Bravos Deckbuilding 101 – Part 1

     Okay, so I’ve had a request for an article on deckbuilding Bravos decks. This is actually a pretty wide topic as we have three different heroes to look at and then potentially look at different takes on those decks. Now this is going to be MY view on this topic. Others may have different views.

     The first thing you need to do with any deck is pick a hero and then understand what your strategy will be. I have heard of a player who chooses a deck and then chooses a hero to go with it, but I think it should be the other way around, but I guess each to their own on that one. Let’s start with heroes as a top level, and because he’s the easiest I’m going to start with Atsadi in my part I guide.

Atsadi Decks

     Atsadi is the easiest hero to evaluate. He wants you to play big characters and play them in sequence. So, what you really want with him is to ramp as early as you can whilst not losing too much momentum to other decks.

1. Ramp Cards

I think are most essential part of the deck are going to be the ramp cards. This is because you need these to get the deck going. The cards you should be looking at here are:-

Tiny Jinn, Aja, Mighty Jinn and possibly Mana Channelling (though I’m not a big fan of that one).

     Tiny Jinn is your best bet to getting a ramp on T1, which is what I feel a good Atsadi deck should be doing. Ramping T1 gives you the ability to play a 5-cost card T2 and draw a card. For Tiny Jinn to achieve this he needs to somehow get a cheap boost. Almost like our Tiny Jinn needs a Helping Hand.

     Mighty Jinn or Aja are your T2 plays if you fail to ramp on T1. They are also useful for putting good stats on the board to win expeditions. I’ve heard a lot of people saying they don’t like Aja because they ramp your opponent as well. Let me put it this way. An Atsadi deck should have better creatures to play for their mana than your opponent, so I don’t care that I’m ramping them as my quality is better for the mana.

      Mana Channelling can ramp you T1, but the reason I’m not a fan as it doesn’t put any stats on the board at the same time. If I play it, it may be one or two of the common version, which can go into mana if needed later.

2. Protection

     After ramp spells I think you need to look at protecting your big guys. Spindle, Muna Bastion is the permanent for the job here and I would play three of them. I know that the Exalts aren’t big on this, but I think the extra protection is needed, even though you need to take a little time off at some point to play it. Since you are ramping though, you should have the spare mana at some point to be able to play it. The spells you need to most worry about in Atsadi are Sticky Note Seals, Mana Reaping, Mana Eruption and Banishing Gate. All these spells with the exception of Eruption are no longer efficient in removing your big guys if they have to pay two more for them. If your big guys also have Tough, then it stacks and it can be even harder to target them.

3. Big Guys

     The next category in your Atsadi deck is the big guys that I was referring to earlier. You want a range of costs in a kind of slightly inverted triangle as five cost cards will only help you one draw a card. My ranking of five and six cost options is:-

(5) Dorothy -> Achilles -> Atlas

(6) Shenlong -> Asmodeus -> Son of Yggdrasil

     At seven mana you only have one option (Sakarabru) which you need to spend a rare slot on to have and eight mana you have to pick Kaibara or nine if you go for the rare. You need to evaluate which ones you want to upgrade to rare as there are a lot of rare slots that you need in this deck for other things.

4. Removal

     The final category you need to consider is removal. Here you have three choices. Intimidation, Mana Reaping and Mana Eruption. For Atsadi I like Mana Reaping the best as I think intimidation is generally weak, and Mana Eruption kills off our ramp. Giving an opponent ramp is generally not an issue as we more often than not have better quality cards. I’d rather remove a Hydracaena, a Robin Hood or a Brassbug Hive and give them a mana orb then let them stay as there’s nothing worse they can do. The second question though is how much you should play. My feeling is 4 removal spells, though I can see an argument for five, but then you would be digging into your mana.

5. Other Spells

     I don’t think (personally) that you should be playing any other spells in an Atsadi deck with the exception of Helping Hand. Helping Hand is good here because it can a) help Tiny Jinn ramp on turn 1 b) it can give you big guys and play out of reserve late on and c) can give you that last minute boost to win an expedition or at least draw it.

6. Uniques

     So, what Uniques do I think you should be looking for in an Atsadi deck then? Well, I don’t think Atsadi needs card draw Uniques and I also don’t think that the big creature Uniques are the way to go (in the main), tempting though they are. I think the first area you should be looking at are Uniques that can either ramp you turn 1 or can give you a double ramp. Then the next thing I would look at are Uniques that can take out opponent’s characters or permanents. If that happens to be on a big guy then you are two for one, but I strongly believe that two or your three Uniques should be turn 1 mana ramp cards or double ramp cards if you can. Here's an example of a T1 ramp with a Tiny Jinn.

Next installment will focus on Basira decks.