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Shadowverse: Worlds Beyond is here, and there's a ton of new cards and strategies to get stuck into. One of the most exciting new decks is the Portalcraft Hybrid deck, which combines the two main Portalcraft decks, Artifacts and Puppets, to create a great and consistent control deck, between the power of the Fuse mechanic and the clear ability of Puppets.
While it may seem easier to go into one deck rather than split your game plan into both, Hybrid Portalcraft provides an all-around deck with the ability to control the board state early on, passively developing massive endgame threats in your hand to take victory. We'll go into more detail about this later on and why this deck fixes some of the inconsistencies of both of the other Portalcraft Decks. Oh, and the deck only needs four Legendary cards, making it the perfect option for a Starter deck, too.
In this article, we're going to go over everything you need to know about Portalcraft Hybrid and how you can utilise it to take down the ranked queue and push to victory. This deck may not be as straightforward to build as other decks in the game, but it's a contender for being at the top of the format in the right hands.
Portalcraft Hybrid - The Deck
Decklist
Portalcraft Hybrid is a Portalcraft deck that combines the strategy of Portalcraft Puppet and Portalcraft Artifact, two potent decks that are already pretty prevalent in the metagame.
Both of these decks aren't at the top of the metagame, though, and for good reason; Puppets can't end games that effectively outside of Orchis, Newfound Heart, whereas Artifacts struggles in the early game versus the current metagame until it can get Ominous Artifact γ online.
This deck aims to combat those two weaknesses. As the Fuse strategy creates a passive gameplay loop, any passive effects that you can gain value from as you're setting up your artifacts means that you can keep control of the board and take out small characters above-rate. This is done with cards like Puppet Theater and Medical-Grade Assassin, both of which are effective earlier on in the game at keeping your enemies at bay.
In the meantime, you can set up your artifacts by gathering artifacts from cheap followers (that are essentially extra Puppets in the deck otherwise) like Kitty Cannoneer and Ironheart Hunter, fusing as fast as possible to be able to quickly get out your big artifacts, using them multiple times with cards like Alouette, Doomwright Ward and Doomwright Resurgence.
On the top end, we've got game enders like Orchis, Newfound Heart and Ralmia, Sonic Boom that can easily end games and provide tons of value when played correctly. Putting both of these game enders in the same deck (with the ability to use them, due to Orchis being pretty self-contained) means that you've got a potent endgame strategy, as well as a way to get there through controlling the board.
Why Hybrid?
As mentioned previously, both of the Portalcraft decks have their own flaws against the metagame. The lack of being able to attack means that Puppets can't really do much unless it draws Orchis, Newfound Heart, which is a lot to hedge on. The other finisher is Liam, Crazed Creator, but the thing is that decks like Runecraft can just fly over the board that Liam sets up.
On the other hand, artifact deck has an insanely strong mid-to-endgame strategy. Being able to consistently keep the board clear with Ominous Artifact γ and push out efficient artifact-matters followers means that you're able to get into the game later on, but the early game is a lot of twiddling thumbs and can't really keep up with decks like Dragoncraft, that ramp up far faster than we can get online.
So, essentially, Hybrid exists to try and be able to improve both matchups into the main two decks in the current format, Runecraft Spellboost and Dragoncraft Ramp. The aim is to use Puppets to control the boardstate early while building up your artifacts throughout the game, using them later on in the game when resources are low.
You can easily have three or four puppets in hand at any given time, meaning that you can freely kill followers that hit the board early on while getting your artifacts built up. On top of this, Medical-Grade Assassin is a vital card to keep in your hand for when you reach the mid game, as it essentially lets you murder something for 4 PPs. However, with Puppets in hand, this becomes a 3 PP play, making it more flexible than Bullet from Beyond.
With this, we can see that a more well-rounded deck strategy emerges; sacrifice your early followers to keep the board clear as you amass your mid-game strategy, before using your endgame strategy to close out the game. After all, Orchis, Newfound Heart can be a 7 damage immediate kill in most cases, with even more if you've got any spare puppets around.
Playing Portalcraft Hybrid - Tips and Strategy
Sequencing in this deck is incredibly important, as you need to be able to keep your opponent's board at bay to be able to get to the late game. We don't care about our early game followers, and so we can generally see them all as ways to be able to keep the board clear. Puppet Theater is a great card, as it give us a ton of Puppets early on to be able to wipe out smaller followers, bridging the gap for us to get to our Ominous Artifact γ.
If going second, I often use my +1 play point on turn 1 for a Puppet Theater, but otherwise I'll save it to ramp into a 3 or 5 cost instead. A lot of the time, this deck just won't have a turn 1 play, and that's okay. Our turn 2 is above rate anyway, and so we're not too worried about missing out on a turn.
Generally speaking, if we're not reacting, we want to be playing out our cheap threats to chip damage or have our opponent take out our early-game followers. We don't want our opponents to ignore the followers we're playing, which means that playing stronger units like Rukina, Resistance Leader, even to just threaten a Striker Artifact (which you might not even want to evolve into).
You're naturally favoured as the game gets longer (except for against Runecraft, in which you do need to close the game a bit more quickly), as getting to 8 lets you deal 7 immediate damage with Orchis, Newfound Heart, and getting to 10 usually means you can play a Masterwork Artifact Ω to end the game.
Importantly, though, don't tunnel vision on Masterwork Artifact Ω! Having two copies of a game-changing Ominous Artifact γ in hand with multiples of Doomwright Resurgence and Alouette, Doomwright Ward means that you can keep the game in your favour, without having to all-in for a 10 cost.
Building Portalcraft Hybrid - Build Path and Rerolling
Portalcraft Hybrid is generally quite affordable compared to other decks, only requiring four legendary cards. On top of this, you can get one of the legendaries from the starter decks at the beginning of the game, meaning that building this deck is pretty simple to be able to spec into if you start the game doing so.
As for rerolling, check out our rerolling guide for more information, but you'll essentially want at least one Orchis, Newfound Heart and either a second or a Ralmia, Sonic Boom to get started with this deck. Then, grab the one that you're missing out of the 2nd Orchis or the Ralmia, as you don't need three Orchis to at least get started with this deck.
Don't worry too much about getting the third copy, as you'll be able to Vial into it (and it's only for consistency). Once you've opened your initial packs and done all of the tutorial and story content, you should have enough Vials to be able to pick up whatever you're missing and be able to play the deck as a whole.
Closing Time
Portalcraft Hybrid is one of my personal favourite decks in Shadowverse: Worlds Beyond, and I think it's the perfect answer if you want a Portalcraft deck that can hold its own in the current metagame, as well as a budget deck to be able to get stuck into the game with.
If you're looking for a great resource for deck, metagame, and other Shadowverse content, check out the rest of our content! We've got guides for beginners, high-end metagame strategy, and everything in between.
In any case, thank you for reading this deck guide, and I'll see you in Shadowverse Park!
