Minionless Mage: How to Throw Off Control Decks

So you’re playing a mage. I’m sure you’re used to hearing, “Are you a control mage or an aggro deck?” What if I told you there was another option… one that is very disconcerting to many builds out there? One that is elegantly formidable, yet requires a small investment. What is this deck I speak of? The minionless mage.

Now, when I say minionless, you must take it with a grain of salt. There are, of course, minions. However, the minions you have are merely there to throw off the competition and perhaps do that extra damage you require to fall below the Pyroblast threshold. For the most part, your spells are the main source of chaos you bring in this deck.

The Concept:

The goal of this deck is to keep your direct damage spells fairly focused on the enemy while keeping his minions away. It uses high damage minions or minions which wouldn’t fit well in most builds because they are disruptive to a minion-focused build. You want to use them to suck your opponent’s mana crystals, leaving you free to nuke him like your name is Fukushima (too soon?).

Let’s go through the types of cards conceptually and work our way outwards.

AoE:

AoE spells are what keep you alive. The intent is to keep minions away from you as much as possible so you can blast your heart out. In this respect, this deck is very much like a control deck. You will use Frost Nova, Blizzard, Cone of Cold, and Flamestrike to keep your enemies minions well at bay.

Secrets:

You will have two Counterspell in your deck. Counterspell is just an amazing spell. When timed well, it can be the difference between life and death, damage or no damage. It prevents a wide variety of spell CC such as Mind Control, and if executed well, will drain your opponent of his or her mana crystals while keeping you well guarded.

In addition to Counterspell, however, you will also want a single Ice Block. I cannot speak enough words to describe how essential this spell is to your deck. There will be countless moments where the opponent is 20 or less health away from death and you will be sitting with two Pyroblasts in your hand. In having Ice Block up, you will be guaranteed to see two turns, which is enough to throw both Pyroblasts and end the game.

Direct Damage:

This list shouldn’t surprise you… you want all of them. There is one caveat, though. Given the amount of freezing you’ll be doing, Ice Lance becomes significantly more potent than it would be in most decks. You will be using Frost Nova to waste turns, but if you feel as though a particular mob might get out of hand in your next turn, you can blast him cheaply with Ice Lance and end that threat. In addition, nothing makes someone’s heart sink faster than a Frost Nova + Ice Lance + Ice Lance combo on turn 3 or 4. You can almost hear the “NERF THIS NOW!” through the screen when it actually does happen (which isn’t often).

Save your fireballs if you can, but remember, living is still important. Don’t be afraid to cast a spell that’ll save the game for a turn or two. You will likely get another soon enough.

Other Spells:

There isn’t much to say here, but I will recommend that you go with Mirror Image. It can keep your few minions alive and can also keep extra minions who have a bit of health left from the AoE from getting a chance to attack you. It’s a cheap spell, and honestly, you wont find a better value for this build at that level of cost. Trust when I say, keep Mirror Image (for once).

Minions:

Ahhhh the “minions”. I put them in quotes because they really are an esoteric bunch. You have Mana Wraith, which slows your opponents summoning quite a bit and makes them a huge agro target. I would say this is a staple because it really keeps your opponent preoccupied and holds off extra summons a great deal.

Then there’s Gadgetzan Auctioneer who can actually feed you quite a few cards with this build (especially if Mirror Image is up and he’s protected). Just pop him up and feed him some spells. If you get a couple, consider it a success.

Next there’s Venture Co. Mercenary. Now this is a strange pick, and I’ll be frank, it’s not great against priests due to Power Word: Death , but it’s a nice, cheap card. It is 5/7/6 which are amazing stats. The downside, of course, is that it now costs you three more mana crystals per summon. However, you aren’t really concerned much with summoning minions, so you’ll rarely find this to be a problem. Normally it takes two minions to bring him down, as well, which completely throws people off their plan at the 5thr round.

Lastly, I put one Molten Giant in the deck. Why? It costs nothing if you’re below 10 health and is very cheap below 15 health. This is a great card that has to be handled immediately and can actually buy you some turns to recuperate from a beating. I found this card to be most synergistic with this deck, though there are arguments to be made for swapping him out for something else (such as Ragnaros).

The Deck:

Finally! Well here it is, the Minionless Mage deck.

Ice Lance × 2
Mirror Image × 2
Frost Nova × 2
Frostbolt × 2
Mana Wraith × 2
Arcane Intellect × 2
Cone of Cold × 2
Counterspell × 2
Ice Block × 1
Fireball × 2
Blizzard × 2
Gadgetzan Auctioneer × 2
Venture Co. Mercenary × 2
Flamestrike × 2
Pyroblast × 2
Molten Giant × 1