My Anti- Heroic Magic Mirror Deck (Karazhan Heroic Boss)

Yesterday, I finally defeated the magic mirror in heroic mode, thereby unlocking the ‘portals’ card back, as I had already defeated every other Kharazhan boss in heroic mode. I don’t know about you, but personally I think the magic mirror is the strongest Karazhan boss in heroic. To beat it, I first sought for a deck on the internet, but the most recent one I could find was already 2 years old. Anyway, I tested it, and although the general strategy (I’ll explain about it in a minute) seemed right, the deck in itself just didn’t appear to be good enough (at least when I was playing it). I slowly started replacing a few cards, still encountering failure after failure, but learning from my mistakes, I was able to gradually improve the deck after each fight until I reached the deck you see here, a modernized (it even contains cards from the recent Witchwood expansion) arsenal with which I overcame the rude looking-glass after two tries. 

STRATEGY

In heroic mode, the magic mirror summons 1/1 copies of every played minion for himself (but not for you as well, as in normal mode). It generally swarms you with minions that have spell damage (+1 or +2), minions that put one of its secrets into the battlefield when they die, minions that reduce the cost of its spells, Archmage Antonidas, who puts a fireball into its hand whenever it casts a spell, or Rhonin, who gives it three copies of arcane missiles when he dies. These minions allow the mirror to constantly throw aggressive spells at you and your minions which, if you don’t have the right deck against it, quickly results in defeat. 

The mirrors main (and probably only) weakness is that it draws lots of cards during the game, either with Looming Presence, Arcane Intellect or Bloodmage Thalnos. This means that it generally runs out of cards after about 14-16 turns. This deck’s strategy is thus to be able to survive until the mirror eventually succumbs to fatigue. There are therefore 3 kinds of cards in this deck:

-The ‘clearers’, such as Arcane missiles, Explosive sheep or Ticking abomination. These cards are the most numerous and important ones, as they permit you to frequently clear the board of the many weak-healthed minions the mirror will launch at you. Don’t forget that the mirror copies all the minions you play in 1/1 form, so if you play, for example, Abomination, the mirror will create one for itself, and if required you’ll be able to kill it with your hero power, thereby dealing 2 damage to all minions. Ticking Abomination, Firelands Portal and Flamestrike are there to destroy the less common but still dangerous big minions you will occasionally meet. 

-The ‘healers’, such as Mistress of Mixtures, Shroom Brewer or Rotten Applebaum. As I already mentioned, the mirror is extremely aggressive and has the potential to rob you of 20(!) or sometimes more health in a single single turn (this normally shouldn’t be able to happen if you regularly clear the board, though). Restoring health is therefore also a key ingredient to survival.

-The ‘silencers’, or in other words: the two owls and Spellbreaker.  These minions are most useful for Rhonin, the card that gives the mirror three copies of arcane missiles when it dies. Believe me, once the mirror gets its hands on six one-cost spells and then cheaply buffs them with spell damage +2 or even +4, you can say your goodbyes. It is therefore very important to silence Rhonin (the original copy, not the 1/1 or it will turn into a 7/7) before killing it. If you have any silencers left after that, they can still be useful to silence the mirror’s other minions. 

To finish with, let me also underline the great importance of your hero power. It will be able to destroy any 1/1 minion the mirror summon (or that you make it summon) for only 2 mana. What’s more, your hero power can be used every turn without consequences, while you might sometimes want to keep some cards for later and not play any cards at all during your turn.

I hope this deck works for you, and good luck! 🙂