The Voidcaster
is the last line of defense against the void... in their own mind at least. Taking in the powers that they seek to fight,
the Voidcasters
manipulate
singularities
and remove enemies from the board with disturbing efficiency. With powerful singular use secrets, spell targeting manipulation and tradeoff with enemy's armor,
the Voidcaster
dances in and out of rifts on the battlefield, shunting enemies into rifts and overall... looking purple doing it. Oh, and
Locus-walker
? The Ethereal behind the whole movement? He'll reveal his secrets... in due time... (C'mon Blizzard, don't keep him an enigma forever).
It's time to bask in the sun and freeze our wrappings off in
Journey to Un'Goro
and
Knights of the Frozen Throne!
Locus-walker has enemies in both locations, as he finds himself in conflict with the Emerald Nightmare and Il'gynoth in Un'goro, and Ner'zhul out in Icecrown. Of course, he'll be utilizing the tactics of his opponents, as this time around, he's reaching out for some new powers of the void...
The powers of Madness!
Singularity
Singularity
is the Overload style tradeoff keyword of this class. All
Singularity
cards feature strong effects, stats or costs, if not all three, balanced on the fact that you can only have one in play at a time, and as a consequence, you need to restrict yourself from over corwding your deck with them. They can be cheated out over the top of each other, such as with the infamous
Mad Scientist
.
Singularity
has no big changes this time around, but it is now officially going to cheated out by in-class cards. This is to make the secrets partially more useful but also to add some more interesting design space for Voidcaster to play with.
Strengths and Weaknesses
Strengths
Strong Single Target Removal:
Single target removal so good you can hit multiple targets with it! VC excels at spreading it's varied removal options, some hard, some soft and some which deny resummoning combos.
Good Draw:
While the draw isn't always consistent, it's across the board strong once it gets off.
Hand Dancing:
VC can throw out a strong minion, get off an attack with it, then return it to your hand until the start of your next turn. It can do this with both yours and your opponent's minions, allowing you to cheat out Singularities over the top of each other.
Strong single turn survival:
VC has several options for preventing it's death for just one turn longer. None as fire and foget as
Ice Block
, but more numerous and a bit more skill intensive
0-mana secrets:
As all VC secrets are balanced on the Singularity Keyword, they are all balanced at 0-mana and thus can be played without skewing your curve.
They can void any bad contracts you're stuck in.
Weaknesses
Inefficient AoE:
If there's anything that really gets to VC, it's the AoE issue. ALL AoEs are either high costed (And in much later sets) or require multiple cards to use. More often than not, they will have to save their single target removal spells to be spread around using Void Might or Gravity Well, or burn an excess of cards inefficiently to proc Twisted Heartbeat.
Singularity deckbuilding:
There isn't really a logistical way to build a 30 singularity deck; Depending the speed you go at, you could brick your hand with around nine. You have to make sure each of your Singularities can be used or at least is worth the draw. Also worth noting that if you're locked into a secret and your opponent neve manages to trigger it, a lot of your other secrets are also bricking something major. Most have pretty open-ended conditions though
Weak Defenses:
Other than some Taunt abilities, VC is severely lacking in armor gain and desperately out of Healing. Health is a resource you won't be getting back much.
Tradeoffs:
A lot of your cards with strong effects that have no Singularity cost will often give your opponent armor. You get irrefutably good tempo through your Hero Power as well, but you'll need a strong board presence to eventually get back through most of that armor.
They expired all your coupons.
Themes
Journey to Un'goro:
It's easy to forget the ties between the Crater and the Emerald Dream, but be assured the Old Gods and Void Lords have certainly not forgotten. Through
Jungle Madness
, the heart of corruption, Il'gynoth, makes his way into our world, whispering madness and spreading dark thoughts to the many elementals and beasts of the primeval jungle. Even some of the stones in Un'goro have been imbued with dark unlife of the void. But of course, Locus-walker always has another agenda... and in this case it's attempting to trap the massive Hydra
Markuranoc
for the Netherstorm Eco-domes.
Mechanics;
Enemy armor capitalization:
Several minions in this set have battlecries or effects that trigger when your opponent has a certain amount of armor, or improves the minion if they have a lot. This class makes that consistent through Hero Power and base set cards.
Twisted thoughts:
Let's face it,
Curse of Rafaam
was underutilized. Voidcaster establishes it's theme of gaining buffs by giving your opponent passive buffs that they have to deal with, unless they pony up the mana to cast them.
Knights of the Frozen Throne:
Icecrown is a dark place, and many of it's inhabitants have varied and expansive pasts with the void. None more so than
Ner'zhul
, though, the original Lich King and practioner of Void magic. Of course Locus-walker is out to end his communion with the void lords, but when you go to fight madness... chances are you'll go mad too. Consumed by the Shadowmoon Warlords power and tied to a Lich's Phylactery, Locus-walker becomes the sort of dark figure he worked to destroy...
Limbo-walker
.
Mechanics;
Discover Synergies:
When he lost his mind to the void, Limbo-walker became obsessed with discovering more and more twisted power. As such, we have several Yogg-saron themed discover cards and cards that return themselves to your hand or board, with the cost of having your discover choice chosen at random.
Damage Redirection:
Damage isn't worth taking, and the Shadowmoon clan, Ner'zhul's clan, have mastered the redirection of it. Survival cards for Voidcaster designed to limit and threaten using your opponent's damage against them, creating a few more 4d chess situations this class was conceived for.
Example Cards
Locus-walker isn't having the greatest time of it, is he? Let's take a look at these first entries...
Jungle Madness:
The real game-closer of Voidcaster,
Jungle Madness
is designed to showcase the Vision cycle of Un'goro. Utilizing the Emerald Nightmare, you can begin to countdown your opponent's health. The more maddening visions you fill your opponent's hand with, the quicker they're lost to the maddening whispers of Il'gynoth. You can use the twisted thought cycle or you can smack a
King Mukla
into your deck for some Super Monkey Ball craziness.
Limbo-walker:
"That's the problem with the void... Once you're in it's grip, what can you do but freefall?" Limbo-walker is the twisted (Well, more twisted) version of the void Ethereal, and he's now tied to his Phylactery. He won't be easy to ill either, surrounding himself in the secrets of the void and building the defenses of his phylactery. His Hero Power still does the 2 damage but now transfers armor to his one-use Ice Block, to make a lategame comeback after an attempted kill by your opponent. He subverts Singularity by bringing in as many secrets as possible in the same instant, popping up as many as five secrets possibly (However, bear in mind how hard your hand can brick with that many secrets in your deck). I avoided an infinite value Hero in favor of one of desperate survival tactics, giving him several chances to retaliate.
Voidrattle Archer:
This is a cycle I'm excited to show off. Once killed, the archer turns all your discover effects into a random choice if you choose to resummon him. This is represented by a fourth option, which adds one of the three cards to your hand and rebuilds the skeleton. Of course, often you may really, really need one of those three cards, and at that point you have to decide if you can gamble on resummoning the archer or if you can break the archer's resummon chain permanently. There are no unending discover chains within VC, so the strength of this minion caps at however many cards you put in your deck to synergise with it.
Monstrous Thoughts:
Welcome to the vision cycle full time. I like Curse of Rafaam, and I felt that it was the sort of card that would be fun to see again. Essentially all of these visions are small tempo boosts for you, either in providing you small minions, cards or buffs, or in slwoing down your opponent's plays to remove them from their hand. One by itself might not be a big deal, but these effects can stack and crowd your opponent's hand, and they're the precursor to something even more devastating... so how long can they let themselves be concumed with visions?
Ner'zhul:
The original Lich King, Ner'zhul was a must have for this set. For those of you who rightfully point out Arthas is the Lich King, I say to you Warcraft lore is complicated and we came in roughly 15 years in. In any case, on alternate Draenor (Bear with me here) Ner'zhul became a practioner of void magic, and that's more info than you need to know. Ner'zhul is the ultimate 1 for 1 card, if not more. If the opponent isn't willing to crank a hard removal into him, He will take down an enemy minion with him.
Remaining Cards
Tokens:
Jungle Madness Tokens:
Limbo-walker Tokens:
Ung'oro:
Knights:
The Lich King Fight
Ner'zhul
May no longer be anything more than the guiding hand of the lich king, but he knows how to counter a void practioner still. During the fight you will be completely locked out of most singularity effects, and you must scramble to find other survival options... as Locus-walker is quite reliant of the dark powers to survive his assailants,
I want to give a massive thank you to McF4rtson, for the several nights we spent with not enough sleep getting this done. Also NiRaSt for putting in the work to actually make the background for Sorceror King Hero Background. Having had to edit nigh-on all cards to give them void theming baseline or at most the wholesale background of the card for the Dormant Il'gynoth, I'm fully aware of how long this stuff takes. Here's to yet more art to turn various shades of purple!
The Voidcaster
It's time to bask in the sun and freeze our wrappings off in Journey to Un'Goro and Knights of the Frozen Throne! Locus-walker has enemies in both locations, as he finds himself in conflict with the Emerald Nightmare and Il'gynoth in Un'goro, and Ner'zhul out in Icecrown. Of course, he'll be utilizing the tactics of his opponents, as this time around, he's reaching out for some new powers of the void...
The powers of Madness!
Singularity
Singularity is the Overload style tradeoff keyword of this class. All Singularity cards feature strong effects, stats or costs, if not all three, balanced on the fact that you can only have one in play at a time, and as a consequence, you need to restrict yourself from over corwding your deck with them. They can be cheated out over the top of each other, such as with the infamous Mad Scientist . Singularity has no big changes this time around, but it is now officially going to cheated out by in-class cards. This is to make the secrets partially more useful but also to add some more interesting design space for Voidcaster to play with.
Strengths and Weaknesses
Strengths
Weaknesses
Themes
Journey to Un'goro: It's easy to forget the ties between the Crater and the Emerald Dream, but be assured the Old Gods and Void Lords have certainly not forgotten. Through Jungle Madness , the heart of corruption, Il'gynoth, makes his way into our world, whispering madness and spreading dark thoughts to the many elementals and beasts of the primeval jungle. Even some of the stones in Un'goro have been imbued with dark unlife of the void. But of course, Locus-walker always has another agenda... and in this case it's attempting to trap the massive Hydra Markuranoc for the Netherstorm Eco-domes. Mechanics;
Knights of the Frozen Throne: Icecrown is a dark place, and many of it's inhabitants have varied and expansive pasts with the void. None more so than Ner'zhul , though, the original Lich King and practioner of Void magic. Of course Locus-walker is out to end his communion with the void lords, but when you go to fight madness... chances are you'll go mad too. Consumed by the Shadowmoon Warlords power and tied to a Lich's Phylactery, Locus-walker becomes the sort of dark figure he worked to destroy... Limbo-walker . Mechanics;
Example Cards
Locus-walker isn't having the greatest time of it, is he? Let's take a look at these first entries...
Remaining Cards
Tokens:
Jungle Madness Tokens:
Limbo-walker Tokens:
Ung'oro:
The Lich King Fight
Ner'zhul May no longer be anything more than the guiding hand of the lich king, but he knows how to counter a void practioner still. During the fight you will be completely locked out of most singularity effects, and you must scramble to find other survival options... as Locus-walker is quite reliant of the dark powers to survive his assailants,
Here's round one's submission... Voidcaster Entry one
And here's the basic set... Voidcaster Basic
Lastly, the classic set... Voidcaster Classic
I want to give a massive thank you to McF4rtson, for the several nights we spent with not enough sleep getting this done. Also NiRaSt for putting in the work to actually make the background for Sorceror King Hero Background. Having had to edit nigh-on all cards to give them void theming baseline or at most the wholesale background of the card for the Dormant Il'gynoth, I'm fully aware of how long this stuff takes. Here's to yet more art to turn various shades of purple!