Yesterday co-designer and rules guru Steve Warner jumped on the official Twitter account to do a rules Q&A. He managed to answer some questions but kept getting sidetracked by the community manager Richelle Brady throwing out brand-new cards!
In total, the Q&A session left us with nine new cards. But that wasn’t all from yesterday. Just a little earlier, the Team Lorcana account on the fan Discord revealed the brand new Genie The Ever Impressive and Megara Pulling The Strings.
They also revealed Kuzco Temperamental Emperor and finally confirmed Elsa Queen Regent in the same day. Later on in a livestream the channel hobbies + happiness also got to reveal the Jafar Keeper of Secrets card live on their content creator roundtable stream!
This was after a Dicebreaker article earlier in the day had already shown three powerful new Tangled character cards which we covered earlier. You might want to take a look at our full Lorcana card listing database to see everything that’s come out way recently.
151 Down – 53 To Go!
So in total, we now have 151 cards (basically) fully revealed, with an extra six we’ve seen a little of or know from rules/leaks. So in total, that’s 53 cards left until we’ve seen everything, and just 27 days left until release as of this article!
We’ll cover the new cards first with a little insight into possible plays and viability in competitive play. Keep scrolling for the full Q&A session below.
While Genie is a beautiful interpretation of a classic character, the card just fills the Emerald gap of cards with the same stats in different colors like Minnie Mouse Beloved Princess in Amber and Donald Duck Boisterous Fowl in Ruby.
Somehow Simba Protective Cub gets the same stats as these guys with the same cost and inkable plus the Bodyguard keyword.
Megara Pulling The Strings sees the character’s first (and probably only) card of this set. Definitely playable.
If you put out a card with just one strength on your first turn and your opponent put out a 1 cost turn 1, then a Simba Protective Cub exerted to protect it while it quested, you can use Megara to get rid of Simba. However, it’s more likely a mid-game buff or a way of dissuading a challenge for an easy trade on an exerted character.
Abu joins The First Chapter! He’s a pretty simple vanilla ally, and that keyword (in our opinion) is going to be very important in Lorcana. In Disney stories, it’s your allies and friends that make all the difference.
On the other hand, Scar Shameless Firebrand is more interesting play. He could be shifted over another Scar card but right now with the cards we have that doesn’t seem very efficient. If we get a cheap Scar in the near future it could be playable.
Some setups I found using the filters on the cards page: Quest with Hercules True Hero, ready with Scar, challenge and remove a cheap card with Hercules, then he acts as Bodyguard for another questing character while exerted. Or maybe quest then use Freeze (or double freeze) with Elsa Snow Queen, or double draw with Tinker Bell Tiny Tactician?
In a very unexpected move, John Silver is the first Treasure Planet card – will we see more? The ability to give Reckless on play and then every time he quests at 2 lore is excellent. If John stays out for a few turns and can be protected with something like Bodyguard.
If your opponent makes the mistake of leaving John on the board he could be healed with the recently released Rapunzel Gifted with Healing for a full 3-card draw?
Kuzco has been known about for a while from art on the official website. The abilities combined make this card a real problem. It will definitely be a tough include because he is uninkable, but if played can be hard to remove.
Essentially he’ll need to be challenged, and because of NO TOUCHY! your opponent’s best play is to buff the strength of a lower-cost card. That can be difficult if you’re not ready to set that up, and could mean Kuzco gets away with a couple of rounds of gaining three lore.
Otherwise, it means they definitely lose a couple of characters or have to use a form of board wipe like Be Prepared. This is a very hard card to work around.
This card is beautiful and really shows the power of imagination Floodborn and Dreamborn cards allow. Getting to see a happy Captain Hook who can fly? Maybe he and Pan are friends?!
He can shift over Captain Hook Forceful Duelist who is already a very playable card, and if you play him on turn 3 he’s going to be very hard to deal with. Combined with cards that can force your opponent’s character to become exerted like Elsa cards we’ve seen, he can take down big characters and stay safe from cheaper ones too.
A very good card only slightly let down by being uninkable.
Horace and Jasper are a dastardly duo, and Jasper’s ability does open up options for frustrating an opponent’s plans with big lore characters. Though, it leaves him as an obvious target of the chosen card.
More Elsa anyone? Both are cards we’d known of, finally getting a full reveal. Elsa Queen Regent is just a solid vanilla card that doesn’t really fit Amethyst’s theme on its own but might see play.
Elsa Spirit Of Winter takes a different approach and suddenly makes things very hard for the person across the table. Bear in mind that it’s been clarified the ability doesn’t need to target readied characters, so you can choose exerted characters to stop them readying.
At this stage in the game by your next turn, you will almost certainly still have this Elsa on board and able to gain a solid three lore. Play another or use an Anna? Almost unstoppable. This card will be one of the most wanted for both players and collectors.
Elsa Ice Surfer combined with Anna Heir To Arendelle begs lots of combos from the pair and other named cards to come. Our second surfer after Stitch Carefree Surfer.
Tinker Bell Peter Pan’s Ally almost guarantees we have more Pan’s to come. A hard card to pick at that stat line in comparison with other Amethyst cards though. Mickey Mouse Wayward Sorcerer seems like a better choice and has similar minion-focused buffs.
Finally, we wrap things up with Jafar, who combos excellently into A Whole New World on the next turn. Having two lore means it’s likely you’ll play, use A Whole New World, then just quest with him unless there are specific characters you need to take down.
You can then play even more draw cards like Maleficent Sorceress or Friends On The Other Side, or get a Bodyguard out like Hercules True Hero or Mickey Mouse Musketeer.
Question & Answer Session
All taken from the official Twitter thread.
With current spoilers it seems that steel (tink, removal actions) and ruby (evasive characters) may be a little overpowered compared to the rest of the inks. Are starter decks balanced to prevent a “best starter” situation?
Starters were all tested against each other. They are different play styles, but they should all be similarly powerful.
MtG has WUBRG, do we have AMERST? Or do you have/use a different abbreviation convention thing?
We do not use an abbreviation in design.
From a design perspective, are “Ramp” effects going to be something that all inks can do in their own way, or will it be “Color pie allocated” to certain ink strategies instead of others (given that we’ve only seen Sapphire and Amber get is so far)? Thanks for the QnA! 
Abilities and mechanics are tied to ink colors, some of those are in 2 or more ink colors. The types of cards that give you extra ink are mostly in Sapphire. Other colors may be able to “ramp” in other ways, but Sapphire is the most direct about it.
If my opponent and I deck out at the same time (say we both have 6 cards left in our deck and one of us plays A Whole New World), how would we know who loses the game?
Active player resolves first, so active player would lose the game in this example.
So far, what would you say is your personal favorite keyword/ability?
Steve: I love a lot of them, but I think Bodyguard is one of my favorites for its ability to change up the current board state and evaluations immediately. Richelle: I wanted to chime in here, Singer is my favorite! I love Song cards.
Will cards in different languages be legal to play outside of those regions?
This is more related to when Organized Play ramps up. We’ll have more announcements and rules regarding that at a later time.
Please confirm the ruling in the case of Brooms while Mickey Wayward is in play, when Brooms banishes Cheshire Cat or Prince Phillip. Same example for Marshmallow v.s. Phillip/Cheshire. Thank you for holding this Q&A!
Any abilities that say “In a challenge” trigger and resolve while that challenge is still happening.
So in the case of say Marshmallow and the Cheshire Cat, Marshmallow will banish the Cheshire Cat. Because it did so in a challenge, the Cheshire Cat’s effect will banish Marshmallow.
This is still resolving in a challenge. So, Marshmallow was banished in a challenge and returns to hand.
The emerald card “Do it again” says Return an action card from your discard to your hand. Are songs considered action since under their title it reads Action • Song
Yes! Song is a classification of the Action card. Good rule of thumb – All Songs are Actions, but not all Actions are Songs.
(Editor’s Note: This is a fairly firm confirmation that there will not be any pure Song cards that can’t be used as an action. At least for a set or so….)
How do you deal with cards like “A whole new world” so they don’t deck you out? Do I need to run an 80+ deck?
Magic Broom 
can help a little there, but something to remember: Since it’s not inkable, it’s very possible that they will have to discard extra ones when they play one of them. But…
On top of all that, as noted above, they resolve first, so if you have the same number of cards left, they would be the ones to lose….. If all that fails, yes, you could go to an 80 card deck.
Are packs randomized to have cards of every color in them or are they completely random?
We try to make sure that there’s one of every ink color in the common cards, but it is in fact random so we don’t guarantee it.
In your internal testing, what has been the average amount of non-flourish cards in your decks?
We test cards with and without ink a lot, there have been decks that have had lots of cards without the ink symbol, and ones that have run all ink symbols.
Overall it’s up to the player, and their playstyle on what works best. But I’d suggest being very careful with the amount of cards they can’t put into their inkwell. Play a few games, and modify as needed.
In a limited sealed or draft environment , what would deck building restrictions look like?
Rules for this will come when we’re ready to share.
Can I challenge and banish my own character with Tinker Bell Giant Fairy since it doesn’t specify “opposing” character for challenging and banishing in order to deal 2 damage to an opposing character?
You have to Challenge opposing characters. Period.
Richelle: I have a question for Steve. Are there any Disney properties yet we haven’t seen that are included in The First Chapter? I love so much of what’s been revealed but I think maybe you could give us something completely unexpected?
Steve: How do you feel about Treasure Planet?
