Changelog

• 08-08-17 - Switched out 2 Hold the Lines for 2 Green Faeries. Credit to Geryon from Discord. Also added Notes under Mulligan section.

Introduction

TL;DR - Use Failed Experiment -> Ruunin and Aurora's Creation -> Ruunin to buff your Illusions. Also has event synergy, faeria ramp, and good card draw. Win game with 18/18 illusions and 3 Ruunins on board.

With the recent change to Ruunin (was 6f and 2F, is now 5f and 3F), she now is able to buff Illusion of Grandeur with the help of Failed Experiment. With that in mind, I bring you a Green/Blue deck Control-Combo Deck that probably puts Apex Predator to shame.

Disclaimer: I have not played this deck yet because I am a poor pleb and cannot afford some of the epics. As such, many of my ramblings below are purely theoretical and are a result of my own analytical work.

What's in the Deck?

This is by no means a budget deck. See my disclaimer? Yeah. Not a deck for the poor. That being said, here's a breakdown of the crafting requirements for all cards in the deck:

• Total memoria = 1830 memoria
• 2 Legendaries = 640 memoria
• 13 Epics = 1040 memoria
• 5 rares = 100 memoria
• 10 commons = 50 memoria

Core Cards:

Ruunin the Relentless - The only Legendary in the Deck. Weak to Blue transform effects and Green's VoT. On the other hand, she is not that bothered by hard removal as she just comes back stronger. While she is the main material to buff Illusion, Ruunin is also a great late-game creature, faeria acceleration (with feed), and the Dash helps to place that aggressive lake for illusion as well as position herself for aggressive/defensive plays.

Illusion of Grandeur - Late game finisher. Weak to transform, hard removal, and VoT. Gets buffed by Failed Ruunin, copied Ruunin, and Dark Stalker. Make sure that you are able to place a lake that your Illusions can charge from and land on opponent's face.

Failed Experiment - This plus Ruunin is the combo to buff Illusion. Doing this twice is usually enough as it brings Illusions to 10/10 at the very least. Using all three FE's will bring your Illusions to 18+/18+.

Aurora's Creation - Primarily used on Ruunin to give +4/+4 to your Illusions, but also to multiply your ruunin's on board. In the mid-end game against Red, Green, and Yellow who don't have transform effects, 3 Ruunins will quickly overwhelm them. Also, when you pay the 5 faeria to resummon the Ruunin copies, they would be at 6/6 already.

Feed the Forest - Used as a ramp card on a super powered Ruunin or on a super buffed Illusion. Ideally, you would want to Feed a 8/8 or more Ruunin. Alternatively, Feeding a 18/18 Illusion gives you enough faeria to put down two more Illusions and +1 to use Aurora's creation on Ruunin. Also provides a bit of card draw to look for your other combo cards and/or the Illusions.

Earthcraft - Since the full combo requires 6 special lands, you would need all the help to accelerate your land development. Provides a bit of card draw as well.

Tech Cards

Aurora's Disciple - Since the combo is so event heavy, Disciple can greatly benefit from it. Average early game collector and can snowball into the mid-end game if not dealt with by the opponent. Also a potential Feed target if need be (though not ideal).

Dark Stalker - Similar to Disciple in that it benefits from the deck having a lot of events. It also buffs Illusion as a secondary benefit. Great in your starting hand as player 2 since you can play Explore -> Lake -> Dark Stalker.

Wisdom, Shifting Tide, Time of Legends - Draw events that synergize with Disciple and Aurora and helps bring out your combo. The draw is necessary especially since you already so much faeria ramp.

Hold the Line - Again, event synergy. It gives you cheap and decent early collectors that can also defend and heal against rush decks and aggro-burn decks. Is also helpful as a late game draw when you are racing against your opponent.

Flowersilk Faerie - great early collector and is easily flipped by all the events in this deck. This can be used to double collect and possibly deny the collection by your opponent's creature. Can also defend in late game racing situations or against rush decks.

Frogify - Just a plain good card. (and if you haven't guessed yet, event synergy too).

Play the Deck

Mulligan

Look to keep cards in the following priority:

1. Earthcraft
2. Ruunin
3. Failed Experiment
4. Dark Stalker (Higher priority if you are player 2)
5. Aurora's Disciple
6. Flowersilk Faerie

Cards to immediately throw away:

1. Illusion of Grandeur
2. Aurora's Creation

Notes

• If you have Earthcraft, look for Ruunin and/or Dark Stalker.
• If you have Ruunin, look for Earthcraft, Failed Experiment, Feed the Forest, and Dark Stalker in that order of priority.
• If you have Disciple or Stalker, look for Earthcraft, Time of Legends, Shifting Tides, Hold the Line, and Wisdom in that order of priority.

Early Game and Land Placement

General Build

Build lands defensively to one side first. After that, you can setup a defensive land placement or build up one side in order to prepare to contest the wells. Build 3 forests and 1 lake ASAP to prepare for the FE->Ruunin and Feed->Ruunin combo. However if your starting 4 cards are mostly blue cards and including a Disciple, then you may build 2 lakes first, then 3 forests after. Good early collectors are Dark Stalker, Imperial Guards, Aurora's Disciple.

Opening Hands

1. Earthcraft, Ruunin, FE
   • Turn 1 - Forest (3 faeria left)
   • Turn 2 - Forest (gained 3f, 6f left)
   • Turn 3 - Lake -> Earthcraft -> Forest -> FE -> Ruunin -> Ruunin again (gained 3f, 9 total faeria used, 0f left)

If you drew into a Dark Stalker on turn 2, you can play Earthcraft -> Dark Stalker (3f gained, 3f used, 3f left), then it would be able to collect next turn for you to do the FE -> Ruunin combo.

2. Dark Stalker, Earthcraft, any other card
   • Turn 1 - Forest -> EC -> DS (3f used, 0f left)
   • Turn 2a If 3rd card was Hold the Line! - build Forest on other side of orb -> HtL -> Imperial Guard (3f gained, 1f collected, 4f used, 0f left).
   • Turn 2b 3rd card was Disciple - if you have drawn into a Shifting Tides or HtL, then you can play Lake -> Disciple -> ST/HtL. If player 2, then save Explore for this turn, then you can play it plus potentially another cheap event to put Disciple to 5/5.