JumpSTARt: Battle Royale — Devlog #12: Laurine
JumpSTARt: Battle Royale is a star-format Jumpstart product for Magic: The Gathering. This blog post is part of a series chronicling its development.
Previous devlogs:
Devlog #00: Kickoff
Devlog #01: Packet Skeleton
Devlog #02: Drafting
Devlog #03: Star-Format-Friendly Mechanics
Devlog #04: “Event” Cards
Devlog #05: Rhoda
Devlog #06: Zndrsplt
Devlog #07: Nikara
Devlog #08: Khorvath
Devlog #09: Pir
Devlog #10: Trynn
Devlog #11: Ukkima
Laurine rappels into the arena!
This packet was exciting to build around. Take a look at the card picks along with an explanation for the choices below:
First, About Goad in JumpSTARt: Battle Royale
Laurine is special — because goad behaves uniquely in JumpSTARt: Battle Royale. When you goad during your main phase, you may actually end up forcing the opponent to attack YOU! It depends on whether you’re the player on the left or right during your turn that you goad.
If you’re the player on the left during your turn and you goaded an opponent’s creature, you’re in the clear. By the time you take your next turn, your two opponents won’t have had their shared turn against you, yet.
If you’re the player on the right during your turn and you goaded an opponent’s creature — then the very next turn taken in the round will be by both your opponents. They’ll be forced to attack you!
This can be fine, though, depending on whether you got the means to defeat the goaded attacker with your blockers! Just be careful!
But, in the end, Laurine has instant-speed goad! The best amount of control over goad in this format.
Okay, Now About the Laurine Packet
Laurine wants lots of artifacts and creatures to sacrifice, so every single creature in the packet provides at least two instances of sacrifice opportunities.
Lavabrink Floodgates is our “multiplayer event” card (red has unique choices for this project, due to a lack of parley & voting cards). Luckily, if things look bad, Laurine can sacrifice the Floodgates, even using the 2 mana it produces to sac itself.
Otherwise, to withstand the Floodgates, we have a rare and mythic rare for creatures: Myr Battlesphere and Rekindling Phoenix.
The Battlesphere costs 7, but you have multiple ramp options in the packet. Its toughness of 7 survives the Floodgates’ 6 damage! And all those Myr are great for a multi-goad initiative!
Rekindling Phoenix dying from Floodgates is no problem — but it can also be an infinite resource (until opponents mess with it) for Laurine to sacrifice for goading. Power of 4 flying for 4 mana is also an amazing rate!
Seize the Spotlight is nefarious to combine with Laurine’s goad. Your opponents might want to instead give you a card and Treasure if they don’t want you to sac the creature of theirs you steal. But, even then, you’d love to sac the Treasure anyway for goading.
Riveteers Requisitioner, & Vault Robber are extra sources of Treasures. So is Plundering Barbarian but with also the necessary artifact removal slot for this packet.
Mogg War Marshal provides a three-sac count for Laurine’s goad while being a Warrior at the same time (each packet needs at least 2 Warriors). The other Warrior is Ghitu Encampment! Which is actually a sneaky way to increase the sacrifice count for Laurine as well.
Dueling Rapier with flash is our combat trick, but it sticks around so it can be used for Laurine to sacrifice OR for Laurine to equip for 5-power first strike (or maybe a 6–power Phoenix in the air).
Farideh’s Fireball was an interesting pick I had in reserve for any red packet, and it fit nicely into the curve here. I also couldn’t fit another rare in this packet (there’s too many already); otherwise, I might have opted for Fall of the Titans, to give another use for potentially-too-many Treasures. (One of these packets will have Fall of the Titans — I’ll try, at least.)
Anyway, due to how JumpSTARt: Battle Royale defines the adjacent-to-you-at-the-beginning-of-the-game players as your teammates, Farideh’s Fireball either deals damage to all 5 players are just to 2 players! I think that’s neat!
Look, Behind You!
*runs away*
