Table of Contents
As we progress further into the Archazia's Island metagame and look at recent tournament results, a few things become apparent. First, Ruby Sapphire Pawpsicle is undeniably the top archetype to bring if you want to play with Sapphire item cards, as it has double the Top 8s of the next best deck.
Second, players are gravitating towards the item-heavy Sapphire Steel version over the aggro Cogsworth one, and their tournament performances are pretty telling.
Third, as other archetypes continue to drop in meta share, it seems that we're no closer to finding a 'meta-breaker' that can pull the numbers down from the top two decks.
Check out the Archazia's Island metagame snapshot for Week 5 below, along with top performing decks for each archetype.
Tier List
| Tier | Deck | Meta Share | Top 8s |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tier 1 |   Ruby Sapphire Pawpsicle | 23% 🔼 | 32 |
 Sapphire Steel Items | 18% 🔽 | 17 | |
 Amethyst Steel Bounce | 10% 🔽 | 6 | |
| Sapphire Steel Aggro | 10% 🔽 | 3 | |
| Tier 2 |  Amber Steel Steelsong | 7% | 3 |
 Amethyst Emerald Discard | 5% 🔽 | 6 | |
| Amber Steel Aggro | 5% 🔼 | 4 | |
| Emerald Steel Discard | 5% 🔽 | 3 | |
| Tier 3 | Amber Emerald Trampbog | 4% 🔼 | 4 |
| Amethyst Ruby Bounce Control | 3% | 4 | |
| Amethyst Sapphire Bounce | 3% 🔽 | 3 | |
| Ruby Steel Mushu | 3% 🔼 | - | |
| Amber Emerald Songs | 1% | 1 | |
| Amethyst Steel Jafar Wheel | 1% | 1 |
Meta Overview
With this week's performance, Ruby Sapphire is now clearly the best way to abuse play 007-162-tamatoa-happy-as-a-clam and friends (and items). Ruby characters and actions seem to be the stronger pairing, allowing for more effective board control and inevitable late game win con.
Perhaps the biggest development this week is the overall decline of Sapphire Steel Aggro. Its meta share has dropped drastically and its top 8 performance has dipped even further.
The only archetypes that have been seeing more play time compared to the previous week are Amber Steel Aggro, Amber Emerald Trampbog, and Ruby Steel Mushu, which unfortunately didn't do well enough to land a Top 8 finish.
For non-meta enthusiasts, make sure to check out the last two decklists that made Top 8, proving there's still hope for competitive strats beyond the popular ones.
Tier 1
Ruby Sapphire Pawpsicle
The biggest additions to this fan-favorite archetype from Set 7 are 007-162-tamatoa-happy-as-a-clam and 007-179-sapphire-coil, a great tool to gain even better board control. They're enough to keep this meta favorite among the most heavily played (and successful) decks.
This 61-card deck went 8-0-2 to claim the win in a 128-player event hosted by Red Saber Games. 005-149-kuzco-selfish-emperor is an interesting counter against fellow item-using matchups. Otherwise it can deal with locations cleanly and at worst make your characters a bit more difficult to take out.
Sapphire Steel Items
Most of the item heavy Sapphire Steel decks play double the number of items of the more aggro versions and can cheat 003-165-lucky-dime with 007-162-tamatoa-happy-as-a-clam.
With so many items, 007-159-belle-apprentice-inventor and 007-154-scrooge-mcduck-resourceful-miser are near guaranteed to be free. Some versions choose to run 006-142-oswald-the-lucky-rabbit and 002-168-maurices-workshop to go even harder on the item synergies.
The winner of the biggest tournament last weekend, the Spring League 2025 at Lore League, beat 434 other players for the trophy. Among their notable inclusions are 002-202-last-cannon to make stronger challengers and 004-139-ariel-treasure-collector for big late game lore gain.
Amethyst Steel Bounce
Amethyst Steel Aggro is largely unchanged from Set 6 versions except for the notable appearance of 007-057-giant-cobra-ghostly-serpent. Bouncing 006-040-the-white-rose-jewel-of-the-garden, 002-051-merlin-goat, and 005-195-pete-games-referee are quite fun things to do.
The deck wants to go much faster, with some running no characters costing more than 4 ink. With lots of card draw and bounce value it doesn't easily run out of gas. All the extra non-quest lore gain in the deck adds up, allowing it to speed past the Sapphire behemoths.
Sapphire Steel Aggro
Sapphire Steel is so prevalent in this new meta that we can separate their two main strategies and still have both land in Tier 1 (though maybe not for long, if this version's numbers continue to drop). While both of these take advantage of items, the aggro version only has around 8 total and most revolve around 002-142-cogsworth-grandfather-clock protecting his friends.
The combination of early pressure of Steel's 2-drops, Bodyguard from 004-200-fortisphere, disruption via 005-195-pete-games-referee, and card draw from Sapphire cards is a challenge for most decks.
This was the best performing deck in last weekend's events with a minimum of 32 players:
Tier 2
Amber Steel Steelsong
Now a staple in the archetype, 007-011-the-troubadour-musical-narrator is another strong singer that can sing 003-195-and-then-along-came-zeus early while also enabling a cheaper 007-195-miss-bianca-unwavering-agent.
With free songs it's easy to run out of cards fast, which makes the symmetrical effect of 001-195-a-whole-new-world way more favorable for you, especially when you have singers ready and waiting.
Some versions also run new Set 7 cards 007-184-bolt-headstrong-dog and 007-004-bolt-superdog for a stronger offense. Same with 007-014-aurora-waking-beauty, who can quest and sing on the same turn with some healing from Rapunzel.
Amethyst Emerald Discard
A couple of new evasive birds fit well into Amethyst Emerald's play style. 007-066-diablo-spiteful-raven and 007-049-iago-giant-spectral-parrot have been joining the other evasive all-stars in the deck, 006-053-genie-wish-fulfilled and 005-048-elsa-the-fifth-spirit.
004-069-cri-kee-lucky-cricket can either assist your challengers or help in a questing race. Simply focusing on discard effects for the disruption instead of as a payoff seems to be working well for the archetype. 007-074-the-queen-jealous-beauty can deal with recurring threats (i.e. items) from the discard pile.
Amber Steel Aggro
Like its Steelsong sibling, the more aggressive versions want to take advantage of free songs while it starts questing early with strong 1- and 2-drops. Cutting down on songs and adding locations, particularly 005-204-seven-dwarfs-mine-secure-fortress and sometimes 005-033-rapunzels-tower-secluded-prison, provides flexible offense and defense options.
007-021-penny-bolts-person and 001-018-rapunzel-gifted-with-healing makes its characters more sticky. 004-069-cri-kee-lucky-cricket comes in to slow down item decks while 005-195-pete-games-referee can disrupt just enough for a winning push.
Emerald Steel Discard
007-114-pete-space-pirate slots nicely into this discard archetype as another way of stifling the opponent's game plan. It can shift from 003-081-morph-space-goo, which also enables cheaper 002-173-beast-tragic-hero and 001-193-tinker-bell-giant-fairy.
With 003-091-ursula-deceiver-of-all doubling songs and 002-089-prince-john-greediest-of-all giving you +1 card while they go -1, the Emerald Steel deck's engine is tough to play against once it gets going.
Tier 3
Amber Emerald Trampbog
Amethyst Ruby Bounce Control
Amethyst Sapphire Bounce
Ruby Steel Mushu
Amber Emerald Songs
Amethyst Steel Jafar Wheel
Final Thoughts
Unless there are spicy new innovations in the coming weeks, the meta looks to be set already for Archazia's Island. There are disappointingly few dual-ink cards being played by the most competitive archetypes, which maybe a design miss considering their stricter color restrictions.
What are you bringing to your next LGS event? Stay tuned for more Set 7 decks next time.
