Hearthpwn

 

Hi guys,

I just hit legend for the very fist time !  And I wanted to share the deck I hit legend with.

https://imgur.com/a/8GH9AIK

The deck has 3 strengths the way I see it.

1. Strong early game pressure. The deck can be very strong in the early game a Northshire Cleric or Firetree Witchdoctor buffed up by Shadow Ascendant, Power Word: Shield or Inner Fire can put a great deal of pressure on your opponent.

2. Late game beefiness, Ysera, Nightscale Matriarch and Crowd Roaster makes it possible to play the late game.

3. Of course the great finisher of Power Word: Shield + Divine Spirit + Inner Fire. You can also get extra spells from Firetree Witchdoctor or from Shadow Visions.

I don't know if people has any interest in this deck, but if you do please upvote and I might put some extra effort into the description/guide of the deck.

 Edit:

I did some climbing within legend.

https://imgur.com/a/nPSHe1v

Not a spectacular rank but shows that the deck works in legend as well.

Tommy wave made a video on the deck:

 Cultrus made a video on the deck:

Different match ups:

Good: Any slower control deck is a very good match-up for this deck. I mainly used this deck to climb from rank 3 to legend and faced a lot of druid, even lock and odd control mage and this deck is very good against those.

Bad: Odd paladin can be tough, the only AoE the deck runs is Duskbreaker, however they usually don't run silence so I've had some succes with just yolo'ing the Divine Spirit / Inner Fire on a minion and just racing them. Remember they do usually run Void Ripper though, so if you want to Divine Spirit a taunt using Inner Fire as well might be a good idea to counter it.

Medium: Anything else from the decks I've described above I'd say. Kingsbane can be though but if you do a correct mulligan you can put on a lot of early game pressure, get a big hp drake to stick and then finish them off. Hunters are also a medium match-up  I'd say with spellhunter being the easiest of the different archetypes.

Edit:

The Level Up! nerf has weakened what I think is one of the decks worst match-up's, odd-paladin, so good news!

Playstyle.

The deck needs to be proactive and this is why a good mulligan is essential. You need to put pressure on your opponent. Another reason why it is important to be proactive is the lack of spells it is a very minion heavy deck with only 8 spells and the spells all have something to do with the Inner Fire / Divine Spirit combo ( Power Word: Shield maybe excepted here since it can give a lot of tempo.) Don't be afraid to use an Inner Fire  on a 1/5 Northshire Cleric, since you run 2 Inner Fires, to gain tempo, you'll need it.

I think a big part of learning how to play this deck is to be able to tell when to use your Divine Spirit / Inner Fire, not necessarily just using them when they give you lethal.

The deck has some late game minion such as Nightscale Matriarch and Ysera so you do have some fuel for the late game. Ysera especially is just a powerhouse and is great in this deck, but I wouldn't advice drawing out the late game too much. This deck relies on the tempo from the early game and closing the game with Divine Spirit and Inner Fire. That the deck relies on tempo is the reason why the deck has no real hard removal such as Shadow Word: Pain or Shadow Word: Death.  The deck does run Twilight Acolyte which is great against high attack minions, but if you have nothing else to play in your hand then playing it for tempo might be a good idea.

The mulligan.

Try to hard mulligan for your early drops by that I mean Northshire Cleric, Radiant Elemental and Shadow Ascendant. You can keep Firetree Witchdoctor if you have a dragon in your hand, but don't  keep any spells, only keep Power Word: Shield if you have early game minions otherwise mulligan the Power Word: Shield in order to get some early game pressure. You can keep Twilight Acolyte if you think you are facing even lock.

Edit: Front page! Wow thanks a lot :)

Edit:

Card replacements/choices.

Tech choices -

If you are running into a lot of Skulking Geist, then replacing Inner Fire with Topsy Turvy might be a good idea.

The spots of Scaleworm and Cobalt Scalebane can be thought of as tech choices. If you are having trouble with falling behind and dealing with the board Mass Hysteria can replace one of these spots ( I would not recommend replacing both with Mass Hysteria at the moment since the deck needs to be proactive and 2 "dead" cards can slow you down). I've had some luck with snagging Shadow Madness from Firetree Witchdoctor when playing against control lock to steal their Voidlord so if you are facing a lot of control lock this might be a good addition.

If you are facing a lot of zoo/token decks I think Mossy Horror might be good, not only for the battlecry but the stats are also great for the deck.

I've seen some comments talking about Lady in White, to me it actually seems like this might be a good addition if you are facing a lot of control, sadly I don't have it and I don't have the dust to craft it, just to test if it is good in this deck. However if you have Lady in White and have tried it in this deck, please share your thoughts in the comments. 

Edit: After some thoughtfull comments and giving it 2nd thoughts I don't think Lady in White will be good in this deck, if it were to be included Twilight Drake should probably be excluded and Twilight Drake is a really great card in this deck. You can try the card if it is good but I doubt it.

Replacements:

Replacement for Ysera - Ysera is the only legendary in this deck and the spot it fills in the deck is unique. Ysera provides dragon synergy when in your hand, powerfull cards each turn it is on the board and a big amount of stats in the late game. I've had some trouble thinking of a replacement but The Lich King seems like the best replacement, Ysera is superior though. If you a newer player and don't have a lot of legendaries another Nightscale Matriarch might be good.

Some people have been asking for a replacement for Crowd Roaster, if you only miss 1 of them then try an extra Nightscale Matriarch. If you are missing 2 then it might be a bit harder since there are no other dragon cards which can impact the board the turn its played, and be a significant thread afterwards. If you are having board trouble then maybe Mass Hysteria will be a better replacement than Nightscale Matriarch.