With Tempest of the Gods now coming to end many cards that we have grown to know, love and fear will be saying their last goodbye to rotation. Below is a List of all the classes and the With Tempest of the Gods now coming to end many card that we have grown to love and fear will be saying their last goodbye to rotation. Below is a List of all the classes and the most impactful cards that will be going away. most impact cards that will be going away.
Neutral: TOTG has a pool of solid neutral cards but many of them were not needed cores of their decks. The biggest cards here to go are likely Ariette, Strix and the big legendary drops. The loss of these cards will directly affect decks like Neutral Forest, Ginger Rune, Ramp Dragon and some variants of Phantom Cat Blood.
Wise Merman: Wise merman leaving only really hurts the most aggressive of Neutral based decks. Since the onslaught of Wonderland Dreams nerfs that style deck became much less common. I do not think many decks will miss this one much anymore.
Wandering Bard Elta: A solid 2/2 for 2 with a less solid half evolve. Elta has a very powerful effect on evolve but I can’t help but feel that its lack of full evolve stats really hurt the potential of what Elta could do. Mostly the card only saw fringe success in Ginger being used as a nil in the coffin after a Ginger turn.
Grimnir, War Cyclone: Gone are the days where Grimnir ended 80% of games. After the nerf Grimnir was not the 3 of in every deck like he used to be but he was always quite reasonable. The rotation of Grimnir is a big deal to me because I feel it shows the beginning to the end of an era of design philosophy.
Impartial Strix: Strix is the best 4 drop on 4 for most Neutral based aggressive and midrange decks. When you can trigger it the game is just flat out massive, evolving into a 4PP 7/7 that demands an answer.
Arriet, Soothing Harpist: The only times this card would get played is in decks only looking to gimp its opponents. Of those decks Queen of the Dread sea and Beauty and the Beast Forest made the most use out of this (Frustrating) card. The card would often put the defending player into the bind of either full clearing a board of large threats every turn or not clearing and risking being dead from a massive damage swing. Ariette only allowed for degenerate things to happen and I think Rotation will be healthier with her gone.
Israfil: Since the rotation of her sister Sahaquiel, Israfil did not get to see much play however she was such a format all star 3 months ago she had to make the list. The decks that will miss Israfil the most will be Ramp dragon and Ginger Rune, a deck that will not survive TOTG leaving.
Zeus: Big Daddy Beat stick. Zeus is just a solid 10 drop. Ends the game, walls you up, and bane to clear off anything big and pesky. Much like Israfil Zeus gets played in ramp dragon and Ginger rune. At the moment the best target shadow has for reanimate is Zeus too so there will be a few classes that feel the impact of Zeus leaving.
Forest: With this rotation Control and Midrange Forest lists will be taking quite the hit. Currently many forest lists interested in taking the game long rely on Crystalia Aerin and Jungle Warden to survive and close the game out. For the most part Aggro Forest gets out unscathed other than the loss of Beetle Warrior, but this card did not even make the cut in many Aggressive Forest lists.
Cybele: Cybele is a great was to snowball a board. In combination of something like an elf song the increased HP can turn your fairy’s into very beefy threats that can dodge some AOE’s like Force of the Dragonewt or Nova Flare. Cybele was never a popular pick since many decks could not make much use of her buff.
Beetle Warrior: Forest Albert is going away. Beetle Warrior is a good way to push damage while developing a reasonably powerful board. The Beetle was never a staple for forest but would always up up every now and then.
Jungle Warden: Goodbye King Monkey. Warden is something forest lacks. A powerful effect on a single card in forest. No combos needed, just enhance on 10 and ward up. Warden is great at ending the game on turn 10 and stalling the game until turn 10. I hope the new king monkey can fill the void Jungle warden leaves.
Crystalia Aerin: I’m not ready for her to go. Great heal. Great Ward. Great stats. Plus a free Evo? What more can you want? Control and mid-range forest is going to feel the sting of Aerin leaving for time to come. Funny enough one thing Aerin was fantastic at was stalling the game out until Jungle warden could come down.
Elf Queen: Queen was a great option when all you cared about was gaining HP. Nothing can heal you up quite like she can. Queen is an interesting card because she let a non Shadowcraft card make use of its Shadows, an otherwise dead resource. Queen occasionally made her way into a deck as a 1 or 2 of as tech against HP based matchups.
Deepwood anomaly: Rest in peace everyone’s favorite meme 2017-2018
Sword: A lot of the power in Swordcraft at the moment comes from its raw card quality. Sword will be losing some of its very strong tools but the cards that will be going away are not mandatory for a functional Sword list. Sword has been top tier all of Dawnbreak Nightedge and will likely continue to be a powerful deck even with the loss of some of its best cards like Gawain and Luminous Mage.
Vagabond Frog: It’s time to settle down my dudes. Frog is the king of pushing uncontested stealth damage. Vagabond Frog was a staple in aggro sword for quite a while even after getting nerfed from 3PP to 4PP. As time goes on Frog will likely fade away as he gets outclasses by other cards but he will always hold a place in my heart.
Gawain of the Round Table: This guy saw 0 play for almost a year. Then one fateful day Swordcraft got multiple good commanders and everything changed. Gawain has a reasonable stat line, a clean enhance ability and most importantly his cost reduction lets him cheat out powerful commanders early like Arthur, Knight King, Sky Fortress or Mars, Silent Flame General. I have a feeling as time goes on this guy will stay quit relevant in unlimited for time to come.
Luminous Mage: My sword brings hope! Luminous mage is flat out Flexible. For 5 PP you get a 2/3 a 2/1 and a free Evo. The Luminous Knight is a great way to help push damage or to trade up. It’s hard to put into words how great the Mage is but the main thing to keep in mind is she just hits many powerful keys. She may continue to see play in unlimited for time to come since she refunds an Evolve.
Support Cannon: What was once a meme is now living as a dominant force in today’s metagame. Support cannon is incredible at grinding out a game if you can safely land it. Cannon is probably too slow to make its way into unlimited but if we ever got a singleton format with I could see Cannon being a staple for sword.
Roland: Did this card ever see play? Roland was neat because she gave you Durandle. Unfortunately that’s about all Roland did and at 7 PP you need just a bit more than a 4/5 Ward. Sword will not miss her much but I can’t help but feel a bit sad that this card never even became close to playable.
Rune: With TOTG Rotating out Rune will be losing quite a bit of power. Quite a bit of the staple cards used in Aggro Dirt will be rotating out leaving the Dirt style Rune decks once again trying to find a new identity. Along with the hit to Dirt, Runecraft will be completely losing the Ginger Archetype. Moving forward Rune may need to look past the loss of Chimera and fall back on its tried and true spellboost style archetypes.
Magic Illusionist: Good Riddens. Dirt Rune has not been very dominant lately but Illusionist used to carry the deck pretty hard. Back then Illusionist was a 2/2 and removing 3 or 4 Illusionists could often be hard to do (Especially since your spending resources to deal with an illusionist while your opponent only spent 2PP for it and a couple of Earth Sigils.
Mage of nightfall: 3PP 4/3 with Ambush. Mage pushed tons of face damage and all she asked of you was a single Earth Sigil. She was a staple in the aggressive Dirt Rune lists that used to dominate the format but lately she has not quite been enough.
Halo Golem: The last of the Dirt package to be rotating in TOTG. Much like Magic Illusionist and Mage of Nightfall, Halo Golem converts your Earth Sigils in to raw damage. Halo golem is comparable to a turn 4 evo card (Such as Priest of the Cudgel or Dragon Warrior) but has 2 major differences. It demands an Earth Sigil rather than an evolve and it gets full stats on evo. Halo Golem has pushed tons of damage for Burn Dirt Rune and the card will certainly be missed.
Mutagenic bolt: Mutabolt has fallen out of favor lately but this card is disgustingly powerful. Muta is like a strange fancy Dance of Death. It can be used to just remove a single big threat or can stifle a full board and turn everything into Flame Rats. A lot of Mutabolts power comes from the powerful swing turns that Wizardess of Oz can create. The rest of Muta’s power comes from the fact that it is a Transform effect and not a kill effect. This allows it to get around last word effects such as Jormungand, Spawn of the Abyss and Tutankhamun. I think one of the main takeaways of Mutabolt is that it is not intended as board clear, it is intended to be used as a win condition.
Chimera: Chimera is one of the strongest cards in spellboost Rune decks. After just a few spells cast Chimera becomes a hyper efficient removal spell with a free threat to boot. Chimera is reasonably statted as a 4/4 too making it a great evolve target if you re trying to get over a larger body such as a 4/5. Spellboost Rune based decks will greatly miss old chimera but they are still keeping Giant Chimera and are getting a new Despondent Chimera so I think they will find a way to get by.
Wordwielder Ginger: The Herald of the end is meeting her demise. Ginger excels at ending the game in a similar fashion to how Queen of the Dread Sea would. She allows the player to cheat dozens of play points into play and create a board that threatens to instantly end the game. Oftentimes a good ginger turn (Something like 2 Zeus and an Israfil) simply cannot be answered. In the current format the only way to beat a strong Ginger would be burning someone out for lethal, Mutagenic Bolt or an obscene amount of cheap removal.
Dragon: Dragon loses quite a few strong cards this time around. Of the cards leaving most are not deck defining, more like strong options that Dragon will be sad to lose. The loss of Sibyl and Dragons nest means Dragon will have to work harder for its healing. Of all the cards to go Phoenix Rider Aina will have the biggest impact, drastically impacting the earth reach dragon can have.
Dragon’s nest: Up until the printing of both Somniferous Whitewyrm and Lindwyrm Dragon was not very interested in a card like Dragons Nest. The loss of Dragons nest likely wont affect dragon much but Lindwyrm will not be happy to leave the nest.
Dragoon Scyther: RIP one of the best Bane cards in the game. The combination of Bane and Storm on a single card allowed her to instantly remove anything scary. She also slots perfectly into PDK decks since she cost 3 and helped push face damage.
Wrath Drake: Wrath Drake made its way into enough Dragon lists to warrant getting on the list. At the moment Ramp Dragon will play Wrath Drake to help clear board in the Mid to Late game. The thing is Wrath Drake never really excelled at clearing boards and I imagine Ramp Dragon will happily take Proto Bahamut over Wrath Drake.
Sibyl of the Waterwyrm: The day has finally come. Sibyl will be leaving us after her very dominant run making her way into nearly all Dragon variants for a time. Nowadays Sibyl is actually a reasonable card to play against but she used to be a 4/5 for 5 that still both ramped and healed. She hard carried the class for quite a while. Since her nerf Dragon has started getting frisky, occasionally cutting her from the deck all together. I am very interested to see how Ramp Dragon will fare after the loss of Sibyl.
Phoenix Rider Aina: The amount of raw damage this card can pump out often times can be pretty absurd. Getting a 4 or 5 attack Aina seems to be pretty common and sometimes she can get upwards on 6 damage…. And that is before evolves happen. Aggressive Dragon decks at the moment rely pretty heavily on Aina and Azi Dahaka to close games out so losing Aina may be a devastating blow to those decks unless they get a good replacement.
Ouroboros: Did you know this guy used to heal for 3 every time it died? It has been a while since Oro has been a staple in Dragon decks (or even just a 1 or 2 of) but I remember those days fondly. Oroboros could lock someone out of a game, removing a weak follower, leaving behind an 8/4 that demanded an answer then it heals for 3 before doing it all again. Ouro was a very interesting way to give Dragon a Play Point sink and for quite a while, it worked.
Shadow: Shadow is losing some pretty powerful cards with the rotation of TOTG. I think its worth pointing out how many of the Shadow cards that made the list got nerfed. Many of the cards that did get nerfed continued to see play in Mid Range Shadow up until the bitter end. TOTG was very nice to Shadow and with it rotating Shadow may struggle unless there are new cards to help fill the void TOTG will leave behind.
Little Soulsquasher: I have PTSD because of this card. Little Soulsquasher has Squashed the souls and hopes of many players. Since the nerf She has gone from a 2/2 for 2 to a 2/1 for 2. The nerf was surprisingly impactful because ever since it happened players started shaving on her numbers, some go as far as to not include her anymore. Moving forward Shadow will have Big Soul Hunter around to do the best Soul Squasher impression possible.
Zombie Party: V A L U E P A R T Y. 2PP to deal 3 is the golden standard for removal. That combined with Zombie Parties insanely powerful enhance ability you get a Grade A Shadow staple. What else is there to say? Zombie Party will leave a hole in many players heart until something comparable returns.
Prince Catacomb: What are you hiding inside? Catacombs excelled as both a way to farm shadows and as a way to create a very sticky board. Catacomb used to cost 3PP and those were some crazy days. A curve of 1 / 2 / Catacomb on the play could end the game by itself back then. Today we see Midrange Shadows hover around 2 and 3 Catacombs since its still a great way to build a resilient board even at 4PP.
Demonlord Eachtar: This head has finally been taken. Eachtar saw the Rise and fall of Shadow as a whole, surviving nerf after nerf of his friends and family until the day he himself got hit. Even after this Shadow still played 3 Eachtar without question, he was simply that strong. It took until his dear brother Thane to get nerfed before Eachtars warpath really started slowing down.
Immortal Thane: How many of you readers heard his laugh echo in your mind when you read Thanes name? Thane provides a ton of stats for his cost. It seems standard for a 4/5 to cost 5PP, a Whight itself costs 2PP and a White King costs 4. Today Thane costs 8PP but he used to cost 7 making him incredibly efficient for his mana cost. The Whight King he give you is incredibly strong too (much like most 0 cost cards) since you could save the ward for when it would be most useful.
Blood: Bloodcraft has been in a strange spot ever since the great nerfs of 1812 Wonderland Dreams. Up until Dawnbreak Nightedge came out much of the support blood got was lackluster. With the rotation of TOTG blood will be losing some of its best 2 drops as well as some strong vengeance activators / payoffs. I believe Cygames will address the issues blood has moving forward but if this doesn’t happen blood may be in trouble.
Spiderweb Imp: One of the best 2 drops blood has gotten to date. Spiderweb is overstaffed at a 1/4 for 2 and she comes with the incredibly relevant ability of ward. She can eat up small followers in the early game and protect your stronger followers or face.
Baphomet: Baphomet got a pretty hard nerf and still remains one of Blood’s best 2 drops to date. A 2PP 2/1 isn’t the best stats for its cost but Baphomet also had the added benefit of drawing a Blood card. Baphomet is very similar to Dragon summoner but they have flipped stats. The extra attack is really appreciated by blood since blood decks tend to be on the aggressive side.
Mask of the black death: This card is the biggest Jebait in Shadowverse. You lull your opponent into a false sense of security, make them think they have you on the ropes then boom, Mask. Mask is a very interesting card that can fade tons of damage for a cheap price. Since it has a countdown of 5 it can stick around for a while and as long as it has any counters on it the mask will block the full hit (Ex. countdown 2 mask will negate a Giant Chimera for 48). Cygames has been printing cards that add amulets to your hand more and more lately, it would be exciting if there was a follower that added a Mask of the Black death to your hand.
Blood Moon: Blood Moon is a sweet card that is not exactly rotating. Waltz, Prince of wolves will be replacing Blood Moon before it even gets the chance to go. This helps solve the issue that blood can have where it is sometimes hard to get into Vengeance. If it were not for Waltz staying around blood would likely struggle after losing both Blood Moon and……..
Belphegor: The other Vengeance activator. Belph is an overstated 4/4 for 4 with a free Blood pact that also puts you in Vengeance. Belph does so much for her cost and smooths out your game plan by bringing you into vengeance (sometimes a bit sooner than you wanted to be). What made Belphegor so nice is how she would reward you for taking a risk and getting closer to vengeance unlike some other cards that try to encourage you to take damage (Im looking at you serpent charmer)
Dark Airjammer: Airjammer is like Blood Arthur. If you can get into vengeance and play it on curve things are going well for you. Air Jammer provides tons of stats for its cost while letting you cheat out helpful effects like ward from a Spiderweb imp or the now rotated Blood Wolf.
Haven: Of the cards Haven will be losing this expansion none of them were really staples. Most of these cards would occasionally pop up but did not define the deck that they were in (except for maybe Aegis). Once again Haven gets off a rotation pretty unscathed and likely won’t feel much pain until the rotation of Wonderland Dreams.
Holy Bowmen Kel: It seems as though Cygames is pushing Tenko’s Shrine as an archetype so it seems like Kel may be rotating just a bit before his time. Kel is a well statted 2/2 for 2 with an effect that can get in some alright chip damage. The main reason he made this list is because he is leaving too soon, not because he saw any notable play.
Octobishop: Another card that people have been experimenting with in Tenko’s Shrine. It is hard to say if Octobishop would have made the cut in Tenko decks moving forward but what can be said is once rotations happen it will not be possible.
Judge of Retribution: 6PP Cudgel. Judge is a solid card that would make his way into decks on occasion. The card is just flat out solid. He is removal, card draw and a reasonable body all in one package. Haven has plenty of Blackened scripture style effects so Judge rotating should not be the end of the world.
Dark Jean: Dark Jean has been making her way in and out of Haven lists for as long as she has existed. Now that Summit Temple is one of the stronger Haven builds Jean has fallen a bit out of favor since her attack buff actually doesnt help anymore.
Heavenly Aegis: The most baller win condition in Shadowverse is on its way out. Aegis is an insanely cool card but he comes at the cost of being very frustrating to play against. Aegis for many decks was just lights out. In the Aegis Haven mirror often the person to land the first one won the game. Against slower Ramp Dragons Aegis was GG. When Aether of the whitewing got printed Aegis got quite a power spike. Haven players were able to cut down to 1 on their Aegis’s but by playing 3 Aethers it was like they were playing 4. Aegis has had its time and it has been a good run but now heaven rebukes him.
When Brigade of the Skies hits everything is going to change. Classes will be losing Staples, Others will lose supporter cards and some wont be losing much. Brigade will be bringing in all new cards that will open up many new archetypes. What cards will you miss the most? Did I miss a card that you like? Let me know in the comments.
Honorable Mentions
Hallowed Sky 