[2023 edition] What‘s your favorite deck - and why?

Seraphayel

Title.

I wanted to make a poll, but surprisingly you cannot create polls in this section of the forum. So I gotta do it this way.

Which is your favorite deck / patron and why that? What do you like about it?

These decks are available as of the day creating this thread:

Almalexia (Dark Blue)
Ansei Frandar Hunding (Green)
Druid King (Light Green)
Duke of Crows (Purple)
Grandmaster Delmene Hlaalu (Yellow)
Psijic Loremaster Celarus (Blue)
Rajhin, the Purring Liar (Orange)
Red Eagle, King of the Reach (Black)
Saint Pelin (Red)
Sorcerer-King Orgnum (Teal)

Personofsecrets

My favorites going from most favorite, top, to least favorite, bottom.

Almalexia (Dark Blue)
Psijic Loremaster Celarus (Blue)
Druid King (Light Green)
Rajhin, the Purring Liar (Orange)
Grandmaster Delmene Hlaalu (Yellow)
Duke of Crows (Purple)
Red Eagle, King of the Reach (Black)
Ansei Frandar Hunding (Green)
Saint Pelin (Red)
Sorcerer-King Orgnum (Teal)

The reason that I chose to rank the patrons in this way is because I feel that power rush strategies undermine the game play of TOT. So I prefer strategies that actually require more thoughtful deck building. In particular, what I like about Almalexia, is that most of the time it's cards really aren't doing anything and require clever use in order to take maximum advantage of. The design of that class is leaps and bounds ahead of the design atrocities that are game aspects like Orgnum or the Ansei Patron button.

NoSoup

Psijic Loremaster Celarus (Blue).

I think this deck brings the most to the table. If you were ever in the situation where the other player got to choose 3 patrons and you only got to choose 1, I would choose Psijic every time. It's the best deck for countering other patrons while also letting you build insance combos.

WitchyKiki

Rahjin, because of his laugh.

All others are failed experiments.

Catagami

I have only played Almalexia once, so take her ranking with a grain of salt.

Red Eagle, King of the Reach (Black)
Grandmaster Delmene Hlaalu (Yellow)
Druid King (Light Green)
Ansei Frandar Hunding (Green)
Almalexia (Dark Blue)
Rajhin, the Purring Liar (Orange)
Duke of Crows (Purple)
Psijic Loremaster Celarus (Blue)
Saint Pelin (Red)
Sorcerer-King Orgnum (Teal)

rbfrgsp

Mostly ranking these on theme and utility. Also, entirely subjective. I'll wake up tomorrow, read all these lists and think that my own one is the worst in the thread.

Almalexia (Dark Blue)
Grandmaster Delmene Hlaalu (Yellow)
Saint Pelin (Red)
Ansei Frandar Hunding (Green)
Druid King (Light Green)
Psijic Loremaster Celarus (Blue)
Rajhin, the Purring Liar (Orange)
Duke of Crows (Purple)
Sorcerer-King Orgnum (Teal)
Red Eagle, King of the Reach (Black)

spartaxoxo

Grandmaster Hlaalu (🟡)
Druid King (🩵)
Psijic Loremaster Celarus (💙)
Ansei Frandar Hunding (🍏)
Red Eagle, King of the Reach (🐈‍⬛)
Duke of Crows (🟣)
Saint Pelin (🍒)
Rahjiin, the Purring Liar (🍊)
Sorcerer-King Orgnum (🚮)

No opinion yet on Almalexia. Haven't played with it yet and haven't played against it enough.

Rankings explained.

Grandmaster Hlaalu is my number one for feeling like the most balanced deck overall. It synergizes well with most decks without feeling like a must pick, it has some cards that are high tier, but nothing that makes the game feel like it's already over. It's patron is risk and reward, so even though it's good you're not necessarily better off spamming it. To make most use of the deck requires thought, and it doesn't drag games out too much either.

Druid King is number 2 because I like the strategic decks and DK feels strategic. It feels very adaptable and synergistic with other decks while still holding it's own. I do think it needs some small nerfs though and I think getting benefits from opponent's moves isn't cool. So, I can't give it number one even though I must admit I have slightly more fun with this deck than my number one.

Psijic Loremaster Celarus is number 3 for similar reasons. It adds a depth of strategy and tactics to the game and doesn't feel too overpowered.

Ansei is number 4 because it has some pretty interesting strats you can pull with the cards that let you move things from your CD pile. However, sometimes it's power generation can lead to some games that feel more RNG based than the above 3. Still, of the decks with big power cards this one feels the most in depth.

Red Eagle is number 5 because it's interesting how so much of it is contract cards, and how valuable they really are opens itself up to late game rather than early imo. In the hands of an experienced player though, it can exacerbate snowballs.

Duke of Crows is number 6 because it's a very swingy deck that seems to cause a lot of people to dislike the game. While I don't dislike this deck as much as many do (and have a pretty good winrate against it), it definitely is more RNG based than any of the decks above it imo.

Saint Pelin, the best of my worst 3 because the taunts are interesting and are one of the best anti-snowball mechs in the game. Unfortunately, there are also some cards in this deck that allow for power rushing RNG, which to me is tot at it's least skill based.

Rahjiin is one of the decks that exacerbates the imbalanced early game the most out of any other deck, imo. Because not only does having certain very powerful cards in this deck set your own deck up incredibly, almost everything about this deck is also designed to help cement that lead by limiting the opponent's ability to express their own skill. I also think the way Bewilderment cards are implemented are poor game design.

Sorcerer-King Orgnum is the easiest to use power rush deck and the one that most unfairly exacerbates early game lead. It even allowed the absolutely terrible early ai to win matches off skilled opponents through pure RNG. When I think of all the paint points of ToT (some toxic gameplay elements, early game decides game too much, heavy RNG based, power rush strats are too easy to pull off, etc) this deck is pretty much an offender in all the categories.

Necrotech_Master

my number 1 would probably be rahjin

the others i dont really have much preference on, since ive used all of the decks at one time or another

orgnum is kind of fun when your not spamming the patron (which ive managed to do when playing an npc) (i think some of the patrons need to be "locked" once they get favored status, kind of like crow to provide more balance)

Seraphayel

I haven’t unlocked it yet, but I very much liked Druid when I had the chance to play it. Those combos can be insane.

Almalexia has grown on me a lot, at first I didn’t know how to use it properly and I thought it sucked, but man is this deck powerful when you better know about it.

I would even say it‘s outright broken when paired with Red and your tanks are protecting the Almalexia agents that just keep on taking cards away.

I just made it to Rubedite league with it (I started playing ToT when Necrom dropped on consoles, so 1.5 weeks ago) and one round all the cards the enemy had left were in his hand. It felt unfair, but that was satisfying so see how the deck can play out. But highly dependent on luck, like all of ToT.

RCubed1967

Top pick is Rajhin because of its ability to control the game pace when needed. But only for first pick.

My least favorite is Almalexia. I will not use the deck until confines are given taunt. I do not believe it is a fair deck as it does not provide alternative strategies. VERY POORLY DESIGNED DECK.