Howdy folks, and welcome to the Crystarium! Today we’re going to take a deep look at how today’s spoiler fits into a Sealed or Draft strategy and how you can both play to its strengths on offense and avoid the threat it presents on defense. We’ve got a brand new Cloud of Darkness which will most certainly be a powerful Limited card in Opus XXV. However, I understand not everyone is interested in strategy for Sealed and Draft, so let’s not make anyone wait and let’s throw our spoiler up on the big screen.
So here we have a 5/8, which is not exactly an impressive cost-to-power ratio. At this point in the game, we’re used to getting 3/8s with upside. So with CoD being as expensive as she is, her ability had sure better be carrying her, and what an ability it is. In general, slower, more controlly decks often want to be able to limit the amount of threats their opponent can field against them. After all, it’s much much easier to defend against one or two attackers than five or six. This set features cards like Volker and Zack who excel at putting multiple Forwards out, and cards like Trey and Light Yuna who are happiest when surrounded by friends, and while it’s tough to tell this early looks like it might favor aggression. This may lead to a limited environment where people are likely to overextend, to put themselves at risk of being blown out by a card like Cloud of Darkness. Usually, big sweepers come at high rarities, like Shantotto and Shadow Lord, so people are often not playing around them in Sealed or Draft where they’re much harder to come by. Cloud of Darkness being C makes a defensive strategy so much safer to draft around, since you know you’ll see her come around the table eventually.
In limited especially, where hard removal is more precious, sometimes the way you deter attackers is just having bigger blockers. This can lead to the game not really progressing much, since your opponent can’t attack into your big Forward, and your big Forward can’t attack without leaving you defenseless. In these situations, commonly called Board Stalls, both players can end up with four or more Forwards on the field, pressure mounting and mounting until something breaks. Cloud of Darkness is perfect for these situations. By paring your opponents board to the essentials, it’s suddenly much more safe to start lashing out.
Cloud of Darkness still has struggles, as some decks are built so that board stalls aren’t very common. If your opponent is sitting on a massive threat like a 10k Dyne, CoD isn’t going to do much to get out of that situation. Same if your opponent has an economy lead and is using Gimme Cat and Dull/Freeze effects to keep your resources low. We haven’t seen any evasive threats yet, like last set’s Zidane and Noel, but any card like this will also let their player avoid getting into a board stall. Cloud of Darkness may be a Get-Out-of-Jail-Free card, but that doesn’t help much if you’re being sent to the Hospital. Like with any good control deck, make sure you have a wide range of answers so that you can handle a wide range of problems.
It’s always fun to see what new tools await us each set, how the same strategies and archetypes are enabled and supported by different cards. Cloud of Darkness certainly offers a unique tool to slower decks, one that I’m excited to use in the months to come. Water is already looking like a much better draft element than last time, and I can’t wait to dip my toes in it again. Hope your spoiler season is lots of fun, and we hope to see you next time here at The Crystarium!
