LoR Meta Snapshot #24

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Rating: 4 stars

Feel The Rush is a Freljord/SI control ramp deck. Its main win condition is to play Feel The Rush on T7 with the help of ramping tools like Wyrding Stones and Catalyst of Aeons. With the exception of Ionia lists, which have access to Deny, many decks find it very difficult to answer FTR’s huge tempo swing. Thus, if FTR resolves, the game is usually over. Atrocity is another crucial card, as it can help you to end the game one turn after FTR is played. You have strong tools at your disposal to dominate matchups with a number of decks. For example, Withering Wail will devastate Discard Aggro, and The Ruination will wreck Tahm-Soraka.

One important skill when playing Feel The Rush is banking mana so that you can play it as early as possible, or to keep yourself open in order to have enough mana for board wipes. For example, it might not be a good idea to play anything on T1 and T2 so you can play an Avalanche with no downsides on T4. Of course, a lot of this is matchup-dependent, but (as usual) being able to plan ahead will be helpful to pilot this deck well.

If possible, try to level-up Trundle before you play FTR, so that you have two Overwhelm units with 10/10 statlines to attack with. Trundle with the Overwhelm keyword can often be the difference between losing and winning. Against Aggro, it might not be a good idea to focus on ramping in order to play Trundle on T4. Instead, you want to mulligan in search of an Avalanche.

For tech cards, you can consider Grasp of the Undying or The Box if you’re facing a lot of Aggro. Both cards deal with 3 health champions (e.g. Ezreal, Kalista) easily. More importantly, they do so at Fast speed. However, we would caution against adding too many copies of Ledros, as he can brick your hand and detract from the deck’s win condition. Remember that this deck is mainly about winning with FTR summoning two 10/10 champions that are very difficult to answer. (Write-up by Crixuz)

Additional notes: Feel the Rush is becoming stronger due to the meta seeing more Ezreal-Draven and Go Hard, both of which are favourable matchups for FTR. There’s also a dearth of Ionia decks, except for Fiora-Shen.

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Rating: 4 stars

With Team Spain showing off a better version of Mistwraith Aggro during the EU Master’s tournament, this deck continues to reinvent itself to stay formidable in the current meta. On top of the prior addition of Pale Cascade to help with consistency and trading, Mark of the Isles has also found a spot to help with survivability against removal.

While it might seem contradictory, given that it adds +2/+2 and Ephemeral, the added stats do help with trades a lot. Moreover, making an ally Ephemeral gives you the flexibility to add potentially lethal damage to an unblocked attacker in the late game, as well as the ability to select allies to die in order to level-up a Kalista, or to make room for The Harrowing.

The deck has amazing drawing power in Pale Cascade, Glimpse Beyond and Stalking Shadows, which makes it very consistent. With all these tools, it’s hard for the opponent to exhaust this deck from a defensive position. Mistwraith Aggro is a really good deck to climb with, as it can be considered the best counter to the most popular list at the moment (Go Hard).

The Fearsome mechanic is still a powerful one in the current meta; the reliability of getting your Frenzied Skitterer with all the draw you have in the deck makes setting-up OTK boards against other board-centric decks (e.g. Tahm-Soraka) a realistic option. Risen Mists is another card that helps a lot in setting-up the OTK and surprising your opponent, as it adds a minion (that buffs other Mistwraiths) at Burst speed, ensuring that priority isn’t passed back to your opponent.

Against more defensive strategies, you can rely on a steady damage output, as bigger boards will be punished by AoE removals. The draw package will be your key to victory in such matchups, as keeping a constant refill is key. Glimpse Beyond is great here, as it not only draws two cards, but it can also deny the healing from draining spells like Grasp of the Undying. (Write-up by Den)

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Rating: 4 stars

Ezreal-Draven is one of the few decks still considered as a work in progress. A lot of the others have reached their full potential, but this one is different. This is a controversial and much-discussed deck at the moment, and for a good reason, as versatility is a central component.

Relying mostly on Ezreal to close out games, the deck presents itself with tons of ways to deal with the opponent’s board and leveling-up its core champion. This aspect of the archetype performs very well against Aggro decks, as cards like Mystic Shot, Statikk Shock and Get Excited! provide significant roadblocks to the opponent’s board development. Ezreal-Draven isn’t weak against control decks, as the early minions and Draven are great ways to deal some damage that will help Captain Farron and an evolved Ezreal finish the game later on.

The huge amount of cycle gained from the PnZ region is what makes this deck so good at the moment, as it allows you to be effective on both sides of the spectrum. This is crucial to the archetype, giving you a much better chance of finding the cards you need. You can cycle the Axes from Draven and the Mushroom Clouds from Chump Whump, so you don’t have to discard any main deck cards.

This deck has myriad different ways to be built, with at least 5 or 6 prominent ones right now. The list we’re presenting here is focused on tempo and staying ahead while cycling for our good cards. Take the board early, either to slow down the opponent or to start getting some damage in. Try to evolve Ezreal while maintaining your lead and cycling your deck, before looking for the killing blow. This can be either a huge damage turn with multiple spells and Ezreal or Captain Farron simply being a huge threat while generating tons of damage in your hand.

While its Tier 1 potential is undeniable, Ezreal-Draven seems to still require a bit more refining before potentially taking over as this meta’s best deck. The archetype definitely deserves a lot of consideration though. Versatile players looking to have flexible game plans should absolutely give it a try! (Write-up by Den)

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Rating: 4 stars

Fiora-Shen is a Midrange deck with multiple win conditions, namely through board pressure or trading four times with Fiora. Most of the game plan is trying to be the one in the driver’s seat; from there, you can decide on which specific win condition you’re aiming at. If you lose control of the game, you lose the opportunity to do this.

In order to gain this momentum, the deck is stacked with combat tricks (e.g. Sharpsight, Riposte) and ways to force combats (Single Combat, Concerted Strike) that protect your board and interact with the opponent’s even outside of the combat phase. Drawing is of course very important, and Rivershaper is the star of the show in that regard. Combined with Barriers and all the support cards in your deck, you can abuse it and cycle your deck pretty efficiently.

Relentless Pursuit is the new addition to the list, a strong card usually seen in MF Scouts. Here, it allows the player to pressure their opponent by trading with barriers and then attacking again, or to take the value trade from your Challengers when the opponent thinks it’s safe to develop their board.

Overall, this is a “do it all” archetype, which can go in different directions and allows the player to focus on various game plans. It’s important to note that the list has a tendency to lose to itself when it’s unable to get on board in the early game, as having the tempo advantage is still a key component to the deck’s success. (Write-up by Den)

Additional notes: Fiora-Shen is a well-rounded machine. It has no obvious weaknesses in the current meta and being the only deck that still runs Deny is extremely strong. It’s better than Zed-Lee, because it can “hold the door” against Aggro much better than Zed-Lee can.

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Rating: NA: 4 stars, EU: 3.5 stars

As a Midrange combo deck, Tahm-Soraka wants to curve out early with its self-damage units and set-up a powerful mid game with Star Shepherd, eventually able to achieve an alternative win condition through the Star Spring landmark. By clogging up the board with units, you’re able to dictate the pace of the game.

Once you’re in control of tempo, you can focus on building towards one of your three win conditions: Star Spring, feeding Tahm and generating board presence. Having said that, it isn’t uncommon to win through the value derived from your combat tricks while Soraka draws you all the cards you need.

When it comes to problematic units from the opponent, this is where the Kench should be unbenched. Between all the heals and combat tricks, in theory Tahm Kench will be able to take out one enemy unit per turn, which by itself could be more than enough to win the game. To help Tahm in the removal department, Shakedown pulls double duty in helping to remove enemy units and damaging your own units to reach the Star Spring win condition.

Another strength of the deck is the flexibility of card choices available to you. The plethora of powerful cards available in Targon (e.g. Bastion, Broadbacked Protector) allow you to tech the deck in various ways for differing matchups. (Write-up by Zenaton)

Additional notes: Tahm-Soraka isn’t very successful in EU due to the prevalence of Mistwraith Aggro (hence the lower rating). Although the deck could never hit Tier 1 because of cards like Crumble and The Ruination, it could be a great tournament deck once you ban your bad matchups.

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Rating: NA: 3.75 stars, EU: 3.5 stars

With efficient units and threatening combat tricks, Ashe-Sejuani is a Midrange powerhouse able to bully its way into destroying most other Midrange decks. With Freeze effects and Troll Chant winning combat engagements for you, you’ll be poised to take over the game and run it at the pace you want. Culling Strike is a strong removal spell that synergizes insanely well with Freeze, letting you deal with problematic enemy units. If your opponent tries to go wide, an early Reckoning can win the game for you, since most of your units will have 5+ power.

Trifarian Assessor allows you to take advantage of all these raw stats on your board by letting you draw enough cards to aid your search for victory. A primary finisher in the form of a leveled-up Ashe, alongside the Frostbite effects, will allow you to have one big turn where you can attack with all your units against an opposing board that won’t be able to block. (Write-up by Zenaton)

Additional notes: Ashe-Sejuani is a good deck if the meta allows it to engage in one-on-one combat. However, the meta is no longer board-centric and hence the deck is slowly falling out of favor.

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Rating: NA: 3.75 stars, EU: 3.5 stars

Fast & Furious, this deck doesn’t have the time to play around. Throw away your whole hand, take advantage of the freebies on your Discard-based cards and hope for the best. With Draven as Dominic Toretto and Jinx as Leticia Ortiz, call your friends and start the race. Vision serves as the nitro in your engine, get some and you’ll power up your cards. This deck is hit-or-miss, so get ready for quick wins and devastating defeats.

Discard Aggro is seeing a lot of play and can succeed on ladder due to SI control decks not being as popular as they used to be. However, the list struggles against Go Hard and EZ-Draven, which prevents it from achieving a higher rating. This is also a deck where the draws can have a greater effect on the game than the player’s own skill. (Write-up by Ultraman 1996)

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Rating: 3.5 stars

Anivia, true to her nature, is making a comeback into the game. By herself, Anivia is already extremely hard to deal with, but with the support of The Rekindler and The Harrowing, she’ll get resurrected over and over with multiple copies on the board.

So, why are Anivia decks seeing play again? First off, with Deny disappearing from the meta, she’s poised to perform quite well. Also, with board-centric decks becoming more popular, Anivia decks are strengthened, as they should be able to stall against such decks easily while setting up a board-wipe-aplenty late game. Along with the absence of Deny, Obliterate effects are also scarce at the moment, which further suits Anivia given her resurrection focus.

The deck plays Anivia as the only champion, which allows us to draw her from playing Entreat. Apart from Entreat doing the obvious job of allowing us to find Anivia in the first place, it also has a role of supplying Anivia’s Harsh Winds to devastate any high attack units in the late game.

As you have access to the great late game of multiple Anivias, your main goal in the early game is to slow your opponent down so you can actually reach the later stages. With all the healing and AoE the deck packs in, you should be able to dominate any Aggro deck. Then, once you’re able to start stabilizing with a T6 Anivia into a potential T7 The Rekindler, you’re well-positioned to win the game with a big The Harrowing. (Write-up by Zenaton)

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Rating: 3.5 stars

Heimer-Vi is very much underplayed for its power level. It’s a Midrange/control archetype that can either use the Piltover tools to seize tempo or the Targon package to generate value. These regions work great together, as both can be used for pushing damage or for slowing down the opponent, giving the pilot a lot of freedom.

Thanks to units like Mountain Goat, Sump Dredger or Spring Guardian, Heimer-Vi can survive the early game. Healing cards, especially Starshaping, are crucial in providing extra survivability. Your aim should be to transfer safely to the mid game where you can start developing the real threats. Vi is often the star of that phase, being able to contain the opposing board while also representing a big threat to the opponent’s health count. A well-timed Heimer which the opponent cannot answer will put you in a favorable position.

The late game is where the Invoked Celestial cards come in, helping the deck avoid running out of steam. Combined with the value Heimer can generate, it gives what looks like a Midrange tempo deck a lot of firepower in the later stages of the game. The damage cards from Piltover can now be used to finish the game and Targon’s support cards (e.g. Guiding Touch) serve as fast cycle to keep the pressure up. (Write-up by Den)