Dreamlit Paths: 15 Decks to Play In the First Week of the New Expansion

Today, I bring you all a gift - 15 freshly cooked lists with the new champions, and a few updated archetypes for you to test in the first week of the expansion.

I chose these lists on release day, when I played more than a few ranked matches and also took part in a tournament between me and my friends called "The Last Survivors of the Competitive Scene".

I picked a few decks I believe are the best versions of what everyone is playing, and at the end I added the lineup that won the tournament me and my friends organized!

Lux: Illuminated & Lillia

Currently, this is the most accepted version of this archetype, at least between community players. This list, in practice, is extremely powerful and consistent; its new game style resembles the old "spider swarm" archetype, but it is much more modern, and uses Demacia and Ionia.

I'll highlight Steel Gale, which became one of the best control tools in the entire game already on day 1. The reason behind this is that it disables practically any archetype people are playing nowadays.

This list is relatively straightforward to understand, even though Lillia is a bit complex. The main card you'll Sleep is Petal Pixie: she helps you maintain a fast game pace because she summons Spritelings any time you summon her.

Lux: Illuminated & Vex

Lux: Illuminated is the most versatile out of all the new champions, and plays really well with them too. Vex Lux: Illuminated is the evil, slower, combo-focused version of this archetype, compared to the Lillia version. Both decks play almost the same Demacia cards, even.

This version focuses a bit more on interacting directly with the enemy board, which is great in this meta because everyone is testing decks that play lots of units on the board.

You'll control the board by granting Gloom to enemy units, and, at the same time, stack attack power on your Shadow, which is your main finisher.

Tree Sprites is an incredibly strong unit, particularly in this deck, because it will Boost all your Spirit units (and give them huge stats), and also debuff the enemy units with Gloom. This play significantly impacts the board and is usually what will win you games early on.

Lux: Illuminated & Taric

Lux Taric is the broken version of the Support archetype. We all feared the day this list would dominate the game, at least since Taric was released back in 2020.

Now, he is in Standard with Golden Aegis: the two cards in one of the most toxic combos in all of LoR. With only them and another unit (nothing else), you can attack up to 3 times on a single turn.

Lux: Illuminated isn't one of the main cards in this deck, however; she works more as a premium support tool because she is great in the early game and will help you dominate the board early on. The greatest finisher and star of this deck is Taric, who, as we've mentioned, with Golden Aegis, will Rally several times on a single turn and give you a win.

Lillia & Taliyah

Get ready, because this is one of the most annoying lists to play against right now.

This deck is a control version of the Lillia archetype, a version I already mentioned a couple of times in other articles. Lillia enables insane combos with Taliyah - you can double the Sleep landmarks on your board, which Lillia creates, with Taliyah's Play effect, besides the other landmarks this list plays.

As Stories are landmarks, cards like The Rootbound Path and The Heart of the Tree become automatically broken in this deck. Rite of Passage, which brings back a landmark that was destroyed, is equally broken - it lets you keep playing your combo every single turn.

This archetype is very consistent because, besides the many control cards you play, you also have several win conditions, such as Taliyah herself and Sprite Mother.

Vex & Mordekaiser

This list is an updated version of Mordekaiser's archetype, as it brings Mordekaiser's support cards and combines them with Vex's cards, which, like it or not, really match this game style.

With Vex, this archetype can be a bit more incisive when it's time to put pressure on the enemy Nexus. Units like Vex herself and Shadow, for instance, have Fearsome, which will give you more aggression naturally.

This list's main combo is to revive Shadow over and over to draw multiple Vexes and keep playing Glare on enemy units.

Azir & Hecarim

This list was created by "AerosMacCousland", an Ephemerals enthusiast who has a couple of Top 4s under his belt.

The Ephemerals archetype got a few incredibly powerful cards, and they're dominating the Standard ranked queue in these first few days of the new expansion.

The Emperor's Army, alongside Sunborn Summoning, make this deck stupidly consistent, considering you can keep applying pressure much more easily with them in your list.

Both champions in this list flirted with each other in the past, but there was always something missing to make them work together. Even though Shurima lost a lot in this rotation, the new cards in this expansion really compensated for that, and single-handedly brought back one of the most powerful archetypes in the entire game.

Big Discard - Sion

This list was created by "LTS SEJUmilde", an Overwhelm/Sejuani enthusiast who was pretty active in the grassroot tournament scene.

Noxus was gifted one of the most insane cards in this expansion: Yeti Handler. This unit, with Vi, who returned from the rotation, revived the Big Discard Sion archetype in Standard.

This is one of the strongest decks right now because it is one of the few archetypes that can ignore the enemy board and deal damage to the Nexus directly. This Burn game style is slowly returning to the meta, which means this deck will certainly be one of the strongest decks in the ranked queue in the following weeks.

Yasuo & Malphite

Yasuo is finally a playable card in LoR, and is even a bit too viable right now.

Actually, this archetype is currently so consistent and strong that Yasuo even revived Malphite - one of the most forgotten champions of all time.

This is all because of Steel Gale, which, as we've mentioned, is one of the best cards in the game right now, and has been destroying every single deck in Standard.

Stunning units is incredibly powerful right now, and, as the game is relatively slower, Yasuo's archetype has enough time to draw all the landmarks and combo pieces he needs to be strong.

Neeko & Gnar

Neeko got an excellent card for her archetype: The Poro Parade.

One of the issues this archetype had was that it would run out of cards fast if your opponent removed your units as the game went on. Now, with The Poro Parade, these days are over: you'll keep creating value again and again, and rarely run out of units to play on the board.

Not to mention, you can create a wide variety of units with this card, and sometimes cards with the Sea Monster, Yeti, or Dragon subtype will make all the difference in your match.

Noxus Control - Swain Norra

This deck takes advantage of the fact people are playing many landmarks to bring a few copies of Scorched Earth so you can destroy your opponents' Stories.

This is the perfect type of list for those who like to have fun when their opponent doesn't have any.

There are no new cards in this list, but it has a few old cards that rotated back to Standard. The most noteworthy of them is Blade's Edge, which is currently one of the few pings in all of Standard alongside Pie Toss.

This is one of the best archetypes to play right now to beat the meta decks. Even though it is a bit slow, and difficult to pilot, your opponent won't be able to put any of their game plans into practice because you're armed to the teeth with removals that can deal with literally anything.

Jax & Ornn

Jax Ornn was impacted by rotation, but it doesn't even seem like it because it only lost a few cards. The most relevant card it lost was Buried in Ice, which was a great late game tool, particularly in mirror matches.

However, as many Jax Ornn lists don't even play that card, this archetype remained practically the same.

This is a list I built myself with Bellows Breath - one of the best cards right now to deal with enemy boards full of small units.

This list is basically the epitome of Midrange in Legends of Runeterra. As long as it exists in Standard, it will be meta; no matter what happens.

Elder Dragon & Norra

This archetype did lose many cards, but, because Elder Dragon's origin is incredibly powerful, there's always some way to play it. Even when he loses some cards to rotation, new ones always return too.

In this case, though Wiggly Burblefish was, indeed, a great loss, Ancient Yeti, on the other hand, will be a great addition to this list.

This Yeti was already popular in the Elder Dragon Shurima archetype in Eternal. Actually, it was one of the strongest decks in this format before this rotation came along, in the Eternal ranked season.

Another card that stands out in this list is Glare, which works great, considering this archetype works better if you draw several cards throughout the game. Norra's portals, which are one of the main mechanics in this deck, really appreciate when you draw lots of cards.

This lineup won the tournament me, my friends, and the last competitive players left in the community organized to celebrate the new expansion. We played each other on the first day of Dreamlit Paths.

Jack & Sett

"AerosMacCousland" won this tournament with Jack Sett in his lineup. The new landmark, The Pit Champion, really matches this deck and might finally make it viable.

We were all really surprised to see this list finally working properly, and how it seemed incredibly strong against the current meta.

As most of the units you play, including your champions, have more stats than most units in Lux: Illuminated and Vex lists, you'll always have a huge advantage against these decks.

Not to mention, the value you create with your Coins is incredibly powerful - it lets you play more than 15 mana on a single turn as early as turn 6 most times.

Pink Hecarim

"Aeros" is one of our most iconic Ephemeral enthusiasts. He brought another version of Hecarim's archetype, this time without Azir.

As Zed is no longer in this deck, its early game is a bit weaker than usual. However, cards like Oblivious Islander and The Iron Conquest really make up for it. They also really improve this archetype, and give it a more combo-focused style.

You can't block with this list (ever), but, on the other hand, your attacks are unstoppable. There is no deck that can, with ease, deal with this game style in Standard for now - so now is the perfect time to play Ephemerals on the ranked queue.

Annie Jhin

The Jhin Annie archetype was one of the few "old-school" aggro decks that remained in Standard. It was even mentioned by the devs that worked on this rotation because it was considered too strong to remain in Standard at one point. This is true: this deck is too strong in this format because it is a direct counter to all the new champions and their strategies, besides other older strategies.

The Arena's Greatest really helps this deck maintain an aggressive pace early game, as it gives you more attack power and also the very strong effect of giving "can't block" to an enemy unit.

Some cards, like Augmented Experimenter and Enraged Firespitter are still incredibly powerful in this list, so if you like them a bit more, you can play them with no further issue. "Aeros" preferred to play a list that focuses more on small units, so he could always attack with a board full of followers.

If you read this far, thank you! I hope you enjoyed reading this article.

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See you next time!