Oliver's Orders

[Cosmic Giggle]

I've been trying to find a competitive deck that includes Vozitian Orders for a while now and after playing around with many variations, this seems to be the most effective so far. This is an extremely unique deck and is so much fun when it operates properly. I've never experienced a deck that can completely dominate a game like this one can where you will be using your opponents' allies against them. However, it doesn't perform consistently. My rating goes back and forth between 220-240. I hope that by sharing this build with the community, some useful suggestions could be given.

1 Lance Shadowstalker

4 Kristoffer Wyld
2 Birgitte Skullborn
4 Priest of the Light
3 Oliver Fagin
3 Sword Thief

4 Assassination
4 Stop Thief
3 Coercion

4 Ill-Gotten Gains
4 Anklebreaker
4 Vozitian Orders

First and foremost, this deck requires a lot of thought and you will experience longer games. Also, you'll need a few pieces in place in order for it to perform well. But if you can survive until you've reached 6 resources with a reasonable amount of health and said pieces in place, then things can get very interesting.

The main strategy of this deck revolves around the Vozitian Orders mechanic. The most obvious combos are Priest of Light to slow or halt your opponent's shadow ability and gain a point of health, Sword Thief to immobilize their allies, and Kristoffer Wyld for an extra point of damage. I've included 1CC allies to cheaply trigger Vozitian Orders, also summoning Kristoffer and casting Assassinate can be very useful.

The real fun starts when you've reached 6 resources. At that time you can cast Coercion and then a 1CC ally to return it to your hand. However even if you can't return the ally you've borrowed, Coercion can be a great card if you choose the right ally to control. If you can't trigger Vozitian Orders I suggest controling an ally that will die when counter-attacked so at least there's one less all ally to deal with and you've softened up another one. Also controlling an ally with a useful ability can come in handy. However remember that allies with Steadfast cannot be returned to your hand. Sorry if any of this was obvious, but I've found out most of these the hard way and it's not fun during a game. A lot of the games I lose because of one mistake. Also, don't cast abilities like Retreat or Road Less Travelled on an ally you've borrowed or else they will be returned to your opponent's hand. And one last thing, if you use Coercion on an ally with Treasured Heirloom and it dies, your opponent will draw 2 cards instead of yourself. Another thing I've found out the hard way. I haven't tried it on something like Night Owl, but I'm guesing it would yield similar results.

At 8 resources you could summon Oliver and then a 1CC ally to return him to your hand. That's most useful when facing a deck with Mind Control, but will also make your opponent hesistant to cast a 3CC ally or lower knowing that you have an Oliver in your hand. In my previous builds I've only had 2 Olivers so I rarely left him on the board since he rarely lasted more than a turn. Sometimes it's worth it to cast him just to snatch an opponent's ally and then return him to your hand. But now that I've added a third one I don't return him as often. So now I'm more likely to attack with him. cast an ally to return him to my hand, cast him again and maybe snatch another ally and if possible give him haste so he can attack a second time for a considerable amount of damage. You could easly perform 6 actions during one turn. I'm not sure what this feels like from my opponent's point of view, but I can imagine that it might get a bit confusing to keep up with everything that's going on.

There are a few things to keep in mind with Oliver. Once again I apologize if these are already obvious. Attack with him before casting anything and return any allies triggered by Vozitian Orders so his attack is at maximum. Although you may be tempted to sacrifice most turns for resources, remember that each card you sacrifice lowers Oliver's attack. Oliver is going to attract a lot of attention so it depends on the situation you're in whether or not to leave him on the board.

I can't begin to explain how fun this deck is when it behaves. There are few things more satisfying than using Coercion on a big guy like Aeon or Dakrath and then returning him to your hand. I've ruffled a few feathers with this deck so if you are going to give it a try then be prepared for trolls. Just ignore them. I don't see the point of arguing with complete strangers over the internet. Don't feed the trolls! Also, part of the novelty of this deck relies on the fact that your opponents probably have no clue what is about to happen to them. They probably won't destroy Vozitian Orders until they realize what you are doing with it, but make sure to keep an extra in your hand anyways.

Good luck to anyone who decides to try this deck out. I hope to read some useful suggestions anyone has to offer.

[Veles]

I have similar deck based of VO, Oliver and Coercion. It is not easy to set up, but once you do it is indeed really fun to play. Biggest difference is that I also run Zailen Crusader to help boost the combo. Coercion is attachment and Zailen will reduce its cost to 3, or 1 if I have two of them out.

I had few encounters with trolls too. They weren't happy about the combo. My favorite was: "your deck is so bad you need my allies to win"



Here is my version:

***HERO***
Lance Shadowstalker

***Allies (22)***
4x Priest of the Light
3x Raven Wildheart
4x Night Owl
3x Zailen Crusader
4x Skilled Ironmonger
3x Sword Thief
2x Oliver Fagin

***Abilities (6)***
3x Stop, Thief!
3x Coercion

***Items (7)***
4x Ill-Gotten Gains
3x Vozitian Orders

***Weapons (4)***
4x Anklebreaker

TOTAL: 40 cards + Hero

I was also trying out same build with Garth. Considering most of allies are low cost and low attack, his spammable ability should help maintain the board. Instead of Ravens I am trying more weapon(Cutlass) or Garth's Concoction.

[Cosmic Giggle]

Wow, you're deck looks very well thought out. Makes mine look pretty juvenile. I've thought about using Zailen Crusader and maybe throwing in a couple of Backstab just to make her a bit more useful, but I haven't gotten around to it yet. And it's hard for me to imagine not using Assassination. It's usually very useful for me especially with Kristoffer Wyld.

I rarely play against someone who used Vozitian Orders or Oliver Fagin, let alone both in the same deck. So that makes me feel this deck is very unique. And then to include Coercion just makes it bananas. I just can't help to think that there is something I've been missing to improve the flow. The biggest drawback is probably it's speed. Hopefully some more suggestions will be added.

[bobrossw]

neat concepts - I've been fooling around with orders as well, but haven't gotten enough SF cards to do it well yet. Some other things I thought of that combo well with orders are the twilight cards - since you can bounce them before they die - like how bout that one with haste - bouncing him with Kristoffer. Also, to really double down on the bounce theme, you could get rid of IGG and replace it with road less traveled. Also don't forget about gravediggers cloak, which is by far the cheapest way to steal enemy cards. It compliments the themes of this deck nicely, and works well vs ability heavy decks, such as burn decks, where you can just throw their own fireballs back at them. You lose Lance's ability, but in the right situation, it's much better.

[Index]

your deck is so bad you need my allies to win!

[Index]

Seriously though, have you considered to use Final Flourish with Coercion?

[Veles]

Seriously though, have you considered to use Final Flourish with Coercion?

But I want to play their allies against them. Thats the whole point. Being evil.

[Index]

But I want to play their allies against them. Thats the whole point. Being evil.

But you still need to pay its cost and taking risk of retreat!

[Cosmic Giggle]

Here's my latest build which is basically a modified version of Veles's deck. BTW, do you have a name for your deck Veles? It's much more consistent and I'm really happy with it so far.

Lance Shadowstalker

2 Kristoffer Wyld
3 Raven Wildheart
4 Priest of the Light
3 Night Owl
3 Zailen Crusader
3 Sword Thief
2 Oliver Fagin

3 Stop Thief
3 Backstab
3 Coercion

4 Ill-Gotten Gains
4 Anklebreaker
3 Vozitian Orders

41 total

I really miss Assassination sometimes, so now I just need to be smart with Raven or Coercion. Zailen combos great with Backstab so I decided to include a few of those. Kristoffer is good for a cheap way to trigger Vozitian Orders, to kill weenies, trigger traps or sometimes you just need to deal one more point of damage to kill something. I rarely get to use Coercion with Zailen Crusader, but regardless she's a little tougher to kill than most of the others in my previous deck.

Demetreyo, Twilight Extremist is a nice combo but would be better for a Twilight deck, not this one. Road Less Traveled can be very useful, but with Ill-Gotten Gains and Vozitian Orders on the board you can accomplish almost the same thing. I think I'd prefer to draw a card everytime I kill an ally. And Gravedigger's Cloak is cool, but I'd rather use my Shadow Ability.

Final Flourish would be a good combo with Coercion because you could possibly get a 2 for 1. But like Veles said the point of this deck is to use your opponents' allies against them. I rarely see Retreat these days so I'm willing to risk it. Even so they would have one less Retreat to use on one of my allies and still have to re-cast theirs. Not a big loss for me.

I found out yesterday that if you use Coercion on Devoted Knight and it dies while under your control then you will get the extra resource. I know an ally with Treasured Heirloom doesn't work this way. The only difference I see is that Devoted Knight says "owner." That means Night Owl might not work either. I'll test that out next.

[Veles]

I named it The Kidnapper for obvious reasons.