This week’s Tavern Brawl is “Blood Magic”!
Discuss this Tavern Brawl on our Discord!
Official Description for Blood Magic
How much are willing to sacrifice for power? All your spells will cost health instead of mana!
Blood Magic Chalkboard
General Information
- Earn a Standard card pack for your first win in this Brawl.
- This is the ninth time we see this Brawl (Blood Magic). Last time we’ve seen it was on February 22, 2023.
- It’s a PvP Brawl.
- Brawl’s format is Wild.
- It’s a build your own deck Brawl. Pick a class and build a regular decklist.
- The twist is that your spells cost health instead of mana. That’s why your deck should mostly consist of spells for obvious reasons.
- Armor or Immune cards no longer prevent you from taking damage. There was a rule change to how cards “costing life” work and they just reduce your health, bypassing anything.
- You can’t play spells if their casting cost would kill you – e.g. if you have 5 health, you can only use spells that cost 4 or less.
- Spells that draw cards are very important since you can cycle through your deck quickly for “free”. Preferably ones that both draw and gain life at the same time – e.g. Lay on Hands.
- Then you need some sort of win condition – the Brawl is very combo-heavy. For some ideas, check out the list of decks below.
Blood Magic – Decks
Those are deck list ideas from the previous times this Brawl was around, but since it’s a Wild version, you can still play them. They should still work well, but they’re a bit outdated now. Post your decklists in the comments and I’ll feature them in this post! I had to remove decks relying on Armor/Immune though.
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There are decks beyond Burn Druid in this format:
I have seen …
Paladin with Tip the Scales and with Front Lines.
Hunter with Nagrand Slam and with Guardian Animals into Tundra Rhino to Charge Unleash the Beast.
Token Druid with all kinds of expensive global buffs.
… but in the end Burn Druid is still king
doomguards go brrr turn 1 killer, less apm required than druid
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I like the idea of T1 crane game into Doom Guard, then buffing them with Monstrous Form and Power Overwhelming and finally copying them with Reverberations for a T1 kill.
I played the deck a lot, and the biggest issue is that the deck fizzles badly if you draw even a single Doom Guard or if you destroy one by Fracking while digging for Crane Game.
At first I wanted to solve that by adding Plot Twist, but I ultimately settled for Sir Finley, Sea Guide and also a pair of Enhanced Dreadlords as Crane Game Targets 3 and 4.
T1 kills are now far less likely, but still possible, and the total win rate goes up. Of course you are still an underdog against Burn Druid, but all other matchups are manageable.
I cut Drain Soul, Hand of Gul’dan and Endgame, adding Molten Giants, a Sacrifical Pact and the above mentionend enhanced Dreadlords instead (I do not own The Soularium).
Now the biggest remaining issue is if you mulligan into all those 1-mana-spells that need a minion on your side instead of Crane Game or draw spells.
Why enhanced dreadlord? Feels very defeatist. I agree with your assessment that drawing doomguards makes winning a lot harder but it’s still entirely doable (just won one where I topdecked doomguard on turn 1, for instance) but making turn 1 kills more infrequent doesn’t seem like the solution to me. I mean besides playing against people who are just trying to have fun/randomly threw together 30 cards it seems like the meta is to kill turn 1. Hand of guldan feels very needed to churn through your deck, since the way you win if you drew a doomguard is by having a bunch of buffs + reverb. Plus it lets you preserve health in a big way if you are able to discard it.
it was just my experience with the 40+ games i played (sounds much, but most games do not last more than 2-3 turns)
real turn 1 kills by my opponents were quite infrequent (even with specialized decks), because you only have little time in your first turn. That lead to many situations where one player puts himself down on cards and life to almost kill his opponent, and then said opponent only needs to inflict 10-15 damage, but only has little life left to do so. That is why Molten Giant is quite effective in practice, even if it does not help with turn 1 kills.
If you expect to face only Burn Druid and Demon Hunter decks (those are the only ones capable of T1 kills in the hands of a very a quick player) you could call it a turn 1 meta, but even there a dreadlord can help you with its taunt, because much of Druid’s and Demon Hunter’s damage comes from attacks by the hero.
I had bad results with Hand of Gul’dan, because if you pay 6 life for it you often miss the necessary life total to play all the cards drawn, and there is no way besides luckily hitting it with scourge supplies to consistently discard it to play it for free (like expired merchant and chamber of viscidus – those are obviously not an option).
Maybe I play too slow, and maybe the fact that i do not own The Soularium makes such a big difference, but i almost never could do 30 damage on turn 1 with the original deck. Drain Soul (paying 2 life to gain 3) made no sense, and i never ever played Endgame in a way that made a difference to the outcome of the game.
Hm I see. Well maybe you have more experience with the format than I do. And maybe I just got a bad view of it because with the deck built this way I would just have to concede on occasion (thus not getting to take a look at their decklist). Soularium is definitely a huge card even though it’s only a 1 of but I agree that I also ended up cutting drain soul and endgame after they weren’t super useful. Hand of guldan is a lot of life, but it’s honestly more or less a fair price for draw 3 (not even considering the synergies). And the fact that you can soulfire to discard soul barrage for lethals meant I very rarely spent too much life from 30 so that I wasn’t able to kill. My “losses to my own deck” were all not finding crane game or finding both doomguards.
what did you add after cutting drain soul and endgame?
i think Finley definitely can save you some games in which you drew doomguards (or in which you failed to draw crane game).
It would be interesting to watch some games in spectator mode. but for the time being this tavern brawl is over, and we have to see if crane game will be viable next time “blood magic” comes around
I won in a single turn with Mage. Played two Arcane Missiles, then a Fireball, then Sunset Volley then played a Galactic Projection Orb to recast all. Turn 1 Lethal.
Arcane Artificer and Solid Alibi do not work as they did, so that strategy is dead.
(apparently this is stated in the “general information” in bold, i just did not read it)
So Violet Illusionist and Blur from Demon Hunter are out too.
draw/heal/burn Druid on the other hand still works, but again time is your greatest issue.
(but even if you do not kill your opponent T1, you can still reduce his life enough to severely limit his options)
Deck DH pls?
Feel like playing wild in 2025
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Had good runs with this list, but heavily relies on Solid Alibi. Mulligan for it and draw into burn.
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Ice Lance x 2
Cram Session x 2
Frostbolt x 2
Frozen Touch x 2
Gifts of Azshara x 2
Research Project x 2
Runed Orb x 2
Siphon Mana x 2
Solid Alibi x 2
Arcane Intellect x 2
Arcane Brilliance x 2
Fireball x 2
Refreshing Spring Water x 2
Firelands Portal x 2
Pyroblast x 2
Mine was close enough to this, dropped Pyroblast and a few others turn one and opponent rage quit pretty soon after. If you high roll, you can just blow through an opponent fast. Ice Block is also a good add.
as a side note, you have to play pyroblast first, because when you drop below 10 life the game does not let you play it, even under alibi protection
This is the wild version:
– still lacks the necessary card draw, but has better damage spells.
– Arcane Artificer is a nice backup for Solid Alibi. They even combo for ultimate armor protection. The best thing is, that the need for mulliganing is now greatly reduced and you can keep all card drawing as soon as you see either Alibi or Artificer in your opening hand.
– Frost Bolt and Ice Lance are included because they can buy you a turn against Demon Hunter and Druid if you cannot win on the spot, and they are still sweet damage. The Ice Lance would possibly be a second GA Missiles if I owned it.
– play Arcane Brilliance always as your first card draw spell. It produces copies, so it will probably not to run itself out of targets (Pyroblast), but why take a chance?
– play Pyroblast always before you go below 10 life, because afterwards it is locked, even under Alibi protection.
– you can still win without alibi as long as your spells deal more than they cost (Missiles, Mask, Bolt, Lance and Pyroblast if necessary
– coin+firebolt is still one damage if you survived their T1 and if you do not need the mana for
Arcane Artificer
– alibi still lasts during your opponent’s turn, so if you fail to kill them, not everything is yet lost.
– even if you cannot get them to 0 health, the farther you whittle them down, the less options they have. still, some opponents can still win from very low life (demon hunter starting with blur and card draw for example), but you can do the same with Arcane Artificer(s) – Solid Alibi – draw spell(s)
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2x (1) Arcane Artificer
1x (1) Ice Lance
2x (2) Cram Session
2x (2) Frostbolt
2x (2) Gifts of Azshara
2x (2) Research Project
2x (2) Solid Alibi
2x (3) Arcane Intellect
2x (4) Arcane Brilliance
2x (4) Fireball
2x (5) Apexis Blast
2x (5) Refreshing Spring Water
2x (7) Firelands Portal
1x (7) Greater Arcane Missiles
2x (7) Mask of C’Thun
2x (10) Pyroblast
Just play DH and search for “draw” and “attack” spells, add Metamorphosis, avoid Glide. T1 OTK all the time. Do not include Discover or Choose cards. Just spam all cards as they are drawn. 3 wins in 3 minutes, but pretty boring.
As paladin, fill your deck with charge minions and then play Front Lines (9mana, fill each players board with minions from their deck)
Easy turn 1 OTK with pala
Proove: https://ibb.co/Dz0zwPB
Deck Code
### Brawl 08-04 19:52
# Class: Paladin
# Format: Wild
# Year of the Hydra
#
# 2x (1) Blessing of Might
# 2x (1) Stonetusk Boar
# 2x (2) Conviction (Rank 1)
# 2x (2) Flash of Light
# 2x (2) Hand of A’dal
# 2x (2) Holy Light
# 2x (2) Potion of Heroism
# 2x (3) Divine Favor
# 2x (3) Seal of Champions
# 2x (4) Blessing of Kings
# 2x (4) Hammer of Wrath
# 2x (5) Blessed Champion
# 2x (5) Holy Wrath
# 2x (5) Solemn Vigil
# 2x (8) Lay on Hands
#
AAEBAZ8FAA9G+gGzA9IEiAWnBfIL4hGdFe3SAuyGA8rBA+PrA5mfBJqfBAA=
#
# To use this deck, copy it to your clipboard and create a new deck in Hearthstone
# Generated by HDT – https://hsreplay.net
I got some wins as Shaman, fun cards include:
Unstable Evolution
Witch’s Brew
Instructor Fireheart
Overdraft
Thank you for the decks.
I replaced Celestial Alignment (which I do not own) in the Druid deck with Moonlit Guidance.
That card seems to fit well for this Tavern Brawl. Earned me a T2 kill (in T1 time ran out)
I tried the Warrior deck too, but what is Into the Fray for?
You never have taunt minions in hand, and it does not work on minions in play
Ironic for them to give us this while Stealer of Souls is running rampant in Wild
Absolutely, just queued into 3 of these bad boys in a row in Wild. Two turn 5 lethals and one turn 6 lethal. Great interactive fun watching the opponent draw their deck and waiting to be killed.
Druid (best) : AAEBAZICAA9AX8EEhQa3BpoI/M0Ch84Cv/IC26UD5boDouEDwOwDuKAEuaAEAA==
Paladin : AAECAZ8FAA9G+gGjArMDvQPSBK8HlgndCvILw6QDna4D67kDysED0tEDAA==
DH : AAECAR8C2QnslgMOqAK1A4cEuwXtBocHlwj5lgOfpQODtgP7uwOC0AOT0QO50gMA
War : AAECAQcC0gKEnwMOFpAD/ASkBu8H/weCCLII1AiWlAOkpAP2wgOR0APS0QMA
thanks 🙂
Thank you for sharing, I featured them! 🙂
El DH es un Cazador
Miracle OTK Paladin!!
With this deck, if opponents don’t concede by the end of Turn 3 or 4, they’re probably dead already.
To summarize what this deck does, you drop a stonetusk boar on the board, buff it up like crazy, and kill your opponent while Violet Illusionist absorbs all the spell costs. The reason you have to wait a few turns is because you need 4 mana to drop both the Violet Illusionist and Stonetusk Boar. Enjoy winning your games and I hope my deck gets featured!
http://www.hearthstonetopdecks.com/decks/tavern-miracle-otk-paladin-blood-magic/
Update: I just noticed that ExaltedSmiley already submitted a similar deck. However, this one is slightly different in that you don’t have to worry about health… in fact your usually left with 30 HP at the end.
Malygos druid might not be the best, but it ends fast :
malygos
every spell that deal damage to the opponent
most card draw (every spell card draw for sure)
every ramp spells
some beast to stay alive and because you spend no mana beside
6-cost portal is nice
cycle, get maly, get mana (ramp + innervate).
end of game
Does Loatheb make them take 5 additional damage?
AKA make pirate warrior job easyer, Took me 6 maches to win my pack, I was looking foward to play a malygos deck but is almost impossible ;-;