Sideboarding 202

How To Beat The ABC's

Written By - Thomas NeilsonMay 24th, 2024

Surviving The ABC's (AGgro, Burn, Combo)

If you've been playing LRAW for even a little but, it's likely you've had the experience of laying down your playmat, setting up your deck and left side, and getting absolutely walloped in short order by Sharn, Adramelech, or Quartzheart, with your opponent reporting the match before you even have time to blink.

These aggressive archetypes can quickly blitz out a game, and at times can feel unbeatable, and in my mind this category is one half of what you'll want to be looking at when building out your Sideboard. Whilst these archetypes can out speed almost everything except the decks in the same category, there are a large number of tools available to beat them out, giving you the breathing room you need to let your deck do the things it's supposed to.

This article will help you understand how you can start to effectively target aggro in your sideboard, but if you're looking for some quicker tips, head down to the bottom of the article for a quick run down of some great anti-aggro sideboard options!

Mist ME

The most obvious way to beat out Fast decks is a category of cards you likely already have in your deck, (or should have in your deck), with those being your Mist effects. Mists From The Fata Morgana is the most iconic one of these, and Welcome To Alburdunn is a close second. These cards give you the general breathing room you need to survive decks that are faster, or the same speed, buying a turn of survival, which may be just what you need to turn a game around into a win.

That being said, it's not necessary to max out on Mists and Welcomes in your main deck, and many decks don't. That being said, if you're running less than the limit, these are some great options when you're looking at where to start filling out your sideboard.

Past the most obvious 2, there are more options than you might think when it comes to surviving against Aggro.

Alburdunn's Mayoral Announcement is the parallel to Welcome To Alburdunn, which has a nice benefit in offering some healing, and being a Unified is a great benefit against Aggro decks packed with Unified negate effects, or ways to remove fortified cards before they can be activated.

Ecrutek, The Wandering Warlock and Ariyus, The Soulbound Warlock are another two great options, which can avoid the power of Unified/Fortified negate cards, and get around Fortified destruction effects. Additionally, in comparison to Welcome and Mayoral Announcement showing exactly when they come into effect, Ecrutek and Ariyus can ambush your opponent after they've invested resources into finishing the game, being able to swift them in after your opponent has activated a card like Slow But Grimm Decay or Ermadexa, Black Magic Sorcerer.

Legion By Legion

In addition to the very strong Bounty options for survival, make sure to look at the options available in your Legion. Many of these pieces are just as strong as the bounty tools available, with the advantage of synergizing with your Legion pieces.

For Archetypal pieces, there are immediate synergies, such as with Black Magic Barrier, which can be retrieved from your Eradication Zone with Reclamation.

A card like Ancient Magi Academy is strongest in a Magi deck where you'll be able to tutor it out, and use it's Once per turn ability repeatedly, but it might be a worthwhile consideration in the sideboard for a Hero deck like Fandorian Midrange. Compared to other defensive tools like Mists, your Ancient Magi Academy can be tutored out with Forgotten Fandorian Keep, and can be retrieved from your discard pile with Fandorian Freedom Fighter.

While certain archetypes may not have a generic option in their card pool, or any option in their legion at all, looking at your in-Legion options can reveal some cards that might be even better than the generic good stuff bounty ones.

Taking It Down

Remember that scene in The Empire Strikes Back, where the Snow Speeders wrap the cable around the AT-AT's legs, completely knocking it over?

Sometimes you don't need an explicit "mist" effect to survive against an aggro deck, and against many lists there are a variety of non-mist effects that can help keep you alive by knocking out a key kill tool, right before they have the chance to finish you off.

For example, Sunrise, Consumed By Courage is a strong sideboard piece, letting you knock out a crucial card, eradicating it from play or from discard. Against Sharn Boars Aggro, their main source of damage comes from Temple Of Duskzog buffing up their War-Boar tokens. Swifting in Sunrise to Eradicate their Temple may be just enough to let you survive another turn, by knocking out their biggest source of damage. Against a variety of decks which rely on battle damage, any Warrior in the game with the (Swift) keyword can keep you alive, even if it's not an intentional kill tool. A card like Majik Void Beast is great for stopping opposing Perish and Rift effects, but it can also help to eat a huge attack from a single big Warrior.

I've personally done exactly this. Majik Void Beast was included in my sideboard mainly against Mal'ady, to stop Rift, Decay, and Suffocate, but it ended up being a great option to bring in against Sapphire Storm too, being something to put in between my Warlord and a 42 Attack Fron.

Calling back to the previous section, there are a ton of cards in each Legion that aren't explicitly damage prevention that can help keep you alive that you might not have considered. Fallen Aerial Assault and Orcbane Savage Wilds both let you deal damage to a Warrior for cost. While they may not as effectively completely keep you alive for a turn, they may be even better for taking out a Warrior before it receives a (Bestow) buff, or an Armament equip, without your opponent being able to stop it.

What To Stop?

Now the important thing to consider here, is figuring out exactly what you're trying to stop. As it is, your sideboard could have 3x Ecrutek, 3x Ariyus, 3x Mayoral Announcement, and 6 more Swift Warriors, but that's a little bit overkill - and leaves you with a lot of weakness against the decks that'll beat you in the late game. Rather, as always when it comes to sideboarding, it's a matter of finding what you need to pack the most impactful 15 card sideboard you can. As such, it's key to look at what effects you have that overlap when it comes to playing into decks, and what effects work to stop the decks you need to stop.

A key part of this will be metagaming. Knowing what decks you expect to see, and how you can expect to stop them. Let's say you're expecting to play into Adramelech Black Magic and Castiel. This case is pretty clear, and is a great spot for Ariyus, The Soulbound Warlock. These decks rely on a huge burst of effect damage, whether from Ermadexa or Oblation, and being able to soak up the damage in response is great.

Now let's say you're also expecting Prometheus Primordial Midrange. In this matchup, Ariyus won't be doing much, but there's other good options to consider. With these three decks especially, you might be interested in a card like Concrete Catacombs. The important thing to think of here is that you're attacking a different part of their deck. You're not stopping them from killing you, but interrupting the setup of their deck. While I'd still recommend having the prerequisite mist effects to stop these decks, the Concrete Catacombs will help out against all 3, stretching out the impact of your sideboard slots.

It's important to note that against some decks the options might not be as clear cut, such as with Sharn Boars Aggro where the deck can push in a lot of Battle and Effect damage. As was mentioned earlier, in these cases you can look at more specific options, or more flexible options. Both choices have their merit, and a sideboard will likely include cards which fit into both categories.

Shackle The Summoner is one example of a more specific sideboard card, locking out token focused decks for two turns with the ability to activate from field, and from discard. If your meta has more decks like Sh'Lara or Marianas, this card might not be quite as specific, and may be a great card into a larger number of decks, but generally Shackle will be targeting 1-2 key decks.

Sunrise, Consumed By Courage, on the other hand, is an incredibly flexible sideboard card, which will be useful in a large number of matchups. While it may not be a complete blow-out, and in the case of boars, your opponent may have another way to buff up their board, but it'll be generally useful in a larger number of matches, whether hitting Temple Of Duskzog against Sharn, hitting Spores Of The Suffering Cyprus against Undead, or hitting any other number of powerful win-conditions.

Even cards like Majik Void Typhoon can be a way to survive, with Typhoon being able to shut down the main win-conditions of Black Magic, Mortis, and Prometheus, if only temporarily. Even if it's not a guaranteed get out of jail free card, it can still be enough to let you see another turn.

Ultimately the crucial point of consideration here is knowing your opponent's decks, knowing what decks you need to be most worried about, and knowing what tools can help throw a wrench in their plans. A card doesn't need to actually prevent damage to be able to prevent a lot of damage if you use it right.

Play Vs Draw

A last point of consideration is play versus draw. Going first or second can have a much bigger impact on your sideboarding than you might expect, and you can get a lot of value out of sideboarding in a way that works best for whether you're going first or second. While there are a few considerations here, such as whether you'll be piercing your veil before they do, my one quick tip for evaluating play vs draw, is that your unified tools will be a little more important going second, and your fortified tools will be a little more important going first.

For example, against Sharn, Shallows At Emerald Loch is a great sideboard card, being able to shut off Reservoirs Of Revival Ooze, and Sildud's Call Of The Orcbane. Shutting off two of their strongest setup pieces is fantastic, but there's a caveat. If I'm going second, chances are that my opponent will be able to activate their Silduds Call and their Reservoirs on turn one, before I've had the chance to even set my Shallows. As such, my fantastic sideboard option gets a whole lot worse if I'm going second.

When going second then, it's important to be aware of your opponent's backline, even if they're playing an aggro deck, as some of their tools might shut you out on your first turn, letting them score a quick turn two kill. As such, I'm a fan of including an extra Dismantle or two in the sideboard to bring in for situations like this, giving me a little more power to punch through their backline cards. Another consideration for going second is to look at your legions first turn breaker options, especially the ones from Guardian's Creed. Guardians like Zenacon, The Magnificent Marvel, and Azrael, The Golden Angelic Requiem, also have great going-second abilities to slow down your aggressive opponents, giving you some room to setup and slow them down.

The LRAW Snapshot Anti-Aggro Sideboard shop

All this information should hopefully help to evaluate why a card might be good in your sideboard, and how it can keep you alive against those decks that'll try to run away with the game early. To actually help with picking out sideboard options however, here's a quick list of some great options to beat out the fastest decks in the metagame, to help build a base for your sideboarding.

Quartzheart Blastforge Aggro

Welcome To Alburdunn

Twilight Daisy

Majik Void Collapse (If you can ignore/remove it!)

Sharn Boars Aggro

Shackle The Summoner

Twilight Daisy

Sunrise, Consumed By Courage

Sharn Orcbane Aggro

Welcome To Alburdunn

Ecrutek, The Wandering Warlock

Ethelhime Alehouse Storm

Stifle Progress

Ignorance Is Bliss

Majik Void Collapse (If you can ignore/remove it!)

Angelica Sapphire Storm Combo

Eon, The Timeshift Warlock

Mysterious Mechanism

Any Swift Warrior

Prometheus Primordial Midrange

Concrete Catacombs (If you don't care about erad!)

Boundless Riptide (If your AP is high!)

Ecrutek, The Wandering Warlock

Castiel Lost MEssiah Tempo

Concrete Catacombs (If you don't care about erad!)

Ariyus, The Soulbound Warlock

Stifle Progress

Adramelech Black Magic Aggro

Concrete Catacombs (If you don't care about erad!)

Ariyus, The Soulbound Warlock

Majik Void Typhoon

Marianas Ancient Relic Aggro

Shackle The Summoner

Sunrise, Consumed By Courage

Destiny Dust

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