Buluc, the Unstoppable Paper Tiger in the 2023 Post Rotation Metagame

Collective’s Context - Why this Metagame matters

In the last 6 months before rotation, the sentiment was becoming clear to me even as a lurker: The card pool is fucked, the core system sucks due to Actions being able to have extra turns to react, the combat system sucks, the economy is shit, too many polarizing matchups, the game pacing is too fast, and everything is shit shit shit. 

Personally, I was having fun playing the game but the doom and gloom energy was very real as both highly prominent and notorious players were leaving the game without any new ones coming in. 

While only the most barebone marketing was done and things were delayed, there was some hype coming into post-rotation. Will the game improve? How will the new systems look? Will matchup polarity be solved with the new card set and the new system? 

With the few months of the year dominated by mostly the same few meta decks, the huge change made some players jump back into the game again and for the first time in a few months, there was a metagame evolution. 

At first, players were trying out all kinds of heroes. Ash, Heldim, Dhat, Buluc, and Fortuno were all deemed somewhat playable. Then, one archetype, in particular, stood out: Vriktik Control. Ou, Celestial Hatcher and its synergy with amazing Mind 5 drops, it became clear that the power level was uncontested and the community started reacting: “Remove the Ward?” Remove Flying and Ward? Redesign Ou? Captain Chameleon is now on the watchlist… 

Then, the doom, the bullied and forgotten cat, strikes back. Matchup polarity was not the question anymore, rather “can anything in Collective beat this?” This new Buluc deck was not defined by its wins but rather defined by its losses. 

The deck so far is able to achieve a Win/Loss ratio of an estimated 75 wins and 16 losses (45W-10L in the last 2 days). Yet, behind the glamorous 82% win rate, a deck so notorious that anti-Buluc designs such as Daylily Warrior are flowing around (donut), is a 0% win rate deck in reality. 

Buluc Aggro Evolution

I overlooked Buluc initially because… Buluc is Buluc. I only tested out the deck because I wanted to see how all of the Aggro decks match up against Vriktik Ou piloted by Deadz0n. One thing was clear, out of all the wins against Deadz0n, Buluc’s victory was by far, the most dominant. 

At first, the deckbuild was very straightforward. 01-26-23 Buluc 0 Head Aggro. Buluc gain EXP when you attack with units put 43 units into the deck and the deck is done. Dummy Mummy and Heartbeet make it very easy to match up against Vriktik’s Acid Rain. 

What is interesting when the card pool has relatively flat power levels, the hero power really stands out. Ashgerdy’s level 3 is lackluster compared to Buluc’s as it can be hard to find the right board state to play the 5 mana card. Heldim’s level 3 is just Buluc’s level 2 but with evasion and 4 turns late. 

Buluc also has a much more useful level 4 than the other two Aggro heroes, while Ash technically can ramp EXP faster, but she can’t compete in board development against Buluc and lack the evasion to hit the procs. Kukul, a God who slept through the entirety of last year, is pretty good at ending games under the new system without multi-blocking. 

After having the 27 games win streak Thano snapped by Magneter’s Ash deck (I got confused by her card choices and didn’t know what to do), the first real challenge came. PrinceCats with their PM Control deck. 01-28-23 PrinceCat's PM Standard Control, 

I was doing the usual deck shuffling and I felt very oppressed playing Lazaro Humans against that deck since Volcanic Stomper is impossible to be played around, and a 9/9 stomper against a deck with relatively fewer units compared to Buluc/Heldim feels terrible. 

Then I used Buluc and to my surprise, I lost. Elderwurm was getting Consumed, and getting threats were nonstop removed by Spectral Dragonfire, 0 mana Stomper into Hellhound to stall out the game… The deck went 3-3 against PM Control. 

First Time Looking at the Card Pool

I had Deface all along, but it does nothing against Stomper. What can I do? 

That is when the Data Disruption tech is discovered. In the previous meta, I generally disregarded these types of cards since it doesn’t develop board state in a game that ends at turn 6 generally + players don’t run out of cards, whereas the current meta last until turn 7-8 usually and players do run out of cards. It feels very refreshing that such cards have a place in the metagame in an aggro deck. 

PM critically lacks card draw and is dependent on playing a few of their huge threats to win the game. I was able to use it to discard their Hellhound / Dino (and ideally Stomper but they never drew it in the few matches) whenever necessary. Lowering the curve also helps. Buluc was back at his winning ways. 

01.28.23 - 0 Head V2

Paper Tiger

One of the “concepts” I have been thinking about is the Floor and Ceiling of cards. 

Why is Cat with a Frying Pan used so much? Giddy Gardener always creates another 1/1, but it is hard to go into the game and guarantee that Cat with a Frying Pan will be useful. While the Floor of a Cat with a Frying Pan can be low, its Ceiling can be relatively high. Pop wards of big threats, finishing off a unit with Lifebond, most other 1 drop cannot offer that utility. 

Behind the seemingly glamorous win rate is a Paper Tiger, carried by tech cards with a high ceiling and low floor. Buluc is a fraud against Heldim for multiple reasons: 

Buluc is 8-4 against Heldim this week, with 7 wins coming from playing this anti-Heldim deck and 4 losses coming from playing the other versions of Buluc aggro. Anti-Heldim Buluc. It is dependent on tech cards Huntsman Jr, Huntsman Spider, Deface, and Data Disruption to remove the key synergy pieces of powerful flying lifebond cards. 

Note: Anti-Air Array is more powerful and better than Huntsman Jr but I forgot to put it in. 

These cards are, however, suboptimal when played against any other decks. If Buluc is forced to run these cards to win, it is at least not tier-0 and really doesn’t warrant the “anti-Buluc” designs flowing around when “synergy” based designs alone such as Pain, Rage, tribe-based stat buffs or new keywords can eventually push Buluc out. 

While Buluc looks like a fraud against Heldim, Heldim overall seems weaker in all other matchups. Heldim is dependent on a few standalone threats and once the threats are removed, Heldim’s synergy pieces fall apart and whump, it is why Vriktik with its powerful single-target removals should be able to defeat Heldim consistently. 

Heldim can be easily beaten by Buluc’s anti-flying tech, but Marie is much, much harder. A perfect draw and perfect setup are required for victory on the Buluc side. 

PrinceCat's Marie Midrange. Sevas is a non-believer of Marie’s power and I would have thought the same if I never played the matchup. There is a combination of many factors that allows Marie to beat Buluc consistently (despite the current positive win rate in favor of Buluc): 

What about Dhat? Dhat also never attacks, Dhat is incentivized to run tanky units with Lifebond… The difference is that Dhat has an EXP system that ensures they never reach level 4 and eventually Dhat’s late-game capability will fall short against Buluc while Marie has infinite value with House of Zombie and her active to cycle through her deck. 

This is my attempt at countering Marie: Anti-Marie Buluc. The noticeably different cards I put into the deck are Veteran Soul Crusader and Terradon to get through the small units. As stupid as Terradon looks in a deck of weenies, it can help with getting 3-4 extra damage with other units while the body itself can deal some damage. Flamp could get replaced by Heartbeet / Serpent Maiden due to Marie always drawing the Anti-Air Array tech against it. 

This list while feels like an improvement in the Marie matchup, it feels very… Lackluster? I am at a loss of how to beat Marie honestly. Perhaps the basic approach of Heartbeet and Flagbearer might be good for winning trades. 

Marie is still a new deck and it would be exciting to see how the matchup pans out between Marie and the other heroes. 

The point I am trying to get across with all of this writing is that, while Buluc is very strong, his win rate is dependent on tech. No tech against Heldim will lead to a 0% win rate. Queueing with an anti-Marie deck against Heldim will achieve a 0% win rate. On the other hand, teching against Heldim leads to a 100% win rate while teching against Marie leads to a ~50% win rate. 

The game can still be seen as rock paper scissors. 

Can Heldim counter tech Buluc’s anti-Heldim tech? Uncertain, since it hasn’t been explored although Scaled Earth Shaker is very good. One thing for sure is that against Heldim and Marie, it is not as simple as the dominant narrative of attack and wins. 

Actual Guide Time

This is a concise description of what cards to run to win. 

Core Cards -> These cards should be run 3x no matter which matchup it is up against. They are the core of the deck. Fluffy Boi, Giddy Gardener, Cat with a Frying Pan, Dr. Cornie, Sleepy Snowbear, Affectionate Farmer, Vexing Voidborne, 3x one of the vanilla 2 drops -> Adventurer or Impatient Hunter. 

One card inclusion I will explain is Dr. Cornie, it is very important for Buluc units to survive blocks from the opponent so that they have enough units to keep on attacking, which makes Fluffy Boi + Dr. Cornie a very good turn 1 combo. 

Counter-able Core Cards -> These cards are still core cards, but you rarely want to swap out these ones. 

Dummy Mummy -> Most decks seem to be running half and half units and action ratio. This card is only bad in Mirror matchups where the opposing Buluc is also not running any Actions. 

Flamp -> Unplayable if the opponent is playing Anti-Air Array. Other anti-flying cards are irrelevant in this instance. 

Swappable Fillers -> The rest of the deck depends on how you want the curve to look / game plan. For starters, Serpent Maiden, Flagbearers, Friendly Axotl, and Skull Scouts are decently playable cards. Serpent Maiden is slightly superior to Skull Scouts because her token can dodge AoE deal 2s. 

Matchup Dependent Cards

Ashgerdy Aggro -> 3x Sweet Scent Kodama is enough to out-heal Ash and outpace them. The rest will be generic good stuff. Ash plays Flamp/Flyers as well but Leap cards aren’t necessary to winning since what matters is that your vanilla units + Buluc active deal more damage and outrace in comparison to their Flamp (for everyone who thought Flamp might need to be nerfed, this is my opinion), though relatively effortless to win either way. 

Heldim Aggro -> 3x Anti-Air Array, 3x Huntsman Jr, 3x Huntsman Spider, 3x Deface, 2x Data Disruption. Heldim lives and dies by their scaling and value flyers. Huntsman Spider is especially key to removing their Veinreaver or Lierec. 

Marie -> 3x Veteran Soul Crusher, 3x Musteli Charger, 3x Terrardon (?), Big overrun units can help with reach against Marie. Author’s Note: After facing Magneter, War Wretch is probably a more valid choice than Terrardon but needs testing. 

PM Control -> 3x Deface and 3x Data Disruption. Deface removes Hellhound’s keywords and Data Disruption removes win cons before they are dropped. 

Vriktik -> 3x Dummy Mummy and 3x Heartbeet -> Heartbeet not only protect your units from Acid Rain, but your Dummy Mummy also gets one more hp. This matchup is, however, so Buluc favored that any cards would win the game. 

Other heroes are too irrelevant to be listed. 

Random Unrelated Collective Thoughts

#1 Any early drops with a stat-line of 1|2 will two for one Buluc 1|1 card. “Just don’t attack with your 1|1” means hindering your level-up progress. 

1|2 used to be a stat line where it is impossible to attack using it since it is easy to double block that unit. Mind having very little access to one mana 1|2 makes Ash very vulnerable to Buluc since an opponent playing a 1 mana 2/1 into your Giddy Gardener is a dream scenario for Buluc. 

The current Vriktik deck runs no early units and Mind, and never forces Buluc into these sorts of dilemmas and that is partly why Buluc has a 100% win rate against Vriktik so far. 

#2 Lifebond units are now stronger than before with Scaling

Let’s say Wendigo gets buffed up by equipment and is now a 6|4. If it attacks, then it will only be able to heal 6 as long as the opponent holds back multiple units to multi-block. Now, depending on the board state, Wendigo is guaranteed to heal 6 and still keep Wendigo alive to potentially heal 6 more damage. 

#3 Ash sucks (relative to Heldim and Buluc, she is still good)

With the new system change, all of Ashgerdy, Heldim, and Buluc were buffed whereas the bird doctors were nerfed. Consistency is key and all of these three generic aggro heroes now have access to turn 1 EXP gain, it wasn’t this way in pre-rotation since only 1 mana Agile cards can achieve this and they usually are mediocre stat-wise as well. Meanwhile, post-rotation bird doctors can still only get EXP on turn 2 if their T1 units don’t get removed immediately. 

Nevertheless, Ash as a hero kind of stinks right now. I think she was carried by how strong the support cards are in her affinity in the pre-rotation. The level 3 reward used to be much more impactful under the old system as well but it is significantly weaker now when everything enters play readied. 

Buluc on the other hand, huge buff with the token coming into play ready, allowing Buluc to be very scarily consistent. Sevas believed that the token should have Agile pre-rotation, I never believed in that. I already value the active very highly pre-rotation and now it is even better, especially with the old Mist Fist Poster context considered. 

People asked for nerfs and intuitively, I believe the adjustment should be that the token will come into play exhausted turns 1-4, but come into play ready turn 5 and onwards. The reason is that attacking with the 2|1 token is much less of a commitment compared to attacking with other units I play. Very safe to assume that this suggestion would never be implemented though for some game design theory reasons.