Don't be late to the ball!

Don't be late to the ball!

Written by Steven Peets

“Cinderella, you're as lovely as your name

 Cinderella, you're a sunset in a frame

 Though you're dressed in rags, you wear an air of queenly grace

 Anyone can see a throne would be your proper place.”

  Hello fellow Force of Will players and welcome to my first article.  Today I'd like to discuss a different approach on a deck and one of my favorite cards Cinderella, the Ashen Maiden.  First lets look at her, go over her abilities, and rate the card over all. Two dark for a 400/400 is in no way what I would consider value and pretty mediocre when compared to other double will cost resonators.  Not to mention she will not be easy to splash in multiwill colored decks.  Her abilities however make up for her lack in printed atk/def.  The first being whenever this card deals damage to your opponent, you may search your main deck for a prince resonator, reveal it and put it into your hand and then shuffle.  Pretty straight forward and a cute ability.  Next we have Activate: banish a resonator this card deals 200 damage to each resonator your opponent controls.  Now that is the kind of ability I can get behind.  With the right resonators and proper deck set up she is a real control power house.  Over all I'd give her a solid 3/5 in the new meta.    

  It is no surprise poor Cinderella has fallen off with how aggressive the format has become.  With how most decks are preparing to face an aggressive plan you never have time to properly set her up.  That being said don't count her out just yet.  Now the plan most of the time when you are facing a barrage of aggro resonators on the other side of the field is to of course remove them.  If they aren't alive they can't hurt you and you get to continue playing with your strategy.  The same can be said for almost any TCG, removal in most decks is a necessity.  What Cinderella offers is the exact opposite strategy.  "But wait she is a form a removal what are you even talking about" I know that and you would be absolutely correct except her abilities are made to be "broken".  IE her combo Ame-no-Habakiri  which has taken up residence lately with good ol Lancelot.  Cinderella with Ame-no-Habakiri is ultimate "value town".  You buff her to 800/800 and now when you banish a resonator your opponent takes damage as well per creature hit by the banish.  You also get the "cute" ability of searching that many Prince resonators out of your deck.  So if your opponent has 5 resonators and you banish one single resonator they take 1000 damage and you search for 5 prince resonators in your deck.  All of this seems great in a fairy tale world, but the reality is you'll get ran over by bahablast if you set your deck up like a regular dark/fire control deck.

  So lets take a look at how you could set up a deck made to not kill resonators until its time to "Go to the ball".  First thing to decide is the ruler the two I have chose are R/R or Grim.  R/R offers... a ridiculous amount of value and Grim offers a little more safety from split heaven and earth.  Both can be used and appreciated but for now we'll go with R/R.  Next the stones.. it goes without saying this will be greedy.  A mixture of Ruler's memoria, Magic stone of moon shade, moon light, and 1 or 2 Unyielding flame's memoria.  The reason for the flames memoria is combining that with Cinderella is absurd.  Dealing an additional 200 per banish will almost kill your opponent on the spot or put them in range of an attack or thunder.  Third the spells and resonators and which ones to choose.  So in a deck where you need to stall but not kill there are a few cards that help to do just that.  Bind of Gravity, Rasputin, Slipper of Cinderella, Cheshire, Seal of Grimmia all of these cards enable your opponents resonators to stay around and prevents them from doing much damage.  Rasputin is your "third" part of the combo that really ensures your win with Cinderella.  Being able to banish multiple times with one creature is something we need in the deck and has always been the go to creature for Cinderella.

"Don't Be Late To The Ball"

Ruler

 R/R

Resonators

Rasputin x 2

Elisabeth, Shadow Princess of Blood x 2

Cinderella, The Ashen Maiden x 4

I, the pilot x 2

The Little Prince x 2

Witch of the Night x 3 (New darkness ressonator)

Cheshire Cat, the Grinning Remnant x 3

Spells/Additions

Bind of gravity x 4

Flame of outer world x 2

Ame-no-habakiri x 3

Seal of Grimmia x 4

Regalia

Artemis, The God's Bow x 3

Change the World, Orb of Illusion x 4

Stones 

Magic Stone of Moon light x 1

Unyielding flame's memoria x 1

Magic stone of moon shade x4

Ruler's Memoria x 4

Side board

Flame of outer world x 2

Blazer Gill Rabus x 1

Rapid Decay x 3

Deathscythe, the life reaper x 4

Keen sense x 3

Stoning to Death x 2

  There's a few other ways you can build this deck.  With this set up though I have found it to be the most balanced in what you're wanting to do and trying to stop in a game.  You're really looking to "combo off" by turn 4 or 5.  Stalling will be your game plan and so I would label this deck as 4 Will Turbo Fog. 

  That's it for now thanks for reading and taking an interest in our blog and I hope you're never "late to the ball".

         Steven Peets