Hearthpwn

Will be updating with more class specific guides tonight. ( Monday 3/21/2016 )

I would like to take a moment to mention that this page is meant to serve as a guide on how to play Mid-Range Druid. I don't claim that it's an original idea of my own, but I did make the final tweaks to the deck itself. I made this simply to help players learn how to play Mid-Range Druid which is and has been one of the top decks in the meta and has been for months now. I'm sure many people have crafted the deck and played it a few times already, and some people may have not truly enjoyed it . As such, I felt like I could make a guide that got into the more deep thought process behind what each of the cards stands for and can do along with some class-based guides to help people play better.

Directory

Considering the length of the guide, I have made a directory. You can go to each individual section by typing in the numerical code  (Example: 1.01)  that is stated next to each section in the list below. You can click CTRL+F in most browsers to access the "find" function.

(1.01) Disclaimer

(1.20) Introduction
(1.21) Alternate Card Selections  
(1.22) Card Choices (and their reasoning)
(1.23) Mulligan
(1.24) The Coin

(1.30) The Game
(1.31) A. Accessing the Situation and Playing Smart
(1.32) B. Board Control, Minion Selection and Trades
(1.33) C. Calculate Your Damage
(1.34) D. Determining Hand-Capabilities and Stretch
(1.35) E. Using your Hero Power

(1.40) Class Guides
(1.41) Secret Paladin
(1.42) Freeze Mage
(1.43) Tempo Mage
(1.44) Zoo Warlock
(1.45) Control Priest)
(1.46) Patron Warrior

 

(1.01) Disclaimer

Nothing I say is permanent knowledge, it is subject to change and the views I subject in this guide are merely the opinions of myself. If you see a situation that you think can be played out better given your current idea, please go forward and do that. I have not taken the time to cover EVERY single corner of game-play.

Introduction (1.20)

Hello, my name is kaym0 and I play Hearthstone for roughly 8 hours a day. I have hit Legend rank many times, sometimes in the top 100 players. One of my favorite decks in  Mid-Range druid and I have decided to write an in-depth guide to help new players and also people unfamiliar with the play style pilot this deck and hit Legend as well.

 

Alternate Card Selections (1.21)

Although having a great deck is one of the main things that will impact your play, ultimately it's your actual skill that will have you rank up quickly and achieve higher ranks than before. Consider this: Most everybody is logging into Hearthpwn, Hearthstonetopdecks and net-decking the exact same decks. Why isnt' everybody legend? It's because they don't know how to pilot the decks. This guide is here to help teach you the insides of what is required to pilot this specific deck further, and hopefully you can apply this knowledge to further decks in the future.

Before the current state of Mid-Range druid is was Darnassus Aspirant that was the two drop that almost everybody used in this deck. It wasn't until alter that people realized it was a dead weight card and that most people drop 3/2 minions or have removal for such a card early game. It gives you a boost and then takes it away and you hardly ever get to really use that extra man crystal because of this. That's why we don't use that card.

Sylvanas Windrunner: Some opt to use this instead of Loatheb. I sometimes do as well but for now, in the current state of the meta, I real;y prefer Loatheb because of it's ability to stop players from using special combos and it also gives you an extra turn to flip the board after playing him.

Ancient of War: This is another great card. You will almost 100% of the time be using the health and taunt buff because people will want to instantly remove your newly layed 10/5 and they will almost all the time. I used to run this card often but I find that Mind Control Tech is superior, and versus classes who don't flood the board you can lay him as a fairly decent 3-cost minion early game instead.

Harrison Jones: Harrison Jones is great if you're battling a lot of decks with weapons. Namely Warrior or Paladin which seem to be becoming more popular. Right now I am seeing mostly a lot of Zoo though and it has no usage towards them and he isn't that great of a card for the mana-cost.

Possible changes: -1Mind Control Tech, +1Ancient of War

-1 Mind Control Tech, +1Sylvanas Windruner

-1 Mind Control Tech, +1Shade of Naxxramas

-1 Loatheb, +1Sylvanas Windrunner

-1Loatheb, +1 Ancient of War

-1Azure Drake, +1Ancient of War

-2 Azure Drake, +1Sylvanas Windrunner, +1Ancient of War

- 1Mind Control Tech, +1 Harrison Jones at times when you're facing a lot of weapon classes. Patron Warrior is becoming increasingly popular and so is Mid-Range Hunter and Secret Paladin/Murloc Paladin. There has also been a lot of Aggro Shaman's on the board lately as destroying Doomhammer can solidify a win almost every time if you can manage to do so.

Card Choices (1.22)

Innervate: Innervate is an auto-include in any Druid deck. It's a quick tempo push that defines the Druid archtype in any deck. Innervate is ALWAYS kept in mulligan. Two if you can. Playing Dr. Boom on turn 2 with The Coin is a great way to snowball and win.

It is also helpful to keep it in your hand if you are favored on the board and have one or two pieces of your Force of Nature / Savage Roar combo so that you can play it earlier, or even play two Savage Roar to increase you instantaneous damage output.

Living Roots: Living Roots is something that we have only begun to see in Mid-Range Druid more frequently in the last 3 months. Although it has always been seen throughout different versions of the deck up until then, it was only established as a solid include around then. With the absence of Darnassus Aspirant it is nearly essential to play this to upkeep your early game.

Living Roots is a great card to play early game to put out two minions and should almost always be used to create those two minions. It can help syngergy with Savage Roar and also usually output more damage than the actual spell.

For example: You cast, turn after you hit face with even just one of those guys. Your overall board influence is up to 3, even if it is killed off by a minion next turn unless destroyed via spells (which also influences the overall tempo and removes one of their spells) (1 Damage to Face, 2 to Minions)
It can, however, be a great way to end games as well. If you have Azure Drake on the board it will increase the damage to 3 and can help extend your damage output even after casting your combo for 9 mana.

Wrath: Wrath is an interesting card and of course one of the most influential cards depending on how you play it based on the "choose one" mechanic. When I was first playing Mid-Range Druid, I would often try to obtain card draw from the mechanic becuase I thought that it was best. Although after a long time playing I learned that the 3 damage to minions can be extremely helpful and actually win you games if used correctly.
It's obviously acceptable to use that one damage to get a card if you are in dire need, however, if you are stable board I would advise using the 3 damage to take down bigger threats and even Piloted Shredder because of its 3 health. Two of these can take down a Mysterious Challenger and any other 5-6 health minion for less than they cost to play. It's good to stick away from spending it on things like Silver Hand Recruit because of the lack of tempo gained from it and I would instead advise to use it on finishing off bigger minions to obtain more tempo from the card.

Wild Growth: I need not explain this to anybody. However in my experiences it's most often best not to coin into wild growth on turn 1 unless you have a Shade of Naxxramas in your hand that you can put on on turn 2. I would instead advise to keep your coin and use it to combo with Innervate or even to play something big earlier, especially since Druid can struggle with early game threats and Wild Growth does not put any presence on the board.

Shade of Naxxramas: This card has been removed and replaced in Mid-Range Druid quite often. I really like it and if you play it correctly it can really change games. I often try to make sure I can trade 2-1 with it.

Example:
4/4 Shade (you)
 vs
3/3Minion and 4/4 minion

Destroy the 3/3 minion so you have an opportunity and destroying both the 3/3 and 4/4 minion if you were to survive.
Rarely will I ever trade evenly with low-cost minions, however, if you can take down something that costs 5+ evenly, you've obviously come out on top during the trade and it's fair to do so.

Mind Control Tech: This card is not necessary to play Mid-Range Druid but I find it very helpful in the current meta that is littered with heavy flood decks such as Secret Paladin, Zoo Warlock and other aggressive type decks that use heavy board presence to control the game.

Big Game Hunter: Some people would argue that it's better to use something else in place of this card but honestly there is such a huge tempo swing from using this, that it's a great addition to this deck. Try not to play it unless you are removing another minion such as Dr. Boom, and as such, I usually throw this card away during mulligan despite its low cost.

Keeper of the Grove: This is one of the most important cards in the deck. Although it can be great to destroy early minions with the two damage, I like to save the spells for either negating serious threats via silence or finishing off either the Hero themselves or a big minion that can't be killed using your current board. It's important to note which class you're playing against, for example, versus Paladin you almost always want to be able to silence Tirion Fordring and KoTG should be kept for that.

Piloted Shredder: I'm sure many people can identify why this card is in the deck. It's the best four cost minion in the game and it's sticky, replacing itself after it is destroyed. I often keep this card if I draw it during mulligan because it's one of the lower costing minions that is great to get on the board early to establish board presence.

Savage Roar: A staple of the arch-type that is usually comboed with Force of Nature to win games. The entire combo does 14 damage from an empty board.
One of the most important things I will stress to you about playing Mid-Range Druid is to always be calculating the exact amount of face damage you can do every turn, especially if you have Savage Roar in hand. I've won games relatively early because of Savage Roar even though I did not play Force Of Nature. To calculate, count your entire damage and then add 2 damage for each minion atop two damage for your hero. I'm sure you knew that though.

Swipe: This is a must have in pretty much every Druid deck along with Innervate. I often keep this in mulligan (usually not two) for arch-types like Secret Paladin, Warlock and sometimes even Hunter. It can be comboed with Azure Drake to output more damage. Spell -Damage effects both the main swipe along with the board swipe and changing it from 1 damage to 2 can be a world of difference in the world of AOE.

Azure Drake: Another card that's been in and out of Druid. I like it for a few reasons.
A. It draws a card which is one of the most powerful things in this combo and minion oriented deck.

B. It adds spell damage to help power your low-cost spells like wrath, living roots and swipe.

Azure Drake is one of the weaker minions in the deck if you look at cost to stats ratios, and because of that, I usually don't use it unless it's my only option or if the board is stable  or if I'm comboing it with spells or I think drawing a card could be helpful.

Druid of the Claw: Auto-include for sure. Although most people seem to choose to Taunt it more often than not, it is sometimes more effective to use the charge to clear a minion that you know would otherwise survive the trades your opponent will make next turn, or if you know your opponent has a removal and as such would negate the entire usage of the card. Also can be combo'd with Savage Roar if you have a decent board because of it's ability to Charge.

 

Loatheb: I consider this to be an auto-include. A great one to cast before your combo as insurance on whatever board you have. I also like to save for turn 9 versus Druids. Try to play it cleverly to ruin a spell that you know whichever class is going to cast is. Great versus Mage's, Paladin's, Druid's, Priest's, Warlock's, EVERYTHING.

Emperor Thaurissan: A great card in mid-range druid. It can increase your damage output of combo by enabling you to double Savage Roar. I primarily use this while a lot of cards are in hand, board is stable, and I might even have part of my combo in hand to help lower the cost. You can lay this on turn 6 with combo in your hand and then play combo on turn 7.

Also, if you play Emperor on curve with a coin or innervate, you can help yourself engage combos a lot more quickly. At turn 5, Coin and then play Emperor, you can then Ancient of Lore on turn 6 and then on turn 7 you can use combo. Essentially Emperor acts as another piece of the ramp, acting almost like Wild Growth, giving you that one extra mana to play something for the next few turns (because your cards cost 1 less)

Considering the deck tends to build on hand size due to its mid-range minions and draw utility, sometimes you can negate 5 or more mana from your total mana-output in one turn by taking 1 mana off of 5 cards. You are always guaranteed this, and often, it will be destroyed by removal. If you look at this situation in terms of tempo, they have reduced your cards by whatever amount of cards you have, and also destroy one of their removal tools and as such you almost always come out on top.

Dr. Boom: Dr. Boom is one of the most valuable cards in almost any deck. It is a seven cost minion that puts a lot of damage on the board. If your Boom bots activate in a pleasurable way, you'll get 4 damage for them each totally 8 damage ontop of the 9 distributable damage from Dr Boom and his Bots themselves. One thing that makes Dr. Boom so valuable in Mid-Range druid is that he drops 3 minions on the board. If you survive until the next turn and have those 3 minions still you can use your Force of Nature+Savage Roar combo to do 29 damage to their face. Without even using Force of Nature you can obtain 17 damage just being use Savage Roar if the three minions are remaining. It is seriously the most valuable card in this entire setup besides the actual combo itself. There is no replacement for him besides maybe Cenarius who unfortunately costs 9 mana which makes it difficult to play him on curve before your combo, but ultimately you will do around 30 damage if you manage to keep him and his two Treats on the board. So if you don't have Dr. Boom try to replace him with minions that summon other minions or Cenarius who is the only other minion who summons two others at once aside from Wobbling Runts who is otherwise useless in this arch-type.

Ancient of Lore: Auto-include. Almost ALWAYS use the card draw. It's essential for the deck, although versus aggressive classes that are beating you down ridiculously faster and that five HP can push you that one more turn you need to win, go for it!

 

Mulligan (Prioritized from most valuable to least) (1.23)

Druid:  Innervate, Wild Growth,  Living Roots,Shade of Naxxramas, Piloted Shredder, Keeper of the Grove , Druid of the Claw

Priest: Innervate, Wild Growth, Wrath, Living Roots, Shade of Naxxramas, Swipe, Piloted Shredder, Keeper of the Grove , Druid of the Claw

Versus Priest I find that destroying their early game Northshire Cleric is very crucial. Having Wrath available to do so is very important, and if you can't get wrath early on, trying to get Swipe is a great alternative because the amount of card draw they get can be game winning.

Mage: Innervate, Wild Growth, Wrath, Living Roots, Shade of Naxxramas, Swipe, Piloted Shredder,  Keeper of the Grove , Druid of the Claw

Most Mage players in the current meta are running Tempo, which often play Mana Wyrm early along with Flamewaker. These are the defining minions of the arch-type, and as such, keeping wrath and swipe can be helpful, but again refer to the chart for card priority. (Shade > Swipe)

Keeper of the Grove is also a great card for easily removing these two minions because their effects are entirely magical. It may be helpful to silence a Mad Scientist as well.

Paladin: Innervate, Wild Growth, Living Roots, Swipe, Wrath, Shade of Naxxramas, Piloted Shredder, Keeper of the Grove , Druid of the Claw

Keep Swipe for early Muster for Battle plays. Usually they may have Knife Juggler or Shielded Minibot up as well and hopefully you can take that done along with.

Warlock: Innervate, Wild Growth, Living Roots, Swipe, Shade of Naxxramas, Wrath Piloted Shredder, Keeper of the Grove 

Save Swipe for early minion dump. Try to use on a cast of Implosion or to finish off a Imp Gang Boss

Warrior: Innervate, Wild Growth, Living Roots, Shade of Naxxramas, Wrath, Piloted Shredder

Versus Patron Warrior, Wrath should be kept to deal with Grim Patron

Rogue:  Innervate, Wild Growth, Living Roots, Shade of Naxxramas, Wrath, Piloted Shredder

Hunter: Innervate, Wild Growth. Living Roots, Shade of Naxxramas, Wrath, Keeper of the Grove, Piloted Shredder, Druid of the Claw

Shaman:  Innervate, Wild Growth. Living Roots, Shade of Naxxramas, Wrath, Piloted Shredder, Keeper of the Grove , Druid of the Claw,

** If you get Innervate in your hand please keep an expensive minion such as Piloted Shredder, Druid of the Claw, or Keeper of the Grove, Emperor Thaurissan

*** If you manage to get two Innervate I would opt to keep either Dr. Boom or card]Ancient of Lore[/card] if possible.

 

The Coin (1.24)

One of the most important things I would like to point out to you before you go ahead and play is that using the coin can make or break games. Something like 52% Victories are players who have gotten the coin. For those that don't know, the coin is given to whoever plays second. You also get an additional card. It's important to use this bonus to win the game. Although it may seem great to coin and play something like Wild Growth on your first turn, it is often not the most optimal time to use your coin. I would like to illustrate to you the fact that using the coin should almost always be a pivotal point in the match in watch the gained tempo can put you ahead by landing a minion that's stronger than there's on the feild, or a spell that cleans their board. One instance that is especially useful to have the coin is on turn 8 versus a Druid. Since their next turn they could possibly use their turn 9 Savage Roar and Force of Nature combo, you could be dead (if your HP is low enough.) In this situation, on turn 8, just before they use that combo, you can COIN and play your combo before them and close the game out. It's not always necessary to hold onto it this long, but it can certainly be what defines a winner and loser in most situations, and I would like to urge you to use it cleverly rather than to simply gain a little bit of momentum.

The Game (1.30)

A. Accessing the Situation and Playing Smart (1.31)

While playing Mid-Range Druid you will notice there are many choices that you will have to make. These will ultimately make and break whether you are a winner or a loser. When I first got this game I thought that having the best cards would make me a winner. I thought the people with the best cards won. I thought it was a pay to win scenario. Although that is partially true, it's also not true. Considering the small pool of cards that we are given in Hearthstone, most of the match-ups we see are mirror matches. Sometimes the decks are exactly the same, or maybe even one card different. What makes a great player is the decisions they make and the planning they do. I always plan as many turns ahead as I can. Sometimes I win a game long before I make the moves, and sometimes, those plans can get foiled. That's why you constantly have to be planning new moves, many moves, you have to know how to respond to everything. I would suggest noting things that occur when you play versus certain classes. Things like board clears you would like to avoid, minions you would preferably not like to deal with and instead remove via spells and whatever else you can find. Attribute these facts to the classes or archtypes and always prepare for them. Try to determine which arch-type of whatever class you're playing is as early in the game as possible while trying to shroud that from your opponent can be exceptionally useful. Remember that nobody can see your cards but they can see how many you have and which ones you touch. Try not to touch your cards often, or hold one in hand that you're about to play and change that. Your opponent CAN see that and will react to it. Especially in higher level Hearthstone.

B. Board Control, Minion Selection and Trades (1.32)

I find it more useful to flood the board with lower costing minions than it is to lay one single giant minion every turn. It's often decks that you see laying many small minions that win, although, Mid-Range Druid focuses mostly on, you guessed it, MIDDLE-RANGED minions. They're minions that you can lay at least two of throughout a turn and are still strong enough to make drastic changes and advancements in play. Having too many weak minions can also cause you to reduce your hand-size too much, and usually if there is a board clear, you can ruin your game. This is one of the main reasons Mid-Range Druid is successful versus almost every arch-type. It has the ability to play many minions, maintain a great hand-size, and also has a great number of valuable spells that either give you additional cards, do a lot of damage, or create damage from nothing.

Most decks in the current meta are centered around board control. Everything except for Freeze Mage, and sometimes, Mid-Range Druid can be most focused around actually using your combo than it is about board control. Nevertheless you will be doing battle for board most of the games and you should always keep in mind that trading minions 2:1 is better than trading evenly. With a board where I have 3 3/3's and my opponent has a 3/3 and 3 2/2's, I would rather destroy the 3 2/2's and leave the 3/3 on the board until next turn. In this way, we can destroy the weaker minions while leaving our minions on the board to fight and destroy the other, stronger minion next turn. In a lot of scenarios this is vital to abide by, but of course, it's not how every situation should be handled. Cards like Mal'Ganis need to be removed, cards like Cult Master, Arch-Mage Antonidas, Flamewaker, Knife Juggler. Cards that have active effects while they're on the board. They are primary targets and considerably a "soft-taunt" (Soft-Taunt is a minion which doesn't have actual taunt  card-text but serves as something which would usually primarily be focused do to annoying board presence.) If you operate like this, we can often come out ahead. Looking back at his scenario, after we attack, we would have 3 minions with 3/1 and they would have one minion with 3/3. We've cleared 3 of their minions but still have all of ours. The reason I have written this is because I often see people throw games by trading into large minions that destroy their minions. They successfully destroy that BIG minion but leave all these other threats on the board which can't be dealt with. An exception to this rule is also if you have an AOE. Destroy that big guy. Aoe will ruin the rest. Mid-Range Druid doesn't have much AOE, and as such, you will normally be running by this play-style.

C. Calculate Your Damage (1.33)

Another thing that I have mentioned earlier and would like to elaborate on is that you should always be calculating your max total face damage that you can do to your opponent. It's important to calculate this because you can close out many games earlier than you would think by using just Savage Roar. I often times do not even need to use my Force of Nature because of the large damage bonuses from Savage Roar. For every minion on the board you get an additional 2 damage, and even if you have 7 1/1's on the board somehow, that's 14 extra damage from minions alone, atop the 7 damage they already do and an additional 2 damage from your Hero itself. That's 23 damage in total. If you can lay Dr. Boom and then play your Savage Roar+FON combo next turn with Dr. Boom on the board with his two bots, you can do 29 damage. It's basically an instant win. This is why it's important to calculate that damage, because you can often do a lot more damage than you would expect at first, but later into playing mid-range druid, you will be able to figure this out almost automatically.

D. Determining Hand-Capabilities and Stretch: (1.34)

One of the many ways you can lose a game in Hearthstone is to become to confident in your hand, your board and even your ability to win the game. When I was new to the game, I would often be ahead in the game and make silly mistakes like dumping my hand onto the board only to have somebody with a full hand of cards use something like Twisting Nether and flip the game on me. I would be looking at my opponent who had 8 health and saying, damn, I could have won and now I am struggling to keep up with just whichever card is drawn every turn. You essentially can lose games at this point.

I would like to point out that you should always be careful with your hand and never dump it if you don't need to in order to win the game on a last effort. Many classes have the ability to clear the board and start anew. As you play this arch-type more and more, you will begin to realize there is a sweet spot in which you like to keep yourself in relation to minions on board and in hand.  I can't stress how many games you can lose by over establishing your worth and throwing out your cards only to mock somebody and say you're better. Don't do this.

I will see it like this. If you dump your hand and don't have draw utility and board is wiped, the person who has a larger hand usually wins. Especially if your hand is 0 because you will be fighting back the game with ONE CARD per turn, from a top deck.

E. Using Hero Power (1.35)

Using your Hero power is important when play Druid. It is similar in ways to some other hero powers because like mage, you can ping, but it hurts yourself and you cannot hit face. Like Rogue you hit minions or face and take damage depending, but you have one armor buffer and don't gain it as a weapon. Anyways, I really think that sacrifing the health is really the way to go a lot of the time if a minion as 1hp. Even if it's a bigger minion like Dr. Boom.

Consider this: If you don't kill the minions and take the damage on your turn, they will likely attack you with that same minion the following turn anyways and it won't kill their minion. So with this method you can kill their 1 health minion off and take the damage -1 because of the armor you gain. This can literally win you games.

Sometimes you will have to make judgement calls on whether you will spend the 2 mana on Hero Power to ping a near-death enemy or if you will combine it with some other mana to lay a minion. I would almost say that the larger the minion is, the more important it is that you remove it from the board unless you will have a reliable way to remove it the following turn like a spell.

The important thing to note here is that board control is very important in this match-up and although you can sometimes when from an empty board using your combo, it's great to solidfy your presence on the board and as insurance to win a game.

 

Class Guide (1.40)

Secret Paladin (1.41)

Playing versus Secret Paladin is one of the worst match-ups for Druid. In fact, in this current meta, I don't believe Secret Paladin is very powerful. If you look at win-ratio charts regarding Secret Paladin and their statistics versus other classes they perform fairly poorly especially at  higher levels due to their difficulty of actually piloting the deck correctly. However, it's still alive and I partially believe it is because of Mid-Range Druid that it is.

The early game can be definitive versus Secret Paladin. You want to maintain their board clear and save Swipe for their Muster for Battle. Use Wrath on larger minions like Piloted Shredder and even combo with Swipe to destroy Dr. Boom. You should always save Keeper of the Grove for dispel their Tirion Fordring and excessively buffed creatures, but Tirion Fordring is without a doubt the biggest threat to Druid because of its taunt and stickiness along with the weapon.

Paladin is weak in a few aspect. It sacrifices minions for large amount of cheap and sometimes useless Secrets. They also don't have a very strong end game and if you can survive and power through past their curve, you can usually win. Try to keep a medium-low hand-size to combat their comeback using Divine Favor because usually they will weaken early due to the lack of card draw utility.

I have listed the Secrets below and I would suggest learning how they operate because by playing around them correctly you can often win games. Secret Paladin is a class that once paramount on the community ignorance and unwant to learn the cards because of distaste, however, to truly learn how to beat Secret Paladin you must learn how they win.

The match-up is favored for Paladin, but it's around 60%, and as such, you can win a lot of the time as well. Familiarize the cards they use and learn to play around.

Import to note: Mysterious Challenger, Avenge, Noble Sacrifice, Competitive Spirit, Repentance, Redemption, Consecration, Muster for Battle, Divine Favor, Tirion Fordring

TL;DR
Learn the Secrets.
Dispel powerful cards with Keeper of the Grove
Play around Divine Favor because it is their only come-back mechanic
Most Secret Paladins do not run removal. Maybe Big Game Hunter
It's a glorified aggressive deck and as such try to out play their early game with whatever you can and you can usually win.

Freeze Mage (1.42)

In the past few months we have seen the rise and fall of Freeze Mage. Now it's rising again. I am beginning to see it more and more on the ladder and increasingly more once you have hit legend. Freeze Mage is one of the arch-types that is specifically not very good versus Mid-Range Druid, despite the fact that it performs fairly well against most other physical based classes besides things with accessive spell damage and aggresion capabilities. The reason Mid-Range Druid performs well against Freeze Mage is simply because of it's ability to do a lot of damage from an empty board. We have Living Roots, Keeper of the Grove, Swipe, Force of Nature, Savage Roar and Azure Drake to power all of those up (asides from KoTG, FoN, SR)

Despite our positive match-up towards Freeze Mage it is still very much possible to lose, especially if they get the right hand or quickly gather the correct cards to ignite their combo.
Freeze Mage is weak in these ways:

A. Needs draw ability and often needs to cycle through most of the deck

B. Not very many minions and pretty much no big minions besides from Alex, Emperor Thaurassin.

C. By using clear abilities they elongate their game by throwing cards away that were meant for their end-game combo.

Now I'll get right to it. For Freeze Mage, I like to fight fast. I use Charge when I cast Druid of the Claw, I silence Doomsayer and Mad Scientist. I usually save Swipe for ending the game because it ignores Ice Barrier if the secret hasn't popped (It doesn't ignore armor, but if the secret is still not "unsecreted," it ignores it and will end the game). So if they have 4 HP and Ice Barrier up, if you attack with a minion it will pop and give them 8 armor, but if you Swipe they will just die.

What I like to do is be increasingly aggressive using these tactics, and sometimes, I even save Living Roots to use as a spell as a finisher because ignoring that Ice Barrier can be important in winning. Sometimes that one extra turn you may give them could end up resulting in a loss.
Try and lower their HP as soon as possible. Break their Ice-Block if it's up. They only use those two secrets. (Ice Block, Ice Barrier)
Try to avoid using your spells on their weak minions because they should be used on the face to quickly win the game. It's fine to use Wrath because it is a minion only attack.

Another strategy that I often go with is saving my Emperor Thaurassin until I have two Savage Roar in my hand. It reduces them both to 2, and when combo's with Force of Nature, whether it has been reduced or not, it will cost a total of 10 mana to dish out a double combo. This entire fight is basically trying to deal damage from an empty board because most of the time you will be frozen, cleared, or ice-blocked so keep in mind these tactics.

Notable cards to familiarize yourself with are: Ice Block, Ice Barrier, Fireball, Frostbolt, Ice Lance, Doomsayer, Mad Scientist, Bloodmage Thalanos, Archmage Antonidas, Pyroblast, Acolyte of Pain, Forgotten Torch, Malygos, Alexstrasza

Note: Malygos, Archmage Antonidas, and Forgotten Torch are rarely seen in freeze mage now. I sometimes don't even see Pyroblast. It's mostly focused around Emperor and Alexstrasza and the Frostbolt, Fireball, Ice Lance's. Either way, I would recommend familiarizing yourself with the fact that they exist and that they are usually in some of the top decks.

Tempo Mage (1.43)

Tempo Mage is another arch-type that has seen a rise to fame in the last while. Although it's been around for a long, long time, it's been really popular recently, namely because of it's ability to take down Secret Paladin and Mid-Range Druid.

Considering the paragraph above you have likely already deducted that Tempo Mage is great versus us, and that's true. It's early game bullying can put you in a horrible position and it's important to play correctly versus tempo mage in order to be able to increase your odds of winning.

I often like to save Wrath in the mulligan, and even sometimes, Swipe and definitely Keeper of the Grove. You want to use your Wrath on Mana Wyrm to destroy them instantly, your Swipe on Flamewaker and Keeper of the Grove on Mad Scientist and Flamewaker. You can also use Druid of the Claw and his charge to remove Flamewaker as it leaves you with a 4/2 on the board which is fairly useful. This will almost completely shut down their board presence and clear. Tempo Mage relies heavily on the ability to bullying using these creatures. Sometimes they will have Archmage Antonidas and you will have to deal with that too, but that is not really a threat until later in the game.

Another thing you should keep familiar with is the secret that they use. I'll get to those in the card list. I would like to emphasize the importance of learning how they trigger so you can avoid them.

Mirror Entity is an annoying threat and can be really harmful if triggered correctly. The worst thing about our deck is that most of the minions are pretty powerful. I find usually I will cast a Keeper of the Grove to dispel something and let them Mirror it because besides its effects, it's fairly weak. Be careful to play around this one as I believe it to be the most popular among them all.

Duplicate: This one activates when you kill a minion. You would probably notice they are deluctant to spend mana or play out creatures when they have this secret on the board because they probably want you to kill the one on the board so that they can gather extra copies. In this situation, if you're sure it's duplicate, I usually just go face and ignore the minion or force them to act in another way, and then kill it so that they may be stuck on mana to react with it the following turn. Keep in mind if it's a fairly strong minion, you should probably remove it if you know you can deal with if the follow turns. Beware of Giants because if you duplicate them sometimes they have ones that can cast for 0 and can flood the board.

Counterspell: This is definitely the most annoying and probably the most detrimental if they can get it out at the proper time. A good tempo mage will play this on turn 8 to prevent combo on turn 9. Sometimes it will get draw from Mad Scientist. One of the best tricks to avoid counterspell is to keep your The Coin if you have it and never use it until you know they have counterspell up. If you discover they don't have it or haven't played it, you can play it later in the game to ignite a combo or something. The Coin counts as a spell and therefore it will get destroyed and since it's not as powerful as your other spells it won't effect you as much, and they will have wasted 3 mana.
These are the main Secrets that they use. The other ones are Ice Barrier,Ice Block which you usually only see in freeeze mage, and Spellbinder and Vaporize which you usually don't see anybody using.

Cards you should be aware of: Mana Wyrm, Flamewaker, Mad Scientist, Fireball, Frostbolt, Dr. Boom, Azure Drake, Archmage Antonidas, Mirror Image, Arcane Blast, Flamethrower, Unstable Portal, Pyroblast

TL;DR

Familiarize yourself with the Secrets! This is important!
Use Wrath on Mana Wyrm
Use Keeper of Grove on Mad Scientist and Flamewaker
Use Swipe on Flamewaker or use Druid of the Claw with charge!
Kill Archmage Antonidas
If you can destroy all of these cards effectively, you will pretty much win unless they can nuke you near the end. I mean, it's a pretty straight forward fight and you just need to kill their best cards.

Warlock (Zoo) (1.44)

Zoo has been around forever and it's back and stronger than ever. It's currently ranked 4th on TempoStorm's meta-snapshot and it's with good reason. I have a habit of adding players after games simply so that I have people to communicate with on Hearthstone as well as play with, spectate and also so we can both complete the quest we sometimes get that requires us to spectate a friend winning a game. I have a lot of friends who normally don't play often and don't do so well that have played Zoo and got to at least rank 5 and sometimes even better. I personally don't like the arch-type, at least, not this time around. I have played it many times before.

Anyways, the reason Zoo has got so popular recently is because Mid-Range Druid is currently the meta's top deck. Zoo is REALLY good against Mid-Range Druid. It has too many minions to deal with. Mid-Range Druid has a lot of spells and it lacks minions and it also lacks the ability to dump entire hands onto the table and fill it whenever need be. Zoo can do this sometimes, and with the recent addition of Brann Bronzebeard, it's even more powerful.

My strategy versus Zoo is to play their game. Zoo players love to clear your board off and solidify the win versus you and you have to do just that versus them. Always try to maintain board presence versus them, and use your spells wisely. I love to silence their Nerubian Egg with Keeper of the Grove because that's one of their "value" minions. Another quick tip is that they normally are reluctant to play Voidcaller and so if you see them launching this into battle fairly early, you can bet that they have some stronger demon like Doomguard in their hand that will pop out and punish you. This is obviously another great target for Keeper of the Grove.

I save Wrath for cards like Voidwalker, Brann Bronzebeard and even Nerubian. Play it intelligently and if you can, use it for the damage to clear enemies off the board and not to kill 1/1 Imp's for card draw. Kill stronger monsters that will gain you some needed tempo versus them, and if you can get card draw, take it. Azure Drake often plays a pretty important role in this battle because he can empower your Wrath, Living Roots and your Swipe to help battle the board flood and large amount of minions you will deal with.

Obviously try to save Swipe for things like Implosion and Imp Gang Boss to clear the board after they have filled it with Imps. You can sometimes throw their game by doing this. I shut Warlocks down all the time by playing my spells properly.

If you can somehow clear most of their minions using your own minions, Hero Power and Wrath and Living Roots SAVE your Swipe because they WILL expand their board with a lot of minions and you WILL need it. I cannot stress this enough.

Swipe literally wins this matchup. Use it WISELY.

Seriously. Think long and hard before you use your spells versus Zoo and you will increase your winrate by so much.

Use your Keeper of the Grove on: Nerubian Egg, Dragon Egg, Spectral Spider, Voidcaller, Defender of Argus'd guys (not the DoA himself.).  This will help prevent them from expanding their large amount of creatures.

Also on the note of silences, they often use Ironbeak Owl and as such please remember that they may silence your taunts.

This is a fight similar to Secret Paladin in the sense that once you've surpassed curve and hit around turn 7 and you have a decent amount of health left and if you're kept the board stabilized or even minor in their favor, you will almost always win.

 Keep that board clear. Remember that their minions that expand will create nothing if their board is filled. Like Dragon Egg hitting when they have 7 on the board. It creates the minion while the Egg is still on the board and it will then kill the egg and they will have 7 minions and the Dragon won't spawn.

Sometimes you will have to fight a Doomguard but you should already have some ability to Taunt at that point and also you can use spells or your hopefully more powerful minions to take it down. This is the only really big threat to you outside of them filling their board.


Cards to look out for: Ironbeak Owl, Nerubian Egg, Abusive Sergeant, [cardFlame Imp[/card], Power Overwhelming, Mortal Coil, Dragon Egg (sometimes), Leper Gnome, Knife Juggler, Spectral Spider, Defender of Argus, Doomguard, Voidcaller, Piloted Shredder, Implosion, Hellfire, Doomwrath, Arcane Golem, Voidwalker, Flame Juggler
I know some of these aren't in there all of the time. I've seen them though and they're all minions that people run in Zoo.

Control Priest (1.45)

Control Priest is a fairly simple match-up for Mid-Range Druid. Control Priest is great versus most decks, especially some aggro decks that host a lot of spells and a lot of slower decks because they can wittle away at your HP and defenses until there is nothing left.

I'm not sure about the acutal statistics regarding this one, but I find Control Priest to be fairly easy match up. It can be really difficult if they get the proper cards early or if you can't get rid of their Northshire Cleric early in the game and they gather a lot of cards to counter whatever you may play. A lot of Priests take a long time to play their turn because of the length it takes to calculate some of their turns and as such they can sometimes be a little better and more aware of things because of the longer time they've spent learning their arch-type.

First things first. Get rid of Northshire Cleric using Wrath. It's important. The amount of draw they can get from this one drop card that is otherwise quite harmless is amazing. Especially if you're silly enough to allow them to do that. Take it out early game and you've almost solidified yourself a win.

Priest's use of Entomb was always a huge issue for me when I was playing things like Paladin. They steal your best cards and turn them against you. In Druid most of the cards outside of Dr. Boom are pretty average in stats and to play a card like Ancient of Lore through Entomb is entirely too slow most of the time. They will also be left wondering which card they should use it on, and if they don't have it when Boom drops, they that's too bad for them.

Priest has one of the highest rates of removal cards of any class and as such, be prepared to sacrifice cards. Try to keep a health hand-size against them and always try to play around their big removals like Auchenai Soulpriest and Circle of Healing. Thankfully a lot of the cards in this deck are 5 health and can survive with one health against the combo but it can be pretty bad early game.

I try to be fairly aggresive versus Priests because the sooner we can get them within lethal range it's possible to finish them with combo. Hopefully they won't heal and take you out of range, and even if they do, you can continue to lay minions and beat them down until they have nothing. The thing about Druid vs Priest is that Druid is a lot faster.

Get your Wild Growth and Innervate's off early game and even your Emperor Thaurissan to reduce cost cards and get your big stuff out early and take them down before they can react. The thing with Priest is that a lot of their reaction cards can cost less than the minions they remove. For example, Shadow Word: Death onto Ancient of Lore is a 4 mana win for them. You get the draw utility from it though which is great and helps versus these sort of situations. If you can lay big cards down faster, before they can have many cards like Entomb, Shadow Word: Death and such down you've solidified a win.

A lot of Priests, good ones, will drag you pretty close to fatigue. You will almost always win versus them because you will have minions out or you will be further back on card draw meaning that they will start to fatigue before you start too due to their usual high amount of card draw.  

Also Priest sometimes has no minions. If you have already baited their Entomb or both and have combo and boom in hand, you can lay [card]Dr. Boom[card/] and if he isn't removed (or the bots) you can do a 29 damage combo next turn.

Most Control Priest run Lightbomb which is very detrimental to most any deck right now. It can whipe your entire board as most Druid cards have equal attack to health besides Keeper of the Grove and a taunted Druid of the Claw and as such, it's good not to flood the board with cards in order to win. This can actually cause you to lose. Try to bait two of them out before you flood and win or you will be angry.
Also beware Auchenai Soulpriest and Zombie Chow combo early game. It can do 10 damage if they have two on the board early game. If they have two early game this is most likely thier plan.


Cards to look out for: Northshire Cleric, Entomb, Circle of Healing, Auchenai Soulpriest, Justicar Trueheart, Sludge Belcher, Holy Nova, Flash Heal, Silence, Shadow Word: Death, Shadow Word: Pain, Power Word: Shield, Zombie Chow, Lightbomb

TL;DR
Wrath on Northshire Cleric or otherwise kill because very important they don't draw.

Spend Wild Growth and Innervate intelligently and get ahead of them in mana so that you can lay big minions and such before they have the cards or mana to react.

Hold off on using Boom if you know they have Entomb and bait it out so you can lay Dr. Boom and do a huge 29 damage combo on them.

Play aggresively because they do not have many minions. It's okay to leave some weaker minions on the board versus them and smack their face in order to bring them within lethal at times. Think a lot before you do this because it has to be at the right oppertunities and it can cause you to either win or lose depending on how well timed it is.

 

 Patron Warrior (1.46)

Patron warrior has risen and fallen and is back once again. Like most decks that I've covered so far.

Patron can be a diffcult match-up and it can be an easy one. It really depends on who draws what more than any other match-up I can think of. One of the best ways to dispel Grim Patron is to kill them off with big damage cards and minions. I save Wrath to deal with these and I also use Swipe to finish them off for good once I've removed the ones with larger HP amounts.

You want to avoid having Armorsmith give them too much armor. It's okay to leave her on the board if you're REALLY ahead, but otherwise, I would remove her. I usually don't use Wrath on her because I would like to use it on the most healthy Grim Patron.

Another good utility versus Patron Warrior is TAUNT. It can really put them behind or even kill off some essential minions or prevent their empty board Grimmash Hellscream from hitting your face and killing you, and sometimes, preventing Grimmash Hellscream can be the difference in a lose and a win.
Of course try to use Wild Growth to get ahead. The more powerful minions you can stick on the board to deal with Grim Patron before they lay and spread them the better. You can use your big guys to remove Patron's and win back the board and defeat them.

Patron Warrior's are heavily draw oriented. So the faster you can usually get control of board, get a good combo in or do a lot of damage, it means you will win. It's often great to keep Keeper of the Grove for dispelling a taunt or Grim Patron so that you can lethal or save yourself from another spread.
Patron Warriors weapons are also one of the most annoying things to deal with. The best you can do is to bait these weapons out early to weaken their strength around the time they start playing Patron's.

Cards to look out for: Grim Patron, Dread Coursair, Grimmash Hellscream, Armorsmith, Battle Rage, Death's Bite, Whirlwind, Inner Rage, Slam, Bash, Shieldmaiden, Piloted Shredder, Sludge Belcher, Frothing Berserker, Dr. Boom,

TL ; DR
Try to be more aggresive and get ahead early game to both bring their HP do for later combos and to bait out Death's Bite so they cannot combo it with Grim Patron

Use Wrath on Grim Patron's before using Swipe to help remove them all from the board without further spread. It is essentially worthless to use either of these spells unless you are using it to full destroy Patron's.

Try to use Taunt's more frequently to set their damage's back a bit.

It's sometimes okay to use your combo to destroy their army of Grim Patron

Keeper of the Grove should be used to silence taunts that prevent lethal or to remove Grim Patron's ability.

Hey guys, I put a lot of work into bringing this to you guys. So if you could upvote and help share it with other players that would be really great! Thank you!

 

here's a video of game-play  by a friend

(I DID NOT MAKE THIS VIDEO.*:

 

If you would like to submit video, please do so in comments. I will screen video before posting it! It' a bonus if you're legend.

Will be updating with more class specific guides tonight. (Monday 3/21/2016 )