Mid-range Shaman Deck Guide

Janek “jankke” Bergman: Twitter

Introduction

Hi there! My name is Janek “jankke” Bergman, I’m a legend ranked hearthstone player and this is my first deck guide for ihearthu.com.

To write a deck guide in the current meta game is like being a gardener during a hurricane. When you think you got everything fine-tuned and set, something shows up and ruins your day. At the moment there are very few decks that can stand the test of time, due to the massive meta changes that the ongoing naxxramas expansion brings us. But one deck that seems to survive the ever changing meta climate is the mid-range shaman! This shaman deck is very versatile, cheap, and most importantly, fun to play! It’s also the deck that got me to legend rank last season.

The reason why this deck seems to manage so well on the ladder is because of the stable foundation that shaman decks stand on. You’ve got Hexes and Earth Shocks for big and buffed threats as well as other cheap removals for early threats that your opponent can put out, you also have lightning storm for the board clear. These removals combined with bonus spell power helps you fulfill the idea of this deck, which is to get early board control and to keep that board control throughout the game.

This mid-range Shaman deck has very few weak matchups. Priest for example can be a bit annoying, Hunter is another one, but they are manageable. On the other hand this shaman deck has some really good matchups, for example druid and miracle rogue. Also, you lose very few early games due to mulligans because the starting hand you want is very much the same against most classes with a few exceptions. Even though nothing is certain when it comes to mulligan-ing nowadays.

This deck is probably nothing new for most of you out there, but it’s still a strong deck and it’s very cheap. So if you want to get that legend rank this season, this deck and this guide might be something for you. Cheers!

Card choices

The foundation of this Decklist is very standard as for most shaman decks. You’ve got your Earth Shocks, Lightning Bolts, Hexes, Lightnings Storms, Unbound Elementals, Ferals Spirits and so on. The Fire Elemental is also a given because of it’s ability to aggressively enter the board. Of the new Naxxramas cards we have got the Nerubian Egg and the haunted creeper and of course, Loatheb. The haunted creeper and Nerubian Egg have got great synergy with Rockbiter weapon and Flametongue Totem. We also have two Defender of Arguses in this deck as additional activators for the eggs and the creepers.

To make our early game removals more relevant also in the late game we have Bloodmage Thalnos and azure drake to buff up the spell damage. These cards are also great for their card cycling ability. Loatheb is just great, he is good as just a five drop, but he can also totally swing a game if you drop him the turn before your opponent for example was about to unleash+buzzard combo, or drop their auctioneer.

As finishers we have the Doomhammer and Al’akir. The Doomhammer is insanely powerful if combined with Rockbiter weapon. So is Al’akir, who is also great to combine with Flametongue totem. In a perfect world, you can combo both Rockbiter weapon and Flametongue Totem with Al’akir for a total of 16 damage.

How to play the deck

This deck is not very difficult to play. But it still allows you to make a lot of mistakes if you don’t take your time on each turn, because it’s so often possible to squeeze in a little bit of extra damage with this deck. Dividing your damage correctly between your minions is also a big part of succeeding this deck. Always consider in what order and with what minions you are going to attack. It’s easy to forget how the Flametongue Totem will move around on your board when a minion is placed or when a minion dies, Or to forget the effect of the healing totem, and find out after you ended the turn that it would have been more efficient to attack with another minion. These things might sound like trivialities, but it’s oh-so-important.

As I said earlier, the main goal of this deck is to aggressively take control of the board early game and to keep it until you have defeated your opponent, and this is your objective no matter what deck you are facing. You want to keep the board control so that you later can combo Al’akir and Doomhammer with Rockbiter weapon/Flametongue Totem for the final blow.

But as with all board control decks you have to worry about their board clearing abilities. Try
to stay out of range of the board clearing abilities that your opponent might use and make them do inefficient trades. The Nerubian Eggs and the Haunted Creepers are great to have on the board if you are worrying about your opponent clearing the board and it will make them bite their tongues if you throw down two Nerubian Eggs on the board right before they are going to use for their turn 7 Flamestrike etc.

So this deck is all about being more efficient than your opponent, and the most important parts of being more efficient are:

1. Get a smooth curve. Count your overload mana crystal discount for the next turn, and consider if it’s worth putting out an overload card this turn, if you don’t have a good follow up.
2. Count your damage and consider in what order you are going to attack and with what minions. I can’t underline enough how crucial this is. There is so much hidden damage in this shaman deck.
3. Don’t give your opponent a full board clear opportunity. Try to make his trades as inefficient as possible. Know the mana cost of all classes board clearing abilities.

Now let’s go through the mulligans, this is by far the most difficult part to illuminate at this point, since there are so many weird decks out there at the moment. People are experimenting with the new Naxxramas cards, so half of the time you have no idea what hit you. But I’m gonna try to break down the most common matchup mulligans as plainly as possible.

Mulligans

Vs. Miracle Rogue:

This is our best matchup. Because of the Doomhammer, against rogue we always mulligan for Doomhammer. The best way to beat miracle rogue with this deck is to race them to it! And this is a race that you most of the time will win if we get our Doomhammer in time. Since it isn’t that fast a matchup either, we can save our unbound elemental and feral spirits as well. Also if we draw a Nerubian egg and an activator, it’s worth saving! If we by some reason know the rogue is playing an aggro deck, we should mulligan for early game removals and feral spirits.

Vs. Zoolock:

This can be a difficult matchup. In the end it comes to if you draw your lightning storms and feral spirits or not. Sometimes you will just draw dead and have no chance at all dealing with his early threats, and from there on it will just snowball out of control. But if you get your Lightning storms, Feral Spirits and a good curve, this matchup can seem like free win.

In this matchup we mulligan for lightning storm and feral spirits. We can also save cheap early removals such as Earth Shock and Rockbiter weapon. Also, always consider saving Nerubian Egg if you also have drawn a Rockbiter weapon as an activator.

Vs. all other classes:

As I said earlier, we mulligan the same cards against most Matchups. And these cards are: Nerubian eggs and Haunted creepers with activators Rockbiter weapon and Flametongue Totem. The other starting hand combination we want is Unbound Elemental + Feral Spirits. If we get one of these two combinations in our starting hand we are off to great start. And this is one of the strengths of this shaman deck, that we have lots of cards that work in our starting hand.

Card replacements

This is a very cheap deck. And the expensive cards in this deck have very natural replacement cards. The expensive cards would be Bloodmage thalnos, Doomhammer and Al’akir.

I’m gonna write this plainly. Bloodmage Thalnos, I would replace with the Acidic swamp ooze. You’ll see a lot of weapons on the ladder now, with the addition of Death’s bite and the weapon classes always being highly popular.

As a replacement for the Doomhammer we need something that can fill its’ shoes. This card needs to be able to burst down your opponent as well as dealing with minions. I think that Lava burst would be a fine replacement for the Doomhammer. This card can be used as a final blow and it’s also a very good card to deal with big minions such as the Savannah Highmane.

Al’akir also has a natural replacement card in my opinion. That card is Bloodlust. Al’akir is there mostly
for the late game burst damage. But Al’akir can sometimes lose it’s value if you’ve already been forced to use your Rockbiter weapons and Flametongue Totems earlier in the game. So in some regards the Bloodlust can be even more versatile in this deck than Al’akir. Because as long as you keep the board control, Bloodlust can be an insanely terrifying card for your opponent.

Conclusion

Finally I just want to repeat that this is a very fun deck, but alongside being very fun it’s a serious deck that will get you to legend rank if you learn it properly!

This deck guide became a long one. And yet I feel like I haven’t told you half of the things there are to know about this deck. But it doesn’t matter really, because you’ll learn along the way. You have to do the same mistakes I did while learning this deck, and you will eventually understand the true value of this mid-range shaman.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this guide. It’s my first guide ever, and I’ve probably made lots of mistakes and forgotten to tell you about important details surrounding this decklist. But if you have any questions, complaints or you just want to comment something, please do. You’ll find me on twitter @jankkish or here on ihearthu.com. Thank you for reading.