[Legend] Snower's N'Zoth Dragon Priest
- Last updated May 29, 2016 (Old Gods)
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Wild
- 21 Minions
- 9 Spells
- Deck Type: Ranked Deck
- Deck Archetype: Dragon Priest
- Crafting Cost: 9800
- Dust Needed: Loading Collection
- Created: 5/16/2016 (Old Gods)
- snower_HS
- Registered User
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- 5
- 7
- 16
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Battle Tag:
N/A
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Region:
US
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Total Deck Rating
312
Edit: Wow! Huge thanks to the guys over at Tempostorm for featuring my deck as the standard dragon priest list! You can check out their writeup here: https://tempostorm.com/hearthstone/decks/dragon-priest-standard-meta-snapshot-may-29-2016
Below is a video detailing my card choices and showing off some gameplay:
Hey Guys! Today I would like to share a spicy new dragon priest list I played exclusively from rank 7 to legend. The list went 65-26 in games (~71%) and is so strong that I truly believe it could lead to a new resurgence of dragon priest. So without further ado:
Legend Proof:
Edit: Trump played a version of this inspired by me! available here: https://secure.twitch.tv/trumpsc/v/67402200
(starts at 39:35, yes he gets my name wrong...)
Edit: Kibler's on the hypetrain!: http://i.imgur.com/4CcJmvL.jpg
What's so special about this deck?:
Well as you can see, the deck is significantly greedier than lists of old. Rather than playing lots of early game and mid-game with one or two finishers, it plays a large amount of lategame, with cards like Deathwing, Dragonlord, Ysera, and N'Zoth, the Corruptor as big finishers. This deck has gone a bit light on the 3 drops to ensure it can run with the big boys in the lategame.
Card Choices:
Deathwing, Dragonlord: Deathwing may at first seem like a very strange include in a naturally defensive deck, but this monstrously large 12/12 can win you game singlehandedly. Often times will get to a grindy state where both players are topdecking. Playing a 12/12 puts a lot of pressure on your opponent to kill it, and they don't know what might behind him. Not to mention that he is resurrected by N'Zoth, the Corruptor. Dragon Priest has always struggled to have enough dragons to activate the Dragon matters cards, and this guy does a lovely job of fitting the bill.
Chillmaw: I have gotten a lot of questions on reddit about this one. A lot of people are quick to point out the anti synergy with shifting shade post N'Zoth. Chillmaw is a straight up excellent minion in this deck. It's a dragon (which matters a lot), it has taunt, and it can be revived by N'Zoth. The card is very powerful and won't always kill your shifting shades, and even if it does, you still draw 2 cards, doesn't seem too bad to me.
2x Shadow Word: Pain: We play 2 of these because it is stupidly good right now. The list of pain targets is too large to list off, but some key ones are: Bloodhoof Brave, Tunnel Trogg, Totem Golem, Thunder-Bluff Valiant, and Imp Gang Boss.
Excavated Evil: A solid AoE card. The extra damage is a really big deal in many situations. I would run 2 if I was seeing alot of shaman, but Holy Nova has also been very good. So I choose to play one of each.
N'Zoth, the Corruptor: This majestic old god allows us to get away with a much greedier and lategame oriented deck. Priest naturally has some of the best defensive early game in Hearthstone and curves into a strong midgame, and thanks to this bad boy: an unbeatable lategame.
But What if I Don't Have:
Deathwing, Dragonlord: Deathwing is a powerful finisher in this deck, and while he's gotten a lot of skepticism, he does work in this deck. My advice would be to replace him with another high impact Deathrattle or Dragon card. Against control, Cairne Bloodhoof and against aggro, Alexstrasza.
Chillmaw: This card is really core to the deck. The taunt and AoE are so critical, both against Aggro and Control. Make him if you can, but if you REALLY can't make chillmaw, try playing some more proactive early game, a good example would be Doomsayer.
Matchups:
Hunter: Yogg and load is good, Midrange is roughly 50-50, perhaps slightly against you. Mulligan for your early drops. Be very conscious of your life total as cards like Call of the Wild mean that your life total is never enough. Make proactive plays to preserve your life.
Paladin: I played against virtually no paladin, but the few I did were favorable. Be conscious of equality clears as you play.
Shaman: One of the deck's best matchups. Look for Shadow Word: Pain and early minions. You should be glad to see these guys, as this is almost always a win.
Warrior: Another great matchup. Against tempo you want your Cabal Shadow Priest, Shadow Word: Pain, and early minions. Against control, look for Wyrmrest Agent and lategame. Be very cognizant of Sylvanas Windrunner + Shield Slam. Often I will hold her until I can kill it myself to ensure I get another one later.
Priest: A free win. Control priest doesn't have good answers to tons of high health minions, and dragon priest's wont be as greedy as yours, making you the favorite. Try to offer them smaller pain targets so you can make space for your Twilight Guardian to do work.
Warlock: Zoo is a fantastic matchup as well your early minions stem their pressure quite well, and you have efficient answers to their threats, namely Sea Giant. In this matchup it can sometimes be right to keep an Excavated Evil to recover the board on turn 5, it all depends on your hand. Reno can be a little tricky because of their high level of threatening cards, but you are definitely still favored. Try to curve out. Look for your Twilight Guardian.
Rogue: Concede.
Druid: A great matchup. Recently there have been some more aggressive token style decks floating around, which stand up quite poorly to your deck. C'Thun druid still rears it's head here and there, but just curve out and look for a Shadow Word: Death and this should be yours for the taking.
Mage: Tempo/Yogg is favored for you, and Freeze is almost as bad as rogue. Look for Blackwing Technician and Wyrmrest Agent to contest the tempo mage early game cards, like Mana Wyrm and Sorcerer's Apprentice
That's all for now! Thanks for reading this far! If you have any feedback or questions, feel free to leave a comment or reach me on twitter at @snower_hs. Happy Priesting!
To answer your question on the C'Thun problem, I have found that the deck struggles to put pressure down on turns 8-9 and is light on hard removal. Take one of these turns to establish a board so C'Thun's missiles don't destroy you. Then, between 2 deaths and an entomb, killing the actual card should be no big deal. Against tempo mage, you win normally because you can build a board that trades well against theirs, meaning they have to use all their burn to stall the game and can't close you out before you play your huge cards.
Absolutely, many games are won or lost within the first 2 draws + mulligan. Learning to mull right is easily the most important skill in playing not just this deck, but any dragon deck overall. Glad to hear you are enjoying the deck!
there are 2 ways this is possible, either you are getting exactly one matchup over and over again, or you aren't mulliganing right.
Funny, my 1st match up was Rogue so I came back to check the strat and was like... oh... FFS!! Anyways, destroyed him. Got lucky though always had a playable taunt when I needed one. If you hold on to them for the right time, it is definitely winnable. Currently 2-3 vs Valeera, so not too bad. Probably only played 20 matches so far but am really liking the deck.
People will complain, cos unlike rush decks, it can draw badly, leaving every play feeling kinda redundant, but that comes with a well thought out deck. I've mostly had success vs everything I came up against, and can even attribute a couple of the losses to my own ignorance of the current meta (just returned to the game after a 3 month sebatacle).
Thumbs up from me anyhow. I will say, I don't have the new Deathwing so I subbed in Nefarian and it's definitely been the make or break card in more than one game. I see you have Cairn as a possible replacement but I would strongly urge players to go with your other suggestion of subbing in a high cost Dragon. Nothing worse than having to play a Dragon dependant card minus the dragon, or having to hang on to a dragon you'd rather play cos without it your next few plays might be totally fucked.
All in all, love Priest, Love Dragons, Love N'Zoth..... Love the deck :-)
Thanks! Glad to hear you are enjoying the deck, and thinking critically about losses, rather than just taking the easy route and blaming me. Maybe there is hope for mankind after all...
Is there anyway to incorporate Justicar into this deck?
Not really, I'd rather play Cairne or Cabal #2 first. Justicar is a slow and low tempo card, and I don't think that the improved hero power is worth all those downsides, especially because we want to be curving out more and hero powering less subsequently.
FeelsBadMan
Are you saying if we get matched up against a Rogue with this deck we should concede?
I'm pretty sure he is. The current rogue archetypes are Miracle and N'zoth.
N'zoth rogue will beat other N'zoth decks 99% of the time from my experience. C'thun Warrior can sometimes kill N'zoth rogue if he manages to hold onto both Brawls, but otherwise the only thing in your favor in either Rogue archetype is them drawing badly.
It's a shame the class got nerfed in terms of weapons, but is back to being what it was with original miracle rogue (RNG dependant, you either win or lose based on them getting Auctioneer/N'zoth in time.)
I wouldn't take him literally, but you gotta draw fairly perfectly to win. Nothing in Hearthstone is an auto concede..... in my not-so-humble opinion :-)
I mean, you may as well play a couple turns out. Occasionally you draw the nuts and they have nothing, but I wrote that to explain in a simple and attention grabbing way that rogue is really bad for the deck.
Definetly at least play till turn 5ish- you never know, they might be running some janky experiement deck that your actually ok against. How do you know its not Taunt Rogue?
I played 3 game so far, I always start with an unplayable hand even with mulliganing agressively for early drops.
I wouldn't go so far as to say "keep ysera in your opening hand". If you are going first and only have a 3 card mulligan you HAVE to get early game or you will lose, so keeping a 9 drop will hurt you. If you are going 2nd you can be a bit more ballsy since you have an extra mulligan but overall I'd still suggest only keeping a high cost dragon drop if you have a dragon synergy card in your hand (whelp, agent, technician).
3 games is NOTHING dude. If you're that impatient for results, I suggest you stick to Hunter and Warlock... or, and I can't believe I'm about to say this..... Aggro Pally :-s
Not every deck is for every player, all down to your preference :-)
I've only tried this deck out today, but I've lost 4 games vs totem and aggro shaman so far (down from rank 9 to 10). Won 1 game against an aggro pirate warrior.
I feel like this deck can be overwhelmed early and lacks the AoE damage to regain control of the board going into late-game.
I've had moderate success, the thing is you need to avoid trying to heal your minions unless healing helps play around something. Tempo is what turns 1-4 are all about. I'd also suggest running 2x excavated evil.
Guys, I get rekt by shamans and zoolocks. Any tips?
All about early game minions. I tend to keep Azure Drake and any 1-2 or even 3 drops with the coin. Activating Twilight Whelp turn 1, Wyrmrest Agent turn 2 and Blackwing Tech turn 3 leaves them losing their minions with shitty trades in a desperate attempt for board control, which is pretty much impossible for them. Twilight Guardian turn 4 and they'd be crazy to continue.
If you like the deck, keep at it, practice makes poifect :-)