The upcoming Disney Lorcana set, Shimmering Skies, is upon us with the early release on August 9 in hobby stores followed by the wide release on August 23. This is the fifth set since Lorcana launched almost one year ago. Alongside a new expansive set, two starter decks will be released: An Emerald/Steel deck featuring The Lion King’s Scar and The Emperor’s New Groove’s Kronk, and an Amethyst/Ruby deck featuring Frozen’s Elsa and Wreck-It Ralph. Starter decks are always a good jumping-off point when getting into a new card game; these two new decks are no exception.
Starter decks usually have a theme, and the hope is that the included cards have a unifying playstyle. Usually, starter decks will get you part of the way to an optimized deck before players begin to brew some ideas. The Emerald/Steel deck, for instance, focuses on keeping your opponent’s characters damaged throughout the game and capitalizing on that board state. The featured Scar character has an ability that allows the player to draw a card whenever one of their characters challenges a damaged character. Another example includes Scar’s hyena minion Ed, who is protected from being challenged if the opponent’s character is damaged. There’s even a location card, Tropical Rainforest, that forces opposing damaged characters to challenge if able. All of this disrupts the opposing player from playing their cards how they want to.
And those are just some of the emerald cards in the deck. Regarding steel, there are some cards that can help with this overarching damaged character control strategy, like Tug-of-War, which gives the player a choice of dealing damage to all opposing characters with the Evasive ability or without, or Yzma, who can deal 1 damage to a character if any of the player’s characters banish another character through a challenge. This disruption deck is kind of interesting in the sense that you somewhat dictate how your opponent plays some of their cards if the setup is there. The only potential concern with this deck is that the player is leaving all of these opposing characters on the field. So if the player were to lose the ability to disrupt, all these surviving characters can now wreak havoc.
With the other available starter, the Amethyst/Ruby deck doesn’t synergize as much as its counterpart. The new Wreck-It Ralph characters Vanellope and Snowanna, for instance, have the rush ability to challenge opposing characters as soon as they are played, but don’t have a huge benefit like the current Amethyst/Ruby decks do when potentially trading characters in this way, such as drawing when banished. Sure, there are amethyst cards that exert characters to make them targets, but the rewards seem disappointing compared to what the new Emerald/Steel starter deck can pull off. With that said, there are just some good cards in the Amethyst/Ruby starter deck that players can most likely use in their own constructed decks. For example, The Sword Released is an item card that lets the player gain lore as well as force your opponent to lose lore if the player has the strongest character on the board. Another useful card is Finders Keepers, which lets the player draw three cards. Drawing and filtering the deck down is always useful when fishing for certain cards at pivotal moments in the match. Although the deck itself isn’t great on its own, the guaranteed cards can be useful in deck brewing if your options are limited.
…if the player were to lose the ability to disrupt, all these surviving characters can now wreak havoc.
Both Shimmering Skies starter decks, like other starters, continue to give players a pre-constructed taste of what their respective set will be like. We have new characters and abilities to mess around with, and that’s always exciting for any card game. Although one starter deck seemingly plays better, both work as a means to get into the game for those looking to try out the latest Disney Lorcana has to offer. For more Disney Lorcana, check out our interview with one of the game designers on how the card game came to be.
Each Shimmering Skies Starter Deck comes with:
60 cards11 damage counters1 paper playmat1 paper tracker tokenGame Rules
Amethyst & Ruby
2x 36 – The Nokk – Mythical Spirit2x 39 – Archimedes – Exasperated Owl2x 40 – Bruni – Fire Salamander2x 41 – Earth Giant – Living Mountain2x 42 – Gale – Wind Spirit1x 46 – Anna – Mystical Majesty 2x 47 – Archimedes – Electrified Owl1x 48 – Elsa – The Fifth Spirit1x 50 – Olaf – Happy Passenger 2x 54 – Maleficent – Vengeful Sorceress3x 56 – Anna – Eager Acolyte 2x 57 – King of Hearts – Monarch of Wonderland3x 59 – Hypnotic Strength2x 60 – Finders Keepers2x 64 – Retrosphere2x 68 – The Library – A Gift for Belle2x 103 – Taffyta Muttonfudge – Ruthless Rival1x 104 – Wreck-It Ralph – Demolition Dude2x 106 – Turbo – Royal Hack2x 108 – Rancis Fluggerbutter – Chocolate Charger2x 110 – Snowanna Rainbeau – Cool Competitor2x 111 – Daisy Duck – Spotless Food-Fighter2x 112 – Mickey Mouse – Enthusiastic Dancer3x 114 – Taffyta Muttonfudge – Crowd Favorite2x 117 – Taffyta Muttonfudge – Sour Speedster2x 122 – Donald Duck – Daisy’s Date1x 124 – Vanellope von Schweetz – Random Roster Racer3x 125 – Simba – Adventurous Successor2x 126 – Minnie Mouse – Dazzling Dancer2x 130 – Glimmer vs Glimmer1x 133 – The Sword Released
Emerald & Steel
1x 69 – Robin Hood – Timely Contestant 2x 70 – Shenzi – Scar’s Accomplice3x 71 – Little John – Camp Cook2x 72 – Zazu – Advisor to Mufasa3x 73 – Ulf – Mime2x 74 – Ed – Laughing Hyena3x 77 – Robin Hood – Archery Contestant1x 81 – Ed – Hysterical Partygoer3x 87 – Banzai – Taunting Hyena2x 88 – Robin Hood – Sneaky Sleuth1x 91 – Shenzi – Head Hyena1x 93 – Scar – Vengeful Lion3x 94 – Hypnotic Deduction 2x 95 – Night Howler Rage2x 102 – Tropical Rainforest – Jaguar Lair3x 173 – Simba – Lost Prince2x 174 – Rudy – Groove Disrupter3x 175 – Royal Guard – Bovine Protector2x 177 – Sleepy – Sluggish Knight3x 178 – Kronk – Unlicensed Investigator2x 179 – Heihei – Protective Rooster1x 184 – Yzma – Unjustly Treated 1x 185 – Kronk – Head of Security2x 190 – Arthur – Wart2x 192 – Simba – Son of Mufasa2x 195 – Pete – Games Referee 1x 196 – Tug-of-War3x 197 – When Will My Life Begin?2x 199 – Food Fight!
