News from the Front: Delirium invades your Dreams!

These dev blogs include not only lore on each of the factions, but faction specific tips and tricks from our battle tested QA team!! Read on to learn more. Without further ado, you know them, you love them, they will devour your consciousness...

Delirium

From an immaterial plane beyond mortal reckoning come the fanatical worshippers and monstrous creations of Delirium. Born from the primordial spark, these nightmarish beings have lurked in the darkness of voids, blackholes, and wormholes waiting to emerge. These creatures have existed since the time-before-time, and feed on the energy of possibility. In Terrene Gall’s darkest hour, these ancient beings have arrived to reshape reality. They seek a return to nothingness in the name of their god Xilith, the Dream Devourer.

In her name, the forces of Delirium are counting down to the extinction of order with chaotic tactics, and the power to remove logic and strategy.

Champions

• The Grand Astronaut is available after you have unlocked 8 other Champions. His Champion ability is a CHOOSE ONE, with the option to search your Draw Pile for a Unit of the Starling Tribe, or to add 2 Chum Creeper Unit tokens to your Hand. The Starling Tribe contains its fair share of powerhouse Units, capable of turning the tide of battle even before being improved with Promotion Gems, so having the option to add one to your hand is a great boon should you have recruited any. On the other side, Chum Creepers are a [1|1] token Unit, excellent for putting up a defensive wall between the Enemy and your Champion; and they come with the Drain gem to ensure your opponent can’t fill up their meter. The power lies in the choice.

• After completing 20 portal battles, we unlock the enigmatic Time and Space. It also has a CHOOSE ONE ability, with the option to destroy & exhaust an Ally Unit, dealing damage equal to its power to ALL Enemy Units; or it allows you to search your Exhaust Pile for a Unit and cleanse its conditions. This means if you do exhaust a powerful Unit with the first choice, then it will be available to add to your hand later with the second choice. This back-and-forth system allows you to potentially wipe the enemy frontlines as you fill your Champion meter, then bring the expended Unit back for a devastating attack later. It may be worth it to recruit Soul Voids, which can add copies of cards exhausted by your Champion Ability to your Hand while they're in play!

• The Architect is difficult to manifest, requiring you to play 30 Lone Wolf cards. Lone Wolf cards cannot be played unless they're the only Unit in your Hand – a necessary drawback to balance out their immense power. As the Architect, your power grows with each Champion Ability card played. Its Ability is to add a [1|1] Fractis Unit to your Hand and grant it +1/+1 for each Champion Ability you have played this battle. The goal with this deck is to find ways to gain Champion Fragments quickly, so you can ramp up your Fractis units. Aside from gathering as many Promotion Gems as you can, consider Relics like Purple Heart, which lowers the amount of Fragments required to earn a Champion Ability; or Delirium’s Blessed Alignment Spell, which has the option to grant 5 Champion Fragments instantly.

• If you are a player that likes to remove cards to make a focused battalion, then you will have no trouble unlocking the Extinction Servant, as it requires 25 cards to be removed from your deck at the Campfire or the Trader. Its Champion Ability is simple: give all enemy units -1 Power and deal 1 damage to them. Even if you don’t kill your opponents, they will be weakened, potentially even reducing them to 0 power and preventing them from activating effects that occur when they deal damage. This Champion also starts with the grotesque Popcorn Leech, a [3|3] Unit which fully heals itself at the end of each turn and can be very difficult to kill if played correctly.

  

Promotion Gems of Delirium

Delirium has four unique gems that set them apart from the other factions.

• DRAIN – When dealing damage, remove 1 Fragment from the Enemy Champion. If you don’t want to deal with banners drawing cards, or mini-bosses and Enemy Champions earning their Abilities, this Gem will keep undoing their Fragment Meter progress. Since this works on every attack, giving this to a unit with Double Strike can be devastating. Don’t forget: the opponent needs to have Fragments to remove them. It may also be worth considering equipping Drain to Units with the Double Down Conditional, which grants Fragments to the Enemy when played, in order to counteract the effects of the condition.

• CHAOS – Applies CHAOTIC to a random card in the Enemy’s Hand when played. The Chaotic status randomizes the target or location when an effected card is played, so a damaging Spell cast by the Enemy might hit one of their own Units, or a powerful Unit might be deployed to your side of the battlefield. Make sure to keep some open spots on your side of the field if the opponent has cards affected by Chaos. Probability is your friend.

• MUTATE – When this Unit dies, RESPAWN a [1|1] Chum Creeper. Not only does this give you board security by adding a respawn trigger to a Unit, but the Chum Creeper also has the Drain gem, giving you an extra Champion Fragment when they are slain. Also, there are a couple Delirium cards that synergize with Chum Creepers, such as Praise the Sky or Cosmic Raze. Just be careful if you or your opponent have any Unwanted Crawlers in play, as their ability will kill the Chum Creeper when it spawns.

• CORRUPT – When killing a Unit, add a [1|1] copy of the eliminated Enemy with BANISH to your Hand. Every kill your Unit makes provides you with expendable Units to keep your frontlines filled. Units copied by Corrupt retain any Gems and card effects the original Unit possessed, meaning some may pull more weight than that of a simple meat shield. Couple this with Gems like Explosive or Overkill to potentially acquire several Units with a single attack; or pick up the Splicing Kit Relic, which will make all [1|1] Units, such as those created by Corrupt, into [2|2] Units instead.

Units of Note

• Sleeping Mists are the basic Unit for Delirium, and gain either +2 Power or Health when spawned. Bring them back to your Hand with the power of a Respite Gem or a card such as Fall Back to receive this spawn bonus multiple times.

• Every Unit of the Stitcher Tribe has its own ability, such as Stitcher Parts granting +1/+1 to another Unit when it dies, or War Stitcher gaining +1 to either its power or health when its Drain Gem activates. To make the most of a deck built around Stitchers, acquire the Tethered Stitcher, which will grant you 2 Champion Fragments whenever another Stitcher-tribe Unit dies.

• Starling Watchers support the Stun synergies of Delirium, giving you a Stun spell whenever they survive combat. Combine their high health with a Double Strike or Regen Gem, and you can potentially acquire a suite of Stun Spells to disable the entire Enemy Army – or destroy them outright if you have a Phase Stitcher Unit to deploy.

• A former member of the court of Scales, Etwas the Jester fell into madness and joined the forces of Delirium. Her Card Ability randomizes her Health and Power whenever she’s deployed, to a value between 1 and 5. However, as a natural [1|1] Unit, she’ll still gain the benefits of the Splicing Kit Relic.

• The Popcorn Leech heals all damage at the end of combat, if it survived, and it has a spot in the frontlines with which to teleport. Building up this unit’s health can really increase its survivability and giving it gems like Armor, Siphon, and Drain will make it devastating.

  

Wrap Up

Overall, Delirium adds challenge to players and their opposition by adding chaos to choices and battle plans. The faction focuses on stunning its Enemies, and utilizes a lot of cards with Exhaust, which removes the card for the rest of battle. Cards that Exhaust upon use often possess great power as a trade-off, but through Spell and Champion use, the player can negate this downside and reap the benefits. Lastly, this faction controls Champion Fragments, whether it is gaining fragments quicker, using them to damage their opponent, or stealing them from the Enemy Champion. Delirium is unpredictable in the most entertaining way possible!