Welcome to the Network, Agent of Zion, today we are going to explore if ReyLo is the right call in the current Destiny meta…
Many people will scoff at any data gleaned from a 32 person Grand
Championship results as apocryphal, but there are useful tidbits to pull
out. First up is that the playrate was 12.5%, with one of the four
players on the deck hitting top 8. IE: Assuming a normal distribution of
skill, performance rate just to make cut was double the playrate and Jon
took it up a notch by going an extra step beyond cut.
This backs up the (partially anecdotal) evidence from GenCon, where
three players on the deck made day two. ReyLo appeared to me and
everyone else I have discussed this with to be one of the least played
of any of the “reasonable” decks. So I can’t put a number on it, but I’m
willing to bet that performance exceeded playrate there as well.
Just on the face of things, for all purposes but the battlefield roll,
this is a 5.5-6.5 die start… So long as you can resolve one or more
character specials for effect. Capable of either huge damage spikes or
very controlling death-by-papercuts (as your draws dictate) there are
few matchups that are downright unwinnable. The deck speaks to the
skill-testing grinder in me in a way that I haven’t seen since R2P2.
So the question is with three day two appearances at GenCon, and most
recently a Top 4 German Nationals finish, Kylo3/Rey3/TT is certainly a
meta staple, but does it have the chops to stand up to the
sure-to-be-optimized versions of other top contenders like Jabba, Ewoks,
Aphra, and Droids?
I definitely think so. Let’s take a look at the most recent list,
piloted by Jon Marx (no relation presumably). A big thank you to Your
Destiny for making the list available in a timely manner, and take a
look at the self-published list here
Things I Love About The List
It may seem obvious to many of the readers, but there are some cards
that I consider to be staples which are being cut by many people. Niman
Mastery, Beguile, Steadfast, and Pacify are cornerstone pieces of the
deck. If you want to adjust the number of any of them to a certain
extent I can get on board with you, but remove them entirely at your own
peril.
Pushing Slash: I’m enamoured with it right now. Blue Melee
has always needed a way to solve it’s dice problem. The character dice
are too valuable to use for their focus sides, and modified sides are
nearly always an issue. Pushing Slash is amazing in situations where one
of your people are about to eat shit and you need value out of his/her
dice ASAP for the low cost of one cash. The versatility here is also not
to be understated, blanking out an opposing die or ensuring you aren’t
going to get blown out by an Easy Pickings (or Entangle).
Obi-Wan Kenobi’s Lightsaber: is particularly effective at
the moment, and a great meta call to include as a one-of. Shield sides
have never been more relevant, and in cases where you’re doing
everything you want to do you aren’t actually sacrificing any damage
output to get them (a running theme with Rey3). It’s playable from
nearly any position and the +3 side is safe from the vast majority of
mitigation in the format. It only pairs with Dagger and Rey’s Lightsaber
for Easy Pickings, un-Forsakenable, all but immune to Entangle, and when
it gets removed by Sinister Peace, Hidden Motive, Hasty Exit, Doubt, or
Risky Move, it generally means you have multiple base melee sides that
you’re getting through.
R2-D2: So uhhh, did people forget that special chaining was a
thing? It’s not like there is any lack of useful specials in the deck to
flip a die to right? Including it at all is great, I’m of the opinion
it’s strong enough to include both copies. It definitely does more to
help your game plan than the Luke’s Protection I see take it’s slot more
often than not.
Things I Hate About The List
Force Jump: I like Vader, I think Vader is still good, but
he simply isn’t in play often enough right now to warrant dedicating two
cards that are completely dead in the vast majority of your other
matchups. Droids don’t keep dice in the pool long enough that you can
get good value out of Jump, Jabba is either using the untouchable
Fist/Entourage, or the spread-focus threat of Megablaster Troopers, and
Ewoks just plain doesn’t care. Even the utility in the mirror is quite
limited because of the specials.
It Binds All Things: I think people get into certain
deckbuilding ruts. It’s been around since day 1 so there is a ton of
historical momentum behind starting any blue melee build with two Binds,
but at this precise moment in time, it has better than even odds of
doing more harm than good. Jabba and Aphra both make playing Binds
incredibly risky because they have no problems mulling for DM and simply
discarding it if you don’t fall into the trap. I don’t like literally
coinflipping to see if I don’t timewalk myself. Against droids, running
this out even as your first action isn’t going to stop someone from
disrupting your remaining dollar and locking you in to four dice on the
round (and minus a reroll). It IS useful in the ewok
match because direct damage dice spam is the way to go, but there are
other avenues to take for the same effect that don’t weaken other
matches.
Luke’s Training: Maybe this is just me not being aggressive
enough with rerolls early, but I fail to see how this card is in any way
better than Forbidden Lore even without the card draw. Totally blank
once your first char falls as well.
Soresu Mastery: Just doesn’t do enough on it’s own in my
opinion, and competes with Niman Mastery for character space. It is
quite good at helping you lose very very slowly, but doesn’t actually
help you win in this meta.
My Own Spin On It
Were I to be attending NoVa, and if I could be convinced to play
something other than Jabba (comfort decks are… Comfortable), this is
what I would sleeve up.
Ewoks are a thing, and I anticipate Aphra to pick up in popularity over
the next month. As a nod to those decks, the A99 Aquata Breather,
Knighthood, and Safeguard all interweave to really help shore those
matchups up.
Knighthood looks weird but it is a shield from hand to enable your Power
Actions, and more importantly Rey’s Special while being faster than
Luke’s Protection and without clogging your hand. This also helps you
buy more time against disrupting droids.
Soresu Training is a flexible spot. I tend to play extremely
defensively, but switching it to a Treasured Lightsaber helps amp up
your aggression a bit, though it opens you up a bit more to Easy
Pickings.
As much as I like Steadfast, it is only outstanding round 1. I cut one
copy of it in favor of a singleton Galactic Deception which is pulling
double duty by shutting down Diplomatic Protection and really upping
your odds in the mirror. On an outside edge, it also helps against
Admiral decks which want to resolve the Admiral die for shields upon
their final activation. Even further from right field, Yoda or Mace lose
quite a bit of potency in the round you play this.
The focus on Ewoks and Aphra may seem like overkill but against other
reasonable decks and meta-staples that aren’t super heavy on indirect
damage, there is enough mitigation in the form of shields and heavy
hitting dice to get the job done but you need to be very wary about hand
hate.
Before I get on out of here, I want to extend a hearty handshake and
very loud welcome to DDU.Network. Bouncewithout, General Jacobi,
Aaronchpmn, and OrdinaryJedi are solid Destiny players and my limited
interactions with the greater Australian Destiny community impressed me
a great deal. I’m very happy to see the underserved and under-appreciated
southern continent get such solid representation, and deeply appreciate
the opportunity to help christen their new website.
Good Luck, Have Fun,
-Agent Of Zion