Introduction
Ihuarraquax is the young male unicorn that was saved by Ciri in the Witcher Novel. In fact, both character saved each other as none would have survived without the other. As interesting as the story is the card itself as it introduces again more cmplex cards to the game after the act of simplifying lots of other cards with the midwinter patch.
We, Jamedi and OtakuMZ took the classic shell of a reveal deck and adjusted it to fit in “Little Horse” (Ihuarraquax’s Nickname given by Ciri) and make this incredible designed card work. It turned out it is less gimmicky and better than anticipated!
General Strategy
The deck plays like a standard reveal deck. You play a Mangonel which then bombards your opponent for two damage with every card revealed by your engine while thinning in the process. It is very combo heavy and has good tempo swings. Those need some low tempo setups, e.g. Mangonel or Stefan Skellen. You can try to fool your opponent into a presumably safe pass which you then overcome with one of the 30+ point combos to end up with card advantage.
You almost always want to win Round 1, which should not be too hard using your leader for a big power play. if not, make sure he loses two cards down. As with any other deck, going second is better and facilitates winning with card advantage.
Mulligans
● Mulligan Imperial Golem, Roach in hand. Try to mulligan away Ihuarraquax, especially if you have Steffen in hand unless you are playing against a proactive deck (with no or little removal) and have Mandrake in hand which would not be of any other use in the matchup.
● Keep all Daerlan Soldiers, Cantarella, and Stefan Skellen always.
● Always keep one Mangonel or Vrygheff (to pull a Mangonel).
● Never keep three Fire Scorpions, but always at least one.
● Mandrake is very situational; see tech section for that.
Card explanations and combos
Leader: Morvran Voorhis
He is the obvious leader choice for a reveal archetype and too good to consider another one. In conjunction with Imperial Golems, one Fire Scorpion or Daarlan Soldier he is a massive tempo play. Usually you reveal 3 opposing cards and one D. Soldier for a 20 power swing. You can add 8 damage on top for each Mangonel on board for a maximum swing of 36 points pus a new card in hand with Daerlan or 37 with Fire Scorpion revealed. Revealing the opponent’s cards first is important as otherwise you have a chance of drawing a Golem first.
Reveal Engine: Alchemist, Vattier de Rideaux, Mangonel, Fire Scorpion, Daerlan Soldier, Imperial Golem,
The plan is to set up one or two Mangonels to deliver 2 points of damage for every card revealed consecutively. The reveal targets are Fire Scorpions that deal 5 damage or Daerlan Soldiers that will get played from hand and replaced by another card. Your bronze reveal cards are Alchemists. Vattier de Rideaux as a Gold helps the engine in revealing double the amount of cards as Alchemist.
Thinning
Thinning is a very important component of this deck as it renders the multiple combos very reliable. In total, there are nine thinning cards: Daerlan Soldier (3x), Imperial Golem (3x), Roach, Vrygheff, and Cantarella. Like this, you can go through 22 of 25 cards of your deck which is why it can be called an ultrathin deck. We tried additional thinning options, but those did help the deck. If you like to add more, either Albrich or Last Wish are the best choices here. Those should only be used after Imperial Golems and Roach are out of the deck; keep that in mind.
Major Combos
-Stefan Skellen + Ihuarraquax +Roach – the deck defining wombo-combo Use Stefan to put Little Horse on top of the deck making it instant active once played for an up to 28 point swing (32 with Roach in deck) when playing the Unicorn. The three times 7 damage dealt by Ihuarraquax are randomly applied to enemy units so timing and board state should be considered carefully to maximize the effect.
-Ihuarraquax + Mandrake (+Roach) This is the second way to activate Little Horse. It is a lot less preferable as any two damage can negate Ihuarraquax’s effect. In total, this two card combo is a maximum of a 34 point swing (38 with Roach). Beware, your opponent can disrupt this combo by his own Venendal Elite of the Unicorn gets revealed, keep that in mind when playing against other reveal decks or NG Alchemy. Stregobor directly after Steffen is also disastrous.
-Leo Bonhart + Cantarella + Venendal Elite Reveal Cantarella with Leo for an up to 20 point swing Removing key targets of your opponent. Later play Venendal Elite setting Cantarella giving you a spy with one power - neat!
-Vattier de Rideaux + 2x Fire Scorpion (unrevealed and in hand) One turn 21 points swing alone and an additional 8 for every Mangonel on board.
-Henry var Attre + Fire Scorpions (revealed in hand) + other friendly/enemy revealed cards Henry seems a weak card at first glance. With two revealed Fire Scorpions in hand, which is easily doable, he is a consistent 23 point play as long as you have an Alchemist left to reveal the Scorpions later on: 9 + 2*2 boost on Scorpion + 2*5 additional damage from Scorpions reveal. Any other revealed card from you or the opponent adds to power on top of that. Don’t conceal your Cantarella or any card that you would like to target with Venendal Elite (e.g. buffed Ihuarraquax in hand). -Assire var Anahid + Roach (+ Imperial Golem) Use Assire to reshuffle Roach to give you additional tempo for round 3. If you have a reveal effect left, you can opt to additionally reshuffle an Imperial Golem. The Nilfgaardian mage is also useful to shuffle back problematic cards in your opponent’s graveyard, e.g. a strengthened An Craite Greatsword or other resurrect targets. If no other card is more important to reshuffle, a used Cantarella can impair your opponent’s draws. -Roach + Mandrake + Assire var Anahid reshuffle
With the before mentioned combo, you can produce an even more powerful 10 point carryover by using Mandrake on Roach turning him into “Big Horse” (pun intended). Sardinilla + Mandrágora + Assire var Anahid.
Replacement cards/Tech
Venendal Elite / Machines
Some hate Venendal Elite as it is situational and gimmicky. It is easily replaceable by e.g. a Slave driver, a third Mangonel, or a Nauzicaa Sergeant in a Hazard-heavy meta. Another option is to swap a Fire Scorpion for an additional Mangonel.
Otherwise, the Bronze package is very tight.
Mandrake – A Meta Call
Mandrake can deal with a problematic Imlerith: Sabbath as well as a heavily boosted cards. It doubles up as an Ihuarraquax activator (see below). The latter strategy is very vulnerable so it is preferably used once the opponent already passed. If imlerith: Sabbath is not meta anymore, Mandrake can be replaced by Peter Saar Gwynleve to activate Little Horse. Peter is not able to banish Imlerith though. In that case it could also be replaced by any other silver meta call as the activation of the Unicorn by either one of the two is not your prime strategy. The carryover synergy with Roach is still good enough in most cases.
Options to swap Mandrake into can be more thinning (Last Wish, Albrich) as well as other tech cards like Scorch, Jade Figurine. Even more Reveal synergy with e.g. Cynthia is a worth taking a look at. ADC is not a good thinning option as it interferes with the Cantarella + Venendal Elite combo unless you opted to exclude it as mentioned above.
The other Silver cards are very synergistic and we would not recommend to change them. Golds are very tight. Vattier could be replaced by Cahir Dyffryn (less points, equal number of reveals). If you chose to swap Venendal Elite, Leo can be swapped too. Replacement options are:
Synergistic: Dandelion: Poet, Rainfarn of Attre, Vesemir: Mentor, Vilgefortz.
Meta dependent: Geralt: Igni, Villentretenmerth, Gold Weather (Korathi Heatwave or Rag Nar Roog).
Other: Aguara: True Form, Shilard, Tibor Eggebracht.
Also, I want to thank @OtakuMZ for writting the English guide, and show me the way on building an Ihuarraquax deck, which we made together. @JamediGwent