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Cards have been purchased and sorted. Some decks have been built. My training partners and I feel comfortable with Epic’s rules. Let’s do this!

With little time to work with, my support team is faced with a dilemma in regards to deckbuilding.

Nathan Davis at White Wizard Games publishes high finishing decks from their bigger convention tournaments. Love or hate it, net-decking is a thing. We can skip several time consuming steps by just building decks that are factually capable of winning.

OR

As Epic is a young game, we don’t have a large library of card choices. My training friends and I each have several years of constructed competitive Magic; no pro tour or anything like that, but local success. More importantly we can directly translate existing deckbulding skills. Once we understand the fundamental pace and economy differences to Epic’s game play, we should be able to engineer our own capable decks.

To start I favored the accomplishment and insight of proven winners. We built four of the decks from the White Wizard list.

Tom Sorenson’s Origins 2nd place weapon stomps out hard. If opponents do weather the early storm, this deck can clear and rebuild quickly, and has a secondary token engine to boot. Power, resilience, and tricks make this deck the most fun to play. http://decks.epiccardgame.com/decklist/view/83/tom-sorenson-origins-sunday-deck-2nd-1.0

Martin Dickie’s Sunday Gencon winning beat-stick is fast, ambushy, pumpable, evasive, reoccurring and supplemented with direct damage. Martin bets he can overrun you faster than you can counter. He is usually right. http://decks.epiccardgame.com/decklist/view/89/martin-dickie-gen-con-2016-sunday-1st-1.0

Brad Watson finished 3rd in the Friday Gencon contest. His spell-dominant deck is built to gain and keep control via discard, abundant board wipe, card advantage, graveyard manipulation, and waves of tokens. http://decks.epiccardgame.com/decklist/view/92/brad-watson-3rd-place-friday-gen-con-1.0

Derek Arnold won Origins with four colors. His deck runs similarly to Brad’s above, however utilizes additional tricks in green. Control via spells and from champions alike, this deck eventually imposes it’s will ftw. http://decks.epiccardgame.com/decklist/view/82/derek-arnold-origins-deck-1st-1.0

We have spent one week playing only these decks. It was well worth it. I am not naive to think we are even piloting these builds optimally yet, but we have learned a LOT. How fast can a deck be? How many board-wipes should a control deck stock? Is there enough discard to warrant a dedicated theme? We have a base. We know what a good deck has to compete with at least.

As that dilemma above is ever-present, my friends have been looking through the rest of the cards. Of all the factors that will determine success here, engagement is the biggest. My own competitive growth will go as far as my partners engage in Epic. Playing other people’s decks has its benefits, but also its limitations. It’s easier to buy into your own innovations.

I have asked my friends to put together their lists. Me? I am not quite there yet. Think I am going to build two more from the list at White Wizard.