Defiance: Smugglers & Contraband!

Markets are quite popular these days, and everyone is on the lookout for deals. Sometimes, those deals require going outside the law…

A 2/3 Double Damage is stronger than most Merchants, and this offers you cards from multiple factions. Of course, the selection of a Black Market is quite a bit different than what you’ll find in your normal Market.

Black Market

A Black Market is a Market that can’t contain any of the same cards as your starting deck.

You only get one 5-card Market to work with. It counts as a Black Market if you have a Smuggler in your deck, and none of your Market cards also appear in your deck. Merchants can still buy and sell from the Black Market as normal.

The price you pay for going to the Black Market is that all it has are goods from outside of the law (and your starting deck). The upside is that the Smugglers who operate Black Markets give you a much wider selection of options – they are all two-faction cards, and let you fill your Black Market with cards of either faction.

They are also formidable cards in their own right, as Red Canyon Smuggler showed. Let’s meet the others.

A 3/3 Lifesteal buys you a lot of time, and works very nicely with all the removal that Argenport offers. It both stops aggro in its tracks and puts a real clock on control, making it a threat even before factoring in what you purchase from the Black Market.

Building a Black Market with Ambush in mind is really fun – not only can you include great fast spells and other ambush units, but cards with Charge and pump effects are enticing too. End of turn Smuggler into Cykalis, the Burning Sand is a lot of damage out of nowhere, and can threaten opposing Sites quite effectively.

Besides Ambush, Lifesteal and Double Damage, there are also some Smugglers that offer more involved deckbuilding possibilities.

Great Valley Smuggler rewards you for acquiring Relics, and becomes quite the threat once you do.

Once you smuggle the right cards in, this is a 3-cost 4/4 with upside, which is no joke. It defends you nicely when you have relics that lead to a long game, and can pressure the opponent if you’re playing a more aggressive relic build (think Lucky Prospector and the like).

Last but not least, we have a Smuggler that often spells doom for your opponents.

Howling Peak Smuggler buffs your damage spells, which is convenient given that she can also sell you some. Putting a selection of damaging Primal or Fire spells in your Black Market can really make your opponents howl, and there are enough different options that it’s not hard to find some that don’t overlap with those in your starting deck.

So, those are the Smugglers, but that’s not all for today. What kind of Smugglers aren’t accompanied by Contraband?

Take a look at the delicious Kerendon Cargo.

As innocuous as a bunch of apples may be, we did mention Contraband. There may be money in the apple stand, but the payoff for smuggling poison past the authorities is vastly greater. Given enough time (and influence), Kerendon Cargo transforms into Kerendon Contraband, which offers a wide selection of illicit goods.

Initially, your Cargo grab you a power, making them essentially Seek Power if you are playing the factions they represent. Later in the game, once you’ve established a power base, these get all sorts of fun and interesting options, though you can never tell what you’re going to get. Even though there is randomness inherent in what the Contraband contain, getting to play a card that functions as power early and a choice of three random cards later does increase consistency. You even get to sequence your influence unlocks to keep these as Cargo for longer, if that’s what you want.

Besides apples, there are a bunch of ways smugglers hide their goods:

We will let you be the judge of who concealed their goods best, and for you to decide what your Smugglers will be selling. The possibility space just got larger, and how you use it is up to you.