Sixty-Five Million Years In The Making

The Saurian Republic serves as a great example of wisdom comes with time. These physically imposing dinos are also intellectually brilliant. They love a good debate and uncovering the technology surrounding them. This house makes extensive use of the Exalt keyword. Exalt places 1 Æmber on a creature when played. Saurian creatures utilize abilities that activate or abilities that become more powerful only when the creature has Æmber on it. When a creature with Æmber on it is destroyed, that Æmber goes to your opponent. This makes the play of House Saurian a risk vs reward style, requiring you to think out your moves carefully.

The first dino we’ll look into is Aquilia, Lone Hero. Aquilia brings the Omni ability, allowing you to activate it even when you don’t choose Saurian as the active house. Players capture 1 Æmber if there are more enemy creatures than friendly by using this ability, giving solid Æmber control to the deck. With 6 power and 1 armor, Aquilia can hold on to that Æmber for quite sometime if not focused on by your opponent.

What’s more imposing than a dino? How about a dino with a ballista strapped to its back? Time to bring in Ballistego to wreck havoc on your enemy’s battleline. Mentioned above, Saurian commonly use the Exalt keyword and Ballistego is one of them. It brings the Play ability where you exalt Ballistego, placing 1 Æmber on it. While it has Æmber on it, it gains the splash-attack 3 ability. This allows you to deal 3 damage to a target’s neighbors when you attack with Ballistego. This means your opponent will need to focus down Ballistego or else you will clear their battleline faster than they can say Grammaticus Thrax.

Which so happens to be our next card to look at. As mentioned in our previous article, every house in Winds of Exchange includes a common card with the Enhance keyword. Grammaticus Thrax carries the mantle for Saurian. The two bonus capture icons grants you extra Æmber control, thwarting your opponents plans to forge a key and the bonus damage icon helps finish off weak creatures.

Planning to join the ranks of the Saurian Republic in Winds of Exchange? Well, welcome to the team Recruit! When you Play this card, you generate a token creature. What’s better is if you exalted a creature during the same turn, you can archive Recruit. That allows you to play it again later!

Now let’s all prepare to check out Symposium. When you play Symposium, you exalt, ready, and use a friendly creature. If you decide to use this on a token creature, you can choose to exalt, ready, and use another friendly creature as well. This card gives great utility to the deck, allowing you the opportunity to use a non-Saurian creature in a turn where Saurian is your active house or use a Saurian creature an extra time during a round.

Finally, it’s time to read Epic Poem. Playing it allows you to exalt a friendly creature. You then gain 1 Æmber for each Æmber on that creature. Keeping in mind the amount of exalt and capture abilities in Saurian, Epic Poem brings the potential to generate a lot of Æmber for you getting you that much closer to forging keys to victory!

Unveiling What Lurks Below The Water

Unfathomable won’t be the newest house in the Crucible upon Winds of Exchange’s release, but they still are a force to be reckoned with. The creatures of the sea brings a flurry of tools to slow down your opponent, temporarily disrupting and stalling your opponent’s play. So what new tools do they have hiding under their gills? Let’s dive into the depths of this aquatic house.

First up is Covetous Hema. This creature brings a strong capture ability upon play, capturing 3 Æmber. Easily disrupting any plans for your opponent. However, it’s best not to play Covetous Hema alone. When it’s not on a flank, it gains the elusive ability. This means each turn when it’s chosen to be fought for the first time, it is dealt no damage while also dealing no damage back. Pair it with a high powered creature near it and hold on to that Æmber for a bit longer.

Our next card, Kamalani, proves quite the conundrum for your opponent. It features the Destroyed ability, allowing you to create 2 token creatures when destroyed. Does your opponent allow Kamalani to remain on the field and reap Æmber for you or do they destroy it and let you generate token creatures? A deck with the previously revealed Cultist token creature could greatly benefit from this ability. Allowing you to play the mighty Tangaika more easily.

The Enhance creature for house Unfathomable goes to Kelpminder. Kelpminder dishes out two bonus draw icons to the deck it’s in and 1 bonus capture icon. This can help you get to your more powerful cards just a bit faster while giving you some extra Æmber control.

Next up is Initiation, one of the token generation cards for Unfathomable. When played, you make a token creature. If you happen to have fewer than 4 cards in your hand, you can archive Initiation to use on a later turn. This is a fairly easy condition to meet if you play your cards right. So be sure to think about the order you want to play your cards before using Initiation on a given turn.

Friendly fire isn’t always a bad thing, especially when it’s coming from Abyssal Sight. This card allows you to destroy a friendly creature. If you do, you can look at your opponents hand and choose a card for your opponent to discard. This can be a great way to get rid of a potential powerful card waiting to be played. A great combination is to use Abyssal Sight with a creature that has a destroy effect, like the previously mentioned Kamalani!

Sometimes you need to quickly stop your opponent from forging a key. Well Crushing Deep may be that card you need! When played, this action card makes keys cost +3 Æmber on your opponents next turn for each forged key your opponent has. That could mean a forged key costs double for a turn, a great way to stall and get yourself right back into the match!