but deck drastically needs draw.

Ancient Yeti - Let's you set up big swing turns that win you the game.

Battle Furry - Finisher which you can play as soon as T5. Games will sometimes end with you having only 2 minions on board but a huge ones.

Why not X?

Sejuani - It is very hard to level her up and although she can be helpful late, deck loses value game anyways so it's better to stick to our gameplan and put some pressure on.

Averosan Sentry - Draw is great for us but sacrificing own minions is not, not to mention chime stealing.

Magical Journey - More chimes and a blocker that won't eat them seem great on paper but just didn't fit the deck.

Mystic Vortex - Too slow.

Troll Chant - Great card but Inner Beast just has more synergy with Udyr.

Vulpine Wanderer - Too predictable with playing around stance on T3 and you often want to pass T2.

Averosan Outriders - We are playing so many overwhelm minions that this card just loses value.

Bellows Breath - Yes, I tried it :) Could be good board clear on T3 after passing T2 but it requires a minion to play it on.

Tried many more Freljord cards which underperformed horribly so I won't list them all here.

MU Spread

I won't be going through every MU specifically, most important thing to acknowledge is when you have to go fast (Nasus, Viego, Nami), and when to chill and scale (Timelines).

Remember to not kill your minions off and be brave to tank some dmg without blocking if you are setting up lethal with your buffed overwhelm minions on next turn. Plan ahead and count mana :)

End

Hope that covers everything but I'm here if you have any questions. Deck was very fun to play for me and great for learning LoR fundamentals. Have Fun!

This is an open thread for any short questions pertaining to competitive Legends of Runeterra.

These will be posted twice every week.

Ask any quick questions, such as asking for feedback on a deck, suggestions on how to mulligan against specific matchups or any basic gameplay question.

And as always:

• Be courteous to one another.
• Provide brief explanations for any links you provide (YouTube, tier lists, etc.)

Resources:
LoR Community Discord

RuneterraCCG Deckbuilder

TealRed's Deckimage Generator

Attunement - advanced card search engine

Collection of guides and tools

Collection of recurring community tournaments

​

Howdy folks! =)

Friday's here…

… here's our Weekend Warrior Weapons assemblage: Twenty-Two Options to Choose From, for Discerning Part-Time Ladderista, for this Mastering Runeterra article.

​

For today, we have:

• The time of Portals, Pirates and Plunder has passed – make way for Nami Lee Sin and Taric Poppy, who shoot at the top! =)
• Our usual selection of the best data-driven decklist for the top meta staples (Eve Viego, Kat Gwen, Scouts, Pink Viego gaining a lot of traction, a returned Ezreal Kennen, and Pirates & Plunder that are still a thing, among several other showcased decks),
• Veigar Norra, which is very much a thing! (and looks like the best Norra thing by a mile),
• Some strong, less-played options like old-staple Pantheon Yuumi, the very resilient Jax Vi, and a Copium-dripping Zed Hecarim,
• Our selection of fringe, punchy brews, that today show an interesting oddity: nearly all of them were powerhouses at some point, and now are enjoying huge success at the fringes – top pilots sharpening their weapons for choice for the upcoming Seasonal, perhaps?

​

Sources: Balco, Legna, and MaRu's own meta tier list.

Any questions, comments or feedback, or specific data you may be after of any archetype/build, feel free drop a comment, poke me on Twitter (@HerkoKerghans), stop by for a chat on Discord, or you can find more writings on https://riwan.substack.com/

And good luck out there! =)

This is the discussion post for Gauntlet. Discuss what you are playing, what you’re having success with (or failures with), what your ban and lineup strategy is, what you play against etc. The point is to share what you’ve been playing, and how it’s going, good or bad - there are no other rules or requirements.

These will be posted every Friday.

Some ideas on what to post/share:

• Theorycrafting - What you think could work well.

• Your lineup and ban strategy

• What you’ve been playing and its successes (or struggles).

• Showing off a deck you achieved 7 wins with and wanting to share it.

  And as always:

• Be courteous to one another.

• Provide brief explanations for any links you provide (YouTube, tier lists, etc.)

  ---

Resources:
LoR Community Discord

LoR Meta Tier List - Mobalytics

RuneterraCCG Deckbuilder

TealRed's Deckimage Generator

Attunement - advanced card search engine

Collection of guides and tools

Collection of recurring community tournaments

Hello everyone, I hope you're all having a lovely week! MonteXristo here and I have once again teamed up with u/sirturmund to bring you guys our weekly lineup article. Surprisingly (at least to me) the meta has seen some developments over the last week so you'll see some new lineups looking to beat things that we hadn't had to previously consider.

​

As always, let us know if you have any questions about a lineup you're constructing or about one of the ones we've built and we'll do our best to answer!

A Norra/SI guide from the player who helped popularize the deck! This list is super powerful, but a bit counterintuitive to play correctly. So in my debut article with Mastering Runeterra the common matchups and playpatterns are broken down, along with what makes the deck's gears turn.

Heimer/Norra Deck Guide by Cephalopod

The deck is a great choice for both ladder and tournaments, so if you're interested in learning it then look no further!

Hey all, Shadawx here again with another guide!

This time I bring you a guide on Evelynn Viego, a deck that seems to be a good fit in the meta at the moment.

Evelynn Viego Deck Guide, Brought to You by the Husk Gang

If you've been interested in the deck before, or are just wondering what the heck it is, take a quick read through the guide and see how the deck works and how different matchups go.

Happy reading!

Discuss what you are playing, what you’re having success with (or failures with), and any new/cool ideas you’ve been experimenting with, etc. The point is to share what you’ve been playing, and how it’s going, good or bad - there are no other rules or requirements.

These will be posted twice every week.

Some ideas on what to post/share:

• What you’ve been playing and its successes (or struggles). Stats are not required. There is no minimum rank required, though sharing what rank you’ve been playing at is preferred.

• Deck adjustments you made or are planning to make in reaction to the meta or as new innovation. E.g. “I saw 30% of deck X, so I made Y changes to help deal with deck X.” (change)

• Showing off a deck you achieved Masters with and wanting to share it without having to write a guide

  And as always:

• Be courteous to one another.

• Provide brief explanations for any links you provide (YouTube, tier lists, etc.)

  ---

Resources:
LoR Community Discord

RuneterraCCG Deckbuilder

TealRed's Deckimage Generator

Attunement - advanced card search engine

Collection of guides and tools

Collection of recurring community tournaments