Top 5 Most Forgotten Shadow Isles Cards (which you've probably never seen!)

Carrying on with the series of articles covering "forgotten cards you've probably never seen", today we'll discuss Shadow Isles, one of my favorite regions. This region is home to the best control and "swarm" decks we've ever had in the game - the two strategies I like the most about LoR.

If you have never seen one of these articles: I always pick 5 cards from a region which are not necessarily weak, or bad, but have been forgotten by players and don't really make much of a difference in the game. If they ceased to exist, no one would notice they were gone.

If you want to check out the other articles I wrote about this theme (about the other regions), click here.

Please keep in mind this article was centered around the competitive scene, and ranked queues (I don't play Path of Champions, unfortunately). It is also based on my 4-year experience playing and casting LoR professionally.

I invite you all to post in our comment section your own list of the top 5 most forgotten Shadow Isles cards. Let's go!

To start our list, we have a card that was released quite recently, and that, for certain, as the years go on, will probably climb up the ranks and become an even more forgotten card: Deathgrasp Cultist.

Something about this card that bothers me a lot is that it has "Cultist" in its name, but it doesn't have the Cultist type.

This unit was revealed in the last set, Fate's Voyage, as one of the Titanic cards that came with Freljord's redesign and Volibear. Shadow Isles is also considered a region that can support Titanic units because of Mordekaiser, Threshold of the Grey, and Deathgrasp Cultist.

The main reason why this card is quite forgotten is simple: even though Shadow Isles is ok when the matter is building a Titanic deck, the cards that are usually in lists with this region are removals, like Vengeance and Grasp of the Undying, instead of mid-game units, like Deathgrasp Cultist.

Deathgrasp Cultist's main idea is to Curse an enemy with Terror when you summon a Titanic unit. As most end-game units from Shadow Isles have Fearsome, removing attack power from enemy units makes sense. But, in practice, summoning Deathgrasp Cultist is a relatively slow process and a bit redundant, as your end-game units will finish the game whether your enemies are Cursed or not.

Cultist grants aggression to a combo/control archetype, which deviates a bit from what the main lists in this type of archetype want to do, which many times is just ramp mana and play units. This means you don't really want to play Cultist because you'd rather ramp mana.

For these reasons, it is one of the most forgotten Shadow Isles cards.

Soulspinner was released in the Empires of the Ascended set, a time when Spider archetypes were still quite popular among new players.

In Empires of the Ascended, Riot released Kindred and Viego, which means, most cards from this set had synergy with them. Soulspinner unfortunately doesn't have a direct synergy with neither of these two champions - actually, it has a secondary effect that can work with these Viego or Kindred lists, but it doesn't make a lot of difference in these decks.

Despite all of this, at this time, a new type of aggressive deck was beginning to pop up with Pyke and Rek'Sai, and also Azir and Irelia. We were going through a transition, and the way we played aggressive lists changed.

Gradually, Shadow Isles became increasingly tied to control decks, and no longer had that much space for Spider lists with Elise - they'd only see play in lower ranks, and, as we discussed, among new players. This helped us forget all about Soulspinner.

Obviously, after this set, there were other moments in which Shadow Isles could play aggressive lists again, but, even then, Soulspinner was never popular in these decks.

The reason behind this is that its effect is a bit weird and doesn't really interact all that well with the game rhythm of aggressive Spider lists. To activate this card's effect, you need an ally to die on that turn so it can gain +1/+1 and Fearsome, all that for 3 mana. Soulspinner, if you activate its effect, is a 4/3 unit, which isn't that strong if you compare it to other units we already had in the game at the time and still have. As new cards are released, Soulspinner becomes more and more obsolete in terms of stats and effects because new cards have been clearly superior.

All of this, added to the fact Riot stopped releasing support cards for Spiders, helped us forget this card completely, and it is now lost in the Eternal card pool. It will also probably not see any play any time soon.

Just like Soulspinner, Lamb's Respite was revealed in the Empires of the Ascended set with Kindred as a direct support spell for their archetype.

The main idea behind this card is to protect a specific unit and prevent it from dying so we can play some combo with it, or just attack with that unit without worrying about it dying.

Many players at the time believed this card would be interesting because we had units like Spirit Leech and Astral Fox, which could activate their effects with Lamb's Respite active without forcing you to slay an allied unit.

We all know that, in practice, this has never happened - and the main reason for this is that Lamb's Respite is a slow spell. This means your weakest unit could be killed before it even got the "I can't take damage or die" effect if your opponent has any answers to this spell.

Not to mention that giving your weakest unit "I can't take damage or die" is a very mediocre effect that only makes sense if your weakest ally has an extremely impactful effect.

One idea players had was combining this card's effect with Powder Kegs, which seemed to be a somewhat promising strategy. However, unfortunately, this deck has never really worked out because you needed to have an incredibly complex setup to play this combo, make your Keg immortal for a turn, and on that same turn kill your opponent by dealing damage to their Nexus directly.

This way, players gradually gave up on giving any purpose to this card throughout the years. The last nail in the coffin was when the combo with Mischievous Marai and Divine Judgment came along, as it has practically the same effect as Lamb's Respite, but at burst speed. This Marai deck (or Bibi, for some) wasn't meta, but it was quite popular for a time in the ranked queue as it was quite fun - and it also completely retired Lamb's Respite.

Not even during the Eternal competitive season, which is when players create and test out new cards, this card showed up as part of some combo. And, to this day, it is one of the most forgotten Shadow Isles cards.

In second place, we have a card that came directly from 2020's Foundations set: Possession.

This spell is from a dark time for Shadow Isles because, in Beta, it was an incredibly popular region. It had one of the best aggressive decks (Elise with Spiders), and also one of the best control decks (Karma Hecarim control). These two lists have never touched Possession.

Actually, no deck has ever used Possession in the history of LoR. This card only ever saw play when it was randomly created by your Karma.

Stealing units seems like a strong effect in Runeterra, and it really is. Even more in Shadow Isles, which can use stolen units as fuel to draw cards and for other effects that force you to sacrifice an ally. This makes a lot of sense, considering Possession only steals an enemy during one turn, and, if you kill the enemy you stole, it can't come back.

The problem is that, historically, Shadow Isles has never needed to steal enemies because it could use better strategies, such as killing its own Last Breath allies and activating their effects. Or attacking with Fearsome units, or just removing everything your opponent played while you set up a combo with Atrocity on your board. This means stealing units has never been all that interesting, even if it is a strong effect.

Not to mention that, during this time (from 2020 to 2021), usually when someone played a gigantic card on the board, they'd play Atrocity on the same turn against your Nexus, which prevented you from stealing this unit with Possession beforehand, for instance.

However, the main reason why this card is so forgotten is that you can't steal champions with it. If you could, this card would be meta because, as we mentioned, stealing cards from the board is relatively strong.

You also can't play this spell if your board is full, considering this will prevent you from obliterating the enemy unit. So, because Possession is an incredibly inefficient and slow card, besides not really matching Shadow Isles strategies, it was completely forgotten by players ever since it was released in 2020.

As usual, the first spot in these lists is chosen through this method: I look at my collection and choose the card that I (after playing 4 years professionally and also casting LoR tournaments) can't even remember what it does, and I usually ask myself if I have ever seen it in my life.

Mistkeepers is a sad card, as it was released during one of the coolest events in the game - Sentinels of Light. That's when Senna and Veigar were released as well, and also Bandle City as a whole.

At this time, Riot was pushing Darkness decks with Shadow Isles, and these lists, primarily, want to remove enemy units with Darkness and then deal a lot of damage to the enemy Nexus with a level 2 Veigar.

Mistkeepers really enjoy this game style because they give you a Mistwraith for free the first time you slay a unit with a spell each turn. As we all know, this effect has never been strong, and, in practice, has never worked out in any deck.

This is because Darkness lists would play their units on curve and could never perform all that well if we played slow cards every turn. Playing Mistkeepers on turn 5 is extremely weak because their stats are awful, and the unit they create is also fragile, as it needs time to become stronger.

Another reason why this card is not that great is that you can't summon more than one Mistwraith with Mistkeepers' effect on a single turn, and you can only summon them if you slay a unit with a spell. This means it is an incredibly conditional effect that, despite being relatively easy to activate, limits your range a lot and doesn't let you snowball properly. It is an incredibly fair effect that, because it is incredibly fair, becomes quite inefficient for players.

This card also costs the same as Senna, who was many times played on turn 5 to maintain the game rhythm of Darkness decks.

Furthermore, Mistkeepers had never found space in aggressive Mistwraith lists with Fearsome units because you don't play removal spells in these decks. Even if you did play them, you'd probably still have no reasons to use Mistkeepers because they don't have keywords or stats that are strong enough to play in aggressive decks.

All these reasons were enough for us to never need or want to play Mistkeepers anywhere - so much so that I completely forgot about them, and, thus, they deserve the title of most forgotten Shadow Isles card.

If you read this far, thank you! I hope you had fun.

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