Bending the Rules with Lyath

Lyath is Flesh and Blood’s first five intellect hero, and with that comes a lot of new possibilities - which, in turn, piqued my interest in tweaking this quirky Guardian. The ultimate question is if seeing one extra card per turn mitigates what I think is a pretty severe downside: your cards have their printed power and toughness halved (rounded up). But even this downside was particularly interesting, because it forces you to evaluate cards that are typically overlooked by most heroes, and also totally disregard other cards that are considered staples by FAB standards (Sink Below, Shelter from the Storm, Command and Conquer, etc).

Both of these game changing aspects initially lead me to believe that you should look at Lyath through the eyes of a combo deck. Your printed values leave you vulnerable to fatigue, and seeing extra cards allows you to establish more combinations of auras to punch through a massive turn. But as I experimented with a few builds, I found that this approach felt weak into many strategies, and I needed to reevaluate my opinion on this hero.

What I came to is the decklist below.

The armor in Lyath is also impacted by his downside of rounding down stats. This led me to the following pieces of equipment:

Arcanite Skullcap: The OG Legendary helmet is very appealing in Lyath for 2 reasons. You can get the full 3 points of defense - since its own effect adds value - but additionally, some Reviled cards want you to be fighting for the higher life total for additional value. Skullcap acts as insurance to dig you out of a lower position.

Fyendal’s Spring Tunic: While it's not the most thematic to imagine my dwarf in his little green dress, the power of this piece is undeniable. It smooths out many hands, and if you ever have a tunic counter to use, it is easy to sink into our next piece of equipment.

Rampart of the Ram’s Head: This card is stellar in this deck. If you ever want to use the defensive capabilities of your hero text, by pitching a blue, you will have one resource left to activate your shield. This is important for stopping breakpoint attacks. Noticeably, with two cards you could block for 4 without activating Lyath; or you can block with one card and the shield, which when using Lyath, covers the same amount of damage while giving you the upside of a Might token and preserving a card in your deck.

Snapdragon Scalers: Just like most Guardians, action points are not abundant in Lyath. But unlike in most Guardian decks, almost all of the attack actions that I decided to run in this list are eligible for Snaps, and they can really help you in matchups like Gravy. They can also enable some of your more powerful setup turns.

Attention Grabbers: This arm piece is really important for multiple reasons. Getting 3 value in block is a premium, while additionally giving you the only ability in the deck to speed up the payoff of your suspense auras. This is important not just for fast matchups, but can also be critical to line up your buff effects for a singular powerful swing.

Titan’s Fist: LSS continues to decide that some heroes don't come with their own weapons, and as a result, you get the default hammer. This weapon is serviceable, but nothing to write home about. It is good that instead of having a printed value of 4, it has a built-in buff, which works around your hero’s downside.

I would say that this deck is divided into two main categories of cards: disruption and setup. I will go through some of the Highlights for each. The categorization might not be perfect, since some of the cards overlap into both categories.

Like most Guardians, a core part of your gameplan is to make the game uncomfortable for your opponent. While Lyath doesn’t seem to utilize the traditional Guardian crush cards well, he was provided with a new suite of baby-sized Guardian attacks that can be quite annoying to deal with. 

Short Shrift and Wee Wrecking Ball can, on crush, remove a card from either their hand or their arsenal. When you increase their power, it will demand that at least one card is stripped from the opponent, which is invaluable to your gameplan.

Spew Obscenities and Battered, Beaten, and Broken deserve more explanation. Spew Obscenities is an example of the hybrid of setup and disruption. It does provide an on-hit that, while it does not immediately impact their turn, provides a lot of value to future attacks. It's also important to mention that, this being a Guardian card, it synergizes with some of our important blues. For this reason, the card makes the cut.

Battered, Beaten, and Broken might very well be the most powerful attack in this deck. While it requires more work than other attacks to execute, its effect is devastating in all matchups. You have 3 very clear ways to set up 3 Might tokens: Cruel Ambition, Two Steps Ahead, and Escalate Violence. As you play the deck, keep your eyes out for more unique ways to get to 3 auras; an example would be having a suspense aura on the field and using Imposing Visage to put Booze! into play.

Tear Asunder should get an honorable mention. This card is just amazing. You can make terrifying combinations of disruption and evasion (pair with confidence). This can be brutal to deal with, and it works with 9 of your yellow attacks and your hammer.

For the sake of this article, I am considering setup to be any card that carries its offensive value into the next round. A lot of the cards in Lyath are much stronger when paired together, so this is very important. 

Edge of Their Seats and Leave Them Hanging are, in my opinion, the best suspense cards that can be utilized, because they provide the most value while only requiring a single blue pitch. They are pretty self-explanatory cards, but I do want to mention 2 things. Depending on the when you need these to pop, it is very important to consider what half of the turn cycle you play these on. The other thing that is not always intuitive is that Leave Them Hanging’s intimidate is very powerful on your own turn as well. Especially in combination with Battered, Beaten, and Broken, you can increase the number of cards they need to be concerned about potentially losing.

I would consider Imposing Visage to be comparable to Escalate Violence in terms of its potency. I think Imposing is worth giving special consideration because setting up a Two Steps Ahead with go again is extremely impactful.

Since this hero is very atypical, it seems appropriate to explain some of the thought process to playing him. 

Since you are drawing 5 cards per turn, it is inevitable that some of the cards in your hand will be hard to convert into offensive value. This is when you should look to block for 4-7 while generating a Might. In these situations, it's very important to consider what attack you plan to send to utilize the Might you have generated. It might feel bad, but in many cases it's not shameful to just throw a card down to block for 2 value if you can’t properly convert it on offense. If your hand is just loaded with blues, remember that Titan’s Fist wants you to pitch a blue with cost 3 or greater, so that should impact your blocking decisions. 

In terms of offensive synergies, your auras become useful in either one or two turns. These are important to consider because, in any of the slower matchups, it's critical to pair at least 2 pump effects on the same turn. As an example, Two Steps Ahead creates the 4 auras the turn after it is played (which is great for Battered), but you get the actual offensive value 2 turns later. Both of your suspense auras work that way as well. Any of your effects that just make a Might or boo you work for the immediate next turn. 

Cards like Revolting Gesture and Villainous Pose are there as good arsenal targets because they allow you to immediately pair their pump with any of your other effects that are on the board. Notably, you do not have quite as much of an emphasis on being higher life compared to the Reviled Kayo, so it's okay to dip down in life further (with the plan to swing it back at a later point). This is most important in matchups where you board in Mocking Blow. 

The final thing I want to address is the fear of being fatigued. There are supplemental tools to aid in this issue in the sideboard, but we also have quite a few tools to help force through damage. There are 6 cards that make Confidence, plus 9 blues that either have or apply dominate to your attacks. In these slower matchups, you should be looking to arsenal some effect like this so that when your auras expire, you can ensure the damage goes through. You need to be diligent and plan your hands for a long-term macro gameplan, rather than maximizing each hand one after the next.

I make the sideboard plan to address 2 styles of matchups, and then some cards for problematic decks (looking at you Gravy). 

If you are playing against a more defensive deck, add in more intimidate effects to make sure we do not get blocked out. Cards like Bully Tactics and Sadistic Scowl are superstars in this case.

If you are playing against a more aggressive opponent, increasing your defense with cards like Oasis Respite and Peace of Mind can prove to be critical.

In those matchups where you have a chance to keep your life higher, Mocking Blow can really solidify your lead with its insane value as a one-card-6. Midas Touch is a pathetic attempt at trying to fight the spooky pirate, and you are equipped with Sigil of Solace and 3 pieces of arcane barrier to help you in the fight versus Wizards.

Overall, the deck has a lot of room for exploration. This is still an early attempt to wrestle with the first 5-intellect hero. The play patterns are unlike any other Guardian, but that leads to a lot of fun. There is undoubtedly room for improvement and variations based on your local meta. 

If you have any cool tech that has really been proving to be powerful, I would love to hear feedback. This current 80, with practice, should be able to get more than a handful of wins at your local Armory. I hope this list brings you the same thrill and suspense that it has for me!