[Top5 Legend] Wild Naga Demon Handlock
- Last updated Sep 7, 2017 (Frozen Throne)
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Wild
- 22 Minions
- 7 Spells
- Deck Type: Ranked Deck
- Deck Archetype: Handlock
- Crafting Cost: 8860
- Dust Needed: Loading Collection
- Created: 9/7/2017 (Frozen Throne)
- clickpwn
- Registered User
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- 10
- 31
- 68
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Battle Tag:
Clickpwn #1538
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Region:
N/A
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Total Deck Rating
498
Hello, I reached legend within first week using this handlock deck with 68% winrate from rank 5 and I decided to write a deckguide on it. Naga giants are all the hype right now in wild and Druid was first to hit the spotlight with them but I believe Warlocks can utilize them even better. Giant Druid can easily fall apart if it does not draw ramp card by turn 2,3 but Warlocks always have powerful hero power available to draw the key cards like Naga or giants early and are almost guaranteed to have huge threat by turn 3 or 4 such as twilight drake, mountain giant, or voidcaller. Warlocks also have powerful AOE clear spells and there are more threats in the deck due to demon synergy so that there is lot more fuel even if your wave of giants gets cleared somehow. Also giants are more usable in handlock since you can play mountain giants on turn 4, and molten giants become free with Naga on turn 5 after 2 hero powers and taking 1 damage. Shadowflames also completely destroy other giant mirrors. With druids getting nerfed with upcoming patch, I believe this is the deck to play if you want to play around with Naga and giants synergy.
**Match ups**
* *Druid*: Very favored as I had 83% winrate against them during my climb and Jade druid is almost an auto-win no matter how great their opening hand is due to having no board clear or removal so you want to mulligan for aggro druid unless you know what deck they are playing. Only way Giant Druid beats you is if they ramp and drop naga and multiple giants on their 5 mana turn so I recommend preemptively dropping doomsayer to prevent that on a turn before you start flooding the board.
Against aggro, Keep Darkbomb, Defile, Doomsayer, Imp Gang Boss, Hellfire, Shadowflame
Against Jade/Giant: Naga Sea Witch, Twilight Drake, Mountain Giant, Shadowflame(against giant). Keep Voidcaller if you don't have other 4 drops and have other big demon with it. Keep Molten Giants with Naga.
* *Mage*:I haven't faced many mages but I would mulligan for aggro since renomage is very favored match up. If it is secret tempo mage, playing doomsayer into their mirror entity is game winning. Freeze Exodia mage can't deal with early giants and only way they can clear is nova doomsayer so try to hold onto shadowflame to kill the doomsayer.
Keep: Darkbomb, Doomsayer, Imp gang boss, Loatheb for freeze.
* *Paladin*: Midrange Paladin could become toughest matchup if they start teching for giants with double Equality, Keeper of Uldaman, and Tarim. Defile is the mvp card since it deals with recruits, haunted creepers, and divine shield minions. You can be slightly greedy with doomsayer early since they don't have the burst damage.
Keep: Defile, Doomsayer, Imp gang boss, Hellfire
* *Rogue*: Haven't seen many rogues on ladder but I would suspect aggro or mill rogue. Mill rogue is fine since your giants costs 0 and aggro rogue is inferior pirate warrior.
Keep: Darkbomb, Defile, Doomsayer, Imp gang boss
* *Shaman*: I have seen one control shaman for month and half but hex is going to be nerfed soon and devolve does not really work on the giants. Only way to clear the giant board early is double elemental destruction and that overloads their next turn by full 10 mana. Usually shamans are aggro that tries to push minion damage early and finish you with burst spells from hand. Always try to preserve your health as much as possible to get out of their lethal range.
Keep: Darkbomb, Defile, Doomsayer, Imp gang boss
* *Warlock*: Usually warlocks I faced are renolocks and they are much less consistent than handlock. They usually don't have early removal and can't deal with board of giants by turn 8 which is usually going to be too late.
Keep: Naga Sea Witch, Twilight Drake, Mountain Giant. Keep Voidcaller if you don't have other 4 drops and have other big demon with it. Keep Molten Giants with Naga.
*Priest*: Priest is only control deck that can withstand the naga giants deck but from my record match up is not even that bad. The game usually comes down to if they drew single copy of lightbomb within their first 10 cards or they lose. (And since I've been meeting same people over and over on high ranks, they all kept Lightbomb and Shadow Word: Death knowing that I am not a renolock.) However even if they clear the first wave of giants it is not over if you risk-manage your plays and keep playing threat after threat. You can bait out lightbomb or anduin DK with just 1 or 2 giants or prevent the spell completely with loatheb. Sometimes saving your naga giants until turn 10 and dropping 4 giants with loatheb is best as you force the opponent to only single answer.
Keep: Naga Sea Witch, Twilight Drake, Mountain Giant, Loatheb. Keep Voidcaller if you don't have other 4 drops and have other big demon with it. Keep Molten Giants with Naga.
*Warrior*: Probably the worst matchup but it is actually not that unfavored as you might think. You can drop turn 2 doomsayer, ships cannon can be taken out with darkbomb, defile almost always clears the board, and you can start dropping giants on turn 5 and overpower the board with shambler taunts or healbot behind it. I am seeing less and less pirates and soon PW will be tier 2 deck at best after the nerf.
Keep: Darkbomb, Defile, Doomsayer, Imp Gang Boss
*Hunter*: Hunters are usually aggro but I may now start keeping shadowflame in case for giants hunter if it becomes a thing.
Keep: Darkbomb, Defile, Doomsayer, Imp Gang Boss, Shadowflame
I am excited for the upcoming patch which will make this deck even more powerful in the meta however I wouldn't mind seeing Naga Sea Witch getting unbuffed because it is not really healthy for the metagame as this kills most of the control decks and force even more players to play priests.
Thank you for taking your time to read this guide and hope you have good luck playing on ladder!
Hey man, thanks for the deck. I have a question about the Giants Warlock, do you think there is a decent version without Demons ?
Why dont u play sunfury protectors in this deck? Without them all agro decks should eat it easily before the giant combo
I don't think the Demon package is better than +2 Clockwork Giants and a Lord Jaraxus, not only are you gimping your T5 Naga turn but you're losing pressure and value in the long run vs Priest because 8/8s > any midrange Demon and Coin -> Clockwork Giant is a real thing vs other control decks.
Other stuff I think is kind of sketch is only 1 Antique Healbot, no Brann Bronzebeard and not enough removal vs aggro.
First 5 games went fine. This is better than giants druid or giants hunter. Both are VERY vulnerable to aggro decks. Here we have few board clears and some heal, and the DK is very good to survive in the end. OFC, if it happens vs. an aggro with a perfect start, there's little to do to survive. Lost to an aggro shaman (perfect curve, nothing to do) and to an aggro token druid, who had all the buffs for 5 minions + savage roar @ turn 5 (1 innervate also).
After another victory I crafted Mal'Ganis too. It is a must in this deck.
Last question, would you use this deck from rank 10 to legend ? I have like 1-2 hours / day of gameplay, so it will be a very close call this month. How many hours it took for you from rank 10 to legend on wild ? I'm also rank 10 on Standard, but I must renounce @ one format because I don't have the time ... even now I'm writing this from work.
Thank you very much !!!
Not sure if I'm just unlucky, but this is not working for me. Not with close to 50% priests on the ladder and a good amount of the rest being pirate warrior.
You must be doing something very wrong ... I'm farming priests on EU ladder ... highlander, OTK, dragon and big priests are the most common. None managed to win yet against this deck - true, nobody had lightbomb on my giants in the last 2-3 turns and they used their removals mostly on my demons. I always kept the giants to end the games with, after the priest uses his DK - most players in that moment are pretty sure they won the game ... and bang! giants :D Until then, clear their minions and play one minion at a time ... let them deal with your threats ... because you're always bringing them back with your DK and most of them are holding to lightbomb for that moment. That's the general strategy until you're ready to play your DK. Play it, the priest will clear the demons board and only then you can push 2-3 giants and refill with the other giants if somehow those are gettin' killed - use your hero power to contrast some of the priest hero power damage. Never play more than 3 giants against priest. Use 1 maximum as a bait and the priest will beat himself without heals on the DK (yup, most are kazakus higlander on EU - the best fun is to kill them right after they desperately used reno).
This is NOT a deck to play fast with and get a win by turn 5. You need to survive 99% of the time until you see played the enemy DK. Mostly you can throw in 1 giant on turn 7, to put some pressure, so they play the DK faster. If you still have some demons in your hand, play those first.
Pirate warrior, like aggro shaman, face hunter and aggro druid are a problem for every deck. This deck isn't the best aggro counter on ladder - if you play mostly against aggro, take taunt druid, control warrior, highlander reno priest.
Just pick your play time with care ... in the evening you find most control players online, so profit :) Those are your best targets. During day time, most are playing fast aggro decks, in the breaks at school, etc.
Remember this is a cards game ... losing games is part of the experience. If you lose more than 50%, it means you're not very patient. You must play controlish style with this deck, even skipping turns, doing nothing if no play is required - just draw some more cards - you will always be ahead of your opponent.
I switched out Loatheb and Twilight Drake for a Demonwrath and Tar Creeper and my winrate has improved a lot vs. aggro druid and pirates.
Priest just always seems to have all the answers at the right time. They discover a third SWD, kill the demons with Lightbomb and then kill the giants with Shadowreaper and anything that is left gets sheeped by Kazakus. But again, I could just be really unlucky with them drawing perfectly...
Naga/ Giant will be nerfed for sure, nothing has ever been so strong in hearthstone (maybe undertaker or buzzard...).
Let's call this deck turn 5 gg
With this decks isn't any turn 5 GG. You need to play this control style. Maybe one of 20-30 games it happens to have the perfect combo and the dumbest opponent to kill with.
With aggro druid, aggro shaman, pirate warrior, aggro paladin, yes, you win in the first 5-6 turns. Those are the real cancer to this game. The naga witch allows only a combo, easy to counter with some brain (yeah, no charge on giants), while aggro / face decks are killing the opponent regardless any win conditions, just playing on curve.
If you want fast wins, play aggro shaman and go legend in 20 hours. I did it just for the card back, but it's only a rage race (because of Blizz's matchmaking system, posting you against a full counter every 2-3 games), not fun at all. The game is dumb like this. You roll the dice each game and you can concede in the first 3 turns if you roll low on your first cards.
I feel like you are criticizing Hearthstone itself and not this deck. Why don't you play a different game?