Hearthstone 21: We DO take candle!

[otakuryoga]

I'm just hoping for the holy grail of encountering the Treasure Room as a Priest with Shadow Word Horror, Once I have all nine wins, I might keep doing Dungeon Runs just to see the stars align that way.

how is that the holy grail..horror doesnt affect the sawblades since they have 3 attack

wait..nm..i am thinking trapped room
do you mean the dragon boss with the 5 treasures?

[Seerow]

how is that the holy grail..horror doesnt affect the sawblades since they have 3 attack

wait..nm..i am thinking trapped room
do you mean the dragon boss with the 5 treasures?

There's a rare encounter treasure room, 5 turn limit with 7 treasure chests each treasure you get is added to your deck for the rest of the run.

It's super rare, I haven't seen it once yet, but it is out there and is glorious with sw:h or doomsayer.

[The Glyphstone]

Togwaggle is definitely Hard Mode. By far the most RNGest of the final bosses; he can accidentally fill his own board with Ice Walls and hand you a game, or he can spam Ragnaros fireballs into your face every turn until he gets enough mana to full-heal over and over with a board of Legendaries.

[Cespenar]

Just curbstomped Togwaggle so bad that I could probably beat him if he had around 300 HP as well. Turns out Skull of the Man'ari into invisible Mal'Ganis has very little counters other than straight up twisting nether or whatever.

Oh, also add Double HP, Wish, Reno Jackson and Bloodreaver Gul'dan as well. I probably won't ever get this lucky again. I had potentially 300 HP and didn't even go down to 90.

[Joran]

Finished my first Dungeon Run; took me about 9 runs with Mage to finally get it (defeated final boss on exactly 50 bosses defeated)

I picked Mage, which is apparently one of the tougher ones. I thought I got some crazy choices before (Antonidas with 1 mana less per spell and invisiblity cloak), but either misplayed or got smorced down by the AI.

The run I didn't think I'd win got me the win. Double spell power (+6! passive Malygos), with a really good top end (Antonidas *2, Rhonin, Lich King, Ragnaros) got me the win. I also drafted Wish right before I got Azazi, who of course milled it =P Unlike my last 7 run, he didn't mill both Antonidas' so I stuck one for a couple turns and burned him out.

Edit: Galvadon on a stick also got me a couple wins.

[Hamste]

So I made a full voidlord handlock deck for ranked and just played against a heavy control warrior. I managed to play 12 voidlords during the game. 2 from deck, 2 from stonehill, got 2 from bloodreaver Guldan and 6 from n'zoth.


Also here is my deck so far. The problem is currently early game, if I can survive I will almost always win late game against any non-jade druid deck so I may have to dump some cards late game cards to get a better match up against aggro. The n'zoth is purely just for getting out voidlords in the end game against the really controlly decks.

### Voidlock
# Class: Warlock
# Format: Standard
# Year of the Mammoth
#
# 2x (1) Kobold Librarian
# 2x (1) Mortal Coil
# 1x (2) Acidic Swamp Ooze
# 1x (2) Defile
# 1x (2) Dirty Rat
# 2x (2) Sunfury Protector
# 2x (3) Stonehill Defender
# 2x (4) Hellfire
# 2x (4) Hooked Reaver
# 2x (4) Lesser Amethyst Spellstone
# 2x (4) Twilight Drake
# 2x (5) Despicable Dreadlord
# 2x (6) Siphon Soul
# 1x (8) Twisting Nether
# 2x (9) Voidlord
# 1x (10) Bloodreaver Gul'dan
# 1x (10) N'Zoth, the Corruptor
# 2x (12) Mountain Giant
#
AAECAf0GBtsGigfgrALfxALnywKX0wIM+wa2B+EHjQjECMwIm8 IC980C8tAC/dACiNIC6OcCAA==

[Spore]

A voidlord deck is one of the more frustrating experiences to play AGAINST. It's 2x 4 minions and then from Gul'Dan 2x, then N'Zoth 2x.

[Seerow]

Last night I took my Recruit Druid deck and decided to try out Hadronix after all. Turns out when half your deck is taunts you are cheating out... it's not too greedy after all. Greedy is when I also put in a Carniverous Cube to turn 1 Hadronix into 3, which could also be revived by N'zoth. I had one game where I lost due to my Hadronixes getting Siphon Souled while I already had a pretty full board, denying me most of the value... but in basically every other game if I got to the point where I could safely play a single Hadronix, I won handily. Biggest trick is stabilizing against strong tempo decks, lots of taunts on turns 3-6, but doing nothing for the first two turns frequently means you're struggling to stabilize most of the game.

[The Glyphstone]

5/9, Xol being crushed under by Big Beast Hunter. I did make what I thought was a fatal misplay by dropping Stampede Kodo instead of Tundra Rhino, but I survived and my next turn managed to force her quest to get discarded (50/50 chance). Without the portal she couldn't beat my discounted Zombeasts.

[Zevox]

...so, did Kobolds and Catacombs just, not do much of anything to the meta or something? Because it's either that or I had some weird luck today. Three out of four matches I did tonight were old meta decks running few or no new cards - Raza Priest with Psychic Scream as the only new card, Evolve Shaman with just the new evolve card, and a Jade Druid with some odd choices but none of them from the new set. The only new deck was an all-spell Hunter.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

...so, did Kobolds and Catacombs just, not do much of anything to the meta or something? Because it's either that or I had some weird luck today. Three out of four matches I did tonight were old meta decks running few or no new cards - Raza Priest with Psychic Scream as the only new card, Evolve Shaman with just the new evolve card, and a Jade Druid with some odd choices but none of them from the new set. The only new deck was an all-spell Hunter.

Paladin got some new tools, and there's a nasty bubble buff token paladin running around.

[Seerow]

...so, did Kobolds and Catacombs just, not do much of anything to the meta or something? Because it's either that or I had some weird luck today. Three out of four matches I did tonight were old meta decks running few or no new cards - Raza Priest with Psychic Scream as the only new card, Evolve Shaman with just the new evolve card, and a Jade Druid with some odd choices but none of them from the new set. The only new deck was an all-spell Hunter.

The old decks are still really strong, that's something that's unavoidable and a large part of why they push for standard rotations. That being said there are a lot of new decks being experimented with, but people just trying to rank are going to default to slightly stronger versions of decks they are already familiar with.

Evolve Shaman strikes me as the odd one out from what you mentioned. Evolve got a lot weaker with the expansion (LOTS of high mana low stat minions got added), and Shaman is overall one of the least played classes. I plan to experiment with it some eventually (Want to try Ele/Jade shaman with the new double battlecry minion, and a Big Overload/Rez shaman, focusing on big stuff like Earth Elemental, Storm Giant, and Al'akir, and then using Spirit Echos and the new Spell Stone to generate tons of value).



In other news, I decided Val'anyr really didn't fit in my Lynessa deck, so I made another Paladin deck built around it. Basically handbuff pally with huge ability to snowball if you get Val'anyr early. My last game against a Big Priest, on the last turn of the game I played a Dopplegangster with not one, not two, but three Val'anyrs that landed on it. Absolutely bonkers. Vulnerable to early silence/sap, but if you manage to get even 1-2 duplicates rolling, it's nearly impossible to stop.

[Zevox]

The old decks are still really strong, that's something that's unavoidable and a large part of why they push for standard rotations.

That's sometimes true, sometimes not. But the thing that surprises me the most is that it's still week 1 of the expansion - I expect this to be the experimental phase, where just about everyone is running something that's heavy on the new cards, even if it's not a totally new archetype. Seems strange to run into so many that aren't.

Also forgot one other match I had, but that was just a Zoolock that overran me very fast. Didn't see any new cards from him, but I was dead by turn 5 anyway, so that doesn't necessarily mean they weren't there.

[ChaosOS]

I realize Wild isn't the most popular format, but it's mostly turned into Call to Arms Paladin spam. Sample deck list that I've got a 60 to 70% winrate on:

Spoiler: Tier 0 Paladin

Show

### Pally Time
# Class: Paladin
# Format: Wild
#
# 2x (1) Lost in the Jungle
# 1x (1) Patches the Pirate
# 2x (1) Righteous Protector
# 2x (1) Southsea Deckhand
# 2x (2) Haunted Creeper
# 2x (2) Knife Juggler
# 2x (2) Shielded Minibot
# 2x (2) Ship's Cannon
# 2x (3) Divine Favor
# 2x (3) Muster for Battle
# 1x (3) Rallying Blade
# 2x (3) Southsea Captain
# 2x (4) Call to Arms
# 1x (4) Gormok the Impaler
# 1x (4) Keeper of Uldaman
# 1x (5) Leeroy Jenkins
# 1x (6) Sunkeeper Tarim
# 2x (7) Corridor Creeper
#
AAEBAYsWBq8EpBXZrgKRvAK5wQK36QIMpwWoBdQFsQj1DeoP7Q/7D7jHAuPLAvjSAvvTAgA=

In short, the game plan is to abuse Call to Arms to summon lots of incredibly overpowered 2 drops and just overrun your opponent in 4-6 turns. I'm already seeing format adaptations however, with Big Priest and Demonlock showing up with excesses of powerful, early game AOE to try and compete with Call to Arms.

[Cespenar]

5/9, Xol being crushed under by Big Beast Hunter. I did make what I thought was a fatal misplay by dropping Stampede Kodo instead of Tundra Rhino, but I survived and my next turn managed to force her quest to get discarded (50/50 chance). Without the portal she couldn't beat my discounted Zombeasts.

Tried Big Beast Hunter as well, lost to a round 6 Bramble-guy. The guy was dropping two biggies every turn, while it was only one for me (2 + 5 mana Zombeast). Not as broken as some of the other builds, IMO, but I might have played it wrong somehow too.

[Hamste]

I managed to beat the run with the luckiest unlucky mage. My very first pick was double battlecry because mage has some good ones but I ended up getting only 3 battlecries that work with it from the draft. I also got the hilt of a sword I drew once, small packs and an adapt wand right before the final boss that got milled with out ever being used.

I started off by picking Kazakus (yay double battlecries) and Reno in my first two picks. Then every pick after had a duplicate. I managed to get 2 Antonidas and a Frost Jaina (no elementals beyond that pick though but double battlecry) but the deck had nothing else notable about it and no real synergy. I managed to barely beat the 2 bosses before the final one (one of which involved me having to top deck Reno Jackson with no duplicates in my deck so I could ping the 11 health boss down to 10, survive their full board of attacks and then pyroblast them the next turn).

Then I get the final boss and it is the discard one. I get Jaina in my opening hand and keep it because I realized I could not afford to have it discarded. Somehow, despite about a half of my deck being milled, I also managed to draw both my Antonidas, Kazakus and Reno. By the time I got milled I was down to both my Antonidas, an arcane missiles and a frost lance in hand while they were still close to full health. Thanks to my elemental healing, their dreadsteed (guaranteed 2 mana 3/6 every turn) and fire balls I managed to slowly roll over them in the next 7 turns of fatigue.

It was a pretty bad deck over all but because it was against the mill guy who has a weak deck and I got all my good cards, I managed to pull it through.

[Spore]

I managed to beat the run with the luckiest unlucky mage.

Yeah? Well I lost with possibly the best Reno Mage ever! Take that!

[Cespenar]

Somehow drew the fight long enough with my Silver Hand pally v2 against The Darkness so that he fatigued to death while I had 2 hp left. Fun times. Oh, also had 5 Equalities in deck, so maybe that helped.

It's almost cheesy, though, the way that guy has almost every board clear imaginable to mankind. Built the board so many times just to have it twisting nethered, and psychic screamed, and so on.

[Seerow]

Somehow drew the fight long enough with my Silver Hand pally v2 against The Darkness so that he fatigued to death while I had 2 hp left. Fun times. Oh, also had 5 Equalities in deck, so maybe that helped.

It's almost cheesy, though, the way that guy has almost every board clear imaginable to mankind. Built the board so many times just to have it twisting nethered, and psychic screamed, and so on.

In that fight Psychic Scream actually usually helped me. Gave me the edge in the fatigue battle (the only way I've beaten him without perma-stealth), and in several cases let me double up on big battlecries (read: Jades). Twisting Nether bothered me way more than the scream ever did. Oh and MC. Screw MC.

[ShinyRocks]

That was fun. I'd taken the 'copy a minion and also add one to your deck' treasure. I was up against the Super-Poisonous guy with the spores. I was losing the battle - there were more spores than I could clear so I was definitely dead next turn.

He'd given one of his spores Mark of the Wild, so it had taunt. I copied it, but was still gonna die - he had enough minions to clear it and still send a spore at me. He had that Druid minion that gives you +2 attack on Inspire. He hero powered, and attacked the Taunt spore, and promptly died.

Sadly I didn't get to use my copied spore to kill any other heroes for the rest of the run.

[Epinephrine_Syn]

That's sometimes true, sometimes not. But the thing that surprises me the most is that it's still week 1 of the expansion - I expect this to be the experimental phase, where just about everyone is running something that's heavy on the new cards, even if it's not a totally new archetype. Seems strange to run into so many that aren't.

I think it's a combination of A, people playing Dungeon and not experimenting as much, B, people just not having as much dust to experiment and most of the newer decks requiring another considerable dump, and most importantly C...

Raza Priest being a leviathan in the meta drowning out all other options. It's 100% assured to be top tier, Psychic Scream is an absolute "you lose" button against anything that isn't a combo deck or hyper aggro, and they've got lots of aggro answers already.

Really, a lot of people aren't gonna bother to experiment when the cost of experimenting is so high, and the Raza priest they'd already made last season is 99.7% going to be better than whatever they empty their dust vaults to try.

[tonberrian]

Man i wish rez spells were better. Any sort of targetted rez would be great, even a discover rez.

[Zevox]

Man i wish rez spells were better. Any sort of targetted rez would be great, even a discover rez.

...not sure if sarcastic or just haven't been playing much?

[Beelzebub1111]

Man i wish rez spells were better. Any sort of targetted rez would be great, even a discover rez.

Eternal Servitude is literally this.

[Mystic Muse]

Only class left to beat adventure mode with is Priest.

I take back what I said earlier about it not being fun, but it doesn't change that some of the classes are an uphill battle. It took me AGES to win with rogue.

[Rocks_Fall]

I really like how many different bosses there seems to be. I just encountered the two Silver Hand guys for the first time.

Spoiler: George and Karl

Show

I would have had a much tougher time against them if they kept Divinity as their hero power. Once they switched, it was much easier. I almost BM'd by destroying my board before taking Karl out, but decided not to at the last minute. When it switched back to George upon Karl's death, my jaw just about hit the floor. Cue Divine Shield trades his next turn, and I almost lose my entire board. Barely managed to stabilize the next few turns and still win.

[tonberrian]

...not sure if sarcastic or just haven't been playing much?

Not playing much <.<

[Zevox]

Not playing much <.<

Ah, alright. Well, there is exactly such a card, from the last expansion: Eternal Servitude. 4 mana, discover a friendly minion that died this game and summon it. It's currently a key card in Big Priest and tends to be in Raza Priest as well, and those are two of the best decks in the meta. Or at least, were before the new expansion hit - we're still too early in that to say for sure what the meta will be, although at least at the moment it doesn't seem like Raza Priest is going anywhere.

[ChaosOS]

I'm up to 5/9 dungeon runs cleared. Most recent victory was a double battlecry cthun druid. Stalled out Valestraz while I held onto the double turn artifact, then dropped a 37/37 C'thun and took an extra turn for easy lethal.

[The Glyphstone]

Epic awesomeness: Getting Treasure Vault as paladin and Equality-ing the board for a total clear of all 7.

Epic sadness: Getting Trapped Room as the very next encounter and being flattened.


Epic RNGenerosity: Flattening King Togwaggle with a swarm of invisible buffed Silver Hand tokens, I don't think he ever even got to attack me.

6/9. Warlock, Mage, and Priest still to go.