Day 3 of Guardians of the Ancient Reveals: Zilean
Hey all it’s Precipic here to do a review of the new cards revealed today.
The new Guardians of the Ancients cards will be revealed every morning at Mobalytics so be sure to keep up with the latest cards!
You can theorycraft new decks with these cards right now by heading to the Deck Builder.
Lastly, to keep up with our previous expert impressions, click here.
Here are the new Shurima cards from today’s reveal for the Guardians of the Ancient expansion.
- Zilean (champion)
- Time Bomb (spell)
- Chronoshift (spell)
- Scrying Sands (spell)
- Soothsayer (follower)
We have a pretty sweet one here starting with Zilean.
For more expert impressions, be sure to also check out Swim’s video!
Zilean / Time Bomb
- Zilean (level 1)
- 2 mana 1|4 Champion
- Text: Play: Creat 4 Time Bombs in your deck, then Predict.
- Level Up: I’ve seen you destroy 2 allied Time Bombs
- Zilean (level 2)
- 2 mana 2|5 Champion
- Text: Round Start: Creat a Fleeting copy of each non-Fleeting card I saw you play last round. Play: Create 4 Time Bombs in your deck, then Predict
Zilean is a very powerful Anti-Aggro card that gives you the flexibility of also being a must-kill value engine against the slower strategies.
To start off a 1|4 Predict for 2 mana is about as good as Aspiring Chronomancer which is already a pretty solid card.
Where Zilean gets most of his value against any strategy that plays to the board is through his Time Bombs.
- Time Bomb
- 2 mana Landmark
- Text: When I’m summoned, draw 1 and advance other allied Time Bombs 1 round. Countdown 1: Deal 1 to enemies and the enemy Nexus/
These cards being 2 mana cards that can clear the opponent’s board while not putting you down a card is super powerful and when played at the right time can completely blow outboards.
The truly nuts thing about Zilean however is that this cheap card that helps stabilize against aggro is also incredibly important for most control decks to kill.
If you are able to blow up 2 Time Bombs with Zilean on the board and level him, the amount of card advantage this 2 mana card can generate is absurd.
The first home I’d try is Zilean Twisted Fate because Zilean’s Time Bombs draw cards which can help level your Twisted Fate and effects that deal damage to the whole board like Twisted Fate Red card and Time Bomb stack quite well with each other.
However, I think that you should just try out Zilean in various Control, Combo, and Midrange decks and see how he feels.
This is a deck I thought up that could potentially use Zilean.
It includes a bunch of Predict and draw effects to help you find your Time Bombs so that you can level Zilean and looks to kill the opponent with Elusives.
Deck Code: CEBQQBAHAEFQ2GQ4E5HV2AQDAYEBCAQCAYNCMAIBAQDXSAQBAQDTWAICAYOQ
[See Zilean Twisted Fate 4.28 deck details]
Chronoshift
- Chronoshift
- 7 mana Burst spell
- Text: Give an allied Champion “The next time I’d die this round, fully heal me and grand me +3|+3 instead”.
I don’t think this card is great.
In general, its role of saving your Champion from a removal spell is already filled by Rite of Negation and that card does it quite a bit better.
Yes, Chronoshift is burst but the fact that Rite of Negation is more flexible and can be used to do things other than saving your champion makes it much better.
Beyond this Rite also costs 4 mana instead of 7 which is a massive amount.
I don’t expect this card to see much play unless the +3|+3 matters a lot, like with Fiora or Lee Sin, and even then I have my doubts.
Scrying Sands
- Scrying Sands
- 1 mana Burst spell
- Text: Give an enemy -2|-0 this round.
This card is very good.
The ability to Predict for 1 mana is already pretty good in Runeterra, it can help set up your early draws super well and late-game finding the specific card you need is often better than drawing a card.
Beyond this, this card is just a pretty solid combat trick.
For 1 mana at Burst speed, giving a unit -2|-0 can do a lot to swing combat, can save you life in a pinch, or can deny a Nexus strike trigger from something like an Ezreal.
Soothsayer
- Soothsayer
- 2 mana 1|4 follower
- Text: When I’m summoned, grant allied champions and landmarks SpellShield
This card is probably the hardest to evaluate of all the cards revealed today.
The high end of this effect is pretty powerful, because it can give you a Spell Shield on all of your most important cards at effectively Burst speed while leaving behind a body.
However, this card’s floor is very very low being nothing but a 2 mana 1|4 without relevant text.
The only deck I’m certain will play this is Mono Shurima Buried Sun Disk because this is probably the best way in the game to protect you Buried Sun Disk From being killed while also helping keep your ascended united protected.
I think the ability to protect Landmarks is a pretty unique effect that could make this card pretty potent if there are others all in landmark strategies.
Anyways that’s it for me today. Always exciting to see new cards, can’t wait to see what the next champion we get is.
To keep up with the latest card reveals, head to our Guardians of the Ancient Spoiler page. Once the cards are revealed, head to our Deck Builder to start theorycrafting.
