Articles

Corey Burkhart

Hi everyone and welcome to another Crown of the Heavens preview! When I played the online game I almost exclusively played a Mage. Casting abilities at a long range, seeing huge numbers on boss fights, and freezing opponents in their place were all things that appealed to me. I had a nearly endless mana bar, and could cast my abilities forever. I could also light people’s faces on fire with the help of some Fireball action. Today’s preview card does everything Mages are known for, and I mean everything!

Before I get too excited and forget to show you our magnificent Mage ability, take a look at Shroud of the Archmage!

It really does all three of those things! Need to draw some cards to find answers to opposing abilities or equipment? Exhaust your hero and draw a card. Need a way to kill your opponent’s hero? Exhaust your hero and deal four to them. Need a way to not die to an opposing ally attack? Exhaust your hero and prevent it from attacking. Need a way to sneak your last ally in unprotected against your opponent’s protector? Yes, your hero can prevent their ally from protecting also! The name of the ability says it all: your hero is empowered with the shroud making him or her the true Archmage!

One of my favorite things about the Shroud of the Archmage is the impact it has while on your hero. It is such a powerful card that the opponent’s entire focus will change to doing whatever they have to in order to destroy the ability. This allows a Mage under significant distress the time to find some Glacial Tombs and Polymorphs to climb out of their hole. If the opponent chooses to ignore the cloak then you’re in business! While it doesn’t destroy the opposing allies, it acts as an ongoing trick that you can use each turn. Drawing an additional card is no joke, and I cannot tell you how many times I would give four or five points of health to have the top card of my deck accessible to me. Even using your hero to prevent an ally from attacking is like having an Al’Akir the Windlord in play on turn 6! The one less on the resource cost is so important that it is a determining factor between dying and scraping by alive when you only start a game with 25 health. The card is seriously like having Blessing of Wisdom, an improved Litori Frostburn hero flip, and Fireball, all packed into a little package ready for your scholarly plan each turn!

There hasn't been a Mage card that does it all like this since Flickers From the Past. Flickers From the Past was awesome for Mages because there were so many ongoing abilities to choose from in the format. Now, there are less abilities, and therefore Flickers From the Past wouldn’t be as good for us in a deck. Shroud of the Archmage finishes the game like Flickers From the Past does, but doesn’t make you play a ton of ongoing abilities in your deck. You can play all the awesome allies that this Core Constructed format has to offer, and at the end of the game you can now have a Shroud of the Archmage to drop onto your hero to slowly grind the opponent out of the game.

Another amazing part about the Shroud of the Archmage is it can go into every kind of deck. A burn Mage with a ton of abilities will love this because it acts as a Fireball without the ongoing attachment each turn! Opposing heroes will quickly fall to the shroud if they lack ability removal or a large piece of armor. A control Mage will be counting their blessings when they know their best card saves them from dying to opposing Mazu’kons, Dulvar, Hand of the Lights, and Thrall, Warchief of the Horde by preventing them from attacking. In a control Mage deck the Shroud of the Archmage can help dig deeper into the deck by drawing cards finding answers to the various threats the opposing decks deploy. Even in an aggressive or midrange Mage deck the card is amazing, and every effect of the shroud is useful in the difference scenarios I described above.

There are a few cards you need to be fearful of with this ability however. A single Oppress or Dispel Magic from a Priest can lead to very unhappy times, so if you’re going to play against a Priest you need to play carefully not to lose your class's best finisher to their effects. Shamans could also destroy your shroud with one of their powerful ways to destroy abilities like Ancestral Purge. Against anyone playing dragons, you will want to use your cloak to protect your allies from trading with their Obsidian Drakonid, preventing them from attacking in and destroying their own Dragonkin, and thus saving your cloak from potential destruction.

These possible ways to destroy your shroud should not deter you from playing it though; you’re a Mage after all, so you have to have answers for these cards right? Mages are the class of pure intelligence, and with this amazing brainpower they can find an ability to prevent destruction to your abilities. To stop opposing abilities I recommend trying out Counterspell or Extinguish as both are legal in Core right now. And coming to us in Crown of the Heavens you’re getting an awesome way to interrupt allies as well, crushing the possible threat of Obsidian Drakonid, “Fungus Face” Mcgillicutty, or Shania, Herald of Faith: Overload! What a sweet name for a very powerful card to help protect your most powerful ability, Shroud of the Archmage, from harm.

If you could only find a way to continually ready your hero to use the Shroud over and over again, then you would be able to do some crazy things. There’s Bottled Elements for that! Normally meant for Shamans because of the second use, the bottle can allow you to ready your hero and use any of the three powers an additional time! A simple way to get around that nasty little second clause about exhausting a Shaman is to play some Shaman allies or Blessing of the Old God. Shaman always has some pretty great allies to choose from like Gerwixicks or Haratha Hammerflame, so finding a Shaman well suited for your style of deck should be a breeze if you want to use your hero multiple times a turn for activating its new shroud!

This card is exactly what I wanted to see for Mages. I’ve been looking for a way to close out the game, while also protecting my hero for harm for a while and this will fill that role perfectly. I’m so excited to get my hands on a few copies of Shroud of the Archmage, as they’ll go right into an awesome Mage deck with one of my favorite crafting cards, Melodious Slippers, and many other decks. I expect this card to see tons of play in Core format moving forward, and it should be just as incredible in multiplayer environments.

I hope you’re ready, because our release celebrations for the Crown of the Heavens are less than a month out and I cannot wait! Be sure to find your local store and get your hands on your very own Shroud of the Archmage!

-Corey

Discuss this article in our forums!