The heaviest hitters in Flesh and Blood make their presence known in the Deathmatch Arena. Rhinar, Reckless Rampage and Levia, Shadowborn Abomination have always skirted the edges of competitive viability, but with newfound tools and an armed friend, the Brute class looks to make its presence known in the metagame.

Our Heavy Hitters!

Kayo, Armed and Dangerous

Kayo, Berserker Runt has survived to adulthood (surprisingly), and he comes with several new abilities as Kayo that keeps him fighting in the arena.

Firstly, they chopped off his arm. Hilarious. This is obviously designed to disrupt the Brute play pattern of Bloodrush Bellow + Mandible Claw swings into a finishing move. This does hamper Kayo’s ability to utilize two-handed weapons such as Romping Club or Rok, but with this heavy handicap comes great power.

Kayo, Armed and Dangerous‘s ability to change the power of cards anywhere outside of the combat chain is a boon to Brute consistency, allowing for their draw-discard cards to hit very consistently, and makes them able to use these efficient attacks to punch up to opponents. This also ensures Kayo can run a greater blue count, enabling long chain turns with the pitch base to support it. It also allows the use of cards traditionally unavailable to Brute to fit smoothly, such as Enlightened Strike or Madcap Charger. 

Kayo’s other ability of generating Might tokens when discarding six-powered cards further distinguishes the efficiency of his assault, alongside enabling potential breakpoints with the rare Brute on hits of Command and Conquer and Erase Face to seven. This is his greatest strength.

Kayo could go in two directions. Firstly, a powerful midrange build wielding draw and discard attacks, and go again sources with powerful payoffs such as Savage Beatdown looking to play a raw high numbers game. The second build is a combo build focused on chaining Berserk triggers on a Bloodrush Bellow turn, pouring damage down an opponent’s throat on one turn and surviving with even trades during off turns.

Rhinar, Reckless Rampage & Show No Mercy

Rhinar is my main man, and he ate good in Heavy Hitters. Rhinar, Reckless Rampage has traditionally excelled in playing the midrange game with decks looking to defend and create incremental advantages. He abuses intimidate to force difficult or no blocks at all, chipping damage before going for an early kill via stripping an opponent’s entire hand.

Rhinar’s builds have been defined by his weapon of choice. Romping Club builds abuse the efficient weapon and his decent defensive capabilities to grind his opponents out with powerful small hands, while setting up powerful Barraging Beatdown chains to finish opponents off. The Mandible Claw builds enable extremely potent Bloodrush Bellow turns. Competing with some of the most efficient turns in the game, they look to survive and trade efficiently until those explosive turns, sending his opponent to the ropes.

Show No Mercy is a deceptively formidable card. The obvious implication is chaining it alongside other intimidate effects to remove an opponent’s hand for blocks, being a powerful three-for-nine in the best case. What is less thought of is how it disincentivizes blocking. If a Rhinar casts a single Barraging Beatdown and Show No Mercy, an opponent is forked between blocking out and enabling Show No Mercy’s effect, or not blocking and enabling Barraging Beatdown’s punishment. This is on top of the random intimidates earlier in the chain disrupting an opponent’s choices to block. This card is extremely powerful, and, assuming your deck is built to pay its three cost, it looks to cement itself in Rhinar builds moving forward.

Equipment

Apex Bonebreaker

This card is ridiculously good. As a Brute player, I never expected them to print a two-block gloves, much less one with such a formidable upside. In addition to the three blocks of value you receive with this card, you also create two Might tokens, generating two points of value assuming you retaliate on the following turn. These Might tokens also push breakpoints for powerful on hit effects such as Command and Conquer or Cadaverous Contraband. This card is powerful, but comes at the opportunity cost of Gambler’s Gloves. Future Brute builds have to rely on Scabskin Leathers less as it is far riskier to roll moving forward.

Ball Breaker & Mini Meataxe

These two weapons enable options as a primary weapon for Kayo, as well as secondary options packing alongside the existing Mandible Claw.

Ball Breaker is the more powerful of the two, working as a miniature Romping Club. It serves as a primary option for Kayo if he’d prefer a chain ender after go again attacks, swinging for four over Mandible Claw’s three. Rhinar may utilize this as an option over the Claw, looking for Bloodrush Bellow to be less explosive, in return an efficient weapon swing following discard effects without sacrificing all of the power Bloodrush Bellow provides.

The Mini Meataxe has applications in all Brutes. For Rhinar, Reckless Rampage it’s a less consistent method to trigger intimidate, for Kayo, Armed and Dangerous it generates Might tokens, and for Levia, Shadowborn Abomination it fills the graveyard. The inconsistency of this card largely lies on the inability to control your arsenal (imagine swinging your weapon, drawing a Wrecker Romp and discarding an important defense reaction). This card also opens you to greater vulnerabilities to fatigue, chewing through your deck each time you swing. Great power comes with great responsibility, and great risk.

Majestics

Send Packing

This is the highlight staple of Brutes, enabling a disruptive on hit (!!!) effect in Brute, at a price of enabling greater flexibility in your opponent’s hand if it doesn’t hit, returning the arsenaled card to their hand. Unlike Command and Conquer, this card fits Brute ratios comfortably as a yellow six power, and receives Brute exclusive buffs, namely Bloodrush Bellow. This card works fantastically with Apex Bonebreaker and Kayo’s Might tokens in particular, pushing it to a difficult seven power breakpoint to defend. Send Packing looks to be a Brute staple moving forward, no exceptions. 

No Fear

No Fear is a powerful flexible defensive tool. Firstly, it’s poor into wide aggressive decks as well as strategies looking to block out an entire assault, the banishing effect preventing blocking out with an entire hand whilst maximizing the efficiency of this card. No Fearing an early attack during a wide assault also prevents blocking an attack later.

However, No Fear is extremely powerful at preventing damage from evasive sources, such as Bravo’s dominate ability, with a unique ability to remove your entire hand to prevent discard effects from Pummel, Crippling Crush or Judge, Jury, Executioner. No Fear also notably prevents single source arcane damage, so is an easier inclusion in the sideboard to hedge against sneaky Kano, Dracai of Aether players. Niche, but powerful.

Cast Bones

Cast Bones looks better than it is. It doesn’t have go again, so it either ends your turn or requires Scabskin Leathers to be utilized. Secondly, while generating Might is most certainly assured, the Agility token is a hopeful, as even Kayo’s decks look to include non six-powers, such as Bloodrush Bellow, defensive tools, or even Cast Bones itself! 

However, when this card works, it works. The Might tokens generated pays this card’s effect off in damage on the following turn, with the potential high roll of Agility to ensure the attacks you’ve revealed will be able to chain together. It has unique implications with revealing six cards, enabling you to know which draw-discard effects will hit and miss and to plan your future assault to minimize risk. Kayo‘s decks definitely warrant some copies of Cast Bones, setting up a turn of overwhelming damage. As with all Brute cards, Cast Bones invokes great power, greater risk.

Gotta Go Fast

Clash of Agility

This card is deceptively the glue that holds Brute together in the absence of Gambler’s Gloves. Brute’s high powered cards means that they are usually winning clashes outside of the Guardian matchups, generating Agility. Agility then in turn fixes the Brute weakness of lacking go again sources, enabling hand activity and closing the combat chain with swinging their powerful weapons. All three of the Brutes are looking to generate Agility, and as a Brute three-block, it fits all the necessary ratios. This card looks to be a staple in Brute decks moving forward.

Agile Windup

Agile Windup is the proactive parallel to Clash of Agility, being able to be discarded before your turn to grant go again to your first attack. When discarded on your turn, it pre-emptively plans your following turn for go again, and generates an intimidate for Rhinar, Reckless Rampage and a Might token for Kayo. It’s also a six-power at yellow and above (blue for Kayo), serving as a card for hitting six-power ratios, enabling action points AND their hero mechanics. Fantastic!

Lead with Speed

While less exciting, Lead with Speed is still a powerful non-attack action that sets up the following turns while being efficient. Being a poor block is discouraging, but it’s certainly a consideration in weapon-focused Brute builds.

Conclusion

These are the highlights of Heavy Hitters tools for Brute, yet there are several other tools that warrant experimentation. The Beat Chest package is potentially powerful in intimidate-heavy Rhinar, Reckless Rampage builds, a swath of powerful new blue options in Talk a Big Game and Smashback Alehorn, and some potent generic options for answering the metagame.

All three Brutes look to hold potential in the Heavy Hitters metagame. Kayo, Armed and Dangerous wields a powerful proactive plan, tossing damage at an opponent and demanding answers. Levia, Shadowborn Abomination gets interesting side-grades, but has always been underestimated in the metagame as she is, wielding the most powerful armor suite in Flesh and Blood with Apex Bonebreaker and Carrion Husk. Lastly, from my limited testing, Rhinar, Reckless Rampage has been an amazing midrange standout (I have a bias) with plenty of room for experimentation in builds, and creative lines when it comes to play.

I look forward to battling my opponents in the Deathmatch Arena, and I hope you too are excited to represent the Heaviest Hitters in Flesh and Blood!

More Heavy Hitters Reviews:

The Best Heavy Hitters Cards for Commoner

Heavy Hitters Set Review – Generics and the Expansion Slot