The moon is a powerful ball of dust, especially when wielded by the right hands/claws. This week, we look at a spell power Druid deck in Hearthstone, designed to use big spells like Swipe and Moonfire to clear the board and secure a safe kill in the late game.
Find out more about this deck and watch it in action in the latest episode of Happy Hearthstone!
Note from Josh: The rest of this article was written by Mick Montgomery. Thanks, Mick!
The Arcane Druid
This is a Spell Power control deck that relies on boosting up the power of your late-game spells to secure the win. A quick example, in case you’re not sold on the concept: Moonfire is a 0-cost card that does 1 damage. With the Spell Power that this deck provides, it usually deals 6 damage for 0 mana! That’s value.
Our primarily plan is simple: control the board as long as we can, then use our beefy taunt cards on turns 7 and 8 to protect your Malygos drop. Then you tee off and nuke the enemy’s face with spells. But this deck is versatile. You have a lot of direct damage spells, and beefy minions. If you don’t draw into Malygos, you still do a lot of damage with the other cards that buff your spell power. The real key is to remove all of your opponent’s cards on the board by turn 7. If you can accomplish that, you’ll be in good shape.
Let’s get into the cards I used in my deck for the mighty showdown with Josh. You can find a completely plain deck list on the podcast episode. Here, I’ll provide additional commentary where I feel it’s helpful or necessary.
Cheap, efficient access to spell power. This is one of three cards that directly buff spell power in this deck, and it’s the easiest one to get on the board early. While getting to the Malygos draw is key to buff the spells massively, minor buffs come in real handy during the early and mid game.
This card can be great to help you get to your beefy cards a bit early. There is a lot of 4 drop cards that could benefit from one less mana cost in the early game. Also, I find the Pint Sized Summoner is a nice victim card. Folks hate that card, and will do everything they can to try to kill it quickly, even if it means playing inefficiently. We’re playing for the late game, so inefficient plays by our enemies are exactly what’ll help us get there.
This helps stabilize the deck against other late-gamers. This comes in handy against other decks that roll out high damage minions. He’s a fine body if played at the earliest moment, and still works great if drawn late.
A staple card for control decks. He can do two damage or silence a minion. Instant value with a decent defensive body behind, that’s available for buffs.
1x Spellbreaker
One of my favorite silence cards. On turn four, he can silence to get some immediate value. If he lasts through the next turn, he’ll also do some nice damage.
1x Azure Drake
This guy is an obvious fit for this deck. He’s one of the best-value cards in the set in general. And with this deck, his buff to Spell Power is even more relevant. I love this card.
This is not necessary to have, but it has such great synergy with the late game cards we’re running in this deck. For example, if the Ancient of War your drop on turn 7 survives, you can use this to get a second for very cheap. Your opponent will not be happy. Oh, and it’s fun to Faceless Manipulator Malygos to get +10 spell power. Yep, I’ve done that.
This is such a strong card on turn 7. You can buff it to 10 damage, if the board is clear, or set up for Malygos by rooting him for the health and taunt effect. I tend to root the Ancient of War more often. Also, he can draw out the CC cards quickly from our opponent’s deck. I’d rather have a polymorph burned on him than Malygos.
Back, when I started this deck, I had no Ancient of Wars, so I used Ironbarks. They rock. Drop one behind your Ancient of War on turn 8 and you’re pretty set for a turn-9 Malygos drop or for Cenarius to buff it to a 10/10. Wahoo!
1x Cenarius
He isn’t necessary to make this deck work, unlike a lot of other Legendaries. In fact he has only been in this deck for a month or so, but he does make a huge difference because he is so versatile. He’s saved my bacon many times.
1x Malygos
The lynchpin of this deck. His Spell Power buff is so massive that once he is on the board, you can wreck your opponent in one turn depending on the spells you have in your hand at the time.
I’ll discuss the spells as a group. The spells are all very versatile. In turns 1 – 8, you can definitely use them to clear the board (first priority) or if you have a clear board, go to the face. Bite and Claw can be used for Control, but if you can go to the face with them, all the better. The only spell not in here for control is Healing Touch. That is for when you find yourself falling behind. Or in a tight one, heal your Hero, and force your opponent to change tactics.
2x Moonfire (0)
2x Claw (1)
2x Wrath (2)
2x Healing Touch (3)
1x Mark of Nature (3)
1x Bite (4)
2x Swipe (4)
2x Starfall (5)
2x Starfire (6)
Possible Additions
There is a lot of room for customization in an aggressive warrior deck, so there are many cards one can use to suit this deck to the current run of opponents or one’s particular collection. Your minion choices offer a lot of flexibility, and there are too many options to list all of them, so I include here only a small selection.
Dalaran Mage (replace Kobold Geomancer)
Ogre Magi (replace Azure Drake, Keeper of the Grove, or Spellbreaker)
Archmage (replace Faceless Manipulator or Azure Drake)
Ironbark Protector (replace Cenarius)
Druid of the Claw (replace Ironbark Protectors or Ancients of War)
Lord of the Arena (replace Ironbark Protectors or Ancients of War)
Sunwalker (replace Ironbark Protectors or Ancients of War)
Naturalize (replace Starfall)
Final Thoughts
I think that most folks ignore Spell Power as a mechanic. This deck is great because folks are not prepared for it, and it is incredibly adaptable. And while you do need the one Legendary (Malygos) to make it work, it’s only one — and that’s a lot less than most of the popular decks!
Be sure to listen to our last episode of the podcast, where we talk about the deck at length. If you try it out, tell us what you thought of it, and what cards you swapped in to have the most success.