Thursday, July 30, 2015

Slow Playing Against Mage Mech

Although dealing with early game pressure from low cost minions is tough, I find that early game pressure from a Mech deck is even more difficult. The main reason for this is the fact that if they are not destroyed immediately after each turn, Mech cards provide exponential advantages to each other as they are played. It is a kind of snowball effect that must be taken care of early on or else it becomes too difficult to stop by turns 3 and 4.

In my opinion, the Mechwarper card really provides the true advantage to this deck. Once this card is in play, all of your Mechs cost 1 mana less. It is as if you are getting a free mana crystal to summon a more powerful Mech on turn 3. Even if you are a beginner to Hearthstone you know that a 4 cost minion is much more powerful than a 3 cost one.

In addition, Mech decks also provide your opponent with Spare Part cards which allow their Mech army to become even stronger. Increasing attack, health, giving minions taunt, etc. at only 1 mana cost each, this does not make your job easier versus Mech opponents.

I just tested my luck against a Mage playing an aggressive Mech deck and this is how it went...

My opponent started Turn 1 by playing Cogmaster. This is a 1/2 minion that gains a bonus from other Mech cards, Bonus = "Has +2 attack while you have a mech". Once he played this card (although I couldn't destroy it immediately) I knew 2 things to begin the match.

#1. More Mechs would follow.
#2. I had Fan of Knives & Blade Flurry so I could be a little more patient in the 1-2 turns to follow.

Turn 2: My opponent played the Mechwarper. I played my Mana Addict to try and hopefully absorb some damage.

Turn 3: Unfortunately he ignored my Mana Addict and went straight for my hero instead. Then with Mechwarper in play he was able to summon Mechanical Yeti (4/5 Minion). I decided to use Preparation in order to play Fan of Knives for free and then played a second Fan of Knives. Knowing that I had Deadly Poison x2 and Blade Flurry in my hand I started slow playing my opponent at this point, hoping that he would continue to summon more minion cards.

Turn 4: I used Deadly Poison to finish off his Mechanical Yeti. He played another Mech card. Again I waited, letting my opponent think he had the upper hand with Board Control and a Health Point advantage 23 HP vs. 15 HP.

Turn 5: I was getting a little worried at this point as I was down to only 9HP. However, I knew he played the majority of his Minions. In addition, I knew at least 2 of the cards in his hand were only Spare Parts that he received from his Mech units earlier in the match.

Turn 5:  Still on Turn 5, I knew I could not Slow Play anymore or I would be dead next turn. So immediately I played my Azure Drake (Giving me +1 to Spell Damage). Then I used Preparation to allow me to use Blade Flurry for free! 4 Damage to all enemies and instantly the match turned in my favor.

Turn 6: At this point my opponent was probably not happy, but was still trying to get the win. Using his Spare Part to freeze my Minion he summoned a 5/4 Minion of his own to try and regain the  Board Control that he lost.

Turn 6: Unfortunately for him, I still had 5 cards to choose from and one of them was Eviscerate. Playing the Dalaran Mage activated the combo Mechanic on Eviscerate which allowed me to destroy his Minion.

Turn 7: He played a secret. I attacked him directly with Deadly Poison, but I didn't want to summon any additional Minions just in case the Secret was Mirror Entity (Which would make a copy of the whichever minion I played). Instead I played cautiously and just attacked his Hero with the 2 Minions I had in play.

Turn 8: I'm not sure what Secret he had, but I ended up winning the match!

Recap: Looking back on the game, I think it was best to slow play the Mech Mage because I was able to destroy all 4 minions in one turn. If I would have killed them earlier, my Blade Flurry card would not have been used as efficiently.

I may have been then left with less cards at the end of the match (Which I needed to eventually finish him off). I likely would not have had my Eviscerate or Deadly Poison left and the match may have ended differently. Especially being at only 9HP against a Mage, you are pretty much asking to be Fireballed/Frostbolted to death.

Anyway, this was the strategy I ended up using for this particular match, but if you have any other strategies or tips when facing Mech decks please share in the comments below!

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