The Wrecking Ball [Bronze League][Silver League]

[willng3]

The Wrecking Ball


Oh look another Quantum Tower based Speedbow.  Fortunately I didn't spot anything close to this deck's function, but if it does exist somewhere in this section then I blame the guy who created that Speedbow List for not finding it for me.

by willng3

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6qq 6qq 6qq 6qq 6qq 6tt 6u3 6u3 6u3 6u3 6u3 6u3 713 713 77f 77f 77f 7ah 7ah 7dq 7gv 7k5 7n8 7n8 7n8 7q5 7q5 7ti 7ti 80g 8pj

This deck earns its name by being able to completely destroy enemy decks and their setups completely.  It covers a wide range of enemy decks and breaks enemy defenses with astounding force.

Now there's a story that goes along with this deck.  Where to begin...

Spoiler for Card Selection and More:

So there I was, grinding the heck out of Bronze League for Shards with my trusty Arena Destruction 101 and then I realized something:  All of these Mono Aether decks are really annoying.  Sure, I could manage to kill them off about 75% of the time, but with SO many of them popping up all over the place, I was getting really annoyed by having my string of wins broken even once.  But how to resolve this issue?  AD101 can't really afford a 3rd form of PC without sacrificing defense or speed, and there was always the chance that I still wouldn't have enough PC to make it through the Dim Shield chains.  But then it dawned on me:  What if I tried focusing on Pulverizer instead?
That was what sparked this idea.  I started off by taking out Discords, replacing them all with Pulvys.  Next the BHs had to go.  I wasn't really sure of what to do from there, so I experimented with a lot of other card choices including Improved Fog, Improved Dusk, Dissipation Field, Twin Universe, Chaos Power, and Skull Buckler.  The bottomline was that I just didn't have enough defense to stand up against the rushier decks; Wings is still necessary for the deck's survival in many cases.  If Wings stays then maxing out on Spiders will offer the highest amount of success.  But I still needed a way to reduce damage coming at me even further, and I needed a renewable form of Creature Control for this to work.  Eagle's Eye conflicts too much with Wings and I wasn't sure I would be able to sustain that much anyways, Otyugh conflicts too much with Pulvy and just seemed too slow to me.  Then my gaze fell upon Maxwell's Demon and I felt a connection immediately.  In its previous state the deck had serious problems with Firestall mods fitted with Phoenixes and Crimson Dragons, but the Demons take care of that.  Of course, that doesn't work if the Demons are killed before you can kill off the other creatures - yet another problem.  But seeing as how I had 3 Pulvys (and a Crusader since it works extremely well with Pulvy) and the 2 Steals were pretty much overkill, why not trade them out for Cloaks to give myself some extra CC and PC protection?  This works extremely well for a number of reasons:
1)  Complete protection from CC (for 3 turns).  Late game this is less effective because of AoE spells, but early game you can set up easily without being disturbed.
2)  Forces decks to waste at least 1 PC before going after anything else.  Early game Firestalls usually won't have enough quanta to be able to execute a Deflag + Deflag or Deflag + Rage Potion/Fire Bolt play, and not being able to do that in the same turn can often signal victory for you.  Steal is laughable due to you being able to smash your own Cloak with Pulvy (at which point it's not very useful to you anyways).
3)  Counters enemy Pulvys.  Once you play Cloak + Pulvy in the same turn it's pretty much given that your own Pulvy won't be destroyed any time soon.
With that aside, I still had some room for other cards so I went ahead and added a second Hourglass.  I rarely find myself able to sustain 2 at the same time unless I get a lot of quanta early game (lots of Supernova, Quantum Towers, etc.), but this increases my chance of drawing 1 early significantly and also allows me to use them as PC bait more often to protect my other cards.  Doubled my Maxwell's as well since I want to get them out ASAP.  Aside from this, most of the cards are standard Speedbow material.

So how does the deck perform?  Very well, I would say it beats AD101 in terms of winrate against Bronze League.  However against Silver League it doesn't fare as well because the decks are able to set up faster which in turn can stop you from setting up.  Don't misunderstand me, it works well against Silver League, but just not as well as AD101.  Also, since EMs are much less common, the profit that comes along with winning isn't going to be as great.  This deck was designed to absolutely destroy Bronze League and over the several dozen games that I've played I've noticed it does this very effectively.  It's fast, durable, and can string together several wins in a row.
The biggest problems you'll face result from not drawing what you need when you need it.  I've tried to reduce this as much as possible with the card choices, but it's still impossible to prevent this from happening completely.  Drawing 0 Quantum Towers will cause problems as well, but even this never means that you cannot win the duel and I've still come back from this without a problem numerous times.

[furballdn]

Wow. Looks pretty neat. The 3 pulvys will certainly destroy those pesky dim shields. Cloak is pretty interesting too. It protects both your growers as well as wings. Very impressive. Maybe replace the abyss crawler with a mind flayer?

[willng3]

Maybe replace the abyss crawler with a mind flayer?

This is probably the one decision I'm still trying to make.  It basically all boils down to me wanting a high HP creature which comes out early and hits hard or wanting something to shut down anything that relies on creatures.  I'm in the process of testing a version with Ulitharid at the moment, and given the deck's theme I just might make this change.

[furballdn]

Maybe replace the abyss crawler with a mind flayer?

This is probably the one decision I'm still trying to make.  It basically all boils down to me wanting a high HP creature which comes out early and hits hard or wanting something to shut down anything that relies on creatures.  I'm in the process of testing a version with Ulitharid at the moment, and given the deck's theme I just might make this change.

I'll probably go with the mind flayer. There's countless times where a mind flayer would help out. Sure, the maxwells can easily take care of things like golems and most other offensive creatures, there are still a few that will bring you a load of trouble (nymphs, oty, spawners, forest spectre). Have you also tried using TU instead of phase recluse? Sure the spider can web and does 7 dmg per turn, but TU can also be a potential life saver in many cases.

Deck looks pretty neat. Not as fast as some other arena rainbows, but this one offers fairly nice amounts of control to make up for that.

[Rember]

You were only going 75% vs the bronze MA's? Strange. Looks cool in any case, I'll try it if I ever farm bronze again.

[xsindomanx]

Hmm I never gave any attention to cloaks, thinking that they are pretty useless since you can see what your opponent is playing them when he plays them (but then, I've really never used a mass control deck, and focused on decent & fast damage ). But I see here that it's a really good choice, and I don't remember THAT many explosions or pulvy in the bronze arena.

Might be (probably) making me look stupid again, but in a fast pretty fast deck like this, wouldn't -1 pulvy, -2 hourglass, +3 precog make the deck faster? It's not the hourglass will serve as a major explosion shield, since they aren't that many, and you are protected by cloaks for a good number of turns.

EDIT: Would agree for mind flyer, but since your shield is wings, why not go with phase recluse ?

[willng3]

I know that a lot of people are convinced that TU is worth replacing the Phase Recluse for, but in my experience it's not.  I've had several cases where that Recluse was the only spider I could draw for quite some time and wouldn't have been able to hold off the damage otherwise.  All that TU would have done in these cases would have been to give me extra damage or an additional Crusader to smash things with, but at that point in the game that wasn't what I needed.  TU offers other possibilities, true, but just from playing around with it I wasn't too impressed by what it did for the deck.  Also, with the Ulitharid I'm not too fond of the usage overlap even if the chances of playing both of them at once is unlikely.

I've had this discussion numerous times with other Speedbows so I doubt you'll be able to convince me otherwise, but feel free to make the switch if it fits your playstyle better.

You were only going 75% vs the bronze MA's? Strange. Looks cool in any case, I'll try it if I ever farm bronze again.

Of course, that's an approximation and it's likely off.  But christ it feels that low sometimes, especially after hours of grinding.

Might be (probably) making me look stupid again, but in a fast pretty fast deck like this, wouldn't -1 pulvy, -2 hourglass, +3 precog make the deck faster? It's not the hourglass will serve as a major explosion shield, since they aren't that many, and you are protected by cloaks for a good number of turns.

You want to be able to draw a Pulvy as soon as possible so 3 is mandatory.  Precog basically slims your deck size down to 27/28 cards, but in decks like these where card advantage is crucial you want the ability to draw continually turn after turn after turn so that you can get what you need faster.  Precog is usually a better choice in Pendulum Supernova Speedbows because you generally won't be able to afford an Hourglass, but this deck can afford it and benefits from it greatly.

[willng3]

Finished my Shard sets with the help of this deck today

by willng3

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6qq 6qq 6qq 6qq 6qq 6tt 6u3 6u3 6u3 6u3 6u3 6u3 713 713 77f 77f 77f 7ah 7ah 7dq 7gv 7k5 7n8 7n8 7n8 7q5 7q5 7ti 7ti 80g 8pj

^The current mod I've been using.  I had a bit of a bad luck streak earlier where I couldn't draw Wings in time to save me so I added a 3rd one and took out a Maxwell's Demon.  I played 60 games with this version today and lost once due to not drawing a Quantum Tower and then getting drained by a single Devourer.  Ulitharid is useful; simply epic when paired with Maxwell's Demon.

[Chapuz]

Ulitharid is useful; simply epic when paired with Maxwell's Demon.

And chargers, and momentumed lava golems...

[Calindu]

Ulitharid is useful; simply epic when paired with Maxwell's Demon.

I prefer a octopus instead.

[Chapuz]

Ulitharid is useful; simply epic when paired with Maxwell's Demon.

I prefer a octopus instead.

I think that would be high on water quanta demand...

[Calindu]

Ulitharid is useful; simply epic when paired with Maxwell's Demon.

I prefer a octopus instead.

I think that would be high on water quanta demand...

This is why I run with frog and adrena instead of spirits.