Hi there rulers,

I’m Raphaël, from the Top Duck team. I’m going to talk about my “Dark Olympian” deck that I played during the Poissy GP in France, on May 6th, 2023.

DECKLIST

11th Place	Raphaël Nicolle	Yggdrasil, Malefic Verdant Tree
Ruler: Yggdrasil, Malefic Verdant Tree (ENW-068)	Magic Stone Deck: (10) 4x Amadeus, Holy Crystal (TST-095) 4x Magic Stone of Moon Shade (MPR-100) 1x Secret Stone of the Cat Moon (TUS-103) 1x Secret Stone of the Wanderer Moon (TUS-107)
Resonators: (48 of 60) 3x Apollon, the Third Olympian (GRV-001) 3x Hestia, the Sixth Olympian (GRV-016) 4x Poseidon, the Second Olympian (GRV-032) 4x Artemis, the Fifth Olympian (GRV-039) 1x Hades, the Fourth Olympian (GRV-053) 2x Aphrodite, the Tenth Olympian (GRV-071) 4x Ares, the Eighth Olympian (GRV-075) 4x Athena, the Seventh Olympian (GRV-076) 2x Hera, the Ninth Olympian (GRV-080) 2x Magna and Lenneth, the Twelfth Olympians (GRV-081) 4x Persephone, the Eleventh Olympian (GRV-082) 3x Improved Healing Robot (ADW-037) 4x Tisiphone, Avenging Fury (TST-062) 1x Alice, Zeus Incarnate (DBV-091) 4x Alisaris, the Invader of God’s City (AO1-045) 3x Geryon (TST-084)	Chants: (8 of 60) 4x Intimidation (PofA-001) 4x Light of Raze and Revive (AO1-059) Regalia: (4 of 60) 4x Horn of Sacred Beasts (SKL-099)	Side Deck: (15) 2x Secret Stone of the Cat Moon (TUS-103) 2x Secret Stone of the Wanderer Moon (TUS-107) 3x Amaterasu’s Foresight (LEL-002) 4x Angelic Battle Barrier (NWE-001) 2x Faerur’s Spell (ACN-096) 2x Faria’s Summon (LEL-055)

Why did I play Yggdrasil, Malefic Verdant Tree (ENW-068), and The Twelve Olympians?

I was looking for a deck that I could afford (I hadn’t bought anything from H1 and H2 so it was difficult for me to build a meta deck like Viga, Steadfast Steward (NWE-085), Hyde, Solitary Assassin (TUS-068) or Eins (NWE-090) …). So I looked at old rulers, but with the recent banlists, I couldn’t play Carlina (TST-075), Belial (TST-073), or Fiethsing (MSW-053) … not even Zeus, the First Olympian (GRV-087). I had to go back way further.

When I started looking into the meta (with help from Antoine and Tuän, mostly), no matter the deck, every one of them shared something in common: the OTK. I had to find a deck that could survive an OTK while still being able to counterattack quickly. That’s when I decided to play the perfect combination: Yggdrasil, Malefic Verdant Tree (ENW-068), and The Twelve Olympians.

Now that I had my basic idea, I needed to build the deck. After a few prototypes, the deck appeared to have feet of clay. Very sturdy, capable of taking the OTK wave, and retaliating, but … there was a huge flaw: the passivity of the deck.

It relied on being attacked too much. With that in mind, a good player will understand quickly that they just have to set up while dealing with the few counters of the deck to build a huge attack to blow the deck in an OTK, while also keeping some sort of direct damage to counter the Alisaris, the Invader of God’s City (AO1-045) loop.

To become more active and less reliant on my opponent to get Union 7, I came up with the idea of including:

Intimidation (PofA-001), to manage the number of damages I could take in a turn in order to reveal Union 7.

Tisiphone, Avenging Fury (TST-062) is a card with several advantages. It is able to hit me with enough damage so that I can reveal Union 7, while also putting a huge threat on the board. While playing this card, I took the bet that my opponent would let the reso stick to the board because they would want to counter the automatic ability to prevent me from revealing Union 7. Less experimented players, who wouldn’t know Yggdrasil, Malefic Verdant Tree (ENW-068) would let the ability resolve, keeping Will up for removal, which would be a mistake. The rest of the deck is a standard Yggdrasil, Malefic Verdant Tree (ENW-068) with:

Alisaris, the Invader of God’s City (AO1-045), Light of Raze and Revive (AO1-059), Improved Healing Robot (ADW-037) and Horn of Sacred Beasts (SKL-099).

HOW THE DECK WORKS

Alisaris, the Invader of God’s City (AO1-045) loop

This loop cannot make you win, BUT it allows you to not lose to deck out since Yggdrasil, Malefic Verdant Tree (ENW-068)‘s ability makes you RFG cards from the top of your deck when you should take damage, and prevent that damage.

So, what happens if I don’t have cards left in my deck but I should take damage? Nothing, damage is still prevented, you just can’t mill more cards. According to the rules, you should lose the game, while attempting to draw from an empty deck during your draw step.

When should you play Alisaris, the Invader of God’s City (AO1-045)?

Alisaris, the Invader of God’s City (AO1-045) has an ability that has a cost of 0 will AND reveal the card from your hand, which can put it back on top of the deck just before drawing it again. You can loop it indefinitely to not die.

What happens if you cancel Alisaris, the Invader of God’s City (AO1-045)‘s activated ability?

The cost of the ability is to pay 0 and reveal it. The card is basically not counterable (it goes back to hand if it’s countered and you can use it again). That’s what makes this loop really difficult to stop.

Is there a flaw?

Yes, your opponent just has to use direct damage once Alisaris, the Invader of God’s City (AO1-045) is put back on top before you draw it again.

Poseidon, the Second Olympian (GRV-032) loop

Once again, this loop doesn’t make you win by itself, but it lets you draw your entire deck and put an Olympian into play, killing with either Athena, the Seventh Olympian (GRV-076), or Magna and Lenneth, the Twelfth Olympians (GRV-081).

How does it work?

Poseidon, the Second Olympian (GRV-032) has an enter ability that lets you bounce an entity you control to your hand. He also has a second enter effect under U7, which lets you draw 3 and put an Olympian from your hand into play. When it enters with U7, you choose in which order the abilities go onto the stack. We will choose to put the draw 3/put an Olympian first onto the stack and the bounce afterward. When resolving, we bounce Poseidon back to our hand, then draw 3 and put Poseidon, the Second Olympian (GRV-032) into play again. This triggers its two enters effect again, which lets you loop it to draw until you find a kill or sculpt a perfect hand. We can play a Horn of Sacred Beasts (SKL-099) for free and when we need to discard to hand size, use Horn of Sacred Beasts (SKL-099) to shuffle our grave into our deck.

That’s it for the theory, now let’s play:

Poissy’s GP tournament report