Hearthstone Players!

... and 2-4 for my next 6, losing to Control Mage, Cubelock (I dealt 52 dmg), Big Spell Priest (Yshaarj off FFA), Tempo Rogue. Close games, but I am losing to Taunts (Tar Creeper is back!) and buffs (Bonemare, Edwin van Cleef). I beat a different Big Spell Priest (with a savage topdeck) and a Quest Rogue whom I just hate. and they were emoting at me, so it was extra double good.

Ouch. Rough roads, man. Just out of curiosity. anything interesting about the Control Paladin deck you ran into? That's one of my all-time favorite deck types and I'm always interested to see new approaches.

On another topic, it's stunning how almost-uniquely suited Taldaram is to Warlock. You look at the decks that play Keleseth and they're often making a serious sacrifice to play that card. No Rogue deck likes to be without Backstab. But Warlock basically has no good cards at 3, except for a couple Zoo things, which wouldn't be playing Taldaram anyway.

Bloodfury Potion and Darkshire Councilman are still good Zoo/Demon cards. But otherwise there's Chittering Tunneler (bad), Drain Life (bad), Felguard (awful), Howlfiend (brutally awful), Sense Demons (bad), Shadow Bolt (marginal), Silverware Golem (bad), Spreading Madness (awful), Treachery (bad), Unlicensed Apothecary (awful), Unwilling Sacrifice (bad), Void Terror (bad.) Taldaram is easily better than any of those, even in more midrangey decks like Demon ones.

Last month I played a control Warlock and made it to Rank 6 -- enjoyable. I played with treachery (2x), howlfiend (1x), and doomsayer (2x) and it worked quite well. I also had Chittering Tunneler in there, but that wasn't anything to write home about.

This time, I switched it up to try to see if I can make lakkari sacrifice work before it cycles out. I went from Rank 19 to Rank 10 in short order with a ridiculous amount of discard (I had a 15/6 BloodQueen last night) that fakes looking like control Warlock. Now, at 10, I am basically playing 50% with the worst matchup being Cubelock.

There was nothing for me to see about Control Paladin, he was dead by turn 6 behind that massive Hyena. His late game Call to Arms got Pyro, Tar Creeper, and something else I don't recall. He had a shot if he had Rallying Blade early to facetank the then-small Hyena, but alas. I have seen Asmo running a bit of Control Paladin and even Zetalot played some right at the end of last season and they both play the Auctionmaster Beardo version that can Coin its way to the OTK off DK Uther.

Space Ghost wrote: Last month I played a control Warlock and made it to Rank 6 -- enjoyable. I played with treachery (2x), howlfiend (1x), and doomsayer (2x) and it worked quite well. I also had Chittering Tunneler in there, but that wasn't anything to write home about.

Yeah, that's the one deck where Treachery and Howlfiend can work. I'd definitely be interested in a list, though, if you still have it. I tried that deck but never seemed to get the cards line up properly.

Jeb, that Call probably pulled Dirty Rat (Tar Creeper can't be pulled with it, because it costs 3.) I tried the OTK Beardo deck. I found it highly annoying. Too combo-y for me.

This weeks omnistone. 23:00ish Firebat starts talking about Hunter ( he plays Barnes spellhunter). 27:30 he starts talking about Silence and why it’s over teched to beat cubelock. Later on he gets into why Howlfiend is good in Demonlock (plays around divine favor). Basically he says everyone has overreacted to voidlord. That if you can beat Murloc Pally and Tempo Secret Mage, that is what is going to get you climbing.

I am not seeing nearly as many Secret Mages as he is though, bouncing around up here, but I have seen the shift to more Aggro over the last couple of days.

I switched to Silence Beast and played a set, going 4-7-1.

• 13.1 Control Mage W; just hero powered until Dragon’s Fury, got both Blocks, but who cares? No Silence impact
• 13.2 Spell Hunter W; he got tons of hits with a buffed Eaglehorn, but I had Highmane and Bittertide on curve. No Silence impact
• 13.4 Kingsbane Rogue L; I dc’d! Phone died. He was at 14, felt good, but those can go sideways fast if they find life gain.
• 13.3 Big Spell Druid L; He silenced my Highmane! I almost won after I silenced his Lich King. He was at 4 life at the end, despite Malfurion and Deathwing, Lich King, and Second-rate Bruiser Taunts.
• 13.2 Zoo Warlock L; just outpaced.
• 13.1 Control Lock D; I put him to 2, he put me to 1. We Silenced each other 5 times.
• 13.1 Call to Arms Pally W; DK Rexxar was solid here. Silenced a couple Taunts, but he was really far behind.
• 13.2 Control Priest L; I am not calling this “Thief Priest.” Fuck that. Good fight, but he highrolllllled into LEOKK + UNLEASH THE HOUNDS. Like, holy shit dude, that’s my job.
• 13.1 Cubelock L; Silenced Lackey, he gained 7 + 3 + 8 + 8 + 3, finished at 17, so I dealt 43. He Silenced my huge Taunt Beast of DK Rexxar. I misplayed a couple times, too. Ugh.
• 13.0 Control Lock W; I dealt 56 damage and had Silence in hand for the Voidlord.
• 13.1 Elemental Mage L; so dead once DK Jaina hits. A solid fight, but Poly on the Bittertide was bad and the Glyph into Glyph into Volcanic Potion to kill my decent boards was worse.
• 13.0 Control Druid? All over the place. Maybe just really bad Jade? W. I Silenced Taunts.
• 13.1 Call to Arms Pally L; overrun by shit that would be killed by DK Rexxar.

I think the lesson I learned is... Hunter is done at this moment. (I don't have Yshaarj for Spell Hunter.) I saw Secret Mage I think once in 25 games or so during this whole swing, certainly not Firebat's 20%.

Still playing Cubelock mostly and really enjoying it. Except I ran into the Barnes Hunter who pulled out his 29 stats of minions on Turn 3 so I just quit. That's completely broken but I imagine it won't get patched before Barnes cycles.

Anyway, next game I had a sterling demonstration of why Cubelock is fun and challenging to play: it lets you plan ahead more than many other decks. I was facing Murloc Paladin - not the best matchup. But I'd kept hanging in there. As we join the match, I'm on about 15 health with The Skull in play and he's building a board full of Murlocs. One of them is a Hydrologist, and I can guess the secret is Repentance.

I only have a Voidlord, pulled out by The Skull, and a Lackey but I know where this is going: Sunkeeper Tarim.

I've got a Doomguard still in my hand and one in my deck - but I also have Hellfire and a Cube in my hand. Let him play Sunkeeper Tarim.If he does, I'll still have 9 life left to respond. And I know exactly what to do.

He does. So he kills the Voidlord, all three of the Voidwalkers, and pummels my face to within an inch of my life. I imagine he's sitting back, scenting victory. Right until The Skull pulls out the Doomguard, as the only option it can. So I hit Sunkeeper with it, then Cube it. The Cube is reduced to 1 health by Repentance, so I Hellfire, which wipes the board. That includes the weakened Cube and the Lackey, so I now have 3 Doomguards on the board, which pummel his face to within an inch of his life.

He threatens, and plays the only card left in his hand, Call to Arms, which summons two Righteous Protectors, buying him - he presumes - another turn to draw a weapon or something and take me out. Except my Cubelock deck runs two Spellbreakers, and I have them both. Game OVER!

So I have been killing myself trying to master Control Warlock. I have as many games with that deck as the rest combined since new expansion and especially post nerf. Lately it has been kicking my ass and I feel I have regressed and make more mistakes than ever. Typically,it’s not seeing the silence/ Leeroy kind of lethal jeopardy I am underestimating, while I am blithely playing out Rin seals to blow up my opponents deck. My hugest error was over time tuning my deck to my tastes, then watching Cifka steam his control lock, and then throwing mine away in favor of his. The biggest difference is Plated Beetle vs Tar Creeper. I don’t think Beetle is correct after trying it for 25 or more games.
1- Mixtress is solid turn one play against anything other than priest if you go first, then you want to be tapping to get the health off mixtress rattle on 2 not playing a 2 drop.
2- VS aggro I would much rather be tapping towards AOE, spellstone, lackey than playing 2/3.
3- 3 health minion doesn’t do much for your defile chain, the most common minion butt must be 3. Whereas tar creeper totally messes up early Murloc beast and mage minions, if they get thru it they leave themselves open to defile most times.
4- 2 attack doesn’t kill anything that mixtress couldn’t have killed already
5- When you play a late Nzoth you want to get all your Voidaddies. Plated Beetle puts your natural pool from 7 minions to 9 and if you Guldan before you could get as many as 4 Voidaddies. Don’t piss in my rez pool.
*I would love to hear your feedback on my logic if you have any thoughts on this.

The main reason I was inspired to write today was that I found a real fun deck that is working and I thought to share it. Yoink Priest. Not sure if the deck is officially named, I am not the originator. I mentioned couple of days ago a deck I heard about that took your opponents stuff, then I saw Asmodai streaming it yesterday. I made my version of it and it is doing great. It’s just super disgusting control priest for the most part that is disguised in dragon shell. Your win condition is taking the game deep by getting and keeping control of the board... it’s almost never correct to go face I think. You just keep trading and holding the board and they run out of stuff. My recent failures with Controlock have seen me fall back to 10, so you see some weird non-tier stuff there as everyone fucks off at the plateau. My sample size is not huge but I have beaten Grumble Jade shaman, Spiteful Druid, Nzoth Control Mage, Spiteful Zoolock, Tempo Mage. The tempo mage was particularly noteworthy. I traded and Duskbreakered away all his early minions. I picked up counterspell to counter his counterspell. Dragons absorb explosive runes pretty well. Priest of the feast heals me up. Mid game I am at 30 health. He plays Aluneth. I Anduin. I focus on killing all his minions knowing he had to fireball down some dragons already. He dies in fatigue. The deck can do some nutty things. Elise and Vision out some packs for late game VALUE. Pint sized potion is sweet when you have couple of minions on board and they play something you want to trade into and keep your guys alive. I had almost always used it in combo for clear before. Mind Control especially when you already have the board is nuts. And of course the Twilight Acolyte/ Cabal Shadow Priest combo is the dream. Voidlords.... hello? Part of the reason it works, I feel, is because it’s not really a deck people have on their radar... yet, so I don’t think they know what you are trying to do until you have already done it.

Anyhow here is the deck. Check it out... so fun.
### Steal your girl
# Class: Priest
# Format: Standard
# Year of the Mammoth
#
# 1x (0) Silence
# 2x (1) Northshire Cleric
# 2x (1) Pint-Size Potion
# 2x (1) Power Word: Shield
# 2x (2) Netherspite Historian
# 2x (2) Shadow Visions
# 2x (3) Curious Glimmerroot
# 2x (3) Twilight Acolyte
# 2x (4) Duskbreaker
# 2x (4) Priest of the Feast
# 1x (4) Shadow Word: Horror
# 2x (4) Twilight Drake
# 2x (5) Drakonid Operative
# 1x (5) Elise the Trailblazer
# 2x (6) Cabal Shadow Priest
# 1x (8) Shadowreaper Anduin
# 2x (10) Mind Control
#
AAECAa0GBKUJoawCz8cCkNMCDQiQAuUEjQjyDJK0AoK1Arq7Aui/AtHBAtnBAsvmAvzqAgA=
#

Love it. Priest is the best. I have played a few games in Wild, this deck:
### Unfair
# Class: Mage
# Format: Wild
#
# 2x (1) Mana Wyrm
# 2x (2) Arcanologist
# 2x (2) Frostbolt
# 2x (2) Mad Scientist
# 2x (2) Medivh's Valet
# 2x (2) Primordial Glyph
# 2x (3) Arcane Intellect
# 2x (3) Counterspell
# 2x (3) Duplicate
# 1x (3) Explosive Runes
# 2x (3) Kirin Tor Mage
# 1x (3) Mirror Entity
# 2x (4) Fireball
# 1x (5) Azure Drake
# 1x (5) Loatheb
# 2x (6) Kabal Crystal Runner
# 1x (7) Dr. Boom
# 1x (8) Ragnaros the Firelord
#
AAEBAf0EBsMB9gK5BvoOnhCP0wIMcbsClQOrBJYF7AX3DYkO17YCh70CwcECmMQCAA==

And the last three games have seen my opponent concede on the turn after I Loatheb them. Loatheb is amazing. Folks new to the game that ever want to get into Wild? You need Loatheb.

I just found out it may be called Paper Ninja Priest. The author. I just beat Miracle rogue that put 12 spiders in his deck. Yoinked Edwin. He had 5 cards left when he died so I probably beat at least 10 spiders. Pint sized /horror and double duskbreaker co-MVP

Sweet. Will try. Meanwhile, Control Warrior seems to be making a comeback. Here's my latest encounter with Frogs: hsreplay.net/replay/TpRKHKVYg4KSF7NumuhcVh

Brrloc, FTfuckingW.

One win away from Rank 10 in Wild now. Mostly on the back of Unfair posted above. Lots of flex in that deck, and I think the mix of Secrets and disruption is just about perfect. Duplicate returns my cheating BS like Kirin Tor Mage, Mirror Entity sets up trades or better, Explosive is undercosted and gross, and coupling Counterspell into Loatheb is like two Time Walks against some popular decks.

That said, I ran into a Paladin this AM that undid me, so I played a game of Giants Warlock and queued into a Control Warlock leveraging Voidcaller over Demonic Lackey, but the rest was Standard. We played out all the demons. SO MANY DEMONS. Voidcallers, Doomguards, Voidloards, Void Walkers galore, BOTH N'Zoth's BOTH Gul'dans... it was insane. Went o fatigue, where he was two cards ahead (he Geisted his own Dark Pacts?) and I still had Naga Sea Witches to pound him out. Crazy game.

//made it Rank 10! Had to fight off a Druid to punch through. Mirror Entity and stole his Sylvanas to punch through.

Heh. I had a game this afternoon that went for over a half hour, Quest Mage without the combo vs. Quest Priest. I finally had to concede because I had to make an appointment, but I'm pretty sure he had me, anyway.

Even better was the win last night with Big Priest vs "Minionless" Hunter. We both got our high roll with Barnes, but I had SWD to follow-up and he, well, didn't.