Building For Arakni: Generic Cards to Fill Out a Shallow Pool

By Dimos K

Last week’s philosophical discussion about Arakni’s design and capabilities was all well and good, but what cards should be in the deck to complement those strengths? Arakni has a limited selection of Assassin cards to pull from, and many of the attack cards serve nearly identical purposes. To round that out, we’ll have to pull from the pool of powerful Generic cards available. Firstly, you need to decide what kind of deck you’re building. If you want to try and fatigue everyone you play against, running lots of defense reactions and Oasis Respite is probably your play. I think there may be some mileage mirroring old Kavdaen builds if you want to go the pure fatigue route. If you want to go for a more dynamic, midrange deck, you may want a couple defense reactions and have the rest of your slots dedicated to focussing on Arakni’s strengths. Since they have no specific defensive abilities, this article will focus mostly around their Generic offensive options. Let’s get into some more practical deckbuilding decisions that complement those Assassin cards.

         Some cards just slot so well into Arakni’s deck that I would consider them to be no-brainers to try in the early stages of deckbuilding. These are cards that are a potent mix of efficiency, helpful to Assassin’s on-hit effects trigger, and provide Assassin attacks Go Again. Art of War is a fantastic choice as it does all of the above. The floating resource after pitching a blue to swing Spider’s Bite fits well with Art of War’s cost and the plentiful zero-cost attacks available to Assassin. Razor Reflex is another perfect fit in a deck that needs to make attacks hit and provide them Go Again. Additionally, the other excellent attack reactions available to Arakni make it more difficult to play around Razor Reflex as opponents will have to weigh the different effects of each reaction

Cash In is extremely efficient in a deck that aims to generate one or more Silver each turn. It can easily turn a five-card hand into a six-card hand. Being able to expand hand size in this way usually has outsized impacts, as once your opponent runs out of cards they are able to block with, your on-hits (a key part of Assassin’s play) will always connect. Flock of the Feather Walkers is a card that can represent insane value, and has been in and out of top tier decks throughout FaB history. It is extremely efficient on its own, as cards that generate action points very rarely hit for as much damage as their non-action-point-generating counterparts, The Quicken token made by Flock of the Feather Walkers can be used to set up a next turn which could present three Assassin attacks, each one more powerful than the last due to Contracts applying to every attack on the chain. This could result in a single attack generating three Silver tokens. Alternatively, Flock can be used with Art of War or Razor Reflex to use the generated Quicken token on the turn it is played, which usually means a turn presenting 15 or more damage.  

         The other considerations I have for Arakni all focus on one of three things: make attacks hit harder, give attacks Go Again, or complement the deck with further efficient attacks. Nimblism is a standard pump card that hits every Assassin attack except Surgical Extraction. Come to Fight can apply to any attack and blocks three. Captain’s Call can either buff attacks or give Go Again. Lead the Charge can be an effective way to ensure three attacks in a turn when combined with a likely hit trigger from Blacktek Whisperers. The action point gained will prevent the Go Again redundancy that can sometimes happen. Even Bigger than That is always a strong option for a deck with a one-damage, Go Again weapon, and will create an always-powerful Quicken token. Exude Confidence and Snatch are consistently amazing zero-cost attacks that hit for four damage. In a deck with Quicken tokens and attack reactions, the draw effect from Snatch is excellent. The defense restriction effect from Exude Confidence is amazing if it is played at the start of the chain, as it can prevent responses to attack reactions on Assassin attacks. This also ensures that the effect of Spider’s Bite is even harder to play around, as defense reactions, instants, and action cards all become difficult to block with.

In terms of some more niche options, or at least less-obvious ones, we can look to the Everfest trinkets for some interesting lines of play. Talisman of Featherfoot works well with Art of War and with blue Cut to the Chase. Blue Cut to the Chase can be a great late-game disruption to an opposing pitch stack, as you get to disrupt the top of their deck twice. Although blue attack reactions are rarely favoured in decks, I think Cut to the Chase is uniquely strong and can be compared with blue Warrior favourites like Out for Blood. At blue, both block three, give a plus-one attack buff at reaction speed, and have an additional effect. With six plus-one effects in the deck, the Go Again from Talisman of Featherfoot is strongly worth considering. Another trinket to consider is Amulet of Assertiveness. Unlike Talisman of Featherfoot, Amulet of Assertiveness lets you choose when to use it. Which means that when paired with the effect of Blacktek Whisperers, can let you grant an attack Go Again and give you a card to continue the combat chain. If one attack has hit in a chain, it’s more likely that the next one will as well. This allows you to stack those Assassin on-hits and Silver generation, giving you enough Silver to buy back your boots with the attack played from Amulet of Assertiveness. The four-cards-in-hand restriction is a challenge, but can be worked around effectively with a zero-cost Assassin attack out of the arsenal. Both of the aforementioned trinkets are yellow, which can fund a decently powerful turn in a deck with as many one- and zero-cost cards as Assassin, and they do not consume an action point. As with all items, not blocking is always a risk, but I think this risk is worth considering. These trinkets will not be the best card in the deck by any means, and some people have written them off as distractions and unplayable, but I like to consider all options in deckbuilding, especially with new cards and new classes.