Kobold Illusionist

Kobold Illusionist Card

Kobold Illusionist is a 5 Mana Cost Rare Rogue Minion card from the Kobolds and Catacombs set!

Card Text

Deathrattle: Summon a 1/1 copy of a minion from your hand.

Flavor Text

He can make ANYTHING look like a candle.

Kobold Illusionist Card Review

Superficially, the effect looks a lot like that of Barnes and actually complements it for the “big” style of deck, allowing you to Barnes out things that you have already drawn. Unfortunately, the subtle differences in how it’s activated mean a lot here, because having it as a Deathrattle is a much bigger downside than normal. Most Deathrattles usually trigger during the opponent’s turn, which means that the opponent will have priority while the 1/1 is being summoned. 1/1s are trivial to remove for just about any class, especially with any amount of board presence, so it will be extremely difficult to get value because it won’t work with classic big minion effects such as powerful Battlecries, static auras and EoT effects, on top of having to play an understatted/overcosted minion. It works best with very very powerful deathrattle effects, however unlike some other classes, Rogue doesn’t usually have many of those. It’s worth noting that with something very powerful in hand to make a copy of, this card can become very strong in the late game when N'Zoth, The Corruptor brings back two copies of it. It gets a lot better when that deathrattle is happening on your own turn.

Card Review by Chimbarozo

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19 Comments

  1. Mantodea
    March 19, 2018 at 6:16 AM

    I want to use this to pull a 1/1 deathwing dragonlord. That seems fun.

  2. Sir Stone
    December 7, 2017 at 4:38 PM

    Kobold Illusionist is actually a Rare, just pointing that out if any admins find this

  3. erik
    November 21, 2017 at 8:52 AM

    quest rogue…

  4. Helioshade
    November 14, 2017 at 1:04 PM

    I can only imaging the Umbra + Maly shenanigans… Umbra into Kobold while you have another in hand as your only minion, fill up the board. Drop the one minion you draw each turn in place of Umbra to keep the infinite 1/1’s rolling (or you draw burn spells to finish your opponent later). When you get Maly in hand, drop the second Kobold, suicide your other Kobolds and turn them all into Maly, then drop a Sinister Strike for 33. Or other spells like Evis. Or double up for 60+ 😀

    • Helioshade
      November 14, 2017 at 1:07 PM

      Oh, and if you draw Maly early, drop Maly early and gang up in Wild so you get him in your deck (simply so that your Kobolds can fill the board and go infinite without a premature Maly).

  5. Crapcrack
    November 7, 2017 at 6:42 AM

    wow… Maly rouge just entered the meta again!

  6. Jose
    November 4, 2017 at 7:58 PM

    I see some malygos shenanigans

  7. The one with a plan
    November 4, 2017 at 6:01 AM

    Oh I have great plans for this one…. Moahahahaa xD

  8. Amr
    November 3, 2017 at 6:01 PM

    If rogue gets defile and they have one kobold illusionist on the board and another in their hand as the only minion, wouldn’t that set the game on an infinite loop?

    • Threather
      November 3, 2017 at 6:22 PM

      Defile has maximum casts, 14. It was to prevent grim patron infinite loop.

      • Piterno
        November 3, 2017 at 11:05 PM

        Which seems weird when you think about it, they nerfed Dreadsteed in wild because there would be an infinite loop. I imagine this was their thought process:

        Blizz Employee 1 “Huh, Dreadsteed would make this card an infinite loop. Better nerf it…”
        Blizz Employee 2″Hey, if you do this and this, with Grim Patron, it’ll be an infinite loop.”
        Blizz Employee 1 “We can’t nerf Grim Patron, it would ruin the card. Just make it 14 times.”
        Blizz Employee 2″But, what about Dreadsteed?”
        Blizz Employee 1 “Just forget about it.”

        • Loreance
          November 5, 2017 at 8:05 PM

          Or maybe, a 6 mana combo, basicly clear the entire board and put a dreadsteed on board seemed a little op.

  9. Threather
    November 3, 2017 at 5:48 PM

    I dont like it just because its a deathrattle, you cant even shadowstep the 1/1 if the opponent clears it afterwards. This only work in n’zoth decks and n’zoth will be rotating out soonish

    It has obvious synergy with:
    – Shaku
    – Sherazin
    – Aya/Jade swarmer
    – Shadowstep
    – Xaril
    – Cairne
    – N’zoth
    – Thalnos makes it almost worth running
    – Any poisonous/stealth minion
    ^ If you make a n’zoth deck out of these cards, this could work

    This card is 4/5 for now, 2/5 when jades and n’zoth rotate out.

    • Maevine
      November 3, 2017 at 8:10 PM

      This card is more for DK rogue – Miracle Rogue deck.

      You play this, you get auctioneer – play spells on turn 4. Draw draw draw. End game – play this, arcane giant, vanish/shadowstep arcane giant to your hand, 0 mana arcane giant + DK rogue hero power for another 0 mana arcane giant. This card is a 5/5 for me.

      • Maevine
        November 3, 2017 at 8:12 PM

        Realized that this is a deathrattle, silly me. But still good potential. 4/5 upon realizing that it’s deathrattle

        • Piterno
          November 3, 2017 at 11:07 PM

          Just coin out that one legendary the turn before, the 4 mana 3/4 that triggers deathrattles as battlecries.

  10. Wut
    November 3, 2017 at 5:21 PM

    Infinite cobold if you only have cobold illusionist in hand.

    Weird meme stuff with umbra?

    Or DR rogue will be a thing?

  11. KillAThrill
    November 3, 2017 at 3:00 PM

    At first glance I really hate this card. Then thinking about janky interactions including that new 5 mana slime that summons 2 copies this could be used in a really weird deathrattle aggro deck or just weird stuff in general. I think this will require some build around for it to do anything at the moment. But lets wait and see for the rest of the cards.