Shudderwock OTK Infinite Drain Life
- Last updated Apr 19, 2018 (Witchwood)
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Wild
- 21 Minions
- 9 Spells
- Deck Type: Ranked Deck
- Deck Archetype: Shudderwock Shaman
- Crafting Cost: 8800
- Dust Needed: Loading Collection
- Created: 4/10/2018 (Patches Nerf)
- Atralb
- Registered User
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- 14
- 33
- 57
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Battle Tag:
Atralb#2201
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Region:
EU
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Total Deck Rating
396
Guys, I am proud to present to you the highlight video of my first day playing this outrageously funny deck !
PS : - As this is footage of games played during the release of the expansion, this is an old version of the deck and does not match current's decklist.
- I am very sorry for the sound of the video. I don't have good headphones for streaming right now, and enabling desktop sound would cause some echo so I just disabled it. I hope you don't mind and that it doesnt kill off your entertainment watching the deck in action.
**** COMMUNITY FEEDBACK : Just wanted to express my thoughts on the community's judgement of the card. This is a very slow combo and is even more difficult to achieve than Quest Mage while this combo was strictly a "Win the game" and wasnt hated by the community for the fact that its winrate was not high. This one has an even lower winrate and should have not gathered all the hate it did, because this by far not an overpowered deck.The reason it is complained in the community is because of the animation time but people confuse it with overpoweredness and asking for nerfs. The only thing where I completely agree and definitely ask for is to fix the animation by making the Battlecry cast all effects at once, or only cast those that actually do something. ****
WHAT NOW : Thank you to all of you who watched Day One stream, this has been one heel of a ride haha, 11 hours uninterrupted stream ! I'll be back on it starting from Monday evening (in Europe).
So how did the deck performed ? Well, now we know the combo is even more busted than we thought and even Primordial Drake doesnt really breaks our combo even if killing Murmuring Elemental, since as soon as you pull off the first Shudderwock (while having emptied your hand before), your very next turn should be exponentially more powerful. However, as expected, it suffers the weaknesses of any combo decks which is the difficulty to survive against aggro decks and being completely anticlimactic when not drawing all the key cards needed.
According to my experince now, there will be 2 archetypes of the deck. The one I made which will be better against aggro decks and the build around bogshaper with cheap spells which will be better against slow decks. The prevalent version will be determined once the meta settled. For now, at least in legend, the meta has been extremely aggro centered. With decks such as Odd Face Hunter (I swear, you can see Wolfrider played in legend now), Odd Dude Paladin, Rush Tempo Warrior being very popular. Thus, my version (which I updated now to beat them, all changes explained at the end of the guide in "1ST PLAYED EDIT") seems to be more efficient atm. However, I do believe the meta will slow down, when people are gonna pick Cubelock again (cause it is still overpowered) and that other will want to beat them and make refined control decks. If a meta like that is happening, then the Bogshaper Build could be better. I will be showing this second version I tried to refine below if you are interested. (In "Discussion")
Hi guys, Atralb here.
So this deck revovles on a pretty busted combo doable with the new (really OP) shaman legendary Shudderwock : You want it to basically recast the battlecries of Lifedrinker + Saronite Chain Gang + Grumble, Worldshaker.
This indeed lets us Step 1 : deal damage to the enemy's face while healing yours, summoning another copy of Shudderwock that would get put back to our hand for only 1 mana. And, then as you all know it :
- Step 2 : Repeat
- Step 3 : ???
- Step 4 : Profit !
The most efficient way to consider this deck during deckbuilding is to compare it to a Kingsbane deck. Both are extremely similar in concept. You need to quickly assemble all your combo pieces that will eventually create an infinite value card in the late game.
So, in order to be doing so consistently, the deck contains (as any classic combo deck) card draw and removal. Let us begin !
Key Cards :
The cards making our wombo combo are Lifedrinker, Saronite Chain Gang, Grumble, Worldshaker and of course Shudderwock.
To help with our plan, two other cards come into play : Murmuring Elemental and Fire Plume Harbinger. The latter one reducing the cost of the first one allows us to cast another Shudderwock's battlecry (a battlecry that will cast a battlecry that will cast battlecries, Battlecryception boys ! Well no it won't work that way since it specifies "other battlecries" ^^, too bad !) for basically the double the damage and healing and the double 1 mana shudderwocks in hand ! When you think about it's really pretty insane. In fact, since Shudderwock's battlecry has a random order , this combo is actually necessary if you want to ensure you get at least 1 Shudderwock back in hand.
Let's talk about the best possible outcome for 1 Shudderwock. When all those key battlecries are alreday done :
- 2 Saronite Chain Gang's + 2 Lifedrinker's = 2 copies of Shudderwock + 6 face dmg + 6 own face healing
- times 2 with Murmuring Elemental = well the double you get it
So basically with 10 mana you are dealing 12 face dmg + healing yourself for 12 and getting back FOUR 1 mana shudderwock that will also deal that same amount of damage and healing !!! This is actually a legit 48 DMG OTK combo (at maximum, which means it can surely attain 30 health on average) AND can aslo be split in smaller part each turn if not all has been assembled. The consistency of this deck's combo seems to be really great to me !
Even if you only get the most basic version of the combo, it's still 6 face dmg and 6 face healing per turn for 1 mana starting from the second Shudderwock, which is exactly like a 6 atk Kingsbane who can only attack face, and any veteran Kingsbane player will easily understand you are already in a pretty good shape when you are constantly attacking face with a 6 atk lifesteal Kingsbane while having great shaman removal tools in hand instead of weapon buffing in hand. And there's even more !
Board control tools
Board clears : Lightning Storm, Volcano and Primordial Drake. Basically all the premium board clears available for shaman as of the upcoming rotation. (Avalanche is rather meh and the 4 mana spot is already crowded)
Primordial Drake is actually bonkers in this deck in the fact that it is already a great control tool, but it is also a battlecry that will get recast by Shudderwock each time he is played. If you have already played both your drakes, this means each Shudderwock you will play will deal 4 dmg to the board, which now, if killing the opponent'hero while healing ours wasn't enough lets you also clear the opponent's board with this single card ! Guys I'm so hyped for this deck !
Hard removal : Hex is insane against Cubelock and we surely will need this in Witchwood's meta.
Stalling tools : Some spots of the deck were chosen to add some taunts and healing, namely Feral Spirit, Hot Spring Guardian and Healing Rain.
Brrrloc is also a good early game stalling card to enable better board clears, and its battlecry can only target enemies which yet again adds a cool disrupting battlecry to Shudderwock.
Card draws
Many card draws in the deck to help us achieve our goal as soon as possible : Mana Tide Totem, Sandbinder which fetches one of our 3 key elementals and Witchwood Piper is another good card draw card that kind of achieve the same goal as Sandbinder, even though in a lesser way, but the fact that it pulls out the lowest mana-using card of our deck is pretty valuable. And moreover, shaman doesnt have any other good card draw.
Potential Replacements and Discussion :
The cards i'm thinking could be changed are
- REMOVING Brrrloc if it doesnt proove to be an efficient addition to Shudderwock
- REMOVING Witchwood Piper if it happens to be too much card draw and not enough removal tools.
- REMOVING 1 Fire Plume Harbinger and 1 Murmuring Elemental if we feel they tend to remain too much dead cards in hand, waiting for the combo, or simply want to add removal and/or card draw for better consistency over higher combos. But keep in mid this also reduce sandbinder's consistency.
- REMOVING the last Fire Plume Harbinger because you can discount a Murmuring Elemental with Grumble, Worldshaker too. BUT Not playing Harbinger means you need to have a turn somewhere in the game where you're gonna pay 8 mana for only a 7/7 on the board, and that you can't drop your Grumble, Worldshaker when it is a good opportunity if you can't combo it with Murmuring Elemental. Not only that, but a Grumble, Worldshaker turn generally needs you to play some bounced minions on the same turn to let you stabilize the board a bit since himself doesn't do anything on it for more than half your mana, and with 2 mana availabe instead of 4, it's even harder. Don't get me wrong, this is a pretty good idea but this strategy has its weaknesses too.
REMOVING Hot Spring Guardian which isn't bad but isn't great either.DONE- ADDING 2 Doomsayer if Aggro is prevailing.
- ADDING Zola the Gorgon not for another shudderwock as everyone seems to think, but instead a third Lifedrinker which empowers all our casting of shudderwock greatly, but is a really weak tempo play (7 mana 2/2 + 3/3). The same possibility with Saronite Chain Gang. This choice will be a balance between greed and survival consistency.
- ADDING Acolyte of Pain for a mighty 3 card draw right away in combo with Volcano. I've already done this in my jade/evolve control shaman deck last season which had some success in Rank 5-4 (i changed decks from rank 3) which prooved to be quite consistent. And Potion of Madness is out now !
- ADDING some weapon removal like Gluttonous Ooze or Harrison Jones will most likely be needed in the meta ahead of us, but I will leave it like that for now since it is indeed a Theorycraft deck.
- ADDING Bogshaper too draw our Lifedrinker Saronite Chain Gang and such. It can be discounted with Fire Plume Harbinger aswell and seems like it was kind of meant for thisdeck. However, as it is now, the deck doesnt have low cost spells to combo with, and i would need to change quite some cards to be adding this one. It will be part of the testing phase without a doubt. Here is my updated version of the deck centered around Bogshaper
Minion (15) - 1x Grumble, Worldshaker
- 1x Shudderwock
- 2x Bogshaper
- 2x Sandbinder
- 2x Fire Plume Harbinger
- 2x Lifedrinker
- 2x Murmuring Elemental
- 2x Saronite Chain Gang
- 1x Brrrloc
Ability (15) - 2x Unstable Evolution
- 1x Blazing Invocation
- 1x Lightning Storm
- 2x Volcano
- 2x Earth Shock
- 2x Healing Rain
- 2x Hex
- 2x Lightning Bolt
- 1x Zap!
Loading Collection
Props to Yinghao, for getting the idea ! (see his original deck : https://www.hearthpwn.com/decks/1066129-shudderwock-otk)
BEWARE when (even if it primarily seems good for shudderwock and overall deck) adding elementals with battlecries such as kalimos primal lord, Stone Sentinel, or Blazecaller. Damage that can target anything is too risky, and summoning multiple small minions is too since, you have good chances to put them back in your hand and clog it up, possibly burning combo pieces like a second Lifedrinker or a Murmuring Elemental.
PRIMORDIAL DRAKE ISSUE : The fact that Primordial Drake's battlecry to Shudderwock can easily kill Murmuring Elemental, and in extreme cases Shudderwock copies (only during double battlecry) before they get back to hand is indeed a concern. However, the drake addition to our overall survival package and the infinite board clear with Shudderwock is still an extremely good addition. Whether with or without is better will be determined after playtesting and I don't think we can settle this matter now. I will then leave the deck as is for now.
1ST EDIT : Removed the Hot Spring Guardian, 1 Fire Plume Harbinger and 1 Murmuring Elemental to improve the consistency of Sandbinder in drawing our key cards. Replaced by card draw : Bloodmage Thalnos (for potential bigger Lightning Storm), Far Sight and Acolyte of Pain. Testing will tell which one of these two will be the best, cause they both have pros and cons in theory now. (far sight for potential discount on combo cards and being a spell leaving witchwood piper a better pool to draw, and acolyte for drawing multiple cards and a combo with volcano). Thanks for the feedback Optimatum :).
1ST PLAYED EDIT :
- 1 Far Sight - 1 Feral Spirit - 2 Witchwood Piper
+ 2 Doomsayer + 1 Murmuring Elemental + 1 Healing Rain
I needed both Doomsayer because of the ladder swarming with aggro decks, and Healing Rain specifically for Odd Face hunter. At this moment, Witchwood piper wasnt good anymore, since it couldn't consistently draw key minions anymore, and as some people truthfully said, the deck had a bit too much of card draw. 2 Feral Spirit was a bit overkill with already 2 Saronite Chain Gang, so I dropped one. And Far Sight was too much of a tempo loss as expected. The second Murmuring Elemental is very good because it can give an additional battlecry of something you want for Shudderwock, and gives you a second chance to get the combo quickly.
Conclusion
As this is a new archetype, this decks needs a lot of playtesting and card swapping at the beginning to see which build will be the most consistent in Witchwood's meta. I actually really trhink this deck will be a viable deck in the meta, even if not past tier 3. But I still have the feeling this has a slight chance to become in high tier meta if Cubelock, aggro decks, or other new archetypes don't get out of hands. Remember we get one of the best cubelock's hardcounter in the card of Hex.
Overall I'm pretty fucking looking forward to play this deck, and will surely test this out on Day One of the release !! Hope you love it guys, I'm out !
fire plume (to my understanding) makes your next Shudderwocks zero (if this effect triggers after grumple)
it also just makes your grumple cheaper when you are just playing the cards to set up the combo
someone correct this if im off.
Hm yeah it can make you next Shudderwock cost 0, but I think most of the time if you play 10 of them anyway you will most likely kill your opponent already.
Discounting Grumble to 5 doesn't seem like it's worth a card in the deck.
Harbinger lets you play Murmuring in the same turn as Shudderwock; it can't discount Shudderwock as it's not an elemental. Like you say it's probably not necessary though since you can just use Grumble for the same effect.
As I answered Optimatum in an earlier comment :
Not playing Harbinger means you need to have a turn somewhere in the game where you're gonna pay 8 mana for only a 7/7 on the board, and that you can't drop your Grumble, Worldshaker when it is a good opportunity if you can't combo it with Murmuring Elemental. Not only that, but a Grumble, Worldshaker turn generally needs you to play some bounced minions on the same turn to let you stabilize the board a bit since himself doesnt do anything on it for more than half your mana, and with 2 mana availabe instead of 4, it's even harder. Don't get me wrong, this is a pretty good idea but this strategy has its weaknesses too.
Another question: Is this better than quest mage?
Well in standard, without Ice block, most likely yes. I've thought of a new build that I think is actually possible with book of specters and arugal, but seems quite clunky though.
Besides, of course this deck is better since you use new and funny cards :p !
Haha yeah new is good. I was more asking will this be better than Quest Mage is right now since they are very comparable. I think it actually might be just because you don't have to have a quest.
I completely agree with you on that, the decks have a same plan, there are some differences though, one being that we build our combo progressively in the game and don't need to hold onto all our combo pieces in hand like exodia mage, and the other being that the combo itself is more flexible (you can play part of it each turn once the first has been played), for the downside of not being a complete "win the game" like quest mage.
As for the quest aspect you mentioned, exodia mage is actually possible without the quest in wild, and is still not an 80% winrate deck. See my own build for reference :
I managed to have a 60% winrate in rank 4-2 which is pretty good but still doesnt make it an overpowered deck. You are still weak to all aggro decks.
Trump picked up on this combo. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RyPyEx0vtbg
I want to make sure I understand: the order is random so if Grumble, Worldshaker's battlecry is triggered before Saronite Chain Gang's (the first time you play Shudderwock) you won't get the 1 mana Shudderwock in hand. This makes it necessary play a Murmuring Elemental the same turn you play your FIRST Shudderwock, otherwise you have a ~50% chance to lose the infinite nature of the combo. And it seems like if we are going to win, we are going to need more than 1 shudderwock as we have no other win condition.
I am with you this seems fun and very powerful. The only issue possibly being the multi step/draw dependent and low tempo nature of the set up. Especially getting the 1 mana Murmuring Elemental in hand.
Edit: I just realized you said this at the end of a paragraph above, but it seems a little glazed over since I think this could be, if anything, the downfall of the combo.
you are playing a combo deck. having 2 harbingers and murmuring ensure you draw your combo quicker. It is more consistant, you need to rework this deck. Also, primordial fucks up your combo. needs to be removed
.... Read the full guide please
I agree on the 2 murmuring elementals. However I think it might be better to rely on the grumble for the 1 mana murmuring since the harbingers are just so bad. Maybe doomsayer replacements. Volcano/board clear + doomsayer is pretty nice to extend the game.
I think the best question to ask about this deck is: Is this better than quest mage? Also a good deck construction comparison. We literally have 0 threats and are relying 100% on the combo to win. This cuts drake since if you get unlucky you just straight up lose (murmuring dies before the Grumble cry). And in quest made you cut everything except combo pieces, card draw, and stall.
I do think this will be better than quest mage will be due to Dirty Rat and Ice Block rotating. I don't see any way the opponent has of screwing up your combo. However Ice Block is so good and Shaman I don't think is quite as good as mage at stalling the game.
I have you said you want to test it - there is no reason to test it as it can destroy your combo. it needs to be removed
Grumble doesn't bounce itself back in hand, so the played shudderwock won't bounce itself back and this is why you NEED saronite chain gang. The saronite is a key piece in the combo, not a greedy addition
Add marin the fox and troll your opponent because they can have 7 treasures on their board
Man, I just reviewed all the battlecry minions that will be in standard, and absolutely wanted to test that ^^.
Another is Deathwing which can be really funny, if you manage to get its battlecry before saronite + grumble and get another 1 mana deathwing for infinity ^^.
And for the Ultimate Lulz, i'd put a King Togwaggle in it, for a deck swapping madness while asking for tons of ransom from your opponent('s hand mostly ^^)
That's something I didnt consider indeed. I didnt want to put the glacial shards instead of Brrrlocs for Sandbinder consistency, but in addition to the Brrrlocs could change our stalling strategy with Shudderwock, that is true. However I can't remember for sure if it needs to target a non already frozen character. Do you have some evidence ?
I know yes, frostcaller works like that, but for this matter, the only real proof is to know whether you can target an already frozen minion with the brrloc and shard or not.
UPDATE : Ok so I tested this out, and as I feared they can indeed target already frozen minions, so this won't work unfortunately.
Haha what a synchro :). Yes that's is too bad. That cas a cool idea