Emerald/Steel Discard Deck List and Strategy Guide | Lorcana
The Lorcana Emerald/Steel Discard Deck has been a strategy for several months now, first appearing on the scene during Rise of the Floodborn. Today, it is the main competitive level discard deck seeing play at major tournaments. In this deck list and strategy guide, we will be looking at a top eight finishing deck at one of the largest Lorcana tournaments to date.
Updated March 26, 2024
Emerald/Steel Deck List
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3 Kit Cloudkicker - Tough Guy
2 Rise of the Titans
4 And Then Along Came Zeus
3 Strike A Good Match
4 A Whole New World
4 Robin Hood - Beloved Outlaw
4 Strength of a Raging Fire
4 Tinker Bell - Giant Fairy
4 Bucky - Squirrel Squeak Tutor
4 Jafar - Dreadnought
4 Morph - Space Goo
4 Robin Hood - Champion of Sherwood
4 Ursula - Deceiver of All
4 Ursula - Deceiver
4 Beast - Tragic Hero
4 Let the Storm Rage On
Ink Colors
Inkable
Card Types
Emerald/Steel Deck Strategy Guide
Bucky is your main discard engine
In the past, discard decks revolved largely around leveraging Prince John’s powerful I Sentence You ability to help you draw extra cards while discarding your opponent’s cards. Today, few competitive level decks use that engine anymore (although you never know it could make a comeback). Instead, this deck focuses more on dominating the board and discarding cards passively thanks to Bucky’s ability.
Bucky – Squirrel Squeak Tutor
Bucky discards one of your opponent’s cards whenever you play a Floodborn character. Luckily this deck runs plenty of Floodborn characters, making the discard ability more of a passive bonus than an active strategy like it used to be in past sets.
Robin Hood – Champion of Sherwood is a powerhouse card
Many have rightfully touted Robin Hood – Champion of Sherwood as the single strongest card in all of Into the Inklands. Part of Robin Hood’s immense power is that he can be played as early as turn three thanks to his Shift ability. Once shifted, you can start banishing characters and gaining lore.
Robin Hood – Champion of Sherwood
However, Robin Hood isn’t your only strategic character that can be played on turn three. You also have access to the well loved and often played Ursula – Deceiver of All. This deck is built purposely around this powerhouse card with many songs that can be used by her twice thanks to her “What a Deal” ability.
Ursula – Deceiver of All
Use Ursula to sing three powerful songs twice
This deck runs three different song cards that are three-cost or under, meaning Ursula is more than capable of singing them twice. Each has its own advantages and can be used to either bolster your hand or devestate your opponent’s board.
Strike a Good Match is an excellent option for drawing plenty of cards.
Let the Storm Rage On enables you to draw cards and dish out damage.
Strength of a Raging Fire can help you tackle tough opponents or clear the board quickly.
Dismantle your opponent with a combination of Steel powerhouses
Steel has some seriously tough character cards. You can use these to do damage to your opponent. Tinker Bell – Giant Fairy is great because she can be shifted onto your Morph while Beast – Tragic Hero acts as a strong draw engine. Being Floodborn characters, both will work to whittle away your opponent’s hand when played. The same is true for Jafar – Dreadnaught, which has the added advantage of bolstering your hand whenever he banishes a character in a challenge.
Pinpoint song cards to discard before they can be played
Ursula – Deceiver
Last but not least, 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.
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.
Strong against aggro: any 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: the worst matchup I’ve faced with Emerald/Steel is Sapphire/Steel. This is mostly because Cogsworth makes it very difficult to do any damage to opposing characters.
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 largely thanks to the discard ability and Kit Cloudkicker. Kit Cloudkicker can massively offset Steelsong’s ability to setup powerful singers like Cinderella or Ariel as they can easily be bounced back into the hand with Kit.
