Following our Comprehensive Preview for Reign of the Black Empire, it is time for theorycrafting. We recommend reading the Preview to understand the reasons for our card choices in this article.
Our first Data Reaper Report for Reign of the Black Empire is scheduled for Thursday, October 29th!
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Remember that while we have extensively worked to produce the featured decks, they are still untested, and nothing can replace the post-launch refinement that is backed up by real-time game experience and data.
If you have a limited collection, we highly recommend that you DO NOT make big crafting investments on any theory-crafted deck. Wait at least a few days to see what strategies end up being strong and fun before making a significant commitment.
The Old Gods are waiting (we lied again, there are 47 lists).
Blood-Ctrl Death Knight decks are receiving a large incentive to run triple Blood runes due to various payoffs.
Bloodfiend is a powerful early-game board clear, but one that requires corpse support. Triple Blood does not have access to Morbid Swarm, so we think there is a case for running Body Bagger in these decks. Scion is not just here to find us a Blood rune card either. A Reborn on 2 is helpful to a turn 4 Bloodfiend.
Fetid Devourer and G’huun encourage a higher Blood rune count in all our cards, so we have tried to fit Blood rune cards that are currently considered borderline choices but have good Blood rune rates, such as Sanguine Infestation and Hematurge. Herald Death Knight is suited to accommodate G’huun since both Obsessive Technician and Experimental Animation are double Blood.
Despite being a very defensive deck, Herald Death Knight is minion-dense. This makes Y’Shaarj trivial to activate. It can act as both a board clear and a finisher, fitting in with this deck’s propensity to summon large minions.
G’huun Blood-Ctrl Death Knight
Blood-Ctrl Death Knight can opt to cut the Herald finishers for a much more lethal win condition: The Deios/G’huun combo. If we can upgrade G’huun to steal a large amount of health, we can double its battlecry with Deios to OTK every opponent in the game. This OTK completely bypasses armor, as the opponent dies with 0 health no matter how much armor it has. We just need a high G’huun health count so that we can execute the OTK through the opponent’s board.
There are two important enablers: A high Blood rune count in our cards so that we scale G’huun as quickly as possible, and Mother to discount Deios and G’huun. Another possible combo enabled by Mother in this deck is Deios/Husk, which represents a massive recovery turn in case we need to stabilize and do not require the primary combo to win.
The addition of the Old Gods offers so many opportunities for classes to access new win conditions. We expect quite a bit of late-game chaos at launch. One combo that is available to all classes is the Murozond/Yogg combo. We play Murozond and Yogg together, then Murozond gains its infinite attack before Yogg’s turn starts. The Old God should spot lethal and finish the opponent off for us. To discount them, we need Mother again.
The structure of this deck is drastically different. Since we do not need G’huun, we do not need a high Blood rune count. Instead, we opt for a cheaper, more defensive curve. There is no need to be greedy when our finisher deals infinite damage. Survive and draw is the name of the game.
Crystalline Golem is a generic defensive card that can find its way into lists without any special synergies. In many other lists in this article, it provides more value.
Fleshshape Handbuff Death Knight
Fleshshape is a great card for Handbuff Death Knight, perfectly timed just before Nerubian Swarmguard. Scion of Insight is a fantastic card in general, but it has more value in this deck, as two of its keywords (rush, lifesteal) scale well with buffs.
Another important piece is Unstable Prototype. This is going to be an extremely common 1-drop for many decks, including Handbuff decks. The tricky part is activating its 0-attack body. It can be done with handbuffs, but if we drop it to the board on turn 1, we can utilize the help of other enablers.
The best one is Blood Doctor Thal’ena. The legendary allows us to effortlessly buff both Prototype bodies without spending cards. Gruesome Nightmare and Defias Smuggler are alternative activators.
Demon Hunter has plenty to experiment with when it comes to new win conditions. Tentacle Lash should be a strong activator for C’Thun, as it is worth two ticks in one card and has immediate impact on the first swing. The rest of the shell is dedicated to survival and complements C’Thun with Broxigar.
Demon Hunter gained meaningful tools to fend off aggression and stabilize. Sigil of Hatching and Encircle should always be fantastic enablers for Remnant of Rage, which we expect will become a more prominent draw engine for the class.
Other notable new cards are Attentive Tender and Hungering Cavern. Tender has potential to create a big swing with a 1-mana Assemble minion, while Hungering Caverns should be permanently discounted to 0 mana in this kind of deck.
The addition of Crystalline Golem means that Ravenous Felhunter has a new taunt to resurrect and copy. N’Zoth is the perfect top-end payoff for a deck that constantly summons deathrattle minions. A single Golem into Felhunter sequence can discount N’Zoth by 7 mana!
The issue with this deck is the absence of Tuskpiercer, which greatly improved consistency in finding Felhunter and its resurrection target. Without Tuskpiercer, we might as well run Ferocious Felbat and try to grind opponents to dust.
Crystalline Golem might unironically be a mulligan keep here, as it is essential to find it first before starting the resurrection chain.
The most intriguing win condition the class has received is Sha’kar. It is extremely powerful on paper, but extremely difficult to activate. The ideal setup would be a Sigil of Hatching into Grubs from Gorishi Stingers or Insect Claw. If the opponent refuses to develop minions that we can trade into, we can complete the ‘quest’ by killing our own summoned rush minions with Broxigar’s Last Stand.
Once we do manage to activate Sha’kar, this deck possesses insane levels of lethality. Encircle becomes 15 damage in charge minions. Illidari Inquisitor can deal 16. Sigil of Hatching and Horn of Feasting become cracked. Every Grub we summon can go face.
Titanic Thrasher makes a lot of sense in this deck too. Early game, it can help us respond to a board-flooding deck, while later it becomes a 6/6 charge with windfury. We think that even Control Warrior might struggle to deal with the amount of damage a Demon Hunter can dish out with this deck.
Void Demon Hunter can run the class’ new defensive package too. The additional removal spells mean that we can significantly reduce the minion count in the deck, to the point Xavius always finds Irida. Irida is the strongest card for the archetype, so there is an incentive to go this direction. It was not possible before due to the inadequate spell quality available.
Thanks to ramp access, Druid should be a strong class at accommodating Old Gods. We believe that Merithra Druid has gained some tools that merit re-exploration of the archetype, both for its early-game survivability and its late-game prowess.
Aetherial Kindling is a fantastic early-game swing card for the class that puts us ahead. Crystalline Golem offers great follow-up to the turn 2 Acceleration Aura. We are curious about Bloatray in Druid too. It is a cheap stalling minion in a deck with a very high curve. Dumping it to the board and forcing the opponent to spend resources on it sounds like a good idea, especially since Druid does not have good single-target removal and can benefit from the pre-emptive move.
At the top end, we add Y’Shaarj alongside Lady Azshara. It should be relatively easy for us to activate Y’Shaarj’s immunity since we run a bunch of expensive minions. Our plan is to play Y’Shaarj and use its 5-mana discount ability to play Zin-Azshari on the same turn (we can also set it up earlier, but the point is we do not have to). We then copy Y’Shaarj and have each copy gain each other’s stats. If the opponent does not have non-targeted mass removal, they lose the game on the spot. If they do have mass removal, we can still win with Merithra.
Another Old God we can build around is N’Zoth. Ammunae is a natural fit for a late-game-oriented N’Zoth Druid deck, as each of them wants the deck to be built in similar fashion. Deathblossom and Crystalline Golem have great synergy with both, as they are strong N’Zoth discounters as well as powerful follow-ups to Ammunae.
This deck’s game plan is to turtle up and overwhelm or fatigue opponents. We want to find Ammunae as soon as possible and double the value in our deck. Our armor potential is high thanks to Underking and Forgefiend.
One trick the deck can execute is copying N’Zoth with Gemstone Hoarder post-Ammunae. If we discard N’Zoth with Hoarder after playing Ammunae, we will have two copies of Hoarders in play that each generate a N’Zoth in their deathrattles.
The fatigue win condition is possible thanks to Meadowstrider. Post-Ammunae, playing Meadowstrider pressures the opponent and makes sure we never hit fatigue, as we are shuffling two Meadowstriders to the bottom of the deck for each one we play.
This is an attempt to incorporate the Beast package into Attack Druid. The payoff card that makes sense for both archetypes is Primordial Bear. Surprisingly, we do not need to cut particularly crucial cards in Attack Druid to fit in the Beast package. Our attempts to theorycraft a dedicated Handbuff Beast deck were not to our liking.
This deck wins by overwhelming the opponent with large minions, whether they were buffed in hand or summoned by Infest the Scullery. Seismopod offers some redundancy in late-game scaling, but Freya remains the priority card to find. Once we do, the entire deck’s minion package becomes massive and difficult to clean up.
The prospect of N’Zoth in aggressive decks is intriguing, as these decks can spam deathrattle minions and discount N’Zoth faster. N’Zoth offers massive reload for a deck that looks to pressure.
Aggressive decks also gain the immense potential of Vaultkeeper, a board-centric win condition that each of these decks should look to run. It allows the Druid to cut board buffs based on spells, such as Overheat.
A minion-dense deck is an opportunity to take advantage of Efflorescence as a tutor. The only other spell in the deck is Wildwood Circle. We know it is an extremely powerful card for the archetype, so its doubled effect could represent a checkmate on the opponent.
The Mech tribe is taking center stage in the Hunter class, and this build is an attempt to incorporate all of the synergies available to this archetype. The core idea is to have multiple good targets for Overdrive, the free spell we generate from Tinker and Flamespitter. This results in sticky boards that make Bombardment, Mimiron and Vaultkeeper consistent.
Unstable Prototype is the top priority for Overdrive, especially if we have Augmented Porcupine or Tank Regiment in hand. Porcupine is a decent target, since we buff its attack value. Ticking Timebomb can help us clear two minions in one go. Vaultkeeper is great if we can immediately sack it to trigger the deathrattle.
Tank Regiment is a unique threat as it can produce a ton of stats on board, but even if it gets cleanly cleared, it deals a lot of damage to the opponent through its deathrattle. Add a Bombardment alongside Reload and this deck can deal a lot of off-board damage while keeping the opponent at bay.
A different approach is to lighten up on the mech synergies and add cheaper deathrattles, with the purpose of supporting N’Zoth. This leads to a more swarmy deck that primarily wins through Vaultkeeper connections.
N’Zoth is a versatile Old God that can either support our pressure plan or respond to the opponent. Call of N’Zoth and Army of N’Zoth can summon a massive board. Domain of N’Zoth and Mastery of N’Zoth can combine to clear an opponent’s board.
N’Zoth can take Hunter down a very different path. This build maintains a high count of deathrattle minions for the purpose of discounting N’Zoth but adds Gemstone Hoarder alongside Sewer Swimmer. The goal is to discard N’Zoth with Hoarder and then trigger Hoarder’s deathrattle with Swimmer.
We then use the N’Zoth we generated with Swimmer to trigger Hoarder’s deathrattle twice through Mastery of N’Zoth. This generates us more copies of N’Zoth which we use again on Hoarder. The result is a board and a hand full of N’Zoth copies.
It is entirely possible that this turn alone is enough to win most matchups. However, should we need a more lethal finisher to beat slower decks with strong removal and life gain, we suggest running Bonechill Stegodon as a contraband option from King of the Underbelly.
A bunch of free copies of N’Zoth double triggering Stegodon’s deathrattle should deal enough burst damage to finish even the most defensive opponents. Since we value tutoring both N’Zoth and King of the Underbelly, running Taelan may not be the worst idea.
This deck’s finishing potential is deadly. The question is whether it can survive to that point.
We think Mage has received the strongest set this expansion and it could help rejuvenate the class. The addition of Discs of Norgannon heavily warps deckbuilding, encouraging us to run a small package of minions to tutor our win conditions. This concept repeats itself in all our Mage decks.
For Burn Mage, the prospect of soft tutoring Archmage Kalec sounds amazing. Joining him is Icebelt Magi, a must-include minion in any Mage archetype going forward. We decided to run Tunnelling Geomancers as they can help us execute burst damage turns to finish off defensive opponents. This is particularly important if we have played Kalec before we got to cast Contraband Wands.
While Burn Mage can deal a lot of burst damage, the class’ board development capabilities have drastically improved. Astral Rain makes Spellweaver’s Brilliance more consistent. Constellar’s Calling can amplify the deck’s board swings through various means. Foreboding Freeze and Thaw From Ice are strong enablers for it. Remember that Cosmic Springs refreshes enough mana to cast Constellar’s Calling whenever we want to.
We are highly interested in a Summoner Mage concept, an archetype built to scam massive threats and win primarily through the board. We are featuring two builds with a similar principle but note that they are not necessarily distinct. It is entirely possible that a competitive Summoner Mage deck will end up a hybrid of the two or run a different combination of minions.
The first build prioritizes explosiveness, with Isiset representing its top end-threat. The game plan with Isiset is to drop it on turn 6 and thaw the Constructs as early as turn 7. Remember that the Constructs can attack the moment they thaw, so they can instantly win the game.
There are two ideal turn 7 plays following Isiset. Casting both copies of Arrival of the Titans, along with a 3-mana spell, gets the job done. Alternatively, we set up Cosmic Springs before playing Isiset. On turn 7, we play Arrival of the Titans, spend 7 mana on other spells and then click Cosmic Springs to refresh 2 mana to spend it on another spell. This gets us to 15 mana.
If we cannot thaw the Constructs on turn 7, it is happening on turn 8, so we can cast Constellar’s Calling on a Construct in the meantime.
Another minion that might be very powerful in this kind of deck is Khadgar. It is extremely powerful with every summoning card in the deck, so it should always be useful in some capacity.
The issue with the Isiset build is that it can lose to hard removal. A Shadow Word: Ruin or another board wipe can counter our Construct game plan. This has led us to make a slightly different, alternative take, one that prioritizes longevity with Jailhouse Manastorm.
Deep Freeze is a very strong card in a Manastorm deck, so we have prioritized it over Spellweaver’s Brilliance. The other card we have added is Eternal Firebolt, which provides us with sustain and persistent board development.
As we noted earlier, it is possible that the optimal build will find some balance between these two approaches. Perhaps we want to run Isiset and Manastorm in the same deck. The goal of these two builds is to help us figure it out.
All the Leyline enablers are minions, so an early Discs of Norgannon can help us find all of them before we draw the Leylines themselves. This solves a major inconsistency issue with the archetype, making Discs of Norgannon an incredible mulligan target.
Another boost for the deck is the addition of Constellar’s Calling, which is very strong with Crystallized Leyline, the primary payoff of the archetype.
We will be surprised if Paladin drastically changes from its current identity. Pure Paladin will mostly look at a few upgrades to its defensive and offensive capabilities.
Sun’s Reckoning is potentially a win condition in faster matchups. We run Dragonscale Armaments to tutor Final Reckoning. Try to save Armaments for when you cast Sun’s Reckoning, as it is otherwise a 1-mana draw a spell.
At the top end, Halls of Origination is an incredible Ursol target, bringing the legendary back to the archetype after a period of hiatus. This combo is strong in every matchup, as it is both a stabilizer with massive healing potential and a source of damage and threats. Halls of Origination is significantly stronger than Renewing Flames.
To make space for the new cards, we drop Violet Treasuregil, which does not mesh well with Reckoning/Armaments. It is possible that Treasuregill still proves to be better than Armaments or is run alongside it. Other cuts involve the End of Turn package, which is currently the weaker part of the archetype.
There are two final slots in the deck that we would experiment with. Sandcrafter is a solid 2-drop that can discover a minion with some swing potential. We can also greed up the deck further with Amitut and Rajh.
An alternative, bold take drops the Pure package for Yogg. The idea behind Yogg is that it is a strong follow-up to Ursol or Gelbin, as it can give our summoned minions charge, or an unanswered board Windfury.
Since we must give up the Pure package, we keep the End of Turn package with Inspiring Maul. Sandcrafter is a bit stronger when Inspiring Maul stays in the deck.
How do we maximize the value of Amitut? By creating a deck filled with high-value Holy spells that are strong when turned into cast when drawn versions. We run a small minion package with Xavius, so that we are guaranteed to find Rajh, Amitut and Ursol from the discover options.
The low minion count and high Holy spell density supports the utilization of Humble Judgment and Oathbinder’s Aura, while the deck’s passive early game merits Lightcaller.
The game plan is to find Amitut as soon as possible, play her and then draw cards. Halls of Origination, Immortalized in Stone and Chronological Aura represent crazy value from Amitut. Dragonscale Armaments can help us pull these spells out of our deck. It is not just a Final Reckoning tutor here.
Aggro Paladin can almost turn Humble Judgment into a consistent buff card, with many minions that gain stats when set to 2/2’s. Unstable Prototype has multiple buffs available to it, but it can also be activated by Abusive Sergeant or Elven Archer.
Like all board-centric aggressive decks, Vaultkeeper is a major boost to Aggro Paladin’s toolkits.
The addition of cheap Shadow spells in this set is a potential boost to the quest completion capabilities of Quest Priest. This archetype has been stuck running some mediocre spells to further its game plan until now.
With Elder Word: Flay, Elder Word: Foresight and Entropic Rift, the Shadow spell package becomes drastically superior, allowing Quest Priest to spend less mana before it can merge Life’s Breath and Death’s Touch. It is not complicated: a quest deck that can complete its quest faster, is going to be more powerful.
While there are other minions this archetype can potentially utilize, we think the faster pace in which we can complete the quest now means we would like to keep our minion pool curated to fish Specter Specialist or Raith Van Geist off Xavius.
The exciting build-around card of this Priest set is undoubtedly Blade of the Black Empire. It provides inevitability to a class whose late-game strategies have desperately missed it. This weapon encourages us to run a heavy package of Shadow spells to maintain maximum uptime. We want to cast a Shadow spell every turn once Blade is equipped.
The availability of Dark Deacon connects the Shadow spell package to C’Thun. It is a good idea to run a secondary win condition alongside Shadow Blade for two reasons: Rustrot Viper and the absence of a Shadow Blade tutor. In games we do not draw Shadow Blade early or have it destroyed; we can still win with C’Thun.
It is possible to build a Shadow Blade deck more aggressively, but we think it might be counterintuitive. Shadow Blade wants us to prolong the game to scale its fatigue damage. Equipping it early and casting spells means we do not have mana to develop minion pressure. This is why we run a more defensive, removal-based package in this build.
A Blade deck should probably run a small Imbue package, as it can help us find more Shadow spells in a pinch.
This is a slight tweak on the previous build, in which we do not give up Medivh or Medivh’s Triumph, sacrificing a bit of Shadow Blade support in the process. This variant would make sense if we could not afford to drop Medivh’s Triumph due to fast-paced board-flooding decks, which might be common, as it is such a powerful AOE when complemented by the uncompleted quest. Medivh the Hallowed is also a very strong fabled card that excels at wiping late-game boards.
We just wanted to showcase the adjustments that are possible if these cards ended up being too important for Priest’s survival.
Should C’Thun not prove to be a worthwhile secondary win condition, we could take a slower and more defensive route, utilizing Shadow Blade as the secondary win condition. The primary win condition in this build is attrition, with Shadow Blade accommodated in a familiar Control Priest shell of recent times. Blade is here to make sure we can win before the rapture.
We run the healing package as well as Medivh’s Triumph, with our priority being survival rather than perfectly supporting Shadow Blade with maximum uptime. There should not be issues with taking some fatigue damage if we successfully fend off pressure, since our healing capabilities are enormous.
What if both Shadow Blade and C’Thun flop? Control Priest might be in a sketchy situation in that scenario, but not all hope is lost. It can complement its existing Control Priest shell with an Old God. Y’Shaarj works well with Karazhan the Sanctum, thanks to its Might of Y’Shaarj ability. Alternatively, we could run Yogg instead, though we do not have a clear-cut guarantee of setting up a lethal board.
Note that Intertwined Fate could find us a second Y’Shaarj if the first one is dealt with. Mismatcher helps us spend mana on minions to activate Y’Shaarj’s immunity more consistently by the time we hit 10 mana.
One focus in the Rogue’s set is the Larva/Combo package. While Larvae can be supportive for every strategy, we first wanted to showcase a deck that treats them as the primary win condition. This requires us to build around Wandering Seeker and The Unknowable One.
The game plan of this deck is to accumulate as many combo minions in hand as possible, then play The Unknowable One. Every Larva in our hand becomes a 6/6, a sizeable threat that must be dealt with. We can chain combo cards alongside Wandering Seeker to swing the board or burst down the opponent’s hero. Larvae can also pair well with Maiev.
What could help this deck sustain pressure is Aqir Goliath. This minion is basically a 0 mana 4/5 that draws a card in this deck around the mid-game stages, without too much difficulty.
Rogue could be a very powerful class at utilizing Old Gods, with N’Zoth looking like a prime candidate to leverage in oppressive fashion. This deck excels at discounting N’Zoth thanks to the availability of strong deathrattle minions along with Everburning Phoenix. In this deck, Larva generation does not just help us discount Aqir Goliath, but Phoenix as well.
Agent of N’Zoth has plenty of strong copy targets and should be a consistent play on turn 2. Crystalline Golem provides healing for Rogue, a rarely accessible commodity.
Once N’Zoth is discounted, this deck’s late-game value potential is enormous. We can bounce N’Zoth with Web of Deception. We can double trigger a Drest’agath deathrattle to generate more Old Gods. If one of those is N’Zoth, we can go again and keep the value chain going. It is entirely possible to generate a horde of Old Gods with this deck, which should be extremely difficult to outlast for any deck.
Since the deck has six deathrattle minions, Drest’agath is not guaranteed to be resurrected by N’Zoth. We may want to avoid playing it until we can drop it alongside our first N’Zoth to guarantee the double trigger, depending on whether the matchup merits the absurd value generation.
The Larva package can complement Herald Rogue well. Aqir Goliath is a perfect 8-mana card to activate Elise with, as it costs no mana in practice. This archetype does not have much card draw, so there is a good chance it will welcome Goliath. Larvae are also good fodder to turn into coins with Agent of the Old Ones, which can accelerate our Mistress turn.
If you thought Rogue could use N’Zoth well, how about Yogg? Ayaya Rogue might be the archetype best positioned to OTK opponents with Yogg thanks to its ability to generate Jade coins. All we need to do is to play Aya, scale our Jade Golems, accumulate coins, then develop multiple sizeable Jade Golems on the Yogg turn. No need to worry about having enough mana to play Yogg when the most common card we play on a turn is the coin.
The larger Jade Golems can represent lethal and Yogg completely circumvents the opponent’s ability to respond to them. Fun and interactive.
The nastiness does not stop there. Mill Rogue is back on the menu. Rather than generating insane value, Rogue can divert its N’Zoth package to burn the opponent’s deck. Alongside Everburning Phoenix, we run a carefully curated deathrattle package of three other minions: Crystalline Golem, Prize Vendor and Disguised Operator. We replace the tutoring role of Drest’agath with The Kingslayers. One Operator must be played on our side of the board before executing the giga mill turn.
Once we discount N’Zoth to 0 mana, we can play it alongside Deios. We resurrect our 4 minions and then double trigger the deathrattle of Disguised Operator. This play alone causes our opponent to draw 8 cards. Run Operator into something and we go to 12. Bounce N’Zoth with Web of Deception before sacking Operator and we can cause our opponent to draw 20 cards. The last part is probably not necessary. We should bounce N’Zoth for board-developing purposes instead. Either way, the opponent’s deck is absolutely gone.
Mug Shaman gets a few very strong cards that fit the archetype well.
Unnatural Cold is going to be played by every Shaman deck that can run spells. It is a fantastic stalling card.
Shadow Sculpt comes online just when Mug’s hero power activates. Has huge potential for blowouts as early as turn 4, if you discover an 8-drop.
Eyemaul is a great board control weapon. Some players might think that it is in stiff competition with Tiny Pal. Just run them all and we will see if their performance diminishes.
With Zee Shaman, we are featuring two variants. The first featured build assumes the deck does not drastically change.
Unstable Prototype has great synergy with the Herald package and can be drawn by Holy Eggbearer. Vaultkeeper should be incredibly powerful in this deck with a battlecry well worth doubling up. Eyemaul is Eyemaul.
The second build incorporates the C’Thun package. There are three main reasons why C’Thun makes sense in Zee Shaman, even though we do not have access to Watch Over. One is that double triggering C’Thun minions makes up for the lower count of enablers. Two is that C’Thun abilities are worth doubling. Three is that C’Thun abilities are powerful in board-centric decks.
Domain of C’Thun is a cheaper Vaultkeeper. Servants of C’Thun makes a wide board. Glare of C’Thun is okay. Wrath of C’Thun helps control board or push face damage. Even if we never hit turn 10 to play C’Thun, these abilities are worth considering.
Making space for the C’Thun package is the difficult part. We dropped Hijacked Securitybot, as we might have too many buff cards and not enough board cards. Carrier Whelp is an easy decision, though it slows us down slightly. We also dropped Tiny Pal, as we have many turn 4 plays now. It is possible that Deathwing is the correct cut.
We view the Rainbow package as a complementary survivability package that can support a primary win condition, in this case Herald. Primus of Power develops big taunt bodies that can stop aggression or pressure. Scholar is an asymmetrical board wipe that swings the game impressively hard.
To activate the Rainbow cards, we need to cast two different spells. Nature spells are the easiest to hill, since they make up the strongest spell school in the class. Our focus needs to be on the number of non-Nature spells. We have 8 non-Nature spells in this deck, 6 of them coming from the Black Empire Set and then Flight of the Firehawk is utilized as a soft tutor.
A C’Thun deck fits in with the Rainbow package well, as Watch Over is a Shadow spell. We do not have tons of faith in Therazane, but she is worth trying. Most of our spells are very strong when doubled, especially Watch Over, which can genuinely burst opponents down.
We think Rituals are extremely powerful and should change the landscape for Warlock, potentially turning it into one of the strongest classes in the game. There are many ways we can approach Warlock in the new expansion, so we tried to cover a few directions while pointing at the flexibility that is available.
If we continue to value the Herald package, due to its late-game scaling and the utility of Cursed Chains, the featured build looks sensible. 4 Rituals should be enough to consistently activate Kith’ix. Annihilation remains our secondary win condition in faster matchups.
We can decide to incorporate an OTK package that consists of Mother, C’Thun and Bat Mask. It does not require us to activate C’Thun, as we can simply activate C’Thun with 2 of the 7 copies we summon to the board with Bat Mask. This combo deals a ridiculous amount of damage with Wrath of C’Thun but might be too clunky and greedy, as we are adding three dead cards to the deck. We can make space for them by dropping Stooge/Annihilation.
Alternatively, we replace the Herald package with a full C’Thun package, with the understanding that Rituals and C’Thun should be enough to win every matchup. The loss of Cursed Chains might genuinely be the primary drawback of this approach, since the card is so ridiculously strong but relies on enough Herald enablers to be consistent. Cutting corners on Herald cards drastically drops its performance.
Cutting the Herald package leads to more defensive stability and gives us more proactive plays in general.
With the availability of N’Zoth, a Big Demon Warlock deck may find some justification. N’Zoth has great synergy with Moragg. Rituals can improve our survivability and help us bridge into the Moragg turn. Kith’ix can make our demons even bigger.
Zoo Warlock has not felt closer to returning to a competitive level for a long time. The archetype has plenty of directions to take, including ones without Old Gods, but we opted for what looked like the most fun.
We have talked about how good N’Zoth might be in an aggressive deck, so the natural idea is to spam deathrattle minions. It is beneficial for Warlock to spam 1-drop deathrattles, as it is the cheapest way to discount N’Zoth and synergizes with several payoffs that encourage us to go low to the ground. Entropic Continuity is just waiting for a good board-flooding deck to arrive. Vaultkeeper leverages board control well.
Most importantly, Zakajz makes these 1-drops cost no mana, which means we can play it alongside all the 1-drops we have in hand on turn 4, threatening buffs the following turn. But we can also hold the free 1-drops and play them alongside OC91 Chariot, for a blowout miracle turn that churns through our deck and finds us a heavily discounted N’Zoth.
We run Rituals with Kith’ix for Ritual of Conquest, turning all our minions into giants. Despite the low curve, this deck has surprising late-game potential.
Zoo Warlock can opt for C’Thun as well. As we have said earlier, C’Thun offers good abilities for aggressive decks. The additional buffs are strong when we run sticky 1-drops such as Unstable Prototype or Twilight Egg.
Warrior’s set is a forceful attempt to put Control Warrior back on the map. It has been injected with a big toolkit meant to improve its survivability, so our first instinct was to rebuild Quest Warrior with the new cards.
The featured build contains 4 different armor gain cards before turn 3, maximizing the consistency of an activated Forge of Origination on turn 3. These cheap armor gain cards also complement Animator of Iron, significantly improving our drawing power.
Shellnado has previously been a disappointing addition to the archetype, but the addition of Stone Gauntlet makes us think it is worthy of another chance, as it becomes much easier to activate.
Our win condition remains Murozond/Time Wrap, but Murozond has a real alternative in Setesh. If our armor count is big enough, we can cast Time Warp on the turn our massive Golem is summoned to OTK the opponent.
And if all else fails, we can always randomly win the game thanks to Archaedas.
We can skip the quest and build a similar win condition with Yogg. The attacking minions in this build are Brassknuckle Brawlers. The advantage of Brawlers is that they are not dead pieces until the OTK turn. We can slap down a Brawler on turn 8 and force the issue when we do not need to OTK.
But if we do need an OTK, we use mother to discount Brawlers and Yogg, allowing us to play all three of them together. We play the Brawlers first, attack, then play Yogg, which should be able to spot lethal on its turn. 40 damage in charge minions with Windfury.
Of course, we can also OTK opponents with Setesh/Yogg.
Herald Warrior’s soldiers have deathrattles. Summoned deathrattles discount N’Zoth and can get resurrected by it. Tol’vir Vanguard, an incredible armor gain card, is a deathrattle minion. Chainbreaker Hogger allows us to have two copies of Ragnaros and N’Zoth in the deck. That is a lot of damage and pressure in the late game.
Our goal with this deck is to discount N’Zoth, drop it to the board, resurrect Herald soldiers and drop a Raganaros alongside it. N’Zoth can double trigger the deathrattle of one of the soldiers. At the end of the turn, Ragnaros will cause all the soldiers on the board to shoot their deathrattles, which should spell doom for the opponent.
We can use the first N’Zoth to summon a board of deathrattle minions to quickly discount the second too. This deck has so much value that we can be very lenient in how we use our resources.
The modern Grim Patron, Destructive Blaze, has failed to make an impact in competitive play. However, Destructive Blaze is a deathrattle minion. When we damage it, or whirlwind it, we are summoning more copies of it while discounting N’Zoth.
Add a couple of strong and new deathrattle minions in Crystalline Golem and Tol’vir Vanguard, while improving the conditions to make Shellnado work thanks to Stone Gauntlet, and there is merit to cook in this direction.
Special thanks to WorldEight for helping throughout the theorycrafting process. Also special thanks to IWUS for helping to proofread our content. Finally, thanks to our Patreon and Gold supporters who have provided feedback on these decklists.
See you later,
The Vicious Syndicate Team
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