by hsdecktech - 6 years ago     show comments

Witchwood is nearly upon us, so we only have one more day to theorycraft fun, interesting, and/or OP decks before reality kicks in and potentially ruins all our fun. Theorycrafting is one of my favorite parts of any card game, so you know I had to share some of the lists I’m most hyped about for tomorrow. On top of that, these might help inform your own decisions about what to build and what that crazy day 1 meta will look like.

As this set comes with a Standard rotation, Standard decks are much more interesting for theorycrafting at the moment than are Wild decks, so I’ll be highlighting Standard only this time around. I won’t be featuring some of the less interesting theorycrafts, but some of those less interesting decks may well be the most powerful decks in the new meta. Slow Warlock, which will look very similar to pre-rotation and likely remain towards the top of the meta, is one such example. I also like Rush Warrior, but it feels like it mostly builds itself, so it’s not the most interesting deck to theorycraft. So, without further ado, here are some of the more interesting decks I’m excited to try out tomorrow!

[wcp_deck id=”24604″]

Shudderwock Combo-Control

Shudderwock is probably the most hyped card and deck from the Witchwood, and something like this might just be why. The deck works by stalling the game (while sprinkling in some relevant Battlecries) until you can Shudderwock to hit your opponent in the face multiple times with Lifedrinker/Nightblade and give yourself multiple, 1-cost Shudderwock copies with Saronite Chain Gang, Grumble, and/or Zola to repeat the process until they die. The specifics are all a bit in the air right now, as all the pros are clamoring to find *the* list in what feels just like the time when Patron Warrior and Cubelock were being developed.

If history has taught us anything it is that combo-control decks are very powerful. Patron Warrior, Razakus, and Leeroy-P.O.-Faceless Control Warlocks were each so strong in their respective times that they dominated tournament play and demanded nerfs from Team 5 (Cubelock falls into the same boat, but, to some peoples’ dismay, has not been nerfed). I’m really interested to see if this deck has that same pedigree.

[wcp_deck id=”24603″]

Odd Hunter

Make Hunters go face again! This deck abuses to upgraded Baku hero power and classic aggressive minions to put a quick clock on its opponents. There’s not too much more than that to say about it. The deck is simple and cheap, and it takes Hunter back to its roots, so I expect to see a lot of this come tomorrow.

[wcp_deck id=”24605″]

Elemental Control Mage

I was a bit lower on Book of Specters than was OtakuMZ in our Power Rankings, but that was more because I saw that it would only have very niche uses than because of its power level. In the right deck, of course, he power level is crazy high! Is this the right deck? Can Control Mage exist without some of its classic “core” spells? (Incidentally, I followed Kremepuff’s lead in putting two Polymorph in because there is only a small chance of hitting it with Book of Specters, it synergizes with the rest of the deck, and I expect to see a lot of Warlocks that need Polymorphing).

I should note that I also have my eyes on “Odd Mage,” some pros are talking about reviving Quest Mage, and OtakuMZ is pretty high on a more tempo-based Elemental Mage, so there’s lots of options for Mage to rebound after losing a lot of core Secret Mage cards.

[wcp_deck id=”24606″]

Spiteful Priest Redux: Now with More Winning on Turn 6!

OtakuMZ was initially sour on Lady in White, but came around hard when he saw some of the beefier minions towards the end of the reveal season. Now he rates her even higher than I do! He thinks she would also do really well in a control shell, which also makes a lot of sense because it means you only have to run one dedicated “finisher” (her), and she converts the rest of your stall cards (Primordial Drakes, Obsidian Statues, etc.) into finishers as well, in the same way that the original Elise worked in Control Warrior. I’m highlighting Spiteful Priest instead because I love Spiteful Priest, because I can call it “Lady in Spite,” and because more aggressive decks tend to do better in early metas whereas control decks tend to take a while to get sorted out.

I also really like the various clever deckbuilding challenges Spiteful Priest presents (and redundancies and synergies created by the new build-around cards). I’m not sure if we want to stick with the dragon package (featured) to make Duskbreaker work, or if we’d rather switch to a Countess Ashmore package using more of the new cards, but I’ll be trying both. Finally, it should be noted that a lot of the “bad” 10-casting cost Spiteful rolls have rotated, so Spiteful Summoner seems to get even stronger in the new meta (unless it is fully countered by Voodoo Doll or something).

Hopefully that’s enough to get you started! Make sure you have the latest version of the game downloaded and ready to go for tomorrow, as we expect an early launch schedule. I’ll probably try to sneak some games during lunch or something, so I’ll see you out there!