1st Place Lorcana Emerald/Steel Discard Deck List & Guide (Set 5)
The Lorcana Emerald/Steel Discard Deck has been one of the top Lorcana decks for several seasons now.
After the infamous Bucky nerf that happened after the relatively droll Ursula’s Return season of the game, people almost abandoned the Ink combo in favor of newer, shinier strategies.
But everyone forgot that Emerald/Steel Discard was also a viable strategy well before the squirrel wrecked havoc on hands everywhere. Everyone except for a few intelligent individuals who piloted the deck to great success at the Vegas Disney Lorcana Challenge, including Lorcana legend Zan Syed who won first place out of nearly 2000 competitors in the event.
Below, let’s take a look at the Emerald/Steel Discard strategy as it stands in Lorcana’s fifth set, using Syed’s deck as an example.
1st place – Disney Lorcana Challenge: Las Vegas by Zan Syed
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4 Pete - Games Referee
2 Anna - Diplomatic Queen
4 Sudden Chill
2 The Muses - Proclaimers of Heroes
4 We Don't Talk About Bruno
4 Strength of a Raging Fire
4 Diablo - Maleficent's Spy
2 Tinker Bell - Giant Fairy
4 Diablo - Devoted Herald
4 Morph - Space Goo
4 Ursula - Deceiver of All
4 Ursula - Deceiver
4 Beast - Tragic Hero
2 Hidden Cove - Tranquil Haven
4 Hypnotize
4 Let the Storm Rage On
4 Prince John - Greediest of All
Ink Colors
Inkable
Card Types
Emerald/Steel Deck Strategy Guide
Bringing Prince John back
Released in Rise of the Floodborn, Prince John is still the gold standard in the discard game. This card massively incentivises your discard strategy by granting you extra draw support whenever your opponent discards. Undoubtedly, Prince John is the cornerstone of this deck’s discard strategy, and should be of any deck that ran discard.
While Bucky might have been easier and more fun than the relatively cumbersome Prince John, the game seems to be designed around the “I Sentence You” ability and will be for the foreseeable future.
Diablo is also a powerful draw engine
Diablo – Devoted Herald
Honestly the idea of having both Diablo and Prince John in play is somewhat terrifying to think of. If you manage to get both in play you’re getting some pretty insane card draw against your opponent. Of course, it’s not like these two are invulnerable and they can be cleared with relatively ease against Be Prepared or Grab Your Sword.
Putting that aside, Diablo is deceptively strong. Capable of being shifted for free at any time (if you have one-cost Diablo in play or a Morph like Zan includes here), Diablo grants you extra cards whenever your opponent draws. This effectively puts your opponent’s hard work into drawing multiple cards in a turn as a boon for you.
Hidden Cove makes your characters a smidge stronger
Hidden Cove
One of the glaring weaknesses of the current Emerald/Steel discard build is how low some of its key character’s stats are. This makes them relatively easy pickings for a range of cards from damage dealing steal cards to low strength targeting ruby cards like Madam Medusa or Sisu. Hidden Cove is a pretty ingenious tech into this build, making it just a little harder for your opponent to take out your key cards, especially Bucky and Diablo.
It can also make your legendary Tragic Beast more playable. Many have bemoaned Beast’s ineffectiveness following the release of powerhouse cards like Madam Medusa. While this isn’t a foolproof solution (ahem…Ice block ahem…), it can help keep him alive a little longer to help you draw extra cards.
Pinpoint song cards to discard before they can be played
Ursula – Deceiver
Emerald/Steel Discard also has an ace in the hole in the form of another Ursula card. This Ursula allows you to look at your opponent’s hand and discard a song you find there. This is an ideal strategy to use against cards that otherwise would be ruinous to this deck like the dreaded Be Prepared.
Let’s talk about Bruno
We Don’t Talk About Bruno
Another card that has come along in Ursula’s Return is the powerful We Don’t Talk About Bruno song card. The Lorcana community went a little wild for this particular card when it came out and honestly for good reason. It’s a strong card that not only discards your opponent’s cards but also bounces any single one of them into their hand.
Because Emerald/Steel’s insane discard engine makes it possible to quickly and effectively reduce your opponent’s hand to zero, often the card that you bounce back to the hand will also be discarded, making Bruno one of the strongest card removal songs in the game.
New cards in Shimmering Skies spice this deck up
While the core cards to this deck’s strategy aren’t new to Shimmering Skies, set five does bring a few powerful new plays into Emerald/Steel’s arsenal. The first of which is Pete – Games Referee. Everyone mostly knew how strong Pete would be in Steel decks once the card was revealed, and he’s certainly panned out. Use Pete to solidify a dominate position on the board, or to slow your opponent down before they can get too far ahead (especially in the case of Amber/Steel).
Meanwhile, Anna acts as something of a Swiss Army Knife, letting you deal with a number of tricky situations when you play her.
Emerald/Steel Discard Strengths, Weaknesses and Matchups
No deck is fully without weaknesses, and Emerald/Steel Discard is no exception. Here are a few strengths and weaknesses of the deck.
Very effective against Ruby/Amethyst: Ruby/Amethyst is still a force to be reckoned with, although no longer the top deck in the game. Emerald/Steel is very handy against that particular deck, and most matches I’ve played against it are relatively easy wins.
Strong against aggro: any pure aggro deck will have trouble besting this Steel deck that can easily cut through them with all of its powerful songs and attackers.
Weak against Sapphire/Steel: Sapphire Steel can be a challenging matchup mostly because Cogsworth makes it very difficult to do any damage to opposing characters. Luckily most people aren’t playing that particular deck right now.
Weak against Ruby/Sapphire: Ruby/Sapphire is your worst matchup. That deck has plenty of ways to draw cards rendering it hard to trap them with discard.
Slight edge against Steelsong: I would give the edge to this deck against Steelsong. While Steelsong can Whole New World it’s way out of the discard play, in situations where they don’t draw what they need, you can dismantle the opposition.
