Earth - basic decks for newcomers (unupped)

[Narabo]

This is my first "guide" attempt so please don't be harsh on me


***Disclaimer ***
The decks below are most probably not the best. In fact in a game containing random, terms as best, perfect, etc are hard to define if not unusable.

The decks might not be original, in some situations I specially avoided go the old awesome way to build a deck or another. More important, this thread is not to claim author rights on any deck but to show the potential of  element and have some fun.

All decks presented in this thread passed a testing of 40 matches (I know is not much) and got at least a 80% win rate against AI3.

Since I am presenting only non upgraded decks, main focus will be on AI3 farming, therefor whenever is possible decks will be oriented on getting high win rate and high speed, after all nobody wants to use stall decks to farm AI3.




What you need to know about earth itself:
Earth is mainly an element that prefers safety on its creatures. Most of those will start being played even burrowed(antilion, graboid) even will have a big health(hematite golem, stone dragon). This comes with greater cost then other elements if you compare quanta cost/damage capability. Normally safety  is good, but not when you can’t pass shields and when your own shielding capabilities are restricted to diminish the damage taken, not removing it. More than that, the only nuke capable creature is bound to its time quanta dependency, so playing earth solo is not usually an option.

An example of pure earth deck looks like this :

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58o 58o 58o 58o 58o 58o 58o 58o 58o 58o 58o 58o 58o 58o 58q 58q 58q 58q 58r 58r 58s 58s 58u 591 591 591 591 591 592 592 8pm

There are 3 possible combinations for duo/trio decks:
1.   Nuke and ignore shields, hoping opponent will not have time to play shields at all. This is the regular earth/time combo.
2.   Pass shields combos. Here you can choose darkness for steal, fire for deflagration, gravity for momentum.
3.   Stall decks, which will prolong the fight by using shields, heals and any mechanism to deck out opponents before you. This however will result in much longer games, and might force you play decks larger than 30 cards.


a)  / deck

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58o 58o 58o 58o 58o 58o 58o 58o 58o 58o 58o 58o 58o 58o 58q 58r 58r 58s 58u 590 590 590 590 590 590 591 591 591 592 592 8ps

Simply using the power of graboids to make it as fast as possible. Notice that this is still considered mono deck according with mono deck definition:
http://elementscommunity.org/forum/index.php/topic,38679.0.html

b)  / quanta denial (+nova)

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4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 590 590 590 593 593 593 593 5ul 5ul 5um 5um 5um 5um 5um 5um 5up 5up 5up 5up 5up 606 606 606 606 8pm

Very good percentage but not so fast, sometimes is even slow. On the bright side however it will bring some elemental master wins.
Can grab some wins in arena also, but don’t expect special spins by playing decks that can’t handle novas. Since this deck is quanta eating, it receives a hard counter from nova using decks.(Ex : Grabbow).

c)  /

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4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 55q 55q 55r 55r 55r 58o 58o 58o 58o 58o 58q 58q 58q 58r 58t 58t 58v 58v 590 590 590 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 8pl

While is not best option for farming, it is far from being the worst. Main problem to achieve this deck will be of course getting the weapons (you can get one as your reward for 500 score quest).
Good things on it is having both CC and PC. Also has a not so bad damage, finishing in around 8-9 turns is possible depending on draws. And yes, still stuck on nova/grabboid combo. Both Earth and Gravity are too expensive to use any other form of damage (just my opinion).

d)  /

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4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 58o 58o 58o 58r 58u 58u 58u 590 590 590 590 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5f6 5f6 5f6 5f9 5f9 5fa 5fa 5fa 5fa 5fa 8po

Very high, speed is also quite awesome. Main weakness is named Otyugh, and sometimes Maxwell’s Demon as well. If you can discard before those cards you have a safe win, unless you will be spammed Bone Walls .

e)  /

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4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vk 4vk 4vk 4vk 4vl 4vm 4vm 58r 58r 58u 58u 58u 58u 58u 590 590 590 590 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 8pj

You will find this deck amazing for many reasons.
First of all it will very hard have a bad draw. It can develop well starting with one pillar, pendulum or nova. It can start damaging instantly by playing 3 novas and start mutating.
Secondly has a very nice speed, regular game will take 8 turns, but due to lucky mutations got even a 5 turns one.
Thirdly is has randomness, which will take away the boring of grinding.
Fourthly it can virtually bring down every single unupped deck since it has its chance to develop ultrafast.

f)  /

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4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 52h 52h 52o 52o 52o 52o 52o 52o 590 590 590 590 590 590 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 8pk

For no synergies at all works decent, also at decent speed. Has the opportunity to deny shielded decks, especially if you can apply 3+ poisons fast. Its speed depends exclusively on grabboid/nova combo, still results shows it is quite reliable.
I have to admit I tried several combinations before this one, including both death shields. Skull shield has games where it is 100% useless, chances to actually act are way to random to rely on it. Bone Wall without a good kill pool will not be worthy either

g)  /

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4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 590 590 590 590 590 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5bu 5bu 5bu 5bu 5bu 5bu 5c7 5c7 5c7 5c9 5c9 8pn

Again no synergies, but shriekers with adrenaline will do 17 dmg per turn, which is insane. This is a fast deck, unless you have a terrible pillar draw. So fast that sometimes 6 turns wins will not surprise you much. A big bonus on this deck is that you can still do decent damage playing burrowed shriekers with adrenaline. Remains weak against Dimensional Shield. Even like that win % is huge and can provide fast AI3 farming.

h)  /

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58o 58o 58o 58o 58o 58o 58o 58q 58q 58q 58q 58q 58q 58u 58u 5aa 5aa 5aa 5ie 5ie 5ie 5ie 5ie 5ie 5ij 5ij 5ij 5ij 5ij 5ij 8pp

With no active synergies between water and earth I chose to make use of earth’s survivability  and turn it into a semi rush combined with CC capability.
The result is not bad, actually you will have some fun against otherwise annoying decks like pharaoh/scarab decks. Only need to pay special attention when fighting Otyugh and Max’s Demon, so if you have any clue fighting against those, always try keep 2 dry spells in hand ready to use.
Speed is not best but will not waste your time either.

i)  /

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4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 590 590 590 590 590 590 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5la 5la 5la 5la 5la 5ld 5ld 5lm 5lm 5lm 5lm 8pq

To be honest was really hard to find a deck combination without big gaps and at same avoid building a stall deck. It still is slower then rest decks, normal speed is around 10 turns, but with luck you can get wins in 6-7 turns (3 grabboids, 1 dragon).

Since nova is present I had options like Pegasus + Bless, but assuming in many games I might not get more then 2-3 novas it wouldn’t pay of. More than that it would be a combo with great risk against reverse time (u can recover the creature but u can say bless bye bye), Bone wall (you will want more creatures), and Maxwell’s deamon.
Then could be shriekers+wardens+bless, but I considered it risky due to the fact that you only have max 6 shriekers that can actually do damage and again Max’s Deamon alone will trash them.
More then that you will have troubles to even play them early against any kind of CC decks, like Rage potion, Lightning, Shockwave, reverse time. So I chose instead a more solid creature and a way to feed the light quanta. Be very carefull while playing this deck, Sanctuary will negate quanta generation from Solar Shield, so decide when you need quanta and when you need healing.


j)  /

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4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 590 590 590 590 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5oc 5oc 5of 5of 5og 5oi 5oi 5ol 5ol 5ol 5om 5om 5pu 5pu 5pu 8pr

Again nova. Again not fastest deck, in fact is quite hard to get a viable combo. Air and Light till now are just not best option for earth, mainly due to the high quanta costs in combination with novas. When you use novas you want to minimize quanta costs, air however is based on consuming, and consuming a lot. As a good thing however, this deck has it’s chance to beat up anything, it only depends on first 3 draws to be completely smashing, or be out of the game when facing for example steam machines + freeze.
As you can also see the deck contains 3 Owl’s Eye. I got 6 of them from testing previous listed decks (and many other till I got to a satisfactory deck), all in AI3. If you choose this trio at the beginning however, replace the weapons with 2 Shockwave and 1 Unstable Gas. It will probably drop win rate but should not be by much.

k)  /

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4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 58r 58r 590 590 590 590 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 5aa 61r 61r 620 620 620 620 8pu

This deck is quite fast and fun, however it will fail against dimension shields for example. While it is far from being the worst combo for earth, the win % is not awesome either, but speed helps into considering it viable.


Regarding Rainbow decks, grabboid is one of the most used cards in such decks.
Below you can find several examples, tried not to list most obvious and used one, and get some more fun on it:

Grabbow 1

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4sa 4sa 4sa 4sa 4sa 4sa 4sa 4sa 4vh 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 55q 55q 55q 590 590 590 590 590 590 5c7 5c7 5lf 5lf 5lf 5rh 8pm

Grabbow 2

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4sa 4sa 4sa 4sa 4sa 4sa 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vl 590 590 590 590 590 5c1 5f6 5f9 5f9 5fa 5fa 5fa 5up 61p 61p 61p 61q 8pm

Not quite grabbow but still has some:

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4sa 4sa 4sa 4sa 4sa 4sa 4sa 4sa 4vh 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 4vj 55q 55q 590 590 5c7 5c7 5lf 5lf 5lf 5rh 5rh 61r 61r 61r 61r 8pu

Hope you enjoyed the view and if you managed to read at least half of it, thank you for doing so 

[timetock]

woah this is DEEP
and not to mention long

extremely detailed nice job 
Is your favorite element? Why not create upped cards?

[Narabo]

Just because I wanted it to be for begginers, and worked it on new account, more than that I am not that farmed myself so prolly will be working it out for upped cards later on.
Earth because when you choose your element is the first one, if this will be well recieved I will work on more elements .

[Chapuz]

+rep for entering to the forums in such a nice way. I will have time to make a better read and comment about each deck later, don't forget to introduce yourself in the newbie area!

[Higurashi]

Not a bad compilation of decks, though a lot of card choices seem random and scattered. If you want to max out speed, you should pack the big three in unupped rainbow rushes (Arsenic, Lycanthrope, Forest Spirit) and max out on Novas and Graboids. Furthermore, all Grabbows have room for at least 1 Deflag. You often pack 2 for drawing chance and the off chance that you'll draw 6 Novas. This removes the main weakness of non-Darkness/Fire Grabbows (and Gravity if you have SoFo's); no PC.

Regardless, I enjoy seeing variety. I especially enjoy the Mutationbow you made.

[Narabo]

Thanks for your replies
Higurashi you are very right with your statements, still the decks are intented to provide something else, not the regular rainbow
I can not say if Forest Spirit for example beats up deja vu fully buffed and able to replicate but I love taking risk and new ways if possible.

P.S. I am not saying Deja Vu is better either 

[Higurashi]

Oh no, a Dejabow is quite different from just adding a Nova-fuelled Forest Spirit, Lycan and Arsenic to any grabbow. It's just that those three add offence to any Nova-powered deck since they only cost 2. I absolutely love making bows out of random creatures like Dejabow, Scarabow, Otybow, Elfbow, PUbow, Lucibow and so on. I run them in PvP1 a lot.

[Acab Jef]

Welcome to the forums, nice first post .

The earth death deck is a bit weird i think. i should replace the graboid with shriekers and remove the nova's. keep it earth death? so you do not need to wait to draw a nova.
the other decks i am not sure if this is a big point.

I think i like the Earth - Air deck, i am going to try it out .

Keep up the good work/posts!

[Narabo]

Dear Jef,

The reason why I was not using shriekers in earth/poison deck is like this :

A shrieker costs 8 quanta and can be played in round 4 most probably. (1st round generates earth quanta but not enough, 2nd generated death, 3rd generates hopefully enough quanta to allow you to play a shrieker next round)
If by any chance you face a deck with some CC you just wasted 4 turns to play a shrieker, which is total loss already.
On the other hand you can play a grabboid (if you are lucky) in round 2, make shrieker out of it in round 3 and play a second one in round 4, maybe even third one in round 4.