This ability is a throwback to Lesson Learned, allowing you to play events from your discard pile. Cards with an ability while in the discard pile have always been strong in Epic. Invoke allows you to have playable cards beyond the maximum hand size of seven. The opponent is forced to respect not only what cards you have shown from your hand and what’s in play, but also account for Invoke cards as well. The respect of that power drives players to play cards like Amnesia to stop their opponents from abusing the discard.

Not only do they allow you to play the cards twice, but also after discarding them. Often your opponents force you to discard cards with the likes of Thought Plucker and Knight of Shadows. Invoke gives you an easier choice for those discards since you can play the Invoke card from the discard pile later.

I would have liked this card without the Ally ability. Being able to Invoke it when you play a Wild Gold is just fantastic. Invoking it combines well with the damage of a Fire Shaman, Smash and Burn, Fire Spirit, or a burn Event like Rain of Fire. As we’ve seen with Smash and Burn, this kind of effect is a great source of pseudo-card-advantage that allows you to string together extra value. This is especially true considering you can play Makeshift Mutation, spend your Gold, and then Invoke Makeshift Mutation on the same target, essentially making it four damage.

One important note about Invoke is that it will not trigger Ally abilities. Ally abilities only trigger when playing a card from your hand. I wanted to get that out of the way before we dive into these cards.

So first thing to note is that it’s a Sage zero. This is a very contested slot in most decks. Between options like Amnesia, Spike Trap, Muse and all of the other powerful zeros in Sage, there isn’t much room for cards that are just “okay”. The first ability alone isn’t super powerful but it does have some interesting applications regarding combat. Without spending your gold you can expend a champion that your opponent was planning to block with. You can even do this after attackers have been declared if your opponent tries to spend their gold to ambush in a blocker. In addition to the offensive applications, you can also use this to expend a potential attacker after their first attack, overall a useful ability.

The next thing you will notice is that the Recycle is not part of the first mode. When you choose to recycle with this that is all you get. Comparing to other zeros that do something and recycle this is definitely a bit sub-par. Deja Vu is actually more akin to gold events in that it has a mode that you would use to interact with the board, and a draw mode. Coupled with the ability to Invoke by discarding a card, this can also do a good impression of Frantic Digging.

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