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Major Power Shopping

Archetype at a Glance

FieldValue
One-line identityAggressively draft Major Powers; forget weak Uniques; spike big plays
Win pathStack 3–5 Majors by T7; each Major is a board-altering event; chain them for closing kills
Primary spiritsVital Strength of the Earth, Keeper of the Forbidden Wilds, Stone’s Unyielding Defiance, Covets Gleaming Shards of Earth
Secondary spiritsStarlight Seeks Its Form (flexible), Serpent Slumbering Beneath the Island, Wounded Waters Bleeding
Best vs.Habsburg Mining, Russia L5–6, any long-game adversary
Worst vs.Brandenburg-Prussia Stage III fast, Blitz scenario, Sweden (fear penalties reduce kill-fear efficiency)

Identity

Major Power Shopping is the “big deck” archetype. Where most spirits gain 3–4 power cards over a game, Major Power Shoppers gain 5–7, heavily weighted toward Majors, and shop aggressively — forget a Unique for a Major on T2, forget that Major’s replacement for another Major on T5, and so on.

The trade-off is obvious: you’re spending draft tempo for late-game card quality. Most spirits can’t afford this because their Uniques are load-bearing. Major Power Shoppers specifically have one or two Uniques worth keeping and the rest are forget-fodder, which makes the archetype cost-effective.

The close is dramatic. T7, you play a 4-cost and a 3-cost Major in the same turn; two lands clear; fear spikes to Terror 2 or 3; the game is effectively over. Before T7, you mostly exist.

Core Mechanics

Aggressive Forget

Majors demand a Forget when gained. Spirits with replaceable Uniques (Earth’s Draw of Fresh Waters is often flagged as a Forget candidate) or matchup-weak Uniques (Wildfire’s Flash-Fires vs. damage-resist adversaries) can Forget cheaply.

Element-curve fit

Each Major has 1–3 element thresholds. Shopping aggressively means you need to match the Majors to your spirit’s element generation. Earth + Plant threshold Majors; Stone + Earth/Fire threshold Majors; Keeper + Sun/Plant/Earth Majors.

If your spirit can’t threshold the Major, the card’s effect degrades badly. Shopping without element-check = draft-tempo lost.

Energy ramp to 4+

Major Power Shopping spirits need 4E by T5 at the latest. Growth choices bias top-track energy placements more aggressively than other archetypes.

Re-forget economy

Gaining a second Major forces a second Forget. The fifth Major in a game cost a Forget of a previous Major in some cases. This is deliberate — your T2 Major becomes forget-fodder by T6 if you’ve gained a better one.

Shopping with an agenda

You don’t shop every Major offer. You pass Majors that don’t threshold-fit or cost-fit. Taking the “cool-looking Major” without element or energy support is the #1 failure mode.

Spirits That Embody Major Power Shopping

Vital Strength of the Earth (primary)

The canonical Major shopper. Energy track supports T4–T5 Major gains; most Uniques are forget-fodder after T3.

Shopping pattern: gain first Major T2 (forget Draw of Fresh Waters); gain second Major T4; gain third Major T6 (often forgetting the T2 Major). Ends the game with 3 Majors in rotation.

Cross-reference: Earth chapter.

Keeper of the Forbidden Wilds (primary)

Keeper’s sacred-site mechanics + high energy support a 4-Major game. Slightly slower to start than Earth but caps higher.

Key note: Keeper’s Uniques are better than Earth’s, so the Forget cost is slightly higher — pick Majors more carefully.

Cross-reference: Keeper chapter.

Stone’s Unyielding Defiance (primary)

Stone is Earth’s Jagged Earth sibling, with more defend + more Majors-per-game. Plays the archetype harder than Earth does.

Covets Gleaming Shards of Earth (primary — extreme)

NI’s “Covets” is the archetype taken to its extreme. The spirit literally hoards Majors as a mechanic; some cards scale with Major-count held.

Cross-reference: Covets chapter.

Starlight Seeks Its Form (secondary — flexible)

Starlight’s form-change mechanic lets it adapt element thresholds mid-game, making it flexible as a Major shopper. Can threshold anything with the right form.

High complexity; experimental play.

Cross-reference: Starlight chapter.

Serpent Slumbering Beneath the Island (secondary)

Serpent’s late-game energy spike supports 5–6 cost Majors that nothing else plays. Not a fast shopper; a very-late closer.

Wounded Waters Bleeding (secondary)

NI spirit with water-element Major synergy. Play-style depends on aspect.

Execution Pattern

Representative arc, Earth solo vs. Habsburg Mining L3:

  • T1: Growth G1 (energy + presence). Play 1 Unique. Accept no board impact. 0E / 2CP → 0E / 2CP, but with +1 energy pacing.
  • T2: Growth G4 (Major gain). Forget Draw of Fresh Waters; gain a 3-cost Plant-Earth Major. Play 1–2 Uniques. Bank energy.
  • T3: Growth G2 (energy). Play the T2 Major for the first time — board-clear event. Fear spike.
  • T4: Reclaim. Hand refreshed; Major in rotation.
  • T5: Growth G4 again — second Major gain. Forget a weaker Unique or weaker Major. Gain a 4-cost Fire-element Major. Energy bank at 3E entering.
  • T6: Play second Major. Another land clears. Fear pool approaches Terror 2.
  • T7: Third Major via Reclaim + growth. Plays of accumulated Majors together clean out Cities.
  • T8: Close.

Strong Adversary Matchups

  • Habsburg Mining — the archetype’s best adversary. Mining’s scaling mirrors Major-shopping’s scaling; your Major chain arrives as Mining’s pressure peaks.
  • Russia L5–6 — Russia’s board pressure is extreme but static; Major-shoppers have the damage to clean entire Settler waves.
  • Sweden L0–2 — Sweden at low level is fine; at L3+ fear penalties hurt kill-fear payout.
  • England (if you hit T5 Major before Stage III) — doable but tight; requires good draft luck.

Weak Adversary Matchups

  • Brandenburg-Prussia Stage III fast — City Cascade before your Major chain lands. Timing fails.
  • Blitz scenario — scenario time-compression makes the archetype structurally infeasible.
  • Sweden L3+ — fear penalties reduce the kill-fear payout that your Majors rely on for fear contribution.
  • Scotland (fast-start versions) — can overwhelm T1–T4 before the bank pays off.

Multiplayer Synergies

Major Power Shopping + Fear Rush (Earth + Shadows): Fear Rush hits Terror 2 T5–6; Earth lands T5–7 Majors that close Cities. Terror loosened win-condition + Major-kill = clean close.

Major Power Shopping + Terrain Control (Earth + Green/Lure): Terrain partner sets up kill-zones; Major fires into pre-positioned Invaders. High conversion rate per Major cost.

Major Power Shopping + Dahan Rush (Earth + Thunderspeaker): dahan retaliation softens lands; Major finishes. Late-game pairing.

Major Power Shopping + Defend & Outlast (Earth + Keeper): double-shopping table. 4+ Majors in hand total. Brutal closer; risky T1–4.

Major Power Shopping + Major Power Shopping (Earth + Covets): both hoard; both close. Risk: they compete for the same Major drafts. Requires coordination: “you take Plant Majors, I take Earth-Fire Majors.”

Anti-synergy — Major Power Shopping alone at high difficulty: without a fast-scaling partner (Fear Rush) or a board-setter (Terrain Control), solo Major-shopping at L6 against most adversaries ends in T4 blight cascade before the engine fires.

Common Mistakes

Common Mistake — Drafting Majors without threshold-fit

Gaining Vigor of the Breaking Dawn (3 Sun threshold) on Earth, which generates 0 Sun elements. The card is stranded. Always check threshold before the Forget trigger.

Common Mistake — Shopping too many Majors

Gaining 3 Majors by T5 on a spirit whose energy supports only 1–2 Major plays per turn. You’ve over-bought; the extras never fire. 2–3 active Majors is usually the cap.

Common Mistake — Forgetting load-bearing Uniques

Earth’s Guard the Healing Land isn’t a throw-away; it’s the defend backbone. Some archetypes forget it for a Major and then have no defend. Check which Uniques are functional vs. replaceable before draft.

Common Mistake — Chasing flashy Majors

The 8-cost Major that reads “destroy all invaders” looks great. But if you play it once at T7 and the game ends T8, you over-paid. Majors you play twice are the Majors worth drafting.

Common Mistake — Ignoring fear output

Major-kills generate fear, but you can’t Major-rush Terror 3. If the game demands Terror 3, you need a Fear Rush partner or additional fear-gen cards. Don’t assume Major kills alone will close.

Source Notes

Last revised: 2026-04-19