I realize you all may not be able to tell the order in which I’ve written these articles, but, for reference, this is the sixth and final article I’ve written in this cycle. The reason I say that is because, despite how generally thrilled I am with the revamps and Zondara, I truly believe that I’ve saved the best for last here with Rimelocked Relics. We’ve been clamoring for a proper flex deck as long as Nemesis has been a thing and I think we’ve finally got it here. Fair warning, since there is a lot of HO-focused stuff in the deck, you’ll be seeing a lot of “universality” rankings of 2 (because, well, beast-centric warbands). No big fluffy intro on this one, but I did want to give a shout out to George, who compiled a bunch of his notes on this deck for me ahead of writing this article. Instead of specifically referencing him each time, just know that his thoughts are weaved throughout this write-up as well. Let’s jump on in!
Plot Card
Given that the plot card text is directly associated with how the rimelocked upgrades work, you can understand why it’s on a plot card instead of directly printed on each upgrade. When you give these upgrades to your fighters, you actually place them face-down and then use the “thaw” ability to start placing counters on the card during the reaction step after an activation. Once you reach three or more, you flip the card face-up and its effect begins to apply. From a thematic perspective, I love the idea of sort of “discovering” a frozen relic, then waiting for it to warm up to actually leverage its effect. From a gameplay perspective, it provides some interesting mind games. Opponents will have to wonder what upgrade I have cooking on which fighter and adjust their plans accordingly. One thing I’d like to address at the start here is that, if I am reading this correctly, Thaw, like Impetus, is an ability that is not optional. This means that you must add the counters each turn and you must flip the card face-up after an activation when it has 3 or more counters. In a metagame sense, this is a lot to remember to do, so be patient with people, especially early in the life cycle of this deck. I am of the opinion that, if my opponent realizes that they’ve missed an activation or two of counters, I will allow them to catch up so that the upgrade finishes, the same way I would expect them to add an extra wound counter if I dealt them 2 damage, but they accidentally only gave their fighter one counter. Since I am reading this as an ability that takes place during the reaction step, not as a reaction itself (after all, it is not referred to as a reaction), it’s not optional, so it has to happen. I cannot stress enough that this is not a “well, you missed the window” kind of thing, don’t be that guy here. All that being said, you would expect upgrades like this to have extra powerful effects due to the additional planning/lag it takes to actually access them. Not to cheat ahead too much, but I do believe that will be the case, as there are some hilariously strong upgrades down there.
For the TL;DR on this, the Thaw mechanic is cool both thematically and mechanically, but I don’t love that it adds additional rules bloat/tasks to what is already a fairly complicated game.
Objectives
A Line in the Snow is our first card, scoring for 1 glory in the end phase if one or more enemy fighters is out of action and two or more friendly fighters are not in your territory. This is a bit like a swapped around [
Cruel Hunters], with a lesser payout. I think this is perfectly doable for pretty much any aggro warband, particularly horde aggro, so it’s not bad at all, and flex warbands can certainly pull it off too. For example, it synergizes particularly well with the enemy territory resurrections on Spiteclaw’s Swarm and Grymwatch as well. Feels a bit along the lines of, but not exactly the same as, [
Blood in the Deeps], which is notably rotating soon. Seems like a decently consistent score, there’s just not much upside to be had here if you need a bit more ceiling.
Power Ceiling: 1, Consistency: 2, Universality: 3
Cold Front is a [
Dominant Position] with the added dual condition that there need to be more enemy fighters than friendly fighters with wound counters. Notably, this objective will not consider out of action fighters (both because they are out of action and because you remove wound counters when they die), so it’s actually functional in two directions. Horde warbands could actually pull this off simply because many of their fighters die in one hit instead of getting wounded first, while elite warbands with access to ping simply have fewer bodies and can therefore spread ping to larger warband sizes. I don’t think [Dominant Position] ever needed a dual condition to be balanced, and this is obviously a tamer version of it (and is arguably a bit too luck/draw sequencing/matchup-dependent), but I think you’ll at least consider this one. With their low body count, ability to heal, and desire to spread damage anyway, Dread Pageant seems particularly well-suited to it.
Power Ceiling: 2, Consistency: 2, Universality: 2
Defrosted is our first surge, scoring when you turn a friendly fighter’s Rimelocked upgrade face-up while they are holding an objective. While they have lately been opting for a lot of surge HO cards scoring after your opponent’s activation, the telegraphing on the upgrades means that you get a bit more “instant” reward here, which I think is fair. That being said, timing the flip and the hold can be a bit awkward. As we discussed already, adding thaw counters is not optional, so you are going to have to plan this out when you put the upgrade down. The best way to make this as consistent as possible would be to ensure the flipping will be done after your own activation, pack tons of push and move tech, then bump the equipped fighter onto the token either during your activation or in the power step preceding it. I do think that there’s something of a trap here, as timing these things will be a bit trickier than you want. You have to balance what you need more between using that upgrade in your own activation (in which case it would need to flip up and score the surge after your opponent’s activation) or take the “easier” score after your own activation at the cost of not having the upgrade available to you when you activate. Furthermore, barring a small subset of cards which allow for free upgrades, you do need seed glory to make this reliable enough, and not every warband has great surges available to them. Gives me vibes very similar to something like [
Audacious Aspect] in terms of using it to snowball rather than provide your seed glory, which I don’t usually love for my surges.
Power Ceiling: 2, Consistency: 1, Universality: 2
Frostbitten Strike is the quintessential flex surge objective. Did you kill stuff while your warband holds an objective? Score a glory. The card basically asks whether you are following your gameplan. I’m normally not a big fan of kill surges, but this one just slots in so nicely to the flex playstyle, I think you’ll see a decent bit of it. Notably, you don’t even need to kill the fighter via attack action (and in fact, your warband doesn’t even have to deal the damage), so you can swing this from lethal hexes, ping gambits, and even opponent’s power cards like [
Maskborn].
Power Ceiling: 2, Consistency: 2, Universality: 2
Glacial Dominion feels like my preferred version of Defrosted. Why bother with timing the flip when you can score just for having the upgrade? Note that the card also does not care about whether the upgrade is face-up or face-down. Sure, it scores after an opponent’s activation step, but I’ve already hinted that the upgrades are mostly very good, so the late game condition could essentially be “you hold one or more objectives after your opponent’s activation.” Still need the seed glory to get going, but it seems extremely trivial in Rounds 2 and 3, with some warbands even being capable of snowballing into it Round 1.
Power Ceiling: 3, Consistency: 2, Universality: 2
Icebound Defenders is a pseudo-[
Death’s Domain]/[
Claim the Prize] mix, rewarding 2 glory for holding two or more objectives and holding each in a single territory. The nice part here is that this includes no one’s territory, where there is often only one token anyway. It makes a lot of sense that Sons of Velmorn are depicted in the art, because you can leverage that fact to score this very synergistically with [
Hereditary Claims]. Additionally, barring some really bad objective placement on your end, you should not run into cases where there is anything worse than two objectives in no one’s territory and two in your own, so I don’t think this ever really gets more difficult to score than the cards I’ve already listed. Just need to watch out for token manipulation effects like in Gravebreakers and/or Seismic Shock. This looks like a staple HO card to me.
Power Ceiling: 2, Consistency: 2, Universality: 2
Hard to see through all this snow and ice, is that [
Swift Capture]? It may not be quite the same, but Icy Grip is pretty darn close. You no longer need to hold in enemy territory, it can just be in no one’s, but you have traded that improvement for the downgrade of only scoring after your opponent’s activation. That being said, there is a lot of “no push” tech in the game right now, so you could very feasibly dump a fat fighter on the forward objective that can’t be knocked off. While I think it would’ve been fine to simply reprint the wording from [Swift Capture] since it forces interactivity by nature, this is still quite good, especially for warbands like Gitz, Thorns, and Sepulchral Guard that can just brute force it.
Power Ceiling: 2, Consistency: 2, Universality: 2
Shattered Defences scores for making successful attack action while that fighter holds an objective not in your territory. Since many warbands will need to charge to pull this off, there is that bit of dependence on dice added in, but this again slots very naturally into a flex gameplan. Note that the attack doesn’t have to be made during an activation step and is Range agnostic, so things like [
Making a Point] can also score this. I do think you want to have access to some Range 2+ attacks though if you plan to take this one.
Power Ceiling: 2, Consistency: 2, Universality: 2
Steaming Corpses is our next end phase card, rewarding two glory for one fighter from each warband being out of action and at least one of those fighters having a face-down rimelocked upgrade. While the first condition is basically free in most games, especially if you’re playing aggro, the second is a bit of a toss up. The rest of the deck does tend to encourage your opponent to kill your fighters with the rimelocked upgrades before they flip, so they could potentially help you out, particularly in the mirror match. Additionally, to cheat ahead, there is some card support for rimelocking your opponent’s upgrades. That being said, the windows on rimelock are so narrow that it just feels like a less dependable version of [
Uncounted Cost].
Power Ceiling: 2, Consistency: 1, Universality: 3
Stolen Warmth is also a 2-glory end phase, this time for having face-up rimelocked upgrades on two or more of your fighters while two or more enemies are out of action. As we saw with [
Chill of the Grave], 2 glory for two fighters being OOA is definitely a powerful option. Obviously, this one comes with the dual condition (as it should), but I again think the upgrades are good enough you might consider this, you just need to be able to keep fighters alive. Really solid if you have raise capabilities, so Exiled Dead, Headsmen’s Curse, and the new Spiteclaw’s Swarm seem like a couple of the best candidates to me, as they will be on the kill-heavier side of those resurrecting warbands.
Power Ceiling: 2, Consistency: 2, Universality: 2
The big 2-glory surge in this deck is Total Conquest, scoring after an opponent’s activation step if you hold two or more objectives not in your territory and have at least one enemy fighter out of action. For 2-glory, I think this is actually very good. Yes, there are not a lot of warbands that are going to push for this, but I think the new version (and the old version, for that matter) of Spiteclaw’s Swarm will definitely be interested in this due again to their ability to resurrect in enemy territory. Wraithcreepers are also a decent option, especially if you are able to drop two tokens into no one’s territory so you can drumbeat onto them. Reminds me a lot of [
Unbeatable Team] both in theme and in that is a bit niche, but very strong on the right warbands.
Power Ceiling: 3, Consistency: 2, Universality: 1
Man they really went hard on the dual objectives in this deck (11 out of 12 cards). Our last of them is Wintry Conquest, a [
Supremacy] that requires at least one of the holding fighters to have a rimelocked upgrade. I like this more than [
Shape the Realm] due to having a more flexible dual condition. Every warband that uses this deck in Nemesis that would ordinarily take [Supremacy] in Championship should take this card. In Championship itself however, I will note you probably don’t have enough room for rimelocked cards to make this worth it.
Power Ceiling: 3, Consistency: 2, Universality: 1
Our Favorites
- Mark: Icy Grip
- Aman: Icy Grip
- Zach: Icebound Defenders
- George: Icebound Defenders
Gambits
Our first gambit is Bleak Outlook, negating critical successes in attack and defence in the next activation, considering them as regular successes instead. I will note that you still rolled them, so this wouldn’t stop a Condemners or Steelheart’s Champions inspiration, but if you for some reason have a strong grudge against Sons of Velmorn, this does prevent them from scoring that critical hit. In general, this is probably best for “dice fixer” warbands against those with low Defence characteristics. Reapers, Gitz, and DKK, for example, can often roll 2-3 dice with very high odds of succeeding on two or more of them, in which case a 1-Die defender literally could not stop the attack. I did a lot of math that I don’t have the space to type out here, but what I determined is that, with “normal” attack profiles of 2 or 3 dice, it will only be better than a +Dice gambit in very select situations (like double supported and/or even needing cleave/ensnare) or can sometimes actively hurt your odds. Defensively was much the same, although it was marginally better than the attack dice situation. The only semi-consistent usage is to turn off grievous and/or other critical abilities in the next activation.
Power Ceiling: 2, Consistency: 1, Universality: 2
Brittle Reveal allows you to accelerate the thawing of a rimelocked upgrade at the cost of breaking the upgrade at the end of the action phase. This is really only useful if it is the third round and you don’t plan to need that upgrade in order to score your end phase glory. I suppose the more immediate thawing could also support a Defrosted score, if you’re desperate. You could maybe argue it is also good for “fight and die” aggro playstyles who just want to send that cruise missile as soon as possible, but I think you will almost always be better off letting them cook.
Power Ceiling: 2, Consistency: 1, Universality: 3
Cool Heads prevents friendly fighters that are holding objectives from being pushed until the end of the next power step. This is great as a way to potentially secure your “after an opponent’s activation” surges, but even better as a way to lock in the end phase scoring, since getting those bricked is a lot more debilitating to your deck cycling. It’s well known that one of the best ways to counterplay the “Hold 3” cards, or HO end phase in general, is to allow your opponent the first activation of the round and then just knock them off tokens in the final one. This can turn that gameplan on its head, I love it.
Power Ceiling: 2, Consistency: 3, Universality: 2
Creeping Frost is a +1 Damage gambit which requires the fighter to have a rimelocked upgrade to access it. I like that this is rangeless, but I do think you tend to need these gambits most often when you don’t yet have upgrades down. Also, having a gambit in hand early that you physically can’t use can be really frustrating.
Power Ceiling: 2, Consistency: 1, Universality: 3
Fractured Steps is a thaw counter-dependent [
Sidestep], making for yet another gambit that requires you to put down an upgrade first. Barring other power card support, you have only two power steps to use this push after you equip the desired fighter with the upgrade. This is just too narrow of a window for me. Since the upgrades need to cook, you’re generally going to want to get them down as quickly as possible, which is a bit counterproductive considering those pushes tend to be most useful later in the round. Not good.
Power Ceiling: 2, Consistency: 1, Universality: 3
Frozen Solid is a 66% chance to flip over and rimelock an upgrade that does not already have the rimelocked keyword. While you can certainly use this to support your own internal synergies with things like our previous entry, where this card seems to provide the most value is as a control tool. Turn off your opponent’s +Wound upgrade that’s on a vulnerable fighter and they just die, turn off a “refashioned” upgrade so now they can’t outmaneuver your charge, the possibilities are manyfold. I think it is probably fair to not have this work 100% of the time, but I think it needed some kind of lesser effect to fill in what happens if you roll a swirly. If you manage to pull this off at the right time, it could have a massive impact, but there is obviously a significant risk that you’re wasting your gambit slot.
Power Ceiling: 3, Consistency: 1, Universality: 3
Glacial Advance is one of the more convoluted double-[Sidestep] cards we’ve seen, requiring each pushed fighter to hold an objective and costing each fighter a Move or Charge token. This one is a bit odd to me. On one hand, we get cards like [
Take Your Positions!] and [
Keep the Forest at Bay], but then we get this? Don’t get me wrong, two pushes in a single card can be fantastic, but I think the tokens were limiting enough. Interestingly though, you can use the Charge token option to leverage the charge out rule. I just would’ve much preferred to push towards an objective token rather than having to push onto one. One final little niche bit, but you can’t even use this to push a beast since they can’t hold (outside of [
Nothing Special].
Power Ceiling: 3, Consistency: 1, Universality: 2
Rays of Dawn is more thawing acceleration. Yes, you want the upgrades to thaw as quickly as possible, but the difference between waiting 2 activations and waiting 3 is pretty marginal for an entire gambit slot. This should have at least added 2 counters, not 1. Also, it is yet another gambit that is of no use until you get those upgrades down.
Power Ceiling: 1, Consistency: 2, Universality: 3
Of the thaw support, Sudden Thaw is by far the best option. It can help you thaw faster for an entire round, for multiple upgrades, with no real downside. Yes, it can be canceled by another domain, but it also offers that same value itself in counterplaying your opponent’s domain gambits. If you have no upgrades to thaw at the time you draw it, might as well hold it until your opponent plays one just to cancel them out. It’s nothing crazy, but it’s far closer to the level of where I wanted the thaw gambits to be.
Power Ceiling: 2, Consistency: 2, Universality: 3
Speaking of better thaw gambits, we finish off on Winterborne Might, which allows you to use your thaw counters as a resource to aid your accuracy while setting back the rate at which you’ll have access to the upgrade. We’ve already talked about the narrow window where this will be useful, but it is at least generally easier to plan out an accuracy effect than it is a push. While more often than not you would prefer the effect of that upgrade, there are certain cases where your big boy might just need to do the bonk. If you’re only activating something like a Kainan once in the round anyway, I think I’m willing to delay my upgrade a bit if I can swing +2 Dice out of it (assuming I’ll still have my upgrade online for relevant scoring and/or use in the next round. Alternatively, you can use this card to manipulate the timing on when/if your upgrade will be turned face-up, which can support some of the lower-rated objective cards we’ve reviewed in this set. I’d still rather have [
Determined Effort] because this is, again, something you already need the upgrade down to use, but it’s at least more in the wheelhouse of where you want the gambit design to be.
Power Ceiling: 2, Consistency: 2, Universality: 3
Our Favorites
- Mark: Cool Heads
- Aman: Glacial Advance
- Zach: Glacial Advance
- George: Glacial Advance
Upgrades
We’ve been leading up to the upgrades this whole time, but we start off with one that is actually not rimelocked in Chillblain Armour. This sets your Defence characteristic to an unmodifiable 2, which of course is a pretty significant buff to anybody who only rolls one die normally. There are a number of 1-Shield fighters in warbands that might like to use this deck who would, of course, benefit greatly. Obviously, this won’t help every warband, and it’s generally not a ton of use unless you’re planning to follow this HO-focused gameplan, but this is just really solid.
Power Ceiling: 2, Consistency: 3, Universality: 2
Next up, we have Frostbite, which is sort of this deck’s version of [
Thrallmaker], but with some significant deficiencies. Perhaps most importantly, the reaction uses the after-activation window rather than the deal damage step, which will cause it to clash with a variety of critical reactions, even within its own deck. This also means that any attacks made in the power step and/or as a reaction to an activation themselves cannot use it either, nor can you use it to react to hits against multiple targets of a scything attack. Furthermore, unlike its aforementioned “predecessor,” there is a hefty Range restriction on this being only Range 1. While you could argue [Thrallmaker] probably should have had a restriction like this (or should have been restricted to voidcursed fighters), sticking to only Range 1 fighters is really tough. I think, if they wanted to stay on theme, they could just as easily (and perhaps should) make this only work on attacks made adjacent to the target. Do that and move the reaction window up to the deal damage step and you have a pretty neat control piece, but it’s just too situational as-written, especially since a lot of this deck will be focused on swinging/shooting at Range 2+ from an objective token. We have talked about the potential power in turning off your opponent’s upgrades, but this is just too hard to access.
Power Ceiling: 3, Consistency: 1, Universality: 2
Frostgale is our first rimelocked upgrade, a remarkably accurate 4R/3H/1D attack action upgrade with ensnare. While you are kind of begging to get voidcursed with this since you’re likely firing from objective tokens, this is really solid accuracy given the Range. Faction cards like [
Hunter of Souls] or [
Sadistic Epitome] that can actually add damage to this will give it quite a bit of value, but [
Unnerving Synchrony] can also be really cool with this to fire from distance and rack up attacks for [
Created for War].
Power Ceiling: 2, Consistency: 3, Universality: 2
You’ve often seen me malign teleports that work as an action, but at reaction speed, now we’re talking. Gelid Cyclone is another rimelocked upgrade that is sort of a mix of [
False Presence] and [
Soundless Step]. When you flip this card face-up, you have the option to react and teleport the equipped fighter to an empty objective token, with the option to also give them a Charge token, which we’ve already discussed can be really nice to set up the charge out rule. Alternatively, you could just elect not to take the token, dump your most threatening fighter onto an objective in enemy territory, and start swinging. I love the synergy here with setting this up to score your post‑opponent’s activation HO surges, as we notably have seen FAQs in the past which allow you to use reactions to set up positioning for those. If this effect wasn’t enough for you, the “permanent” effect of the card is [Soundless Step], which was already a fantastic upgrade in its own right and would absolutely be worth taking even on its own. This card is just phenomenal, so much potential utility, but with such a high floor.
Power Ceiling: 3, Consistency: 3, Universality: 3
Our next rimelocked upgrade is Leyfrost Conduit, another dual-purpose card that, at base value, subtracts 1 die from your target’s defence roll. This effect on its own I think was already very solid and probably worth an upgrade slot due to their being a number of relevant 2-Dice fighters near the top of the meta right now, especially because you can use it at any range (which makes it a great pairing with Frostgale, for example). However, they’ve again delivered a phenomenal secondary effect of supporting each friendly fighter (both offensively and defensively) while the equipped fighter is holding an objective. Give this to Gikkit or Shank, or a fighter in Thorns that has a Charge token, pop them on a backline objective and just reap the benefits of double support. Alternatively, dump this on a Mortek holding an objective and you are setting up support and Nadirite or better big K accuracy for as long as they’re alive/holding. Give it to one of your non-Velmorn fighters to smooth out your accuracy/survivability/inspiration all in one go. Of course, you need to be capable of holding objectives to make use of this card, but it has the potential to be extremely powerful both offensively and defensively.
Power Ceiling: 3, Consistency: 2, Universality: 2
I told you the rimelocked upgrades were worth the wait. Our next one is Polar Connection, a flat +1 Dice at Range 1 and 2 plus innate single support while the equipped fighter holds an objective. In addition to making for a great combo with our previous entry, flex-capable warbands that naturally access support very easily (DKK, Gitz, Reapers, SoV) are going to love this card. Adding a die and effectively adding a success to an attack roll will be extremely powerful. Of course, you’ll be a bit positionally restricted as you go about setting this up, but certain warbands will arguably find this better than [
Guided by Fate] even. In Championship, there’s also great synergy with the BBA cards like [
Unexpected Ally] or [
Ever-hungry Fiend].
Power Ceiling: 3, Consistency: 2, Universality: 2
Raw Power is arguably the weakest rimelocked upgrade we’ve covered so far, which is really saying something considering that it is still pretty decent. You get +1 Damage on Range 1 attacks where the fighter rolls no successes on Defence. While Leyfrost Conduit can obviously help improve the odds that this happens, warbands with easy access to cleave/ensnare (and, of course, Range 1 attacks) will love this card. Sons of Velmorn are another obvious shout-out here due to their natural synergy with this deck and hunger for damage, but this is also great for Chosen Axes and Morgok’s Krushas (though they both typically need speed and accuracy more than damage), as well as Range 1 aggro like Magore’s Fiends and Garrek’s Reavers. Since you don’t have to deal with any objective holding, even something like Exiled Dead could make use of this. George has kindly done the math on this one for me and, depending on how much you’ve fixed the odds, this will often have a better chance to proc than grievous (although can sometimes be much less reliable if your opponent has supports), which I think makes it worth taking despite the fact that you don’t have a ton of control over the outcome, especially for warbands that are starved for Damage.
Power Ceiling: 3, Consistency: 1, Universality: 2
Shifting briefly away from the rimelocked cards, Rimewyrm Skin Boots is the increasingly (and delightfully) more common “your opponent cannot push this fighter” card, although it cannot be given to large fighters and beasts. While it stinks that I can’t just slam this on Jedran and park him on that critical objective in no one’s or enemy territory, we’ve seen just how good this effect can be with cards like [
Darkwater Anchor] or [
Stubborn to the Bone]. I like that there’s no positional requirement here as well. Flex/HO warbands should love this one, and even aggro might enjoy not being pushed out of attack range/enemy territory.
Power Ceiling: 2, Consistency: 3, Universality: 3
Back to the rimelocked cards, The Arctyc Crown allows you to inspire the equipped fighter after an activation step in which they are holding an objective in enemy territory. For fighters that want to inspire for scoring or have a difficult/taxing method of inspiration (cough… Jedran… cough), I like this quite a bit. Soulraid can skirt their inspire condition (note that you would become uninspired at the beginning of the third round still, but can re-inspire for the duration by using the reaction again), Krushas can avoid having to discard their Waaagh! counters, Crimson Court can improve the reliability of [
Gravelords] and [
Recovered Poise], or Dread Pageant can get a clutch inspire onto someone without having to worry about spreading damage around. There are a myriad of cases where fighters would want to accelerate/improve the consistency of their inspire. The main thing you need to factor in is whether it is worth putting yourself in enemy territory to do so. There will have to be a lot of risk-reward analysis with this card, particularly when deciding if you should even put it in your deck in the first place, but I’m glad to at least see some opportunities where it would be useful. Worst case, it can help you score your other cards.
Power Ceiling: 2, Consistency: 2, Universality: 2
The Snowblind Cloak is arguably the most balanced example of a Range-agnostic damage reduction card in the game. You can’t give it to a large fighter and you can only benefit if you are holding an objective not in your territory. This makes it far less consistent, but such a valuable effect should not be easy to access (see [
Frostwyrm Cloak]). If you’re taking this deck, the plan is probably to be meeting this condition anyway. Slap the Rimewyrm Skin Boots onto a fighter together with this and it’s going to be very difficult to dislodge you from that critical forward objective. This is great card design.
Power Ceiling: 3, Consistency: 2, Universality: 2
Our Favorites
- Mark: Gelid Cyclone
- Aman: Polar Connection
- Zach: The Snowblind Cloak
- George: Polar Connection
Conclusion
As I mentioned at the top of the article (and throughout), this is some incredible flex support that more than a few warbands have been dying to get. While I am starting to get tired of the Rivals deck objective card formula of “fighter that has [insert upgrade type] does X task,” I have to say that I find these much more interesting than poison, denizen, or even mask upgrades. The planning of when to put down the upgrades and whether you need them face-up or face-down for your scoring is a really interesting thought exercise. Additionally, the ability to Rimelock your opponent’s upgrades with a couple of cards in this deck to temporarily turn off your opponent’s most critical effects is a fantastic control tool. However, remembering to apply those Thaw counters will likely be a bit taxing, and I think it will be extremely unfriendly to new players since you effectively need to explain how upgrades work in multiple different contexts. This will especially be the case when you are the one playing the deck and not them, something I’ve already experienced a lot with VCT but that may be even more clunky in this case, particularly when you use an ability that can Rimelock an opponent’s upgrade.
While it’s hard to say if this deck will make a huge splash in Championship due to the current power level of plot decks like Fearsome Fortress and Breakneck Slaughter in that format, the more “universal” objective cards supporting interactive HO play is going to draw a lot of warbands into actual relevance in Nemesis. DKK strikes me as probably the biggest winners here, with Sons of Velmorn something of a close second. That said, there are a ton of other warbands who could use and/or were looking for a deck pretty similar to this one. Blade Coven, Dread Pageant, Gitz, Reapers, Sepulchral Guard, Spiteclaw’s Swarm, Thorns, and Wraithcreepers all come to mind pretty immediately, and I’m sure there are even more that I’m not thinking about as of the time of writing this article. Let’s see what the rest of the gang has to say about this deck:
Zach: One of my major complaints about Nemesis in modern times is how poorly Hold Objective has been represented compared to Aggro or Aggro/Flex. We’ve had a few attempts at Hold Objective Rivals Decks like Fearsome Fortress, Paths of Prophecy, or Seismic Shock, but none of them really seemed to push the playstyle up to the same heights as other ways to play. I do think Rimelocked Relics has the ability to change all of that. This deck seems really good. A bit wonky in some places (what Rivals Deck isn’t?), but overall, very solidly designed for a playstyle that needed some love. Expect to see me rocking it!
George: About the Rimelocked Relics, this ragged rascal roars! I don’t think I’ve been this excited about a deck in the entire history of Nemesis. We are finally getting a proper objective-centric deck with strong upgrades and an emphasis on flex play, and I, for one, cannot wait to bring this pairing with a number of warbands that have long hungered for this playstyle to be supported.
Since this is my final article in this cycle, I hope you enjoyed not only this one, but the whole sequence of new releases. There’s a lot to test out and, hopefully, there’s a little something for everyone in this set of new content. Let us know as well if you liked the addition of the “blurbs” from my co-hosts to give you more than just my perspective in these articles. Anyway, I’m finally all typed-out, so until next time, we wish you the best of luck on YOUR Path to (Frosty) Glory!
