Locust (Time/Aether)

Overview[]

Strategy by Devilord Bloodshadow

What is cheap to summon, and grows in power by devouring opponent monsters? Otuygh? No, not Otyugh, but Scarab. Compared to Otyugh, the new card Scarab is a much superior creature, noted by its "Swarm" ability by which its HP increases with each additional Scarab you control, and its much cheaper cost.

The main strategy of this deck is to get out as many Scarabs as you can, while getting out more Scarabs using Parallel Universe, and devouring all opponent creatures that dare to stand against you. This strategy is named "Locust", because it functions like swarms of locust that eat up everything in their path. This deck has a very quick setup, and at the same time is also excellent on creature control; what's more, once your Scarabs are buffed up, they will be very hard to destroy.

This deck is not very good only use if you have upgraded cards.

List of Cards[]

Optional:

Strategy[]

The main strategy is to get out as many Scarabs as you can. With the cost being only 2 Time Quanta, this shouldn't be a problem. Use Parallel Universe on your currently strongest Scarab whenever you can.

You do not need any Gravity Pillars, because your Mark of Gravity alone will be enough to fuel your Scarabs to devour enemy creatures.

You can include a few Reverse Time in this deck, when your Scarabs aren't powerful enough to devour a dangerous enemy creature. When you are in trouble, use Dimensional Shield.

Weapons are not completely necessary; before you complete your last quest (500 score for a free rare weapon), your weapon can be a simple Dagger or Short Sword. When you pick your free rare weapon, you can choose either Eternity or Lobotomizer; Titan is not recommended as Gravity Quanta are sparse, used solely to power your Scarabs. Personally, I would choose Lobotomizer, because while Eternity is an excellent creature control weapon, your Scarabs alone is enough creature control, and Eternity can be replaced by a couple of Reverse Time; on the other hand, Lobotomizer can permanently remove any dangerous abilities, and its effect cannot be replaced by other cards; and Lobotomizer deals more damage than Eternity.

Notes:[]

When you summon a new Scarab, your Scarabs' HP only increase at the END of your turn.

A scarab's HP is determined by the base HP + the number of scarabs you own. The base is 0 when played from your hand; but when copied with PU, the base HP is the full HP of the original Scarab. This can lead to incredibly powerful Scarabs if done correctly.

Sometimes, it might be best if you save up, and summon 2 to 3 Scarabs at once, because when first summoned, Scarabs' HP are 1 and therefore very vulnerable to damaging spells. But once you have a few good Scarabs going (screenshot below), they could be very hard to kill off.

This deck doesn't do well against a poison/freeze deck. They're just so ****ingly annoying, especially Ice Shield and Arsenic. This deck doesn't have a very high damage output, so delay + poison = death.

A Gravity Shield against this deck is pretty much an instant loss, since the HP of the Scarabs build up so quickly.

Screenshots[]

http://img193.imageshack.us/img193/2484/scarabepicwin.jpg

An example of an epic win using this deck at its almost peak potential. As you can see, I am completely pwning my opponent, and yet my Gravity Quanta was not yet exhausted. He managed to beat me down to 28 HP only because I had a few bad draws.

Bad draws are sort of a double-edged sword. For this deck, if you have a few bad draws, they have a slight benefit of letting you build up some extra Gravity Quanta.

Alternative Strategy: Hungry Horde[]

The Locust deck is built to bring the Scarabs' Swarm ability to their maximum potential. However, this card is slightly too rainbow for a dual element deck. To fix that, the deck could be changed to the following. The Hungry Horde deck is composed of Scarabs and Otyughs, which is spread over only Time and Gravity; while this maximizes their Devour ability, the Swarm ability is reduced.

Optional:

Reverse Time
Momentum
Gravity Pull
Gravity Shield / Procrastination / or both
Titan / Eternity / other weapon

I have not tried this deck, so I don't know how good this is compared to the original Locust deck. However, this could possibly satisfy some people's complaints of the deck being too rainbow.

I used this deck for a while (4 otyugh instead of 6) and I can say it sucks. Way too difficult to build up scarabs, Otyughs are routinely pwned by firestorms, poison, owl's eyes and such. Adding some plate armors improves slightly your chances, but most of the times your armies will simply be removed form game by some trick of the AI.

Alternative Strategy 2: Rainbow Scarab[]

Original strategy by Scaredgirl, the person who made the ultimate anti-God deck. See her forum thread below:

http://elementstheforum.smfforfree3.com/index.php/topic,215.0.html

She said this deck would work against all False Gods.

Personally I would take a few Blessings to allow quicker Scarab buffs. Do NOT add Momentum; it's bugged, because if you use Momentum on a Scarab, then PU it, the copied version would only have Momentum and not Devour.

An Owl's Eye with this deck might be good, to make the devouring easier. And maybe a Purify.

Pulverizer can also be added to this deck for some permanent control.

Anubis could be good, too. If you can get one out early, it almost guarantees victory. But remember, always leave your strongest Scarab un-Immortalized, so you can PU it.