It may be a bit later than usual, but the annual Halloween shenanigans have returned to the Arena, with Dual-Class mode offering never-before-seen synergies and crazy combos for the players. This year, the mixture is even spicier than usual, thanks to the set rotation and the launch of Deadmines. It’s a lot to get your head around, but there are clear winners and losers as usual, and having a good idea of what to look for can get you ahead of the competition for this limited-time event.
How Does the Dual-Class Arena Event Work?
This annual event serves as a great way to spice up the Arena gameplay experience: you select not one, but two classes before beginning your draft, and the cards offered in the draft will come from a shared pool. This allows you to fish for unique synergies that are not available anywhere else in the game!
The first character selects your portrait, making it the less impactful choice – the second one is what gets you your hero power, so please don’t select Warrior as your number two class under any circumstances! This also means you can game the system a bit: if a class with an awesome hero power is offered up for the first choice, you might want to pass it up for an opportunity to see it again.
Past the 21.6 patch (the Deadmines release update), the following sets are in the Arena:
- Deadmines Mini-Set
- United in Stormwind
- Ashes of Outland
- Rise of Shadows
- Knights of the Frozen Throne
- Journey to Un’Goro
- Mean Streets of Gadgetzan
- Core
The Best Classes in the Dual-Class Arena
Card quality: Paladins are busted. The mini-set features two cards that are straight-up broken in Arena (Wealth Redistributor and Righteous Defense), plus the rotation has brought back many old classics like Spikeridged Steed, Vinecleaver and Dinosize from Journey to Un’Goro, Libram of Justice from Ashes of Outland, Righteous Protector from Knights of the Frozen Throne and Grimestreet Protector from Mean Streets of Gadgetzan.
Alliance Bannerman from the previous set is, of course, still insane. Nothing’s changed there. Grab the board and never let it go. Note that the newly printed strong Secrets made Desperate Measures and Hydrologist significantly better cards. There are also additional dual-class synergies to be found here.
Warlocks are still excellent, even after the rotation. All the Core and Stormwind cards are still around, Enhanced Dreadlord is back alongside EVIL Genius, Defile and Despicable Dreadlord. Though you’d much prefer to have it second because of Life Tap, Warlock is still the pick when offered against two mediocre classes.
Warriors have always been a good choice in this format because you can get rid of their useless Hero Power. Their flexible ping options and strong weapons make them a strong candidate this time around as well, though mostly to plug the holes provided in the drafts from the previously mentioned two classes.
Note that the class card offering rate is lower than what you may be used to from past iterations of these events, meaning fancy combos like Bloodbloom + Ultimate Infestation rarely come into play. Individual strong cards are the way to go.
Rogues always warrant a special mention in this format as any bonuses offered for playing cards from a different class are incredibly easy to trigger – for instance, making Obsidian Shard a near-guaranteed 0-mana 3/3 weapon in the Dual-Class Arena. They’re a serviceable secondary class choice.
Hero Power: Warlock’s Life Tap is still the premium choice (especially with their awesome card pool in mind), with Demon Hunter an obvious second thanks to their flexible and cheap pings. Priest is also a good choice as the hero power can help you leverage a board lead to further extend your advantage.
Gameplay Tips and Tricks for the Dual-Class Arena
Tempo and board control are the name of the game, mostly thanks to the dominance of Paladins. The abundance of buffs and the return of the Knights of the Frozen Throne set (which gives us massive tempo leverage tools in the form of Deathspeaker, Corpse Raiser and Bonemare) means that you should almost always try to clear your opponent’s board before proceeding. This also makes Silence cards much better than usual.
(Since this is a casual-friendly event, the level of overall play is also lower than usual. This also makes it a good idea to just proceed with simple but effective play, leveraging a board advantage by trading over and over again. Your own buffs will hit hard enough to trade up almost every time.)
Initiative is at a premium. Anything with Rush or direct damage is very desirable, and the same holds true for weapons. The ability to claw back on the board after losing it can make or break a run, though your best course of action is to not lose it in the first place.
The Best Neutral Cards to Draft in the 21.6 Dual-Class Arena
We’ve mostly moved past the Mean Streets neutrals in terms of power level, but Journey to Un’Goro still has a ton of heavy-hitters. Fire Fly and Glacial Shard are excellent utility tools, Stubborn Gastropod serves as a 500000/2 minion for the purposes of board combat, Tar Creeper serves as a shutdown option.
Higher up, Frozen Crusher and Volcanosaur are overstatted (though the latter is a Beast, which is a bit of a downside right now due to Golakka Glutton), and Primordial Drake is a premium defensive tool. Golakka Crawler is extra good in this event because of all the Pirates in the mini-set.
Almost all the notable neutrals from the Knights of the Frozen Throne set all involve leveraging a board lead: Deathspeaker, Corpse Raiser, Cobalt Scalebane, Necrotic Geist and Bonemare can all shut the game down as long as their ability hits. The overstatted neutrals of Hyldnir Frostrider and Keening Banshee can also help with this critical task.
Rise of Shadows offers Hench-Clan Hogsteed as strong early removal plus Dalaran Crusader and Eccentric Scribe as sticky mid-game options. Burly Shovelfist is still a near-guaranteed two-for-one, provided you make it that far in a competitive state.
Ashes of Outlands brings back the Augmerchants (ensuring there are pings all over the place), the Dormant cards (ensuring high power-level shenanigans), plus premium mid-game initiative options in the form of Burrowing Scorpid, Ruststeed Raider and Scavenging Shivarra. Bonechewer Vanguard is a notable big idiot from this set.
The usual suspects from United in Stormwind are also still with us, of course: Peasant and Pandaren Importer are excellent, Deeprun Engineer is busted because of the Goliath, Sneed's Masterpiece discovery potential and Mo'arg Forgefiend still serves as your best stabilization option in the late game. Far from being just a meme, Maddest Bomber is a pretty damn serviceable card in the Arena, and Golakka Glutton, though clunky, can be game-winning as well.
Having said all that, keep in mind that this is a time-limited event with a focus on wackiness rather than strategy. Make sure to have fun with it and try as many wacky combinations as possible – trying to min-max this one might actually make you derive the wrong lessons for the regular metagame and the inevitable post-rotation shift that will follow once the dual-class stuff is over.
