Riptide in Outsiders Limited

Riptide, Lurker of the Deep is a brand new hero in Flesh and Blood Outsiders. At first glance, the thing that jumps out the most about him is that he starts at 19 life instead of 20. This tells us that his specializations and/or hero ability are powerful enough that there was a need to adjust one of the rarely touched levers (life and intellect) to properly balance the hero. And that brings us to one of the biggest questions in Outsiders: Is Riptide going to sail to victory in Limited, or is perhaps the new hero actually just a TRAP?

Overview

Riptide has been publicized as the ‘trap hero’, which is reinforced by his specializations being traps (3 different Legendary ones!), and by his hero ability. Riptide’s first hero ability allows you to put a card into your arsenal from your hand whenever you play a card. However, it should be noted that it must be played from hand, so you can’t play a trap from arsenal right into another trap from arsenal, or attack with Go-Again from arsenal right into a Death Touch or Virulent Touch.

Riptide’s second hero ability states that whenever a trap triggers you deal 1 damage to the opponent. Only prevention effects can interact with that. This lets you get full defense value out of your hand and continue chipping damage while doing so. This ability will be especially threatening in the low life total stage of the game.

Another way of evaluating Riptide is that the combination of his hero ability and the traps means that he has access to many different potential 0 for 4 cards with pseudo-on-hit effects. Traps defend for 3, and through his ability, deal 1 damage to the opponent for a total swing of 4 just from playing the one card, as long as the trap effect triggers. 

It is worth noting that Riptide’s first hero ability doesn’t actually depend on which player’s turn it is.

A possible strategy for Riptide will be to pitch easy to trigger traps, play for the second pitch cycle, and reach a point where you have more traps than the opponent has life points left. Between the threat of traps forcing the opponent into sub-optimal plays to try to avoid triggering them and a handful of high impact on-hit effect arrows, Riptide may do quite well taking control of the late game. But this is far from the only likely strategy that will develop in limited.

Core Cards

Because this is an article about Riptide’s Limited format potential, we’ll be focusing mainly on common and rare cards.

Equipment

• Driftwood Quiver - This lets you clear out your arsenal if it ever gets caught with a trap that you can’t trigger and don’t need or want to use as a block 3.  It also can get rid of a card you can no longer pay for in order to get a trap into your arsenal.

• Wayfinder’s Crest - Rangers typically don’t get much block, so the 1 block for a critical break point is actually good value for Rangers.  

• Toxic Tips - This also has great Ranger value in the 1 breakpoint block.  Since Riptide doesn’t have access to Dominate, it will often be possible for the opponent to block any attack the effect is added to. This seems at first glance to indicate that its best use for Riptide is to identify when it will get you the most value to make the opponent block when they otherwise wouldn’t.

• Mask of Malicious Manifestations - This appears to have a standard use case for Riptide of saving you from a no-arrow/attack hand.  It may be good insurance to have against bad draws.

• Seeker’s Cycle - Seeker’s Mitts is probably the worst of them since it competes with Toxic Tips. For Riptide it feels like you really want 2 of them if you want the effect. Azalea coming in for 5 with Dominate would need two of them to cover it.  And you are likely often pitching a yellow or blue to pay for it, so 3 may be best if you don’t have other Equipment options.

• Threadbare Tunic - This is a good safety valve for a resource constrained turn.

  

Traps

As mentioned above, all traps are theoretical 0 for 4 cards if you can get them to trigger, so the main thing that differentiates them is the different conditions they have and effects they produce when they trigger.

• Generally Useful

  • Boulder Trap (Rare) - All heroes have the ability to pump attacks, and most heroes will have 1+ blade break Equipment that can be effectively shut off, so this should be relatively easy to trigger against all heroes and its effect should also be pretty universally applicable

  • Tarpit Trap (Rare) - All heroes have access to Go-Again attacks at the class card level, and there are generic Go-Again attacks in the set, so this should be able to prevent an on-hit from any hero often enough

  • Inertia Trap (Common) - Most heroes will increase the power of an attack often enough, and all heroes should on average end up with a lower power turn with a future 4 card hand instead of a 5 card hand, so the effect is applicable across the board

    

• More Targeted

  • Pendulum Trap (Rare) - Likely only Azuri and occasionally Ninjas will play/activate reactions

  • Bloodrot Trap (Common) - While the effect is universally bad for everyone, getting it to trigger is likely also targeted to Azuri and occasionally Ninjas as Rangers won’t be playing Attack Reactions

  • Frailty Trap (Common) - Getting it to trigger is similarly easy to Tarpit Trap, but the -1 to weapon/arsenal attacks really only hits hard against heroes running multiple weapons

    

Arrows/Attacks

There are a few arrows and attacks that Riptide can make use of that are worth noting.

• Go-Again

  • Falcon Wing (Common)

• Above Rate Damage

  • Infecting Shot (Common)

• Attacks to ‘Reload’ off Riptide’s Ability

  • Death Touch (Rare)

  • Virulent Touch (Common)

  

  Detrimental On-Hit Effects

  • Sedation Shot (Common)

  • Withering Shot (Common)

    

Sleeper Cards

• Since this is a brand new hero, there is no established baseline of how Riptide can or should be played, so it’s a bit early to even try calling out sleeper cards.  However, one interesting option to note is that Red Seek Horizon is still a 0 for 4 attack even without the alternate cost, which may be a fine response after a defensive turn.

Meaningful Generics

• Come to Fight (Common): It blocks 3, and it pumps any arrow!

• Humble (Rare): Shutting off the hero abilities in this set is a really good way to slow down an opponent. Playing this off a yellow or blue makes it a VERY good looking 2 card play after defending with a trap or two. Plus even the blue comes in for a break point!

• Cut Down to Size (Common): Forcing an opponent off of a 4 or 5 card hand can be a back breaking, game winning kind of play in the right spots. If you have a good ratio of traps, plus this and Humble, it may be a viable non-arrow focused strategy or endgame plan since the blues are all good.

• Brush Off (Common): It’s a card you can play from your hand on your opponent’s turn, and it costs 0.  This means you get to play this for prevention plus put a card from your hand into your arsenal going into your turn. Just be careful…if the attack is pumped over the amount Brush Off prevents, there will be no prevention effect!

Example Playlines

Arsenal: empty

Hand: Red Virulent Touch, Red Ravenous Rabble, Frailty Trap, any 3 block card

Against a multiple weapon hero:

Get attacked with a Scar for a Scar > React with Frailty trap > Deal 1 dmg, and shut down their weapon attacks forcing a 3-4 dmg attack followup > put in Virulent Touch with Riptide’s ability > block with the 3 block card on their attack > go to your turn > Play Ravenous Rabble revealing a red card for 4 > Attack with Virulent Touch

Including the -1 to 2 attacks (2 weapons), the damage from Riptide’s ability, and the threatened Bloodrot Pox, this is an overall 19 point value play between defending and attacking from a 4 card hand! 

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Arsenal: Tarpit Trap

Hand: Red Humble, Any Blue, Any two 3 block cards

Equipment: Wayfinder’s Crest

Against a Ranger:

Get attacked with a non-aim counter red Falcon Wing > Defend with a 3 block > get attacked with a red Scar for a Scar with go again > Defend with Tarpit Trap plus Wayfinder’s Crest > Get attacked with an aim countered red Infecting Shot > Defend with a 3 block and prevent the Pox token > go to your turn > Pitch the blue to attack with Humble

Your 3 blocks prevented an effective 12 damage (3 per attack, 1 from Crest, and 2 less due to no Pox), and you presented 6 damage with a massive on hit effect, for a total 18 value play.