CFV - Altmile Brave April 2017

Here's my Brave build properly introduced...

The last time I did a post on Altmile was about the same time last year since then the only Royal Paladin deck I've played is SGD, reason; I play what I feel is the the best Royal Paladin deck of the moment =P SGD imo is still the best variant but Altmile got a HUGE boost from the TRY3NEXT set giving SGD a really big run for his money.

There are multiple ways to build this deck but here's mine =) 

DECK RECIPE

GRADE 4: 16

2 Blazing Sword, Fides 

4 Aerial Divine Knight, Altmile

2 Transcending the Heavens, Altmile

1 Holy Dragon, Brave Lancer
2 HolyDragon, Saint Blow Dragon or Holy Dragon, Luminous Hope Dragon (explanation down the post)

1 Air Element, Sebreeze
1 Holy Dragon, Laserguard Dragon

2 Divine Knight of Godly Defense, Igraine

1 Dark Element, Dizmel

GRADE 3: 6 

4 Knight of Heavenly Decree, Altmile

2 Blue Sky Knight, Altmile 

GRADE 2: 15

3 Counteroffensive Knight, Suleiman

4 Knight of Ambuscade, Redon

3 Hopesong Angel 
2 Sage of Salvation, Benon 

2 Knight of Twin Sword 

GRADE 1: 13

4 Laurel Knight, Sicilus
1 Knight of Powercharge

1 Hidden Sage, Miron
1 Headwind Knight, Selim

3 Support Sorcerer of Damascus

3 Hope Keeper

GRADE 0: 17

12 Critical 4 Bringer of Dreams, Belenus

4 Heal

1 Knight of Discipline, Alectos


Foremost what you need to know is that Brave is slower than SGD even with a build with heavier emphasis on the early game it doesn't compare to the insanity SGD is, it also has a power dip on first stride but has an insane second and third stride so strong imo its able to cover up all the shit it gets prior.

It took me a while to think about how to talk about this deck so I can cover as much of it as possible without too much dilly dallying so I thought phases. 

EARLY GAME

Unlike most GB decks my version of Brave actually has an early game created by Hopesong Angel and Sage of Salvation, Benon, basically they superior call a unit for a small cost of 1 counter blast (cb). The early game mainly consists of controlling game pace and most importantly getting stride priority.

The easiest way to control game pace and get stride priority with this deck is by rushing and I don't mean just throwing your hand down to deal damage though because unlike SGD, Brave doesn't have an op first stride like Regalie so if we get counter rushed we'll lose units and have cb denied which prevents us from making plays in the future, instead we want to take some damage (2~ is a good amount), use the cb for Hopesong or Benon and then use the free cards gained from them to attack or guard, if you think about it Hopesong and Benon are basically 10000 shields. 

• We can sit on G1 until our opponent rides G2 first. 
• We want the opponent to ride G2 first because this automatically puts Sebreeze pressure on them, they'll then have to ride to G3 first, re-ride G2 or not damage us to prevent us from playing Sebreeze (which they've already done because we sat on G1). 
• This gives us a chance to hoard counter blasts which is important because the deck doesn't function on low damage, post stride the deck actually needs 2~ cb each turn to actually be effective. Being on higher damage than our opponent is also a good way to deny heals.
• Alternatively if we already have 1 cb we can ride to G2 first and apply pressure immediately, same rules as above sorta applies. 
• We can initiate the G2 game and re-ride a G2 and call either Hopesong or Benon to nullify the -1 this'll again put the Sebreeze pressure back on them. Basically as long as we can play Hopesongs and Benons we can play on G2.
• If you want cb on G2 just leave your front rear circles open.

Main call targets for Hopesong Angel:

• Counteroffensive Knight, Suleiman
• Knight of Ambuscade, Redon
• Support Sorcerer of Damascus
• Hope Keeper

• Remember, calling another G2 gives us another attacker and 5000 shield.
• If you have enough G2s then you probably want to call Damascus to help create columns and setup for later in the game.

Main call targets for Sage of Salvation Benon:

• Knight of Powercharge
• Hidden Sage, Miron
• Hope Keeper

• Knight of Powercharge helps enable Brave later in the game if you can't use Alectos (maybe Kalibum spun him back to the deck). 
• Here's a cool example; say we have a lot of cards in hand and we don't want to discard cards, we can actually use Brave Lancer to plus even more! We can bind our hand with Powercharge to essentially dodge Brave Lancer's discard cost and just call 3 units for 1cb.
• We generally want to grab Miron, the classic Benon+Miron combo is a +2 (Benon, cb1 > Miron (+1), sb1 > draw (+1) = (+2)), the free cards help set up field and can be used as stride or G-assist fodders, after all I am playing a lower G3 count than what most would call the norm...

MID GAME

What I consider the mid game is first and second strides. 

FIRST STRIDE

Brave actually has a really bad power dip on first stride, think about it...the best strides we have access to are Blazing Sword, Fides and Aerial Divine Knight, Altmile which when compared to Holy Dragon, Sanctuary Guard Regalie or Interdimensional Beast, Metallica Phoenix, is essentially a "blank" turn so we make the best of the situation...what we want to do is change the flow of the game which is determined by the outcome of the early game.

FLOW 1 (FAST): END THE GAME 

Probably less common but if you rushed or crit sacked hard enough in the early game, say they're on 4-5 damage AND you think you can break through your opponent's hand then you may try to end the game now.

The easiest way or probably the only real way for this deck to close the game out is by multi-attacking, this early in the game the only way to do so because they pretty much do the same thing is by using either Counteroffensive Knight, Suleiman or Knight of Twin Sword...grab one from the deck with Fides if you don't have one in hand or field. They both call a G2 when they attack, the difference is Suleiman doesn't need to be boosted but you need to discard a card in addition to the cb. So it'll be something like this...

• Rear Guard (RG) attacks (1) > Twin Sword boosted attacks (1), cb1, call a G2 over RG > New Rear Guard attacks (1) = 3 RG attacks

Put them together and you get this stupid wombo combo...

• RG attacks > Suleiman attacks, cb1, call Twin Sword > Twin Sword attacks, cb1, call...
• You get the point...attack until you're out of units, out of cb or your opponent concedes.

FLOW 2 (SLOW): RESET

Its pretty hectic in the early game and if we've played Hopesong or Benon a couple times that's easily 2~ cb gone so we want to slow things down and reset the game in preparation for our 2nd and 3rd strides basically we're gonna refresh our resources that's generating cards, cc (counter charge) or sc (soul charge). Don't be fooled though we can still easily push out 21000 columns with Altmile's stride ability, Redon etc to apply some pressure.

Easiest ways to get free cards on first stride is through Suleiman/Twin Sword and Fides. 

• Leave 1 column empty (this way your not replacing/losing units) > Twin Sword boosted attacks, cb1, superior call Benon (+1), cb1, superior call Miron (+1), sb1 (soul blast), draw (+1) = +3 cards
• Fides' ability, discard a card (-1), superior call Brave G2 unit (+1), draw a card (+1) = +1 card
• You don't have to call a Brave G2 (-1/+1), superior call Hopesong or Benon instead to get access to other cards.

These are not the only ways to generate cards but you guys get the point right?

The only form of cc this deck has is through Support Sorcerer of Damascus, it does take a little bit of set up but her ability is very simple; at the end of turn Brave, retire her to draw 1 and cc2. We can bring her out with Hopesong Angel and if we had played him earlier she could already be on the field. Remember that her ability only triggers if Brave is active but you do not want to be ending your turn with 3 or less cards in hand...especially after only the first stride so we can use our starter Knight of Discipline, Alectos (cb1, move to soul) or Knight of Powercharge (retire, choose cards to bind from hand) to help us enable Brave. 

Soul management in this deck is actually a thing, its not the priority resource, cb is more important but Hopesong and Divine Knight of Godly Defense, Igraine uses soul so depending what cards we have access to we may want to set up. There are 2 ways to sc; using Alectos' ability (cb1, move to soul, enable Brave) and Bringer of Dreams, Belenus (Altmile crit trigger).

SECOND STRIDE

Brave's second stride is dependant on the results of the first stride; if you chose to end the game and it failed then you're probably not going to have much resources to play with but if had the game reset and took some damage during your opponent's turn then welcome to paradise. With 3-4 maybe even 5 cb Brave imo has some of the strongest 2nd strides in the game.

You can play it slower/safer and aim to get more card advantage, maybe your opponent healed 3 times =S and you can basically mimic the reset play on first stride.There's a lot of creative ways to generate cards once we have GB2/3. 

• I mentioned earlier, we can bind our hand with Powercharge to essentially dodge Brave Lancer's discard cost and just call 3 units (+3) for 1cb. 
• With empty circles Aerial Altmile or Transcending Altmile ability, call Hopesong, Benon, Suleiman or Twin Sword > proceed to plus...

OR you can slap your opponent's cards out of their hand cuz they won't have anymore by the time your done with them =P Just a joke, if your opponent is on 3 or more damage you can try to end the game/make your opponent drop a lot of cards to gain game control. Basically we use the Suleiman+Twin Sword wombo combo here.

• If you want to make the maximum amount of attacks stride Brave Lancer. You want to make 2 columns, attack and then essentially reset the field with Brave Lancer's ability and create another 2 columns. Brave Lancer, Suleiman, Redon and Altmile's stride abilities should easily make 4-5 21000+ attacks. For example:
• Beginning of ride phase, Altmile's ability, call Twin Sword +4000 power > stride Brave Lancer Dragon > Altmile's stride ability, call Damascus +4000 power > Damascus+Miron attacks, 20000 (base 7000+Altmile 4000+Brave Lancer Brave 3000+base 6000) > Twin Sword+Sicilus attacks, cb1, superior call Hopesong over Damascus, Hopesong cb1, sb1, superior call Hope Keeper over Miron, 23000 (base 9000+Altmile 4000+Brave Lancer Brave 3000+base 7000) > Hopesong Angel attacks, 11000 > Brave Lancer attacks, cb1, superior call Suleiman over Hopesong, Redon over Twin Sword and Damascus over Sicilus, 32000 (base 26000+Brave Lancer Brave 3000+Redon Brave 3000) > Redon+Damascus attacks, 22000 (base 9000+auto 3000+Brave Lancer Brave 3000+base 7000) > Suleiman+Hope Keeper attacks, cb1, discard 1, superior call Redon over old Redon, 26000 (base 9000+Brave 3000+Redon Brave 3000+Brave Lancer Brave 3000+base 6000+Brave 2000) > Redon attacks, 17000 (base 9000+auto 3000+Suleiman 2000+Brave Lancer Brave 3000) = 7 attacks, roughly around 110000 shield value not including triggers.
• If you think less attacks but higher power is better then stride Transcending Altmile, if you went in to Aerial Altmile the previous turn you can get cont. +6000 power to the front row then add any other powers from Redon or Altmile's stride abilities. For example:
• Beginning of ride phase, Altmile's ability, call Twin Sword +4000 power > stride Transcending Altmile > Altmile's stride ability, Redon +4000 power (on field from previous turn) > activate Transcending ability, cb1, flip Aerial, front row +6000 (Aerial was first stride) > rest Alectos +3000 power to Redon > Redon attacks, 22000 (base 9000+Altmile 4000+Transcending cont. 6000+Alectos 3000) > Twin Sword+Sicilus attacks, cb1, superior call Suleiman over Redon, 26000 (base 9000+Altmile 4000+Transcending cont. 6000+base 7000) > Suleiman attacks, cb1, discard 1, superior call Twin Sword over old Twin Sword, 18000 (base 9000+Brave 3000+Transcending cont. 6000) > Transcending attacks, superior call Hopesong over Suleiman, +5000 power, Hopesong cb1, sb1, superior call Hope Keeper behind Twin Sword, 32000 (base 26000+Transcending cont. 6000) > Twin Sword+Hope Keeper attacks, cb1, superior call Headwind Knight, Selim behind Hopesong, 23000 (base 9000+Transcending cont. 6000+base 6000+Brave 2000) > Hopesong+Selim attacks, 29000 (base 8000+Transcending auto 5000+Transcending cont. 6000+base 7000+Brave 3000) = 6 attacks, roughly around 115000 shield value not including triggers.

I kinda just made up these scenarios in my head based on what I come across but if you set up properly you can actually consistently force 130000-150000 shield values which are easily 10~ card drops and either options will likely leave you on a low hand afterwards 5~ but you guys get the point right...right? 

LATE GAME

Late game is third stride+ so if you didn't use Transcending or Brave Lancer before, now's the time to go all in and use them, basically make multi-attack plays mentioned for the mid game. 

Otherwise if the game has got to this point, its dire...reason is because if we've superior called a bunch to plus or multi-attack in previous turns we won't have much left in deck for more attacks, the Altmile strides, Twin Sword, Suleiman and Hopesong all start to lose value. If you have nothing left then you have 2 options, make a field and stride Holy Dragon, Saint Blow Dragon, smack your opponent with a crit and pray they don't have the cards to guard it or make a field and just swing with Knight of Heavenly Decree, Altmile's GB2 ability, you should be able to get 2 columns that hit 21000.

*NOTES*

• You can also play 2-3 copies of Holy Dragon, Luminous Hope Dragon instead of the Saint Blows, they serve a similar purpose for my deck but Luminous Hope is typically better since he can be used earlier to buff your field and call a card, the reason I play Saint Blow is for the SGD match up. Its unlikely for this deck to be striding before SGD, if SGD strides first and we G-guard we get access to GB2 on our first stride, since SGD doesn't typically play much defensive cards (sentinels or heals) if we can swing 31+ with crit they probably have to either hand drop or take it and die.
• There's actually another card you can play instead or in combination with Suleiman and Twin Sword; Knight of Encouragement, Albion. When he attacks at the cost of 1 cb and 1 sb, he can call a Brave unit, it's actually a decent ability, it can basically call half the deck the only issue is the best decks right now are Chronojet and Nightrose and they have access to Gear Cat and Mickie the Ghostie respectively, essentially they can pump their vanguard to 21000 base for the entire turn when they G-guard. This means anything that Albion calls become weak when not boosted and in most cases won't hit at all. Suleiman and Twin Sword can both call Hopesong or Benon which can create a new column that easily breaks the 21000 base. Here are 2 examples:

•  Brave is active and vanguard is Brave Lancer:
• Twin Sword+Damascus attacks for 22000 (19000 first then changes), ability cb1, call Hopesong Angel > Hopesong, ability cb1, call Redon behind him, abilities, discard a card (-1) to boost > Hopesong+Redon attacks for 26000.
• Twin Sword 15000 (base 9000+Brave Lancer Brave 3000+Redon GB2  3000)+Damascus 7000 = 22000
• Hopesong 14000 (Redon GB2 3000+Brave Lancer Brave 3000)+Redon 12000 (base 9000+auto 3000) = 26000
• Brave is active and vanguard is Aerial Altmile:
• Suleiman+Miron attacks for 26000, ability cb1, discard a card (-1), call Benon > Benon, ability cb1, call Hope Keeper, Brave activate abilities > Benon+Hope Keeper attacks for 21000.
• Suleiman 20000 (base 9000+auto Brave+3000+Aerial call+5000+Aerial cont.+3000)+Miron 6000 = 26000
• Benon 13000 (base 8000+Suleiman call ability 2000+Aerial cont.ability 3000)+Hope Keeper 8000 (base 6000+Brave ability 2000) = 21000
• Alectos' ability triggers at the "BEGINNING" of "EACH" battle phase, this is before you actually make the first attack and can be activated during either player's turn.
• I'm playing 6 G3s, returning readers should know I like low G3 counts and this deck can do so because I'm playing the Benon engine which helps deck thin as well as net free cards which I can be used to G-assist if need be.
• I tried playing 12 crit and 2 heals, honestly I prefer that line up more but this deck actually needs heals against SGD...
• Its downhill after second stride is because this deck similar to SGD doesn't actually generate much card advantage after your initial Benon plays, your second stride usually goes through a good amount of G2s which means you won't have much left in deck to repeat the same plays again. 

Closing the article...TRY3 booster officially puts Brave on the map with exploding potential however the deck faces the same existing problem...everything Altmile can do, SGD does it faster and better, I mean why try to end the game on second stride when you can do it on G2 or first stride? The next few waves of support for Brave will tell us whether Bushiroad wants other variants of Royals to flourish or forever be in SGD's shadows.

This is a build that I feel most comfortable playing so feel free to let me know what you like/don't like. I got super lazy towards the end of this post so..forgive me if things feel messy or incomplete. I'm happy yo answer your questions if you leave a comment =)

*images from cardfight.wikia*