Hello guys, sorry it has been some time since I typed something. Don’t worry, the Crystal Cavern is back and ready to produce some nice gemstone worthy articles. Today we will be talking about finishers, 2 finisher cards that we got. Each costs 6 yet one is for blue, and the other is for black. Lets begin with the coolest looking one:
Initial Thoughts
Man, the art they create for this game never fails to amuse me. Kudos to this artist, I want a wallpaper or something of this card. Anyhow, here we have a nice 6 cost finisher. With this card, you can rest every card in the fort, and that means direct attack the fort for damage. You are still venerable to ambushes, but they can’t use anything in that fort to defend as now all of the cards are rested. This forces them to play over, which means say they have 2 strong cards on a fort, and they are both rested. Now they are forced to play over one of those strong cards in order to have a small blocker. This is a great finisher as now you don’t have to worry about getting over some strong wall or any card with an effect when they get destroyed. Likewise you can go over deadly cards that destroy your card when you attack it regardless of toughness. That is good when going against decks that run Undying Executioner and the most anticipated: Izarco-Tvash, Born of Magma. Use this as a final turn finisher when you know you can end the game, or if you want to just destroy a fort with 2 barriers. Another good counter for going over Izarco-Tvash, Born of Magma is to play this card, so you don’t have to deal with the split damage it does when the card is destroyed. Now you blue players can relax a bit, I know that card was the most talked about card so far, and people have been asking for solutions. This is a very clear one. If you fail to draw this card out and it is a barrier, it has a nice fort burst effect which rests and gives you a draw. That is more hand and 1 less attack for your opponent to use against you. This gives this card high utility as a fort burst or an endgame card, so it will be of some use regardless where it is placed. My strategy is to have field set up; make sure not many of your cards die the turn before even if you must sacrifice a barrier or two. That way you drop this next turn and destroy them with all you have unless you have enough to play this and one small cheap costing card.
Pros vs. Cons
Pros:
Grand finisher
Good counter to deadly cards
Good way to play over Izarco-Tvash, Born of Magma or any card that has on death effects
Fort burst which gives you plus 1 hand and -1 opponent attack; good to keep you in check for recovery
Cons:
Heavy cost
Only rests the cards in the fort so they are still alive
If you fail to end then you are going to get punished heavily since this will drain most of your banners
Ambush can stop you except ones that summon if the forts are full of cards
My Rating: 9/10
NEXT… Let us look at the black finisher. Gosh, if you love blue/black cancer you gotta try using both of these. Might be hefty because they both cost 6, but it might be fun to use. I will for sure use a test deck using 4 of each of these finishers.
Initial Thoughts
Once more, never will get bored of the art. Good job on this one too. So now we have a card that does something similar, yet different from Guns Blazing. Instead of resting, you destroy every creature in select fort. This can be helpful because as we saw in Guns Blazing, it only rests the cards. That means next turn, they just stand them and get ready to attack you back. You get punished harder if you fail with Blazing than this card. The downside is you will trigger effects such as the feared Izarco-Tvash, Born of Magma since this destroys them and Izarco has an on destroy effect. Otherwise I would play this over Guns Blazing. Therefore, what one could do is since they did announce side boarding for this game, one could play a few copies of this card or Guns Blazing and side the other card. Say you run 2 copies of this card in your deck, side in 2 copies of Blazing so when you do go against a deck that uses Izarco-Tvash, Born of Magma or on destroy effect cards, you can swap this with Blazing during round 2 and proceed to wreck. More glory for Blue/Black cancer players. It can also work for tri-color users as long as 1 banner is blue and 1 is black. I will be testing a plethora of color decks including Blue/Black, Blue/Black/Yellow, and Blue/Black/Green. Those articles will be out once the set is out as I need to study more before I can give an analysis. This cards fort burst does not give you draw which makes it slightly weaker than Blazing, but it gives you a choice in destruction which can be helpful.
Pros vs. Cons
Pros:
Grand finisher
Destroys the cards in the fort, forcing your opponent to play new cards after the turn is over
Fort burst, destruction too
Gets over big blockers or walls
Cons:
Heavy cost
Ambushes counter you harder here and summon ambushes can work since this clears space for a summon
You will get punished if you fail to end them but it wont be as bad if they don’t have many cards to summon next turn
My Rating: 9/10
Comparing the two
All Guns Blazing:
Rest over destruction. This helps you get over on destroy effects or deadly cards that will hurt you next turn
Fort burst rests AND gives you a draw
Summon ambushes cant work properly since you rest all the cards in the fort. So if the fort has 2 cards on it, you can keep pushing since the fort can’t have 3 cards and therefore they are forced to summon over, which can force them to lose a strong wall in order to have a blocker
Gluttony of Albert:
Destroys rather than rest
Fort burst only gives destruction, no draw
Gets over walls or big cards than can’t be destroyed easily
You won’t get punished as hard as using blazing since they won’t be able to re-stand the cards when your turn is over
Summon ambushes can stop you because they summon on the fort you used the card on
Both:
Both are 6 cost
Both have a fort burst making them useful regardless where they are
One is black and one is blue, so you can mix them up in a Blue/Black deck
Each should be used as a final finisher or if you really want to get through and destroy a fort
You need a good field setup because of the cost preventing you from summoning much the turn you use this card. If you are playing aggro you want to use this as early as you can
Ambush can stop your progress
Hope you enjoyed the read and found something new or informative. I will be sure to keep everyone informed as we grow deeper into this game. As I finish this article, it is July the 5th. I want to thank you all who asked me questions so that I can bring it forth to the Bushiroad team once they arrive at my shop today. I will have your questions answered and my own too. Next article we will try to go over a card or the questions that I asked. Hope they visit your shop, I bet the event will be real fun, and it is your chance to WIN WIN WIN.
The Crystal Cavern 