Achroma 2.0 has shaken up some decks, and may possibly have just toppled the top deck in the game, Rayders.

Hex Clunker decks got a huge boost when the Rise of the Realm Runners expansion brought us Realm Runes, allowing you to tutor (find) the Clunker, improving the deck’s consistency considerably, resulting in a 43% probability of drawing Clunker turn 1 if you included the runes Isaz and Kaunan and no other cyan or red cards. The Mulligan has made that even more likely, pushing this up to 68%, and that’s not including draw effects such as Lone Survivor and Restock. It’s therefore no surprise that the Achroma 2.0 launch event had 4 players who brought variations on this deck.

2 of the players, Lewis and SaraJane, kindly shared their different takes on this deck. First up Lewis (long time player and owner of the website achroma.tools) shared his achrom heavy and tournament winning palette:

Lewis actually wrote a deck review of this build way back in June 2023. For that review, click here. He’s included 11 characters, objects, and locations with mixed achrom and chroma, meaning this deck has some serious burst potential thanks to Arabella’s Recipe. The object package is light, but contains the ones you want: Achrom Converter for control, Alchemist’s Tincture to play objects on the cheap and as a REACTION, Corrupted Muon Trap for control, Hex Clunker Parts for some free gain, and Cintimani Stone because why wouldn’t you? He’s also included a couple of Hex Clunker Engineers to go fishing for objects the opponent erases (or at a pinch, steal from an opponent), and a couple of Smuggler’s Way to protect the Clunker. A formidable deck that can consistently throw out massive value cards turn 1, and put you on the back foot from the get-go.

Next up, SaraJane (long time player and regular high finisher in events) shared her more chroma heavy control palette that she used to finish 2-1:

To compare these builds here’s the differences:
Lewis: +2 Arabella’s Recipe, +2 Road to Ludlam, +2 Smuggler’s Way, +1 A Conjuring at Curdle Cove
SaraJane: +2 Magus Elite Muon Trap, +2 Muon Sphere, +1 Lone Survivor, +1 Curdle Mine, +1 Rangled Wood

As is apparent, this is a more control heavy build, though contains the same backbone of cards: the rares and legendaries are the same, we still have Corrupted Muon Trap, Abundance of Quintessence, Hostile Takeover, Rabid Dog, Occultist Warlock, Restock, Alchemist’s Tincture, and Clunker Engineer. I can imagine this build grinding out slower chroma wins versus Lewis‘s quick burst achrom wins, but both decks will be able to build an enormous boardstate turn 1.

I couldn’t resist making my own take on this palette, so here it is:

It pains me to build a Salum deck without Dark Rainbow, but despite toying with the yellow Rune Algiz, I fell back on Kaunan/Isaz as I really wanted to build around Arabella’s Recipe plus include Alchemist’s Tincture. As I’ve gone with an Arabella strategy, here’s a comparison to Lewis‘s build:
Lewis: +2 Abundance of Quintessence, +2 Restock, +2 Road to Ludlam, +2 Smuggler’s Way
Me: +2 Rangled Wood, +1 A Conjuring at Curdle Cove, +1 The Curse of Curdle Hill, +2 HAIM Shard Cache, +2 Lone Survivor

I’ve ditched the Abundances, and included Rangled Wood for consistent gain, plus HAIM Shard Cache as either +5 trade fodder, or a setup for a burst steal play using Cintimani Stone. Losing Road to Ludlam does hurt the Arabella’s Recipe play, but I’ve got 2 more promo locations so the net number of achrom/chroma cards hasn’t changed. Losing Smuggler’s Way means less protection for the Clunker, but I figure I can live with 1 turn of powerful use out of the Clunker. Finally, I’ve swapped the Restocks for Lone Survivors. It draws 1 less, but gives you an extra target for Alchemist’s Tincture. People who know me won’t be surprised to note that the average trade value of the palette is more than 3, with 6 uncommons carrying a trade value of 4 or more, compared to Lewis‘s 2 and SaraJane‘s 1.

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Regardless of the build, Hex Clunker decks are painful to play against. The enormous amount of control makes it very difficult to play your game, and occassionally can create a negative play experience, most notably for newer players. Chroma Clunker builds are weaker against trading decks that don’t need to play so many cards, but the achrom builds have a better shot against Rayders-like strategies. The presence of Hostile Takeover and Achrom Converter, as well as Corrupted Muon Trap means this deck is as strong against location heavy palettes as character heavy palettes.

But is it the best deck in the meta? Sure, it won the Achroma 2.0 release event. But there were only 10 players, only 3 rounds, and as far as I’m aware noone was playing Rayders. I haven’t had a chance to really test this against Rayders or Staycation, and while it’s looking strong, I don’t think a nerf is necessary yet until we have more data and players have had a chance to try to tech against this palette. Either way, it’s nice to see a Salum deck rise to the top. Hopefully the next Norso release will bring with it a powerful palette to give all realms a shot at victory in an event.

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