Jalexander’s Tempo Rogue Deck List Guide – Top 100 Legend (April 2017, Season 37)

Tempo Rogue has always been a fun deck, but hasn’t seen a lot of play since very early on in Hearthstone’s history. Jalexender tries to change that with this list that was used to get to Legend! They were also kind enough to allow us to re-host their deck and guide.

Today I wanted to bring you all my Tempo Rogue list I’ve been playing almost exclusively since I hit legend this month and have been hanging around top 100 with. I don’t track my stats, so I can’t tell you about specific win rates, but I can tell you that it’s been my favorite deck so far.

I’ve become increasingly annoyed with people writing the deck off as bad compared to the other Rogue strategies because the decks have, in my opinion, been real misbuilt. So I wanted to share my list to add to the discussion.

Decklist and Legend proof here

There’s a lot to like about this deck, namely that it appears very strong and consistent against other aggressive and Midrange strategies. It has the potential to blow out Pirate Warriors, Murloc Paladins, Hunters, and other decks of that ilk. The matchup against other Rogues feels favorable as well.

It’s largest weakness tends to be Freeze Mages and Taunt Warriors. There are ways to tech against those matches (Eater of Secrets and Envenom Weapon, respectively), but the issue is often that they don’t make up sufficient portions of the ladder to warrant the inclusions; that, and when it comes to Warrior, you can never tell if it’s going to be taunt or pirate, which makes mulliganing for tech cards quite difficult.

How to play it

First and foremost, this deck wants to start with a 1-drop on turn 1. The gameplan of the deck is a lot like Zoo, and the difference between a one drop and a missing turn one is huge (so is the difference between going first and second, but not much to do about that). After spending a lot of time with the deck, I can say that, almost without exception you want to be hard mulliganing for them, with Fire Fly and Swashburglar being preferred. There are some rare circumstances were you would keep anything in the mulligan if you don’t have a one drop:

• Against Quest Rogue, you often want to keep a copy of Cold Blood if possible. You need to kill them quick, and repeatedly jamming a CB into their face is the best way to do that.
• If you have Edwin VanCleef on the coin, he’s often worth keeping. Feel free to keep SI:7 Agent on the coin as well against non-control classes.
• Against aggressive lists, keep Backstab.
• If you know you’re playing against a slower class, feel free to keep Vilespine Slayer on the coin, but that’s about it.

If you have a one-drop, feel free to keep other portions of the curve.

Cards that aren’t included

• The Finja Package: Initially, I tried playing the Finja package as I had been the season before, but I repeatedly found that it just felt too inconsistent. Finja, the Flying Star is good, obviously, but I felt like I wasn’t winning off him nearly as much as I was losing off hitting the other murlocs beforehand
• Southsea Deckhand: This is another card I had in my initial list, but I found there were two things about him I didn’t like. First, he wasn’t a true 1-drop the way the other options were, and having a turn 1 play is so important for the deck. Second, it often doesn’t offer enough value, and I found myself running out of cards too quickly because of it.
• Shadowstep: This is a card that I do like in the list, but just haven’t been able to really find room for. It can be a powerhouse when it hits a Leeory, Defender, or Vilespine, or it can dead. Since I’ve been opting for consistency in the early game, I ended up cutting it.
• Mimic Pod: Another card you could play. I was playing one copy in place of the Hallucination for a time, but I wanted to give Hallucination a try to see if it was consistent enough while helping with combo activation when needed. The only issue I really had with Pod was that you basically never want to play it until you have run out of gas or absolutely need the right answer. That made it so I was usually not super happy to see it in my hand in many games at almost any stage. In general, I prefer the Hucksters for maintaining gas while also building tempo.
• Xaril, Poisoned Mind: I haven’t tried him yet. He seems good for value but has struck me as slow. I wouldn’t mind giving it a try in place of either a Thalos, Defender, or Hallucination, depending on the shape of the meta.
• Obsidian Shard: I’ve seen lists playing this card and I have no idea why. It’s not good against fast or slow decks compared to your alternatives. If it’s not improving any of those matches, I don’t see the point of the card.

Cards I’m unsure about

There are two cards in the list I’m currently not sure I like: Bloodmage Thalnos and Hallucination. Both are included for the purposes of gas and both have other synergies like Spell Damage and Combo activation. I’d say those are your primary flex spots.

[EDIT: As an aside, I’ve been entertaining the idea of testing out something like Questing Adventurer in place of Bloodmage. I haven’t tried it yet, but I wanted to float the idea, given the number of cheap card generators in the deck]

[EDIT 2: After playing for a bit, I’m quite happy with Hallucination over Mimic Pod. I would also be happy with a second Hallucination over Bloodmage, but right now I’m still testing out whether Questing Adventurer or (potentially) Sherazin is worth playing in that slot instead]