Hi. Long-time Sapphire hater here, first-time complainer. That’s not true at all actually. If you play with me at my local game store (or follow me on social media) then you’ve been hearing me complain about Sapphire in Disney Lorcana for a long, long time.
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Lorcana’s next set is almost here and players are very, very afraid.
Thanks to some outrageously powerful new cards in Lorcana’s new Archazia’s Island set, I now have a legion of Sapphire haters who finally understand what I’ve been moaning about for the last two years. Sapphire just went from strong and frustrating to totally out of control on the power scale, and now I’m worried about how much psychic damage I’m going to have to take playing Lorcana over the next 12 weeks.
The Most Annoying Ink Color Just Got More Annoying
It’s not that Sapphire decks aren’t for me. I mean, they aren’t, but that isn’t the issue. Everyone has their own preferred playstyle and strategies they connect with, and I personally just don’t enjoy playing item-focused decks. It comes down to a matter of preference, and I love that Lorcana offers so many different ways to play.
The problem is how miserable Sapphire decks are to play against. Their strategy often relies on characters and actions that let them dig their deck to find their win condition while looping items in and out of their discard pile. The result is that Sapphire players take exponentially longer to plan out their turns, make decisions, and execute impossibly complex and unreasonably powerful plays.
It’s one thing to get your breaks beaten off by overpowered decks, it’s another to have it sit there with nothing to do while your opponent takes an eternity to make decisions, slowly but surely draining away your will to live.
With Archazia’s Island, Sapphire decks got an absurd power increase. The big players here are Belle, Apprentice Inventor; a three-cost character who can be played for free as early as turn one if you have an item to banish, who functions as an early singer for three-cost songs, a way to counter aggro decks, and a shift target for multiple Floodborn Belle cards, most notable the new dual-ink Sapphire/Ruby Belle, Mechanic Extraordinaire.
Next we’ve got Tamatoa, Happy as a Clam – the card ironically making players the most unhappy right now. This legendary gives you back two items from your discard pile when played, and lets you play an item for free every time he quests – and who doesn’t want to play a seven-cost Lucky Dime for free?
Finally, Archazia’s Island’s other Sapphire Legendary, Scrooge McDuck, Resourceful Miser, is a four-cost character who can be played for free by exerting four items, and when played lets you search the top for cards of your deck for an item and put it in your hand – a great way to find Lucky Dimes, as well as Pawpsicles and Fortispheres, to help you draw even more cards and set up more item synergies.
If you’re keeping track, that’s three new powerful item-focused Sapphire characters, each with an ability that lets you play cards for free, and they all work together beautifully in both Ruby/Sapphire and Sapphire/Steel decks. Arguably the strongest ink color combination over the last several sets, Ruby/Sapphire, just got the biggest upgrade. This isn’t just a power creep, it’s a power leap.
When these cards were first revealed ahead of the release of Archazia’s Island, some of the most accomplished competitive Lorcana players sounded the alarm bells. Ruby/Sapphire has been a meta-warper for several sets now, but it’s also had clear weaknesses. Aggressive decks like Amber/Steel Diggy Diggy Hole were able to sneak under it, while North American Championship winner Ed Chiu proved you could out-control Ruby/Sapphire by stalling out its resources.
But Belle is an answer to aggro decks, while Tamatoa and Scrooge give the deck more tools to keep up the momentum. The deck has fewer weaknesses than ever, and is absurdly ink-efficient thanks to that pesky little word “free”.
What’s even more concerning is that Sapphire/Steel, a deck that hasn’t been relevant for the last three sets, may actually be the stronger Sapphire deck. It has access to both Pawpsicle and Fortisphere for more turn one Belle consistency, and lots of three and four-cost removal actions for Belle and Scrooge to sing. Early tournament results have demonstrated that this is going to be the deck to beat this set – or, maybe more accurately, the deck everyone will be playing.
Sapphire The Fun Killer
It’s still early days for the new set. The meta is anything but solved, and a deck that capitalizes on Sapphire’s weaknesses will eventually emerge… probably. It’s too soon to call this a Tier 0 meta and cry for card bans just yet, but the one thing we know for a fact is that Sapphire is going to be absolutely everywhere, and if you don’t enjoy playing against it, the next few months are going to be pretty rough.
I think it’s going to be time for some Lorcana players, myself included, to learn that it’s okay to take a break when the format isn’t doing it for you. Just like there are different flavors of decks for different people, not all metas are going to resonate with everyone. Some people really enjoy the Sapphire playstyle and don’t find the matchup as painful as I do, and I’m happy for them. But if nothing changes, I suspect I’m going to be playing Lorcana a lot less over the next few months.
Disney Lorcana
- Original Release Date
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September 1, 2023
- Publisher
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Ravensburger
- Designer
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Ryan Miller, Steve Warner
- Player Count
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2-6 (suggested)
- Age Recommendation
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8+