Is anyone else feeling like that should start being the new name of the game? Because that's what it feels like when playing against Magic with Clear Mind opponents lately.

How do you stop a deck that can take you out in a single turn easily with 25 Health by Turn 11 and there is no way to protect your god?

The Leyhoard Hatchling opponent uses different cards to fritter away any creatures you might play because this opponent doesn't have many creatures, and if they have them they're made to just buy them time. Starshard bolts, tracking bolts, faraday cage, Beam, Wyrmbreath, crystal rain, Astric Implosion, and O Fortuna make sure you're not ever going to build up any sort of meaningful resistance or offense.

Meanwhile they hit the gas on their influx of cards, giving O Fortuna a second use along with Rune Viper Tincture, maybe a Wind up roller - because these competitors have definitely invested their money too. All the while they Foresee 2 and just answer everything you put down with something to stall you or a spell to destroy you while tossing out Mana Toads and feeding them sips of Elixir to get the mana advantage too.

If you do happen to have any of your own creatures even just survive this largely creatureless opponents turn - because for almost every other God and every other power creatures are essential - you still likely have to start by popping open their little foresee protection bubble wasting valuable hits just to gain access. Typically they've also worked a way in to protect and ward their god too somehow through all of this.

But it's all just wasting time though - for them and for you - because there's no fun when creatures don't have any decent chance of staying on the board. But this is how it is when you play the Hatchling Deck. You sigh when the signs of the end start coming because it always ends the same:

It typically begins when they have 8 mana and have injured your god to about 20 mana. Up until this point you may have even been doing comparably well, maybe even are beating them. But you can't destroy even 14 mana in 1 turn - nearly any other deck this is impossible by this turn. But then it happens:

The first Leyhoard Hatchling is dropped and always goes for the god and it's directly followed by a Portal Wrangler. This process happen again forcing you to take a 12 point hit in 2 turns that can be turned on any unruly creature that may land upon the board during that time too if it's deemed a threat - but most of the time it isn't. Then you see the "Clone" cards get played -always 2 to get their lowest creature cloned. And well well well... Leyhoard happens to only cost 1 Mana that very same turn if that's what it already cost.

So while the game thoughtfully makes sure there's only a 2 card per deck rule the Leyhoard Hatchling deck offers up to 6 Leyhoards per deck with 2 Portal Wranglers and 2 Clone cards. That's 36 health hit. And that leaves 24 cards open to merely support, protect, and bolster this little treasure of a tactic. Cards that drop the cost of mana on other cards are often used as support as well.

But the real problem ultimately lays with the developers as seeing leyhoard as a high mana card. It's deceptive because it's initial cost is 10, more mana than is possible to receive in a turn... But when this card is almost always played it's a 1 mana card with a 6 health hit. 1 mana 6 hit, 2 mana 12 hit, 3 mana 18 hit and so on... What other 1 mana card can be used up to 6 times in a turn and hit for 32 points between them all without any way to protect against it?

So what is someone to do against this tactic? You can't protect your god because Leyhoard is not a spell. You can't use Frontlines because Leyhoard breezes right on by them. So there is nothing to do but frantically try and kill them before they can set this up.

It doesn't have to be this way though. I really appreciated how the game devs have been reworking the Sanctum. Initially they doubled the cost of everything in it and in the most recent update the cost of powerful and cheap items had their price raised (like the starshard bolt). I still think there are adjustments there that need to be made but I can tell the developers are doing a good job with that.

I myself enjoy the Magebolt when it comes to playing magic, it goes back to what felt best to me in beta. You don't run into too many Magebolt players these days particularly because in beta they removed the power for the Magebolt to attack the God. Their explanation was fair - it gave the magebolt too much power with little way in defense. We are once again here with Clear Mind and Leyhoard decks.

So let me propose some ideas to make the Leyhoard Hatchling deck less... obnoxious for the rest of us who actually play with unique decks: the problem with the Leyhoard Hatchling card is that it's allowed to hit the god directly and its a creature. Protection is the only source of defense but unless you're playing with Magic and Foresee or possibly War you likely aren't getting more than 1 turn at a time protected. And I regularly have over 20 health drained from my god by Leyhoard Hatchlings in 1 turn - so protected only does so much protection.

1.) Just like with the magebolt, don't let leyhoard attack a god anymore. Still would be incredibly powerful but this leaves them with needing to be more creative on how to reach the god. Nearly all other creatures who attack with roar can't attack gods, typically only spells can, why does this cheap creature get a free pass?

2.) If it must remain hitting gods then let it not be able to reach past a frontline, needing to waste a 6 hitter on a 1 health frontline. It would even the playing field while still allowing for its cheap deadly attack. OR... Have the leyhoard hit be worth only 4 or 3 hit points, instead of 6.

3.) Turn the leyhoard into a spell, not a creature, and allow both protection and ward to defend against it's attack on a god. Warding your god would become more meaningful then too so as to not be used primarily to protect against deception steals. Even better clone wouldn't be able to be used here.

4.) If nothing can be done with the Leyhoard card anymore and it cannot be changed then hopefully some new card can be made that's like "if your opponent holds a leyhoard Hatchling deal that much damage to their god and obliterate their leyhoard Hatchling" that would be so sweet. And it's not just to one leyhoard, it should be for all leyhoards, let them feel the risk of losing nearly their entire health of their god for one turn, it's only fair.

5.) Another solution would be that all copied leyloards (whether it be by clone or portal wrangler) get pegged at a cost of 9 mana or something. This will allow the initial 2 Leyhoards that are allowed in the deck be worth as little as 1 mana with 12 point hit between them, but all copies remain expensive at 9 mana making the following 6 point hits a lot harder to deal in 1 turn.

6.) If nothing else can be changed then they need to fix the ranking system so that all the Leyhoard decks can float to the top and play stupid boring games against each other while the rest of us play each other with more diverse decks. I'm getting matched to top 100 players who use this tactic too regularly while I'm closer to being in the top 1000

Decks like these take away the fun of the diversity in the game and I know that aggressive players will do whatever it takes but Magic is a god that can have a lot of diversity and the Hatchling Deck isn't allowing for any sort of strategy.