Season 3 Underway — August 2019 - June 2020

Good Morning, Good Afternoon, Good Evening and Good Night, Drifters—wherever you are on Eeventide, welcome back to the official Exodus TCG Organized Play News Column! For those of you who are new or reading for the first time: welcome! As for returning readers, thanks for joining us; today we're going to dive into a lightweight analysis of the current metagame since the release of Set 5 The Dimension That Disappeared. It'll mainly serve as an overview of what decks are currently being played or, conversely, not-so-playable right now, competitively speaking. Some decks may get a closer look than others in this article, so if one piques your interest, do let us know so that we can cover it more in-depth in a future post. We'd also like to preface this article by saying that we would like to start opening up the News Column here to more writers while keeping it official. Yup, you read right--YOU can be a published columnist, so stick around till the end of the article for more details!

Before we get into the nitty gritty, a few related announcements:
          ➤ Qualifiers to secure Worlds invitations will be held earlier than usual this Season.
                ↳Quals appointed time will be independent for each region: USA & Singapore, with the possibility of adding Canada & UK, depending on regular tournament attendance).
                ↳Qualifier dates & locations TBD January - May 2020, pending best date(s) selected by the Emissary or TO in each region, per EG's approval.
          ➤ Worlds 2020 will be held June 2020, one whole month earlier compared to the last two World Championships. Exact date(s) TBD.

 

To alleviate some stress, we've decided to move the Exodus World Championship forward so that it isn't so close to Gen Con on the calendar. We've taken into careful consideration the dates for Worlds and will continue to do so, choosing the most convenient days possible for the majority of competitors. There's a wide age range that plays Exodus, and we know some players get out of school for the Summer at different times. Furthermore, we understand that overseas competitors get better travel rates by booking as early as possible, so that was another factor in hosting Qualifier tournaments earlier as well.

The shift in dates also means that competitive seasons will be slightly shorter than they've been in the past. Previously, there was just a 2-week break between seasons (ending in July with the new Season starting in August), and some competitors expressed concern that there wasn't enough of a break. We are now more accutely aware of potential player burnout, thus the adjustment in dates and Season length. We don't want players to feel pressured to maintain their weekly Ranking during the off-Season, so we hope everyone benefits from this change. On the other hand, we will also be working more closely with Organizers to offer optional Exodus events for fun rather than prizes during the seasonal break. For those who wish to continue honing their skills and meeting on a weekly basis, we hope you enjoy this benefit without having to worry about Rankings during that time.

 

 

Road to Worlds

          For reference, you have several options on your journey to the World Championship:

 

 

      Weekly shop tournaments have the option to alternate between 1v1 and 2v2 format this Season. In 1v1, the normal rules apply, so players can freely mix Chronos into their Eeventide decks during 1v1 weeks. It has been interesting to see which of the new Chrono cards have been mixed into older competitive decks from previous Seasons to keep them relevant. However, since all sanctioned Level 2 & 3 events this Season (re: Qualifiers & Worlds) will only use 2v2, that is the format we will focus on when taking a look at which decks are topping the current meta.

 

Guild Stats / META Breakdown

Here's the statistical breakdown of decks used since the beginning of the Season from August 2019 to Present, sorted by popularity:

      Not counting a few rogue decks that fall into the ‘Other’ or Guildless category, we are actually looking at a decent spread of various types of decks. Dragonis didn’t see much change, but Skyborn dropped below them in terms of popularity—which, for Angels was a huge drop compared to previous Seasons.  Both of those Guilds have definitely had their chance to shine, and their support in terms of card quantity is pretty evenly matched at this point. That said, it's nice to finally see both of these Guilds balance out number-wise.

     

      Meanwhile, long-standing Reveal and Freeze decks have seen a huge uptick with all of the recent support for them in Set 5. They also happen to be evenly split as far as players running decks from each of those Guilds—a good indicator that their new support is nearly equal in terms of excitement and power level! Treefolk decks received a huge boost to their arsenal in the form of new cards like Roaming Skyscraper, Langis and Treeforge Boardroom. Their creature Abilities and new symmetries synergize extremely well hand-in-hand. The Reveal Mechanic was expanded upon immensely, and since it was revealed (pun intended!) that multi-reveals dig deeper into the Main Deck rather than just revealing the same card over and over, the competitive possibilities have really opened up. Last Season, Vastion the World's Hollow was the main revealer, but revealed from hand instead of the deck. Powerful new SRs like Vanciere the Future Phenomenon and Coldcrux, Root of the World can be found in the latest expansion to further boost Treeforge's reveal strategy.

     

      Shardfolk were already a top contender last Worlds and their new support further strengthens them. They already had awesome creature utilities like Chief Bandit, Crystalline Stag and Harpoon Halberdier, but Set 5 really upped their available symmetry toolbox to include versatile freeze support on a competitive level. Now it's fairly simple to freeze energy thanks to cards like Lucia Lievdrahs and Cryogenic Criterion, the latter of which also serves as anti-Chrono support. Encased Runerock has proven immensely popular since the beginning of the Season, highlighting an optional but powerful cost-scaling effect. Perma-freezing cards of all types (energy, symmetries, creatures & Afterthoughts) has become easier than ever. While it's certainly possible to build different types of Shardfolk decks, this Guild in particular could move from a Beatdown-style preference into something much more Control oriented. They've got some particularly good cards that become even more useful in 2v2.

      Of course, then we have the ominous new Chrono Guild... Well, more of a time-altering, manipulative, mind-controlling, smoke-wielding, sentient faction that infects almost any Drifters who mess with them...! Chronos have burst onto the competitive scene at long last! Although we saw Chronos introduced to the game for the first time last year in Set 4, it wasn't until Set 5 that we saw their original Afterthought Mechanic and players really got a feel for what they can do. Chronos are currently more popular than any other single Guild on their own, and they're only slightly behind in the popularity race if you were to combine those playing Shardveil and Treeforge (the next two most popular).

Devourer Deck Profile

Competitive? ✔Check.  Challenging? ✔Check.  Weaknesses? Sure.  Able to Handle Any Matchup? ✔Check.  Fun? Oh Yeah.

Now let's take a gander at a new competitive deck built around the big bad of this season...the Devourer of Dimensions! Eroda was teased as the cover character for Set 5 before its release and was met, unsurprisingly, with a neutral or generally underwhelming reception. But the head-scratching ceased as fast as its adversaries when Devourer was the SR discovered to be Eroda's true form.

Despite not having any Afterthought Abilities itself (more on that later), Devourer desperately wants other Chronos in the deck. The beautiful thing is that you can take this build in several different directions. Don't like dedicating so much space to cards that will search out Eroda? No problem. Eliminate draw power for creatures with Abilities that will help you control the board state. Or perhaps you prefer doubling up on your symmetries for early game consistency? Heck, you could even swap out one-ofs for lower rarity Chronos and veer the deck toward Chrono Flood territory. There are more choices to be made than ever before, but be sure your build works for this Season's 2v2 team format.

Speaking of which, 2v2 matches are played best-of-1, so hitting hard and fast could be more crucial. This particular build does just that and gives you room to adjust it to handle your local meta. Fair warning: much like the villainous baddie, the deck is extremely unforgiving; heavy decision-making and timing your plays (almost) perfectly is key, so don't expect to play this deck on autopilot.
The decklist we're looking at here today focuses on getting Eroda out of the Main Deck as fast as humanly possible. The reason? It's energy-hungry. You'll almost never have a reason to hold back energy in your hand; having energy in play will allow you to feed it beneath your Main Deck every turn (even if Eroda isn't there, it can be done via Chains of the Ancient One and Silent Irregularity). So, when it does finally come out, Devourer will either be ready or easily summoned via Eroda's Ascendance--and it'll be strong to boot.

It's also pretty difficult to get a bad opening hand with this deck. Mechanical Hallucination shuts down most early game shenanigans your opponent may have--like Vortex or Glimpse of the Sanctuary. Opponents probably won't bat an eye at you dropping a Silent Irregularity or two into play as if it were a normal creature; you letting them kill it will only swiften their demise when it becomes the Afterthought that enables you to instantly play late game bombs like Chronological Relapse and Tethered to Eeventide. Did you open with Brigantine or Caustic Silhouette? Even better. Put them to work to instantly start cycling through your deck or destroying opposing energy. Even if your starting hand consists solely of symmetries, something like 80% of the time you'll be able to draw or search using either Glimpse or Sign of the Crow. Shrinking your deck, putting energy beneath it and possibly sending Irregularity to grave for additional triggers is also not a bad way to start. All that to say: the deck is very fun so long as you plan ahead and play things in the right order. Regularly checking your hand & graveyard and weighing the possibilities as to what's left in your deck will greatly improve your win percentages with a deck like this.

Finally, we get to the deck's finisher--Devourer of Dimensions. It can trash a Chrono beneath it to literally target any card with an effect or Ability and destroy it...including those that trigger outside of play to stop them from going off! Ideally, Devourer will enter play with 7 or more energy. Remember, you can always leave a blank pile of 3 (or 4 with Glimpse) open, so that when Eroda comes out naturally, or you need to suddenly use Ascendance, all energy that was sucked beneath your Main Deck can be added to wherever you choose to summon Eroda/Devourer.
Whenever you do use its Distort the Dimension Ability to negate and destroy something, you get 2 additional benefits:
1) You get to choose which Chrono beneath Devourer is sent to the graveyard;
2) You get to choose if that Chrono becomes an Afterthought (so long as it has the symbol) instead of going to the graveyard, while still fulfilling Devourer's Ability;
Even if Devourer enters play with a low amount of energy like 3 or less, it will often have at least 3 or 4 Chronos beneath it as insta-destructo fodder. Sometimes that's all you need to clear the toughest opposing forces. Usually, you can 2-shot your opponent since there's several different ways to feed Devourer after it's in play as well.

Surprise Counter-Play Ideas That Your Opponent Won't See Coming:
1) Summon Devourer on top of Eroda by normal means --> use it to attack into opposing creature --> use a card effect like Reversion to bounce Devourer back to your hand (Eroda and all Chronos beneath it stay in play) --> attack again with Eroda --> play Eroda's Ascendance in your Attack Phase to bring Eroda/Devourer back into play & continue attacking with it on the same turn;
2) Let your opponent think you are vulnerable with an open field; after they commit their resources into attacking or pushing for game, use Ascendance to bring Devourer into play (esp. when you have several Afterthoughts) --> respond with its Ability multiple times --> destroy opposing cards, leaving opponent open to direct attack on your next turn;

Many players don't realize that Eroda's Ascendance is more of a late game / backup option, despite being at least a x1 staple in the deck. Playing it early can put pressure on your opponent, but it also leaves you more vulnerable and at less Life Points. If you can summon Devourer normally, by all means do it. Acting like you're playing the long game even with a 'speed' build will only strengthen your position. Another misconception is that you can only play Ascendance a finite number of times before you run out of Life Points. But the truth is that you can not only use Madness Settles as a psuedo-Chains to protect your field, but also to heal yourself back up to 3 Life Points if they've dropped below that!

Devourer's one weakness is being attacked. While it can take out any effect or Ability and put that card out of commission, it can do little on its own to stop opposing creatures from attacking it. Madness Settles can do wonders for it, but other times you'll want to let it die if it's already expended all Chronos beneath it. Regular ol' Chains may be a good deckbuilding choice if you opt to run less creatures. If you do lean more symmetry-heavy, consider your local meta. What seems to be rampant the most? End of the Rift is a highly underrated choice that could perform well if a lot of Vortexes are still going around your locals. Crystal Cove is an obvious choice for additions to the deck core. But play around with it because you might find that those Coves aren't needed if you can quickly and consistently get Devourer going.

When it comes to 2v2, your partner must also be playing a Chrono deck of their own per Season 3's rules. That does not mean, however, that they have to play an identical deck. In fact, you may find that 2 Devourer decks might be a bit counter-productive, even if you starve one to feed the other. Everything can be played strategically, so play around with a team supporting role that will help Devourer shine. You might just find an unstoppable combination!

 

Ranking News & Guild Wars

Congratulations to our current Top 10 players:

 

1st: Victor M. — 31 points

2nd: Perrin W. — 30 points

3rd: Nick J. — 30 points

4th: Darren C. — 30 points

5th: Alex P. — 28 points

6th: Edward B. — 24 points

7th: Lucas W. — 23 points

8th: Zach C. — 23 points

9th: Jacob B. — 20 points

10th: Beth R. — 20 points

 

 

2022 Hiatus Announcement2020 QualifiersBlack Friday / Cyber MondayOrganized Play Season 3Worlds 2019 RecapWorlds 2019 Judge ArticleWest Coast Qualifier ResultsEast Coast Qualifier ResultsNews 5/10/19News 5/1 - 5/2/19News 4/18/192019 World Championship2019 QualifiersNews 4/1 - 4/2/19Organized Play Season 2Worlds 2018 Recap Pt. 1SEA Distributor NewsNews 6/30/18News 6/10/182018 World Championship2018 West Coast QualifierNews 4/1/18News 3/20/18News 2/15/18News 2/1/18End of Year 2017 NewsOP - Closed BETA