Hello! It’s Wamuu again!
Today I’m bringing you this week’s Top 5 Gaunlet Lineups for your prime glory.
Like last week, this Top 5 is based on the results of our weekly Wednesday Night Runeterra community tournament. The lineups have been curated based on results but we added some variety to spice things up. We wanted to ensure that multiple gameplay styles were covered so everyone can find a lineup they enjoy!
I won’t be covering matchups with the Bo3 Ban Helper, because we are in a new patch there is not enough data to effectively utilize the tool. I will however provide you with my personal opinion on the matchups using the 2.18 patch matchup table.
Without further ado here are this week’s top decks:
#1 MEMAANHC 4-0
18 cards
22 cards
27 500
12 cards
28 cards
29 400
21 cards
19 cards
24 000
This is a very spicy lineup because all three decks except Teemo
Swain
are unique in their way.
This lineup consists of a standard Shellfolk Vi deck with the addition of some new cards like The Forge Of Tomorrow
and Ferros Financier
that make the deck a little bit better. He also added Fizz
as an additional one drop in aggro matchups and an alternate win-con in slower matchups.
The other two decks are two midrange Swain decks but the Twisted Fate
one runs Gangplank
instead of Swain because of the format limitations.
If I had to guess what MeMaanhc was going for I would say he wanted to run two Swain decks. Twisted Fate Swain and Teemo Swain but because the format does not allow us to run two of the same champions in a lineup he replaced Swain with Gangplank and The Leviathan
with The Dreadway
. This lineup also has the added benefit of being favored against most control decks in the current meta so control lineups are targeted by this deck also.
The reason to run this lineup is that Swain decks tend to have an approximately 50% win rate across their matchup table. This is a very smart move right now because in competitive play there is a Rock, Paper, Scissors situation going on where aggressive lineups beat rally lineups; control lineups beat aggressive lineups and rally lineups beat control lineups. As such, if you run any of these lineups, chances are you probably won’t make it to the end of the tournament because you will most likely run into a counter lineup along the way and lose.
This makes lineups that lie outside of the Rock, Paper, Scissors triangle extremely good because you have better chances of making it to the end if you pilot your decks with skill!
GOOD MATCHUP
A good matchup for this lineup would be Chirion The Mage’s control lineup: Lee Sin
Zoe
, Veigar
Senna
, and Viego
Thresh
.
Utilizing data from our Patch 2.18 matchup table the matchups should look something like this:
Note: Teemo Swain is used twice because there is no data for Twisted Fate Gangplank NX.
My personal opinion is that the Gangplank Twisted Fate deck has a similar matchup table to Teemo Swain. If we accept this, every single deck is favored into Chirion’s lineup and MeMaanhc should 2-0 him easily.
BAD MATCHUP
The lineup that can do best into MeMaanch’s is, TheSkyvalkeR’s lineup
Aggressive decks will run MeeManch over if he doesn’t draw well:
Note: Teemo Swain is used twice as an example because there is no data for Twisted Fate Gangplank NX.
This might look bad but we have to remember that MeMaanhc has teched his decks to be better against aggro.
He runs Fizz in his Curious Shellfolk
deck which gives him an extra one drop.
Twisted Fate Gangplank can shut down aggro with Make it Rain
, Twisted Fate and Marai Warden
While Swain Teemo can survive early aggression with House Spider
, Arachnoid Sentry
and Poison Dart
.
The matchups are probably not as bad as I have shown them to be on the table. They are probably slightly unfavored instead of outright unfavored, making this lineup incredibly strong!
The only major weakness of this lineup is any lineup with at least two Targon Invoke decks. This is because Equinox
can shut down Curious Shellfolk]], The Leviathan, and The Dreadway for a mere one mana. While Falling Comet
can remove all of those plus Swain and Gangplank for essentially an even trade.
TAKEAWAY
This is a very unique lineup and I applaud MeMaanhc for thinking outside the box to come up with it. Besides very aggressive matchups, which we are teched for, and the odd Invoke lineup, you shouldn’t have trouble getting your prime glory with this lineup. It is a good all-around lineup in a Rock, Paper, Scissors tournament meta.
I recommend this lineup for experienced Curious Shellfolk and Swain players. If you’re not practiced on the decks be cautious of locking this in as they can be extremely tricky to pilot correctly in some scenarios.
#2 KAIS3R 3-1
20 cards
20 cards
28 400
21 cards
19 cards
23 400
19 cards
21 cards
23 000
Kais3r’s lineup is a pretty standard rally lineup except for the inclusion of Teemo Swain. This lineup looks to punish control lineup as rally is very punishing to them. Something to take notice of in Kais3r’s lineup is his Sivir
Akshan
list. It is a bit more aggressive because he’s gone back to Ruin Runner
over Vekauran Bruiser
.
The most standard control lineup right now is Senna Veigar, Lee Sin Zoe + a control deck of your choice. All three decks in this lineup have favorable matchups into both Darkness and Lee Sin Zoe, you should have no trouble closing out if you queue into a control player.
Aggressive lineups can, however, be a problem as Sivir Akshan and Poppy
Zed
have a hard time blocking.
GOOD MATCHUP
As this lineup seeks to target control players, Chirion’s lineup is a good example to use when drawing our matchup table:
As we can see the control lineup target succeeded! Kais3r is very favored in this matchup, he just needs to ban either Thresh Viego or Lee Zoe and he should 2-0 he’s opponent most of the time.
BAD MATCHUP
Aggressive lineups tend to counter rally lineups so let’s use a standard aggressive lineup:
As expected the matchups are very bad for Kais3r, and his only good matchup will likely be getting banned. No matter what he bans he is going to have two terrible matchups while the other two are slightly unfavored. He has a fighting chance but he’ll have to work for it if he doesn’t want his opponent to walk away with the W.
TAKEAWAY
This is a pretty standard lineup and you can get your prime glory with it if you pilot it well. I would only recommend this lineup if you anticipate a lot of control players or if you’re someone who loves rally decks!
As this lineup has a major weakness to aggro, so you may want to consider one of our other recommendations if you expect a lot of it!
#3 CHIRION THE MAGE 3-1
15 cards
25 cards
26 400
21 cards
19 cards
27 300
21 cards
19 cards
26 100
Chirion’s lineup is a standard control lineup that runs Thresh Viego as it’s third deck. This lineup is targeting aggressive lineups, particularly those including Draven
Sion
. Chirion’s lineup runs a ton of healing in all three decks, making it very difficult for aggro lineups to stand a chance.
This lineup’s weakness is of course rally lineups. Rally helps to exploit the lack of blockers in any given control deck and it lets you close out the game by starting a surprise attack when they’re out of resources.
GOOD MATCHUP
The dream scenario for Chirion is to encounter an aggro lineup with Draven Sion in it, the standard aggressive lineup used before can be a good example for this scenario:
BAD MATCHUP
Rally lineups are this lineup’s kryptonite so we’ll use Kais3r’s lineup as an example of a bad matchup:
This is a nightmare scenario for Chirion’s lineup; it doesn’t matter if he bans Rally Elusives or Teemo Swain the results are going to be the same. Kais3r is probably banning Senna Veigar and Chirion will end up with, at best, three unfavoured matchups and a 50/50 matchup. This doesn’t bode well for his series, Kais3r will likely come out as the victor in this scenario.
TAKEAWAY
If you’re looking to punish aggro players and love control you should try out this lineup!
If you’re only looking for prime glory or winning a tournament, I wouldn’t recommend it as it is hard countered by rally lineups and these are pretty common in tournament play and you will probably run into it a few times.
#4 THESKYVALKER 3-1
15 cards
25 cards
26 700
4 cards
36 cards
28 900
19 cards
21 cards
23 600
Skyvalker’s lineup is an aggressive midrange lineup, playing two decks that do well against most of the meta. These decks are Sivir Akshan and Gangplank Sejuani
. His third deck, Ziggs
Poppy is here to help round out his matchup table. I guess that Skyvalker wanted a neutral lineup and included Poppy Ziggs to give his lineup better odds against Rally Elusives and Teemo Swain.
If he did curate this lineup predicting that Teemo Swain was going to be popular in the tournament he was right! Filling his third slot with Poppy Ziggs paid off, as it beats Teemo Swain which normally can’t deal with wide boards (their only stall tools are House Spider and Arachnoid Sentry).
This lineup is just an amalgamation of good decks with good matchups spreads into the current meta, because of that a true ‘counter lineup’ to this one doesn’t exist. It also doesn’t target any other lineups.
GOOD MATCHUP
It was hard coming up with a good matchup for this lineup as it wasn’t built to counter a specific lineup. The best I could come up with is an aggro lineup using Teemo Swain to target rally lineups:
As you can see in the table, the matchup isn’t even that good. It would require your opponent to mess up their ban to work for this strategy to work. If both players ban correctly Poppy Ziggs, and Gangplank Sejuani should get banned. Leaving Skyvalker with potentially two good matchups, one terrible matchup, and one coinflip matchup. This makes TheSkyvalker slightly favored at best.
BAD MATCHUP
Coming up with a bad lineup for our lineup is also hard since the lineup is made to do slightly well against most lineups. The best I could come up with is an aggressive lineup that runs Rally Elusives as its third deck:
Most of the bad matchups are against Draven Sion, banning it is optimal. If our opponent banned either Poppy Ziggs or Gangplank Sejuani Skyvalker is only looking at one slightly favored matchup, two coinflips, and one slightly unfavored matchup.
In the end, the bad matchup isn’t threatening to immediately end your tournament run. With a solid understanding of your deck’s win-conditions and ‘perfect’ play, you’ll have a fighting chance in even your worst matchups! This is what this lineup is looking for, average matchups across the board, leaving it up to player skill to decide the winner.
TAKEAWAY
I recommend this lineup above all others on our list for two reasons:
The decks are fairly easy to pilot (particularly when stacked up against our other recommended lineups)
It is a very neutral lineup so it doesn’t have bad matchups against other lineups.
For these reasons this lineup can be played by both experienced and inexperienced players and you should get some satisfying results.
#5 AKAIDO 3-1
23 cards
17 cards
21 300
26 cards
14 cards
28 100
20 cards
20 cards
26 300
This lineup is very interesting, it utilizes the new cards and champion Jayce
in an Invoke deck. They synergize because the invoke deck already played some six cost cards like Sunburst
and Falling Comet. Switching Vi
for Jayce makes sense because you can level up Jayce consistently.
Jayce’s package provides the removal option of Shock Blast
and fearsome blockers (Assembly Line
and The Forge Of Tomorrow).
The other two decks are Poppy Lux
and Glorious Evolution Shellfolk with Fizz, these two decks tell me Aikado was targeting Lee Sin Zoe while taking the opportunity to test out Jayce.
It is also notable that he is running six copies of Curious Shellfolk in his lineup, so he could also be betting on Curious Shellfolk being a broken card for countering control lineups.
Jayce is a new card so I do not have data available to cover matchups for Targon/PnZ. I will cover the weaknesses and strengths of the other two lists in Aikado’s lineup. For our example, we’ll pretend Jayce Zoe was banned.
GOOD MATCHUP
Since Akaido’s lineup is targeting Lee Sin Zoe, Chirion’s lineup is an excellent example of a good matchup:
Note: Ezreal Vi (BC) represents the Fizz Shellfolk because it is the most similar in the statistics.
Here we see that two of our decks counter Lee Sin Zoe, potentially three depending on how good Jayce Zoe turns out to be.
This tells Akaido he only needs to ban Senna Veigar to be left with four potentially good matchups. Even if Jayce Zoe doesn’t get banned we can guarantee at least two favorable matchups. I doubt that Jayce Zoe is too bad into Lee Sin Zoe or Thresh Viego so it is more likely than not a victory for Akaido.
BAD MATCHUP
Because we run six copies of Curious Shellfolk in our lineup our main weakness is aggressive midrange lineups. TheSkyvalkeR’s lineup serves as a good example:
Note: Ezreal Vi (BC) represents the Fizz Shellfolk because it is the most similar in the statistics.
We can see here that even without knowing Jayce Zoe’s matchups we can still counter Akaido’s lineup because his lineup is made to counter Lee Sin Zoe and control lineups, the decks lack mid-sized unit removal. If the opponent gets too ahead on board, as these decks usually do, Akaido will have a hard time coming back. These are four losing matchups, Skyvalker should win the series.
TAKEAWAY
If you love Shellfolk decks this is the lineup for you, it has some notable weaknesses but if you’re confident in your play you can overcome them.
This is also a good lineup if you want to try out Jayce in competitive play because Akaido already confirmed that you can do well competitively with him in this lineup.
As Jayce is a new champion I would not personally recommend you run him without extensive practice. These three decks can be very complicated to pilot so I advise you to play as many games as you possibly can them before bringing them to a competitive setting.
About Wamuu
Top 200 Master LoR player. I have a lot of passion for this game and love sharing my thoughts and game knowledge through deck guides and articles for competitive play.
If you would like coaching from me, you can dm me in Discord at Wamuu#7531