This is a guest blogpost by Josiah Fiscus. Josiah Fiscus is a 31-year-old gamer from Pittsburgh, PA who has been playing CCGs and designer board games for over two decades. When he’s not at the game table, you’ll find him playing drums and serving as a deacon in his local church or enjoying time outdoors with his wife, Erin, and two kids (ages 5 and 4).
I’ve been given the opportunity to spoil an Epic: Uprising card. And this one is a mother of a card. Feast your eyes on Den Mother!
I first received this card yesterday afternoon and I’ve been stewing on it since then. While I haven’t yet had a chance to sleeve up a proxy and put it in a deck, I can still say with confidence that this is yet another standout card for the Wild faction.
The obvious comparison is to Raxxa, Demon Tyrant. Raxxa comes into play and puts down 18 attack worth of champions spread across three bodies. Den Mother comes into play and puts down 14 attack worth of champions spread across four bodies. But while Raxxa’s overall attack is higher, the floor is lower too, because killing Raxxa makes the tokens much weaker. Conversely, Den Mother has a higher ceiling because killing her tokens just makes this mama wolf very angry. In fact, each wolf token killed actually INCREASES the overall attack!
The value of Breakthrough here cannot be understated. While other cards like Demon Breach can also put lots of bodies on the board, those bodies can also be chump blocked easily with tokens of your opponent’s own. Not so here. This card is sure to elicit a groan from your opponent as soon as it hits the table. (Of course the dream here is to play it as a follow up to a Wave of Transformation!)
But my absolute favorite thing about this card is how it contains built-in combat tricks. When you attack with Den Mother and wolf tokens in play, your opponent is almost required to put as much defense in front of her as possible because the threat of +3/+3 on a Breakthrough champion is so nasty. (In my dreams, I always have a Wither in hand to use on my own wolves when I attack with her.) So as much as you want Den Mother to stay on the board, you need not be afraid of attacking with her when her wolf pups are in play.
I have no doubt this card will show up in some constructed decks. But it’s even more impressive in limited formats in my estimation. Raxxa is a first-pickable card and Den Mother is no different. Moreover, combat tricks are always a much bigger deal in limited formats (Lash and Mighty Blow, for example, go way up in value as compared to constructed) and the ability to at least threaten to boost your Breakthrough champion at will is going to cause serious headaches for your opponent when considering how to block. I’m very excited to build some decks (in constructed and limited) that feature Den Mother and I hope you are as well!
Recent Comments