Introduction
Hello and welcome to yet another Decks to Play edition!
Tonight we are going to be discussing some of my choices this week regarding competitive play.
This week I decided to start playing EU tournaments, some of you might not know but I was an NA-exclusive player up until this week, so I decided I needed to play more tournaments, both for training as well as having more options regarding tournament time.
This choice was taken for two reasons:
- EU has more tournaments than NA, and during different times.
- Having an EU and an NA account allows me to log on and play a tournament whenever I like (the tournaments basically cover all times I am awake).
So I started my EU account, bought the following items:
- 60 Classic Packs.
- League of Explorers Expansion.
And went competitive as soon as I got the basic cards (class levels) I needed. A point to note here is that I was also granted the 13 initial WOG packs, which helped me a little, regardless of me being unlucky with those packs and getting zero legends and epics with it. I also got zero playable Legends from the 60 classic packs, but enough dust to craft my decks.
With only one expansion and 60 packs, however, I was able to make 5 different decks in which I can use to play tournaments, and since those decks are good enough to be played in competitive, and cheap enough to be done on a clean account with just a couple bucks invested, I decided it was worth it making an article to discuss these decks, shall we begin?
Pirate Warrior
So Pirate Warrior is the ultimate deck when we think about budget options, but regardless of not being so efficient on the Ladder, the deck has a couple of pretty one-sided matchups(including the super-popular Midrange Hunter), which can be a good reason to be taken into tournaments.
leeroy-jenkins isn’t really needed, but was a card I decided to craft because I could fit it in a variety of other decks, including Zoo and a Miracle Rogue one since I had opened two preparations in the packs.
Another important thing to note about Pirate Warrior is how much it fits the playstyle of the composition you can make with cheaper decks such as Midrange Hunter, Aggro Shaman, Zoo and Miracle Rogue.
Miracle Rogue
Miracle Rogue was a deck I only made because of the double preparation I got from the packs I opened. However, I don’t believe it to be impossible to make this deck without opening the preparations as long as you get at least the deck’s rares (which I didn’t). Besides, I not only didn’t get the deck’s rares, I also got unlucky with the packs I opened.
To the deck itself, this is a straightforward version of Miracle Rogue, with an extra deadly-poison and an extra earthen-ring-farseer instead of edwin-vancleef and bloodmage-thalnos. While the lack of the two Legendaries can make the difference in some matches, the simple fact you are running more two-ofs can make the deck more consistent, and specifically in the ladder matches those cards may not be missed as much.
Miracle Rogue is also a decent tournament deck that fits into the strategy we were trying to make, so having it in our options is a decent pick.
Aggro and Midrange Shaman
So, with the amount of dust we have, and the small difference between the two strategies, we are able to make both Aggro, Midrange strategy and ultimately the Hybrid strategy, which is the optimal one for tournaments.
Both Aggro and Midrange versions seems to be better laddering options, meanwhile the Hybrid version is the one that takes over the tournament scene because of its snowballing potential.
Why did I choose to make every single Shaman build available instead of only crafting one kind of strategy, you wonder? Shaman is indeed the most played class in the game right now, however the “most powerful” build keeps changing, as new ideas keep popping up, and since the options are very different from one another, while being close in dust value, it is better to have all the options available to us than simply one version.
The list posted here is a ladder one, acidic-swamp-ooze is a tech option instead of harrison-jones, since I don’t have it, but can also be replaced by bloodlust or a second thunder-bluff-valiant.
Midrange Hunter
And the last one version showcased today comes the most played single-strategy deck in tournaments right now: Midrange Hunter.
Much like Shamans, I decided to have access to every Midrange Hunter build there is, and crafted quite a lot of Hunter cards in addition to the one you’re seeing right now.
This one build is a tournament oriented one, and a very similar list to Thijs’ Midrange Hunter, the main difference is the dual explosive-trap instead of dual quick-shot.
While having the Explosive Traps instead of the shots can hurt the Midrange and Control matchup, which are the main focus of this build, it adds to the Aggro matchup and makes it a lot smoother than it is supposed to be.
Thijs’ build was made purely to fight against Midrange and Control strategies, taking full one-sided advantage of desert-camel while almost auto-losing to Aggro. While this strategy is fine, we don’t have Quick Shot, but replacing it with Explosive Trap is an equal-level replacement, meaning our game plan won’t be crippled by the replacement.
To smooth the aggro matchup even more without hurting the Control one, I also decided to add a copy of stampeding-kodo, which can also be used against Control to get rid of a various number of threats while generating tempo.
Zoo
And the leftover strategy I made was Zoo, simply because I had all the cards already.
The Zoo strategy, different from the other decks, is slightly crippled by the lack of imp-gang-boss, but in the end I realized it is possible to make up for the loss with a few tweaks to the deck, including the replacement of one Imp for brann-bronzebeard which can be equally threatening, sometimes even more depending on the situation.
There are of course implications of carrying this one Zoo deck to tournaments, and I wouldn’t recommend but in regarding to Ladder I think carrying this one deck is as good as any of the ones listed before.
This deck can be made even without leeroy-jenkins or sea-giant with a pair of doomguards instead, without sacrificing any of its potential.
Closing
And, with the least amount of cash spent, I am able to compete on high-level tournaments without any kind of disadvantage.
Besides my obvious choices, I have to admit that there are many other options for you to pick and different strategies you can invest on depending on the cards you get from your packs. My choice regarding the investments however are the most important ones: League of Explorers and 60 classic packs are the best options to start a clean account, as you’re basically building the base for every deck you might want to make, and you can choose which deck to make based on that base.
Another cool option to be picked is Elise+cthun Warrior if you get 2-3 Warrior epics and want to invest on C’Thun Strategies – I know this deck is expansive, but picking this one deck allows you to also have access to both C’Thun Druid and Priest, although I wouldn’t recommend going this way. A decent bonus of picking C’Thun strategy over the ones I choose is that C’Thun decks won’t rotate out of the game in 7 months – However, keep in mind that even here you would rather pick 60 classic packs as the deck base for the whole decks are still classic.
I hope you guys enjoyed this slightly different version of Decks to Play I made today, and we’ll see each other again soon! 😀
Love you guys,
Nuba
