The new Lorcana set is here and with it comes powerful new cards that will impact our current metagame! My article will be focused on one of the six colors in Lorcana - Sapphire. This new set, Azurite Sea, features quite a few cards that have the ability to truly impact the game! Sapphire is a staple in the meta with Ruby/Sapphire and Sapphire/Steel decks being contenders and leaders in the meta. With Sapphire having such an influence on Lorcana, we take a deeper dive into the cards this set that could impact the game!

We will start with the card that has many people think will immediately make its's way into sapphire decks - Sail The Azurite Sea!

This card screams "value!" On turn two you not only get to ink a second card, so that by turn three you can go up to 4 ink, but this card also replaces itself and allows you to draw. It's super powerful in that sense. If you're able to pull off a turn one Pawpsicle, into a turn two Sail the Azurite Sea, that means you've already seen an additional two cards at such an early game state that should put you ahead of your opponent! Next let's look at another good generic Sapphire card that has potential to find its way into decks!

This card has a ton of utility if cards like Lucky Dime and Fishbone Quill are still seeing play. HeiHei allows an opposing item to remain exerted, so any item that has to exert itself for its effect would not be able to be used. This can give you an extra turn if your opponent could clinch the game with a dastardly Lucky Dime or help you get ahead of your opponent by not allowing them to use Fishbone Quill. However, this card also has another cause. Heihei can swing into opponents Diablo and take it out! As long as that Diablo is not located at a hidden cover, our friend Heihei can challenge that bird and remove it from play! This is huge because decks increasingly need to have answers for Diablo.

Tadashi can become pretty insanely stated, very fast. He gains plus 1 strength and plus 1 willpower for every item you have in play. This means with just a few items he can get to be a 6 strength and 6 willpower card that can quest for 3 making it very had to be dealt with. Not even the likes of Madam Medusa or And Then Along Came Zeus could remove it at that point. Another key attribute of Tadashi is the "Inventor" typing. This set features quite a few cards that synergize with the inventor typing. This can allow Tadashi to be played at a cheaper cost, or add resist, etc. I'm super excited to see if and how people try to use this card! Also being from Big Hero Six is a huge selling point.

If there is one thing Sapphire decks do well, it's find a way to ink a lot of cards. This makes Zipper here a super interesting card. We all know the ward mechanic can just allow a card to sit on the field for a long time since it can't be chosen for an effect for removal. Something like Be Prepared or Grab Your Sword would be one of the few ways available to deal with this card. Zipper allows you to grant plus 1 resist to one of your other characters WHENEVER a card is put into your inkwell. There are some turns where you might ink 2 or 3 times and be able to really beef up some of your characters. This makes this ability super interesting and possibly an ability to abuse.

I think Oswald here is the best Sapphire card this set. Oswald let's you look at the top card of your deck whenever a card is put into your inkwell, and if that card is an item card, play it for free. Yes, play it for free. Even a 7 cost Lucky Dime could be played for free. The fact that Oswald is only 2 cost and can quest for 2 makes it to where you can play him pretty early and start accruing value off his ability real early into the game. The one downside is this card can be removed easily. I just think the ability to cycle through your deck and play items for free gives this card a lot of value. Expect this legendary card to be one of the more expensive cards of the set.

Well, that is a wrap for Sapphire in Azurite Sea! This set looks to be a promising one and here at Cool Stuff, the writers are breaking down every color of this set. So be sure to read them all to get a grasp on what cards look to be impactful and what cards you should be chasing after. Good luck to everyone on their pulls!

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Garrett Farrington

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