Fizz/Lulu is a tempo-based deck that has been flying under the radar for most parts of the meta. Today, we take a closer look at how this deck achieves two main goals with an unlikely combination of discards and Yordles.
18 cards
22 cards
20 300
Deck Breakdown
There are two main ideas of the deck that make it so oppressing:
First, playing Lulu
alongside a Flame Chompers!
on turn 3, removing anything your opponent plays on that turn. Secondly, flooding the board with cheap units, especially Daring Poro
s, and rapidly enabling Yordles in Arms 
to overwhelm the opponent.
Lulu is the bread and butter of the deck. Heck, throw in Purpleberry Jam as well. Optimally, she would like to cuteify a Flame Chompers!, but any other small unit to push in extra damage also does the trick. There is not a single deck that can handle a 4/4 unit on turn 3 well. How is transforming a 0/2 unit into a 4/4 one considered cute anyways?!
Flame Chompers! seems like a ridiculously bad card at first glance for 2 mana, but we discard it 95% of the time. this gives us a great tempo advantage and even without Lulu, they can pull away blockers to push extra nexus damage or get buffed later by Yordles in Arms.
Boom Baboon
delivers us more Flame Chompers!, making sure that we don’t run out of cards to discard and hit the Lulu-Flame Chompers! combo more consistently. The 3/1 body also trades into most units and can sneak in good damage if left unblocked.
Yordles in Arms is our main line of finishing the game when we don’t draw Lulu. We want to summon as many small units as possible and attack on turn 5/6 with six 6/5 units. What deck can deal with that?
Every other card is in the deck supports the above two game plans, either enabling the Lulu/Flame Chompers! combo or playing around Yordles in Arms.
Poro Cannon
is a premium way of burst-summoning Flame Chompers!, making it difficult for our opponent to react in time. The emerging Daring Poros are also a nasty way alongside Yordles in Arms to attack with multiple 5/5 elusives.
Scrapheap
is an additional means of burst-summoning Flame Chomper!, while the manifested Mecha-Yordle can come in handy at a later time. Its one mana cost can make it awkward to play alongside Lulu on turn three, so plan ahead accordingly. This card works surprisingly well and gives you more value since we had to cut Bandle City Mayor due to its nerf!
Zaunite Urchin
is another great card for discarding Flame Chompers! while proving us with card advantage. Her downside is that she can’t burst-summon Flame Chompers! and can’t be played on turn 3 alongside Lulu, after developing Boom Baboon.
Get Excited!
is our final card for discarding Flame Chompers! whilst presenting burn damage and removal. This is just an allrounder that provides this deck with everything it wants and more, how could we not play it?!
Mystic Shot
is the replacement for Bandle City Mayor
since he was nerfed. The deck fits surprisingly well into the deck and provides us with a little more burn. It also works well against aggro decks as removal or even Darkness as a way to deal with Twisted Catalyzer
.
Wait, my editor is trying to tell me something…
What? There’s a second champion in the deck? Oh, you mean Yodles in Arms, right!
Wait, what do you mean spells can’t be champions?!
Fizz? Can he discard something? I don’t think so!
Okay… I get it, I will feature him as well, promise.
Yeah, thanks a lot, Fishhead!
Fizz
doesn’t look like a champion at first glance, and neither does he at second in his deck, but he fulfills his role. We need to summon units from 4+ regions to activate Yordles in Arms and we naturally summon PnZ and Bandle City units, so we are only missing 2 extra regions. Since Fizz is a multi-region unit, he is an efficient way of progressing our game plan. He can also sometimes become elusive allowing for some tricks.
Bomber Twins
does the same as Fizz as in enabling Yorldes in Arms. He also creates a landmark in hand that serves as discard fodder. Sometimes it also gives you Preservarium
which is just an unfair way of refueling your hand. Hint: We like unfair game mechanics if you haven’t noticed yet 🙂
Loping Telescope
also progresses Yordles in Arms and creates an additional unit or spell in hand. Since the pool of cards is so vast, it’s not a reliable option to count on Loping Telescope manifesting a certain card, like Crescent Strike
or The Serpent
. We usually want to play this card on turn 4+ since it is tempo-losing.
Pokey Stick
is simply one of the best cards in the game so we have to play it. It cycles your hand while also dealing that one ping damage that's needed to take down a unit or even burn your opponent down.
Finally, Yordle Captain
supports our plan of rapidly filling up the board by buffing our small units, making them harder to remove and overall more threatening. His high-cost low upfront value makes him also a tempo-losing play, so we usually don’t want him in our starting hand.
Remember how I told you in the beginning that every card supports Lulu or Yordles in Arms? Well, I lied to you. But only 1/40th percent!
Tech cards
This deck is fairly set in stone where everything is supporting our game plan so well that it’s difficult to replace something.
Group Shot
can be a cute way of surprising an unaware opponent who expects a third copy of Pokey Stick, but it tends to only be good into aggro matchups. Only make this a one-of and replace a Pokey Stick with it.
Bandle City Mayor is a value-generating card that lets us flood the board quickly after Lulu hits the board. Note that it is a very slow development so we rarely want to play him on turn three. He is only useful if we can deploy several multi-region followers alongside him. He tends to do well into control matchups where you want to refill your board after a board wipe. Replace Mystic Shot for him!
If you are really desperate for adding your own touch to a working deck, you could tech in a Bandle Painter
or Bilgerat Rascal
to progress the Yordle in Arms game plan, but they are also tempo-losing which we don’t want more cards than necessary in the deck.
Gameplay Tips
Count your lethal damage
It’s easy to forget how much damage Daring Poros can deal with Yordle in Arms, especially when you know that your opponent can’t interact with elusive units.
Take notice of your attacking turns
Our game plan can change quite drastically depending on if we attack on odd or even turns. For example, Bandle City Mayor is a horrible play on turn three if we want to attack the same turn, but can set up a wide board on the following turn for a devastating attack.
Think about your Lulu turn
This is usually straightforward: Get a Flame Chompers! in hand, play Lulu, discard Flame Chompers! and win the game. But sometimes, the combo can look different.
If you can’t burst-speed summon Flame Chompers! for example, you might want to play out one on turn two (yikes!) or discard it with Zaunite Urchin or even Get Excited! Make sure you have enough mana for those turns to set up your Lulu for success.
Sometimes it’s okay if Lulu doesn’t support Flame Chompers! Even if she supports “only” a 2/1 unit or Daring Poro, she pushes a lot of damage and makes sure her supported unit survives. It can be rough, but sometimes it’s the right decision to attack with Lulu even though she can be blocked and will die to push more damage.
Basic Mulligan Guide
We always look for Lulu, she is better the earlier we play her and we will always have a unit onboard that is worth supporting with her.
Zaunit Urchin is also almost always a keep because she either discards Flame Chompers! on turn 1, a created one from Boom Baboon on turn 3 or 4 alongside Lulu, or nothing on turn one. Yes, you heard right, you can simply click on the “summon” button when given the choice to discard a card and Zaunite Urchin will not discard anything. In that case, she won’t draw you a card though!
Like we mentioned in the deck breakdown, we are usually not looking for tempo-loosing cards like Bandlke City Mayor or Yordle Captain in our deck. We want to draw into them later to refill our board.
Our priority usually goes this way:
- If no Lulu in hand, full-mulligan (with small exceptions).
- If we have Lulu in hand, Keep Flame Chompers! and Boom Baboon
- If we have Flame Chompers! or Boom Baboon in hand, keep cards to discard them (Poro Cannon, Scrapheap, etc.)
You don’t need to pay too close attention to the Yordle in Arms level-up condition since it’s very natural for our deck to enable it. This is why we don’t want to keep the likes of Fizz or Loping Telescope in our starting hand.
Matchups
Mulligans are listed in order of cost, they all hold roughly the same importance.
You can click on the deck’s names and will be linked to a sample decklist.
Darkness: even
Mulligan: Zaunite Urchin, Lulu, Yordle Captain
Flame Chompers if Lulu in hand
{Twisted Catalyzer} {The Box} {Withering Wail}
This is the one matchup where we keep Yordle Captain in hand. They want to develop Stilted Robemaker
on turn 4 which gives us enough time to invest in the quality of our board, insulating our units from ping effects.
The problem with this matchup is that there are many different lists out there and we kind of have to play around everything. Some lists run two off Withering Wail and Box, some run Withering Mist
, others The Ruination
. I think playing around Withering Wail and The Box is reasonable while playing around Ruination isn’t.
Our advantage is that a cuteified Flame Chompers! threatens Veigar
and Senna
, making it hard for them to develop those. Consider passing a turn if they refuse to play something on turn 4 or 5.
Yordle Captain into Poro Cannon and Yordles in Arms is a great win condition in this matchup since they want to develop a lot of chump blockers but can’t deal with Elusives that don’t die to ping effects.
Pantheon: Slightly unfavored
Mulligan: Zaunite Urchin, Lulu
Boom Baboon/Flame Chompers if Lulu in hand
{Wounded Whiteflame} {Single Combat} {Cataclysm}
You would think this matchup is favored because Pantheon decks don’t go wide on board, but the problem is that they can buff their units enough to survive a Lulu attack on turn 3 or 4. They can also just ignore our attacks and lethal us a turn before we could kill them with their overwhelm units.
In this matchup, our best option is to go wide and attack with Yordles in Arms asap. Or we hope they don’t draw their units.
Ahri/Kennen: unfavored
Mulligan: Poro Cannon, Fizz, Boom Baboon, Lulu
Flame Chompers if Lulu in hand,
Get Excited! if Flame Chompers/Boom Baboon in hand
{Dancing Droplet} {Recall} {Kinkou Wayfinder}
This is by far the worst matchup on ladder. They can recall the units we challenge with our cuteified Flame Chompers and push in unblockable damage with Ahri
. Get Excited can be a means to deal with her, but they can usually also prevent that with Twin Disciplines
or Nopeify!
.
Flooding the board also doesn’t work because they can flood it back with Kinou Wayfinder. This is a nightmarish matchup and our best shot at winning is blocking their Elusives with Daring Poros and open attacking on turn four. My prayers go to you if you run into this matchup.
Ahri/Lulu: slightly favored
Mulligan: Zaunite Urchin, Lulu, Get Excited!
Boom Baboon/Flame Chompers if Lulu/Get Excited in hand
{Suit Up!} {Twin Disciplines} {Windfarer Hatchling}
This deck tries to do everything we do but slower. They have the same Lulu game plan as we do, but miss Yordles in Arms. Instead, they want to push unblockable damage with Ahri and capitalize even more on Flame Chompers with Suit Up.
They run Sai'nen Thousand-Tailed
and Windfarer Hatchling to buff up their board and are a little bit better at drawing cards, but we usually out-tempo them and lethal them before they can develop their late-game units.
Be aware though that this is a very similar deck and oftentimes comes down to who can draw Lulu first. Get Excited is a premium card of removing both their champions, though they can save them with Twin Disciplines, so be aware of that!
Elise: favored
Mulligan: Zaunite Urchin/Fizz, Boom Baboon, Lulu
Flame Chompers if Lulu in hand
{Stygian Onlooker} {Doombeast} {Noxian Fervor}
Fizz/Lulu performs great against aggressive matchups because we provide a lot of early blockers and kill them before they can burn us down.
Boom Baboon is a clutch Elise/fearsome blocker in this matchup. We also want a one drop against their early aggression.
Bandle Tree: even
Mulligan: Fizz, Lulu, Bandle City Mayor
Boom Baboon/Flame Chompers if Lulu in hand
{House Spider} {Bandle City Mayor} {The Bandle Tree}
This matchup can be difficult because they are just as good as we are at going wide on board and chump blocking us to death. they also don’t particularly care if we drag one of their units with a cuteified Flame Chompers unless it’s Bandle City Mayor or Poppy. Consider passing on turns 3 and 4 if they refuse to play anything.
Buster Shot
is a cheap way of dealing with Lulu for them so we usually don’t want her in this matchup. Crazy, right?! We try to go as wide as they do and close out the game with Darin Poros and Yordle in Arms before they can finish The Bandle Tree.
Plunder: even
Mulligan: Fizz, Zaunite Urchin, Lulu
Flame Chompers if Lulu in hand
{Crackshot Corsair} {Make it Rain} {Monkey Idol}
Playing against Plunder means playing a fun little minigame: Can you efficiently activate Plunder this turn?
We want to make their life as difficult as possible to activate their Plunder effects and advance their champions level-up condition. This includes blocking their attack on turn 1 or 2 and not developing anything into a Make it Rain
when they haven’t activated Plunder yet.
If you know chess, making them waste Make it Rain on a turn where they already activated Plunder is like doubling their pawns. If you don’t know chess, you can’t be helped and should seriously consider taking control of your life again.
If we can rush them down before they level their Sejuani we win the game, otherwise, we don’t because we rely on our board to deal damage and can’t remove her.
Akshan/Sivir: favored
Mulligan: Fizz/Zaunite Urchin, Lulu
Boom Baboon/Flame Chompers if Lulu in hand
{Brightsteel Protector} {Merciless Hunter} {Single Combat}
We want a one drop to contest theirs and deny a potential target for Brightsteel Protector. Lulu absolutely murders this deck by challenging Sivir with a cuteified Flame Chompers.
This matchup can be a game of chickens. Usually, we don’t want to develop Lulu before they develop their Sivir because otherwise they can make our Lulu vulnerable with Merciless Hunter and kill her.
If they don’t develop anything on turns 3 and 4 though, we will have a wide enough board to rush them down and it will be too late for them.
Nami/TF: unfavored
Mulligan: Lulu, Yordle Captain
{Otterpus} {Double Trouble} {Fleet Admiral Shelly}
Nami/TF is excellent at deploying early chump blockers and going wide with Double Trouble, effectively countering our Lulu game plan. They are also great at never running out of cards thanks to Curious Shellfolk
and various card-draw effects.
Eventually, they will outlast us and run us down with a buffed-up board and elusive units. this matchups seriously isn’t fun.
Our best way of dealing with their chump blockers is deploying a more valuable board and doing favorable trades thanks to Yordle Captain. I would say keep Poro Cannon defensively for their elusive attacks, but if they have Fleet Admiral Shelly and a school of Wiggly Burblefish
es on board it’s too late anyway.
Lurk: favored
Mulligan: Zaunite Urchin/Fizz, Boom Baboon, Lulu
Flame Chompers if Lulu in hand
{Bone Skewer} {Redfin Hammersnout} {Snapjaw Swarm}
Since our game plan is to go wide and overwhelm our opponent with cheap units, Lurk is a deck that can’t deal well with us. Boom Baboon is a good blocker for their 3 health units and fearsome Xer'sai Hatchling
. If we can block their units early and they don’t Lurk with a Pyke
, this matchup is favored for us.
Keep in mind that Pyke only has 3 health, so Get Excited can take him out if worse comes to worst.
Conclusion
Fizz Lulu is an incredibly strong deck in the current meta that has many good matchups. Its straightforward game plan and tempo-based play style make it an easy pickup with a quick learning curve and fast games.
Like most decks, this one could shine even more in a Bo3/Gauntlet format where you can ban Ahri/Kennen or Nami/TF. It could pair up well with Pantheon and Lee/Zoe for example.
I hope you enjoyed this deck guide and learned something. If you are interested in more meta decks, you could check out my weekly meta report every Monday, where I take a deep dive into the data to show what decks you should play and those you should prepare to face!
Thank you for reading!