Hearthpwn

Forged in the Barrens Wild Combos

Massive changes are approaching, and the new expansion is just one of them! Here, we'll focus on the potential combos you can pull off in Wild mode once these new cards become available.

Two of the oldest powerful Deathrattles come from Stalagg and Feugen. They summon a huge 11/11 beatstick on death after their counterpart also dies. While this is still a strong effect, one of the reasons they fell out of favor over time is the fact that you had to get both out to make the effect work. Waiting to draw the second one is often too slow, which makes playing the first one just a tempo loss in the long run. If you draw one of them in a Deathrattle themed Demon Hunter deck, Death Speaker Blackthorn can potentially pull cheat out the other. If both are still in your deck, it's even better!

Plaguemaw the Rotting generates more minions, but you can increase the value by using Taunt minions that have other effects as well. One of the most popular Taunt minions in the last year was Khartut Defender. Being able to resummon himself happens to combo extraordinarily well with Plaguemaw. Khartut Defender dying 2 times will generate two new copies. Even if they don't have Taunt, they'll still have Reborn. With just this one minion, Plaguemaw can create two 3/4s that summon 3/1s and restore a total of 12 Health!

All a beast has to do is attack to have Tavish Stormpike trigger his effect. Good old Tundra Rhino lets everything he summons attack right away. If you build your deck with a nice curve of Beasts, you can easily fill the boards with minions that all have Charge!

In a vacuum, Reckless Apprentice deals 1 damage to all enemies. This effect along with a 3/5 body for (4) mana is good enough on its own. But if you were to deal 3 times as much damage with Daring Fire-Eater and summon a Water Elemental for each minion killed is a really big deal! Mage's standard Hero Power always has synergy with the same cards as Frost Lich Jaina's, and capitalizing on those synergies rewards you with consistent 3/6 Elementals with Lifesteal.

Both of these minions are meant to be in Secret Paladin. While Mysterious Challenger can't be played on the same turn as Cannonmaster Smythe, your opponent will be stuck with 2 choices. Either your Secrets completely screw with their next turn, or leave your Secrets up and let you get a large and extremely mana-efficient board of fairly strong minions.

Any healing also becomes damage when you follow it with Xyrella, and few other cards can heal as much health as Reno Jackson. If you happen to be low on health late game while also being behind on the board, Reno can fully heal your hero and Xyrella can nuke everything your opponent has.

Mankrik only gains value beyond a (3) mana 3/4 after finding his wife. Rouges happen to have a way to specifically find her in the form of Stowaway. If you manage to play both of these cards on curve, your opponent will have a hard time dealing with all the stats you brought out.

By itself, Chain Lightning (Rank 1) is a decent removal tool, becoming more impactful as the game goes on. Zentimo can triple what is already good damage for its cost. By the time you can play both in one turn, Chain Lightning will already be at Rank 2. If you wait until it reaches Rank 3, you have what can easily be a strong board clear for 5 mana. Most of Shaman's other forms of powerful AOE also damages your own minions, but this combo can take care of enemy minions without having to damage yours.

Using Power Overwhelming for massive burst was a popular finisher in past Warlock decks. Oftentimes people would use 2 copies to boost the attack of Arcane Golem and copy it with Faceless Manipulator for a total of 24 damage. However, this is a 10 mana combo, so only control decks could do this consistently. Now that Power Overwhelming is a Shadow spell and can be duplicated with Tamsin Roame, there is another way to accomplish massive burst damage much earlier. With Tamsin and 2 copies of Power Overwhelming, you can generate 16 damage for only 5 mana! It's less damage than the original combo, but this lets aggro decks gain even more value out of Power Overwhelming than they already could. A 19/18 Flame Imp on turn 5 is nothing to sneeze at.

What's better than a Zilliax? Two of them of course! As always, he benefits from buffs more than most minions because of how many Keywords he has that are great on big minions. Warriors have few ways to duplicate their cards, but Bulk Up is a good way to do it. You can either copy an already powerful Zilliax, or get 2 of them to stack up on effects that buff multiple minions in your hand like Armagedillo and Into the Fray.

We hope you give some of these combos a shot. Maybe you'll even discover your own! There are always new ways to use your cards, so experiment away!