(Phantasmaclasm | Art by Marco Gonzalez)

Hello and welcome back to another edition of Outsiders, A FABREC series where we look at underappreciated cards and heroes.

This time we’re taking a step back from my Riptide, Lurker of the Deep deckbuilding binge – partly because I’m still mourning the recent (but completely warranted) ban of Drone of Brutality in Blitz, and partly because I’m going back to my roots and playing Illusionist.

That’s right! When I started out in Flesh and Blood, coming from Magic: the Gathering, instead of falling head over heels for stinky green weirdos, FAB’s most board-heavy class felt like home. I spent a lot of time (and money!) on Dromai, Ash Artist. And now it’s time to bust out the old Phantasmal Footsteps once again, because there’s a combination of underappreciated cards that make me want to go back to that well and see if the feeling is still there.

The Spark

I’m starting my exploration of the Illusionist class off the back of a single card: Phantasmaclasm. Big value cards with downsides that must be mitigated by careful deckbuilding and play are my favorite thing in card games, and Phantasmaclasm ticks all my boxes. It’s a big, threatening attack that has the added benefit of possibly messing up your opponent’s plans by tucking the exact card they need – either to trigger its Phantasm effect, or to crack back with a more threatening attack.

But if we look at our opponent’s hand and don’t spy a six-power attack, the draw effect of Phantasmaclasm might give them one. Or, arguably worse, they might show us two cards that can trigger Phantasm and we’re pretty sad. But fret not: Talisman of Tithes is here to save the day! If we play a Phantasmaclasm and have a Talisman already in play, the draw our opponent would usually get after bottoming a card out of their hand gets removed – and we turned our Phantasmaclasm into a Thoughtseize!

This combination of cards piqued my interest, and while the people who make tier lists tell me that Dromai, Ash Artist is actually pretty well positioned in the meta at this time, which chafes against my hipster instincts, I’m giving this list a pass because of the sheer joy of taking an entire card out of my opponents hand – after ideally already threatening them with an onslaught of dragons.

The Catch

However, as with any cards we’re evaluating in this series, there’s bound to be a wrinkle here. And it’s pretty obvious why just about no decks (0.273% of decks!) include Talisman of Tithes: it’s a card that does literally nothing on its own and doesn’t block. It’s blue, fair enough. But neither Dromai, Ash Artist nor Prism, Awakener of Sol care much about blue cards. However, of the two Illusionists currently legal in Classic Constructed, Dromai, Ash Artist can get away with running it more so than Prism, Awakener of Sol. Dromai’s life total is healthier, she has Dragons to fall back on if her hand leaves something to be desired, and she’s perfectly happy blocking with two to three cards in the early game and dropping an item to prepare for an overwhelming turn later on.

Comparatively, more decks (a whopping 1%) include Phantasmaclasm, but that’s still not a whole lot. It can be awkward to run, considering that it costs three whole resources, and you can get blown out by Phantasm, yes, but the upside is very much there – catching the one attack in your opponent’s hand that could save them from our big, nine-power attack just feels great. Of the two outsider cards that we’re choosing to include in our deck (pardon the pun), this one feels less deserving of its low rate of inclusion.

The Deck

"Talismantaclasm"

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Hero (1) 1 Dromai, Ash Artist Weapons (1) 1 Storm of Sandikai Equipment (7) 1 Crown of Providence 1 Flamescale Furnace 1 Phantasmal Footsteps 1 Vambrace of Determination 1 Nullrune Boots 1 Nullrune Gloves 1 Nullrune Hood Main (72) 2 Burn Them All red 3 Command and Conquer red 2 Down and Dirty red 3 Dunebreaker Cenipai red 3 Dustup red 3 Enlightened Strike red 3 Fate Foreseen red 3 Invoke Azvolai red 3 Invoke Cromai red 1 Invoke Dominia red 3 Invoke Kyloria red 3 Invoke Miragai red 1 Invoke Nekria red 2 Invoke Ouvia red 1 Invoke Tomeltai red 3 Invoke Yendurai red 3 Oasis Respite red 3 Phantasmaclasm red 3 Rake the Embers red 3 Ravenous Rabble red 3 Scar for a Scar red 3 Sigil of Solace red 3 Sink Below red 1 Remembrance yellow 2 Tome of Fyendal yellow 3 Talisman of Tithes blue 3 This Round’s on Me blue 3 Warmonger’s Diplomacy blue

The Gameplan

Attentive readers of this series can probably tell where I’m going with this. It’s another deck that tries to bridge the gap between being aggressive in some matchups and defensive in others. What can I say, I like having options! Against aggressive decks, we side in our Sink Below and Fate Foreseen and play patiently while developing a board state with ash tokens and items until we’re ready to take back the tempo with a big turn of go again attacks ending in a Phantasmaclasm.

Against defensive decks, we play much the same, siding in our Ravenous Rabble and Scar for a Scar to create some easy pressure and maybe leak some chip damage. This should provide us with the ability to weave in an item drop more easily or close out our turn with a naked Phantasmaclasm if our opponent has already blocked with most of their hand and we happen to have the blue pitch in hand.

In a Dromai, Ash Artist deck we can’t feasibly run enough blues to guarantee playing Phantasmaclasm any time it shows up. So to ensure that we can enable it with a bit of setup, we run nine blues. And all of them synergize and enable the “Talismantaclasm” package in their own little way! Talisman of Tithes can negate our opponent’s draw from This Round’s On Me while Warmonger’s Diplomacy is a blue card that blocks for three and provides us with added disruption. If all the stars align, we might even be able to play a Warmonger’s before we Phantasmaclasm, giving us another angle to pick apart their hand once we know what card type they won’t be able to play during their next turn.

The rest is standard fare for Dromai, Ash Artist – or at least it was back in the ancient times of 2021. When I first started playing FAB, it was big dragons, some aggressive attack actions like Dunebreaker Cenipai to pile on the pressure if needed, and a smattering of late game reach in the form of Burn Them All and Rake the Embers, with a single Remembrance in the sideboard for the Guardian match-up.

Conclusion

The more I play this deck, the more I like Phantasmaclasm over the card it replaced, Embermaw Cenipai. One or two big, chonky attacks just feel right in the push and pull of a typical match with the Illusionist class. And with just a playset of Talisman of Tithes, it doesn’t take much to make this card sing with a bit of careful planning, the right choice of arsenal, and a window to drop an item or go on the counterattack.

I’m sure that Talismantaclasm (yes, I’m unreasonably proud of this name and will take any opportunity to use it in this article) is far from the best way to play Dromai, Ash Artist. But it’s an incredibly fun puzzle to figure out! And who knows – after the red-pitch-matters Illusionist Dromai and the yellow-pitch-matters Illusionist Prism, we’re bound to have an Illusionist hero that cares about blue cards some day. And if we do, the stock of Talisman of Tithes as well as Phantasmaclasm is bound to rise. So, I hope you give this deck a try and get your practice in early!

Jonah Lara

Raised on a steady diet of fantasy storys and video games, Jonah discovered trading card games at the impressionable age of 12 and has since spent over half his life and about the same percentage of each monthly salary on card games. If he's not brewing new decks or catching up on the latest FaB news, he's probably dead - or painting a new Warhammer mini.