Disney Lorcana: Archazia’s Island Set Release – First Impressions

Archazia’s Island – Set overview

For the records, Archazia's Island is the seventh set of Disney Lorcana and the first one of 2025. As usual, all cards of the set are available in a 12-cards Booster pack that includes 6 common, 3 uncommon, 2 Rare or Super Rare or Legendary and 1 foil card of random rarity). It has to be noticed that the foil treatment of the cards in this set as been changed so now the whole card is foil, not just the main artwork.

In addition to the 12 cards, each Booster pack will include 1 out of 20 random Lore card featuring a piece of 2 different 9-cards puzzle on the back. This last type of card is a new feature introduced in the set and will tell a new chapter in the story line of the Lorcana Realm while also provide the usual puzzle artwork we all love. Usually the story of a new set can be read and followed in a short movie on the Lorcana website thus adding it to each Booster Pack in the form of a collectible card is quite nice and super exciting. Considering the lore and the puzzle cards, this set will be super exciting to open but make sure you consider the amount of space all puzzle and lore cards will take in your binders.

The full card list of this new set includes 204 cards. However, due to this set featuring “dual-Ink cards” and these cards be considered in both colours, it may feel the set is larger than usual. In reality, each Ink colour has exactly 44 cards of which 20 are Dual Ink. As mentioned before, these new cards are considered as belonging to both Ink colours at the same time thus they can only be used only in Decks featuring both colours.

Archazia's Island Booster Box will come as usual with 24 Booster Packs for a total of 288 cards. As a remind, a box will usually include 3 to 6 Legendary cards while the chances to get an Enchanted card are one every 4 boxes. The new Enchanted cards are no longer mono-colour as seen in Azurite sea but they are now colourful and linked together by a style that mixes geometrical shapes and nature. This style is inspired by the legendary Disney Illustrator Eyvind Earle and you can read a bit more about them in the interview with Anna Stosik, the Art Set Lead. Among them, the new "Hiro Hamada - Armor Designer" is not only available as standard Enchanted but also as Enchanted promo for the Set Championship. As a remind, starting from this set, the tournament prize cards will include a non-foil version for all participants to the tournament and this card will have the same art as the foil Enchanted made available for the top-8 participants.

Among the other products available for the set, I would strongly recommend to take a look to the Lilo gift set. Together with a nice box to store all your cards, this new gift set includes an alternative art of “Lilo, Escape Artist” and 5 booster Packs randomly picked from set 2 to 6. Even without First Chapter or Archazia's Island packs, opening this gift set will definitely be a thrill and potentially a good way to get some cards from the previous sets. Considering the overall price being just above £20 Lilo Gift Set is a good product to catch-up with older set or to use for playing the super fun “chaos draft” format. We did one a few month ago as you remember from this content and it was so fun we got one pencilled down at our locals right after release of the of the gift set.

New set mechanics and Strategies

The main attraction of the new set are obviously the new Dual-Ink cards. Disregarding the considerations around which cards have been released and how much they can impact the gameplay of their related decks, I think the main point here is that having Dual-Ink is a great way to improve the balance of the game. In the past sets, each new card released have to be carefully balanced due to the fact that it can be used in each Deck featuring the same Ink colour of that card. One good example is “Lilo, Escape Artist” that can be used efficiently together with “Daisy, Donald's Date” in a Red-Mufasa Deck as well as in a Lemon-Lime Deck but that it can become super explosive in an aggro Steel-Song deck. Having Dual-Ink cards will allow the developers to create cards specifically for a certain type of strategy or Archetype without necessarily impacting any other Deck using one of the two colours of the new cards. That's why for example the new Ruby-Sapphire cards are very specific for a certain type of deck but they are not likely useful for any other Sapphire combinations. Overall, a great addition to the game and a great way to ensure this game can growth further while staying as balanced as possible.

The next new mechanics introduced in Archazia's Island is the new “Illusion” Characters and their related keywords “Vanish”. All these Characters have slightly better stats that you would expect from their cost to balance the fact they are banished if an opponent chooses them as target for an action (including songs). At first glance, this new gimmick seems very thematic for this set considering how it is strongly linked to Jafar but I would not be surprised to see more cards and effects being dependent on how many Characters you have in the discard pile. Pretty much all TCGs have Archetypes focused on banishing characters to obtain bonus or to bring more characters to the field and these Illusion Glimmers may be a good way to setup these mechanics.

Last but not least, the new set also introduces the very first alternative winning condition in Disney Lorcana, “Donald Duck, Flustered Sorcerer”. Together with being an amazing card (and a awesome-looking enchanted), Donald's ability changes the amount of Lore needed in order to win from 20 to 25. Note this effect only apply to your opponent while the Player can still win at 20 and it is only active if Donald is on the field. Therefore, if the opponent is at 21 and manages to remove the Flustered Sorcerer from the field (or the Player bounces it back), they win immediately.

What are the best cards to look for (Spoiler alert!)

As mentioned before, please skip this section if you do not want any spoiler on the new cards of the set. If you decided to stay and continue reading, let me start mentioning that Archazia's Island comes with a ton of great cards and many of them are expected to impact the competitive gameplay.

Among the cards that are expected to have the biggest impact and, likely, the higher price on the secondary market, the most important one will likely be “Tamatoa, Happy as a Clam”. The original Tamatoa from the First Chapter has been a solid staple in most of Ruby-Sapphire item-based deck due to its ability to retrieve one item each upon questing and to increase its Lore value for each items in play. The new Tamatoa is similar to the previous one although its abilities allow the player to retrieve 2 items from the discard pile on play to then play any item for free every time Tamatoa quests. The most obvious target for this second ability is obviously the 7-cost item “Lucky Dime” that is the most common Win condition for this deck in particular if the deck includes also “Tamatoa, So Shiny” to generate tons of Lore.

Another Sapphire card expected to see a lot of play is the 4-cost “Scrooge McDuck, Resourceful Miser”. This version of Scrooge McDuck can be played for free by exerting four items but, most important, allow the player to take one Item card from the top four of their deck when the Characters is played. It is clear that this card synergizes pretty well with Tamatoa and can complement well other cards that helps getting items to hand quickly.

“Donald Duck, Flustered Sorcerer”, discussed earlier, will also be a highly sought-after card in this set together with “Bagheera, Guardian Jaguar” a, 5-cost Steel card with the ability to deal 2 damages to all opponents Characters when banished. Unfortunately, Bagheera effect only takes place during the opponent turn but its Bodyguard ability definitely increases its value making it a interesting card to have in your Deck.

While all the cards named previously are Legendaries, there are a couple of low-rarity cards that are already making waves and that you would like to keep an eye out while opening your packs. The first one is the new Common card “Belle, Apprentice Inventor” that can be played for free by banishing any of the Player Items. In a Sapphire deck, this means being able to have a 3 Strength, 3 Willpower Character on the field on turn one by playing a Pawpsicle that can make a huge difference against aggro Decks.

Ruby-Sapphire Players should also keep an eye out for the “Sapphire Coil” Item due to its ability to reduce the Strength of any character by 2 every time a card is placed in the Inkwell enabling easy removal by “Sisu , Daring Visitor”, “Brawl” or “Sisu, Empowered Sibling”.