Aggro Tempo Mage
This week’s Deck of the Week is another tempo mage. The basic strategy is just like the free mage list I posted last week, but this version has significantly stronger cards. There are a lot of tempo mage decks going around right now, and I got this one from Sottle, a professional Hearthstone player that writes for icy-veins.com. Icy Veins is also my go-to site for arena lists, so if you want to get better at arena, they are a great place to start.
The Basics
This deck is a faster paced version of the tempo mage style. It has many 1 and 2 mana drops, the key ones being Mana Wyrm and Mad Scientist. Sottle even recommends throwing away your whole starting hand to find these during the mulligan phase. If you’re going second and have the coin, and are lucky enough to have both Mana Wyrms in your starting hand, you can play both on turn 1, leaving you with a 2/3 and a 1/3. That’s a very strong board on your first turn.
The tricky part about this deck is deciding when to fight for board control and when to go for face damage. You always want to control the board, but sometimes you can force your opponent to make the trades for you. On the other hand, simply lining up a bunch of minions and going for face leaves you very weak to board clears like Consecration or Explosive Trap. It’s important to keep your side of the board balanced if you want to win games.
Flamewaker
Flamewaker is the key card in this deck. Because this deck runs many low cost spells, you can get amazing value with this card by playing it early then casting a lot of spells on the next turn or playing it later and burning a lot of spells on the same turn with your extra mana.
The extra 2 damage that you get every time you cast a spell is so important for getting valuable trades in this deck. Against other aggressive decks, a Flamewaker with Arcane Missiles is 5 damage for 4 mana, with a 2/4 threat on the board to boot. That can clear your opponent’s side of the board and give them a dangerous card they will probably have use a removal spell on. Against control decks, getting big damage out early is your best way to win, so the extra damage helps in that match up as well.
Finishers
While this deck has a fast early game, it does have a few late game threats. Archmage Antonidas has great synergy with low mana cost spells, allowing you to stack up some extra Fireball spells to finish your opponent off. Dr. Boom and Sylvanas are also big threats that can serve as finishers or help you get back tempo while you wait for that last Fireball.
This deck has good match ups against other aggro decks, but it can struggle against control decks. If you can’t get a big enough lead in the early game, you won’t be able to keep up with all of your opponent’s bigger minions, so mulligan for those early game minions. I’ve seen it played at Legend rank, watching streamers, and since it is so aggressive, a lot of matches are over quickly. This can help if you want to grind a few more ranks out before the season ends.
If you have any questions or want to try this deck out on me yourself, contact me at ritterific@agentsofgame.com.
