North America clearly had an effect on the Europe Championship metagame with 26% of the room following in Dillon’s footsteps by bringing Amber/Amethyst, while Emerald/Steel representation dropped to 13% making it the fourth most popular choice for competing players. This seemed smart choice considering its lackluster matchup into Amber/Amethyst, which was bound to be a popular pick after its success at the North America Championship.
Amber/Emerald however, jumped back up the ladder of representation being piloted by 25% of the room, with the aggro builds hoping to shine among an expected field of mid-range and control decks.
That said, Amber/Emerald is the ink combination with arguably the highest amount of competitive variants, with the item build featuring cards like Buzz’s Arm and My Adventure Book still lurking in the shadows of the metagame, looking to pray on other control decks with its plethora of strategies to slow the opponent down with cards like Strange Things and Raging Storm, while slowly but surely creeping its way to 20 lore with Enigmatic Inkcaster, and Kevin – Flightless Bird.
Additionally, the “Songs” version of the deck continues to be popular as a control strategy, utilising cards like Strike a Good Match and Tod - Clever Fox to dig through the deck for combo pieces, while discarding powerful glimmers such as Milo Thatch – Getting his Hands Dirty, to then play from the discard with Circle of Life. Something that can be achieved as soon as turn four due to efficient singers like Ursula – Vanessa.
The last deck I want to highlight which sat among the top of the metagame as the 4th most represented deck in the room Is Emerald/Sapphire, or more specifically what the community have affectionately named “Mouse House”.
Attack of the Vine introduced the “team” classification, with glimmers such as Peter Pan and Tinkerbelle – Fast friends immediately becoming a staple in their given ink pairings. Another Team which has proved popular is Mickey Mouse and Minnie Mouse – Adventuring Duo who can be shifted for a cost of 0 on top of one Mickey Mouse and one Minnie Mouse, sporting 5 Strength 5 Willpower and 5 Lore! Since we have the 1 cost Minnie Mouse – Practical Traveler and the 2 cost Mickey Mouse – Bob Cratchet in our format, this means we can play the Adventuring Duo as soon as turn two and be questing for that five lore as soon as turn three which is reasonably terrifying! Plus, when this duo is banished, they are instead placed in your inkwell along with all cards under them, meaning either your opponent immediately ramps you, or if they ignore the card, you just keep questing for five! Some decks simply cannot deal with the 5–5 stat line this early in the game meaning they will just run away with lore before players can do much about it. If they are able to banish them, then you are instantly ramped into other formidable questers like Scuttle – Birdbrained, or Hades – Meticulous Schemer, who quest for a lot of lore and carry the Ward keyword meaning they cannot be chosen, meaning a lot of the games most popular removal pieces are no help at all. This is essentially another aggro deck with the bulk of its questers sitting a little higher on the curve, but if you can develop the turn two or three Mickey and Minnie Shift, you’ll have few issues unlocking this part of the deck.
