Hearthpwn

Backstab: Only when you already have a minion in hand. Minions are extremely important against a druid.

Sap: Throw that early innervated Druid of the Claw back to their hand. Or make tons of tempo in the midgame. Druid has no way to play a minion and deal with your board at the same time.

Preparation: For the same reason as above, playing a minion + removing their board is superstrong against druid. Although should not be kept when not on coin without a minion.

Minions: SI:7 Agent, Tomb Pillager, Earthen Ring Farseer and/or Violet Teacher. Drake can be kept when you have turn 3/4 and preferably on coin.

Tip: Against druid you will usually win when you gain control over the board, try to keep it that way, don’t be afraid to sap something just to make them spend all their mana next turn again without reacting to your board.

Backstab, SI:7 Agent, Preparation, Eviscerate. On coin: Tomb Pillager.

If you have none of the above cards it is justified to keep Shadowstrike to deal with a Totem Golem.

Tip: Shaman will most likely be the agressor in this matchup, try to turn the tides and push as much facedamage as you can, once they have to play defensively you will have the upperhand.

Backstab: Only when you have 1 or 2 minions already, preferably an SI:7 Agent. Backstab is not that good against priest.

Preparation: With a minion.

Deadly Poison: Really good against Priest, deals with all their early game: Museum Curator, Northshire Cleric, Wild Pyromancer, Shifting Shade.

SI:7 Agent, Tomb Pillager. On coin: Azure Drake and even Gadgetzan Auctioneer if you have a Tomb Pillager or Preparation.

Tip: Don’t be afraid to pass a turn if that means you can have a better turn with Auctioneer. Eg: Instead of Coin - Auctioneer - Prep - Conceal turn 5, go with: Pass turn 5, then Auctioneer - coin - conceal - Prep - Sap/Evis/Shadowstrike turn 6.

Backstab, Eviscerate, SI:7 Agent. On coin: Tomb Pillager.

Tip: Using Sap on a Highmane is insanely strong but don’t be too greedy on it, sapping an infested wolf when you already have board is perfectly fine! You need to try to kill them before Call of the Wild happens.

Backstab, Eviscerate, SI:7 Agent, Deadly Poison. On Coin: Tomb Pillager.

If you have none of the above cards it is justified to keep Shadowstrike to deal with an Imp Gang Boss or Darkshire Councilman.

If you are 100% sure it's Renolock: Always keep Tomb Pillager and throw away Deadly Poison.

Tip:

Against Zoo: Keep Preparation too. Try to keep the board as clean as possible, once they have nothing and you have minions the game should be won. Be aware of your health too, some decks run Leeroy Jenkins and Soulfire.

Against Reno: Keep playing for board, don’t try to ignore their minions and push face because it might be punished by Reno Jackson. Try to burst them down from 20+ if your hand allows it.

Backstab: Only when you have SI:7 Agent or at least 2 minions.

Preparation: When you have Tomb Pillager/Azure Drake already.

Deadly Poison: Really good against Acolyte of Pain.

SI:7 Agent

You are really looking for minions like Tomb Pillager and Azure Drake. If your hands looks really good you can even keep Gadgetzan Auctioneer.

Tip: Value your minions highly, don’t just feed an SI:7 Agent to a Fiery War Axe, instead wait until you can put it on the board with another minion or when you can go for a conceal play. 

Side-note: Pirate Warrior is the worst matchup in the game, the only way to win against them is to have a huge Edwin VanCleef early or rely on them having a really bad draw. You should try to mulligan for Control/Tempo warrior.

Mage is quite hard to mulligan against because the 2 popular archtypes are completely different. If you have no idea what kind of mage it is, I'd suggest mulliganning for Tempo Mage because against Freeze Mage you have a lot more time. (and it is a really bad matchup already)

Tempo Mage: Backstab, SI:7 Agent, Deadly Poison, Tomb Pillager.

Freeze Mage: Deadly Poison, SI:7 Agent, Tomb Pillager, Azure Drake, Gadgetzan Auctioneer.

Tip:

Against Tempo Mage: They don’t run any heals or taunts so push as much facedamage as you can and burst them down.

Against Freeze Mage: Make a huge Edwin VanCleef early on or try to pop their block before the Alex turn with Cold Bloods and Eviscerates.

SI:7 Agent, Tomb Pillager and Azure Drake. Deadly Poison can be kept too for their acolytes, although not necessary. Gadgetzan Auctioneer can be kept when you have coin and possibly a Tomb Pillager.

Tip: They can’t heal, taunt and deal with your board at the same time. Put as much pressure on them as possible but don’t overextend. Be aware of an Equality combo (with pyromancer of consecration). Either bait one of their combo’s out with your board and then go for an Auctioneer conceal play or go for an Auctioneer Conceal play, draw lots of cards and make a board after. Keep Sap preferably  for Sylvanas Windrunner , Cairne Bloodhoof and Tirion Fordring but don’t hesitate to Sap Ragnaros, the light lord when you already have a good board. 

It is really important to be the aggressor with initiative in this matchup. If you're behind you'll most likely lose. Your health is extremely important. It happens very often that one of the rogues will do a 2-turn lethal setup and if you're high enough on health that can be prevented.

Backstab: Only when you have minions already.

Deadly Poison, SI:7 Agent, Tomb Pillager.

If you have none of the above cards it is justified to keep Shadowstrike to deal with a Tomb Pillager or Azure Drake.

Tip: Rogue can’t do anything against a concealed board, try to find the right moment to push with your minions and conceal them. The rogue with the highest health during the midgame usually wins.

Deadly Poison is a card that has lost a lot of value since the nerf of Blade furry. Which is also why I decided to cut 1. I feel like Deadly Poison is almost only worth it when you either can kill a 3hp minion on turn 3 and have a tempogain into the next turn, when you can use it to buff Edwin VanCleef or when you can cycle it with a Gadgetzan.

A lot of decks also play Harrison Jones which makes it so that you can't keep your weapon up too long, especially not a buffed one.

Gadgetzan Auctioneer is the engine of this deck, the only reason Miracle Rogue exists is because of this card. This card in combination with Preparation, The Coin and Tomb Pillager (giving you more coins) draws you so many cards that you can fatigue even before you hit turn 10. It also makes it possible to gain tempo without worrying about card advantage. Not to mention drawing all the answers you need or finding your combo pieces in time. With this being said it is still not justified to keep the card in your opening hand. It is a 6 mana card (which is already far past the early game) but you usally don’t play it turn 6 because you want to play spells with it too. I feel like it’s only correct to keep Auctioneer when you already have a Tomb Pillager in hand and when you play against really slow control decks. Or maybe when you have the absolute perfect hand: Coin, Backstab, SI:7 Agent, Tomb Pillager and Preparation. Then and then only would I consider keeping it against faster decks.

99% of the rogue games you will hero power turn 2. And most people pass their turn with both charges of the dagger (or 'wicked knife') up. This is never completely incorrect BUT it might result in missing some damage. And for whoever watched Forsen when he was streaming Miracle Rogue: Remember that he was always 1 damage off lethal?

So when is it good to have only 1 charge of your dagger left at the end of your turn?

~ You having nothing to play the next turn and will most likely just dagger up again.

~ Against classes/decks were dagger will go face most of the time anyway. (eg. Control Paladin, Control Warrior, Priest, Renolock, etc)

~ When you expect a Harrison Jones to be played. Sometimes I even redagger and THEN hit instead of hitting and then redaggering, just to play around the museum.

~ When you absolutely need that 1 damage for a 2-turn Lethal Setup.

Bloodmage Thalnos is one of the strongest cards in Rogue, the reason being that Rogue greatly abuses BOTH Spellpower and Carddraw. Often you want to keep Thalnos in hand to combo it with Eviscerate or Fan of Knives for very efficient boardclears. But sometimes he can be played turn 2 to force your opponent in an awkward turn or when your hand is so bad that you really need extra cards.

For example: Druids usually want to play wild growth turn 2 or innervate something out but if Thalnos gets played they either have the tendancy to hero power it down or put their Innervate play on hold. If they still go through with their initial play you might punish them hard with a 3 damage Backstab into a possible SI:7 Agentplay.

I feel like there is a lot of controversy about this between Rogue players. Some people say it's bad because it doesn't do anything on it's own and you prefer other cards and topdeck into preparation in the later stage of the game. Other people say that it's absolutely nessecary because without it your Gadgetzan Auctioneer won't start rolling and/or you might completely lose the board before you even get to turn 6.

I'll give you my opinion on the matter.

I'd like to compare Preparation with Innervate. Innervate is without doubt a stronger card because you can get a big minion on the board very early into the game. But it kinda still does the same. You play multiple cards and 'cheat their mana' to gain a quick tempoadvantage over the board. Rogue is a huge tempodeck, especially since losing Blade Furry there are few to no comeback possibilities. Which means that Rogue has to be dealing with everything starting from turn 1. This is why I think Preparation is an absolute necessity. Even if you have the perfect curve, SI:7 Agent into Tomb Pillager into Azure Drake you might still lose the game if you can't deal with their minions at the same time. And if you deal with their minions without playing some yourself they will keep refilling until you run out of removals. Remember: Minions are slow, spells are instant. You should always try to play your slower cards first and follow them up with faster cards.

So my answer is: Yes, you should absolutely keep Preparation in a Tempo matchup where you know they will play minions in the first few turns. As I said before, you can not afford to lose the board because there is no way to gain it back if you fall behind too much.

Against slower decks like Priest, Renolock, Warrior I would only keep it when I already have some minions in hand.

Personally, I don't like doing this. If there is an alternative I think it is better to just play an Azure Drake turn 5, for example. Preparation is more powerful the more mana you can 'cheat'. So using it for a 1 mana spell can result in a tempoloss later into the game because you still have to use a Fan of Knives or a Shadow Strike for the full mana cost.

It IS very good though when you are absolutely certain that your opponent has no way to answer it and when you have a hand full of spells that you can cycle the turn after. Or when there is just no alternative play possible.

My rule for Cold Blood is simple: Whenever you have mana leftover, a minion on the board and there is even the smallest chance that the minion will survive you should use coldblood. This is almost never wrong. People think you run cold blood to burst your opponent down with Leeroy Jenkins, but this is incorrect. Leeroy Jenkins is in the deck BECAUSE you run cold blood. Cold Blood is a very efficient card (1 mana 4 damage face + a permanent buff) that can make you finish games really really fast with the use of conceal. There are a lot of games that I won when I was behind just by playing double cold blood on a minion, go face and then conceal. If they don't have the resources to kill you that turn you usually win.