(Dash, Inventor Extraordinaire | Art by Sam Yang)

Welcome back to CnC! Through this series, we’ll break down just what each hero brings to the table, from abilities, to playable cards and equipment, and interactions with other heroes. Looking at Blitz, CC, and UPF, we’ll see which heroes are winners, playable, fun, or need more support.

The next chapter of Flesh and Blood leads us to Bright Lights, a newly announced draft set where everybody and everything is Mech. While visiting Metrix, we’ll get to meet the man himself – Teklovossen. With him, there’s one more hero that hasn’t been revealed yet, and our Mechanologist mastermind – Dash. So while waiting for the new Dash to see what abilities she’ll get, let’s jump into the old and very much loved Dash and see how she fares when it comes to casual and competitive games.

What Does She Do?

Young Dash has 4 intellect and 20 life, while Adult Dash (Dash, Inventor Extraordinaire) has 40 life. Her effect lets you start the game with a Mechanologist item with cost two or less in the arena. For purposes of various item effects, it’s considered to have entered the arena.

Weapon and Equipment

Dash goes pew pew, at least the most famous Dash does. Teklo Plasma Pistol is a common beauty that does everything an inventor would want. A one-cost, two-attack weapon that’s a wildly printed token. The other weapons you can use are Plasma Barrel Shot and Hanabi Blaster, as well as the generic Talishar, the Lost Prince, which has seen an increase in play.

The Barrel Shot is a two-cost X attack, where X is equal to one plus the number of times you’ve boosted this combat chain. The more pricey weapon is the Blaster, which isn’t your standard weapon, as it doesn’t cost resources. Instead, the third time you play a card with boost each turn, put a steam counter on Hanabi Blaster. You need to remove two counters to be able to attack for five with Overpower. On the other side of the weapons spectrum, Talishar is a two-pitch, four-attack sword, but can only attack three times before breaking. Depending on the playstyle you’re aiming for, some weapons will suit you better than others.

Mechanologist equipment is a must-have with Dash, as most generic pieces just won’t cut it. Some of the exceptions are Arcanite Skullcap or Crown of Providence, which will be something you wanna play. As for the chest of choice, you’ll need a Teklo Foundry Heart if you want to crank up the resources (and the block is also nice). The arms and legs are the most versatile pieces, as you don’t need expensive cards to be able to dish out damage. Galvanic Bender will mostly be here if you want the extra one block or you’re keen on building your Mech, but that’s about it. Your other option is literally any Gauntlet, depending on if you want to block less (Ironhide Gauntlet), or more (Ironrot Gauntlet), or if you wanna make one of your attacks hit harder (Goliath Gauntlet). Not as many options with legs, but you can still choose either Achilles Accelerator or Snapdragon Scalers. If you really wanna turtle your way through the match, you might go with Ironhide legs as well.

Cards That Are the Core

Dash can be played in a variety of styles, but the two most common are boost Dash and pistol Dash.

As boost Dash, you want your chosen starting item to be Teklo Pounder, as hitting hard will be your main priority. Your weapon of choice can be the Plasma pistol, but Talishar might be a better option as it swings for more damage. If you can get your hands on a Hanabi Blaster, go with that because you’ll want to boost as many times as needed, and the gun doesn’t have a cap on the number of steam counters. This does mean that you’ll be able to attack once every two turns, but five overpower is worth the wait. You also need to make sure at least 90% of your deck is Mechanologist cards so you don’t boost out something you needed at a time when you really needed that go again. Low cost attacks like Zero to Sixty and T-Bone will be your best friends in boost Dash, as well as higher cost babies such as Maximum Velocity. The problem with this build is that if you’re not careful, you could lose by boosting very fast and fatigue yourself. Be careful with your resources and only Teklo Heart when you really need to.

Pistol Dash, on the other hand, is a bit different. While weapon attacks with boost Dash are something you might even forget to do, with pistol Dash they’re the backbone of the deck. Your Plasma Pistol will lead the game along with your Induction Chamber, which you should take as your first item. Giving your pistol go again and making it hit for more than two is the recipe for success with this Dash. A Plasma Purifier or two (or three) on your field is exactly what you want. You also want to have some defense reactions as well as a lot of blue cards. With just one blue card in hand and maybe a powerful attack such as Nourishing Emptiness or Command and Conquer, you can start off with a fairly good tempo.

Let’s take a look at the formats she can be played in and see if she’s playable, fun, a winner, or needs more support.

Blitz

A fast Dash is all you need against an opponent in Blitz. Unless your deck is packed with d. reacts, you want to let as many attacks pass as you can. Kodachi for one with no extra attack and it being the last card in hand? Pass. Dominated attack with no extra effect other than just 10 damage? Pass. You’ve got to keep an eye out for things that could mess up your resource calculation, because Dash is all about having those resources, either to give the pistol some steam or just to be able to attack at all. Slowly and steadily build up the damage that you deal and if you’re sure you won’t need it for bigger attacks, a three block with the Heart is still better than just letting the equipment marinate in sadness on your board.

That being said, feel free to go all out with your boosts. If you manage to keep your tempo through the whole match, and you’re not up against Ice heroes, you should have stable footing even if you’re on the brink of outdecking yourself.

CC

Setup is key. Keeping it slow in the early game till you have all your items on board may be the most important thing in a CC Dash deck. As with Blitz, life is a resource and you’ve got plenty. Depending on your playstyle, you might want to get it over with ASAP or stall for time, hoping they’re the ones who will outdeck themselves, but just be patient. Always keep something in your arsenal (a d. react or a high costing attack) for that optimal turn. Construction Mech might seem like the right thing to do, but keep it until fairly late game, when you still have all your equipment but you’re running out of cards in your deck.

Not all matchups will be fun, as you do have some calculating to do if you want to make sure you can play everything, but a simple weapon attack isn’t as bad if you have just one card in hand.

UPF

Maybe not the first choice of hero for an UPF match, but if left unsupervised, Dash can expand with multiple items just waiting to strike at the right moment, or you could play it diplomatic like. Seeing as everything goes in UPF, playing the humble inventor trope so everybody leaves you alone just might work, and then when you construct your Mech, it’s basically game, till somebody destroys/steals it. (It is in fact an item after all, and the Kyloria is starting to give your Mech weird looks.)

Overall Score: Winner / Fun to Play

Dash players love Dash. They might play other decks and come back to her after a while, but the fact is that if you want to play Dash, you either love her or the idea of Mechs in general. And even though she’s already a good hero, the upcoming Bright Lights set will give her an extra boost.

Valera

Valera tried Magic in highschool then forgot about it. Some years later, she fell in love with broken FaB heroes (like Data Doll MKII) and tribal commander MTG decks. A shapeshifter, collector, traveller, writer... Who needs free time?