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The Deck and How to Play It
Untitled Deck
Round 1
Round 2
Round 3
Round 4
I always love feedback, so please leave a comment! I'm happy to answer any questions you might have. If you can find a better line of play or have an idea that might improve the list, I'm all ears.
Bonus Hearthstone Content
While the idea of playing a Mage secret deck is not new, I've been tuning my list and made a number of unusual card choices to great success. I've used this list exclusively in my climb from a rank ~300 Legend to my current rank 28 and I am optimistic about my chances of continuing to climb when I next find time to play.
In addition to this deck being very effective for me, it's also very cheap for you to build! This list has some ridiculous nut draws and also has the ability to play a longer game I've won many games that go almost to fatigue against control decks.
- 2 Mana Wyrm
- 2 Undertaker
- 2 Frostbolt
- 2 Loot Hoarder
- 2 Mad Scientist
- 2 Counterspell
- 2 Mirror Entity
- 2 Harvest Golem
- 2 Kirin Tor Mage
- 2 Fireball
- 2 Polymorph
- 2 Water Elemental
- 1 Loatheb
- 2 Sludge Belcher
- 2 Argent Commander
- 1 Flamestrike
Sadly in the few short days between writing this article and publishing it the HS meta has changed some and my mage secret deck went from crushing the ladder to “probably still good enough to get to legendary with.”
This is the deck I really want to play in Modern, mostly due to your videos – it looks like a lot of fun to play. I just don’t think now is the right time to purchase fetches, so I’m sticking with my inexpensive W Hate Bears, until we see the reprint.
Side note – did you try Haunted Creeper in the list instead of Loot Hoarder? It’s pretty nice with your hero ability. Although I can see the need for card draw in that list. It also seems like an aggressive oriented deck, so wouldn’t blizzard provide more utility than flamestrike? Blizzard can give you an extra turn of attacking the face when needed. I feel like it’s not that you want to necessarily out-value your opponent, and so the tempo seems more useful than the damage. Plus, now that Naxx cards are in the mix, sometimes killing the opponents creatures is harder to beat than freezing them for a turn. Curious to hear your opinion.
Maybe I didn’t try Haunted Creeper as much as it deserves but I did play it for a couple games and basically I don’t like the card very much in decks that can’t pump power, it adds a lot of vulnerability to Unleash. As for Flamestrike vs Blizzard, if the game reaches that stage I often really am trying to out-value my opponent. That said, I’m all about experimenting, if you have a theory that you think sounds good I almost always support testing it. If the idea is good then trying it is a huge win, and if it’s not good then maybe you can learn something important by testing it.
Great videos! How did you feel about only one Chord and the Path?
There was a time, I think in R3, where you could Pod out a 2cc for Exarch into a 4-drop. I remember it being relevant at the time but can’t remember any more of the play.
Also, every comment ever in a Pod video is “there was this play you missed” so I’m sorry : ( This deck is infernally hard to play for me!
I feel pretty good about singleton Chord and Path because while they’re quite powerful in the right spot, they are not cheap creatures. Pod decks have very limited slots for spells that aren’t creatures costing 4 or less.
Pointing out plays I missed are totally my favorite kind of comment.
Don’t be sorry! Learning > losing. I just wish you were able to be more specific.
Paul, I love your videos, and your insights are amazing. One of the reasons I watch everything by you and LSV is how well thought out you are and how well you do at explaining the available lines.
My only request, is that (and you may just naturally be soft spoken) you boost the mic or speak louder. I really have to crank the sound to hear your commentary.
Keep up the good work though, and look forward to the next video.
Thanks for the kind words! I’ll keep your feedback in mind.