Hearthpwn

**Introduction**

After the latest card announcements I had basically given up on priest and swapped to warrior, then last night I couldnt sleep and started watching random hearthstone youtube videos. I stumbled across a deck playing 30 spells for priest only near rank 4 and he was winning his games pretty convincingly.

Using his list as a starting point I decided to make a deck to troll low ranked players with while I climb towards rank 5.

Something miraculous happened though, the deck was actually good, a few tweeks later I am currently something like 9 and 0 with the deck and only a siingle one of those games were close. I've completely dominated druids, other priests, dragon warrior, cthun warrior, and a hunter.

The sample size and the ranks the decks were played in do leave something to be desired but the deck is really fun to play and I honestly believe it could be the best priest deck at the moment.

**Problems with Standard Priest**

The problem with priest has always been that all of their minions suck and all of their spells are situational. This creates a situation where you don't want to draw minions early game but instead want to draw the correct types of removal for the board state. Here is the idea curve for standard control priest.

1 -> pass, 2 -> SW:P, 3 -> SW:P, Arch + Circle, Death, Entomb, more AOE, ?, somehow win.

The problem is, if you drew too many minions and your opponent (who, lets be honest, has tempo and more efficient minions) can deal with them you can never hero power and you will eventually miss a removal turn and you lose.

Any active priest player can tell you that you don't get this kind of a curve often but those games feel completely in your control at all times and are really fun for you, and probably extremely frustrating for the other player.

**How this deck is different**

Going against common logic this priest deck with almost no minions is actually MORE consistent than a standard priest deck at living to later turns where priests actually have powerful options.

The deck doubles down on removal spells, You run duplicates of Holy Smite, SW:P, SW:D, Shadow Madness, Excavated Evil, Holy Fire, and Entomb. You also play duplicate copies of mind vision and thought steal which often give you more removal spells and weapons.

This set up has carried me through the early game vs every single deck I've played, including aggressive Dragon Warrior variants. Late game you use Yogg-Saron and your 2 copies of Mind Control + Golden Monkey to win games.

**The Deck List and Card Choice explanations**

*Forbidden Shaping* - The first question most people will ask is, why only a single copy? The answer is, I only own 1 and the only cards I would consider cutting from this deck are flash heals and Justicar which I like for their ability to keep me alive vs Hunter, if you don't care about hunter and tempo mage match ups and the occasional agro paladin, cutting Justicar for Forbidden Shaping is probably a reasonable decision.

*Flash Heal* - Its a cheap spell for yogg and it helps keep you alive to find answers vs rush down and also allows you to make better use of weapons that you copy with thoughtsteal or Mind Vision.

*Holy Smite* - MVP, this card has done so much work for me along side pyromancer in standard priest that it was a no brainer here. All you care about early game is staying alive, this makes turn 6 excavated evil way stronger vs a lot of decks with 4 attack 4 health minions and it also gives you an edge vs Zoo and Hunter early on, its a really nice answer to huffer or Elek and if you aren't using this in your other priest decks I urge you to give it a try.

*Mind Vision* - Initially I put it in as a joke, but it is a cheap spell for yogg and its a good turn 1, its really nice vs a lot of decks, Warrior often mulligans for FWA but any of their removals except shield slam are really strong and its always great vs druid. It probably needs more testing but I've really liked it.

*Convert* - This card was in the 30 spell deck that inspired this so I decided to use try it. Nothing is more satisfying on turn 10 than using 2 converts on a grom and then entombing it. This combo also works on Sylvanas, Cairne, Ragnaros. This card which I anticipated to be one of the weakest in the deck is actually performing amazingly, vs Druid this almost always reads 2 mana add a 5/10 taunt to your hand.

*SW:P* - Surviving early game is all you need, if you draw this late game you can transform it with Elise into a legendary.

*SW:D* - This is the card that creates tempo for you in the late game, I try to destroy minions using other removal options if possible so I can play Death and a converted minion on the same turn. In a bind it can be used on 4 mana 7/7 creatures.

*Thoughtsteal* - You don't play minions, thus the tempo loss of this card never comes into play, just play it on turns that the enemy has an empty board or you have nothing else. This card often gives some good removal and creatures that you need in control match ups, vs Agro it can give you some cards to contest the board in the mid game.

*Shadow Madness* - Often destroys 2 minions, I'm more than happy to run a 3/3 into a 3/5 and holy nova the 3/5 and some other stuff later on though. It helps weaken opponents board state early game.

*Excavated Evil* - Board Clear, you really need this.

*Holy Nova* - Why run this over someting like circle and embrace the shadows? The simple answer is card advantage, this deck actually has single target removal so you don't need to take as much face damage waiting for high damage AOE, just kill what you can when you can.

*Entomb* - Stops deathrattles, in a pinch can remove buffed minions, often gives you some late game minions to use in control match ups, pretty bad vs aggro decks but is still pretty decent vs mid range. Probably the best card priest has even though this is normally such a huge tempo loss.

*Holy Fire* - This card is awful... in standard priest. But in this deck it's actually super strong. Its single target removal and helps you stay alive vs flood decks, I often use this on 3/3s vs agro or on naked Sylvanas' and such in other match ups.

*Mind Control* - While I've been generally lucky in my games to not draw this early I think its a really powerful card in the late late game. Once again this deck has so much more removal than a normal priest that its okay to wwait for them to play an 8 drop, its not like standard priest where having an extra card in your hand that you cant use means you lost. Although I've also used it to steal 9/9s from dragon warriors.

This deck runs 3 minions, 2 of which are optional.

*Elise* - This card is what makes the deck viable, she IS your game-plan vs aggro, you remove minions until a turn where you can clear the board and monkey and then you win the game for free. In control match ups it puts you 1 further away for fatigue and turns all those useless Shadow Madness spells into powerful cards that you can drop turn after turn.

*Justicar Trueheart* - Because you run so few minions your opponents are very likely to have removal for your minions, thats why Justicar Trueheart is such a great fit, even if he dies for free he still lets you outlast other decks so much easier. Good replacements could be Emperor or another copy of Forbidden Shaping.

*Yogg-Saron* - we play 27 spells in this deck, Yogg-Saron can win any game. I tend to play Yogg vs mid range decks that are outdrawing me, some games your removals only go 1 for 1 and your opponent has drawn a lot of cards, the average Yogg in this deck on turn 10 is going to be casting 12-13 spells, really great odds that you will draw or generate some cards and clear a board. While I do think this deck would function wwithout him I think that he is a big part of what makes this deck fun. He provides almost all of the decks high moments and is a really powerful comeback mechanic.

**Game plan & Win Conditions**

Remove threats as efficiently as possible while saving the correct removal for the corresponding threats, vs aggro you want to either convert some medium sized minions and protect them OR you want to make it to monkey and blow them out wwith legendaries and a 6/6 taunt. VS Control this deck has too many win conditions to count but the basic idea is to conserve single target removal and last until Mind Control turns or double convert entomb turns on a powerful minion and ride the efficiency of those minions to easy victories.

The toughest match up is OTK Warrior, the are 2 ways to win this match up. Convert of thougtsteal 3 copies of Shield Block or play a Yogg and hope he plays Freezing trap or Ice Block, kill the worgens then heal out of range of weapons.

**Conclusion**

I can't even begin to imagine how irritating this deck would be to play against. It can win games in completely 1 sided ways that don't feel fair. As a long time Priest player this makes me feel gooey inside. The only matches that have been even remotely close have been vs NZoth Priest and Ramp Druid, Ramp Druid always feels like I am losing the whole time but then somehow I win in a very convincing way.

Would love to hear your feedback!

**Change Log**

-1 Mind Control, -1 Shadow Madness, -2 Mind Vision

+2 Archenai, +2 Circle