Join CtheTree for his take on Daniel deck.
Introduction:
It has been a while since I last shared a new deck build with the community. During this tournament season I had mainly been just refining my Two Arrows deck build which is the main build I have been using for in person and online tournaments this fall. You can read about Two Arrows here. I had built that deck with cards in the new set Times to Come soon after they were spoiled late summer and I have had little time for deck building after that. This is mainly due to me starting a new position at my work that is more hours and has impacted the time I have for Redemption. Outside of trying to play one game a week online, running my local play group, and refining Two Arrows here and there I have had little time for the game until recently. I had some time off around Christmas time and earlier this month so I was able to work on building some new decks. I actually have three new deck builds I have worked on and I have refined some of my deck builds I have previously shared here on Land of Redemption with the new cards from Times to Come. I will be aiming to gradually share the three new deck builds as well as the refined versions of my older decks as I am able.
The first build I will be sharing with you all today is my take on Daniel deck. I actually have always enjoyed Daniel deck and built a very speedy Daniel deck back before Rotation which you can read about here. That was actually the first deck build I ever shared on Land of Redemption back in 2021. So it was natural then with all the new Daniel cards in the new set for me to build my own Daniel deck with them.
I call my deck Ancient Power as a play on an old Pokemon move I recall from my younger days enjoying the old school Pokemon video games paired with the reality this is a turbo Ancient of Days build seeking to power out Ancient of Days turn 1 consistently.
With that background information in mind here is the deck...
Deck (50 cards)-
1 Son of God [K]
1 The Ancient of Days
1 The Second Coming [Fundraiser]
1 Bound in Battle
1 Three Woes [Fundraiser]
1 Crowd's Choice (GoC)
1 Forces Arise
1 Lost Soul "Orphans" [Jeremiah 22:3]
1 Lost Soul "Crowds" [Luke 5:15] [2016 - Local]
1 Lost Soul "Humble" [James 4:6 / Proverbs 3:34 - RoJ]
1 Lost Soul "Lost Souls" [Proverbs 2:16-17]
1 Lost Soul "Harvest" [John 4:35]
1 Lost Soul "Darkness" [Job 30:26]
1 Lost Soul "Distressed" [Zephaniah 1:17]
1 The Cross (GoC)
1 David's Harp (Promo)
1 Abomination of Desolation [T2C]
1 The New Covenant (I/J+)
1 Seventy Weeks
1 Kingdom of the Divine
1 The Realm of Greece
1 The Angel of the Winds
1 Eternal Believers
1 Meshach (Mishael) [T2C]
1 Michael, the Guardian
1 Daniel, the Treasured
1 Abed-nego (Azariah) (PoC)
1 Shadrach (Hananiah) [T2C]
1 The Interceder
1 Servants by the River
1 Gabriel, Sent by God
1 Angelic Guidance (I)
1 Love Righteousness
1 Joy (EC)
1 Given from God
1 Daniel's Prayer (Promo)
1 Faith Unbowed (LoC)
1 Four in the Fire
1 Rescued from Lions
1 The Deceiver (RoJ)
1 The Prince of Greece [T2C]
1 The Goat with a Horn [T2C]
1 The Depraved [Black]
1 Cassander of Macedon
1 Antiochus' Army
1 Alexander the Great
1 Without Touching
1 Smashed Opponent
1 Allowed to Be Trampled
1 1,290 Days
Reserve:
1 Servants of the King [Sky]
1 Royal Parade (LoC)
1 Angel Chariots (Roots)
1 Lost Child Found (GoC)
1 Prayer over Power
1 Do Not Question
1 Return to Fight
1 The Priests of Zeus
1 Herod Antipas (GoC)
1 Contagious Fear (GoC)
Community Deck Listing on RedemptionCCG App: https://redemptionccg.app/decklist/93b6149b-c0b9-409b-a7df-7571b17b6f7a
Explanation:
Objectives-
Turbo and Optimized Ancient of Days-
This build is seeking to consistently get to Ancient of Days turn 1. Ancient of Days provides remarkable card advantage and therefore is quite helpful to get to consistently and early in the game to have a good start to the game. As I was doing my study on the Daniel deck build I realized Eternal Believers can be used to very consistently get to Ancient of Days turn 1.
This deck build has 8 ways to Ancient of Days turn 1: Ancient of Days itself, Crowd's Choice to Ancient of Days, Eternal Believers to Ancient of Days, The Angel of the Winds to Eternal Believers to Ancient of Days, Angelic Guidance to The Angel of the Winds to Eternal Believers to Ancient of Days, The New Covenant to Angelic Guidance to The Angel of the Winds to Eternal Believers to Ancient of Days, Love Righteousness to Eternal Believers to Ancient of Days, and David's Harp to Love Righteousness to Eternal Believers to Ancient of Days. I believe this build I have here is about as consistent as it gets in terms of getting to Ancient of Days early.
Not only is this build seeking to get to Ancient of Days early in a turbo fashion but I am also seeking to optimize Ancient of Days when I play it. As you can see this build is estimated to average 5.53 card when Ancient of Days is played. Starting the game with a 5+ card burst consistently is quite good and that is exactly what this deck build does through it turbo consistency suite to get to Ancient of Days and its card selections being mostly Daniel to optimize how many cards Ancient of Days gets into the hand.
One other thing to note is I run a decent number of white battle winners main deck to pair with Eternal Believers since sometimes I will be entering battle with a lone Eternal Believers to tutor for Ancient of Days. This is to help with trying to have a successful turn 1 rescue when going into battle with lone Eternal Believers.
Daniel, the Treasured Focused Offense-
The great debate with Daniel offenses currently seems to be centered on which version of Daniel to run. I have been back and forth between both. There are many reasons to run Daniel, the Apocalyptist as he is a fantastic hero due to negating evil characters, NT enhancements, and fortresses while being CBN. I find Daniel, the Apocalyptist to be very good against the Herods defense and good against annoying evil characters such as Haman. I do think Daniel, the Apocalyptist is going to be run in more Daniel builds and is a great meta call.
Why then am I running Daniel, the Treasured here? Well I believe in this specific Daniel deck build he is the right choice. The reason why is partly tied to the defense. The defense I am running here is very good at getting around good fortresses. The Depraved, The Prince of Greece, Allowed to Be Trampled, and The Priest of Zeus all offer options to deal with Herod's Temple. Furthermore, running The New Covenant means I get access to Lost Child Found in Reserve which gives me an additional way around Herod's Temple. I also like The Interceder against Herods since I can add The Interceder to battle and negate the opponent's annoying Herod Agrippa I with Herod's Temple active. I believe this is enough to offset the loss of Daniel, the Apocalyptist's negating of fortresses. Regarding Daniel, the Apocalyptist's negating of NT enhancements the Daniel offense has another hero who can prevent enhancements in Shadrach (T2C). Shadrach due to how quickly this build gets a large Daniel band set up will be preventing most EE's in the game. He also prevents OT enhancements not just NT. Shadrach does prevent good enhancements too but duet to how large the numbers are on so many of the good enhancements in this build with many having strength of 6 or higher Shadrach will not be preventing those most of the time. So therefore this build offsets the loss of Daniel, the Apocalyptist's negating of fortresses and NT enhancements. What about the fact Daniel, the Apocalyptist negates evil characters? How do I offset the loss of that? Well that is where Seventy Weeks comes in. Seventy Weeks being active means that it is easy enough to get Evil Characters prevented.
Due to all of these factors I felt I could afford to not run Daniel, the Apocalyptist in this Daniel deck and reap the unique benefits Daniel, the Treasured offers. One thing I believe is that the Daniel, the Apocalyptist focused Daniel offense can struggle against defenses with CBN enhancements such as Reap the Whirlwind, Scattered, Scattered Sheep, Bound Before the Fire, No Straw!, and Abandonment. Daniel, the Treasured provides a nice way to protect an entire Daniel band from these enhancements. One issue he has though is getting negated. Due to this I believe Joy (EC) is a worthy inclusion to make Daniel, the Treasured CBN. The other perk to Daniel the Treasured is that he adds choose the blocker as a tactic to the Daniel offense which is quite valuable in my mind. Overall I feel due to this build being able to do the various things Daniel, the Apocalyptist does well through other cards it is viable and indeed even advisable to go with Daniel, the Treasured rather than Daniel, the Apocalyptist.
Other key things to note about this offense is that David's Harp opens up some nice options in Reserve in Angel Chariots and Royal Parade. As was mentioned earlier having The New Covenant allows me to run Lost Child Found in Reserve which offers nice support to the offense. Another key card in this offense to me is Abednego (PoC). Abednego gives great Reserve access and paired with Meschach (T2C) I am able to draw what I tutor for from Reserve. The Interceder is a very good card as mentioned earlier being able to negate an evil card played by the opponent and giving the Daniel offense some add to battle support. Lastly this offense is built to work with The Cross active. The Cross helps the offense against CBN enhancements as well and Dominants. You will notice I do not run any CBN GEs other than Joy and Prayer Over Power. If I have Joy I do not need The Cross active as much since I will have CBN protection with Daniel, the Treasured. If I have Prayer over Power tossing it for 7 off The Cross is handy.
The Defense-
One great challenge in an Ancient of Days centric build is finding a the right defense. Naturally a defense with mostly Daniel cards is needed to optimize Ancient of Days. As I surveyed the Daniel defenses I felt the Black Daniel defense fit best. I like the battle winners this defense has as I feel overall they are the best straight Daniel battle winners out of any of the defenses available for Daniel builds. I run Herod Antipas/Contagious Fear in Reserve as a target for The Deceiver since Contagious Fear will Reserve Herod Antipas maintaining unity for Alexander the Great.
Key things I like in this defense are of course 1,290 days into Abom, Antiochus' Army into Abom, The Goat with a Horn making my EE's CBN, and Without Touching which is just fantastic. I like how well this defense does at fortress and artifact removal which is something the offense is weak at. I like the large band this defense can create. The Realm of Greece is great against banding offenses and useful as a Reserve tutor as well. Also the fact the Black Daniel defense pairs so well with Forces Arise is key as well. I believe this defense can block enough to create time for the offense to win. This defense also pairs great with The Cross.
Utility Cards-
Aside from consistency pieces which have already been mentioned and The Cross this deck runs only a couple utility cards. Kingdom of the Divine helps the build immensely with soul gen. A downside to it is when I create a token I lose my Crowds LS, Distressed, and Orphans LS but that is a trade off I am alright with especially against 100 card decks since I will want to negate their abundance of annoying lost souls.
Speaking of lost souls I run a package of lost souls meant to mitigate weak points of the build adding soul gen (Harvest and Lost Souls), hand protection (Crowds), territory class character negation (Distressed), and CBP support through Humble.
Maybe board-
Cards I have considered for this build include: Wall of Protection, Storehouse, Michael (Promo), Shadrach (PoC), Pagan Sailors, Hopper LS, I Am Sustainer, Twenty Shekels, Color Guard LS, Prosperity LS, Buckler/weapon main, Swift Beings, Clash with Persia, YWR, Expelled from Heaven (Reserve), The Book of Knowledge, Daniel, the Apocalyptist, Hope, Holy Ground (Reserve), No Need for Spices (Reserve), The Child is Born (Reserve), Hospitality in Bethany (Reserve), The Annunciation (Reserve), Lost Coin Found (Reserve), Reprimand/Repercussion (Reserve), Sword of Light (Reserve), Protection of Angels (Reserve), The Final Act (Reserve), The Coming Prince (Reserve), Complacent LS, Conjurers/DoU if cut Orphans, Lurking, Leaders for the Lord, Servants of the King (soul gen), Daniel’s Guardian, Prince of the Air, The Winged Leopard, Alexander of Troas, Seleucus, Antigonus, Perplexing Vision, Lawless LS, and Coliseum.
Conclusion:
Overall I like this Daniel deck build quite a bit. I do believe it is powerful and can hold its own against top builds in the meta. I would wager a Daniel deck could place top 10 at Nationals this year. However, I am not sold the Daniel deck build is a Nationals winning caliber deck build. Ancient of Days is very necessary to help it have speed yet having to run mainly Daniel cards for Ancient of Days even with all of the great options in the new set is a bit of a liability on defense. I could be wrong and maybe Daniel is better than I am giving it credit for.
What are your thoughts on this build?
To buy singles, sealed product, and other gaming supplies mentioned, please visit our sponsors!