When any card game comes out with a ranked ladder mode, the conversation inevitably turns to what the meta is going to be. This, in itself, is fine and good. I like climbing ladder myself, but it’s always good to remember that card games, like any game, are there to be enjoyed first and foremost. So why not go for a deck that might not be as effective, but is way more fun?
Here are my favorite deck archetypes available right now; some are meta viable; some are less so.
Mushroom Power!
This deck is based around Puffcap synergy, available in the Piltover & Zaun region. The key cards here are all 5 Puffcap synergy cards: Puffcap Peddler, Chump Whump, Mushroom Cloud, Clump of Whumps, and Teemo, in rough order of how important they are.
The idea here is to drop Puffcap Peddler once you’ve filled your hand with Mushroom Clouds and then drop a bunch of them. Mushroom Cloud is a Burst spell, so you can get this off even if they try to cast a spell to remove the Peddler(s) instantly; each cast of Mushroom Cloud slams eight Puffcaps onto random cards in their deck (or five if you need to cast them raw for whatever reason).
If you can, you can try to play Teemo in the later game to multiply their caps, but boy is that just a nice extra, not your main goal. Teemo is fragile (even leveled up he’s only a 2/2 Elusive), and in the current meta, other Elusive minions are super common, so it’s almost sure he’ll be blocked or removed otherwise.
To that end, you have a few options to try and increase your chances of winning. Tying this deck to an aggressive shell (like a Shadow Isles or Noxus token strategy) is an excellent way to make Puffcaps a good alternate win condition. In contrast, a more midrange or control-oriented Demacia or Freljord shell can increase your survivability into the midgame.
Fiora OTK
This is one of the more meta variants, but OTK decks are pretty much always fun.
The decklist is pretty easy to build, too; you add Shen, Fiora, and then every single card that says “Barrier” on it, with some Challenger units to help keep Fiora alive.
Slam Fiora into four enemy units throughout the game, and you win instantly! Given that most people are running lean, aggressive decks with small units, this makes things pretty straightforward until you run into those decks that are super heavy on the Elusive units.
Not much more to say about this one; go forth and conquer.
Etherealness
This is a primarily Shadow Isles deck based around using Phantom Prankster and a bunch of disposable token trash to quickly slam down your opponent’s health, whether they block your units or not. Putting the spider package indefinitely benefits this deck, incentivizing you to also run Noxus as your secondary region for cards like House Spider and Arachnoid Offering.
Key cards include Phantom Prankster, Haunted Relic, Shark Chariot, and Glimpse Beyond, along with the better spider synergy cards (like Brood Awakening) to round out your strategy in the early and midgame if your opponent is putting on too much pressure to focus on hitting face exclusively.
Big Poro Energy
This focuses on a combination of Freljord and Ionia to handbuff large minions with Overwhelm and provides too many threats for your opponent to answer over and over again easily. Tryndamere is particularly crucial, being a high attack, resilient Overwhelm minion that can slam your opponent into the dirt if they don’t have good enough direct removal options.
Ionia only provides the core hand buff options: Jeweled Protector and Zephyr Sage, with one major exception being The Empyrean. A large Elusive minion may not pack the same punch as an oversized Overwhelm boy, but it’s way harder to deal with in many ways.
The core of your deck comes from Freljord, with Tryndamere, Braum, and Mighty Poro (both by itself and via the ones created by Braum), forming the mighty backbone of this huge deck.
If your tastes run toward summoning bigger and bigger men for the whole game, this deck has your back.
