Blueflame Liberators

Stable 2

For all decks labeled as:
stable - working as intended.
test - still under tuning and some things may or may not work as intended.

*Note: Working as intended != finished build, it just means deck functions as planned and is overall consistent

FVG:
Coronagal Liberator *1

Trigger: (6 crit/6 stand/4 heal)
Liberator of Holy Tree, Elkia (Heal) *4
Liberator of Hope, Epona (Critical) *4
Liberator of Ambition, Asus (Critical) *2
Catchgal Liberator (Stand) *4
Fortune Liberator (Stand) *2

Grade 1: (*13)
Shine Formation Liberator, Eldol (PG) *4
May Rain Liberator, Bruno *4
Fast Chase Liberator, Josephus *4
Little Liberator, Marron *1

Grade 2: (*12)
Liberator of Destiny, Aglovale *4
Liberator of Oath, Aglovale *4
Liberator, Lawful Trumpeter *4

Grade 3: (*8)
Bluish Flame Liberator, Percival *1
Bluish Flame Liberator, Prominence Core *4
Bluish Flame Liberator, Prominence Glare *3


   So I haven't posted for a while... with Silver Thorns not getting any support and being creeped, I've been playing and testing with a lot of different decks... mainly Revengers, Blue Flame Liberators, and then recently, Star-Vader and Perdition. I wish I can do more tutorial-ish things, but real life is real, and I don't think auto-pilot decks like Revengers or straight-forward decks like Liberators would be good tutorial material. And then there's also some decks I don't feel comfortable enough to say I know the guts inside-out because I have not spent as much time exploring them as things like Silver Thorns. Anyways, there's like a great-wall-of-text down below so I'll stop my ranting here.



   So, this is a stable build 2 because... it has gone through the prototype stage and initial stable stage, and this is an improvement based off the initial stable build. I'm pretty happy with build honestly, as it works really well at what it is intended to be doing and packs a fairly good punch. Furthermore it kept the chain-calling ability with minimal effort to net you free advantage without compromising a lethal, crit-heavy center.

ProGlare is a great finisher, and
a valuable addition to Blue Flames

   The prototype was there to try out Prominence Glare as a main boss, and while Glare is a great boss, he's not strong and reliable enough to dedicate the entire deck's winning image on him, hence putting all the eggs in one basket. The issue behind it being, that a pure Glare focused build does not benefit from chain calling, and so you would naturally steer away from chain-calling. However, Glare is a 20k boss, meaning without chain calling, he would be only swing with 30k even if you have Bruno sitting behind him. While 26k 2-crit glory clone attack is great, it's not great enough to always win you games because if we take interceptors into consideration (glory skill does not stop interceptors), all your opponent needs is 2 10k shields in hand and they can 2-pass you. While saving 2 10k shields isn't incredibly easy, it's not incredibly hard either.

   If Glare was cheap at doing his skill, then it would have been fine. However, Glare is very resource intensive, and so by dedicating to his skill, you end up hogging CBs and suffer minuses for that big play that's good enough to win a lot of games, but far from guaranteeing a kill, and with all the CBs hogged, you also lose the ability to keep your columns pumped and burning to make those delicious 21k Bruno columns as well as always calling with Oath Aglovale whenever you get the chance. He is also literally an inferior Prominence Core at all stages of the game except for the 1, maybe 2 turns you use his glory skill. Overall Core is still a much better and more consistent backbone boss that you should use as the core (lol pun not intended) of your deck, as he is strong throughout the game and keeps your deck running and pumping (similar to our red flame friend, DOtG, who lacks kill potential and burst, but is extremely consistent and powerful as a backbone boss that keeps the deck running, pumping, and creating advantage gaps), even though he has less burst and his attack is less lethal than Glare.

   Now while Glare isn't that great as being a backbone core boss, he is excellent as a finisher. He completely excels at this role, and as a bonus, he's still a great boss and therefore a very good backup boss if you fail to ride Core and does half of Core's job, making Glare still a very robust unit to run. And those are the 2 roles he play in this build - a finisher and a back up mid-game boss.

ProCore is truly pro at being the core...
...
omg that was so bad

   Why is Core a better backbone boss than Glare? Using at most CB1 per turn through Core, it means he is not CB intensive (costs as much as DOtG). His 1st skill also procs for free, and any form of superior call can potentially trigger it. Assuming we look at top 4 and ignore Catchgal, there's a 41.75% chance that we will hit Black Jack. Even if we only look at top 3, that's still a 33.01% chance of hitting a Black Jack, and both these probability ignores Catchgal, and ignores the fact that you can superior call more than once per turn. Lets say you legion Core and triggers Lawful Trumpeter, and use Core right after, that's instantly a whooping 7 cards looked for only CB1, and this is a common scenario that gives you 62.49% at hitting Black Jack. And all this chance and actual acquiring Black Jack with Core comes completely free.

   Some people argue that his effect is inconsistent, and therefore unreliable, which is true. Relying on Core getting Black Jack is like relying on triggers. However, on the other side of the table, assuming Core will not go off would be like relying on 1-passing. You simply cannot assume that Core will not go off with such high probabilities, and assuming that he won't fire (lol another unintended pun) can easily cost you the game with Core's ability functioning kinda like critical triggers (you can proc it more than once, and with looking at top 3 having a 33.01% success rate, getting him to go off twice is literally about as common as getting double triggers). And even at 33.01% proc rate, that's about as likely as checking a trigger with a single drive check.

Skill costs as much as ProCore,
people say he's light on CB.
Then people say ProCore is too
CB heavy to run with Glare...

   Another myth people often claim against a Core/Glare build is the deck being too CB heavy. This is not true. Glare is CB heavy (when you rely on him), but Core is not. A pure Core build actually have trouble burning out all the CBs because he alone uses at most 1 per turn, with the only other CB user in the deck being Aglovale. Core/Glare actually works incredibly well because your backbone is on a boss that uses but is not heavy on CB, who also can make very good use of Glare's finishing power, but is not required to rely on Glare. A boss that has built-in 41.75% chance at getting 2-crit for CB1 is often good enough to finish the job on his own.

   Now why do I run the cards that I run? What is the reasoning behind my choice?

   The first thing people might notice is that I run Catchgals and run a 6/6 scrit/stand split. While both Core and Glare work incredibly well with crits, Catchgals is just way too strong of a card that really doesn't have much of a drawback if you know how stand trigger works. Catchgals is a trigger unit, which means he doesn't take up precious deck space, yet he is the main backbone for chain calling even before Glare was even announced. Catchgal makes your top-deck calls more consistent and reliable at finding a card that fits your role, he also helps boost your Bruno and Corongal columns, and proc Core's crit skill. While the deck is now significantly less reliant on chain calling to reach magic numbers, a 2nd call still makes huge differences. For example, a Bruno boosted 9k attacker will be attacking at 22k instead of 19, and a Corongal boosting a boss will be at 31 instead of 28. That's literally an additional stage of power and consistency for free even in terms of deck building and space allocating. For how ridiculously much Catchgal is offering, he's way too good not to run.

   Then there is 4 Lawful Trumpeters. This guy, is a must-4. Mandatory. He is a free +1, literally free of any cost. That alone is really good. What makes him better  is that his free +1 also comes with a great bonus - triggering Core and Glare's skill for free. With Glare as a finisher, chances are we will not try to ride him until later in the game. Lawful Trumpeter instantly turns Glare from a CB2 finisher into a CB1 finisher. That's significantly easier to achieve than CB2. Significantly. The difference in 1 CB can easily translate to an additional turn you are making 21k columns, or another +1 you can get through Aglovale, on top of his free +1.  And as I already mentioned, he also procs Core, making our awesome core boss even better. He syngerizes so incredibly well with the deck and the bosses on top of his super awesome sauce free +1 makes there absolutely no reason not to max this guy. His only hiccup is that he doesn't work too well with Percival, who is a mediocre and incredibly situational boss that we either don't run or don't run more than 1 copy anyways. So yeah, moral of the story, Lawful Trumpeter too stronk.

   I don't think I really need to explain my reasoning with choices on Destiny, Aglovale, Oath, Aglovale, Bruno, and Josephus as it's fairly obvious why they are run at max copies. Both Aglovales are legion mates, and both are excellent units themselves. Bruno is the bread and butter of the deck, and Josephus is a free +1 that utilizes a resource that we don't otherwise use (now with 1 other competitor).

Doge Liberator Corongal

   Now finally, Corongal. He is naturally a 8k booster for your VG, and if your Core finds a Black Jack, he makes your column 31k. Or if you find a Catchgal, that's again 31k. Many sees this as a weird choice as Guido now exists, who is also an excellent card. Here's the thing with Corongal. We want our crit-heavy center to hit hard. Our VG is 20k. Bruno is literally as effective a VG booster as Corongal. We want Bruno behind our VG if possible because then we might be able to hit the next stage and not get stuck on 27 or 30k. Guess what Corongal is? He's your wet dream center column already pre-setup, guaranteed, since the beginning of the game. Any Bruno we find can now just go to a RG column and wreck faces because our perfect center column is already set. This means, what Guido gets as best case scenario (getting a Bruno somewhere), we already have as a default.

"But froliz, what if Corongal gets sniped/locked/caught drunk driving and taken away by the police? He's too slow!"

   Now here's the thing. Both Guido and Coronal require your VG to be in Legion. This means they are as slow as one another. If Corongal will get sniped/locked/high on drugs, so will Guido, and vice versa. So speed is not a determining factor in choosing one over the other, because they are the exact same. In fact, Corongal is actually slightly faster than Guido in most cases because you'd be using him as soon as you legion, where as Guido has his value in triggering ProGlare for free.

   Now we have looked at the big-o and big-omega... I mean the best and worst case scenarios, lets look at the average case scenario. On average case, Guido will probably turn into a 7k booster if you find one, or a front row attacker, where as Corongal will be a 8k booster because you'd be pumpin' every turn anyways in most cases. That means on average, they're likely going to be a 7k booster vs. a 8k booster, so their average case is also, generally speaking, equal.

   The only thing that Guido has over Corongal, is that he can sack a Josephus and +1 for free (because he is a soul himself), and he can potentially tigger your ProGlare for free if you sit on him for a while (which isn't a great idea btw, 25k columns...). So why are people super crazy over Guido as a FVG? *shrugs*. I mean, Guido is very useful and pretty awesome, and great as extra G0s to toss in the deck if you don't mind the slightly skewed ratios. But I see Corongal bringing in a much larger impact to the game in your favor.



   So that's basically it for my Blue Flame Liberator deck. I think I've explained my choices fairly clearly, but if you have questions, disagree, etc, leave a comment below.