Highlander Rogue - 67% WR
- Last updated May 20, 2020 (Second DH Nerfs)
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Wild
- 20 Minions
- 9 Spells
- Deck Type: Ranked Deck
- Deck Archetype: Galakrond Rogue
- Crafting Cost: 13820
- Dust Needed: Loading Collection
- Created: 4/30/2020 (Second DH Nerfs)
- S0lus
- Registered User
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- 5
- 27
- 46
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Battle Tag:
Solus
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Region:
US
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Total Deck Rating
107
Edit: Turns out there's a hidden 30 dmg OTK in this deck, you need the scorpion (stealthed), praise galakrond, brewmaster, shadowstep, ashtongue slayer, Zephrys (to get windfury) and the coin, so good luck ever pulling it off, I only ever did it the once in over 70 games, but it's probably my greatest HS accomplishment.
Rogue got a lot of new archetypes pushed on them over the past few expansions.
In particular, this expansion gave us Secret Rogue and Stealth Rogue, but neither were better than the still strong Galakrond Rogue.
I've seen a lot of decks try to merge one of the two new archetypes into the existing galakrond package, but I set out to try to merge all 3. Turns out, Hearthstone won't let you run 39 cards in your deck, so I cut out all the duplicates and yeah, it's working out pretty well.
So why merge all 3?
Well, each archetype has its strengths, but really I just wanted all the synergy cards.
Stealth: Stealth minions tend to trade really well and bait out removal against more control-y decks who assume you're playing aggro. Ashtongue Slayer can really swing games in some matchups and Akama is actually pretty solid, but really it's all about the Greyheart Sage. Card draw = Good.
I don't really need to explain the galakrond and secret packages, we all know they're good.
It all comes together surprisingly well. You do occasionally low roll and none of it comes together, but no more so than any highlander deck in my experience. Sometimes your good cards hide at the bottom and you die.
More importantly, this deck absolutely farms control priest, and does pretty solid against Rez Priest as well, it stands a solid chance against Demon Hunter (though it's very mulligan dependant), and every other matchup feels either winnable or favorable.
The only bad matchups I've experienced are Face Hunter since we can't really stabalize against their HP, and DH if your mulligan is bad.
Against Hunter: Go wide, a lot, save some pressure so you don't get blown out of Explosive Trap, and hope you draw Zephrys the Great for a cheesy lethal.
Against DH: Hard mulligan for a 1 drop. Zeph and Hanar can usually carry the game, if you get none of these you probably lose, getting at least one of them can massively swing the game.
Changes:
took out some of the weaker cards like Akama and the 2/2 rush invoke, Jungle Panther and Waggle Pick which was just too greedy.
Added in Faceless Corruptor, Magic Carpet, Worgen Infiltrator and Ruststeed Raider
These cards all provide a more immediate board impact (except for the worgen which is just much easier to play, and works with carpet), and the deck has been performing much better. Almost made it to legend playing exclusively this deck, but I got stuck at diamond 1, dancing between 2 and 3 stars for about 5 games and ran out of time.
Any replacements for Skyvateer?
not really, but it's also not a very important card, so probably evisc.
I'm not convinced by the stealth package. Especially with a highlander the chance you can take advantage of it is even smaller
It's higher than you might think, the problem isn't drawing your synergy cards, it's actually the same problem every rogue faces - drawing your card draw cards. If you actually hit your card draw, then hitting all your synergy cards tends to just happen naturally, and the trick becomes knowing your deck and what resources you can afford to spend now and what needs to be saved for later. Honestly the only card I've ever had an issue using in a game was Ashtongue Slayer because it requires you to have already played a stealth minion, and setting that up against aggressive decks can be difficult, but that little guy has also almost single-handedly won me games against big druid, so I'm thinking he might still be okay.
Although I have been considering cutting Akama, I still think it's a solid card, but when I'm behind I'm finding the last thing I want to do is shuffle a 6 mana card into my deck that doesn't immediately impact the board. When they don't have a board either it's awesome, but currently the deck is lacking come-back mechanics, so I might swap him out for something in that vein. When I'm behind I need to be drawing stronger cards, not polluting my draws with tempo I can't use.
so after about 30+ games I think the stealth package is solid, but I DID end up removing Akama and swapped the panther for a worgen, even without the synergy cards it turns out that a turn 1 stealth minion is incredibly strong against demon hunter, since it basically screws up their first 4 turns. (after turn 4 there's no reason to keep it stealthed because Altruis exists, but it threatens literally every play they have before then besides that 1/2 weapon that summons 1/1s).
But I usually get the chance to use both stealth synergy cards, and when I don't it's usually because I don't want to draw more cards. Magic Carpet with the worgen or spymistress also made the ashtongue easier to take advantage of.
But really nothing beats the feeling of shadowstepping your ashtongue slayer to make an 11 attack scorpion that kills their 12/12 edwin on turn 6 and just watching them mouse over all your cards to see what the f*ck just happened. At the end of the day the deck works, is legend viable and is just fun to play.