Players are picking up the Steel Amethyst Jafar Wheel deck again, with the meta shifting away from hard removal cards. This combo deck uses Jafar – Striking Illusionist as a main part of its game plan.
Decklist
4 A Whole New World
2 Aladdin - Brave Rescuer
3 And Then Along Came Zeus
4 Archimedes - Electrified Owl
4 Archimedes - Highly Educated Owl
2 Ba-Boom!
4 Beast - Tragic Hero
4 Blue Fairy - Rewarding Good Deeds
4 Friends On The Other Side
2 Grab Your Sword
4 Jafar - Dreadnought
4 Jafar - Royal Vizier
4 Jafar - Striking Illusionist
4 Merlin - Rabbit
4 Pete - Games Referee
4 Robin Hood - Beloved Outlaw
4 Robin Hood - Champion of SherwoodHow to Play
This deck aims to set up Jafar – Striking Illusionist, exert him, and start drawing cards. This lets you gain Lore quickly with Jafar – Striking Illusionist‘s ability, becoming a win condition and forcing opponents to remove him ASAP.
The easiest way to have him on the board is by shifting him to characters like Jafar – Royal Vizier or Jafar – Dreadnought.
The Early Start
You’re playing a combo deck that wants to set up all the right pieces in the late game. This means our early game will revolve around keeping up with the opponent’s board development and ensuring they don’t take over the game while we wait to set up Jafar – Striking Illusionist.
Robin Hood – Beloved Outlaw and Archimedes – Highly Educated Owl are our early characters to have on the board. However, if you have their higher-cost versions, Robin Hood – Champion of Sherwood or Archimedes – Electrified Owl in hand, you’ll avoid questing/challenging with the 1-cost Robin Hood or Archimedes as they’ll be more valuable as Shift targets on turn 3.
We got Robin Hood – Champion of Sherwood on the board on turn 3? Well, we’ve successfully kept up with the opponent’s board development and even created a mid-game threat for them to deal with. Getting to challenge and banish characters with Robin Hood – Champion of Sherwood gives us 2 Lore, forcing opponents to either avoid questing with their low-power characters or find removal tools to deal with our 5-cost Robin Hood.
Archimedes – Electrified Owl is a 5-cost Evasive Character that Quests for 2. He can be difficult for opponents to remove thanks to the Evasive keyword and 4 Willpower. His ability to gain +3 Strength when challenging means opponents can’t safely quest with their low-cost Evasive characters.
These two characters will also act as Singers later in the game, but I’ll discuss it later in the article.
The Jafar Wheel Combo
Jafar – Striking Illusionist is our main win condition and we want him on the board as early as possible to start generating Lore with every card draw. He’s an Evasive 4|5, so opponents can’t easily remove him off the board, but cards like And Then Along Came Zeus can banish him on the spot.
Playing at 7-cost means we’ll have to wait for a full turn before we can exert him and activate his Lore generation ability. This feels a bit too slow, and in a lot of cases, your opponent might have the tools to deal with him and shut down your game plan entirely.
This is why we rely more on Shifting Jafar – Striking Illusionist onto the board, having him “Ready” the moment he’s played, and using Jafar – Striking Illusionist to sing a song, allowing us to exert him and cast A Whole New World. This discards both players’ hands and draws them 7 cards, which means 7 Lore!
The ideal scenario in the late game is to play A Whole New World, gain 7 Lore, draw into another A Whole New World, and gain another 7 Lore. 14 Lore in the late game should be enough to win the game on the spot.
Jafar Shift Targets
Waiting till turn 7 to play Jafar – Striking Illusionist doesn’t sound like the best plan, so Jafar – Royal Vizier and Jafar – Dreadnought can cheat out our 7-cost on turn 5.
Since we’re reliant on Jafar – Striking Illusionist being “Ready” when played to cast A Whole New World, we cannot challenge or quest with Jafar – Royal Vizier or Jafar – Dreadnought on the turn we shift Jafar – Striking Illusionist.
Draw Engines
Card draw is a key part of this deck’s tactics. It wants to look through the deck to find the combo pieces, Jafar – Royal Vizier or Jafar – Dreadnought, Jafar – Striking Illusionist, and A Whole New World.
At the same time, getting to draw cards while there’s an exerted Jafar – Striking Illusionist gives you more Lore. Blue Fairy – Rewarding Good Deeds and Beast – Tragic Hero can continuously draw you more cards, creating that threat of the Lore generation that your opponent needs to interrupt.
We want to avoid Questing with them if there’s a threat of a Challenger attacking them. Blue Fairy – Rewarding Good Deeds has the Evasive keyword, so opponents need to have an Evasive character as well to challenge attack her.
The Singers
Although these cards offer draw value and board control, they can also Sing 5-cost Songs like A Whole New World, Grab Your Sword, and And Then Along Came Zeus. They come in exceptionally useful when we have Jafar – Striking Illusionist on the board, allowing us to cast A Whole New World and potentially draw into a second A Whole New World to draw 7 other cards or ensure we control the board with our damage songs.
Damage Cards
Yes, we’re a combo deck, but every combo needs time to shine! This is why damage cards like Ba-Boom!, Grab Your Sword, and And Then Along Came Zeus are needed to remove opponents’ characters and slow down their Lore gain.
Grab Your Sword is valuable against decks that can go wide on the board with low-will power characters. Getting to Banish multiple characters will slow down the opponent’s questing, giving you more time to set up Jafar.
Other Cards to Include
- Smash is an addition to the list if we’re in a meta where a 3 Willpower character has great value for opponents.
- Tinker Bell – Giant Fairy is great for board control, dealing 1 damage to all opposing Characters, potentially banishing low willpower or damaged Characters. Whenever she banishes a character in a challenge, you may deal 2 damage to a character for more board control. Tinker Bell – Giant Fairy can also act as a Singer.
- Yzma – Scary Beyond All Reason gives two draws on the turn she’s played. She’s good as a value draw and synergizes with Jafar. You could also remove remove one of the opponent’s characters from play, but the downside, they get to draw two cards.
Strengths/Weaknesses
- This deck has answers to Evasive characters that gain Lore or can draw cards.
- The draw engines can keep you in the game against discard decks.
- Damage songs and hard removals can shut down your game plan. Your opponent banishing Jafar – Royal Vizier or Jafar – Dreadnought will slow down Jafar – Striking Illusionist development, giving them time until you can get your combo play-off.