Hello and welcome back to Illumination, the Disney
Lorkana podcast. My name's Max. And I'm Sam.
For this episode, episode 40, Sam, I have bad
news. What is it? We lost the die roll. Oh no.
We are going to have to go second in this game.
This is our on the draw episode. We are going
to talk over some things that change when you
are not the one going first during a game of
Disney Lurkana. So we're going to start off by
talking about ways to randomize this, how you
should be altering your hand, talking about what
cards get worse when you're going second and
what cards get better when you're going second
and help get you back into a game when you are
behind on tempo. going to go over all of that
on this episode. Talking about ways to randomize
going first, typically you're going to roll 2d6
and usually... the high roll will go first. Some
people do not like this. There is some contention
around rolling dice for high or low roll. Sam,
have you had to do anything differently than
high or low roll yet while you've been playing
Lurkana? I haven't had to do anything differently,
but I did hear somebody joking around last weekend,
do rock, paper, scissors. Rock, paper, scissors.
In other games, there are cards that they've
printed that kind of let you like pick one. There's
like magic has paper tiger, scissors lizard,
and rock lobster, and you can pick one and then
whatever one wins. can go first. Very common
amongst people, if you're not going to high roll
or low roll, is one person will roll the dice,
the other person will call odds or evens. If
you call it correctly, you go first. If you call
it wrong, the player who rolled the dice gets
to go first. This is generally used for a couple
of reasons. One, it prevents re -rolling, which
is a minimal thing, but it can eat up a little
bit of time. If you're both on slower matches
and you both chit -chat for a minute, be polite,
then you both roll, oh, both got a seven. re
-roll again. Oh, both got a nine. And now all
of a sudden between our pleasantries and the
die roll, we've eaten up a minute or two of our
time clock, which can be the difference between
winning and drawing a game. So important thing
to think about. The odd even helps prevent that.
It also is just one set of dice that are being
rolled and the person rolling them cannot predict
what you're going to call. So it prevents the
concept of a quote loaded dice. Much cleaner,
much easier. It cleans things up. pretty nicely.
I've done an Otter even, I think, twice playing
Lurkana, but much more playing Magic just because
I've played much more Magic. The important thing
is, is that it's fair and it's random. Moving
on to altering your hand when it comes to being
on the draw. Sam, what do you think about when
you're altering your hand? Especially depending
on what deck I'm playing. I think there are decks
that you definitely need some specific cards
when you're on the play versus on the draw. So
I think... I look for more cards that we'll discuss
later that do better on the draws to help you
get back into the game, to help alleviate that
play -draw discrepancy. That makes sense. So
what you're saying is cards that help you come
back from behind, cards that add tempo or add...
board presence are generally cards in a very
general sense that you want to keep. You'll have
two different game plans. One will be a sacrificing
a little bit of your deck's quote -unquote game
plan to keep cards that will stop your opponent
from enacting their game plan. So that's really
important. A good example of this can be found
in the Emerald color. There's a significant difference
between on the play wanting a Cursed Merfolk
and on the draw electing to either skip your
one drop altogether or play something like the
one drop diablo obedient raven so that when it
gets banished you draw a card so bare minimum
you're not losing too much also people do elect
sometimes on the draw to play something like
little baby pegasus so that it's evasive and
it's more of a chance it doesn't get knocked
out by the opponent's first character play of
the game so those are things that definitely
both only quest for one they're far less powerful
than something like curse merfolk but if your
opponent is playing amber steel for example and
They lead on Cinderella and you just lose your
merfolk. That's a huge tempo loss versus where
if you at least are losing Diablo, you're drawing
a card or you're skipping your one drop altogether,
conceding the fact that you're not going to be
the aggressive player this game and you are going
to instead elect to play two one drops maybe
on turn two. That's one of my favorite things
to do is play two one drops on turn two when
I'm on the draw. Absolutely. Or you can scan
their hand with an Ursula, see what's going on.
And then your follow -up could be something like
Flynn. rider charming rogue plus that curse merfolk
plus that diablo there are a lot of options for
changing your game plan around right certain
cards definitely become better certain cards
definitely become worse other decks don't have
a great way to navigate they're not as fluid
amethyst you'll see a lot of fluidity in emerald
decks tend to see that fluidity as well where
you're kind of changing your game plan completely
cards like ursula deceiver cards like we mentioned
a moment ago curse merfolk versus something a
little bit more flexible tend to make your game
plan a little bit less proactive and more reactive
some decks don't have that ability some decks
like that are more hyper aggressively strategizing
will lean into you know what i'm just going to
maximize pressure so that same amber steel deck
while it might want cinderella on the play for
example might lean on something like daisy duck
donald's date on the draw because it's just a
more aggressive card I'm just going to make my
opponent figure it out. So there's kind of two
general ways to play that, right? Like some decks
just can't eschew their really good opening line.
Their opening lines are just some of the strongest
in the game. We see this a lot with the Sapphire
decks. They want to ramp on two, whether they're
on the play or on the draw. I would dare say
maybe a smidge more on the draw because they
definitely want to stay in the game. Sometimes
you're on a deck where you just can't afford
to mitigate those things. You could just have
to go for the best possible assemblage of cards
that you can play. Like these are the strongest
cards. This is the best opening line. I just
want it as close to 100 % of the time as possible,
irrespective of if I'm on the play or on the
draw. So it's really about practicing, right?
We talk about this constantly testing on the
podcast. You have to figure out what the heck
of the deck is supposed to be doing. It's taken
a lot of people a lot of time and testing to
understand when you're playing on the draw, you
want this. grouping of cards or you want to go
with this particular curve versus when you're
on the play, you want to do something maybe a
little bit more ideal or a little bit more proactive.
Depends on the deck. So you really have to think
it through and also kind of snowballs if you
know what your opponent's playing or not when
you're on the draw. If you don't know and you're
just in the blind, I have no idea what they are
doing. You can make a guess. You can try to double
down. I have definitely taken the I'm going to
guess what my opponent is on and been so far
from correct and punished because of it. I will
rarely lean heavily into my intuition or just
like basing it on what I've seen this person
play in the past. But sometimes when you see
the local crew and you're like, okay, this person's
a blue red player. I'm going to try to keep as
if they're playing blue red and they're like,
no, never mind. I'm actually on like purple,
amber, hyper aggro. And you're just like, oh
no, things have gone terribly for me because
I have kept cards that are better in a late game.
It can happen. trying to make your best guess
and this is these are all reasons why when you
add it all up we tend to see that what sam described
earlier is that play draw discrepancy when you
get percentage points for being on the play because
lorikana is so predicated on your opening moves
in a similar fashion to chess the opening stages
of the game are very critical to trying to set
up the mid and late games so not knowing what's
going on it forces you to do the most either
thin spinning or kind of diluting your hand,
where it's like, I'll keep a couple of things
that are good and hope that I draw more of those
things as the game progresses, but I'll keep
one or two things that help me early, one or
two things that if they're a slower deck I can
play, and I'll just ink appropriately. Essentially
like keeping five real cards and conceding the
fact that I'll be inking two of these cards in
whatever direction my opponent is playing. That's
a strategy as well. There's a lot of thought
that goes into it, and I think the more mid -range
your strategy is, the more you're stuck trying
to figure out how the heck do I mulligan for
the best chance of winning when I am on the draw.
So let's talk a little bit about that. Some cards
in each ink identity that lose a little bit of
advantage when you're on the draw. We'll start
with Amber. We already mentioned one of them
at Cinderella. Ballroom Sensation. Cinderella
is almost, if not one of the best singular cards,
not counting a Diablo shift, not counting a bell
off of a powerful opening cards you can play.
Just one singular cardboard rectangle. She represents
a litany of disastrous things that can happen
to you. You either have to call your opponent
and hope that they were bluffing, but if you're
wrong, you're in trouble. Or if you're too scared
to put something on the board, they just get
to quest and you eventually know you're going
to have to call them. But you'd like to do it
maybe in a spot that's a little bit more advantageous
for you to kind of pick that battle. Either like
we said earlier, you skip your turn one play
or you play cards that will survive. her singing
a three cost song right sometimes you'll elect
to build your deck in such a way that you're
playing a heavier amount of one threes for one
because you want to survive that first initial
let the storm rage on shot so you'll see this
when emerald steel or amber steel are heavier
players in the meta card like cinderella definitely
has the hallmarks of that and similarly i guess
on the other side of the amber coin is something
like lilo making a wish insanely powerful because
you know you're going to get a quest off most
of the time before Lilo gets answered. And if
your opponent doesn't have that one drop, you
might even be able to get two quests off with
that Lilo, which is backbreaking. The odds of
you being able to quest more than once with that
Lilo, you may not be able to quest at all. If
that Lilo comes out, if the only one drop in
your hand and your opponent plays Cinderella
and passes, you're like, oh no, oh no. What do
I do now? It's not even inkable. Right. It's
not inkable. Like you just throw it down and
close your eyes and just hope that you're not
just wasting an entire card for essentially half
of a card, right? Because let the storm rage
on. will replace itself so that's kind of a disaster
put you way behind both in terms of cards in
hand the opponents evened out cards with you
being on the play and you haven't gotten to leverage
those cards using the best advantage of the extra
card you were drawn so That's a disaster. Amethyst.
We see kind of two cards that are very similar
on this list. Chernabog's Followers and, of course,
the Magic Broom. They both, again, suffer from
the same problem where if they get put down,
they may not get to do their cantrip where you
don't get to replace them with a card, which
can be really rough sometimes on the draw. However,
you can leverage these cards a little bit because
you're not leaning as hard on them to draw you
a card. Sometimes you can just be like, you know
what? I'm going to smash with my Chernabog. followers
because I don't care I'm already up a card my
opponent's down a card so I'm willing to go one
for one trade because remember if I'm in eight
cards because I went second my opponent's on
seven cards because they went first and we trade
one for one I'm still up a card in the scenario
where let the storm rage on comes down I'm no
longer up that card I've now conceded that card
to my opponent they not only got to resource
and add to the board first they also are now
at card parity with me and that is a disaster
I need to do everything I can to make that card
count, right? I need that card to help get me
back into the game. That's why you draw typically
in trading card games when you go second. Emerald,
we talked a lot about these already. Curse Merfolk
and Ursula, Deceiver of All, both cards that
when you play it on time behind, you risk your
opponent having a card that can just immediately
answer them and let them do nothing. And that,
again, is the hallmark of a disaster. And you'll
note a lot of these cards have the similar problem
of they come down and don't do anything. Flynn
Rider, frenemy. We don't even see Flynn Rider
getting played right now because it's such a
disaster against the steal strategies. I play
Cinderella, pass. I play Flynn Rider, pass. Sing
the song, damn. I've lost all kinds of advantage.
We see this in Sapphire with McDuck Manor. This
card, oftentimes, you're not going to be able
to just slam it down on four if your opponent
is a little slower because they're, again, they've
got an add to the board. first. You can use it
certainly to buy yourself a turn or two to try
to get back into the game and force them to exchange
essentially some quests and give up lore advantage
to try to take out your manor. So I'm not saying
it's awful. I just think it is a slight step
worse on the draw. And then in steel, we have
good old one drop captain hook forceful duelist.
Looks great when you're on the play, but on the
draw, sometimes just like goodie, my opponent
can answer this and still quest or they can just
set up to it. ignore it, or respond to it, where
if they lose the unit, they can immediately just
take it out very easily with something like a
Calhoun, for example. So these cards tend to
lose you that advantage, giving the opponent
the chance to take down an entire card from you
without necessarily giving up a card on their
own, which means that, again, you've lost the
advantage of drawing an extra card. And when
that happens, your opponent is now entirely advantaged
because they got to ink and play cards first.
They always are wanting. up on you. Obviously,
towards the mid and late game, they might not
be inking every turn, but in the early stages
of the game in Lurkan, at least the first three
turns, typically, we're going to see a player
inking in order to play cards. It's bad if they
don't. Right. Something's gone disastrously wrong,
or I don't know what kind of strategy they're
playing, if that's intentional there, but you
never know. So let's flip the script a little
bit and talk about cards that get us back into
the game in these colors. So let's talk first
about Amber. Amber has seen an uptick recently,
right? Got a couple new cards. In the set eight.
meta it's definitely seen more popularity especially
the non whole new world variants than we've ever
seen before and it's no surprise that two of
the best cards for amber on the play are on the
draw to get back into the game something like
rhino we've seen rhino now just define the on
the draw line of playing the 116th wolf into
the power hamster crazy just crazy powerful and
then lady family dog being able to just dump
your hand before they can start to leverage discard
just forcing you to add more units to the board
quickly than your opponent can answer. So you
get to respond very quickly and kind of lessen
that tempo advantage. And of course, we have
Daisy Duck, one of the best cards for Amber on
the draw because of those stats. Even giving
your opponent extra cards, right? Again, we talked
about how bad it is to give up card advantage.
Daisy's so powerful that it's like, yeah, I'll
give up card advantage for 6 -8 lore. No problem.
Amethyst has some cards that all look very similar.
I can tell you they all cost three. You probably
have already thought of them. We have Madam M.
Fox, of course. And she wouldn't be complete
without her best buddy in crime. Merlin Crabbe.
And adding to the menagerie on terrible things
you can see out of Amethyst on three has become
Peter Pan, Shadowfinder. The blight of anyone
who does not play many evasives in their deck,
where this card can just shoot you from the skies.
Meanwhile, just singing friends on the other
side, thumbing their nose at you. Easily take
out a Diablo. Takes out Diablos. It gives gigantic
four drops the ability to come rushing in and
answer. board it just it so cleanly answers so
many things and in concert with things like crab
it just gets even worse even quicker emerald
we have wrong lever of course this card has become
the blight of many people who want to answer
things with non -rush evasive characters if you're
playing diabolos we've seen this in a lot of
the emerald amethyst strategies whether you're
playing tempo or you're playing the diablo style
discard deck the new comer to the party as well
lewis our favorite crocodile buddy, coming in,
giving something reckless and usually just devouring
it in the process or making them jump through
hoops to not lose that and then taking more time,
which gives you more setup. And then, of course,
we have everybody's favorite two -dropping in
Emerald, which is Ursula Deceiver. Just happy
taking cards out of an opponent's hand who has
less cards to begin with is always really nice.
So there's some strong ones there. Ruby, of course,
the three -drop Sisu that comes down. is evasive
and can take care of something with one or less
strength. That's a great way to take care of
something. The following turn, hit something
in the air with like a pump from a vitalosphere
or in two turns or less shift into the empowered
sibling and just wipe the opponent's board completely.
Since the beginning of the game, the very first
chapter, we of course have Maui, hero to all.
This card just comes down and can usually take
two to three cards with it. No problem. And of
course, not too dissimilar, the Blight of everybody
who has an opponent at 18. Super Goof coming
down and challenging and gaining two lore. These
are ways to get back into a game effectively
and keep a body on board. Drop your opponent
down one. So all very strong. In Sapphire, we
talked about this earlier. We have Teepo and
Sail being the two drop rampers that help you
get ahead going from two to four. Powerful. The
context that Blurple is founded on is going from
two to four. It's just the strength. of that
strategy. A newcomer to the party, Bell, Apprentice
Inventor, just a blight to anybody who has small
characters acting like a giant roadblock or a
fine singer. So both of those very, very good
on the draw to help get you back into a game.
And Steel, no slouch when it comes to these cards
either. We of course have the Deadly Calhoun.
We've talked about that card already. We have
kind of related in the Amethyst Steel world,
we have the Giant Cobra that can really help.
Gigantic. body that comes down ahead of schedule
and puts you ahead on lore. Oof. And takes advantage
of the extra card you have in hand. Yes. And
I think the card, and I saved this to the end
intentionally, is kind of a card that ties the
whole discussion together is underplayed right
now but might see a tick up in play because i
do believe it doesn't rotate is steel action
twin fire so this is a two cost unankable action
that deals two damage to a chosen character or
if you also choose to discard a card it deals
two damage to a different chosen character. So
on the play, you can shoot one thing. Likely
that would be the case, right? You're just only
going to need to shoot one thing. But on the
draw, you can take your opponent's board from
two characters to none through utilizing that
gasp extra card that we got for going second
so that is a really huge benefit that twin fire
gets and i think that this card is kind of a
good way to think about a card that helps you
on the draw and it's most stripped down sense
it really just lets you leverage a card that
you have that's extra so it puts you at parity
and can put your opponent down two cards on board
so now you've gone down two cards to make your
opponent go down cards and now they have lost
as strong of a board advantage and you maybe
discarded a card that was irrelevant in the matchup
or wasn't going to be an impact until much later
in the game. Just an uninkable that was clogging
up your hand. We've all had those double dock
hands, right? Just lets you leverage and get
through some of the chuff in your deck in a really
effective way and can help you again turn what
is an overwhelming board early into a parity
state just off the back of one card leveraging
that card. Definitely all awesome cards. I just
want to give a shout out to our awesome community
on Discord who gave us a lot of these suggestions.
We really appreciate it. Honorable mentions are
the beloved Sticky Mickey, hard to remove. Everybody's
favorite Bumbling Mate, Mr. Smee, just one of
the best two drops of all time. Any 1 -3 we haven't
previously called out. And Kit Cloudkicker, tough
guy. So those cards all feel pretty good on the
draw. Cloudkicker is insane on the play. if you're
playing Amethyst, Emerald Tempo, but is fine
enough. on the draw, right? Delay that Diablo
long enough, you can get a genie down and then
answer the Diablo permanently is a great strategy
to deal with something in a color combination
that doesn't have direct answers, I guess up
until wrong lever, because goodness, that's a
real card. So these cards get your opponent to
slow the game down a little bit while you generally
can add to the board and keep things on board
or leverage the cards to keep your opponent down
or controlled on resources and then allow you
to kind of ratchet. momentum back and start to
take over the game which will allow you to win
the game by this simple premise. Keep questing.