Satellite’s Bloodreaver Zoo Guide

Zoolock hasn’t been in the best of spots in the Standard meta for a long while now. Throughout the history of the game, the deck has been in relevance in most meta games but with more aggressive decks like Pirate Warrior and Aggro Druid being more efficient at quickly ending games, Zoolock has fallen out of favor for several months now. Zoo is unlike the quintessential aggro deck, you rely on board control to keep things in your favor and slowly drain out your opponent’s health pool. Zoo decks are known to be able to have enough fuel to last much longer than generic aggro decks thanks to the Warlock hero power that keeps getting you playable cards and allows you to get to your key cards in time.

Satellite peaked at Rank 3 Legend with this list last season and it has been a very different take on the archetype from what we are used to. The deck completely skips out 2 drops and makes room for Prince Keleseth. Prince Keleseth has become quite popular since the last balance patch in Rogue and it’s also a card people consider using in Handbuff Paladin decks. The deck compensates for the lack of 2 drops by putting in additional 1 cost cards. You also have access to Bloodreaver Gul’dan in the deck which resummons your demons. You have to be careful with Bloodreaver however, with multiple discard cards in your deck and against Control matchups where the card is your win condition you should try to hold on to cards like Soulfire and Doomguard unless you are close to lethal.

Card Choices

Flame Imp: Flame Imp is a very aggressive 1 drop that has solid stats that are good enough to deal with most 1 and 2 drops in the game.

malchezaars-imp: While this is not a pure Discard themed deck, the card gets a lot of value out of the few Discard cards you have nonetheless. And even without its effect, it’s still a 1 mana 1/3 which is quite solid and works great with Acherus Veteran early in the game to get good trades off and also potentially survive against your opponent’s early drops.

Mortal Coil: Mortal Coil is a powerful card draw tool that can be used to finish off 1 HP minions while also drawing you’re a card. It is a very good early game board control tool and can also help in the mid to lategame to get good trades off and it’s one of the few spells in your deck.

Soulfire: Soulfire is a very efficient spell that can be used to deal burst damage or to kill of mid-sized minions. Also, the Discard effect can be negated if you have a Malchezaar’s Imp on the board. You have to be careful with the usage of the card as discarding Doomguard or Bloodreaver Gul’dan in control matchups can hurt your win condition.

Voidwalker: Voidwalker is a solid early game taunt that can keep other high value early drops like Malchezaar’s Imp alive to get value out of them. It is also a very good anti-aggro tool against decks that run a lot of low stat minions.

Darkshire Councilman: Darkshire Councilman is a very powerful 3 drop that can snowball out of control if left unchecked even if for a single turn. Protecting it with Voidwalker and allowing it to gain massive amounts of attack can pressure your opponent very effectively in any matchup. Its high health pool also makes it very hard to be dealt with.

Shadowflame: Zoo is not known for running area of effect spells, but this deck makes room for one copy of Shadowflame to be used as a comeback mechanism if you fall behind in board state. Leeroy is a very good Shadowflame target in the deck as it allows you to deal 6 damage to your opponent and also deal 6 area of effect damage to your opponent’s board. Shadowflame also is very good with Keleseth as it buffs up your cheap drops to get more value out of them.

Despicable Dreadlord: Despicable Dreadlord is a very good minion and it applies a lot of pressure on your opponent’s board every turn if not dealt with. It is very good against aggressive decks and its stats are quite good as well, making it a very resilient minion for its cost.

Doomguard: Doomguard is one of Warlock’s strongest cards and it works both as a finisher as well as a powerful 5 drop that pressured your opponent thanks to its amazing stats which can easily lead to two for one when it comes to trades against your opponent’s mid game.

bloodreaver-guldan: Bloodreaver Gul’dan serves as a win condition for the deck in matchups where your minions get removed quite handily and you cannot sustain a board long enough to close out the game. It is specially powerful in control matchups as you can exhaust your opponent out of board clears before playing Bloodreaver, and it can make it really hard for your opponent to deal with your Battlecry.

Acherus Veteran: Acherus Veteran is a weaker pre-nerf Abusive Sergeant. It is very good for getting better trades off or simply as a tempo play with its battlecry on one of your minions for adding damage to the board.

Fire Fly: Fire Fly is a decent 1 drop that gives you an additional 1/2 for 1 mana in hand. While we do not run any elemental synergies in the deck, the card is decent on its own regardless.

Patches The Pirate: We run a very small package of Pirates in the deck and the goal is to draw Keleseth before drawing Patches to get good value out of your Southsea Captain.

Prince Keleseth: A very powerful card if you manage to get him early enough. With the Warlock hero power available to you, you have the draw engine to fish for the card early on. You can easily mulligan aggresively for the card in many matchups because you have enough cheap cards to almost guarantee you a good early game board however you mulligan.

Tar Creeper: Tar Creeper is one of the most solid taunt minions in the game right now and it’s an amazing anti-aggro tool against almost every aggressive deck out there. It is also a great minion to protect your cheap drops from being traded off too easily. While we do not run any elemental synergies in the deck, it is a great minion to include nonetheless.

Dark Iron Dwarf: We run one copy of Dark Iron Dwarf in the deck, allowing you to make good trades instantly with its battlecry if you have an existing board. It also works great with Shadowflame, allowing you to buff your board to get more value out of the spell.

Leeroy Jenkins: Leeroy is a great finisher in the deck and it also serves as a Shadowflame target for big board clears.

Mulligan

• Prince Keleseth
• Flame Imp
• Acherus Veteran (with other 1 drops)
• Voidwalker
• Darkshire Councilman / Tar Creeper (with solid turn 1 and turn 2 plays)
• Fire Fly

Conclusion

Satellite’s take on Zoolock has been very effective on ladder against most meta decks. It has the right balance of early game aggression and spells to control the board and a decent amount of burst damage to close out games fast enough. Even if you fall behind in the mid to late game, you have Bloodreaver Gul’dan to back you up and close out matches very effectively.

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