Pierre-Marc Duguay's Emerald Steel list went 3rd-4th at the North American Championship on August 30, 2026. You can find the full list on TCGplayer. We verified all 60 cards against the catalogue and priced them from our daily feed. Total cost at cheapest printing: $252.78.
- Angel - Experiment 624 is 59% of the budget. Four copies at $37.52 each. Everything else is cheap.
- The engine is Elinor. Three exerted characters at end of turn deals damage, gains lore, and draws a card, all at once.
- Fifteen copies of Evasive. Alert shuts that down entirely. Know what your opponent is running.
- Eight copies lean on Resist. Effects that banish any character, no conditions, ignore it. That's the real threat.
Here's what makes this deck unusual. The name says aggro. The curve says something different.
What the deck is actually doing
Twenty of the 60 cards cost three ink. Twelve cost four. There are only eight one- and two-drops that do real work early. This isn't a deck trying to flood the board on turn two. It's a deck trying to establish a board of exerted characters and then let Elinor - Renowned Diplomat take over.
Elinor costs four ink. Her ability reads: at the end of your turn, if you have three or more exerted characters in play, deal one damage to chosen opposing character, gain one lore, and draw a card. Do that two or three turns in a row and you're pulling away. The deck is built around making that trigger reliable.
Tod - All Alone and Darkwing Duck - Crime Fighter go in early. They're both one ink. They quest, they exert, and they're the bodies that make Elinor's count hit three. Vixey - Forest Friend costs one ink less when Tod is in play, and she has Evasive.
So does Mushu - Stealthy Dragon and Hamish, Hubert & Harris - Troublemaking Triplets. Fifteen cards in this deck have Evasive. Challenging them takes a character with Evasive to do it. That protection buys the turns Elinor needs.
Where Angel fits in
Angel - Experiment 624 costs four ink. She does two things. While you have no cards in hand, she gains Resist +2. And once per turn, you may discard a card to deal two damage to a chosen character.
That second ability is the engine piece. The deck wants an empty hand. Launchpad - Trusty Sidekick lets you draw and then discard, which feeds Angel's damage trigger. The Terror That Flaps in the Night deals two damage on entry, three if Darkwing Duck is in play.
Do that two or three turns in a row and you're pulling away.
Angela - Night Warrior can give a chosen character Challenger +2 and Resist +2 until your next turn. All of it points toward pressuring the opposing board while Elinor closes out lore.
At $37.52 a copy, four copies of Angel cost $150.08. That is 59% of the deck's total price sitting in one playset.
Everything else is surprisingly cheap. Elinor - Renowned Diplomat is $10.70 each, $42.80 for the set. Mushu - Stealthy Dragon is $7.20 each. After those three playsets, the rest of the deck costs under $17.
The cards holding it together
Strength of a Raging Fire is a three-ink song. It deals damage to a chosen character equal to the number of characters you have in play. Any character with a cost of three or more can exert to sing it for free. In a deck that wants a wide board, this scales fast.
He Hurled His Thunderbolt costs four ink and deals four damage to a chosen character. Two copies. Enough to finish off something that survived earlier damage.
White Rabbit - Late Again is worth naming. He costs two ink, has Evasive, and if it's your first turn and you're not the first player, you pay one ink less. Going second hurts in most aggro mirrors. White Rabbit makes it sting less.
Broadway - Sturdy and Strong is the five-ink capstone. Bodyguard means an opposing challenger has to target him first if able. But if you have three or more cards in your hand, he can't ready. The deck wants to empty its hand anyway. That condition should rarely trigger against you.
The Queen - Devious Disguise runs two copies. She draws a card on entry, but each opponent gains two lore. The Jealous Heart ability gives her two extra lore while an opponent is ahead. Two copies suggests she's situational, not a core piece.
What answers this deck
Fifteen copies of Evasive is the protection plan. Alert breaks it. A card that grants Alert to the whole board means your Evasive characters can suddenly be challenged by anything. Cards like Judy Hopps - Lead Detective or Angus - Mighty Horse do this. If your opponent is running Alert sources, the Evasive shell stops working entirely.
Eight copies lean on Resist. Angel's passive Resist and Angela's temporary grant both reduce damage. An effect that banishes any character, no conditions, doesn't deal damage at all, so Resist does nothing against it. That's the actual threat. Not combat math. Straight banish.
It's also worth noting that another Emerald Steel list finished top 8 at the same event for $217. That list is $35 cheaper. If you're choosing between the two, the gap is almost entirely Angel - Experiment 624.
The full list
Build this if you already own Elinor
If you're building from scratch, start with Elinor - Renowned Diplomat at $10.70 each. She's the card the deck is named after and the reason the end-of-turn plan works. Pick up Mushu - Stealthy Dragon next at $7.20 each. The rest of the deck is under $2 a copy.
Angel - Experiment 624 at $37.52 each is the last purchase, not the first. Buy her when you're certain the shell is what you want to play, because she's 59% of the price tag and she won't save a list that isn't already working.
Prices update daily. Price any list as you build it in the deck builder, which reads the same feed as this page, and every card above links to its own page in the card library.
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