Xander (B06)

Xander: Unifier of the Kingdom of Nohr - (B06-051SR) / (B6-051SR)

Written by - Magic Ball

Playstyle - Aggro/Midrange/Meme

### Overview

The original Dragon Vein Deck, the King of Nohr is here to have a Stage for a Singular Duel. He can flip one of your orbs faceup to give all allies infinite range, and if either player has a faceup orb both Xander and your opponent’s MC get +30 attack. Depending on how the deck is built, you can either use cards that require your or your opponent’s MCs to be at 100+ attack for effects, or you can try and play a more defensive game where your opponent struggles to hit your 100 attack MC that, unlike Medeus, can take a few hits.

### Gameplan

Early on, you want to try and flip an orb as soon as possible, as this reduces the promotion cost of the 5(4) down to 5(3), which is very much appreciated. Cards such as BW Azura or Lilith are well suited for this, but Elise’s or Leo’s c1s are more niche options.
Once you have promoted Xander, what makes you a unique deck is the attack buff. Many colorless and black cards have effects that boost their attack or punish your opponent if someone in particular currently has a 100 attack or higher card on the field (see Key Cards for a sample list). There are effects that also benefit you for a high amount of orbs (as a base 100 you are unlikely to be hit too much unless…) and effects that can help with critical hits (Miracle, RobinM’s c4). Overclass Genny and DV CorrinM can help you heal orbs which can drag the game out for your opponent, who is likely needing to crit or use bonds to boost attack to hit your MC through the +30 attack boost. The infinite range of Xander’s Dragon Vein skill safe in the back but still able to attack, or can help Xander himself contribute while in the backline. It also prevents your opponent from just moving to the backline to avoid being attacked.

### Strengths

Stage for a Singular Duel - Boosting your attack by +30 is huge, and outside of skills or critical hits, most non-MC opponents will struggle to hit you
Power - As the opponent also gets the +30 attack, the rest of your deck is likely designed around this. Cards you control will have high attack during your turn and can usually hit non-MC even if they fail a support
Flexible Deck List - While the identity of the deck will be consistent, there are a lot of different cards you can consider, which allows you to customize the deck a lot

### Weakness

Stage for a Singular Duel - While this does help your MC, it gives the exact same buff to your opponent. While you are likely better able to take advantage of this, your opponent does also get a bonus to attack which means that cards you have that don’t have high attack struggle to hit and even those that do, its usually just on your turn.
Face Up Orbs - If you run out of orbs, the deck turns very vanilla, as all of Xander’s skills revolve around faceup orbs. Cards like DV CorrinM and OC Genny can get you another orb, but they are expensive and/or require multiple cards in hand, and you would rather spend bonds attacking your opponent usually. If you take a faceup orb, your opponent will also know what cards your adding to hand and can plan around that.
Black MC - As a black MC, you run the problem of you need black cards to promote your MC, but Black does not have a ton of great cards. Access to Black/White Cards helps, but you can end up either forced to run suboptimal cards to have black cards or to risk ending up with a hand of no black cards to bond.
Bond Cost - There are a lot of skills Xander would love to use, but cost a lot of bonds, (EX: Surtr’s destruction, Genny’s heal, etc). As a black MC, aside from KanaM c1 and CorrinF c6, he has no access in color to bond acceleration. Using BigYellow can help, but he does not contribute much beyond range to a control BigYellow deck.
Meme Tier Status - This is a gimmick and not suited for serious tournament play.

### Key Cards

#### Azura / Lilith

Both of these cards are able to flip orbs faceup and face down. Being able to be deployed on turn 2, they are able to flip an orb face up before the start of turn 3 to help get a turn 3 promo rather than a turn 4. Flipping orbs facedown is useful later on to let Xander (or other cards) flip them faceup again for effects, or just to lower your opponent’s MC’s attack by 30 if you no longer have any face up orbs. Lilith has range and can increase her own attack and Azura can draw 2 discard 1. They do need a Black/White Bond however.

#### Loki

There is a dedicated section to cards that “Stage for Singular Duel” enables, but Loki gets a special mention. With no cost, her skill 1, “Come with me… to your grave!”,, she can reduce not just your opponent’s MC, but their entire field down to 70 attack. She also can incrementally do this, so cards such as Surtr or Freyr that need the opponent at or above a certain attack are live while lowering attack as much as possible. Many cards use an ACT skill to buff themselves, and then retain the buff after Loki reduces the opponent's attack. It does not guarantee a hit, but the odds of forcing an orb break or an evade go up when you swing a 100 attack into a 70.

#### Orb Healers

Xander needs his orbs intact to not just be a 70 attack beater. DV Corrin and OC Genny, amongst others, can help give him more orbs to flip, or just simply to not die. Genny comes with the benefit of being able to heal additional cards by flipping bonds, while Corrin only requires himself to be in hand rather than Genny that needs to overclass to heal an orb. Other options such as Robin are also great.

#### Other Options

Here is a sample list of cards that are less common but are enabled by the attack boost of “Stage for a Singular Duel”. They are in no particular order, and vary in viability.

Abusers of Your High Attack

* Selena (Nohr) - B02-070R - CONT, +30 during both phases
* Hector - B07-004SR - ACT, gives a CONT buff to Hector where if he destroys an enemy you can destroy another non-MC for free
* Soren - B12-014R - ACT, allies with 80+ are unavoidable by non-MC enemies
* RobinM - B14-006SR - CONT, draw a card if opponent evades/crits

Abusers of Your Opponent’s High Attack

* Cherche - B22-069HN - ACT, increases her attack to match opponent’s MC
* Surtr - B13-097HN - ACT, flip 3 destroy any 1 enemy (including MC) with 80+
* Laevatein - B13-095R - ACT, increases her own attack by 40 to 110, no cost