Artemis & Posthumoose Lock Down the Board in Elestrals - Lifestream

The Artemis Starter Deck from the Lifestream set isn’t your typical “drop big bodies and swing” Elestrals deck. Instead, it leans into a style of play built around disrupting your opponent’s plans, shutting off their key abilities, and then grinding them down with repeated recursion from the Underworld. It’s slow, deliberate, and tactical—like a hunter stalking its prey under moonlight.

If you like winning games because your opponent slowly runs out of options while your board keeps returning from the grave, Artemis is absolutely your lane.

How Artemis Plays – Tempo Through Denial and Attrition

Artemis has a very particular rhythm. It doesn’t rush the board or try to overwhelm early. Instead, it builds small, incremental advantages by interfering with your opponent’s Elestral abilities. Many decks rely heavily on triggered or ongoing effects for tempo and Artemis punishes that dependence.

The deck’s plan is simple: Turn off what your opponent is trying to do, keep your own engine running, and outlast them.

This creates a play pattern that feels calculated and methodical. You aren’t just reacting, you’re shaping the pace of the game.

What Suppress Actually Does (And Why It’s So Strong Here)

“Suppress” is one of the defining mechanics of the Artemis deck, so it’s worth understanding exactly how powerful it is.

To Suppress a card, you temporarily remove that card’s printed effects. Exactly like Misenchanting it, except it comes from another card rather than the rules.

While a card is suppressed:

• None of its abilities work.

• None of its ongoing effects apply.

• None of its triggers happen.

It's just some cardboard full of meaningless words.

This is devastating to many decks in the Lifestream meta, because so many strategies rely on Elestrals with strong on-board abilities—stat buffs, utility effects, resource gain, or protection. When Artemis suppresses those pieces, entire lines of play collapse.

And unlike Misenchanting, which happens due to the game’s structure, Suppression is targeted, intentional, and repeatable. That makes it a core weapon, not a coincidence.

In practice, suppression isn’t just disruption; it’s tempo theft. You’re stripping value from their board while maintaining yours.

Underworld Recursion – The Other Half of Artemis’s Identity

Suppression handles the “deny” side of the deck. Underworld recursion handles the “survive indefinitely” side.

Cards in the Artemis deck can bring back Elestrals or spirits from your underworld to keep you alive longer.

Where most tempo decks suffer if the opponent wipes the board, Artemis can sort of shrug and rebuild:

• Suppressed threats stay neutralized

• You don't blow through resources

• Opponent slowly bleeds resources trying to keep up.

Recursion Artemis feel more like a hybrid tempo-control deck. You’re not trying to win fast; you’re trying to make the game unwinnable for your opponent over time.

Why Artemis Works in the Lifestream Meta

The current Lifestream environment is full of decks that rely on activated abilities, triggered effects, and Elestrals that generate value over time. When you remove those abilities with Suppress, many of those decks fall apart.

On top of that, some of the big meta-defining threats from previous formats are weaker or unavailable. That leaves more breathing room for a grinding denial deck like Artemis to succeed.

Where other starter decks present somewhat straightforward lines, Artemis brings problems opponents aren’t always prepared to solve.

Upgrading Artemis – Leaning Into Suppression and Recursion

If you plan to tune the deck past the stock pre-con, the best improvements are the ones that enhance its identity:

• More repeatable suppression effects. These help you lock down entire sections of the opponent’s board.

• More recursion tools. The stronger your Underworld loops, the harder it becomes for the opponent to stabilize.

• A slightly more resilient midgame. The pre-con can sometimes draw hands that are all tricks and no pressure; smoothing that out turns Artemis from “cute” into “competitive.”

  
  

Once upgraded, the deck becomes almost suffocating—your opponent keeps playing Elestrals, and you keep turning them off.

Who Should Play Elestrals Artemis?

If you love:

• Controlling tempo through denial

• Making your opponent’s cards feel useless

• Sandbagging

• Winning because you simply outlast everything…

Artemis is perfect for you, and you can pick up the starter deck right from the Elestrals website!

If you prefer big stats, explosive aggro lines, or decks that “just bash,” this will feel too subtle. But for methodical, tactical players, the deck is incredibly rewarding.