Chillinon’s (Wild) Malygos Shaman – Top 10 Legend (January 2017, Season 34)

Thanks to Chillinon for allowing us to re-host their guide!

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Hey, I’m Chillinon, a guy who really like combo decks. I’ve been working on making a viable Malygos Shaman for quite some time but was impeded until now by the popularity of Secret Paladin that is generally a pretty weak matchup for this deck; because Pirate decks currently dominate with a mixture of Renolocks and Priests on the side, I thought I’d give the deck another spin and was able to hit Legend pretty quickly from rank 22 in about 3 days.

Whilst I have no precise stats due to playing on tablet, I documented the majority of my lethals which I have just below to give the general jist of how it can win / prove I’ve actually been playing this Jank all the way.

• Album: http://imgur.com/a/iNVR2
• Legend Proof: http://imgur.com/a/faibj

Card Choices

Frost Shock and Lightning Bolt double up as removal in aggro matchups and cheap spells that turn into big burst in conjuction with Malygos. Frost shock in particular is especially great as games go on again weapon classes and preserves our soft, squishy face against Arcanite Reaper.

Spirit Claws allow us another way to deal with weak minions without using mana on subsequent turns, once buffed from a spell power totem or one of our minions is seriously menacing. Much less useful in control matchups who almost always run ooze, generally alright in those games to swing straight away (if you have to play it) for chip damage as it won’t normally last a turn. Ancestral Knowledge is a great card for fast draw, cheap upfront cost often allows you to pick up an answer you really need e.g. Hex and play it on the same turn when the opponent is pressuring you. Only really against slow matchups like Reno would I typically use it turn 2, and only then if I don’t have a Mana Tide Totem or Far Sight for turn 3.

Bloodmage Thalnos, one of the best cards ever printed, activates Spirit Claws and pushes our AoE cards up a stage when needed, also fine to slam onto the board at other times and dig deeper into the deck.

Crackle, hate this card from a design standpoint but there’s no denying how good this card can be as a Hail Mary when you need to risk a lethal or lose next turn. When not under pressure, I tend to account for the dame I will get at the lowest possible roll. Lava Shock is debatably the reason this deck can function, it’s so versatile and whilst ideally used to rid huge overload like Elemental Destruction, it’s often correct to use it to rid a niggling bit of overload if you want to have a big Emperor turn you couldn’t have overwise, for example.

Barnes is another method of activating Malygos’ burst but also brings a great deal of versatility to the deck, potentially cheating an early Emperor tick, gaining additional draw in Mana Tide or Thalnos or even allowing us to heal through Hallazeal’s effect. A must have in the deck’s function.

Maelstrom Portal, fantastic clear for low impact minions and the only AoE we have as a Shaman with no drawbacks.

Elemental Destruction and Lightning Storm are also great AoEs, despite their randomness, and the reason you play this combo deck over the others available due to the low upfront cost to high impact of their use. Sometimes you’re forced to make the hard decision between a Lightning Storm that could clear versus a Elemental Destruction that will set you back an additional 3 mana, a good way to guage what is correct whether the consequence of not fully clearing outweighs the consequence of mana penalty for your next move.

Far Sight is an unusual and very potent card to use, besides getting cheaper burn, it is probably one of the biggest game-changers in how many matches play out. With regards to Lava Shock, Ancestral Knowledge and AoE cards in particular, a lot of games it’s good to bank these when reduced to 0 cost if you can get a very good Overload reset turn soon that you couldn’t normally (I hope that made sense). Very basic example: turn 4 Far Sight draws Ancestral Knowledge, turn 5 Ancestral Knowledge + Elemental Destruction + Lava Shock to reap optimal value.

Healing Wave At maximum, potentially game stabilising heal. At minimum, various degrees of disappointing. A necessary evil.

Hex is the best hard removal in the game, 2x because it’s just that good and can be used to decent effect in almost every matchup.

Mana Tide Totem a soft taunt that provides constant draw if not dealt with, great minion to get off Barnes when wanting to dig through deck. It sounds strange but quite often, killing your own Mana Tide Totem can be the right thing to do in control matchups so you don’t have to needlessly waste resources thereafter to not overdraw.

Ancestor's Call more than anything is the reason this deck is restricted to wild as of writing, cheating Malygos out for 3 or 4 mana is so good in pretty much every matchup and the few minions we run means the randomness of the effect is rarely a problem. Against Reno Mage or other cabal class that has gotten Ice Block, if you do pop them because of Barnes and still have Ancestor’s Call in hand + mana to spare, use it in case they have Reno in hand to maximise chance of winning.

Azure Drake – Cantrip, Spell Power, decent costs for Jousts. Neat.

Hallazeal the Ascended in conjunction with Elemental Destruction restoring my health to 30 from single digits and wiping the board largely responsible for many of my aggro opponents instantly conceding. Fine card and well statted for cost so can be slammed down as a body often against control.

Emperor Thaurissan – You get huge discounts that boost survivability and combo potential. Is good.

Malygos – The king of this deck. Malygos comes down, something is going to die.

Why you should you play it?

1) It’s like Freeze Mage, but with much better AoE options and ability to stabalise itself against the current meta. It also is a bit flashier, and has much more BM potential than your regular Freeze list, for those so inclined.

2) It’s consistent as a deck focused around a single minion can be (also a notable minus).

3) It’s got good matchups against all pirate based decks and reno warlock/priest, which are currently the most popular decks.

Why you shouldn’t play it

1) Against control, Malygos is almost always your only win condition and occasionally ends up as your last card, Barnes alleviates this somewhat, but isn’t a guarantee until you’ve drawn all other minions.

2) if you’re easily tilted by Lightning Storm.

Sounds good, how does it play?

Mulligans and Matchups

Pirate (even-favoured) / Dragon (favoured)

Always keep – Lightning Bolt, Lightning Storm, Maelstrom Portal, Spirit Claws, Bloodmage Thalnos, Lava Shock

Keep most of the time – Healing Wave, Elemental Destruction, Crackle, Frost Shock

Sometimes keep – Barnes, Hex (high priority if Dragon), Far Sight

As of writing you should assume this unless you know 100% that the opponent is playing control, use removal aggressively, minimise opportunities for Bloodsail Cultist to get value, if things are going your way, you should stem the bleeding by turn 5 or 6, generally if you get a Hallezeal combo turn off at turn 8 you can’t lose thereafter. Against Pirates you can use Hex against anything vaguely threatening. Dragon warriors pressure you much less, be a bit more cautious around the 15 health mark and Deathwing where sensible, hexes save for big health and Drakonid dudes. Frost Shocks are Godsends in these matchups and you almost always want to use it on the Warrior’s face to stop them bleeding you with their weapons

Control (VERY UNFAVOURED; BE PRAYING) –

Always keep – Malygos, Ancestor’s Call, (draw cards), (burn), Hex, Spirit Claws

Sometimes keep – Emperor

Gather your combo and kill as fast as possible, I’d like to say it’s less pessimistic than Freeze Mage vs Warrior but I attribute my relative not-awful results against the few I encountered as down to not knowing how to play against my deck.

Dragon (very favoured) / Reno (favoured)

Always keep – (Draw cards), Ancestor’s Call

Keep most of the time – Hex

Sometimes keep – Emperor, Barnes, Elemental Destruction + Lava Shock

these play pretty similarly, draw when convenient (coining out Mana Tide Totem is often a good shout), wipe the board when they pressure you about mid health, get a good emperor turn and OTK. A nuance with Reno Priest is that you want to avoid getting Malygos dragged out by Dirty Rat, hence why we don’t keep him in the Mulligan and keep Ancestor’s so we ideally kill at the first opportunity. Additionally, Kazakus potions for 10 armour are a pain but not unsalvageable, just be extra wary of expending all excess burn until you know what they got. In a typical match, 1 hex goes on an Operative and the other Ysera but it’s a little flexible (Deathlords are good candidates if you haven’t drawn Malygos)

Renolock (even-favoured)

Always keep – (draw cards), Hex, Ancestor’s Call

Keep most of the time – Elemental Destruction, Lava Shock, Barnes

Sometimes keep – Emperor

A bit harder than Renopriest as they can OTK you back but overall you still feel pretty confident going in, Hex wants to remove scary or bulky things like Mountain Giant or Twilight Drake etc, Healing Waves at 20 are fine to play around leeroy, like priest, you go for the full OTK though a lot of the time they’ve kindly damaged themselves enough for you to finish them without the full damage (or even without Malygos on occasion)

Aggro Pirate shaman (very favoured)

Always keep – Lightning Bolt, Lightning Storm, Hex, Maelstrom Portal, Healing Wave Elemental Destruction, Lava Shock, Spirit Claws, Bloodmage Thalnos

Keep Most of the time – Barnes, Crackle

Sometimes keep – Far Sight, Frost Shock

General strategy follows the same as Pirate Warrior but easier as they have much less weapons, Lightning Bolt is a very important keep as it handily rids us of tunnel Troggs and Buccaneers turn 1, Hexes almost always go on 4 mana 7/7, Frost Shocks go on the 7/7 if you don’t have Hex / mana cost prohibits it or if they have the Doomhammer out.

Midrange Totem Shaman (even)

Always keep – Lightning Bolt, Lightning Storm, Hex, Ancestral Knowledge, Elemental Destruction, Lava Shock, Spirit Claws, Bloodmage Thalnos, Far Sight

Playing around Bloodlust maths is the main issue with the matchup because you don’t have much to contest the board and Midrange Shaman is very good at producing harmless junk you don’t want to AoE, this is another matchup where you’re wanting to kill them from 20-30 as they always will run Hex, concerning your own hexes however, you generally use them their Thunderbluff or Flamewreathed Faceless if ran.

Jade Midrange Shaman (even)

Always Keep – Lightning Bolt, Lightning Storm, Ancestral Knowledge, Lava Shock, Spirit Claws, Bloodmage Thalnos, Far Sight

Sometimes keep – Hex, Maelstrom Portal

A bit like Midrange but much higher priority on your draw, as they don’t run Bloodlust afaik we’re “safer” for longer and the opponent’s lethals will almost always be apparent on board so you can play a bit greedier on AoE usuage. Kill as fast as possible.

Malygos Mirror [no data]

Always keep – (Draw cards), Ancestor’s Call

Sometimes keep – Hex

This is hypothetical, draw as much as you can, waste a heal or Maelstrom if you need to, Ancestor’s Call could pretty interesting as you could drag out their Malygos and Hex it should you seriously believe they him as their sole minion in hand however that’s probably an iffy move as it weakens your own OTK potential. Science needs to be done.

Egg Druid (unfavoured)

Always keep – Maelstrom Portal, Spirit Claws, Bloodmage Thalnos, Lightning Storm, Lava Shock

Sometimes keep – Hex, Elemental Destruction, Healing Wave

A good early Maelstrom Portal does wonders against this deck, though our slowness means that they can often mount a board that becomes too bad to try wipe very fast. If you can get rid of all their resources though, you win. If they get a big Soul of the Forest up and you can’t remove both layers, you should probably just concede.

Jade Druid (unfavoured – even)

Always Keep – Hex, Lightning Storm, Ancestral Knowledge, Lava Shock, Spirit Claws, Bloodmage Thalnos, Far Sight

A bit worse matchup than Jade Shaman because of the Druid’s Hero Power and ability to ramp as well as silly Fandral and Auctioneer shenanigan turns to pressure you. Try to combo as fast as possible and be fairly greedy with AoEs, Hex Aya and Fandral or Arcane Giants. If the Druid knows what you’re playing then Feral Rage for 8 armour is a massive additional pain to slow you down.

Reno Mage (unfavoured – even)

Always keep – (Draw cards), Lava Shock, Lightning Bolt

Sometimes keep – Lightning Storm, Hex

I dislike this matchup because it’s very luck based; if they don’t get their Ice Block up, you win and if you drag out Reno when popping a block via Ancestor’s Call you probably win. If they happen to recover to 30 from single digits we lose 90% of the time obviously. Thankfully, only having a single copy of each card gives us a tiny bit of time statistically to eat through our draw and kill them before that can happen so i not entirely unfavoured.

Freeze Mage (pretty – very favoured)

Always keep – (Draw cards), Ancestor’s Call, Emperor

Sometimes keep – Malygos

We do the same thing but our reach is better and draw faster most of the time. Generally it’s better not to activate Ice Barrier. Always waste your AoEs if you need to to avoid overdraw, they’re pretty much useless here. They can’t really soften you down because of our healing and they generally can’t complete their OTK setup by the time we’ve got Malygos down and the block popped.

Secret Paladin (very unfavoured)

Always keep – Lightning Bolt, Maelstrom Portal, Spirit Claws, Bloodmage Thalnos, Lightning Storm, Lava Shock, Hex

Like Egg Druid, this deck has loads of minions that are hard to kill directly on top of secret interaction, Divine Favour and crazy-strong minions like Dr.Boom and Tyrion. I think I’ve generally when I’ve played to win and pretended like Divine Favour doesn’t exist, play around secrets in the early game

Miracle Questing Rogue (even – favoured)

Always keep – Hex 🙁 , Bloodmage Thalnos, Lightning Bolt, Lava Shock, Crackle, Far Sight

Sometimes Keep – Elemental Destruction, Ancestral Knowledge, Barnes, Healing Wave, Azure Drake

The main advantage we have over this Miracle is that they need to be on board to deal burst damage outside of Evis and Leeroy, and we can deal with most their Concealed minions with Elemental Destruction sans a big Van Cleef of Questing Adventurer, it’s fine to use Healing Wave after the 20 mark like with Renolock, Hex priority goes to a big Vancleef or a Questing although it can often be very good to use it on a Tomb Pillager in order to deny coins that enable the Rogues game winning combos. You do not need to combo in the matchup, just wear them down, survive and maybe drop Malygos down once you feel safe, Hallazeal is often MVP here and has consistently gotten me just outside of what I expected the Rogue’s remaining reach to be, the 6 health also making it difficult to remove without spell damage or a Sap.

Basic Tips

If you have to kill an opponent from 30 e.g. Priest or N’Zoth Paladin (LUL), your basic OTK is Lightning Bolt/Crackle x 3 + Frost Shock, after Malygos that’s 8 + 8 + 8 (minimum) + 6 for a total of 30, additionally this is 9-10 mana without an Emperor tick after Ancestor’s Call.

Just slapping Malygos on the board is encouraged vs aggro once you’ve stabilised, they can’t do shit to it most of the time and if they do waste their reach to kill him, you’ll win anyway.

Whilst I didn’t use one for this run, I recommend using a deck tracker whilst playing this to save the need to memorise what burn and minions are left in the deck

Additional Tech Considerations

2nd Maelstrom Portal if meta is more Secret Paladin or Egg Druid; the only Shaman AoE without a penalty for using it and it often deals with the annoying layer (e.g. divine shield) of the sticky minions that these decks produce.

Lava Burst if meta is more control / Jade, end games a little faster before the opposition can overwhelm you with their minions.

Subbing out a Hex for Devolve is an option worth considering as a great answer to sticky swarm decks like Secret Paladin or Egg Druid as well as being a good way to deal with stealthed threats or N’Zoth boards. thanks u/Efendi11 for reminding me about this card

Closing words

Ultimately, whilst it takes some getting used to, the deck is a pretty strong alternative to Freeze Mage in the current wild meta and is a blast when you get into the swing of things. I feel like the deck achieves something that never really turned out well during the previous standard cycle and to me, that’s what the allure of Wild was meant to be about.

I may have missed something you think is important so point it out, though I have tried to proof read before posting. There are a few niche matchups I haven’t bothered to discuss like Anyfin Paladin or Secret Hunter, a lot of them are very favoured for us (especially secret hunter) and I’ll write about them if you really want.

I’m not a perfect deckbuilder so don’t be afraid to critique! :]