5 Early Access Deck Builds for Forces From Beyond
Introduction
Hey there, Raphterra here! Today I’m sharing the deck builds I experimented with in the Early Access Event for the Forces From Beyond expansion. To give you a preview of the new expansion and some of the decks featured in this article, please watch the following expansion trailer for Forces From Beyond:
Please do take note that these decks are still in the experimentation phase. They may require further refining, but you can use these as starting points for your games once the expansion starts. As usual, once I find decks that work for me in ranked ladder, my detailed deck guides will be coming right after!
Gwen Illaoi
Of the three new champions revealed, Gwen seems to be the the easiest champion to build around. Gwen‘s Hallowed package can fit into aggressive, midrange, and combo strategies. Early Hallowed units like Boisterous Host and Phantom Butler will either deal chip damage or die to trades which will just strengthen your succeeding attacks.
I decided to pair up Gwen with Illaoi as my first experiment with this champion. Gwen Illaoi uses the attack bonus from Hallowed units to make powerful attacks with Illaoi and her Tentacles. Setting up a board with of Gwen, Illaoi and a decent-sized Tentacle can lead to devastating attacks.
If you attack with your Tentacle getting the Hallowed bonus, Gwen still gains the power bonus from Hallowed while Illaoi also gains the power bonus from the Tentacle. Games will end very quickly if you can safely setup your board with these units.
Riptide Sermon and Tentacle Smash are powerful tempo tools that can help you setup your board, since both cards can remove units and develop your board all in one action. Atrocity is the deck’s alternative finisher. Gwen, Illaoi, and the Tentacle are all viable targets for Atrocity in the late game.
Kai’sa Pantheon
After seeing Evelynn and Kai’sa during the reveal season, my initial gut reaction was to pair the two champions together. However, upon testing my build in the Early Access server, I did not get the results I was expecting from this pairing. After losing a lot of games, I decided to explore different options for the two champions.
Pairing up Pantheon with Kai’sa seemed to be a good starting point, since Pantheon gains many keywords upon leveling up. Evolve units like Kai’sa and Void Abomination go online once Pantheon levels up, giving this deck multiple keyword threats in the late game.
The deck functions similarly to the classic Pantheon Yuumi deck. You want to look for, protect, and target Fated units to progress Pantheon‘s level up as fast as possible. The big recent nerf to Zenith Blade forced the Fated archetype to explore region pairings outside of Demacia. Shurima gives this deck more reliable options to give Fated units overwhelm either through The Absolver or through Kai’sa‘s Supercharge.
Mountain Goat, Guiding Touch, and Pale Cascade are still excellent cards from Targon to trigger the Fated keyword. Desert Duel gives us tools to interact with opposing units and works very similarly to Single Combat and Concerted Strike. Shurima also gives access to Ancient Hourglass and Rite of Negation to help protect our key units from removals.
Evelynn Lucian
I decided to combine Evelynn with Lucian in Demacia after losing badly to this pairing. This plays similarly to classic Demacia decks like Elites or Scouts. The plan is to go wide and outstat the opposing board early. Evelynn‘s husks progress Lucian‘s level up, and units from Demacia benefit greatly from gaining more stats and keywords.
Durand Sculptor is a blowout card if you can get her early and setup a wide board. She increases the health of Evelynn‘s husks, which means your units that kill these husks receive double the bonus from Durand Sculptor‘s effect. Domination and Solitude can further snowball Durand Sculptor‘s effect by giving even more stats and keywords.
These stats when paired up with keywords like Regeneration, Challenger, or Tough can be game winning early. Petricite Broadwing, Fleetfeather Tracker, and Lucian will become big threats if they are given the right keyword.
Board-focused Demacia decks often struggle with card draw. Vanguard Redeemer synergizes well with Evelynn since her husks dying will always activate Vanguard Redeemer‘s effect. Golden Aegis can close out games if you have a wide board, and Concerted Strike can get rid of threats from your opponent.
Zilean Xerath
This is an upgraded version of the Landmark control deck with Zilean and Xerath. This archetype saw experimental ladder play but never really made it to high-tier status. Forces From Beyond came with two new fun support cards for this deck: Rite of Passage and Drop The Bomb.
Rite of Passage makes Zilean very easy to level up by duplicating Zilean‘s Time Bombs. An early Level 2 Zilean can outvalue almost any deck in the game with his ability to duplicate cards. Drop The Bomb gives the deck an efficient early removal tool while also giving a free landmark. This can go a long way since this deck has many Landmark-reliant cards like Xerath, Rite of the Arcane, and Desert Naturalist.
The game plan of this deck has not changed much with the new support cards. Xerath levels up quickly in this deck. Once leveled up, Xerath can lock down boards in the mid game when combined with multiple Roiling Sands. As this deck that summons and destroys multiple landmarks across the game, The Arsenal is the most potent late game finisher for the deck.
I never found the time to play this archetype extensively, and I’m really excited to test this upgraded version out in ranked ladder!
Reputation Yetis
The final deck in this article is Reputation Yetis. Riot has been slowly buffing the Reputation archetype, starting with the buff to Trifarian Assessor last patch. Trifarian Training Pits and Captive Yeti are the latest additions to Reputation, and this build tries to make the most out of these new support cards.
This deck goes all-in on the Yeti synergy. Avarosan Trapper, Ancient Yeti, Tall Tales, and Abominable Guardian allow this deck to go wide quickly with 5+ Power units. With this wide board of big units, you can get full value out of Trifarian Assessor and trigger Reputation quickly.
Trifarian Training Pits can be game winning if you are able to establish your board. Both Ashe and Leblanc progress their level ups when you attack multiple times, and big Yetis will force your opponent into bad trades in the mid game.
This deck exerts a lot of pressure against slower decks, but you can also incorporate more Frostbite synergy depending on the meta. Please do take note that I found this deck to struggle a bit against Evelynn and Kai’sa decks. This deck can have a hard time against decks that can develop units bigger than your Yetis.
Closing Words
Riot has really been delivering with the new champions and new support cards. Although I wish there were some balance changes to hit the past meta decks, I still can’t wait to start playing once the expansion goes live!
If you have any questions, feel free to reach out to me on YouTube, Discord, or Twitter!
Raphterra
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