Chaos Deck Tech: Dreaming of 80 Cards
/One of my favorite things about the WoW TCG is the variety of deckbuilding options available. You’ve got the broad archetypes of aggro, control, midrange, and combo. Then faction and class break things down even further. Your deck can focus on a specific type of card, or even a specific card. The possibilities are endless.
One obvious thing to consider when building your deck is what format you’re playing. Sure, you could build a core-legal deck and play it in Classic (looking at you, Neil), but Classic presents its own set of problems to solve that aren’t necessarily a thing in Core or Contemporary. Possibly the most unique (pun intended) format of all is Chaos. You might be thinking duh, Chris, it’s 80 card singleton, of course it’s different. That’s definitely true, but like Classic, it presents its own challenges that you may not think about. Solving those puzzles and presenting our opponents with problems to solve is what we’re doing today with our first Chaos Deck Tech™!
The Hero
If it wasn’t already obvious, the heroes specifically made for Chaos are incredibly strong. Strong enough, even, to build your deck around. And that’s our starting point today, our hero:
Ysera’s power to draw a card whenever you heal is incredible. Normally I’d have an entire section of my Chaos deck devoted to drawing cards, but Ysera allows us to dedicate those slots to staying alive and keeping our allies on the board.
As far as deckbuilding rules, we get to combine Druid and Hunter cards, as well as our choice of Alliance or Horde. And like her Aspect siblings, she counts as a Monster, too.
The Ramp Package
Something worth noting about Chaos and multiplayer in general is that getting aggressive in the early turns is typically a bad plan. The amount of damage you have to put out is too great, and you end up just wasting resources and making enemies. A much better plan is to set yourself up to do bigger things later. Those 9 cost allies on turn 6 or 7 can make a huge impact.
To that end, I try to devote some number of deck slots to resource ramp. Typically around eight or so. Unfortunately, there isn’t a ton of it available (yet), so this is the portion of the deck that does get a bit samey with other decks. Time, for example, is bar none the best card you can play to increase your resource count. For anyone who is familiar with the Commander format from Magic: the Gathering, I consider him to be the Sol Ring of Chaos.
Luckily, the Druid/Hunter combo does give us some solid options to work with that other classes miss out on. No Mere Dream is great here as it does it from the resource row, and Boots of Speed and Flourish are also cost efficient. Going Horde gives us the Toho/Jaga’zul pair that I’m fond of since they can get into combat before ramping. Hibernate can also serve as ramp in a pinch.
Mending for Fun and Profit
This is normally where I’d talk about the need for drawing cards. But Ysera lets our heals pull double duty allowing us to load up on those effects and draw a ridiculous amount of cards. Fun fact about the Mend keyword: Every instance of Mend (even each separate Mend 1 from Celadon Pendant!) is its own packet of healing, so you draw a card for each. As you can imagine, it stacks up fast!
Nautilus Ring is huge here, because it lets us keep drawing beyond 7 in addition to giving us a big heal of its own. Odo’s Ley Staff lets us create a loop of healing and drawing until we run out of things to heal or decide to stop.
Thunderpetal, Magatha Grimtotem, and Hammer of Atonement let us convert those heals not only to cards but damage as well.
Nourish is here for redundancy in case you get stuck with an opposing Hero’s Surrender or the like.
Big Game Hunter
Removal is a big part of the 60-card formats, but it’s easy to forget how necessary it is in big, casual games. You want to make sure a sizable chunk of your deck can take out opposing cards, especially abilities and equipment. I try to include a minimum of 8 removal effects, preferably closer to 16 in most of my decks. Priority goes to mass removal because of its efficiency in multiplayer, and Instant cards so you can save that removal until you know you need it. I also included the weapons here, but something like Final Voyage can end a game in a hurry if your opponents don’t have something to protect against it.
Druid is one of the best classes for removal, as it can efficiently deal with any card type. Hunter is no slouch either with its Snipe effects and big flashy ally takedowns. Of particular note here is Runesong Dagger, which can clear a board pretty easily given how many cards we’re drawing.
Building on Synergies
One thing I started to notice in looking at allies with healing powers was that a lot of them deal nature damage. Of course, since we’re a Hunter/Druid combo that immediately brings to mind Aspect of the Wild and Earth and Moon. It didn’t take much digging to fill up a good stable of Nature dudes. Another notable trend I saw was the increasing number of Taurens I kept putting in the deck. I even have a Tribe trigger in Magatha Grimtotem. Kahul the Sunseer became a shoo-in to go with the rest of the herd. Imagine resolving Toshe Chaosrender after Kahul. The stuff of dreams (or nightmares)!
Do It ALLLLL Again
In a singleton format like Chaos, getting things back after you’ve used them can be quite powerful. In this deck, since we can draw so many cards, I’m using several ways to reshuffle the graveyard so we can keep drawing those same great cards. Eternal is a fun keyword here as well, especially since these cards get even better on the return trip(s).
Here’s our full list, sorted by type this time:
Hero: Ysera the Awakened
Allies (31)
1x Bath'rah the Windwatcher
1x Boomer
1x Cairne, Earthmother's Chosen
1x Elizabeth Crowley
1x Emerald Acidspewer
1x Emerald Lifewarden
1x Lifemistress Tanagra
1x Tatulla the Reclaimer
1x Tesla
1x Wazzuli Wildmender
1x Lena Naville
1x Malfurion Stormrage
1x Merithra
1x Jaga'zul the Wild's Fury
1x Cunning
1x Time
1x Mazu'kon
1x Toshe Chaosrender
1x Vanessa VanCleef
1x Yertle
1x Hamuul Runetotem
1x Thunderpetal
1x Thanu Sunhorn
1x Aggra
1x Daedak the Graveborne
1x Thrall the World-Shaman
1x Kahul the Sunseer
1x Toho Bloomhorn
1x Blood Knight Lynesta
1x Farseer Horgath
1x Magatha Grimtotem
Abilities (22)
1x Aspect of the Wild
1x Blast Trap
1x Bombard
1x Earth and Moon
1x Explosive Shot
1x Flourish
1x Hibernate
1x Hurricane
1x Natural Repossession
1x Nourish
1x Planned Assault
1x Rejuvenation
1x Resourcefulness
1x Snipe
1x Spoils of the Hunt
1x Thrill of the Hunt
1x Trophy Kill
1x Utopia
1x Starburst
1x Wild Rejuvenation
1x Obliterating Trap
1x Nurture
Armor (2)
1x Cobrascale Hood
1x Boots of Speed
Items (4)
1x Celadon Pendant
1x Twined Band of Flowers
1x Nautilus Ring
1x Ammunae, Construct of Life
Weapons (7)
1x Envoy of Mortality
1x Final Voyage
1x Netherbreath Spellblade
1x Runesong Dagger
1x Staff of Ammunae
1x Odo's Ley Staff
1x Hammer of Atonement
Quests (13)
1x Deep Sea Salvage
1x Demonic Contamination
1x Dr. Boom!
1x Mystery Goo
1x No Mere Dream
1x Retribution of the Light
1x Solanian's Belongings
1x The Restless Dead
1x The Ring of Blood: The Final Challenge
1x The Spirit Polluted
1x The Torch of Retribution
1x Reoccupation
1x Terror of the Tides
Locations (1)
1x Skywall
Hopefully today’s deck has been awakening (editor’s note: GROAN) to some of you who are still thinking about where to start with the format. Did I forget something obvious? Do you have a spicier take on Ysera? Have a request for the next hero for me to cover? Post on Facebook in the WoW TCG Reborn group or tweet @WoWTCGReborn or @thechriswaits with your comments. Until next time, insert dumb catch phase here!
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