Saviors of Uldum Card Reviews #6 – Embalming Ritual, Shadow of Death, Siamat, King Phaoris, Wretched Reclaimer, Activate the Obelisk, Bazaar Burglary and More!

Welcome to the sixth part of Saviors of Uldum card reviews! After skipping them for Rise of Shadows, I’ve decided (thanks to you) to pick them back up for Saviors of Uldum. I’ll try to share my thoughts about as many Saviors of Uldum cards as possible.

In this article, I’ll take a closer look at the newly revealed cards, reviewing them and rating from 1 to 10. The scale itself should be quite obvious, but just to quickly explain how do I see it: A card rated 5 is average – it might be playable in some decks, but it’s nothing special. Cards below 5 might see some play in off-meta decks, or as obscure techs, but the closer we get to 1, the lower chance it is that they will see play. When I rate card 1 or 2, I don’t believe that it will see any Constructed, non-meme play at all. On the other hand, going above 5 means that I see this card as something with a lot of potential. While I can’t guarantee that it will work out in the end, I believe that the cards with 6-8 are likely to see at least some Constructed play, while cards rated 9 or 10 are, in my mind, nearly sure hits. 1 and 10 are reserved to the worst or best cards I can imagine, meaning that they won’t be used often.

Remember that with only a handful of cards seen, it’s incredibly hard to review them accurately, since we have no clue what synergies will be printed or which themes will be pushed. I advise you to pay more attention to the description than the rating itself – I will try to explore some of the potential synergies and reasons why a given card might or might not work. I also encourage you to share your own predictions and reviews in the comment section. Even if you aren’t sure, don’t worry, no one is! There is nothing wrong about being wrong, I have never seen anyone who nailed most of the card ratings before the release. But, without further ado, let’s proceed with the reviews!

Other reviews:

• Saviors of Uldum Card Reviews #1 – Plague of Death, Puzzle Box, Corrupt the Waters, BEEEES!!!, Armagedillo And More!
• Saviors of Uldum Card Reviews #2 – Highlander Explorers, Making Mummies, Hidden Oasis, Expired Merchant, Wild Bloodstinger And More!
• Saviors of Uldum Card Reviews #3 – Riftcleaver, Hunter’s Pack, Tip the Scales, Anka, Arcane Flakmage, Hooked Scimitar, Tortollan Pilgrim, Mogu Cultist And More!
• Saviors of Uldum Card Reviews #4 – Diseased Vulture, Into the Fray, Pressure Plate, Frightened Flunky, High Priest Amet, Generous Mummy, Grandmummy And More!
• Saviors of Uldum Card Reviews #5 – Plague of Wrath, Colossus of the Moon, Hack the System, Overflow, Plague of Flames, Dark Pharaoh Tekahn And More!
• Saviors of Uldum Card Reviews #7 – Ancient Mysteries, Crystal Merchant, Dune Sculptor, Garden Gnome, Hyena Alpha, Injured Tol’vir, Mischief Maker And More!
• Saviors of Uldum Card Reviews #8 (Final) – Naga Sand Witch, Oasis Surger, Octosari, Quicksand Elemental, Unseal the Vault, Vessina, Zephrys the Great

Pharaoh’s Blessing

“Make your own Sunwalker” kit. After Spikeridged Steed has rotated out, Paladin didn’t have too many options in “big buffs” department, and I guess that they wanted to fill that void up. I mean, this is clearly NOT Steed. Both give Taunt, both give the same amount of stats (although I’d say that +2/+6 is better in general, because health is generally more important as long as you have enough attack to kill stuff that attacks into your Taunt)… but instead of Deathrattle, it gives Divine Shield. 2/6 Taunt (worth 4 mana – Stegodon) vs giving Divine Shield (worth 1 mana – Hand of Protection). I mean, it’s clear which one is better. Obviously, Divine Shield gains some extra points for being put on a buffed minion, which means that you can kill something without your minion dying, but that’s relevant only if your opponent has a big minion on the board you want to run into. On the other hand, Divine Shield can be pretty useless vs small minions, and even worse against pings (in that case it’s like +1 Health).

I think that they were too afraid of making another Steed (which might not have been a problem later, but it was a really class-defining card back in Un’Goro) and made it a tad too weak. For the most part, you’d prefer to run Blessing of Kings. Paying 2 mana to give that minion Taunt + Divine Shield is often not worth it, plus the same amount of stats coming down 2 turns later make a much lower impact. If you would make a dedicated Buff Paladin deck then I guess it might find its way there. Or if you let’s say need a 5+ cost spell for Sunreaver Warmage. Buffs might also be more relevant with Reborn minions, which are sticky. The issue with those that they will be double-susceptible to Silence (and losing both buff + Reborn will suck a lot). But overall it’s not very impressive.

Card rating: 3/10

Tomb Warden

HOW LONG CAN THIS GO ON? We’ve got a new Saronite Chain Gang… with nearly double stats. 4 mana 2/3 that copies itself got promoted to 8 mana 3/6 that copies itself. Or should I say demoted? Because if we look at the card itself, it’s worse than Chain Gang (pre-nerf, of course – when it still used to copy handbuffs). That’s because this kind of minion is clearly designed with handbuffs in mind, but handbuffs are much more efficient on cheaper minions. After you play Into the Fray, you’d on average rather have a 4 mana 2x 4/5 than a 8 mana 2x 5/8. The first one makes more impact on curve, is usable earlier, is easier to fit into your turn etc. Of course, this doesn’t make Tomb Warden bad at all. It’s just that by itself, not considering any kinds of handbuffs, it’s a bit understatted.

2x 3/6 minion is annoying, but not that hard to deal with in the late game (unless you play Aggro and you were trying to make a final push). But if you play Taunt Warrior with your handbuff cards for Taunt, you absolutely want to run this. Because while I’d rather have Chain Gang, there’s nothing bad about 2x 5/8 Taunt for 8 mana. Against Aggro it’s an overkill, but even against slower decks it’s now a serious threat. At 8 health it’s out of range of many removals, and one single target removal won’t even cut it – opponent needs to use two. And since it’s not a Legendary, you can have two of those. And since even without buffs it’s not BAD (it’s not great, but hey), I think that it will definitely fit into Taunt Warrior if that deck exists. But will it be better than the currently existing versions?

However, there’s one more important thing – the card is a Mech. Yes, a Mech. Which means that you’ll see it quite often thanks to Dr. Boom, Mad Genius and Omega Assembly. And as a Mech, it also gets more scary. Both bodies will gain Rush with Boom in play. You will also be able to Magnetize stuff onto it. It’s not as good as Omega Devastator or Zilliax to pick from your Hero Power, but it definitely won’t make the Mech pool worse given how you get them in late game. And the 8 mana will make it perfect to discover it from Hero Power and play immediately.

Card rating: 4/10 in a regular Warrior deck, but 7/10 in Taunt Warrior if that deck will take off

Embalming Ritual

Embalming Ritual is a card that does not fit into any currently existing archetypes, but it has a lot of potential. It’s cheap, easy to use and can be played on anything. Reborn cards are carefully balanced to not include some very powerful Deathrattle effects etc. because that would make them too powerful (since they would be able to trigger twice). However, this can be used on anything – now the question is, what you want ot use it on? The best idea would most likely be – yeah – Deathrattles. I’ll give you the most simple idea how strong this card can be. Let’s say you have Cairne Bloodhoof on the board and then you play Embalming Ritual. When it dies, you get another 4/5, as well as 4/1 Cairne that Deathrattles into another 4/5. That’s A LOT of value for a single point of mana. Zerek, Master Cloner is also a nice target – you would end up with a 5/5 and 5/1 on Deathrattle and those can be further buffed for more revives (although that probably still wouldn’t make Zerek playable). Convincing Infiltrator with Reborn can be a real nightmare to deal with. Or let’s say Catrina Muerte – she can carry the game by herself and now opponent can’t kill her so easily, because she’ll be back. And of course – Zilliax. Getting it back at 1 health doesn’t really matter, since it still has Divine Shield and Rush, so it’s almost like getting a full copy on death for 1 mana.

But the issue here is that in order to get value out of this card, you need to play all of those minions first. It gets much more value on big stuff – so it’s not a great card until late game. You also can’t play a lot of that stuff on curve because it might die – if you want to combo it with Embalming Ritual, you need to wait an extra turn (or play them first and hope they stick, which is always possible with Deathrattles). And while looking at the best case scenario is nice, most of the big Deathrattles are just too slow. They have been too slow in many metas now. If they don’t have Taunt, you can’t trigger them immediately, give them Rush or whatever – you’re just falling behind on tempo too much. And if you manage to stick them, making even more greedy plays is usually not the way to go, because you need to be catching up and not adding more slow value.

On the bright side, it’s a cheap spell for the Miracle Priest. It kind of goes well with Wild Pyromancer since it triggers AoE and can let it deal 3 damage without any buffs. It’s a nice thing to cast on Gadgetzan Auctioneer if you want to keep it alive. Because it’s cheap, it might slot into that deck even though it doesn’t have many amazing synergies.

Or, there’s one more thing – Tempo Priest. It would probably run some Deathrattles – e.g. EVIL Conscripter – and giving it Reborn would be nice (2/1 + 2 more Lackeys). I acutally think that the deck might finally be viable, but I’m not really sure if this will fit in. So call me crazy, but I think that people are overrating this by focusing on the best case scenario too much without realizing that lots of the time it will sit as a dead card in hand for MANY turns and that those best case scenarios won’t come up very often. It’s not bad and it might see some play, but I don’t think that it will be any kind of meta breaker.

Card rating: 6/10

Shadow of Death

Shadow of Death is a twist on Fal'dorei Strider and other similar cards. As anyone who played Rogue last rotation knows, the card was insanely powerful. Shuffling 3x 4/4 into your deck gave a lot of incidental tempo as the game went by, and while I think that it was too random (I think that the game should spread them quite evenly to reduce randomness), it was one of the strongest Rogue cards up to date. Of course – Shadow of Death is not on the same power level. It’s also a bit different of a card. While it has a potentially way more powerful effect, the issue is that it comes with no body and the target needs to be on the board. It means that not only playing it on curve would be a tempo suicide, but most likely you wouldn’t have anything to pick from. Still, the card can be insanely powerful with the right target.

I think that there are two ways to approach it. On the one hand, you can pick some big minion, or high value minion, or powerful Deathrattle card. Something that normally might be slow, but will get its value when you summon it for free (potentially multiple times). This kind of strategy would work very well vs slower decks – they would have a lot more random threats to deal with than suspected. However, Rogue doesn’t really play cards that they would really want to shuffle like that, so I’m guessing Specialist if Warrior will still be prevalent? (I mean, people are teching in Cairne Bloodhoof vs Warrior).

The other approach is to treat it as a combo card. The idea here would be to play Leeroy Jenkins and then shuffle it – especially after Myra's Unstable Element has been played and your deck is empty. This way you can deal 24 damage from 4 Leeroys in total. Another great target is Malygos, but you need to play both Preparation and Coin to do it. Still, getting 3x Malygos out of nowhere is basically game over, even against heavily armored Warriors. Even getting a single one is enough to win vs lots of decks.

The potential in this card is very high, but it’s also high to use. It’s a bit like Beneath the Grounds vs Fal'dorei Strider. The first one also had insane effect ASSUMING you drew your 4/4’s. But lots of the time you didn’t and you paid 3 mana to do nothing immediately. Fal’dorei was great because you always started with a 4/4 body, which wasn’t the best thing for 4 mana, but was something at least. This might be similar to Beneath the Grounds – unless you build a consistent combo around it, you will often play 4 mana to do nothing and the value will only come down the road. But down the road is often too late. So I really like the card, but at this point I think that it might be too difficult to use. But I would love if players would prove me wrong!

Card rating: 4/10

Bone Wraith

When you look at the cards, at first you see a pack filler. Kinda weak stats, Taunt, and Reborn doesn’t seem to be very impactful without an additional effect. But when you start thinking about it – it’s much better than it appears at first. The best comparison others are making, and the one I also have to draw is with Sludge Belcher. Belcher is one of the best Taunts in the history of Hearthstone (its power level at the time was comparable to Tar Creeper for those who weren’t playing back then), so this comparison seems good for Bone Wraith. However, I’d have to argue that Belcher was still stronger. While this costs 1 mana less, we’ve already learned how big the diference between 2 and 3 Attack on a Taunt makes. 2 Attack Taunts don’t see much play simply because they can usually be traded into without your opponent’s minions dying. 3 health minions are ALL over the game right now – and them getting a free attack is big. Then, the second part. After Belcher died, it gave a 1/2 minion, and one of its strengths was the fact that it couldn’t get pinged. This gives you a 2/1, and it can get pinged (or killed by some 1/1). Still, despite those flaws, this seems like a very solid card.

The card will 100% go into any Reborn deck, given that not only we didn’t see a lot of Reborn cards yet, but it’s one of the better ones that were revealed so far. But the question is – will it become the next staple Neutral Taunt that people will put into every deck in which they’re looking for some protection? It’s hard to say. I still think that Tar Creeper was better, but now with it gone, it might be good enough. It’s often more difficult to kill than Saronite Chain Gang and kills the same stuff, but it’s not as good with handbuffs and you can’t make two different attacks with it. Eh, it’s pretty hard to rate without seeing meta (the less popular 3 health minions we will see early, the better it is) and playing around with it. But I’m nearly certain that it will see at least some play. My guess will be a moderate amount of play – I don’t think that it will become an uniform Taunt-to-go, but it can be good at times.

Card rating: 7/10

Pharaoh Cat

The card is very, very strong. It’s far from the first time we see as similar card. Small 1 mana minions that give you random stuff on Battlecry/Deathrattle are common. Rogue already had Swashburglar, Mage had Babbling Book, Hunter has Shimmerfly etc. And a common thing among those cards is that most of them sees play. They’re just solid. Great thing about them is that you have something to drop on Turn 1 that replaced itself with another card. The card is not always amazing, but it’s at least something. However, unlike those cards, Pharaoh Cat is a 1/2. Which is weird, because the effect is not much different than getting a random card from your opponent’s class. Looking at the currently revealed Reborn cards, they aren’t really amazing, but they are not bad at all (the only exception is Generous Mummy, but I think that even that card can be useful in certain scenarios – especially on curve when you play an aggressive Rogue deck or later in the game when your opponent is nearly out of cards anyway). Right now I’d rather get a random Reborn card than lots of cards from other classes. In that way, the card is a bit similar to Town Crier. Most likely worse simply because it pools from random cards instead of drawing, but Town Crier is IMO one of the best cards currently in Standard (it’s only kept back by the fact that Warrior didn’t want to play that many Rush minions, but it’s still staple in the class right now).

Given that favorable comparison, I would be absolutely surprised if the card didn’t see play. The difference between 1/1 and 1/2 is massive. It can clear of all the 1/1’s without dying itself. It also doesn’t die to the 1 damage Hero Powers. Since it costs 1 mana, it can activate Combo cards quite easily and reliably. It provides extra resources, and those resources can come from a different class, so it also fits well into Underbelly Fence / Vendetta builds. It’s not a consistent activator, but an overall amazing card that can be even better sometimes if it activates those.

Pharaoh Cat is good. It WILL see play, and I mean lots of play. It should be played in most of the Rogue decks, if not every single Rogue deck.

Card rating: 9/10

Mortuary Machine

Finally, we’ve got us another 5 mana 8/8 Epic with downside. After Fel Reaver and Bittertide Hydra, we’re getting Mortuary Machine. Fel Reaver’s downside was often irrelevant (because by the time your opponent burned through your deck they were dead) and Hydra’s one was risky but still playable (Volcano was often lethal, it was bad against a bunch of small minions too – and a single Righteous Protector could really drive you insane)… I feel like this one is too much. Giving every opponent’s minion Reborn is crazy value AND tempo. Of course, the tempo is not shown right away, but the fact that they won’t just leave board once they die is big. You absolutely need to kill your opponent in 2-3 turns or else he takes over the game with Reborn minions. Any Taunt is incredibly powerful, because you will now have to kill it twice. Charge / Rush stuff will also be annoying, because it will be able to attack twice immediately. Opponent dropping Zilliax will just be game over for you lots of the time (since you will have to hit it FOUR times for it to die).

The only upside is the fact that Reborn cards without Taunt usually are pretty slow – sticky, but slow, so you might have some time to hit them in the face and then possibly finish with Charge minions or burn spells. 5 mana 8/8 is also not as impressive right now as it was back in the day. Against Mages you often have to deal with two of them on Turn 5, for example. Decks are well equipped to deal with those most of the time, and I don’t think that’s going to change.

I guess that if you play against decks that run little to no minions, the downside is nonexistent. Or when the minions are small. Which makes it great against Spell-based decks and Combo decks that mostly run small cycle minions that you don’t mind giving Reborn that much. So I think that depending on the tournament meta, it might be a Specialist tech card. For example, if you played it against the old Spell Hunter, it would be just a 5 mana 8/8 with no downside whatsoever. Or you could also play it in Silence Priest and just Silence it immediately. But 5 mana is a bit too much for the deck – it really, really wants to take off around T3-T4. Oh, and of course, it will see some play in Warrior since it’s a Mech and can be discovered. I guess it might be used as an instant removal vs Giants and other big stuff (but Warrior will want to make sure that it dies too). So in reality, it should see more incidental play than real play where people put it into their decks.

Card rating: 2/10 (unless you face non-minion decks, but that’s pretty rare)

Conjured Mirage

I really, really like this card. Not because I think that it’s strong (honestly I think that it’s pretty bad), but because it’s a very cool design. This is something HS should do more often – print cards with cool, interesting effects that make you think before putting into your deck. Will this actually fit in? How can I best use its upsides and play around downsides? And so on, and so on.

The best comparison I have for this card is Frost Nova. You play it, opponent won’t likely attack into it (unless he can easily kill it and get through), then it disappears from the board at the start of your turn and you shuffle it into your deck. However, unlike Frost Nova, it does not actually stop minions from attacking. If it gets Silenced, opponent can still get through. If you’re at 10 health and opponent has 20 damage on board, he might still be able to kill you – he couldn’t with Frost Nova. And – of course – it costs 4 mana, which is a significant difference. Frost Nova is clearly way better. But not every class has access to one – that’s the thing. So this MIGHT see some play in Combo decks from other classes that can’t stall very well. For example – Druid can be a deck like that now. Without Spreading Plague, Oaken Summons, Malfurion the Pestilent as well as all of the other ways to gain Armor or produce Taunts, the class will have a very hard time stalling the game right now, and this might help.

The fact that it shuffles back into the deck is both good and bad depending on the context. Drawing it again to stall even more can be good, but it means that you’re less likely to get to your combo pieces in time. Good thing is that it completely prevents fatigue, since Start of Turn effects occur before drawing cards. That said, there aren’t many matchups in which that part could be very useful.

Technically it could also be played in Silence Priest, but I’m not seeing it. You NEED to combo it with Silence immediately or else it gets shuffled to your deck. You can’t drop it ahead of time – that’s a big advantage of those minions. You drop Arcane Watcher on T3 and opponent won’t likely run their minions into it, so you can just Silence + buff it on your turn and they have no answer. If you Silence it on your turn – they will know what’s coming. Silencing it also means getting rid of its biggest advantage – Taunt. Of course, at 10 health it means that your Divine Spirit combo is great, but honestly, so is if you play Hench-Clan Shadequill and it sticks.

So, again, I really like the design, but I don’t think that the card is strong enough to see too much play.

Card rating: 3/10

Siamat

Siamat looks like Zilliax v2.0. Well, maybe a bit more balanced Zilliax, mostly because 7 mana cost fits into much less decks than 5 mana cost does, but it’s even more flexible. Zilliax is the most ubiquitous card we EVER had in Hearthstone. Right now it sees play in 70% of the decks (R10-Legend). That’s right, 70%. Even Corridor Creeper and Giggling Inventor stopped around 50% during their prime time, and that was already insane.

And while I don’t think that Siamat will be the same, I’m absolutely sure that it will have a very high inclusion rate. Flexible cards are often doing well in Hearthstone, but most of the flexible cards are weaker in the individual cases. For example, if you play a card that can be both good vs Aggro or vs Control depending on which options you pick, it might be overall good, but it will probably be both average vs Aggro and vs Control (and flexibility is what will make it great). Siamat, however, is just good basically no matter what deck you play against.

My guess is by far the most popular combination will be Rush + Divine Shield. I think it’s comparable to Blazecaller. Worse, because you can’t go face or through Taunts, but Blazecaller required you to build a deck around it and activate it first by playing an Elemental last turn – this can be dropped any time (and has many other options). You deal 6 damage and summon a 6/6 minion. It’s great, because the card adds a lot of tempo. Most of the cards either put a threat on the board or remove something – Siamat does both. And unlike let’s say Dyn-o-matic, the 6/6 body is threatening enough that your opponent will have to deal with it quickly or else it will push a lot of damage (or get some good trades). While it’s not Omega Devastator power level, unlike Devastator, it will also be active Turns 7-9 and will leave a bigger body.

But there are so many other ways to go around the card. You need to put a wall against minions? Taunt + Divine Shield (bigger Sunwalker). You want to put up a big threat? Divine Shield + Windfury (it’s pretty hard to remove and hits for 12 without any buffs). You need to remove something immediately but still want to have Taunt up? Rush + Taunt (Amani War Bear). You need to remove two minions immediately? Rush + Windfury.

And all of that is before you even consider any kinds of synergies. Play it in Shaman deck with Shudderwock? Shudderwock will copy its Battlecry and also gain Taunt/Rush/Divine Shield/Windfury. Even better – play it with Quest’s Hero Power first to double it’s Battlecry and get all 4 options at the same time! Play a deck with any buffs? Windfury option will get much better. If it sticks, you can just kill your opponent. In Paladin, you can give it Lifesteal with Lightforged Blessing (already sees play in Mech Paladin) and pick Rush + Windfury to heal for 12 immediately (DYI Walking Fountain). And I bet that there are more things.

Of course – it won’t be AS popular as Zilliax, because faster decks won’t want to play a 7 mana card + it doesn’t have Lifesteal (which is a big part of why Zilliax is so good). But I do think that Siamat will be present in most of the decks that can play 7-drops. Slower Midrange decks, Control decks. Even more in decks that can synergize with it in some extra ways. The flexibility just makes it so good.

Card rating: 9/10

Flame Ward

Interesting – Mage is finally getting a new Secret, and it’s a pretty good one. Or is it? On the one hand, the pretty good. You get 3 damage AoE for 3 mana after your opponent attacks you. It’s a good effect, but it’s not really a good SECRET MAGE effect. Keep in mind that Secret Mage is not a Control deck, it’s a Tempo deck. It relied on getting out stuff for free, on 1-drop that outgrew it mana cost very quickly (RIP Mana Wyrm), and – ultimately – on aggression. Flame Ward is a card that fits a slow Mage deck that wants to sit back and play reactively. That’s not the play style of Secret Mage. Besides, the deck already got one new AoE this expansion – Arcane Flakmage. Flame Ward would still be good in an oldschool Secret Mage vs Aggro matchups, but it would be just a dead card vs anything slower – any Control or Combo decks could just ignore it for the majority of game and trigger it when it’s basically irrelevant. The biggest downside is that it hits only minions, not face.

But maybe it might be time to revisit the archetype? Maybe instead of building it aggressively, we could build it a bit slower? Flamkage also seems to support that kind of play style more. Maybe it should be played more like a Control deck with some Secrets added in for the sake of synergies (and just them being good)? However, the issue here is that we no longer have Ice Block and Ice Barrier is pretty meh. Mirror Entity and Counterspell are not as good in slow deck as they are in fast deck. Plus, the most classic Secret synergy – Kirin Tor Mage – is a 100% tempo card. Which makes the entire endeavor pretty awkward.

Oh, and one thing that I have not explicitly mentioned yeti s that the Secret does NOT work like Explosive Trap. Explosive Trap triggers WHEN a minion attacks, so during an attack. This triggers AFTER, so the first attack gets through. Which means that – for example – if your opponent has a 5/3 minion on the board and you play this, it can attack first and only then will die.

Maybe if the meta gets more board-flood-oriented, slower Mage builds will want to run this Secret with no Secret package? You’d run this card against Zoo, Murlocs or Token Druid even without any extra synergies. Or maybe Highlander decks will want to run a Secret package? (But it’s hard to imagine, because we don’t really have enough great Secrets to put only 1 copies of.) The card is definitely not bad. But I’m still not seeing a fully dedicated Secret Mage build. If anything – a Control Mage deck with a Secret package. But even then, I have hard time imaging the deck win in the world where Dr. Boom, Mad Genius exists.

Card rating: 6/10

Sahket Sapper

Sap on a stick! That’s a pretty cool card. If it was Battlecry, it would be absolutely broken, but Deathrattle makes it more… awkward. 4 mana 4/4 is okay for a minion with an effect, but nothing crazy. But the issue is that the effect – despite being a positive tempo one – is just too slow to begin with. Let’s say that your opponent has a big minion on the board. If you would just Sap it and play something else, you would be ahead on tempo. But when you drop this, you’re still behind. You did nothing to the big minion. It can still hit you in the face, it can still hit one of your minions. Then next turn, you need to run this minion into the big minion to kill it off (so all the extra tempo you’ve gained from a 4/4 body is gone) AND you also need to win a roll in case your opponent has a few minions.

There are situations in which it will be useful, but the fact that it needs to die for you to get Sap makes it weird. Normally you’d want it to survive to get the value of the body you got, if you just wanted to Sap one of the opponent’s minions, you’d play it for 2 mana.

To be honest, I’m not really seeing it being put into your regular Rogue deck, you need something more. One interesting interaction I’m seeing is the one with Necrium Blade. You can play Necrium Blade on T3, swing with it, then drop this on T4, swing with it again (potentially removing some small minion that might take the Sap) and get a free Sap on top of this card (and it will – of course – trigger again when it dies). Plus, the fact that Sapper is a Pirate definitely helps – Pirates are always doing well in Rogue. For example, if you run Captain Hooktusk deck, it can be a great one to play too. You get a 4/4 body with Rush that Saps something when it dies. It will make some serious comebacks possible (e.g. kill smaller stuff with your other minions, then run it into something to get an extra Sap).

So, long story short – I don’t see it in a regular Rogue deck, but if you run some extra synergies (Deathrattle / Pirate), it can gain the extra points it needs to become viable.

Card rating: 6/10

King Phaoris

Very powerful card to drop on Turn 10, it can create a massive board that your opponent just has to AoE down, all of that done by a single card. The card would be absolutely amazing vs Control decks – you force them to have AoE or lose the game. However, looking at the best case scenario won’t really get us far. It’s a 10 mana card without any guaranteed immediate impact on board or Taunt, so it’s not nearly as good vs faster decks. In order to get a lot out of it, you no only have to play expensive spells, but also have them in your hand at the time you drop it. If you have no spells in your hand, then it’s terrible. Even with big spell, it’s still not good – you wouldn’t play a 10 mana 5/5 that summons a random 10 mana minion. It all makes the card rather restrictive. The biggest issue is that everything is there is no guarantee that you will get any Taunts/Rush minions/etc. Other “board in a single card” have seen play, but you could control the outcome. N'Zoth, The Corruptor brought back Taunts (Sludge Belcher), so did Bloodreaver Gul'dan (Voidlords, and often Doomguards too for more immediate impact), similarly Zul'jin has an immediate board impact by summoning 5/5’s with Rush, casting Deadly Shot and so on.

In order for Phaoris to be good, we’d need a way to “cheat” him out earlier quite consistently. One AMAZING combo is Prismatic Lens into Phaoris. Not only you could get him out for cheaper, but you would also summon a random 10-drop thanks to the Prismatic Lens now costing 10 mana. Of course, in order to guarantee this combo you’d need to not run any other minions, so it would basically be like Barnes + Y'Shaarj, Rage Unbound combo in Spell Hunter. Unlike Spell Hunter, however, Paladin can’t really support a no-minion deck that easily. Another great combo is drawing him from Jepetto Joybuzz – having a 1 mana 1/1 copy of it with this Battlecry would be insanely powerful. Even if you could summon just a few mid-sized minions, that’s already amazing. However, the problem with this combo is that a) you might draw Phaoris before Jepetto, b) if you run more minions you might not hit the right one and c) it still comes down pretty late in the game.

You definitely DON’T want to build a deck around him without a way to cheat him out. That said, if we got a deck that already wants to play those big spells and is good, then I guess I could see it making a cut. The one I have in mind is Resurrect Priest. It plays Mass Resurrection (obviously), runs Mass Hysteria (not AS good, but it’s still a random 5-drop), could also slot in the new Plague of Death. However, slow decks against which another big board refill would be great are not the ones Resurrect Priest struggles against – it’s the fast decks that can kill it before Mass Resurrection that are really difficult to beat. And King Phaoris would do nothing to help against them.

Maybe Control Shaman? You have some more expensive spells, you have Hagatha the Witch, who can generate more spells, but most importantly, you can repeat the Battlecry with Shudderwock, making it way, way scarier.

I will say that the card has A LOT potential (just like any “board in a card”), but might be very hard to use. You need to either find the right deck to put it in, or the right combo to build around it, and even then be careful when you drop it, since there is never a guarantee that you will get any immediate board impact (despite flooding it with minions).

Card rating: 7/10

Khartut Defender

Cool, but seems to be one mana too expensive to see competitive play. I guess that they didn’t want to release a new Giggling Inventor, so this time around they’re more cautious about sticky Taunts. Khartut defender is a definition of “average” card. Stats (considering Reborn & effects) are okay for the mana cost, effect is also okay, it has Taunt so is pretty safe to drop, but also not really a threat. You get 3/4 + 3/1 Taunt + 6 healing for 6 mana. The healing part is a saving grace of the card – we don’t have that many mid game healing options available (in Neutral), and 6 healing alright. The issue here is that unlike e.g. Antique Healbot, the healing occurs on Deathrattle, so doesn’t do anything immediately. If your opponent wanted to burn you down with spells, he’ll do that anyway.

I guess that the best point of comparison would be Rotten Applebaum. It’s a bit stronger than Applebaum, but also costs 1 more mana, and that’s a deal-breaker IMO. Against Aggro, every turn matters. And against Control, neither is really good to be honest. Khartut is also even more vulnerable to Silence, since it loses basically everything and becomes a 3/4 minion.

It’s definitely not bad, and I can actually see it being played in decks that need more healing options and class cards aren’t cutting it (Control Warlock might be an example). But not really because it’s a great option, but rather because they have nothing better to run.

Card rating: 5/10

Wretched Reclaimer

Now now, Priest is getting some really powerful cards this expansion (finally). Wretched Reclaimer is just great in many decks and many strategies. Base stats – 3/3 for 3 – are not great, but okay-ish given how good its Battlecry is. But what can you do with it, exactly?

Let’s start with the most simple thing – healing a minion. Since it revives at full health, you basically heal it back up to full. It has synergy with “Injured” minions like Injured Blademaster or Damaged Stegotron. Another synergy is the one with Deathrattles. When you use it on a Deathrattle minion, it’s like Hunter’s Terrorscale Stalker, which also bring minion back to full health. And we all know how good Terrorscale Stalker was in a dedicated Deathrattle deck. Then, Reborn cards. Here we’ve got double synergy. One is using it on the first part of the minion – then you trigger Reborn and revive the first minion anyway. But you can also kill off your Reborn minion first and then use it on the 1 Health one to heal it back up. Both plays are perfectly reasonable and can be useful in different scenarios.

You can also create combos around it with Embalming Ritual. The easiest one would be with Leeroy Jenkins. Since Leeroy has charge, you can attack first (6 damage), then drop Ritual and this. You get two more copies, attack 2 more times for 18 damage in total. Add in second Embalming Ritual for extra 6 damage for a grand total of 24. Let’s face it, Priest is a class that heavily depended on combos to work well, so Priest players will naturally look for something to replace Mind Blast. If I’m not mistaken, you can also use this to steal a minion with Shadow Madness forever, although that’s more of a cool, niche combo.

The only big downside of the card is that it’s awkward to use on buffed minions, because those will disappear. If you played Extra Arms on a Reborn minion, then you might not want to use this card on it.

I think that the card can see play in many different decks. Deathrattle, Reborn, Tempo. It’s not insane, but looks powerful enough to see a serious amount of Constructed play, assuming Priest will be viable in the first place.

Card rating: 8/10

Wrapped Golem

Great Arena card, but is it good enough in Constructed? I know that I’ve said that often, but it’s true. Some cards just work much better in Arena, and this is one of them. I think that it might be a real powerhouse there, just like Warrior’s Obsidian Destroyer was. To be honest, I think that it might be even better than Destroyed – I’d take Reborn over 2 health on a card like that any time.

Summoning a 1/1 Taunt at the end of turn is not a very powerful effect, but it’s pretty annoying. If you don’t play against a class that can ping, he might have to waste a lot of damage and run his minions into it. And if he does – he still has to waste 2 mana (more 1 mana in case of Rogue, but still). The stats or this are also quite solid. 7/5 is not good, BUT we need to remember that it has Reborn, which makes it much harder to clear cleanly. Even if you remove the first body, you still face a 7/1 which is possibly behind a 1/1 Taunt that might block your small minions from killing it.

What I don’t like is that it’s pretty slow. The main body has no Taunt, and 1/1’s aren’t big enough to stop Aggro. So they can go over the Taunt and just hit your face while ignoring this. 7/5 are not great trading stats, you will have to trade down and extra 1/1’s won’t really matter that much. Also, how strong it is heavily depends on whether Transform effects (Polymorph, Hex) and Silence will be more common this expansion (which, on the other hand, depends on how many Reborn cards will see play).

Might see play in Reborn Paladin if that deck will be a thing after all (but to be honest I have my reservations) – not only it’s +1 on the Quest, but also a great target afterwards. I actually think that it would also be funny in Reborn Priest with High Priest Amet – instead of 1/1’s, it would summon 1/7’s, and now those are much harder to get through. But again, I’m not sure if Reborn Priest will actually be a thing. Overall, pretty average card.

Card rating: 5/10

Activate the Obelisk

(Obelisk's Eye)

Oh man, the reward in this is really and I mean REALLY strong. Healing minion for 3 AND giving it +3/+3 every turn is absolutely insane. This alone can carry you in almost any matchup. Against Aggro/Burn decks you can even heal yourself for 3 every turn in case you need to, which should be enough to get out of range quite quickly. What is pretty awkward about that card is that the quest is easier to complete in a slow, Control build (which can pack more healing effects into the deck), but the Hero Power is more useful in minion-packed Tempo deck (but that deck can’t really add as many healing cards). Maybe you’ll build a Quest deck somewhere in between?

Healing for 15 is pretty awkward. It’s A LOT and not that many at the same time, depending on many things. For example, if you don’t draw your AoE healings or don’t end up with any boards which you can AoE heal, then it might be difficult. Also, if you play vs a Control deck, healing for that much might be difficult. Control decks often leave your minions or kill them – they don’t often just damage them a bit and wait for you to heal them up.

What is interesting is that healing opponent’s stuff AND their face works too. That’s why Circle of Healing is probably the best way to complete this Quest. But Tempo decks might also run Hench-Clan Shadequill. They should be able to deal some damage early to the opponent, so they get an overstatted minion with basically an upside – because healing opponent will complete the Quest faster.

You can also run “Injured” minions like Injured Blademaster. Those will give you some extra healing targets throughout the game. You can also play stuff that damages your Hero (e.g. Crystallizer, Ornery Tortoise) so you can use your Hero Power and Divine Hymn to heal yourself in case opponent doesn’t damage you.

What I like about the card is that you can build your deck around it and it won’t be useless after the Quest is done because of +3/+3 every turn. Even if you run some minions that will be bad to play afterwards, you can turn them into bigger threats. Let’s say the Crystallizer I’ve mentioned. In the late game, it becomes a 3 mana 4/6, which is a decent threat. Injured Blademaster is even better – with new Hero Power it will be a 5 mana 7/9. See – you just play any minion, Hero Power it and then it becomes threatening enough to warrant a removal from your opponent (sadly, Warriors can generate obscene amounts of removals right now).

The card is very good, I think that Quest Priest might be the best way to play Priest after the new expansion goes live.

Card rating: 8/10

Bazaar Burglary

(Ancient Blades)

Uhh, I think that this Quest is the easiest one to complete by a huge margin. It’s not even PLAYING four cards from another classes, it’s just getting them. Especially with the new revealed card (Clever Disguise. Quest T1, Disguise T2, Blink Fox T3, Hench-Clan Burglar T4 and you’re done. That’s not even some outlandish scenario, it should happen quite often since you would run two copies of each of those cards. And then have some extras like Pilfer and of course Pharaoh Cat which can also give you a card from another class. I can imagine this Hero Power being up around T5 sometimes, and around T6 quite consistently. But is it actually good enough? I would say that yes, it’s pretty solid. Probably not as good as other Quest Hero Powers, but also easier to get. And then having a combination of Fiery War Axe and Candleshot as a Hero Power sounds sweet.

The weapon provides a lot of board control (you can deal 3 damage to opponent’s board every turn) and most importantly you don’t take damage for hitting anything. Usually hitting minions with Rogue is risky, because you can get killed so easily if you go too low. And this is much safer. And what if your opponent has no minions to hit? Well, then you hit his face, of course. 3 damage per turn is also a solid clock vs many decks.

The main issue I have with this Quest is that it doesn’t help vs Aggro early. Sure, after you finish it you can get a really great control over their board at no health expense. But you won’t have it up from the get-go. For example, Odd Rogue worked quite good vs Aggro, because it could play a 2/2 Hero Power on T2 and use it for the board control. Doing the same thing on Turn 5+ hasn’t got as big of an impact. It’s still good, but you need to pray that your opponent didn’t have an insane hand and didn’t rush you down.

Yesterday I would probably rate it 4/10, because we didn’t have enough activators to get it out in the mid game consistently. But now with Clever Disguise, I believe that it has more potential. I still think that people are overrating it a bit. The reward is not as strong as other Quest rewards. It would be insane on T2, but becomes weaker and weaker later in the game. Against Control Warrior in the late game, it could be nearly ignored, because you won’t outvalue them and you probably won’t kill them either if they’ve already stabilized. But it can be really amazing win condition vs Midrange/Tempo decks that don’t rush you down completely, but also don’t hold such an insane late game value.

Card rating: 7/10