Core: Epics and Legendaries
Obliterate
2 mana hard removal but with a potentially steep cost. Blood Death Knight are theoretically resilient enough to take the damage, but we’re not sure there aren’t better defensive tools available. You normally want hard removal for big threats, which means you’re taking a lot of damage by casting this card on its ideal targets. This is likely a skip, as it seems worse than Asphyxiate in most scenarios.
Score: 1
Grave Strength
4 mana permanent Bloodlust. This is a very strong win condition for swarming Unholy Death Knights, encouraging them to play fast and furious, capitalizing on a board lead very quickly. If you’re playing Triple Unholy, it means your corpse generation is very good, so the steep corpse cost should be manageable. If you’re leaning into a slower late game though, Grave Strength might not be as good of a fit. This finisher defines Triple Unholy as the combination most potent at board dominance within the class.
Score: 4
Repulsive Gargantuan
Very strange 4-drop. We struggle to see where it would fit. The stats are underwhelming and quite slow for an aggressive deck. The ability is very limited, not accounting for armor gain. Frost Death Knights would rather burst their opponents down. Unholy Death Knights would prefer so many other cards. No shot.
Score: 1
Stitched Giant
One of the cornerstone cards of Unholy Death Knights. Stitched Giant has great swing potential and doesn’t require us to sacrifice initiative to discount it. We basically discount it by fighting for board with cards such as Tomb Guardians and Army of the Dead. This also has great synergy with Corpse Bride, allowing us to occasionally develop 20/20 stats in a single turn during the mid-game. The ability to constantly pressure the opponent through the board, and then slap down a cheap giant as a follow-up sounds devastating. It makes Unholy Death Knights very versatile, able to attack the opponent through both wide boards and tall threats. Impossible to pass up.
Score: 4
Thassarian
This 4-drop deals a total of 6 damage once it’s cleared, meaning it has stronger impact on the board and your opponent’s face than Cold Case. We suggested that Rime Sculptor will be a necessary Manipulator booster, but this is a card you’re happy to play in any deck that runs a single Frost Rune. Whether you’re playing aggressively and can put some pressure on your opponent’s life total through a very sticky 4-drop or playing it in response to the opponent’s pressure and having Thassarian clear some minions and soak up trades, this is just way too good to pass up.
Score: 4
Deathbringer Saurfang
A very over costed taunt, Saurfang becomes an “infinite” value card that can be constantly played at the price of health after the initial death. It’s not very “infinite” since you can just run out of health and lose the game. You’re essentially trading 5 health on your hero for 5 health on board, and we don’t like this exchange. Blood Death Knights do have a lot of healing, but that doesn’t mean we should be throwing away health for mediocre effects.
Score: 1
Overseer Frigidara
A 6 mana 5/6 that draws 2 cards and casts Consecration. This is nothing short of amazing for a Frost Death Knight deck. Yes, we are restricting ourselves to only play Frost spells since we always want the effect to go off, but this is an effect that’s completely worth the deck building cost. Frigidara represents such a huge swing both on board and in terms of card advantage that it will be very popular. Reminder that it goes face. We like going face.
Score: 4
Patchwerk
This is an absurdly strong late game card that will cause every Death Knight deck that aims to play a slow strategy to consider tapping into a Blood rune. Patchwerk is a giga Mutanus, sacking a minion in the opponent’s hand and deck, making it twice as likely to hit a priority target and significantly depleting their resources. It also removes a minion on board, which is generally going to be a stronger effect than Mutanus’ stats buff in a defensively minded deck. One of the most disruptive cards we’ve ever seen in Hearthstone.
Score: 4
Lord Marrowgar
The mother of all corpse payoffs, Marrowgar has potential to generate an insane board that could end games on the spot, especially in faster matchups, since opponents are not capable of dealing with it whatsoever. This does completely deplete your corpse count, so using it in slower matchups against defensive decks with mass AOE requires some planning ahead. However, this provides Unholy Death Knights with a timer on many different opponents. If you allow the Death Knight to accumulate corpses with impunity, Marrowgar will eventually blow you out of the game in an instant. The board swing will likely be too powerful to recover from. Hell of a win condition for a Triple Unholy build.
Score: 4
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