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Of the three starter decks included inDisney Lorcana’sThe First Chapter, the Ruby/Emerald is the trickiest one to improve. Ruby and Emerald make an interesting pairing with their combination of aggressive tactics and heavy control. Finding a way to leverage the strengths of both inks is the key to building a strong deck.
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In this guide, we’ll be covering three ways to build the Ruby/Emerald deck, depending on how much you want to spend when upgrading: a budget version, a more advanced version that will require some investment, and a top-end version that combines the best of Ruby and Emerald into a highly competitive deck.
There are other ways to play Ruby and Emerald, but these upgrades are designed to enhance what the Starter deck does, rather than replace it completely. If you enjoy playing Ruby and Emerald, these are a good place to start.
Stampede (x2)
Tigger, Wonderful Thing (x4)
This starter deck’s greatest strengths are its Evasive characters and its ability to remove threats from the board, so this build emphasizes both of those strategies, while also aiming to make the deck more consistent.
Start byremoving several low-impact items and combat trick-style actionslike Stolen Schimitar, He’s Got a Sword, Viscious Betrayal, and Steal From the Rich, and replacing them with more extra copies of Pongo, Ol' Rascal; Peter Pan, Neverlanding; Jasper, Common Crook, and Mad Hatter, Gracious Host.
you may replace the starter deck’s top-end cards like Stich, Abomination; Captain, Colonel’s Lieutenant, and Rapunzel, Letting Down Her Hair withmore Evasives:Tigger, Wonderful Thing; and Goofy, Daredevil. Finally, you can take out a few of our cheap characters like Megara, Pulling the Strings and Horrace, No Good Scoundrel and replace them with a Dragon Fire and Fan the Flames to help us control the board.
There’s a good number of swaps in this version of the deck, but we’ve only added common and uncommon cards, so it shouldn’t be too difficult to get your hands on them.
The strategy of this deck is toplay your Evasive characters on curve as often as possible, then use your control tools like Dragon Fire, Mother Knows Best, Stampede, and Jasper, Common Crook tocontrol the board and give your Evasive characters an open lane to quest.
Your goal is toquest with your characters as often as possibleto maintain a lore lead on your opponent throughout the entire game while using those control tools to slow them down. When non-Evasive characters like Aladdin, Heroic Outlaw and Mad Hatter, Gracious Host hit the board, you have tools like Shield of Virtue and Fan the Flames that can keep them safe from challenges.
Shield Of Virtue (x2)
Tigger, Wonderful Thing (x3)
For a mid-cost version of the deck, start working in some super rare powerhouses like Hans, Scheming Prince; Genie, On the Job; and Kuzco; Temperamental Emporer. These cards all offer powerful effects or high lore value, so you may scale back on our Evasives slightly in order tofocus on cards that provide aggressive questing as well as board control.
You can alsoadd another Aladdin, Heroic Outlaw to verify you find this high-impact character more often, and replace some of your early game cards like Horrace, No Good Scoundrel and Mickey Mouse, Steamboat Pilot with additional copies of Cruella De Vil, Miserable as Usual.
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This version of the deck is mucheasier to build if you can get multiple copies of the starter deck, since each one will provide you with an additional Aladdin, Heroic Outlaw and Cruella De Vil, Miserale as Usual, as well as a booster pack.
This is a mid-range deck that caps out at six ink (not including the shiftable seven-cost Aladdin) and has a decent number of tools that will help you respond to your opponent’s game plan while keeping the pressure on with high-impact characters. A perfect curve for this deck would look something like this:
You’ll almost certainly be in top deck mode at this point, but there’s a good chance you’ll continue to pull high-impact cards like Kuzco, Tigger, Genie, and Aladdin throughout the rest of the game. If you’re able to get a Mad Hatter, Gracious Host down after turn five, you’ll almost always get to draw one or two more cards, which can give you a big card advantage over your opponent, especially if your Flynn Rider forced them to discard from their hand.If you can continue to quest with your Evasives and control the board with Dragon Fire, Mother Knows Best, and Kuzco, you should have an easy time staying ahead on lore.
you’re able to’t control the cards you draw, which is why it’s so important to focus on making good choices with your opening hand. Lorcana has a generous mulligan rule that allows you to redraw as many cards as you want in your opening hand, so take advantage of that opportunity and attempt to start each game with the best curve possible.
For this deck, you want to ensure you have something to play on the first three turns, while also prioritizing evasive cards.
Pongo, Ol’ Rascal (x4)
Tinker Bell, Most Helpful (x4)
This is the most streamlined and consistently performing Ruby/Emerald deck that maintains the starter deck’s identity asan Evasive-focused and control-centric deck.
Our main goal when designing the deck was to reduce the variance as much as possible while still providing a variety of tools that will help youdevelop a strong board and control your opponent’s play. With this deck, the early game is all about playing valuable targets like Flynn Rider, Charming Rogue, Cheshire Cat, Not All There, and Jasper, Common Crook.
These are cards that your opponent will want to remove quickly, but setting them behind on tempo early.
Ideally, you want to build up to a Turn Five Aladdin, Heroic Outlaw and follow it up with big questers like Kuzco, Temperamental Emporer, Hans, Scheming Prince, and Mad Hatter, Gracious Host, while building a healthy board of Evasive characters like Pongo, Ol' Rascal, Tinker Bell, Most Helpful, and Genie, On the Job.
In order toprotect your board and give your Evasive times to build up your lore total, you’ll use tools like Dragon Fire, Mother Knows Best, Cheshire Cat, and Genie to remove threats.
You can add Maui, Hero to All, which is a Reckless/Rush character that acts a bit like a human Dragon Fire - perfect for getting around characters with Ward. Try tohold onto your Fan the Flames and Lefou, Instigatorto ready your big questers like Kuzco, Mad Hatter, and Aladdin, Heroic Outlaw so that they get more turns to earn lore before they get banished.
This deck has 13 non-inkable cards, or in other words, about 20% of the deck is non-inkable. This is a comfortable ratio for me because drawing too many non-inkable cards can make you quickly fall behind, but some people don’t mind taking a higher risk and adding more non-inkable cards to their deck. You may want to consider putting more Kuzco, Temperamental Emporers and Genie, On the Jobs if you want to play a more high-risk, high-reward deck.
If you lose tempo early and you’re struggling to keep up with your opponent, you havetwo copies of Be Prepared you can use to wipe the board and start fresh. If your opponent overextends, Be Prepared can dramatically set them back and give you the opportunity to catch up.
If you manage to play an Aladdin, Street Rat on turn four and follow it up with a shift to Aladdin, Heroic Outlaw on turn five, you can play Be Prepared early and wipe out an overly aggressive board.
Hopefully, these decks will help you tighten up your Ruby/Emerald starter deck and start thinking about new ways to construct your own versions too. Deckbuilding is an important part of any TCG, so once you’ve tried out these options don’t be afraid to make further alterations until the deck feels good to you.
