The Ringleader
The Ringleader is a light, fun-loving class that does its best to put on a show for its audience. The class has a lot of strong synergies, buffs, heals, tokens and a focus on miracle play.
Signature is the Ringleader's keyword, and a big part of what makes the Ringleader the Ringleader. Many circuses are famous for their own different acts, one specific act among the entire show that they slap on posters and imprint into the memories of everyone watching. Signature symbolises that. When you begin building a Ringleader deck, everything's as normal, the deckbuilding is just the same as any other. But when you include a Signature card into it, a slot appears at the top, filled with a pair of bananas to keep the seat warm. From there, you can drag any spell in your collection into it.
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These spells appear at the top of the decklist no matter what, in golden text and still taking up the slots in your deck. For a Ringleader, these spells are their, well, Signature , the one they're best known for and the one that puts them apart from the rest. Most Ringleader decks aren't defined fully by their themes, but more specifically by the one specific Signature that ties it all together. Enough talk on thematics though, what does a Signature really mean for a deck? Many Ringleader cards add copies of your Signature to your hand or your deck, and some modify the way it works. Many times, this just means it'll have an extra effect added on top of the spell, both spectacles triggering at the same time, but some change the way the Signature is targeted, repeating every effect on the card onto every new minion it affects.
But then, what of the subtle, overly cautious rogue, or the stoic, overly annoying priest, neither whom pay the same love towards their granduer as the greatest of Ringleaders, who happen upon Signature cards through their burglery and mind-reading? Well, much alike the Worthless Imp s from Sense Demons or the Shadow of Nothing from Mindgames , the Bananas from before will act as the default option. Should they be the type to rely on stealing a lot, they should end up finding a Signature generation card eventually. And by that point they should have built up quite the impressive Banana indeed. And besides, most Signature cards will do something by themselves regardless.
Card Showcase
Star Performance ~ A cheap, targeted, multi-purpose buff and heal card from the basic set. While not the most exciting card on its own in the game, a Ringleader knows that the signature act of their show is their most trained, not their most extravagent. Healing your hero and buffing friendly minions is a big part of Ringleader; be sure to consider basic cards like these when looking through Signature cards.
Circus Supplier ~ A handy little chap that's sure to be of use in any circus - he just radiates enthusiasm. He's a nice and simple way of getting yourself more copies of your Signature across the course of the game. I had two Star Performance s in my deck, but with two of these, I may as well have four. That's a lot of attack boosting and healing, however we're not really doing anything too fancy with it yet. And hey, if another class gets one of these guys, what they get will be amusingly appropriate.
Firedancer ~ Before, we were just setting up, but suddenly, those Star Performances might be looking a little scary to your opponent now. If the Ringleader can establish a small board, an extra 9 damage is gonna be coming right for the opponents face, maybe more. The Firedancer is an exaggerative man, putting on quite an impressive performance, and positively heating up the audience for what's to come next... But wait, those Star Performances also heal, right?
(Pay no heed to the old Ringleader border! The work of trickery, surely!)
Three times the targets, three times the spells. Three buffs, three individual heals that bring you an extra 9 Health. This goes for any targeted card that does more than one thing, though effects that say "Your next Signature " only pertain to one of those casts, of course. While any Ringleader can run any spell, the ones they're using as their Signature will surely feel different from the rest.
Dining Dash ~ Ringleaders also have access to aura spells or turn spells, whatever you want to call them. Think of Lock and Load or perhaps Stampede . These spells work the same way, and of course reward the Ringleader for doing a LOT of things in a single turn. Such as, for example, healing your hero a lot of times in one turn. Hmmmm... I wonder how they could do that? Miracle players need look no further than Ringleader for their source of massive, one turn insanity.
Finale Architect ~ This lady is the one who likes to plan out the final acts of the shows she works on. Works great with aura/turn spells and spells that don't require targets, though the ones that do will just target randomly should their original target die before they cast. Sometimes, things don't go according to plan, and that's just fine. Be sure to write out a little risk assessment form before using her, because she certainly won't be doing that. All she cares about is making sure your next turn is one that leaves an impression, which it certainly will.
Expect a lot more signature generation, healing, buffs, wacky insanity and potential for explosive plays in the future of Ringleader, for these five don't even scratch the surface of its potential.
Art Sources:
Regina ~ Fajareka Setiawan
Announce ~ Maren Marmulla
Performer ~ Jingsketch
Chain Dance ~ Anastasia Bulgakova
Star Performance & Finale Architect ~ Anzka Nguyen (Seriously check her stuff out she's great)
Circus Supplier ~ ALRadeck
Firedancer ~ Cesar Rosolino
Dining Dash ~ Dmitry Bolotov
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Congratulations McF4rtson for creating another amazing creation!
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My cards:
In all honesty, I have no good ideas for this comp cause it's more flavour-oriented than mechanical-oriented. I'm slightly tempted to phone it in and submit this at this point XD.
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More custom creation cards! Kewl! Okay, sooo I like the Priest version of Skilled Grafter because let's just say that Warlock's 1-drops might be a tad bit OP if they're stitched together (e.g. Voidlord + Flame Imp). Also, I like me some Aggro Priest cause why not. For balancing I think we can compare this to Kabal Courier, who more or less has a unique Discover effect. The only difference here is that because 1-drops are stated so heavily (The baseline of a 1-drop has 4 stats and the baseline stats of a 2-drop is worth 5 mana), you tend to result in a card that's worth 3 mana unlike Kabal Courier whose Discover product is worth...well what it's worth. As such, I think you should make it either a 3 mana 2/1 or 1/1.
If you want, you could review my cards (I scrapped Zul'jin and the second set is near this comment)!
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Meanwhile in Cogi's brain:
I failed to go into the top 8, participate often, and write the review correctly.
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Completely Professional Review 7.19...Almost the End :(
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9th Place...
In all seriousness, there are some absolutely stupendous cards here! The card quality here is through the roof, and I can't wait to see who wins. It's gonna be a close one tho.