How to play : Akali Rogue Assassin

Read the legend first. Its ability works only on your turn, on a unit that is in a showdown: exhaust Akali, Rogue Assassin and that unit moves back to your base. On its own that is an escape. Move in, let the opponent answer, and if their trick wins them the fight, bring the unit home before damage: they have spent a card and you still have your unit. Pay its Empower cost once, 3 energy and 1 power, and it stays Empowered until something disempowers it: from then on the unit also comes back ready, so it can move again later in the turn.

That is the engine. Stellacorn Herder draws a card each time it moves: in, home through the Empowered legend, then in again once the showdown is over, three cards in one turn, and it can still conquer on the last move. Akali, Deadly Weapon deals 1 to a unit at the battlefield she moves to or from, 2 once she is Empowered, so the same route is three hits. Around them, Kai’Sa, Survivor draws when she conquers, and the three Astral Heron are the late game: 7 might, and while one is at a battlefield, the first card you play each turn makes your next one cost 2 energy and 2 power less.

You draw four and may replace up to two. Keep a two-energy unit (Scuttle Crab, Mournful Witness or Mischievous Marai) next to a cheap spell such as Shuriken Flip, Defy or Discipline: that hand takes a battlefield early and is ready for the first fight. Scuttle Crab is the best of them: it draws a card as it lands, and even at 0 might it can conquer and hold. Mournful Witness becomes Empowered when a combat it was in ends, and has +2 might from then on.

Stellacorn Herder and Kai’Sa, Survivor are good keeps at four energy, but keep only one of them in a four-card hand. Send back Astral Heron: at 7 energy it is a card for later turns, and the deck draws enough to find it. Never mulligan to find Akali, Deadly Weapon: she is your Chosen Champion and waits in your Champion Zone from the first turn.

In a best of three you pick your battlefield (in a single game it is drawn at random from your three), so pick it for the deck across the table. Void Gate is the damage pick: each hit a spell or ability lands on a unit there deals 1 more, so Shuriken Flip deals 3 there, Falling Star 4 twice and an Empowered Akali, Deadly Weapon 3 on each move. Threshold of the Gray gives the attacker and the defender 1 energy each when a combat starts there, enough for Defy’s energy in the middle of the fight. Sigil of the Storm makes whoever conquers it recycle one of their runes, a tax on early attacks that hurts most while every rune counts.

On the first turns, move a cheap unit onto an empty battlefield and start hiding cards behind it. Hiding a Hidden card at a battlefield you control costs 1 power, and from the next turn on, the opponent’s included, you can play it from there as a Reaction for 0 energy: Zhonya’s Hourglass, Mischievous Marai and Back Off all work this way. Marai played from face down deals 2 to an enemy unit at that battlefield, and Back Off stuns for 0 energy from there but draws only when you play it from your hand. On your third turn, Kai’Sa, Survivor with Accelerate (5 energy and a Fury power in all) enters ready, walks onto an empty battlefield and draws as she conquers.

Get the order of the legend’s turn right. Empower the legend before you move, make the move that triggers something, then wait: let the opponent answer in the showdown before you use the legend. If their answer wins them the fight, send the unit home. If nothing comes, choose between staying to conquer and coming home for one more trigger. A unit sent home and readied still has to wait for the showdown to end, because a standard move is never available during a showdown, and the legend exhausts to do its job, so it works once a turn: give it to the unit whose trigger matters most.

Shuriken Flip is damage and a move in one card: 2 to up to one enemy unit at a battlefield, then a move for one of your units. That move triggers Stellacorn Herder or Akali, Deadly Weapon like any other, and since the spell does the moving, the unit does not need to be ready: Akali can reach a battlefield on the turn you play her. Open the attack with it: 2 on the defender, then its move brings an Empowered Akali in for 2 more, so the defender has taken 4 before combat damage. Once it is in your trash, Flow plays it again for 3 energy and 1 power, then it is banished. With Astral Heron at a battlefield, lead with the cheap card and let the discount fall on the expensive one: a second Heron then costs 5 energy.

The legend only works on your turn, so on theirs the Calm half holds the line. Discipline gives a unit +2 might this turn and draws a card, and on Irelia, Fervent it is +3, because choosing her gives her +1 more. Long Sword plays as a Reaction too: it attaches as you play it, gives +2 might in the middle of a combat and stays. Not So Fast counters an enemy spell or ability that chooses one of your units or gear, and Zhonya’s Hourglass takes the next death of a friendly unit, sending that unit home exhausted instead: a recall, not a move.

Defy counters a spell that costs no more than 4 energy and 1 power: on their turn, keep 1 energy and a Calm power up for it. Falling Star deals 3 twice, to one unit or two, and costs 2 Fury power, so an opposing Defy cannot counter it. For gear, Brittle Steel kills one, and Flow plays it again from your trash for 4 energy and a Fury power, while Tomb-Raider Barbara kills an enemy gear as she lands once you control 7 or more runes, or disempowers it instead if it is Empowered. Numbers worth remembering: an Empowered Akali, Deadly Weapon is 4 might and hits for 2 on every move, and Stellacorn Herder is three cards a turn with an Empowered legend.