“What we have in the Amber/Emerald starter deck is less of a cohesive vision for a new deck archetype and more of an Into the Inklands greatest hits sampling, compiling a medley of many of the new mechanics and exciting cards Lorcana’s third set is introducing.”

— Amber/Emerald Into the Inklands Reveiw

Into the Inklands Amber & Emerald Starter Deck

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The Amber/Emerald Starter deck contents have been revealed, and with starter deck tournaments coming up, players are going to want to have a fair understanding of how to pilot these new decks to victory. In this guide, we’re going to go over some of the high points of these decks, as well as share a few ideas on how you can upgrade this deck with additional Into the Inklands cards once the set releases at the end of February.

Amber/Emerald Starter Deck List

Cubby - Mighty Lost Boy (x3)
Dalmatian Puppy - Tail Wagger (x5)
Don Karnage - Prince of Pirates (x2)
Flotsam - Riffraff (x2)
Helga Sinclair - Vengeful Partner (x1)
Horace - No-Good Scoundrel (x2)
Jasper - Common Crook (x2)
Jetsam - Riffraff (x2)
Kida - Atlantean (x3)
Kit Cloudkicker - Tough Guy (x2)
Lucky - The 15th Puppy (x1)
Nani - Protective Sister (x2)
Patch - Intimidating Pup (x3)
Peter Pan - Lost Boy Leader (x1)
Pluto - Determined Defender (x1)
Pluto - Friendly Pooch (x3)
Pongo - Determined Father (x1)
Robin Hood - Daydreamer (x1)
Rolly - Hungry Pup (x3)
Starkey - Devious Pirate (x1)
Tinker Bell - Generous Fairy (x2)
Wendy Darling - Talented Sailor (x3)
Wildcat - Mechanic (x2)
Strike A Good Match (x2)
Hypnotize (x2)
Improvise (x3)
De Vil Manor - Crueella's Estate (x3)
Neverland - Mermaid Lagoon (x2)

You can see the full Amber/Emerald starter deck list below via The Laughing Place.

*Photo Creds: Disney Lorcana and The Laughing Place*

Amber/Emerald – Strongest Characters

Lorcana starter decks aren’t exactly tournament ready the moment that you get them. However, they do typically contain several very strong cards, and these cards can then be used to upgrade your deck later. While there are several interesting things going for this deck, we’ll go over the strongest cards first and dive into what you can do about the weaker ones after.

Robin Hood – Daydreamer

We’ll start out with what is one of my favorite cards to be revealed in Into the Inklands so far: Robn Hood – Daydreamer. This cards gives a powerful questing option to this deck, and if you are playing this at a sealed starter deck tournament, this will undoubtedly be one of your strongest cards. For only the cost of six, Robin Hood has incredible stats and four lore.

Of course, you won’t be able to play this powerhouse card until much later in the game. Luckily, this deck also has several solid options earlier in the game to help you come out of the gate firing. One of these is the highly anticipated Peter Pan – Lost Boy Leader card which can be played for only the cost of four ink.

Peter Pan – Lost Boy Leader

While you only get one of these in the Amber/Emerald Into the Inklands Starter deck, it’s certainly one of your strongest cards. As you play the location cards you have in this deck, you will also gain gain lore whenever Peter is moved to them.

In addition to Peter, another low cost, high power card is Kit Cloudkicker – Tough Guy (shown below in its promo form).

Cloudkicker is a pretty solid card in both constructed and starter deck tournament formats, enabling you to bounce weaker cards into your opponent’s hand. This can be very handy early on to help gain a competitive advantage over your opponent, and is especially powerful in limited formats where that sort of a thing is hard to come back from.

Pluto – Friendly Pooch and Determined Defender

Last but not least, you’ll need to watch out for the Pluto Shift combo that really helps make this deck stand out. People were pretty excited about Pluto when it came out given its ability and that it can shift into Pluto. However, while this card is likely to be strong if you were to pick this deck during a sealed starter deck event, I doubt either versions of Pluto are going to do particularly well in constructed play.

There are a couple of reasons why Pluto is being largely overhyped. First of all, Friendly Pooch’s ability isn’t actually all that good. Unlike the handy Lantern item card which can be played and used in the same turn, you still have to wait a turn to use Pluto’s Good Dog ability. Meanwhile, there are other, stronger cards like Doc who can do the same thing as Pluto but also gain you two lore in the process.

Meanwhile, for a Shift 5 character, Pluto – Determined Defender is a little underwhelming, with a healing ability that isn’t really all that attractive. I’d rather just play a regular, lower cost bodyguard character than try to get this super beefy card into play.

For example, the Nani – Protective Sister card is a solid bodyguard character that’s a bit easier to get into play, and also quite strong.

While these are pretty attractive in the starter decks, I would definitely look to replace them once you upgrade your own deck, and Nani is a great option if you like the powerhouse bodyguard route.

Amber/Emerald Starter Deck has powerful card search and Draw support

One thing that really makes this starter deck stand out, however, isn’t just the powerful cards. It’s really how many excellent card search abilities this includes. Two of these include Pongo and Lucky.

Pongo – Determined Father

Pongo may not have high stats or lore value, but he does have a strong ability that will make him a huge asset in your starter deck, enabling you to draw extra characters into your hand.

Lucky – The 15th Puppy

Speaking of Pongo, there’s another card that can help you achieve a similar aim in this deck, and that’s Lucky. While its a cost four character and uninkable, its ability is also quite strong at enabling you to get characters into your hand, and it also benefits from powerful questing once you mange to get enough characters in play.

However there’s really no shortage of strong draw support and card search in this starter deck. In addition to Pongo and Lucky, you also have Tinker Bell – Generous Fairy which has a built in ability effectively the same as the “Be Our Guest” song card, and three more cards for draw support: Hypnotize, Improvise and the new and powerful Strike a Good Match song card.

Strike a Good Match

While it’s relatively easy to overlook a powerful draw support card like this one, you shouldn’t. Strike a Good Match is one of the strongest draw songs in the game. Playable/singable for only the cost of two, you get to draw two cards and then discard just one. As you look to upgrade your Amber/Emerald starter deck, running four copies of this particular card is a must.

How to upgrade your Amber/Emerald Into the Inklands starter deck

Now that we’ve gone over some of the basic strategy of these decks to help you know what to look for at your starter deck tournament, let’s go over some of your best options in regards to what cards you should keep and which ones to get rid of.

Swap Seven-Cost Pluto for Nani – Protective Sister

As previously mentioned, I would replace the Floodborn Pluto with Nani. Nani gives you more flexibility than the higher cost Pluto – Determined Defender since you won’t have to rely on having another Pluto in play to get her onto the field, and effectively she does the same thing (Pluto’s healing ability is largely overrated and unlikely to make a huge difference in actual gameplay).

Add two Strike a Good Match cards

Another easy upgrade option here is to do away with the Hypnotize and Improvise cards. Hypnotize is typically only helpful in discard decks when paired with Prince John from Rise of the Floodborn, and Improvise is an action making it far less handy to have around than a song card like Strike a Good Match. You should run four copies of Strike a Good Match in your upgraded Amber/Emerald Into the Inklands starter deck.

Get rid of Flotsam and Jetsam for Peter Pan or Kit Cloudkicker

Flotsam and Jetsam may have abilities that come into effect when they are both on the field, but you only have two copies each of these cards, making that scenario unlikely to happen. Additionally, the benefits you gain are hardly worth the effort of having them in play. Instead, swap them out for additional copies of Peter Pan – Lost Boy Leader and Kit Cloudkicker.

Replace Don Karnage with Ray – Easygoing Firefly

If you are in need of a five-cost Evasive character, you have better options than Don Karnage. Instead go with Ray – Easygoing Firefly. A horrendously overlooked card, Ray has an incredible three lore value and the helpful Evasive keyword. Additionally, he’s got enough strength to take out popular Evasive characters like Minnie Mouse – Stylish Surfer.

Replace Pluto with Doc or Lantern

As lovable as Pluto undoubtedly is, there are better options in the game if you want to cut down ink costs. Consider instead the powerful Doc character from Rise of the Floodborn or the tremendously popular Lantern item card.

Add Floodborn Kida

Another thing you should definitely do if you are looking to take your Amber/Emerald starter deck a bit further is to add a Kida – Protector of Atlantis card to your deck. This deck already runs three copies of one-cost Kida as it is. You could easily add another one and then add in four Floodborn Kida cards to increase consistency.

Kida – Protector of Atlantis is a solid card with great lore value for a Shift 3 character. Not to mention her ability could give you a powerful strategic advantage.

As for what you should replace for Kida – I would look to remove Starkey and Cubby as neither of those cards are going to be super helpful for you once you’ve made all of these other upgrades to your deck.

Drop Horace for more Jasper

Interestingly enough, this starter deck contains Horace and Jasper from The First Chapter. A really easy and cheap way to boost the viability of this starter deck is to just drop the two Horace character cards in favor of two Jasper. If you have a lot of Lorcana cards already, you may even find a few of these Jaspers lying around. Its a common and good card with a stellar ability that really puts your opponent on their heels.

Amber/Emerald Into the Inklands Starter Deck – Final Verdict

What we have here in the Amber/Emerald starter deck is less of a cohesive vision for a new deck archetype and more of an Into the Inklands greatest hits sampling, compiling a medley of many of the new mechanics and exciting cards Lorcana’s third set is introducing. And that’s sort of fitting for a Lorcana set that’s bursting at the seams with exciting new strategies, mechanics and cards that has all of us waiting at the very edge of our seats.

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