Marsh Drake

Marsh Drake Card

Marsh Drake is a 3 Mana Cost Common Neutral Minion Dragon card from the The Witchwood set!

Card Text

Battlecry: Summon a 2/1 Poisonous Drakeslayer for your opponent.

Flavor Text

She would have gotten away with it, if it weren't for that meddling Drakeslayer.

Marsh Drake Card Review

Those overstatted minions that summon something for your opponent never turned out to be good. And at the first glance, this one looks even worse – after all, the minion it summons ALWAYS has Poisonous. Meaning that you can’t play it on Turn 3 unless you have something to clear that minion off, and the thing you clear it off with just dies. However, I actually like this design, because it’s also the most consistent of those minions – you know that it’s going to be a 2/1 with Poisonous, so you always play around it. With cards like Hungry Dragon you never knew what it’s going to pull, so you couldn’t possibly play around it. For example, in case of this card, Rogue might be a good class to play it. If you Hero Power on Turn 2, you can clear the 2/1 unless there is a Taunt in your way. But you’d always need to spend your Turn 2 daggering – which might actually not be bad in a Prince Keleseth deck, since you often dagger up if you don’t play Prince (and you play Prince on T2 only about 30% of time if I remember correctly).

It could also work with the Hunter’s Candleshot, or with Priest’s Potion of Madness, but the latter is luckily rotating out anyway.

I feel like this is about average. The thing is that even if you make it work and clear the 2/1 token immediately, you always lose something – a small minion, even a weapon charge, and what you gain instead is +2 Attack on your vanilla 3-drop. Is it good? Yes, it’s pretty good. But is it great? I don’t think so. I feel like people might experiment with it for a bit, but I don’t see it being too powerful.

Card rating: 5/10

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26 Comments

  1. TallJake26
    June 21, 2019 at 11:50 AM

    This card should actually be really good with Rogue.

    The go-to turn two play for Rogue is to equip a dagger. Then, on turn three you play a minion with stats equal to that of a turn four or five minion. You can also kill the 2/1 poisonous with your dagger.

    Basically, for Rogue this card might as well be a 5/4 3 cost dragon that has a Battlecry of “deal two damage to your hero”.

  2. Aaron Slack
    April 10, 2018 at 11:36 AM

    I’d like to mention shadow madness or Cabal Shadow Priest as those are classic and could steal their poisonous, the first option giving the poisonous charge…Awww Yeah

  3. Xix
    April 10, 2018 at 1:39 AM

    I noticed this and and some other cards that might make odd-Rogue an possibility. This card is only good if you hero power as a Rogue on turn 2. Keleseth rogue is atm death, it might come back with cards like these. But a 2-2 weapon is allmost a card. So interessting decks to try 😀

  4. NIGHTxBLADE
    April 9, 2018 at 11:41 PM

    HAIL TO THE NEW TEMPO ROGUE

  5. MARCUS CHAPIN
    April 9, 2018 at 3:55 PM

    I get the rogue ideas for this card… But I see it as better in the context of dragon priest (likely wild), potion of madness seems like a near perfect complement for example.

    • Ertje
      April 10, 2018 at 1:54 AM

      That will only work in Wild, since Potion of Madness will be leaving standard with the rest of Mean streets

  6. Soup And Salad
    April 9, 2018 at 3:46 PM

    This seems to be a high risk, decent reward sort of card. Unfortunately, without having a minion you’re willing to lose on the board as it is or have a very cheap alternate removal option, you are unlikely to get the reward of a 3 mana 5/4.

    Granted, a vanilla 3 mana 5/4 might not be good enough as it is to see play. The dragon tag would edge it closer to being playable, but I can’t think of a vanilla minion that has see play in quite a while. Even Flamewreathed Faceless was dropped from Shaman decks when Mean Streets and the Jade Package was released. The game is such that if a minion does not come with a bit of a bonus, it is unlikely to see play.

    That reason is likely why none of the over-statted minions that give your opponent stuff have seen, and I doubt the two in this set will see extensive play too.

    • Ertje
      April 10, 2018 at 1:55 AM

      Strong in the Odd-mage deck, with the upgraded hero power

      • Soup And Salad
        April 10, 2018 at 2:40 AM

        How? You’d have to pay five mana to get a 5/4 on the board. You can’t play this and use your hero power when it’s at its strongest, on turn 3.

  7. tokeghost
    April 9, 2018 at 3:44 PM

    everyone wondering how to efficiently use this?

    candleshot?
    on the hunt?
    unleash the hounds?
    greivous bite?

    oh i guess those are all midrange dragon hunter ideas, nevermind fellas don’t listen to me.

    • Soup And Salad
      April 9, 2018 at 3:49 PM

      None of those cards would allow this to be played on curve in Standard, other than Candleshot which doesn’t make it into Midrange Hunter decks currently. Maybe it will since Alleycat is leaving standard, but Hunter has access to more consistently better 3 drops.

      • tokeghost
        April 9, 2018 at 4:45 PM

        5/4 and a 1/1 on turn 4 isn’t the worst possible play. it’s a cheap tempo body if you meet the requirement, not saying it’s played on curve to be effective. i expect rexxar to take one a much different attitude this year than “turn one: alley cat.”

        • Soup And Salad
          April 9, 2018 at 6:49 PM

          On the Hunt is leaving Standard though. It was in Whispers of the Old Gods, but I do agree with your prediction on Hunter’s attitude likely shifting somewhat.

          That attitude will likely degenerate into “Turn one: new 1 drop beast that’s better than diremole,” in a set or two though.

      • NIGHTxBLADE
        April 9, 2018 at 11:42 PM

        Still a 2 mana for 2 turn wicked dagger work well with this

        • Soup And Salad
          April 10, 2018 at 2:35 AM

          Maybe it would, but I don’t think this potentially strong three drop in a Baku Rogue would be enough to justify giving up much of the removal Rogue has access to.

          • NIGHTxBLADE
            April 10, 2018 at 5:27 AM

            No i meant without baku its still 1/2 dagger

          • Soup And Salad
            April 10, 2018 at 3:06 PM

            To NIGHTxBLADE

            Rogue has not been begging for another good three cost card, especially one that would require you to specifically to use your hero power on your turn 2 if you want to play it on curve. This is not at least much better than any of the typical three cost minions rogues currently play.

  8. EksSkellybur
    April 9, 2018 at 3:32 PM

    I didn’t Really like this Card.

    This is Overplay THE worst Dragon Card in the Entire Game In My Opinion, since your just using it for a Fringe Moment with Priest.

    The only Class that would want this is Rouge, becuase of her Hero Power and Kingsbane.

    Otherwise, Think of it as: 3 Mana, 5/4; Give your Opponent Noble Scrafice 2.0.

  9. SaturnRebirth
    April 9, 2018 at 1:51 PM

    Good card

  10. GlosuuLang
    April 9, 2018 at 12:19 PM

    The tool Tempo Rogue needed to be good again. And of course it’s a neutral! Hahahaha Yeah, I think this is strong, especially in Rogue. And in Wild Priest will like to Potion of Madness your poisonous. =) 4.5/5 stars.

  11. TonTon
    April 9, 2018 at 12:08 PM

    As long as you have the board this is crazy on curve

  12. ChingChong
    April 9, 2018 at 12:04 PM

    In wild, combo with potion of madness with priest to get 4 mana destroy a minion summon a 5/4

  13. David
    April 9, 2018 at 12:03 PM

    before yall rate it low, this in rogue is crazy good, just t2 dagger, t3 this guy and boop him

    • Soup And Salad
      April 9, 2018 at 3:33 PM

      In that case, it’s a slightly overstated vanilla minion. Rogues have been able to do that with VanCleef for quite a while now. If this were a 4/5 instead of a 5/4, you may be right, but if you can’t deal with the token, your opponent has just been handed a free minion kill.

    • MockRock
      April 9, 2018 at 3:39 PM

      This is a Rogue card. Not a Dragon Rogue card, but just a generic tempo tool. The problem is that Voidwalker, Righteous Protector, the new Gargoyle, etc make this very clunky to play against some decks. Whether it’s good or not depends on how often they see play.