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Mulligans
General Mulligans
Emerald stone its the card you will always mulligan for. Kick out the secrets, you'll end up drawing them anyways. wandering monster, as an exception may be useful most of the time. Subject 9 is meant to be played as early as posible, so keep it. And stitched tracker is always great to have early on hand in case you need some minion from your deck for some combo, but its not that important. In case you have no idea what your opponent its going to play just kick every card except the mentioned ones. Note: Springpaw, although being a 1 cost, has barely any impact on early game.
Aggro Mulligans
Versus aggro, just go for the secret kit, and in case you have a good hand you can also keep springpaw to fill that turn 1 (only if you dont get the coin).
Midrange Mulligans
In this matches i where your spirit of the lynx shenanigans can shine. turn 2 snake trap into turn 3 spirit of the lynx followed more beasts/secrets on turn 4 will be a real nightmare for your opponent. In case your opponent can get rid of your spirit of the lynx, turn 5 emerald would make them concede (even if not fully charged).
Still emerald is your most important card on hand.
Combo Mulligans
Just play as a casual face spell hunter and win before your opponents manages to do whatever theire planning to do.
The original point of this deck was to make Zul'jin recast many shaman spells, previously generated by
Witch's Cauldron, wich turns out to be very valuable
when replayed (there are some good and bad ones, but theyre great on
average). And due to Witch's Cauldron relying on
having wide boards of small minions (wich are also beasts in this case) i
decided to include both the loa and the spirits of the Lynx. And
finally as the deck relies mostly on playing Zul'jin the secret package was not being thrown away; turns out Greater Emerald Spellstone has great synergy with Spirit of the Lynx.
Early on your best bet are your secrets and its synergies. Wandering Monster may always be your best play at turn 2, and Explosive Trap can save you from boardflooding enemies. Venomstrike Trap and Snake Trap are mainly meant to take advantage from Spirit of the Lynx, though it doesnt mean you should hold them on hand till you draw it.
lesser emerald stone will always be your best card
especially if played at tempo, its no secret (pun intended) that this
card can win many games by itself.
Spirit of the Lynx its meant to reinforce the
boardflooding style of the deck, and not necessarily to make them big
threats for your opponent, but also to make them stick longer on board
till you can play your Witch's Cauldron. All cards that gets benefit from it on this deck are: Springpaw (though mainly meant to get value from Witch's Cauldron, but not necessarily), Snake Trap, Venomstrike Trap, Animal Companion, Flanking Strike, Halazzi, the Lynx, Subject 9, Greater Emerald Spellstone, Deathstalker Rexxar, Zul'jin, and sometimes
Wandering Monster. One may think that getting value
from this card may be hard or complicated, but its actually plays very
natural on a game, especially when played alongside Snake Trap.
Given all the ways mentioned to
get a board easily with this deck, and thanks to both Springpaw and Halazzi, the Lynx turns out very easy to get a lot of value from your Witch's Cauldron. Stitched Tracker can help to bring you extra copies of
Witch's Cauldron if needed, though it can be also
useful by giving extra copies of every other minion in your deck (even
Subject 9 if you didnt drew him earlier). Its still a
pure value card, and must ve avoided in most of your early games,
focusing on making better tempo plays (especially your secrets
shenanigans). In case you still think of this card dont making it
alongside Zul'jin, ill make a brief list of some of
the best cards from shaman you can get for this deck, given the current
standart fromat (raven year): Ancestral Spirit, Big Bad Voodoo, Blazing Invocation, Bloodlust, Feral Spirit, Haunting Visions, Healing Rain, Hex (not synergy with zul’jin, but still great card to get), Lightning Storm, Primal Talismans, Rain of Toads (wich funily also synergies with spirit of the lynx)), The Storm Bringer, Unstable Evolution, Voltaic Burst (for extra value from witchs cauldron), and
Windfury. One must be aware though that playing
overload spells will also make Zul'jin to overload mana when played (not
really a big deal given the value it will provide).
Legendary replaces:
Ill
write no replaces for any epic cards as theyre only Witch's Cauldron and Snake Trap and they turn
out to be very imporant to the deck. Still you can decide if you want
to play with only one copy of one of them and add some other card.
Halazzi, the Lynx is the easiest card to write a replace, as it
is not that very used on other decks and not everyone has it. Also
given the synergies for the lynxes on this deck i feel halazzi the lynx is kind of weak on average. I would replace it
for a copy of Hunting Mastiff.
Subject 9 is too strong in this deck to be replaced, and this
single cards covers many functions (summons beast, get secrets, draw
cards, acelerates deck). If you dont have it i recomend to replace it
with a copy of Tracking rather than Secret Plan, as the former provide the deck acceleration needed
in case you dont get to draw Zul'jin when needed.
Deathstalker Rexxar has barely any synergy with the deck, but
still its just too powerful to not add if you have it. In case you dont
just add some of the cards mentioned above.
And Zul'jin, you know, he’s the key of the deck. Still if you dont
have it you should give a try to the deck, as there will be a lot of
games that can be won without even playing it, and can still be fun
enough.
Werdly enough the site was not letting me to submit the guide until i deleted the mulligan for control. In case you need it, just go for the secret cards (not the actual secrets you know), and try to get as many value from the cauldron as you can without droping the tempo of the game.