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Hey all, Shadawx here. Today as a followup to my other article Jayce and friends reveal, we’re gonna take a look at some of the Jayce decks that have been popping up since his release. The data and decklists I’m grabbing will be from Balco’s https://lor-meta.com/, so let's get into it!
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Lux Jayce
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1497 matches/50.2% WR in platinum+
21 cards
19 cards
27 000
One of the two popular Jayce decks seeing play is Lux/Jayce. With Jayce and Lux sharing a similar level up condition, it would make sense that a deck featuring both of them would perform well. The deck features seven spells with 6+ costs and six units that generate more of those spells, it looks to get the champions leveled quickly.
Looking at the champs alone, Lux offers a ton of control through her Final Spark
. With cards like Assembly Line
and Remembrance
the deck has lots of options for proactive play. You can open your turn with one of the aforementioned spells with Lux on the board to try and generate a Final Spark or level her up. This deck also has access to reactive spells like Back to Back
, and given this, you’ll be able to level Lux through many different means.
A neat thing to do if you’re in a bind and need a Final Spark or don’t want to give your opponent a chance to remove Lux with something like Minimorph
, you can always play Back to Back burst speed to level her and get a laser right away. Then from there you could open attack or cast the laser to remove if there is a priority target you need to remove before the opponent has an action.
As for Jayce, as a solid stated unit, he offers favorable trades with Quick Attack or can pull threats to kill with Challenger. When he levels up the threat of doubling spells like Remembrance or Assembly Line to instantly fill your board, or casting his Acceleration Gate
on your board to push tons of damage is something your opponent needs to watch out for. Having a leveled up Jayce with Lux on the board is the dream combo for this deck because if you get the chance to cast a 6+ cost spell, you’ll get 2 Final Spark for the price of one and can usually clear out any opposing units in the way.
Another interesting choice is the inclusion of some Mageseeker cards. Mageseeker Persuader
and Mageseeker Inciter
are part of the same 6+ cost spell archetype, but they were released in the foundation set and haven’t seen play, but now with some support, the time for them to shine may have come. With these two cards being buffed once a 6+ cost spell is played, they become annoying threats for your opponent to deal with on top of everything else being thrown at you. Mageseeker Inciter becomes a 4/3 Challenger which will help control the board against units like Sivir
, Bandle City Mayor
, Poppy
, Crackshot Corsair
, and all the early elusive units. Mageseeker Persuader becomes a 6/6 beat stick that just threatens big damage to the Nexus or can serve as a solid blocker.
Heimer Jayce
Bandle City
1076 matches/47.1% WR in Platinum+
6 cards
34 cards
27 000
Two versions of this deck have been popping up, an Ionia PnZ version and a Bandle PnZ version. Let's talk about the Bandle version first.
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This version features the newest member of the Tech family Hextech Handler
! This card was the boost Heimerdinger and Tech decks needed, with it being able to boost Techs everywhere once you’ve played a 6+ cost spell. With that in mind, the pool of spells played in this deck helps get the Hextech Handler online as well as Jayce. With things like Shock Blast
and Minimorph being able to assist in controlling the board, there’s also the “X cost” spells Thermogenic Beam
and Production Surge
which also can count towards the 6+ cost spell condition. While we’re at it, Production Surge is a neat card for this deck because it provides you with many more Techs that would be buffed with Hextech Handler, more Techs for Adaptatron 3000
to share keywords with, or if you have Heimerdinger on board, it will progress his level up condition and give you a Tech in hand.Â
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Flash of Brilliance
is another neat tech card of choice in this deck, because a neat kind of trick is to have Heimerdinger on board and play Flash of Brilliance, and bam, you got a free 3 mana turret to play. It also provides you with a 6+ cost mana spell to use later, which also fits into the synergy with Jayce and Hextech Handler.
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This deck goes more into the go wide and swarm the board with attackers, and some of those attackers will be hard to block because Heimerdinger’s 3 cost and 6 cost turrets are Fearsome and Elusive respectively. And if you ever get the chance to level up Jayce, you can go wide with turrets and buff them all with Acceleration Gate making them much harder to block efficiently and making them ever so much more lethal.
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Some changes I would make to the deck though maybe add more Production Surge since I think that card works well in a deck like this. It assists a good chunk of your cards, gives you a wide board or big threats when needed, and can double with Jayce or refill your spell mana with The Forge Of Tomorrow
.
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Ionia
660 matches/50.0% WR in Platinum+
9 cards
31 cards
25 400
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For the Ionia version of Heimerdinger/Jayce, the synergizes I outlined in the Bandle version are still there, but this version is way more spell-heavy. We can see there are only 6 followers in this deck, 3x Ferros Financier
and 3x Hextech Handler. While this may seem to be a problem, there are a bunch of spells that generate units being run in place of the lack of main decked followers. Cards like Production Surge and Assembly Line help give you multiple units, whereas The Forge Of Tomorrow and Concussive Palm
will net you a singular unit.
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As for the spells, we see Twin Disciplines
, Nopeify!
, and Deny
being run to protect units from removal, and Deep Meditation
to help search out spells needed for the occasion. With Production Surge being run as a 3 of here, it looks to get more use out of the Hextech Handler buff for Techs but lacks the Adaptatron 3000 to share the keywords, which is a fine tradeoff.Â
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Overall this version does play out similar to the other version with going wide and swarming the board with Tech threats, whilst having more control spells at their disposal.Â
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Spooky Jayce
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569 matches/49.0% WR in Platinum+
19 cards
21 cards
26 700
Lastly, we have this Elise/Vi/Jayce deck, running 2 copies of each champion. It’s a mix of control and aggro as it runs Sentinel and Spider cards alongside the usual PnZ/SI control cards. Let's look at each side and then see how it works together.
For the aggro package, it runs Burgeoning Sentinel
, Buhru Sentinel
, Frenzied Skitterer
, and Elise as cheap early game Fearsome units. The Sentinels in particular are quite threatening because they get buffed once you slay a unit with a spell, such as Mystic Shot
, Thermogenic Beam]], or Glimpse Beyond
. On top of these Fearsome units, we have Brood Awakening
as a nice 6+ cost spell to refill your board and possibly buff your spiders already on board, and 1 copy of Assembly Line to also assist in refilling. Getting these hits in with these units helps set you up for later in the game when you can shift into a more control style plan and can finish off the game with Vi, Commander Ledros
, Shock Blast, or Atrocity
.
On the control side, we have cards to help stall for turns or remove blockers. Despair
and The Ruination
can help clear the board of high priority targets, while Shock Blast, Vile Feast
, and Mystic Shot can pick off smaller units. When paired with the Sentinel units, these control cards help easily slay units so they can receive their buffs and help push more damage though. Also just by generally clearing the opponent’s board you keep them open for damage here and open them up to be finished off by Commander Ledros or Atrocity.
Overall I think this is an underrated deck right now that can provide a good mix of aggro and control that can catch people by surprise. And it features the Commander Ledros + Atrocity combo late game that can sneak out wins even if you don’t have that early game pressure.
Final Thoughts
Jayce has made a bit of an impact on the meta, and there is still much to be explored with his potential. Just because we’ve talked about 4 different decks with him, it doesn’t mean there aren’t other hidden gems out there that would be the next big meta breaker. Keep innovating and enjoy the game!
About the Author
Playing LoR since beta, consistent masters player. LoR Dreamhack winner and other high-level tournament win/top cuts. Crazy deck builder. I like garlic bread.
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