Zerek's Back, Back Again
- Last updated Aug 24, 2018 (Boomsday)
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Wild
- 4 Minions
- 25 Spells
- Deck Type: Ranked Deck
- Deck Archetype: Big Priest
- Crafting Cost: 9060
- Dust Needed: Loading Collection
- Created: 8/7/2018 (Boomsday)
- Echo_
- Registered User
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- 7
- 38
- 117
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Battle Tag:
Echo#11883
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Region:
US
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Total Deck Rating
274
And again, and again, and again, and again. He never really leaves to be honest.
By utilizing a Big Priest shell, Zerek, Master Cloner is able to show how much he cares about you by never leaving your side.
How to Play
For those of you who normally play Wild, you are probably already familiar with Big Priest. For those who aren't, try your best to get to turn 6 through utilizing removal such as the Shadow Words and Spirit Lash. Once you get to turn 6, play Shadow Essence or Zerek, Master Cloner (doesn't really matter if he dies, you can always get him back later). Afterwards, use all the revive effects to bring back Zerek or Obsidian Statue and just overwhelm the opponent with either a swarm of 5/5s or 4/8 lifesteal taunts. If your swarm of undying 5/5s aren't able to finish off your opponent, Shadowreaper Anduin is there to help not only clean up the board but then also provide the last bit of damage with the help of all the cheap buffs.
Don't worry about throwing away buffs on Obsidian Statue or your Free From Amber minion because there is probably too much buffs and I should find a way to reduce that and get better early game.
Match ups
As you can probably tell, this deck struggles against aggressive decks, not really a surprise. That being said, this deck has a real easy time pulling wins out of it's ass after turn 6-7 so any slow deck is often an easy match up as they just can't deal with endless storm of Zereks and Obsidian Statue.
Mulligan Guide
Since I still don't really know what the defining archetypes for each deck is (and I don't think they are all decided yet, still day 2 of the expansion) so I'll just say what you want to mulligan for depending on the match up.
For aggro decks, try to find Shadow Word: Pain and Spirit Lash. These two cards are easily the safest ticket out of the early game.
For combo and control decks, pretty much hard mulligan for Zerek, Master Cloner or Shadow Essence. Shadow Visions are fine too since it lets you try finding said Shadow Essence.
Substitutes
Shadowreaper Anduin is mostly just icing on an already late game powerhouse. If you don't have him and don't want to make him, he can just be replaced by more removal such as Shadow Word: Death. If silence becomes a big thing (which I still don't think it will), Mass Dispel could also be a good replacement. Finally, if you want to be real greedy, Extra Arms is also pretty decent at being able to help keep Zerek alive for longer.
Vivid Nightmare is absurdly good in the deck, but it's still replaceable. Another copy of Extra Arms is good and Divine Spirit is also pretty decent.
Obsidian Statue is a card that is incredibly important just because it's strong in so many match ups, but if you don't have it, The Lich King, Deranged Doctor both do a decent job, albeit not as good of a job.
Psychic Scream is pretty good for securing wins against aggro, but originally I had a second copy of Power Word Shield. This does not do the same job whatsoever, but there isn't really another card that does what the scream does.
Shadow Visions and Zerek, Master Cloner are the only two non-common and rare cards you actually need for the deck. Shadow Visions simply provides way too much consistency for the deck that is very much needed and Zerek, Master Cloner is literally the reason why this deck exists, so no cuts for either of them, sorry.
Final Verdict
Here's where I normally say how good a deck is and how I feel it compares against most the meta. However, the meta hasn't really stabilized yet so I'll just talk about how it feels at the current rank I'm at (played it from 15-9 so far). The deck punishes the daylights out of control decks. To the point where I don't think I've actually lost a match to a control deck. As for combo decks, it typically depends on how fast they are able to pop off. Unfortunately, there is no way for priest to really interact with these types of decks. The one way we can interact is by getting Nozdormu off of Free From Amber, which is not a reliable way to win at all. I've still beaten combo decks by just rushing them down (and the aforementioned Nozdormu play), but it feels like a mixed matchup. Aggro match ups are easily the worst but atleast for me, I haven't been seeing that many aggressive ones. Odd Paladins are not that bad if you can get Spirit Lash but Odd rogues are literally the worst thing for the deck. This deck just flat out cannot beat a turn 3 Hench-Clan Thug because it becomes a 4/4 immediately, then by the first time we can properly deal with it, it has already dealt too much damage. That being said though, I still think this deck is pretty decent. I've mostly gone against slower decks and this deck excels at beating those. Not only that, but nobody knows how to deal with Zerek, Master Cloner and I find that hysterical. Overall, I'd recommend this deck in a heartbeat. It is without a doubt the most fun I've had in this game for ages. With all the zoo and other aggressive decks running amok, this deck hasn't really been doing that well unfortunately, so as of right now I'm working on making a deck that still utilizes Zerek to the extremes, but is more board focused.
So I made a list that is more focused on the board and is a midrange deck, here's a link to it.
I just want to thank everyone for all the attention this deck has received. Going to be honest, I thought this deck was just going to end up like my mill druid from Witchwood, not being ignored but never really taken off either. This deck blew that out of the water, reaching the front pages of not only the priest decks (which at the moment it's at the top of that) but then also making it on the front page for a bit (like 3 hours or so until it fell off, but still). It means a lot to me knowing that people would spend the time to try out a deck I made. Thanks for all the support!
Old Big Priest was crazy consistent. Right at the end of that meta, I got from rank 4 to legend only losing 2 games with that deck.
Turn 3 Coin -> Barnes -> Y'sharj -> other Y'Sharj was so broken
Playing this deck no-stop with quest for the last 7 hours, lots of fun vs all control decks and rarely, very rarely , wins vs aggro if they waste time and you have coin + shadow essence into obsidian on turn 5.
Lack of activity on this deck is bugging me. It's very cool but everyone is out to find the new perfect aggro deck they skip this awesome and fun deck.
Loving it atm, remember to rope each turn vs aggro , they deserve it!
Still trying to think of faster ways and more cardraw without screwing up your shadow essence pulls :(
Yeah it deck right now is in kind of a weird place. I feel like it has a lot of potential to just pop out of nowhere and dominate things, but it just can't do things in the early game. Priest just doesn't have either reliable ways to clear a board early on like it used to with Pint-Size Potion + Shadow Word: Horror to deal with a board early on and since Barnes rotated out (thank god honestly) the earliest the deck can really start working is turn 5 with the coin and there's not much we can do about it. Like I've been thinking about messing around with Cloning Device simply because it creates a minion (albeit a lot worse) without having to actually put one in the deck, but I don't think that would work at all and adding more spells just dilutes Shadow Visions even more.
Maybe the deck can get some support next expansion or if Blizzard decides to nerf anything, I dunno. This deck is just in a strange place right now. If the meta shifts to more control decks, this deck will rise up too but otherwise, it'll stay kinda in the shadows. Glad you are loving the deck though, it's such a blast when you can get to the later turns.
Yeah, it is. And dr. Morrigan is bugged, don't craft it, it's a shit card anyway.
Thanks for the advice, I'll check out the quest if I get the dust to do so.
By the time the deck gets moving you are dead. Not a great meta for a stall deck without drake to clean up the board.
Yeah with the popularity of Zoo right now, this deck isn't really that strong right now, which is pretty dissapointing considering how much fun it is to play. Hopefully though the meta will shift more towards control so this deck can work out well.
I took out a nova and threw the quest, works well and it's basically a free amara, with all the deathrattles you summon and what not.
Yeah I've been thinking about the quest seeing as how so many people in the comments for this deck are saying they are using it. I just worry it ruins the mulligans too much. Is it really that beneficial for the deck? (I would try it out but I don't want to waste 1600 dust since I'm wasting it on Dr. Morrigan instead)
You didn't have to credit me lol, your deck is pretty different then mine. Glad you took inspiration from it though.
The deckstring is not the list that you have posted, fyi
What about Psychic Scream in there somewhere? List looks fun, but buff heavy, it also needs Mass Dispel for draw and silence.
Twilight's Call seems overkill hereé.
I've been thinking about putting in Psychic Scream, just that a lot of the time at that point I'm just starting to become ahead on board. I'll still probably try it, maybe going down 1 Power Word: Shield for a scream. Only reason why I'm hesitant though is just because most of my losses have been against aggro decks where I've died before getting off a Shadow Essence so I'm not sure whether it'll be great. But yeah though, if you have Zerek I'd recommend trying the deck out in a heart beat. It's absolutely hysterical when it works, which it does a good job at going off against most decks.
Twilight's Call might be a bit overkill, but as of now I really like how it feels in the deck. It's a cheap card to combo with Shadowreaper, getting copies of Obsidian Statue basically just prevents my opponent from having a board, and it also helps clone a lot of Zereks to finish off a game. Maybe it should just be a 1 of but so far in all my games it's done pretty well.
I was playing a version of Big OTK in the last meta and the problem with Twilight's Call is that it's a ''Win More'' card. It never really get you over the hump if you're behind.
I used your list as guide and took out the Call and Elixir, added Mass Dispel, Lich King (to maximise the Resurect) and 1x Scream instead of 2x Holy Nova.
It's still a lot of buffs, but I like the idea of pulling a ton of Zerek. I tried a smaller tempo version and when you have 3-4 Zerek, it's pretty much game over.
With the big, all you have to do is outlive the Aggro and it's a coin toss if you draw well.
The new clone spell in Priest with a 5/5 copy of a friendly minion works wonder with Zerek (and Statue for that matter), I'd use that instead of Call since you can pull a turn of Servitude and Clone for a super board.
Yeah it's definitely a win more card a lot of the time, but it still does feel good though in a lot of the games. I've been thinking of Mass Dispel but I've had maybe three games out of all the games I've played where I've thought to myself "I wish I had silence". I've also been thinking of Lich King, probably going to swap out a call for him. I also tried Psychic Scream and it's been okay so far, so thanks for that suggestion. Really not sure though how I feel about PW: Replicate though because it feels like it's in the same boat as Twilights Call and in most cases, I'd rather just want sheer quantity over quality most of the time.
Thanks for the advice though!
Doing nothing untill at least turn 5 is a lost game in the new meta. This deck is for the meme.
Yeah it's definitely not a fast deck, but if you make it through to turn 6 (which I haven't had a ton of issues with if you mulligan for your removal) then typically you can stabilize.
That being said, if the meta stays fast, this deck won't really stand a chance against anything. If the meta slows down, wouldn't surprise me if this deck appeared somewhere in the meta.
added awaken the makers
Would you be able to tell me how that works out? I don't have Awaken the Makers but it seems like it could be pretty decent for the deck.
Repeat 5 times: {
Draw....Look at decklist to see when you can play your first card....heal....end turn. }
Die while looking at the awesome hand that would've won the game if your opponent had also done nothing the first 5 turns.
Only play this deck if you change it for early game defense.