“Wanna bet on that?”
Art: Betsy, Skin in the Game
by Simon Dominic
Table of Contents
Today’s Featured Hero Is:
Heavy Hitters is an awesome set, and the first set I was able to go to a prerelease at my LGS; going in blind and knowing nothing, I was very excited. From the beginning, I heard players talk about Betsy and how good they were for both CC and for the upcoming prerelease. In my first round, I was absolutely crushed by Betsy and was immediately intrigued about how awesome a CC deck with Betsy could be after receiving an absolute beatdown in the sealed event. Ever since the prerelease, I have been jamming games with Betsy like a madman; I did focus on Betsy’s ability, and wagering is a huge part of the deck; we want to wage as often as possible. I found this deck to have a few good matchups but was able to stack up quite well against many of the most common heroes and strategies in the format; since we are a midrange deck, it feels like we are active and in the game throughout the duration. I have been having a blast with this one and am very excited to share this with you all! Without further adieu, let’s get it!
Gameplan:
Betsy, Skin in the Game is an awesome Hero from the brand new heavy hitters set, I can tell you from my experience in prerelease Betsy is very strong overpower can put a ton of pressure on midrange and control decks, and the way the deck is built allows us to be decent against aggressive matchups. Our general game plan is to be attacking with usually one decently expensive high attack card and hold back; since we have Betsy and we wager often, we are able to spend a few turns a game just holding back and not attacking. Betsy can also be quite aggressive, sporting some huge attack cards, and if we wager, which we do quite often, we are able to give +1 and overpower, which against an aggressive strategy or any deck that does not prefer to block it can be a huge piece of chunk damage.
Betsy, Skin in the Game Wage Classic Constructed:
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| Hero / Weapon / Equipment |
|---|
| Hero: Betsy, Skin in the Game Equipment: Anothos  Civic Steps  Crater Fist  Good Time Chapeau  Tectonic Plating  |
| Inventory |
|---|
| Pitch 1: 3x Command Respect (Red)  3x Fate Foreseen (Red)  3x Sink Below (Red)  3x Test of Strength (Red)  Pitch 2: 1x Starting Stake (Yel)  Equipment / Weapons: 1x Arcane Lantern  1x Nullrune Boots  |
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Deck Stats:
Attack Cards:
I want to highlight some of my favorite attacks in the deck. Naturally the trio of wage cards are very strong in our deck and why we are 3x of Wage Gold (Red)
Wage Might (Red)
Wage Vigor (Red)
which are all very sweet high-attack cards that can give us a large advantage over our opponents if we win the wagers. Many people within the community aren’t huge fans of these cards, but I found them to be strong against a large majority of decks; now, if we lose the wager, they do feel much worse. For me, most importantly, they are a strong way to trigger Betsy, which is a key aspect of the deck.
We can’t discuss attacks without mentioning Betsy’s signature attack in Bet Big (Red)
which can put us at a huge advantage if we hit and against many decks we can usually win this wager. We have some actions that help with our attacks and make sure we win our wagers like Money Where Ya Mouth Is (Yel)
which is not often a card we wager on but on the follow-up attack we always wager and deal huge damage, get Betsy’s ability and some more sweet tokens.
Non-Attack Cards:
Double Down (Red)
is, in my opinion, one of the best non-attack cards in the deck, not only is it basically a free Betsy ability if we wager we get and win we get an additional token and it has go again, this card just feels like an absolute haymaker in this deck. Since we are a Hammer user it only makes sense to run Pummel (Red)
which can be a great way to be aggressive or defensive depending on the situation. The discard on the second ability can be very relevant, especially against more aggressive heroes. Starting Stake (Yel) is another great card for the deck and gives us an additional card draw outlet, and since we are Betsy, we love having extra tokens hanging around. Tear Asunder (Blu)
is another great action that can be very strong against a ton of opponents mostly control and aggressive strategies since taking cards out of their hands puts them at an extreme disadvantage.
Equipment and Weapons:
Head: Good Time Chapeau
Oh man, this equipment is strong! The action ability is extremely strong, and with a decent amount of ways to produce gold in the deck, this action can happen quite often, which also triggers Betsy; this card is a damaged machine and can put a ton of pressure on our opponents.
Arms: Crater Fist
We have a fair amount of attacks with crushes in the deck, which not only have on-hit abilities, but Crater Fists gives us +2 and go again, which can allow for a turn where we deal some seriously huge damage; this card is hit or miss. I see a lot of lists run it, and some don’t. I personally have found it to be quite strong, it’s not something we use every game but it can be strong if it is needed.
Weapon: Anothos
While Anothos is not Betsy’s signature weapon, it really feels like it! Anothos almost always attacks for six, which can put great pressure on our opponents, especially when combined with all of our might tokens that we typically have hanging around. I know there are many options, but this is my favorite option for Betsy’s weapon.
Chest: Tectonic Plating
Tectonic Plating, like many equipment, is something we block with only as a last resort; we typically use its ability as often as we can to get a seismic surge token, which makes our guardian attacks cheaper, which is perfect for us.
Legs: Civic Steps
Civic Steps is an interesting one since we often do want to block with it, but with it, we need to be very mindful when we give an opponent a quicken token against the right deck or on a strong turn. This could very easily lose us the game; in matchups like this, I find it often better to take the extra damage.
Strengths of the Deck:
- If you wager multiple times and have the resources to pay, you can activate Betsy’s ability multiple times, this has actually won me a couple of games and is very strong in conjunction with Good Time Chapeau
- Our tokens are easy to create, now this is dependent on wager luck and being able to get all of the tokens but they give us an inherit advantage and help us get ahead and edge out the game.
Weaknesses of the Deck:
- With the popularity of Kayo and Betsy having a tough matchup against brutes, we struggle heavily against arguably one of the best heroes currently in the format.
- We are very weak if our wagers lose, we become very far behind if we lose only a couple of wagers
Deck Matchups:
Please note: I am still fairly new to the game and haven’t played every hero with this deck. These are just from the games I played and some notes and takeaways I have.
Best Matchups:
In my experience, the Kassai matchup is quite favorable for us; while there were a few games where I got high-rolled and ran over, most matches are advantageous for us. The overpower is very good against Kassai and we can often out-damage them or out-race them. Kassai is extremely cheap in terms of resources so with cards like Cartilage Crush
we can slow them down especially because many Kassai decks are light on resources due to the low costs. I found this matchup to be quite favorable for us.
Arakni is a favorable matchup for us. They are often a little bit slower in us, and we can hit them very hard in the early game, and as they start to heat up during the mid-game transition, we can continue to pressure and do a ton of damage. Their hero ability typically doesn’t matter to us, the only caveat to that is Primed to Fight
which is only bad because it is a one of in the deck. I like this matchup and found it to not be bad at all for us.
Worst Matchups:
General Weaknesses: Brute decks, pretty much any deck with a large amount of attack reactions since we end up wasting a lot of cards and making our turn considerably weaker.
Kayo is one of the worst matchups we have; this matchup is certainly not unwinnable if we have a strong hand and go first, we are able to put a decent amount of pressure on our opponent. Since Kayo focuses heavily on beat chest cards, they can easily attack for ten plus on nearly every turn, forcing us into a terrible situation of wasting our whole hand to block or try to get some chunk damage on our turn. Brute has a ton of abilities to use, like beat chest and indimitate, which almost always make us take a ton of damage. We are not as aggressive as Kayo so it is nearly impossible to race them in terms of damage. Overall, Kayo is a tough matchup for us. For what it’s worth, many decks have struggling with Kayo since the release of heavy hitters, man he is strong!
Another tough brute matchup for us, Brutes, are not easy for Betsy to deal with. Now in my games I found there to be a caveat we are less weak to the more aggressive brute style deck and much weaker to the Blood Debt version of the deck since we have trouble dealing with the high barrage of consistent damage without running into the blocking every turn and never being able to be aggressive or attack. I have sneaked out a couple of games, but the blood debt version of the deck can be much faster than we are and have a crazy high damage output; Overpower and wagering certainly help, but it is often not enough. Levia is also in a position to make us lose our wagers since they have a ton of three-block cards, and losing wagers in this deck is very bad for us.
Inventory Guide:
I don’t have a comprehensive inventory guide for every hero since I have not played against all available heroes. Here is the Inventory Guide from all of the games I jammed and my takeaways and notes. Heavy hitters just came out, so this inventory guide is certainly subject to change.
General Inventory Guide:
1x Arcane Lantern
1x Nullrune Boots
These both are great to go in against any deck that may deal arcane damage.
+1 Starting Stake (Yel) I like the extra gold token production against Kassai, allows us to cast more and get some extra damage in.
Kayo and Levia have the same inventory guide because expensive cards like Macho Grande tend to just be hard to cast and don’t do much for the deck, being able to block their more aggressive attacks can be the difference between life and death.
Conclusion:
I don’t think Betsy is strong enough to light the world on fire in CC and change the format, but I do think she is an absolute blast to play and something I would love to bring to an LGS or just play with. Awesome and fun design coupled with cool abilities and art. That’s a win if you ask me. I have been having a blast with this deck and with heavy hitters in general. Thanks for reading to the end and for all of your support!