My understanding of the CL meta is that a significant portion of it is shard based. How do the latest Shard changes affect this, would you expect?
Depends on the shard. Here's my two cents:
Aether: Hard to say, since being able to be played on any creature now it's probably stronger than it is now. The only decks I've seen in CL using shard of wisdom are shard golems and flying morning glories. Shard golems will take a bit of a hit, since 2
is harder to play than 1
, and I'm not yet sure if the new SoW can be played on immortal creatures like it can now. Flying glories can probably just use aether mark and call it a day, assuming that you can play SoW on them still. The changes might well result in seeing more SoW next season.
Air: We'll probably see more SoFr next season. Right now, I see it mostly in shard golems, chaos wyrms, and seraph/phoenix immorush, and I think once in flying glories, and all except the glories will still be able to use it, possibly even more easily due to cost.
Darkness: In two seasons of CL I've seen shard of void in one game. I don't think the cost change will affect that any.
Death: The cost change will make some difference, although most decks using SoSa were either mainly death or rainbow, so I think there will be little to no change. There will be more counters to SoSa, now, though, since things like black hole, discord, pests, etc can potentially take away that quanta, but then the counter to that counter is just keep one death tower or nova in hand for it.
Earth: Only deck it's used in right now is shard golem, obviously :p With the cost decreased to 1
, I can see it being used in quick monoearth decks as a kind of cheap weenie; worst case it's a micro abomination (or thereabouts; I think it's 2/5 with no other shards) and if you have more shards, it's kind of like playing a hand full of micro abominations for 1
, but having the whole thing vulnerable to one piece of removal.
Entropy: Not used a lot in CL, but by changing a few QTs to entropy towers, it can probably still be used, just with less copies.
Fire: Mostly used in cremation rushes now. I expect to see it a LOT more if the current 1
cost is kept. I built a few decks in the beta compilation thread with this.
Gravity: We might see a few next season in rainbows. I've never seen monogravity in CL, though maybe we will now... but I doubt it. SoFo was EVERYWHERE in CL this season and last.
Life: Only saw SoG used once in CL, and the deck it was used in will be largely unaffected by the change, possibly having to use a few more pends to support it.
Light: I've seen SoD used in several decks, most of which will be slowed slightly or need quanta bases refined, so it will lose a bit of popularity, but not much.
Time: Seen it a lot, mostly in mummy/rt/SoR decks, or some OTKs. I don't think it will be used seriously in CL in this version. If it were an other card with the two use/turn clause included, it would still see some use, even at the old 5 // 3 cost.
Water: Saw it a few times in CL, but never in a competitive deck. This might change next season with the buff, but that remains to be seen.