Okay, so this is the third time I've been on Team Aether in War, so as such I'll do a quick rundown of Aether's place in the metagame, as well as an overview of the cards.
The first thing to realize that in general there are 3 types of Elements.
"Complete" elements have a balance of powerful control and a variety of damage sources. They will have a large variety of decks, as they can use their own elements as support or for damage.
"Maining" elements have limited control but plenty of damage options. They will generally use their own cards to deal damage, and focus on bringing in more powerful support from other elements.
"Support" elements have limited damage options but focus on other cards to do well. They will generally use other elements to deal damage while useing their own cards for support.
As you may be able to guess, Aether is by far the most defining support element. We focus on our support cards rather than our ability to deal damage. This is important to note when planning our vault.
Here's an overview of the cards we have available to use.
Aether Pillar:
The staple. Not much to say, except...
Aether Pendulum:
Tends to be more useful than pillars. Pillars are required sometimes to have a good split and for balance, but in general we want more pendulums than pillars.
Spark:
Almost useless. The exception is if we want to use an Immolation deck, Sparks are the fodder. We don't need more than 6, if any.
Lightning:
God, this card is awesome. It rips half the decks in the metagame to shreds. It's our most valuable card by far. Between killing off armies of graboids and dragons, we can use it as a surprise finisher. Most valuable card by far.
Parallel Universe:
Oooh boy, this card is amazing. It let's us do practically everything. It's one of the best stall breakers around, and lets us take a few off element cards and turn them into an army. It's the defining damage potential card we own and is probably the 2nd most valuable card we have.
Immortal:
Outclassed by far by Phase Dragon. Essentially useless. It is much, much better to use other elements to do our damage.
Dimensional Shield:
This is one of the most centralizing cards in the metagame. It's very powerful and the other teams know that. The simple existence of it makes prediction easier. If the other teams can't bring a card to somehow get around this, we win. It's that good. Even one or two splashed in can win you games. Another one of our most important cards.
Lobotomizer:
It's okay but... in War the majority of teams use a formula of Damage Dealer + Control. There are very few decks that rely on creature abilities so it's not as useful as it seems at first glance. It's nice enough to warrant a few, but it's not a staple.
Phase Dragon:
The only real form of damage we have available. The untouchableness of them is better than you might think in a metagame swarming with control. It is still usually better to focus on other elements, but they are great if we're anticipating a CC deck, as it renders a lot of cards dead.
Phase Spider:
The other form of damage we have, and it provides a great way to stall in the form of dimwings. It has +1 attack to quanta so it's a very nice card to throw in rushes. It should never be our main win condition though, only put in for support or to make fast decks faster.
Quintessence:
Honestly... what do we have to quint? Anything worth quinting is usually better PUed. If we have a deck that uses these well then sure, but it's not a priority.
Fractal:
Surprisingly, PU is usually better. However, Fractal is amazing when there's access to upgraded cards, as the quanta ratios get MUCH better. Fractal is amazing with devourers which is the main thing we use them for. It's usually to slow for the majority of unupgraded cards, but becomes great at the hands of our general or lieutenant. A priority because of the variety of powerful decks that use it.
Mindgate:
Basically useless. Since everything uses pendulums, without mindgating the correct mark it will do nothing for us.
Silence:
Good at first glance, but for a variety of reasons it's way too hard to use.
It's uses all have a major downside.
1. Stall breaking (Denying Miracle)
Sanctuary. Nuff said. It will be running around everywhere, so Silence just can't do it's job.
2. Early game disruption
Silence actually costs a lot... The amount of time you buy with silence is about equivalent to the amount of quanta it takes to chain it anyways, so it does nothing for you in the end except waste a card slot.
3. Covering creatures.
We had the idea of covering Graboids with Silence so they have time to burrow... but Lightning is better in every way. There's nothing more to say about that.
Turquoise Nymph:
I don't think we have enough of these to warrant a vault spot.
There you go. Feel free to ask if you have questions.
