December 12, 2019 July 29, 2023

The Kroger Jewels Maycasts

If you’re an active player in the Arena, chances are you’ve heard of Kroger maycast jewels. It’s hard to ignore when your opponent’s pet does a funny dance and places Feints on your entire team. Let’s take a look into exactly what these talents can cast, and more importantly how we can use them!

A Bit of History

These new talents were introduced through gift cards. Instead of giving you a free pet as normal, these cards give a 2-talent jewel for your pet – granting a stat talent AND a maycast talent!

The only stores currently selling these gift cards are Krogers and Safeway/Albertsons/Vons, with only the Krogers selling the $10 cards. The jewels available change every month. You can check which jewel is available this month here. As Kroger jewels are only available only through gift cards and only one jewel being available per card per month, it can be difficult to study them thoroughly. However, this guide should put this difficulty to rest.

Brace for Impact
Or don’t, your pet can brace for you!

Talents: MC Brace + Spell-Defying (+5% Resist)

Triggers: Anything you do, except passing. This even includes other maycasts!

Available on: July on Kroger, Albertsons, Von’s and Safeways $20 gift cards.

The best thing about this jewel is the balance between the maycast and stat talents – they both are useful. While you might use other jewels solely for the MC, you’ll definitely get to enjoy this one’s stats too. A free defense aura is always welcome so it works well in any content.

Spontaneous Combustion
Your pet will burn your enemies, your friends, you! But don’t worry, it doesn’t self-combust.

Talents: MC Incindiate + Armor Piercer (+2% Armor Piercing)

Triggers: Friend or foe taking damage, while a Damage over Time is present in either friend or foe.

Available in: February and August on Kroger, Albertsons, Von’s and Safeways $20 gift cards.

Arguably the most dangerous talent in this article, Incindiate will detonate all damage (and heals!) over time for all players, on both sides!

With the effect of dealing 200% of the remaining damage is an undeniably powerful tool, it’s also risky, as your pet may detonate a DoT on your character, even if you don’t have one on your opponent.

It has a lot of potential in team matches, though your healers might not appreciate the extra trouble it may give. However, this maycast is probably too risky in 1v1, seeing how most schools use some form of DoT.

Fortress
Let them come. No one can breach through this fortress!

Talents: MC Mass Tower Shield + Blocker (~25 Critical Block rating)

Triggers: Friend or foe taking damage.

Available in: November on Kroger $10 gift cards.

This one is just overpowered. It provides solid defense to your team, has ample opportunity to be triggered each round and offers no risk or downside to its user.

Because it can be triggered by anyone getting hurt this talent’s cast rate increases according to the number of players and the numbers of hits cast… this also means Damage Over Time cannot reliably clear the shields as each tick provides an additional window for it to trigger.

The stat talent isn’t as impressive. Since block is one of least valued stats in PvP, it’s unlikely anyone would seek out this jewel for the Block alone. However, the Fortress more than makes up for it. This clearly a jewel oriented towards team matches and it can effectively force your opponent to need Shrike to attack you in a meaningful way. Combined with healing and jade gear, this jewel’s place in PvP clearly needs to be reviewed in the future.

Wild Wild Bolt
What’s better than a unreliable spell with massive damage potential?! Only your unreliable pet having the aforementioned unreliable spell!

Talents: MC Wild Bolt + Critical Hitter (~21 Critical Rating)

Triggers: Outgoing single-target spells (hits, traps etc).

Available in: December and January on Kroger $10 gift cards.

Pet Maycasts are already something unreliable, but when they’re casting a spell of random value like Wild Bolt or Healing Current… well, the odds you’ll get something helpful are pretty slim.

The triggers here aren’t particularly helpful, as they require you single-target your opponents – this means Wild Bolt will cast only when you’re using a hit, trap or negative charm. Furthermore, it being a Storm damage spell only hurts it further. Unlike other jewels which may cast an universal utility spell, Wild Wild Bolt requires a good amount of Storm damage and pierce to be truly effective.
And once it does cast, you might end up with just 10 or 100 damage, which is hardly worth your star socket.

Disjunction
Ever wished to live someone else’s life? This mythic jewel just may grant your wish!

Talents: MC Disjunction + Sharp-Eye (+2% Accuracy)

Triggers: Unknown?

Available in: May on Kroger $10 gift cards.

When your pet decides to use this, I hope you weren’t stacking any blades your opponents can use, or making them a great Crown of ~~Thorns~~ Weaknesses, because all of your hard work will now turn against you at your pet’s whim.

While Disjunction has an unrivaled potential as a game-changer, the random nature of MC make results unpredictable. The only way to protect yourself from this uncertainty is by using a very specific style that won’t allow your opponent any advantage when this triggers – such as using no hanging effects – or limiting yourself to non-trigger spells when the maycast wouldn’t be helpful.

Happy Accident
It’s only “happy” because it’s not a Ravenwood student who goes spinning in the air…

Talents: MC Pigsie + Healer (+4% Outgoing Healing)

Triggers: You taking damage.

Available in: March and September on Kroger, Albertsons, Von’s and Safeways $20 gift cards.

It’s Pigsie! The totally NOT overpowered 4-pip AoE heal, wow! Alas, its practical usefulness as a maycast is up for debate. I’ve met many players who claim it casts less than Unicorn, with that being my personal experience as well. However, that’s no surprise, given that it’s almost two Unicorns.

While other jewels offer risky spells that might endanger you or just moderate advantages, this jewel’s cast rate is its own risk – your pet won’t get you killed, but it might very well never come to your rescue.

Observation: Given its low cast chance I was unable to confirm any actions as NON-triggers.

Feeling Feint
Take a breath and know your enemies are feeling death.

Talents: MC Mass Feint + Pain-Bringer (+3% Damage)

Triggers: Traps, negative damage charms (Plague, Weakness).

Available in: April and October on Kroger, Albertsons, Von’s and Safeways $20 gift cards.
Also available in the 2019 Winter Scroll of Fortune!

The spell’s effect and the talent’s triggers make this a very a suitable jewel for Death jades, as they’re already very fond of using Plagues and Feints, and their high resist should minimize the risk of allowing a +75% trap on themselves. Furthermore, self-hit spells coupled with a death jade’s high resist and low damage can remove the trap at minimal cost. And in regards to the cast rate, as long as you’re using trigger spells, you’ll find the cast rate is decent.

On the other hand, this talent is completely useless for anyone who’s not an avid user of traps and damage debuffs, and therefore wouldn’t provide enough windows of opportunity for the MC to trigger.

This jewel is extremely dangerous in 1v1, given that it will give equal gain to both sides, but the one Feint on yourself might be worth the risk in 3v3 and 4v4.

Lance A Lot
Disclaimer: Does not guarantee entrance into the Knights of the Silver Rose.

Talents: MC Dragonlance + Pip Boost (+5% Power Pip chance)

Triggers: Blades, auras, shields.

Available in: June on Kroger, Albertsons, Von’s and Safeways $20 gift cards.

Another talent that activates almost entirely by itself, this time providing a substantial offense boost! There’s nothing special or particularly overwhelming about this Dragonlance. It’s a combination of a spear and blade spell, has a moderably reliable MC, and has no downsides to it.

While the buff isn’t as strong as Mass Feint, Dragonlance isn’t as risky, nor does it demand that you use niche spells to trigger it. This jewel is also equally viable in both 1v1 and team matches. Overall it’s a superior maycast to Mass Feint for a hitter.

A few fun facts about the gift card jewels

Although some of the spells themselves are usually NO-PvP (Incindiate, Mass Tower Shield, and Mass Feint, for instance) they are legal in all PvP content as may-casts! This is mostly balanced by their unreliable nature as may-casts, meaning we can’t use them as consistently as we do spell cards.

Although these talents are currently only available through jewels, they’re actually separate pet talents that could eventually be trainable. They even have different names than their jewels!

All of them are “No Shatter”, meaning you can safely remove it to switch between pets and even trade to different characters.

They also won’t let you sell them – precious huh?

In addition to the amazing utility potential of these talents, the Kroger jewels will also occasionally surround your pet with sparks should “jewel effect” be turned on in your settings. Crush your opponents’ egos as they gaze with awe at your pet glittering with the power of its jewel!