Shadowverse

Verdict: yet another ugly expansion pack.
The only decent map is the one with the little pig.

Yggdrasil looks okay. It's a bit simple, but it's alright.

Do you usually look at the stats first?

Yes

With this approach, you should play Hearthstone or Gwent.

To be honest, I don't even pay attention to the technical aspects of new maps anymore. I don't play for that, and I didn't start playing for that either. So, taking this opportunity, I'll say it again – tsai-games, or however you like to call it, [DATA REMOVED].

Azazel is not present in Hearthstone or Gwent.

It's a shame they closed off the standard 2 mana, 3 health option in favor of ramp, where they put ramp as an alternative. Although, the more I think about it, the more it seems like the card is more good than bad.

What's so sad about it? I think it's a super-strong card. Need ramp? Ramp. You can even get two orbs with Aiela on turn 4. Need to defend against an aggro deck? Defend. Playing a creature in the mid-to-late game? Still useful, just take a spell; it's not like Oracle is top-tier in the late game. After the Bahamut rotation, they'll play with Frenzy Dragon, and you won't be short on cards in your hand. It's an instant pick in any deck and any archetype.

Mini-Odin. Well, we have FFGs, which are worse, but cheaper and can be used on units if needed.

I don't like Grace at all – wasting 4 mana to give your opponent 1-3 drain units. If I really needed to defend against some mills and Rolands, I would take that giant.

PDK support. I'm not sure if Orcs can take off on their own, but a bunch of 2 mana, 2/2 creatures combined with PDK sounds very good. Again, it's a good top-deck in tier 2. It could also be good for aggro decks without PDK. It has potential, in short.

I have PTSD from the zombie party and Death's Breath :( I was just happy they got rid of them, and now they're back.

The lions look cool.

PDK support. I'm not sure if Orcs can fly on their own, but a group of 2-level, 2/2 units accompanied by a PDK sounds very good.

Haes stole the rush strategy from Sylvan, and Sylvan stole the echo strategy from Haes. One-one) Although, it's very likely that this map was announced before Haes announced the echo strategy...
So, we can say that Saigames stole the heroic brawl from Blizzard... that is, the Grand Prix. Or... they introduced a tournament mode when Blizzard was just announcing it? Never mind.
How do you like the new mode, by the way? I haven't played for the last week, I logged in to test it, lost 3-2, and I'm wondering if it's worth re-qualifying or just giving up. I didn't quite understand how the ticket works - I played, but it remained.

One match is free, and the other two cost money or tickets.
I lost in matches 1-4, what a bummer. And I barely managed to complete the daily quests.
BUT I GOT AZAZEL IN GFB, AND IT WAS WORTH IT.

Another 3-2, just keeping you updated. "Top plays" section:



Lost to Dasha with a terrible starting hand (by turn 10, I had no Ogres, one Blade Mage, one Destroyer for 7, a Chimera for 6, and one Dasha, which didn't seem to draw any spellboost cards), because my own hand was even worse. Before that, two Sapphires were exchanged in a desperate move. In the end, the opponent played an Enhance-Golem-Storm combo and simply overwhelmed me with Golems, while I sat there with three Accelerations like an idiot.
But I was most upset not about this, but about the decisive match against a Shadow player, which I messed up myself: sitting at 9 health and knowing that the opponent probably has Aisha, I first destroyed my only Mystic, and then realized that it was, damn it, a Ward that would have saved me. I would have won the next turn. Don't do that.

I also tried a tournament, played as Haven, and the score was 3-2. The winning matches weren't difficult, but in the losing matches, both times the situation was close to an auto-loss – a mirror match where the opponent summoned Aegis earlier than I could, and a neutral rune with their Ginger combo on turn 9.

But I'm having more luck in ranked; I got a 7-win streak with Midsword... I found a situation in one battle against Mid-Dungeon amusing:



It seems to be the strongest Hedgehog I've ever made without spending evolution on it, but that's not the point. On the previous turn, the opponent played Prince of Darkness and Aisha with an evolve for 10 shadows, apparently expecting to clear the board, where, besides the Hedgehog, there was a Lancer/Cú Chulainn, which I had previously used on an enhance to remove Ectar. But he apparently forgot that the Hedgehog had the Mars effect, even though it had been buffed by her, and he foolishly lost Aisha, even though he could have cleared the Lancer with skeletons instead, but he went with them directly to my hero. Don't do that.

I went 4-1 and made it to A. Then I played another match for some reason. It could have been 5-0, but in the first game, I messed up badly due to inattention – I thought I had discarded all the Sapphire cards against Mid-Shadow, and I didn't redraw the last 10+ cards for two or three turns, finishing with my board. Once, he hit me with Aisha directly, and two turns later, he played a second one and dealt another 10 damage, exactly on the ten shadows that I had again forgotten to pay attention to. The funny thing is that before that, I had managed to redraw when I couldn't handle the resonance, and in the next hand, I got the last Sapphire – I didn't discard them all after all. But I thought I had, because before that, I had played a few ranked matches, and in several of them, including against Shadow, I had exactly that situation, so I projected it. Don't do that.

In one of the matches, I encountered Whispering.

200 rubles and two packs for five wins. I saw online that some people got 250 and one pack. Yesterday, I got 120 and one pack for four wins. So, you can farm for a free trial once a day.

Let me bring some more Rivels.





And then I realized that I'll see a reprint of Lucifer in about two weeks.
Not a bad card, although considering all sorts of banishers and a completely insane portal, they won't last long.



Lol, cool, but it's more for T2.



The worst Imperia. More expensive, loses to Jeanne and Left. Only for T2.



This is a real reprint of a card, not just for show. Considering that they remembered about Vanyusha and Battlecraft, it's okay. I'm just curious how they'll handle it in the unranked mode.



Well... I'm not sure if it will place more than 1-2 puppets, but overall it's decent for Bronze.





An interesting card. Overall, it seems pretty good. But I'm not sure if it will be good in control matchups, plus Arthur counters it.





Um... And what's the gold for? Completely uninspired options, very weak.





It's like some kind of Snowcraft. But overall, it's okay. 4 spell boosts for a rune are useless, and you don't need more. The question is, what deck to put it in, it's unclear.



A slightly better Necromancer.



Only for T2, bitsticks are not needed in constructed. But in T2 it's good, and it's also flexible.



I didn't like Elana even before, and now...



E-e-e-e-e.
Starting with RoB, Sidegames has been printing overpowered neutral Bronze units. Hamsa. Kotosov. Eggsplosion (a spell, but whatever). Moon guy. Swintus. Now this.
The effect is so-so, on the level of Hamsa and Kotosov.




Well, it's like "make puppetcraft great again," as if the portal didn't already have tools for clearing the board.





DISHIFT 2.0 IS COMING





THAT'S WHY THEY NEEDED THE ATTACK REPLICA OF THE AEIDOLON
I wonder if we'll ever hear the death replica of Aegis in the game.





Make Mysteria great again; it's decent for casual play. Also, jokes about the rune being a better dragoncraft than the dragon itself.





They didn't have enough forest elephant. Overall, it's a very overpowered finisher, but I'm not sure how easy it will be to trigger.




Mordecai portalcraft edition.



Trippy, but a good tutorial.



DREDKWIN JUNKIE COMBO CHECK
I have a feeling that after the release of this expansion, the number of storming anomalies and faedragon units will increase sharply. And they'll become T1, may Rassilon have mercy.



LOCK FOREST DREAMS COME TRUE
It's a shame that all the lock cards have already been rotated, and it would have been better if this ability was made a clash.



Overpowered lancer.
Although... How overpowered? Mechamancers are already crying over a bunch of cards with enhance, when you want to play ten cards in one turn, and enhance only allows you to play one and a half.