It’s just a template, don’t pay too much attention to it. All of the 2017 expansions had 3 Commons + 3 Rares + 2 Epics + 2 Legendaries for each class, so I’d assume that it will be the case with The Witchwood too. Edited it to be more clear.

It was already confirmed that it doesn’t. And that’s pretty logical, otherwise Echo cards would be pretty broken.

We would need a 1 mana Echo minion for it to be broken. Or maybe a 2 mana one if it would be strong enough. The Phantom Militia is REALLY bad in Quest Rogue.

The 20 bonus packs are part of the pre-order, and pre-orders can usually be bought until the day before the expansion’s launch. So you should still have a lot of time to get it.

We still don’t know. They are most likely hinting at something, and it might be a real card. But after asking Ben Brode, he didn’t say anything about it. We’ll just have to wait!

Edit: As it turned out, it is now officially confirmed – Shaman will get a new Hero card. But only Shaman.

Thank you!

Shadowreaper Anduin, as useful as it is, is not absolutely necessary and you shouldn’t have a lot of problems replacing it. You can look at the list of potential replacement at the bottom of the guide, but I’d generally lean towards a slower replacement – since Anduin is most useful in slow matchups, you might need something extra to win in those. I’d go for something like Elise, Alex or Ysera. Medivh is probably not a good option, since you run only a single expensive spell – Mind Control. Lich King can also be good, but Ysera or Alex might be better in this slot, simply because they’re Dragons (so even if you draw them early, they can act as a Dragon activator and you don’t have to worry about running out of Dragons).

Unless you face a lot of fast decks, then something like another Primordial Drake or Priest of the Feast might actually be a better replacement.

That’s why the list runs only one, because there aren’t THAT many targets and you can take some other things through different means.

Mind Control works really well in most of the slow matchups, actually. Obviously, Voidlord is one of the best targets, but that’s not all. Doomguard, Cube (if they don’t pop it right away) and Rin are other great targets in thoe matchups. Against Spiteful Summoner decks, you can MC whatever big they summon (there will probably be a few targets of the course of the game). Against Big Priest, any minion besides Barnes. Against Jade Druid, either Aya (if you can’t Silence her) or a big Jade Golem. Against Big Spell / Control Mage, you can steal Medivh, or even a Water Elemental after they play Frost Lich Jaina (it doesn’t seem like much, but if you’re putting a lot of pressure on them, that’s a great steal so they can’t heal). And of course, in the mirror, Drakonid Operative, Primordial Drake, or Alex/Ysera if they run one.

Minions can already be stolen other way, but I still prefer to run one, as I seem to face awful lot of Cube and Control Warlock. However, if your matchup distribution looks differently, like you face a lot of Dude Paladins etc. then you might actually consider cutting it. It’s really up to you. This list is already pretty anti-Aggro, but you can always make it even more!

Those are general replacements, not necessarily BUDGET replacements 🙂

But anyway, since Ysera and Alex are from the Classic set, a lot of people who don’t own the Primordial Drake own them.

About Nature’s Champion – I forgot 🙂 Yes, it also works well if you want to replay Battlecries. However, the thing is that relevant Battlecry minions tend to be expensive anyway, which still makes small minions the best targets. But I’ll mention Battlecries!

About Hand of Salvataion, well, it’s not always that easy. Just to give you a random example, your opponent has Bone Drake and some small minion on the board + a Secret. Now, which one do you kill first? If you kill Bone Drake first to play around Hand of Salvation, and it turns out to be Redemption, it sucks, because they get a 6/1 back and another Dragon for free. Now if you kill the small minion first, it sucks if it turned out to be Hand of Salvation.

Yes, sometimes you can leave that Bone Drake up, but that’s often already a win for your opponent, as they get either 6 damage or can dictate how the trading goes now.

There will be situations like that. Sometimes it’s impossible to play around both at the same time, and you have to pick which one you play around. With Redemption, you ALWAYS started by clearing the small minion without Deathrattle, now it might not be the best option.

Not to mention that it might mess up with your AoE turn. Let’s say that your opponent has some Deathrattle/Stealth/whatever minion played first and you want to AoE down the whole board. Right now when you see a Secret, you try to proc the Redemption first by killing something small (usually pinging it) and THEN AoE, so the Deathrattle/Stealth one doesn’t get revived. Right now it might not be that obvious. If it’s Redemption, then clearing minion first is the right play – if it’s Hand of Salvation, then (depending on what was the second minion on the board), it might be better to AoE everything.

I mean, sometimes playing around them will be easy, but there will be some situations in which you will have to think hard (or just go for whatever option screws you less). It will make Redemption stronger, because people will usually put a higher priority on playing around Hand of Salvation, as it’s more deadly if it works.

Or maybe I’m just overcomplicating it 🙂

From the guide:

This specific list doesn’t run Elise the Trailblazer, as she’s pretty useless in the fast matchups. But if you do run her, she plays a vital role in the slow matchups, when you’re going for the value play. Try to save your Shadow Visions for after Elise. Since Un’Goro pack is a spell, you need to get an extra copy through Shadow Visions. Having two, or possibly even three packs gives you so much extra value that it’s hard to lose the value war if you play everything correctly.

You’re right, I completely forgot about it, fixing it now!

Sorry! I’ve mostly focused on adding the last few sets, and didn’t fix all of the outdated information. Should be good now, thanks 🙂

Sorry for the late reply. You get her by simply winning 10 Standard games (Ranked or Casual). Most of the players got her by just playing the game – I know some people who didn’t even know they have her 🙂

Eh, it’s pretty simple.

Let’s say that you have a regular copy right now.

You disenchant it for +100 Dust. You craft Golden copy for 1,600 Dust (you’re at -1,500). You get a full refund for your Golden copy (you’re at +100). You disenchant your Golden copy for 400 (you’re at +500). You gain +500 Dust for doing that.

And now, if you just keep your regular copy you get 400 Dust for it rotating and you disenchant it for 100, for a total of… exactly, +500 Dust.

It’s literally the same thing. If you feel like doing it, of course you can, but you won’t gain anything that way.

Because the deck has a lot of great Barnes targets.

There are 16 minions in the deck in total and only four of them are “vanilla”, without any effects when you get them from Barnes – Kobold Librarians, Ooze and N’Zoth.

There are 2x Mistress of Mixtures and 2x Plated Beetle for extra healing, Rolling Tainted Zealot is like playing one – it’s a 1/1 anyway. Tar Creepers are 3/1 Taunts (on your opponent’s turn), and that’s only just beginning. Possessed Lackey can obviously summon a Voidlord, Rin is great roll in the slow matchups for the Deathrattle, and rolling Voidlord is amazing, as it Deathrattles into 3x 1/3 Taunts.

You have 75% chance to roll something with an effect and ~30% to roll something with an amazing effect. Maybe even higher given that you always want to mulligan for the Kobolds and they’re basically an auto-keep in every matchup.

But this is just not true. Wild is a cheaper format in the long run and I don’t get why people can’t see it. Yes, GETTING into the Wild is more expensive, but the maintenance cost is much, much lower. It will be more apparent with time, but the thing is, Wild meta doesn’t change that much. E.g. Dude Paladin is a solid deck for the last few expansions. You only had to add 1 or 2 cards with each expansion and you had a completely viable deck. Same for RenoLock, the list I’ve been playing a year ago in the Wild is almost the same as the list I could be playing right now, with maybe 3-4 cards changed.

Keeping up with the Wild meta is much cheaper. You just need to make a bigger initial investment, either money or dust. I think that they should totally introduce Wild packs you can buy with gold to the store, but that’s the thing – they actually don’t want people to play Wild, because it’s cheaper in the long run. Instead of 100 packs from a new expansion, you need 2 or 3 times less to keep up in the Wild.

It’s a way for the Wild players to test their strength in a more competitive environment with better rewards. It’s a bit like the Heroic Tavern Brawl, but with lower risk/reward. It’s like saying that tournaments don’t make sense – it’s just playing the same decks but to get rewarded more than usual. See?

But yes, I think that a lot of Standard players will try themselves in the event too. And that’s cool. Your previous point about Standard players not having Wild cards is not exactly correct too, because from what I’ve gathered, most of the players are keeping their Wild cards and not disenchanting them (at least the good cards, I’ve heard about some players getting rid of the bad/meme cards). I’m playing Standard 99% of the time and I didn’t disenchant any of the Wild cards, because I might want to play the mode in the future (or in the events like that). So did most of my friends, even though we could all obviously use some extra Dust.

But anyway, I again fail to see the problem. It’s just a Tavern Brawl, you can just ignore it. You don’t even miss your weekly pack, because you get one entry for free – if you retire immediately you get rewards for 0 wins, which include a pack (and some extra dust/gold), even easier than your normal Tavern Brawl.

Alleycat will be gone from Standard with the next expansion, so it’s still over a month until then.

And we will have all of our budget decks updated when the expansion hits. It’s impossible to say right now, because we don’t know what new cards will get printed 🙂

Prince Taldaram is good, because of its flexibility. You can copy a Taunt if you need one (Voidlord in particular is amazing, but copying your opponent’s Righteous Protector ain’t that bad), you can get a 3/3 Charge with Doomguard in case you need to kill something right away or deal more damage, you can copy Mistress of Mixtures for more healing, but the best use is to copy the Cube once you’ve eaten something big. For example, if you Cube the Doomguard, and then copy it, you have a 3 mana 3/3 which Deathrattles into two freakin’ Doomguards.

Of course, the card is not absolutely necessary, you can run the deck without it. But it is a really good card in this deck.

About that matchup, I think you’re talking about Big Priest, right? In that case, with this deck you should try to win through the aggression, not outlast them (because you won’t be able to). The best way to kill them is through an early Mountain Giant (assuming they can’t answer it) or multiple Doomguards. Cube is great, as you can duplicate your big threat. Turn 10 Bloodreaver Gul’dan is also a great way to finish off the game, especially if you’ve managed to get a few Doomguards onto the board before that – charging 3 or 4 of them at your opponent is usually a good way to close the game.

It’s not a good matchup and the deck will often start reviving stuff as early as Turn 4-5, meaning that some of the games simply can’t be won. On the other hand, sometimes they draw really poorly and don’t do anything for the first 6-7 turns, and those games are auto-wins.

But yes, N’Zoth would make that matchup better, because if your initial aggression failed, you could always have another big board refill that they absolutely have to answer.