Cardboard Corner Considers: Phantom Monarchs
Sometimes writing the Cardboard Corner can be hard, especially when it feels like the designers of those cards aren't exactly filling you with confidence in their stewardship of their games. That being said, I've never talked about Grand Archive in CC, a game that feels like the Pepe Silvia meme, but we're doing Keurig shots straight out of the pod. Grand Archive is the anime-styled CCG from Weebs of the Shore, who take a lot of lessons from those Wizards of the Coast, but draw equally from their successes, their mistakes, and their competitors for inspiration. It has epic lore, clever design, a growing fanbase, and a vibrant tournament scene, all of which Voltron into a thrilling experience both strategically and socially (seriously, our locals are so nice.) So buckle up buttercup, here's some ghastly glee about the wonderland weirdness that is PHANTOM MONARCHS!
For those uninitiated, Grand Archive/GA is one of those games where you have a character outside of your deck. Over the course of the game, that character or champion levels up into more durable and more powerful versions of themselves, allowing you to hit harder, usually with a wider arsenal of cards. Alice here is one such champion, who's a bit different than other Level 2 champions (you level up from 0 to 1, to 2, to 3 generally) in that generally you're locked into Norm cards and one basic element (wind, water, fire) until level three, but she unlocks an advanced element (crux, umbra, etc) at level 2! While her abilities might not be very strong, getting to that advanced element without paying an extra 3 cards to level up is nothing to sneeze at, and enables some super spicy strats! Basically unlocking however much of your deck a turn or two early lets you unleash a whole lot of power ahead of schedule, meaning your opponents could be caught off-guard before they have a chance to set up their defenses!
Lost Providence is a hot include for your Material deck (a side deck that you keep your champ's level up cards and their special equipment in,) which gives you an alternate Grand Crusader's Ring, but only if you've got an advanced element activated due to its exalted element gating. GCR is super strong, as card draw in GA is king since your hand is also one of your in game currencies, but because it takes a Materialize step, playing it means you compromise tempo in your setup in order to ramp. Lost Providence however can be activated from the Material Deck meaning that you can play it the same turn you enable an advanced element, and then get the card from it next turn when it awakens (untaps.) You can only pick one of these two supercharged cards though (because of the Divine Relic keyword,) so be thoughtful when you're building your material deck!
Merlin is the other champion featured in Phantom Monarchs, and is clearly the winner of the costume contest this time around with the Tuxedo Mask vibes. She has a lot of text, pulling in both the Memorite Blade and the Fractured Memories when she levels up (if you play your cards right.) Speaking of playing your cards right, Grand Archive (to me) is all about the rhythm of incremental advantages that cumulatively let you take more game actions than your opponent. This Merlin punishes players for using their turns to the fullest, filling up their memory to be taxed on their plays in their next turn's Recollection phase. Unless your opponent is all about the Agility keyword, you'll be able to put sheen counters all over their stuff, and then with the Fractured Memories mastery, you can kill those threat units and still deal overhead damage to their champion. Its convoluted, but we like that in our engine building game about building engines. Also, have I mentioned the tuxedo?
PAWN PIECE BECOME QUEEN PIECE! TRANS GENGAR CONFIRMED!!!
This is just an interesting translation of the actual factual chess move (because chess and cards are themes in this set and Distorted Reflections, the set this set is expanding upon,) and I love how its been interpreted here. Most of the time, you'll need to play a handful of En Passants to gain the momentum or use big spooky beaters like Heavy Swing plus a buff counter to get your pawn to the threshold to greatness. Once there though, you're encouraged to go all out nuking face, which can be followed up by the flipped Queen Piece, who if supplied with command cards can deliver +7 damage per smack. Hail to the Queen baby.
You guys, its Bill. You guuyyyyyssss.
Bill and Treacle (pictured below) are two of the Alice Bonus Ephemerate allies, who can be brought back from your graveyard for a cost, and on the condition that the next time they would enter a graveyard they are banished instead. Bill has a neat trick where his enter from hand forces you to sacrifice another specter (to balance out his buff stats as a 3 cost no doubt.) That forced sac is actually a boon, because you can use it on things like your Liminal Guide, Undying Dreams, or Rosewinged Hollow to set up their graveyard triggers. Treacle on the other hand can be resurrected stealthy and can be used to keep your life total from getting too low by recovering damage counters off of you.
He Eeepy (and so am I)
One thing I've noticed is that Rangers being so focused on distant don't have room for much else in their decks besides guys that like getting distant, and cards that make them distant (and then some interference with suppression and counters because rangers are petty.) I don't know if the math checks out on this, but this could change the way rangers throw their weight around, given how impactful the compass is on THE CLOCK, while doing you a kindness by replacing itself. A better mathematician should crunch numbers, but I didn't invite anyone, so we'll both have to wait and see on this front.
There isn't a whole lot of copying in Grand Archive (18 cards with the term as of this posting,) and most of them are very controlled. This one is on the more restricted side, but two 3/3 with stealth for 3 cost and another guy is really strong, even if locked behind an advanced element. Being unable to deal with 6 attack worth of threats is not gonna sit well with most opponents, especially since those allies can fight the turn they enter/become the Drib Bujbuj (let's goooo Drib Bujbuj!!!!)
Lastly, here's the Jabberwocky, who looks absolutely impossible to activate (play) given it's 8 cost and advanced element type, and everything else that expensive usually have an Efficiency, or are somehow cheatable by being a fatestone or something. Although it is still a mystery to me, how one gets this beastie on the battlefield, I wouldn't mind having the Jabberwocky being a menace on my side of the board since its impervious to everything but the Vorpal Sword. Maybe you'll figure it out, and stomp folks next Wednesday, but for now that's all from the Cardboard Corner. Thanks for reading along! We hope you've enjoyed looking into the dark dimensions that contain Grand Archive's latest expansion Phantom Monarchs.
Ben Doane has been a member of the Pandemonium Team since 2019, and has been playing wargames, rpgs, and tcgs since 2004 and earlier. When not blogging, Ben runs the wargames and mailing departments, and also puts together the store's newsletters. Her current favorite card was BILL because look at him!!! HEEEEEE'S BILLLLLLLLL!!!!!