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The ‘Starting Hand’ or Mulligan as it is commonly known in other trading card games (TCG’s) is an important decision making stage at the start of a game in Parallel.

Before each battle begins on Parallel, each opponent will have an opportunity to look at five random cards from their deck and choose how many of those five cards they would like to keep for their Starting Hand.

Cards which are not selected for the Starting Hand get shuffled back into the deck and that same number of cards are then drawn at random to complete the Starting Hand.

Starting Hand decisions are given 30 seconds to be actioned and if no decisions are made from the player about what cards to keep or shuffle back into the deck then the Starting Hand will be those cards seen at the initial selection.

Playing cards in Parallel requires energy and players must bank cards each turn to increase the energy they have to play more cards as the game progresses. 

This means that Starting Hand decisions in Parallel not only need to consider the cards a player would like to use for the first few turns but also what cards could be banked for energy too.

It’s also worth noting here that as you gain more experience playing the game and going up against different decks, you will begin to develop a much better understanding of what cards you need more or less of in a particular matchup and this will further improve your Starting Hand decisions.

With all that said, let’s take a look at the different Starting Hand decisions and strategies that exist for our Kathari decks to give you an idea of what you should think about when playing with your own decks.

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Gnaeus Starting Hand Strategy

Our Gnaeus deck is all about getting a quick start by playing low cost cards in the early turns of a game so we can flood the board with units and overwhelm the opponent.

This means that our primary aim for the Starting Hand should be focused on getting a good amount of 1 and 2 cost units so we can start developing the board early.

Cards such as the Valerusi Striker, Shielded Assassin or the Mercenary Gunslinger in our Starting Hand would represent a strong starting position for the Gnaeus Peasant deck especially if we were going first in the game.

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We’d also be in a great position if we could keep some units in our Starting Hand for turns two and three so we can plan out our board plays for the opening few turns.

Cards such as the Valerusi Standard Bearer, Cunning Scipian and the Convergent Sanctorum are also good cards to look for when deciding on your Starting Hand.

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Keep in mind that a good Starting Hand sets you up for a strong start in a game but doesn’t necessarily guarantee a victory. 

However, a bad Starting Hand will almost always cost you in the game due to not having the right cards to execute your game plan or the cards to stop the opponent from executing theirs which is why mastering Starting Hand decisions is crucial.

Here are some Starting Hand examples to give you more insight on what to think about for your own Starting Hand decisions when playing with Gnaeus.

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Gnaeus Example 1

In this example our opponent is Shroud New Dawn and we are going first in the game.

Our Starting Hand consists of 1x Black Market Fixer, 1 x Convergent Centurus, 1x Synchronicity, 1x Shielded Assassin and 1x Seeing Triple.

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We decide to keep just one of the five cards for our Starting Hand by holding onto the Shielded Assassin and redrawing the remaining four.

The Black Market Fixer at a cost of 4 energy to play is too expensive to keep in our Starting Hand and we might not need him until later on in the game anyways.

The Convergent Centurus is a card that we will want to play at some point in the game but again, at a cost of 4 energy to play is too expensive to keep in our Starting Hand.

Synchronicity is a powerful Effect card which can swing the game in your favour but as we are going first we need to look for more 1 or 2 cost cards in our Starting Hand. 

Seeing Triple is another Effect card which can help in the mid-game either to protect more powerful units on the board with their Defender ability or to help make the board go even wider with units to overwhelm the opponent with damage.

The Shielded Assassin which we decided to keep is one of the best early game cards within a Gnaeus deck especially when going first because it can be played on turn one and is then ready to attack on turn two where it will grow +1/+1 from the Gnaeus passive which is why this is the card we decided to keep in our Starting Hand.

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Gnaeus Example 2

In this next example our opponent is Marcolian Cathy and we are going second in the match.

Our Starting Hand consists of 1x Formatician’s Exalt, 2x Valerusi Strikers, 1x Cunning Scipian and 1x Crew Boss.

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We decide to keep both the Valerusi Strikers and the Cunning Scipian and redraw the remaining two cards for our Starting Hand.

The Formatician’s Exalt is too expensive to keep in our Starting Hand at a cost of 4 energy to play so we redraw it back into the deck so we can draw it later when needed.

At a cost of 5 energy to play, the Crew Boss was the most expensive card in our Starting Hand and not only is this card too expensive to keep but it’s a card we will want in our hand when we have created a wide board full of units so the Crew Boss can buff them all +1/+1.

The Valerusi Strikers are high priority cards we should always be looking for in our Starting Hand when playing as Gnaeus and getting two means we can potentially have both on the board by turn two which will give them +1/+0 to their attack stats for controlling two Strikers on the board.

Keeping the Cunning Scipian is also a wise choice here as we can look to play this on turn two if our Valerusi Striker played on turn one is destroyed or if we want to match the tempo of our opponent by getting several units on the board in one turn.

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Aetio Starting Hand Strategy

When playing as Aetio your primary goal is to waste the entire deck as quickly as possible to unleash Aetio’s Iterant and so it’s important to find and play cards which help to achieve that goal while providing good control on the board too.

Just like our Gnaeus Starting Hand strategy, the focus here should be about getting 1 and 2 cost units to maintain high pressure against our opponent in the early rounds.

Cards such as the Valerusi Striker, AZ-12 Target Painter and the Tabula Rasa are the sort of units you should be trying to get in your Starting Hand with the Aetio deck.

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In addition, cards such as the Valerusi Standard Bearer, Cunning Scipian and Alkaline Hydrolist are all options you should look for too as they can help to maintain early pressure on opponents while the Hydrolist in particular can start to waste cards.

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Here are some Starting Hand examples to give you more insight on what to think about for your own Starting Hand decisions when playing with Aetio.

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Aetio Example 1

In this example our opponent is Augencore Juggernaut Workshop and we are going first in the game.

Our Starting Hand consists of 1x Alkaline Hydrolist, 1x Convergent Centurus, 1x Collateral Damage, 1x Aetian Subjugate and 1x Mercenary Gunslinger.

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We decide to keep the Alkaline Hydrolist, Aetian Subjugate and the Mercenary Gunslinger for our Starting Hand and opt to redraw the remaining two cards.

As we’re going first in the game it's important we have a card to play in the opening turn to set the match tempo and put our opponent on the backfoot straight away. 

The Mercenary Gunslinger is a good card for our Starting Hand because we can play it in the opening turn and deal 1 damage immediately to the Shield Pod which is a token Defender unit created on the board for any player who goes second in the game.

The Alkaline Hydrolist is the perfect card to keep in our Starting Hand as we can play it on turn two and immediately start to waste cards in our deck which will get us closer to an empty deck state and our main win condition.

We also keep the Aetian Subjugate in our Starting Hand so we can play this on-curve and get a unit in place to start buffing other units we plan to play after.

Even though the Convergent Centurus is exactly the sort of card we’d like to play after the Aetian Subjugate we decide to redraw it rather than keep it in our Starting Hand because at a cost of 4 energy to play it is too expensive to keep and we should try to look for cheaper cost cards that could be more useful in the opening rounds. 

And lastly we decide to redraw the Collateral Damage which is a good card against Augencore Juggernaut Workshop as this Parallel tends to play relics but we should instead try to search for a unit or card which can either help our deck apply board pressure or waste cards in our deck instead of relic removal like Collateral Damage.

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Aetio Example 2

In this next example our opponent is Marcolian Cathy and we are going second in the match.

Our Starting Hand consists of 1x Aetian Subjugate,, 1x Cunning Scipian, 1x Triumph of Europa, 1x Logistics Support Cruiser and 1x AZ-12 Target Painter.

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In this scenario we decide to keep the Aetian Subjugate, Cunning Scipian and the AZ-12 Target Painter and choose to redraw the remaining two cards.

Even though we are going second in this game it’s still important to have a card and ideally a unit that can be played on our first turn and the AZ-12 Target Painter is a good option that allows us to do more damage to units we target for our second turn.

The Cunning Scipian is one of the best 2 cost cards in our Aetio Noble deck and allows us to match the tempo of our opponent by playing a unit that can create more units on the board.

We also decide to keep the Aetian Subjugate so we not only have a card that can start buffing units we play after it but the Subjugate can also waste cards too which helps us towards our win condition.

The Triumph of Europa is one of the deck’s most powerful cards and it also wastes cards as well but at a cost of 5 energy to play it is too expensive to keep in our Starting Hand so we decide to redraw it in the hopes of drawing a cheaper card instead.

Lastly, we also decide to redraw the Logistics Support Cruiser so we can find a cheaper card that could help us in the opening rounds like a PS-8 Launcher since we are going second in the game and having an Effect card could help control the board.

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Scipius Starting Hand Strategy

Lastly we will look at the Starting Hand strategy for our Scipius King deck which shares some similarities with the previous two decks when it comes to decision making for your opening hand.

In this deck we want to get the strongest start possible by prioritising low energy cost cards which can help us control the board and give opponents problems early on. 

Cards such as the AZ-12 Target Painter, Mercenary Gunslinger or the Tabula Rasa in our Starting Hand would represent a strong starting position for this deck especially if we were going first in the game.

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Cards such as the Valerusi Standard Bearer, Cunning Scipian and the Alvaro Interrogator would be great options to consider keeping in our Starting Hand too for their ability to control the early game and develop a board.

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Here are some Starting Hand examples to give you more insight on what to think about for your own Starting Hand decisions when playing with Scipius.

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Scipius Example 1

In this example our opponent is Earthen Nehemiah and we are going first in the game.

Our Starting Hand consists of 1x Wong, Purveyor of Curiosities, 1x Saboteur, 1x Valerusi Standard Bearer, 1x AZ-12 Target Painter and 1x Convergent Centurus.

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We decide to redraw Wong, Purveyor of Curiosities, Saboteur and the Convergent Centurus and keep the Valerusi Standard Bearer and the AZ-12 Target Painter.

The Painter is the perfect card for us to have in our Starting Hand as we can play it on turn one so this unit can start to target an enemy unit for extra damage in turn two.

We keep the Valerusi Standard Bearer because it’s a great card to play on-curve and sets up plays after that as clone units we deploy to the board will gain a buff of +1/+1.

Wong, Purveyor of Curiosities is a fantastic card but one you will want to draw mid-game so you can use him to replenish your options in hand. At a cost of 5 energy to play he is also too expensive for us to keep in our Starting Hand so we redraw him.

The Saboteur is a card which we will often need to use against Earthen for some relic removal but as we are going first it is better to look for other cards that can be more impactful in the opening turns and we just draw the Saboteur later on in the game.

We redraw the Convergent Centurus because even though this is a card we will want to play in the game it is a card which costs 4 energy to play and we can look for other cards which are lower cost and give us better options for the first few turns too.

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Scipius Example 2

In this example our opponent is Marcolian Cathy and we are going second in the game.

Our Starting Hand consists of 1x Convergent Centurus, 1x Tabula Rasa, 1x Saboteur, 1x Triumph of Europa and 1x Idaian Hammer.

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This time we decide to keep only the Tabula Rasa and redraw the other four cards to see if we can get lower cost cards that give us better plays for the first few turns.

The Convergent Centurus is again too expensive at a cost of 4 energy for us to keep in our Starting Hand especially as we are going second in the game because we will need lower cost cards that can help us to contest the board with units early on.

We redraw the Saboteur as we don’t need him early on in the game as it will be around turn four at the earliest potentially when we will need to remove relics so we redraw for cards which can give us better options for the first few turns.

The Triumph of Europa is too expensive for us to keep in our Starting Hand with a cost of 5 energy to play so we redraw to find lower cost cards that can help us try to control the game in the opening first few turns too.

And the Idaian Hammer is one of the most expensive cards in our Scipius King deck with an energy cost of 7 to play so it is an easy decision here to redraw this so we can naturally draw the Hammer later on in the game when we need it.