How to play : Ahri Nine-Tailed Fox

The legend is the whole idea: every enemy unit that attacks a battlefield you control gets -1 might this turn, never below 1. So take the battlefields early with cheap units and make the opponent come to you. Eleven Reaction spells decide those fights on their turn, and the Discipline, Stupefy and Premonition among them draw cards, so a good defence also refills your hand.

The points come from holding, not attacking. Ahri, Alluring starts in your Champion Zone, so she is always available for five energy and one Calm power, and each time she holds, you score one more point. Hold points and Ahri’s point are never blocked by the final-point rule, which is why the two copies of Time Warp close games: an extra turn is another Beginning phase, another point for every battlefield you hold, and one more from Ahri.

You draw four and may send back up to two. Keep a two-cost unit (Ravenbloom Student or Scuttle Crab) alongside a cheap Reaction (Discipline, Stupefy or Defy): that hand gets onto a battlefield early and already holds an answer when they attack it.

Send back the top of the curve: Time Warp, Singularity, and any second seven-drop (Astral Heron or Thousand-Tailed Watcher). They win the late game, but the deck draws plenty on the way there. A hand with nothing to put on a battlefield in the first two turns is a mulligan: Ravenbloom Student, Scuttle Crab, Eager Apprentice, Diana, Lunari and Desert’s Call all count.

Your first turns have one job: get a cheap unit onto a battlefield and keep it there. Ravenbloom Student gets +1 might for the turn each time you play a spell, so a 4-might attacker is not the threat it looks like: the legend makes it a 3, Discipline on the Student makes the Student a 5, and you drew a card. Eager Apprentice is the other early unit to land: while it is at a battlefield, every spell you play costs 1 energy less, never below 1.

Play units on your turn and keep energy up for theirs: Stupefy and Defy cost one, Discipline two. When Diana, Lunari is on a battlefield, pay the one energy she asks each time a showdown begins there: more than half of this deck is spells, and a revealed spell goes to your hand. And spend power sparingly: every rune you recycle for power leaves the board, and Time Warp costs ten energy and four Mind power.

Astral Heron rewards a planned turn: while it is at a battlefield, the first card you play each turn makes the next one cost 2 energy and 2 power less. Lead with your cheapest card, a Stupefy or a Charm, and let the discount fall on the expensive one: Time Warp drops from 10 energy and 4 power to 8 and 2, and to 7 energy if Eager Apprentice is at a battlefield too.

Thousand-Tailed Watcher is your attack button: pay Accelerate (eight energy and two Mind power in all) and it enters ready, every enemy unit is 3 might smaller this turn, never below 1, and the Watcher can move straight in. On a turn you hold The Academy, make your first spell one you want twice: it gets Repeat equal to its base cost, so Find Your Center paid twice is two cards and two runes.

Two counterspells, two different jobs. Defy costs one energy and one Calm power but only stops a spell costing 4 energy or less and at most one power; Wind Wall stops any spell. Spend Defy on the cheap tricks and keep Wind Wall for the one big spell their deck is built around. Neither touches a unit, because units cannot be countered: against a big unit, your answers are Back Off, which stuns it, and Singularity.

Zhonya’s Hourglass belongs next to Ahri, Alluring: the next time a friendly unit would die, the Hourglass is killed instead and the unit goes back to base exhausted, alive but off the battlefield, so plan who holds the battlefield after. Sterak’s Gage plays as a Reaction too: it attaches as you play it, gives +3 might in the middle of their attack, and stays. Numbers worth remembering: keep two energy up on their turn, and when combat starts on Threshold of the Gray, each side adds one more energy, enough for a free Stupefy.