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TCGplayer is back up and running after some unfortunate downtime. They've been hard at work improving things for the loyal readers out there. For any of you that haven't noticed, you now have options to keep yourself in the know regarding updates to not only this blog, but also any blog on this site with the RSS features that have been added. This was something that a lot of you have been asking for and now you've got it. You're welcome. I should have this week's Metagame Madness up some time tomorrow.
Tags: World Of Warcraft
Well, the holidays are behind us, and that means it's back to business. For those of us looking to get ahead of the game here in the WoW TCG, the first order of business then is trying to get a handle on the new March of the Legion metagame. I feel confident in saying that March of the Legion has more raw power than any other set we've seen thus far. It has everything from beatdown to control with several cards that many players (including myself) thought would have major impacts on the metagame. People can go back and forth all they want with theorycrafting, but the results speak for themselves. What have people been playing and how has MotL changed things? Well, let's put all the talk aside and take a look at the numbers.We'll start with the look at the faction breakdown which couldn't be much closer.Alliance-28
Horde-27
There is an odd number because one result just had a deck listed as Mage with no hero or faction. It's still close here which is a good sign of the balance of the factions. Players see to gravitate toward Horde for their beatdown purposes and Alliance when they want to control things. That's not always the case, but so far it seems like most of the Horde decks are beatdown while a lot of the Alliance are leaning toward control.Next we'll take a look at a breakdown by class.
Warlock-10
Priest-8
Druid-8
Warrior-7
Mage-6
Paladin-6
Hunter-5
Rogue-4
Shaman-2
At this point, most of the classes have one style that most of the decks of that class will fall into. Let's start at the top.
Most of the Warlock decks are of the control persuasion. There have been a fe Mazar decks pop up that use the Wintervolt combo, but most of the decks are sower control decks that draw the game out. One of those big time cards that was supposed to make an impact was Bringer of Death. This is one of the decks that puts that card to great use. Warlocks have always been pretty good at beating ally based rush decks but had problems with solo decks like Rogue and Warrior. Now if they can drag the game out to turn 8, Warlocks have a great answer to these solo decks that have given them fits for so long. Don't get me wrong, Bringer of Death is not the be-all end-all apocalypse for solo decks that some people will make it out to be, but it gives Warlocks a lot more game against the solo decks than they've had before. That is one of the reasons that Warlock has taken the early lead in the class war.PriestMuch has been made about the ability of Priest decks to rip apart a hand and push opponents into a devastating Bringer of Death, but all the Priest decks to this point have been the same old Shadowfiend-based rush decks. Most have been Omedus, but there have also been a couple of Anchorite Kalinna decks as well. Omedus got some nice new tricks in MotL that have been somewhat overlooked because of all the higher profile cards in the set. Bloodsoul is one of, if not the best beatdown allies to come out so far. The stats on this little guy more than make up for the "drawback." Allies in Omedus decks rarely find themselves attacking opposing allies, and if you're reduced to wanting Bloodsoul to attack allies, you're probably in bad shape anyway. The other new trick available to Omedus is Shadow Weaving. This makes the already brutal Morlug Soulslaver an outright mauling. It also helps with some of the other damage sources in the deck, but with Morlug particularly, Shadow Weaving gives Omedus that devastating Mortal Strike-esque finish that Twig decks had before. Druid
Druid is one of the few classes that has multiple play styles seeing success. There are actually three styles of Druid decks that have seen top 8 success and the class spans both factions as well. The first deck is the one Druid constant we've seen since Pierre Malherbuad took it to a Darkmoon Faire title. Telrander picked up a couple of cards that make it better. One of the things I have seen is Vengeance of the Illidari. In combination with Prowl, this gives Cat Form decks a Rapid Fire style win condition as you will rarely need more than 6 attacks with stealth to finish off any hero.
The second type of deck is one that I still think is one of the best decks that no one talks about, Boomkin. Basically a solo deck that wins through ability spam rather than the traditional solo style of equipment based attacks, this decks picked up a few solid additions in MotL. The first and highest profile addition to the deck is Dreamstate. This turns all of your abilities into cantrips which is an incredibly powerful ability. The deck also got a couple of choices for what weapon to use. People seem to go back and forth on Runesong Dagger vs. Braxxis Staff of Slumber. With the amount of card draw the deck has between Stormrage Cover and Dreamstate, the Dagger can become a formidable force in no time. My biggest problem with the Dagger though is that it doesn't hit heroes (which is probably fair), and so far, this deck is already pretty solid against ally-based decks. The fastest rush decks generally won't care too much about the Dagger because it's pretty slow against decks like Omedus or TwigBelly. I personally prefer Braxxis' Staff in this deck. It gives your hero the opportunity to get in there and get free swings in, but in conjunction with Moonkin Form, the Staff can turn you into quite a tank. Even something as simple as Pads of the Dread Wolf becomes a whopping 4-DEF with Moonkin plus Staff. If you play a small cheap armor suite with the intention of taking advantage of these DEF buffs, Boomkin has the potential to just lock any preventable damage out.The third Druid deck that is getting some love is simply a Balance rush build. Utilizing the new powerhouse Gift of the Wild to make their little guys big, this one is a relatively straightforward aggro deck. It plays lots of little guys, but with the Balance Druid it gets Gift of the Wild, Force of Nature (which combos very well with GotW), decent burn, and Twig of the World Tree. This deck is very potent, and I wouldn't be surprised to see it pick up in popularity as more people realize the power of GotW.Next up is Warrior. They got some new toys of their own, including big hits like Puncture, Gear Upgrade, and Bracers of the Green Fortress. So far, of the decklists I have seen, most of the Warrior decks are solo. Only one of the lists I had seen was the typical TwigBelly. And for some of the ones that don't have decklists, I think it's fair to assume that if they are not Arms Warriors, they aren't beating down. Solo Warrior benefits from having a great answer to Bringer of Death in the form of the 1-cost Wreck. I haven't tested a lot with solo decks vs. Bringer of Death, but Wreck seems like it gives Warrior the best matchup vs. the BoD wielding casters.After Warrior, we move on to Mage. So far, most of the Mage decks are fire Mage rush decks, Ozzati and Ta'Zo. I'm just about ready to give up on Mage control ever being viable. If it can't make it now with Bringer of Death, Portal, Nether Fracture, and Crimson Shocke, I think UDE would almost have to intentionally unbalance the class to make it worthwhile. I haven't given up all hope on the archetype yet, but it's clearly inferior to its if you can't beat 'em, burn 'em Fire counterparts.Tied with Mage is Paladin. This class is slightly divided between the Seraph-based Graccus builds and the "classic" Nathadan build. As someone who played Nathadan all summer, I can say that I think that deck's time in the sun has faded. It simply doesn't pack the late game power that some of the other control decks do, and it seems like every day brings another deck that presents a bad matchup for the Red Paladins. Graccus on the other hand has a lot of power. With the Seraph-based builds, if you get a ready phase with Seraph in play it becomes very hard to lose. Paladin seems to remain the class of choice for these decks because of Blessing of Freedom (and it's ability to keep Seraph alive long enough to reach that next turn and Redemption bringing Seraphs back when needed or just another monsters when Seraph isn't needed. The next class as we enter the last third of classes is the Hunter. Almost all the Hunter decks are now Ona Skyshot mid-range decks. Hunter as a class didn't get a whole lot in this set. Scraps is a solid beatdown pet, but most of the Ona decks still seem to prefer Hootie and Shelly as their 2-drops. There isn't very much exciting about this class right now as these decks are almost unchanged since before MotL.Rogue has fallen from its perch near the top back to where it is more accustomed to being. Rogue decks are still mostly Rotun and all solo. It's hard to say what has caused this slide by the class that many feel was the best heading into Worlds. Bringer of Death probably has at least a little to do with it. In my limited testing of Rotun vs. Warlocks so far, I have found it difficult to get enough pressure on them to force a Bringer of Death without putting a little too much into it so the Bringer wrecks me. I'm sure part of it was simply people being afraid of Bringer of Death and not playing the deck. While BoD has made an impact, it hasn't warped the game in favor of casters like many seemed to think it would. It will be interesting to see how some of the decks affected by its presence adapt to make it less of a threat over the next few months.Finally at the bottom of the heap we have the once mighty Shaman. Shamans have kinda turned into Druids. They can do a lot of things, but don't really do any of them particularly well. They have solid equipment, but aren't as good with it as Rogues and Warriors. They've got solid abilities, but nothing like Warlocks. They've got decent burn, but not on the level with Mages. I think Shamans biggest strength was always its midgame, but it's very hard to play in that area these days. The rush decks are so fast that despite the game going 5-6 turns it's often times decided in the first three, and the control decks are better at dragging the game out where they want it to be played. Shaman has found the weakness of being aggro-control. Right now, Shamans aren't good enough at it to out control the aggro or to out aggro the control. When that's the situation you have to look to other places to find a Shaman deck. Right now, there are simply better choices for both super fast rush decks and long game control decks. Somebody has to be last and right now it's Shaman.Now that I've given a breakdown of how all the classes are playing, let's look at individual hero numbers. I'm not going to go into great detail regarding these numbers, because I think that the class numbers have become slightly more important because we have so many choices for heroes so some decks are dipping into mutiple heroes to play the same basic deck type. With that said, here's the breakdown.Omedus-6
Mazar-5
Telrander-4
Ona-4
Ozzati-3
Rotun-3
The following are all at 2
Graccus
Pagatha
Halavar
Nathadan
Anchorite Kalinna
Zenith Shadowforce
WarraxThe following are all at 1Kassandra
Bloody Mary
Ta'Zo
Indalamar
Gorebelly
Hekto Starspire
Dizdemona
Morova
Daspien
Phadalus
Aleyah
Litori
Yanna
Grennan
Taheo
As you can see, the top tier is currently made up of well established aggressive decks. That is partially to be expected until things start to settle down and the metagame starts to get some definition. The control decks are still unrefined and an unrefined aggro deck tends to be much better than an unrefined control deck. This is further proof for anyone who doubts it, that new metagames are usually led by aggressive decks. I think we'll probably see this continue for about 2-3 more weeks when the control decks will start to come into their own. Then I think we'll see Omedus and the rest of the aggro decks start to slip a little each week like they did through the Fires of Outland season. Depending on how things shake out, the metagame could stay all over the place until DF: Orlando does a little more to define it. If you're going to any of these Regionals this weekend, please pass along the top 8 if you can:
Richmond
Madison
Lauderhill, FL
San Jose
Waco
Edison
Rockville
Broken Arrow, OK
I'm sure most of you have noticed that I haven't been updating the blog very much over the last couple of weeks. Well, there's a very good reason for that. For one thing, this is easily the most hectic time of the year personally. We have several different family obligations that have to be met and a gigantic family which means tons of shopping in overcrowded malls. A lifelong friend of mine decided to add to the frenzy this year by getting married tonight (Dec. 28) and asking me to be in the wedding.
In addition to the hectic schedule I'm keeping away from the game, there just isn't that much to talk about right now regarding WoW. I've built some decks with the new cards, but I'm not going to be attending a Regionals (or Group Championship Qualifier) until February so I don't have very much incentive to work super hard at making good decks for the post-MotL metagame yet. The rest of the country seems to be in its own holiday hiatus meaning there isn't much to report from around the country. The new Organized Play announcement is pretty exciting, but the Player of the Year race won't start really heating up until Nationals season and we don't have any real information about the Group Championships yet so any talk about them would be premature.
After the New Year, things will settle down for me away from the game with the holiday season behind me which will free up more tiem to write and the Group Championship season will kick off meaning there will be more to write about. Until next week, everyone have a safe and happy new year.
I know most of you are expecting me to talk about World of Warcraft, but this weekend I played in my first Legends of Norrath tournament.
For those of you unfamiliar with the game, it's an online only game based on the MMO Everquest. I've never played Everquest, but I love TCG's. The fact that it is online makes finding a game just about any time relatively easy, the game is cheap to get into because of MMO loot hunters who trade the cards for packs at rates that are very good for the player, and the game is going to have monthly $5k tourneys leading to a $100k championship in August so I decided to give the game a try.
The game itself is actually pretty fun, but it's significantly different than any other TCG I've played which has forced me to learn a lot about a brand new game in a short amount of time. Sadly, there is very little information on websites about what decks are popular and there are no decklists from big events other than what people are willing to post themselves. Given that I've only been playing the game a week or so, I had a pretty tall task in front of me getting ready for the first $5k.
I had to determine what decks were popular, learn how to actually play the game, build a deck that would do well in the tournament, then find a way to get the cards for that deck.
I came up with a couple of lists that I thought were pretty solid places to start. There are two ways to win in the game. The first is to destroy your opponent's avatar (much like their hero in WoW). The second is by completing 4 quests. For decks that choose the avatar destruction route, the 2 easiest paths are unit attacks (like allies) or avatar vs. avatar combat. Some decks combine both these to get their damage in.
From the limited information I could gather, unit rush decks were the most popular and probably best decks in the format. I set out to build more than one deck to give myself plenty of options. The first was a somewhat slow questing deck based around beating the unit rush decks and eventually winning through attrition. This deck was very good against any deck that tried to win through combat, but was somewhat weak vs. other questing decks.
The second deck was a very fast quest deck. This deck was really good against other questing decks, but the matchup vs. rush decks was quite a bit trickier.
The third deck was just a Mage unit rush deck that seemed to be the best way to go if I wanted to play the "best deck."
As I set out trying to figure out what the metagame would look like in the tournament, I didn't have much info on the net to go with so I was basically reduced to deciphering the metagame from playing against people in the casual rooms. This isn't the best way to go because I don't know anyone in the game, so it can be really hard to tell in a casual setting whose decks are serious and who's just there to have fun.
As I played the decks, I made some tweaks to all of them. For most of the week, I thought that the fast quest deck was probably the best, but then I ran into someone who seemed like they had a really good version of one of the unit rush decks, and I was struggling pretty mightily with it. After reading the forums some more, I decided there would probably be a lot of these type decks so I finally made the decision to run the deck that was good against them.
The morning of the tournament rolled around, and I was actually a little nervous. I had about 50 or so games under my belt, but I wasn't feeling great about either my ability to play this game well or my deck choice. The tournament was 8 rounds with a cut to top 16 so I was looking for 7-1 to guarantee my spot, but 6-2 would also get some people in.
Round 1 I played against a unit rush deck. This match went almost exactly as I hoped it would. My defensive deck held off all his guys and I won a long match, but never really felt threatened. It was a lot like playing Nathadan against rush decks. The game lasted a long time, but I never really felt like I wasn't in control.
After this round, I was feeling a lot better about things, but that would change quickly.
Round 2, I played a "combo" deck centered around a guy who can deal damage to himself and opposing avatars and another guy who can get the first one back. I hadn't seen the deck mentioned on the net, and hadn't seen it once in all the casual games, so I was completely unprepared. His deck was very defensive, which made it hard for me to complete quests without taking any damage, and once the combo came online I had very few ways to stop it. I managed to get one game here, and game 3 was a lot closer than it should have been. 1-1.
I'm a little shocked by the deck as I hadn't seen anything mentioned about it anywhere. I decided it must be one of those wacky decks that isn't really that good, but got a good matchup round 1 and then got me round 2.
Round 3 I play against the exact same deck. It boggles my mind that I've never seen this nightmare of a matchup anywhere, and now I've got it back to back in a major event. I'm not sure whether this version of the deck was better, or whether he just played better but he just flat trounced me in 2 straight. 1-2
At this point, I'm wishing I would've played the questing deck because I think it was better vs. more decks than the one I chose. My tiebreakers are going to suck, but 5 straight may still get me there.
Round 4, I play against a moderately fast questing deck. Again, I have little defense for this type of deck. This one I did know about, but took the calculated risk of playing against more combat-based decks. I don't have much chance here because my ability to complete quests is much slower than his. He beats me pretty easily, and I'm just going to end the misery at 1-3.
At this point, I think I picked the wrong deck. I played the questing deck quite a bit more than the one I ended up choosing and it had done better over the course of the week, but the night before the tournament, I crammed a bunch of games in trying to decide which deck to play, and the Fighter deck I played went 9-1 that night which led me to choosing it. As they said in Indiana Jones, I chose poorly.
The total lack of success in my first big event hasn't turned me off from the game. It's just shown me that I still have a lot of work to do to reach the top of this game. The game's first expansion comes out this week and looks to really shake things up. That can be expected any time you effectively double the card pool, but I am looking forward to playing in the release events this weekend.
I don't have any Regionals near me until January 5th, so LoN is feeding my need for competition in the meantime.
As I'm sure most of you are aware, I haven't been blogging that much the past couple of weeks. Preparation for Worlds (which I didn't attend) and then a week-long illness just didn't allow me much time for blogging. After missing Worlds, I was a little bummed out and with the holidays coming up, my desire to play WoW was really at an all-time low. Thankfully, a couple of nice things have happened since then, and I can't wait to get back out there and start playing again.
The first thing was the release of March of the Legion. New cards are always a good way to shake things up in a TCG when things start to get a little stale and March of the Legion is no exception. We could tell from the previews that this set was going to be really good. In fact, there were points during the previews that I thought MotL might be a little too good with the potential to really make older sets obsolete.
Luckily, that was a bit of an overreaction, but I do think March of the Legion is the most powerful set we've seen so far. It offers cards and strategies that will really change the face of the game. There are at least 15 decks that I'm wanting to put together to test out to see what all is viable in this new metagame.
The second thing that really brought my interest back up was the announcement during the Worlds players' meeting. Other info was also posted by Ben Drago on his Worlds blog at www.wowtcg2007.com.
First, there will be a Player of the Year race in 2008. In fact, according to Ben, the PoY race started at Worlds last weekend. Events from Regionals up will count toward PoY standings. I think this is great because it will keep people coming back to Regionals because there's more at stake than just the Nationals invite.
Speaking of Regionals being more important, according to Ben's blog, Regionals will now be split into three seasons. Seasons 1 & 3 will lead into some sort of championship events and Season 2 will be the normal Nationals-qualifying season. Again, I think this puts an added emphasis on Regionals since there's more at stake than just a Nationals invite. Regionals will also begin featuring Limited events more which I think is another great thing.
The first North American Darkmoon Faire will be in Orlando in March, followed by Columbus in April. Right now, I'm hoping to attend both events, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed for no conflicts.
The blog has slowed down a little bit here. With Worlds now only a couple of days away, most of my attention has been focused there. This time of year is also a distraction all its own so my time to devote to writing the past couple of weeks has been limited to say the least. Curse you, real life. But to make up for it, I'll be doing live blogs from San Diego from the time I arrive in town Thursday morning to the time I leave Sunday evening.
The backstory
As most of you know, before the big Worlds announcement I was prepared to travel almost 3000 miles playing in tournaments to get my rating/Honor Ranking high enough to get the invite. But after the announcement something happened. Once I saw how easy it would be to get the required Level 6, I knew I didn't have to go to all the tournaments I had originally planned. Ft. Worth and Oklahoma City were both easy choices as they are the closest I am likely to ever see both being 2 hours away. Everything else was at least 3 1/2 hours and San Antonio is actually about 6 hours away.
So I set out to decide which tournaments to play in with the knowledge I wouldn't have to play in all of them to get where I needed to be. I had narrowed it down to 5 tourneys I thought would get me there, Waco (3 1/2 hours), Tulsa (4 hours), Oklahoma City (2 hours), Ft. Worth (2 hours), and Killeen (~4 hours).
I made it to Ft. Worth and OKC, but for some reason ended up talking myself out of all of those 3+ hour trips. Well the end of the story is that I now sit at Level 5 and 95%. Any of those Regionals that I talked myself out of attending would have put me over the hump, but now after being prepared to drive 3000 miles and taking myself down to only about 400, I find myself on the outside looking in.
My Only Hope
With the disappointment in myself at falling 5% of a level short, with no one to blame but myself, my last hope to get into Worlds is the Honor Grind. I'm on the first flight out of Dallas Thursday morning and due to arrive in San Diego at 8:55. Barring any unforeseen delays, I'm hoping to get there in time to get into the first Honor Grind at 10 a.m. It's MotL sealed. I played 2 flights at the Sneak Preview to get more practice knowing I would probably need to play these. I feel like I have a good grasp of the cards so I think I should be able to do well in this event.
There will probably only be one round before the second Grind starts. It's Constructed at 12. If I'm not there in time for Grind 1, this will be my first shot. If I lose Round 1, I will obviously be in this afterwards. If I win Round 1, I will be faced with the decision of whether to stay in Grind 1 or drop and move to the Constructed side. Several factors will weigh in this decision. How good is my sealed deck? How many more rounds do I have to win? How many people are signed up for Grind 2? Will I have enough time to play Round 2 before the Constructed Grind begins?
If I do play in Grind 2, I already know what deck I will be using in it, and it's not the one I hope to be playing on Friday. I think this would be too early to give away my deck for the big event, so I'll play a deck I like to play and has a decent chance of getting me into the top 4. If this doesn't work out it's off to Grind 3.
Grind 3 is at 2 and is back to the MotL sealed format. This time, I should have 2 rounds out of the way in Grind 2 before I'm faced with Grind 3. I plan on playing a pretty fast deck in Grind 2 to try to make sure I don't go to time so that I can get into Grind 3 if I'm booted in round 2. There won't be any tough decisions here though regarding dropping because I won't drop from this to join a sealed deck tourney. I'm in this one until I lose.
If Grind 3 comes and goes and I'm still not in, there's only one shot left. Grind 4 doesn't start until 6 so if I play in Grind 3, there's a good chance we'll get at least 3 rounds in before Grind 4 starts, so I probably won't have to consider dropping from the tourney. The difficult decision regarding Grind 4 will be what deck to play. I have already made my decision regarding the deck I will play if I make it into the show, but the question is do I go ahead and play that deck here. This will essentially be ALCS Game 7 for me if I'm still not in meaning I've got to pull out all the stops here. It won't do me any good to keep my Worlds deck secret if I don't get to play it. On the other hand, I don't want to show my hand before the big one even starts.
These are the things I'm struggling with today, 3 days before the biggest tournament this game has ever seen.
As I'm sure most of you know, the March of the Legion Sneak Previews were held this past weekend. That means we've now got a chance to take a look at the new set and see how it will shake up the metagame. Today, I'll get things started by taking a look at the Druid abilities.
Barkskin
This seems like it has the potential to be a decent sideboard card depending on how interrupt heavy the new metagame is. Mages and Warlocks both got cards that can interrupt allies, so there is the potential there to start seeing some more dedicated permission decks. If those start doing well, this is a solid choice as a sideboard card against them. I can't really think of a reason to play this maindeck though.
In, Limited it's probably never going to affect a game so I would say it is at best a very situational sideboard card in case you have a bomb to squeeze through against a deck with an interrupt answer to it.
Dreamstate
This card has the potential to just be ridiculous. Spamming Moonfire is going to get a little nutty.
Druid Training
In Constructed, this card is just not good enough. If you could put it on your hero, it would obviously be very good, but finding an ally that has the possibility of living but that you don't want doing something else is unlikely.
In Limited, it's better, but it's still not great. It's certainly playable, but I wouldn't go out of my way to draft it or try to build a Druid deck just to play it.
Earth and Sky
I don't think it's quite good enough to make a Boomkin deck, and being a Balance ability, it's not likely to make a Feral deck. The card is pretty good, and I would just barely say it's not good enough for Boomkin, but I'm not going to say for sure that it won't find a home there.
In Limited, it's a very good card. The ability to take out a relatively large ally or a small one and replace itself make this card not only efficient but versatile as well. It's not a bomb, but it will always make your Druid deck.
Feral Instinct
This card suffers from needing an exhausted character to attack. Feral decks generally want to use most if not all of their attacks getting after the opposing hero. If you're playing a deck that doesn't exhaust its hero, this card is going to be worthless because it's not really worth it putting in something just to exhaust the hero to bring this online. Feral Druids already have enough ATK bonuses as it is. This one's just not that good.
Gift of the Wild
This card is ridiculous. I'm not sure a Druid rush deck will make it or not, but this card alone certainly makes me want to at least attempt it. Particularly sick with Force of Nature.
In Limited, this is one of the cards you really want to crack. This is reason enough to get into Druid if you don't have a class yet, and reason enough to switch classes up until very late in the draft. In sealed, you would either need a really shallow Druid pool or a bomb in another class to warrant not playing it.
Invigorating Touch
Healing is generally pretty weak in Constructed and I don't think this one is quite good enough although 6 for 1 is a good deal.
In Limited, I would probably play it since it only costs 1 and can swing a game late. Like Earth and Sky, it will probably find a spot, but it's not a reason to get into Druid.
Natural Genesis
I don't really like this card. Using turn 3 to play this is bad for tempo and board control, but you do get to lay another resource immediately. If it cost one or two, it might be worth it because you wouldn't be making as much of a sacrifice to get it into play, but at 3 I don't really think it's good enough. I could see a Resto Druid trying to do something like drop a huge guy on turn 4 or 5 with this and Nature's Swiftness, but that deck will be so inconsistent it will only manage to work if you get paired against me.
In Limited, it's just way too much of a tempo sacrifice to spend your turn 3 not doing something more productive.
Shred
Now, we're talking. I haven't played a lot of Feral decks, but if I were, I think the 2 damage this card does would outweigh the ability to return a destroyed copy to my hand, giving this the nod over Cat Form. Then it would come down to Cat Form vs. Call of the Wild vs. Claw. I'm not sure what the right ratio is there, but I think 4 Shreds will be common in Feral decks from now on.
In Limited, cat form is like a mediocre weapon. Getting into it cheaply and dealing 2 damage is a deal I wouldn't pass up too often. This is a card that is really good, and if Druid continues to be underdrafted you should be able to get a couple of these.
Strangling Roots
This card isn't good enough to make a Constructed deck.
In Limited, another blue collar Druid ability. It doesn't have the flash of some of the cards in this set, but this will never be in your sideboard if you're playing Druid.
Sustain or Reclaim
Another card that really isn't going to be seeing much Constructed play.
In, Limited, I like this card a lot. The healing only costs one more than Invigorating Touch and that one extra gets you the option of returning an ally to your hand. That is a power that really shouldn't be underestimated. If they managed to kill your big dude off, this will put him right back out there. The fact that it only costs 2 means there's a decent chance you can just put that ally straight into play.
Swipe
This would be a lot better if it gave you Cat Form instead.
Bear Form is quite a bit better in Limited for the protector aspect. Giving your hero protector is a powerful play in Limited as it gives you more control of how you trade allies.
Today, we're going to continue getting caught up with all the new cards that we have seen. As more cards are revealed, something is becoming more and more clear. This game is never going to be the same.
The next card that was previewed was the first part of another three-parter. Runesong Dagger.
This card is similar to Azuresong Mageblade from the Molten Core Raid deck. The difference here is that instead of removing counters to get more cards, you remove counters to deal damage. Given the amount of cards that these classes, Mages particularly can draw, this card shouldn't be underestimated. The big drawback is the fact that it is pretty slow, requiring three draws to get your first three damage out of it. Unlike Mageblade, it also doesn't fuel itself. Still, three permanent damage isn't something to be underestimated. What looks to be one of the problems for this card though is that casters are suddenly getting a nice influx of playable equipment and this is really going to be fighting for spots alongside some very good new equipment. The place I see it fitting best is in the new Boomkin getting powered up by Dreamstate.
Crimson Shocker
The Perdition's Blade for casters? This card is also really good. It's a wand and when you look at the Wand tag on the card, you see it's neither a Ranged nor Melee weapon so you can have a Wand and a Melee weapon which is nice. The 2 damage for 3 isn't a great deal, but the 1-strike cost for 1 ATK after that is a solid deal. Granted, casters don't particularly like to mix it up hand to hand style, but this will give them a pretty good weapon to use on defense. That's something that casters have never really had. A relatively cheap to play and more importantly cheap to swing weapon that can help them take out things like Apprentice Merry and Shadowfiend.
The Bringer of Death
Here we go. This is one of those game-changing cards whose mere presence will send a ripple effect throughout the rest of the game. One of the things that people seem to be misunderstanding about this card is the potential to just play it on turn 5 and let it wait. A lot of people think you can't play it until turn 8 for fear of getting it destroyed. Against Alliance decks especially, if Chipper isn't already in play, the Bringer is almost invulnerable the turn it comes into play (on 5). Chipper can't hit it that turn, Moira doesn't see much play and Ka'vai the Wanderer can't get it until turn 7. Horde decks are a little more inclined to be playing things like Jon Reaver or Nyn'jah so it might be a wise idea to wait until you can pop this thing the turn it comes in against those decks.
This card will completely change the way people are forced to play. The "board-sweepers" in this game so far haven't been that good. Consecration and Shadowfury have really been the best. In addition to destroying all allies, it also hits abilities and equipment. That makes it really good against ability based decks (Santa's Sac, Boomkin) and equipment based solo decks (Warrior, Rogue). I suggest you pull these out of some packs because you probably aren't going to want to buy them on the secondary market.
As I'm sure most of you are aware, previews for March of the Legion have begun. Hold on to your hats, kids, this set is going to change the way we play the game. I'm going to give my thoughts on all the cards previewed so far so I've got some catchng up to do.
Dreamstate
This card was originally "previewed" during gunslinging at DF:Philly. This is the type of card that your opponent has to deal with immediately or lose under a sea of card advantage. The obvious pairing here is with Moonfire in a Boomkin deck. In fact, since the card is Balance Talent Spec'd, that's probably the only place it will actually see play, but this has the potential to really kick the Boomkin deck into overdrive. It's also stackable, meaning multiples will be a truly savage beating. The thing to watch for Boomkin decks is the popularity of Santa's Sac. If the combo deck is popular, it will hurt Boomkin in two ways. 1) Boomkin doesn't have a lot of solid answers to the combo and 2) If SS is popular, people will pack a lot of ability hate which will be accidentally good againt Boomkin as well.
Ishanah, High Priestess of the Aldor
This card was originally previewed with two other cards here. Ishanah is a member of the Aldor sub-faction. Sub-factions work in pretty much the same way regular factions work. If you have Aldor cards in your deck, you can't have Scyer and vice versa. They can go into decks of either main faction however.
Ishanah seems really good at first look, but I think it will require too much work to get a really game-breaking effect out of. You will probably start by getting a couple of basically irrelevent allies, perhaps some Magni tokens or a late game Scout Omerrta. It will take several turns of taking small allies and killing off others before you can get to their big guns. If you can keep an 8-drop in play that long against another control deck, it really probably could have done a lot more than that. Against rush decks, I don't really want to have my 8-drop there just to take their little dorks. It might be better than I am giving it credit for, but I don't like it nearly as much as the Scryer 8-drop
Voren'thal the Seer
Now that's a powerful and immediate effect for an 8-drop that's good against both rush and control. By the time you reach turn 8 against rush decks, you should already have a good idea of where you stand. But if it's close, doubling all your card draw should push you over the top. In control matchups, this guy is insane. If you have a way to draw cards the turn he comes into play, he will have an immediate effect on the board even if he doesn't survive a turn. If he does survive against another control deck, it's going to be hard for you to lose. Much like his Aldor counterpart, the longer he stays in play, the more decisive your advantage will become. He has one advantage over Ishanah though. Ishanah forces you to play to her strength, which is removing all but the best allies from the opponent's board. To get maximum utility from her, you have to play a specific way. But with Voren'thal, all you need to do is draw cards. As a control deck, you probably have a decent amount of card draw in your deck anyway, so you can just go about business as usual, just with twice the gas.
Sironas
She is one of the new demonic allies. This is the only one we have seen so far, but they have said that most of these allies will have a powerful effect that can either help or hurt the controlling player. On this one, she has the ability to destroy your resources as well as your opponent's.
I think this card has some potential, especially in decks that have a way to control their own resources like Twig of the World Tree. Against a control deck, she is a threat that must be handled immediately. They want to get to their high resource bombs and if they are forced to destroy three or four resources it may put them in too big of a hole to recover from. If unanswered, she has the potential to put the game into a soft lock for her controller. If you play her with a Twig in play, you can simply decide not to play a resource each turn and destroy one to strike with Twig. You and your opponent will each go down one resource per turn. If she survives three turns, she can set a control deck's resources back to 2.
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