Verdict: Banger. v0.106 fight pressure flipped the card meta upside down. The cards that win runs now are the ones that do something immediately—not the ones that promise to be good in five turns.
The v0.106 Card Meta Shift
Here's what changed: fights got faster and meaner. Aeonglass doesn't let you stall for setup. Infested Prism punishes turns where you only block. The result is that cards with immediate impact went up in value, and cards that need setup went down.
This isn't complicated, but a lot of tier lists haven't caught up. They're still ranking cards based on v0.104 pacing, where you had time to set up complex engines and scale into infinity. That time is gone. v0.106 asks "what are you doing THIS turn?" and cards without a good answer got dropped.
The Sleepers Nobody Talks About
Quick Slash is the biggest sleeper in v0.106. It's a common, so you see it often. It deals front-loaded damage AND draws a card. In a patch that punishes slow starts, this card is basically a win condition disguised as filler.
Shrug It Off on Ironclad is similar. Pre-buff Ironclad didn't have enough draw to make block turns productive. Now Shrug cycles your deck while keeping you alive, which means you find your damage faster while not dying.
The pattern is clear: draw + block or draw + damage is the best card type in v0.106. Cards that only do one thing are falling behind. Cards that do nothing immediately are basically unplayable now.
The Traps Everyone Still Takes
Barricade needs to be exposed. The community treats it like an S-tier card because it enables "infinite block" memes. But here's the truth: if you're generating enough block for Barricade to matter, you were already winning that fight. It doesn't save bad decks. It only makes good decks slower and more expensive.
Searing Blow is the new player trap that never goes away. Every patch, someone posts a screenshot of Searing Blow+10 dealing 80 damage. What they don't post are the 20 runs where they never saw enough upgrades to make it viable, or the runs where they spent all their gold upgrading a card that still doesn't solve their defensive problems.
FAQ
Why is a common card rated higher than a rare?
Because you see commons more often. A card you can reliably draft is usually better than a rare you see once every five runs. Consistency beats ceiling in v0.106.
Should I stop taking scaling cards entirely?
No. But you need fewer of them. v0.106 rewards decks that can fight immediately AND scale. Pure scaling without early tempo is a trap now.
How much does this change by Ascension?
A lot. At A0-A5, greedy builds still work because fights are forgiving. At A10+, the early fight pressure makes front-loaded cards basically mandatory. This list assumes A5+ play.