Budget Lady Deathwhisper

Introduction:

Continuing our little series of budget decks for the Frozen Throne adventure: I have a friend who is new to the game and thus lacks much of a card collection, so I’ve come up with budget decks for beating the frozen throne adventure. As before, the idea, if possible, isn’t to simply come up with a deck that can beat the boss, but one that can do so reliably. I’ve managed that for the first to, but the third was a bit of a challenge. Lady Deathwhisper will damage each of your minions down to one health at the start of her turn, which essentially trashes your board. She also has 30 health, 90 armor and a metric tonne of taunts in her deck, just in case you were planning on going full aggro. Fortunately, you start the game with a 30/5 minion with the ability: cannot attack or be attacked while damaged. The deck heavily utilises this because other options are expensive with regard to dust cost. The total cost here is 320, but they’re all cards that see play in high tier priest decks and two of them are also used in my budget Marrowgar deck as well. The boss fight is, however, kind of technical so don’t be surprised if it takes you a few goes to beat. In the end I could go 3 for 3 with practise, but I was dropping a game here and there while I got the deck where it needed to be.

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Strategy:

You win if the dragon hits the boss 4 times, it really is as simple as that. There are a few options in this deck for getting it to full health in order to take a swing, but at some point you’re going to want to cast Silence on it as the full health requirement is prohibitive. The downside, however, is that the dragon is now open game for the enemy minions so you need to keep them off it or you may need to just restart. I need to be clear: getting the Silence played on the dragon is really important. However, if you can’t silence early you can still conceivably beat the boss, the worst I had it during testing was both Silence in the bottom 9 cards of the deck and I managed to win that game. On another note, it is a really risky idea to silence on your first turn. The one hit early probably won’t win you the game, and Deathwhisper has a tendency to virtually always coin out a haunted creeper turn 1, a move for which you have very little answer to unless you have some excellent draws. This could work out for you if you get a good draw to protect the dragon, but I didn’t do this much myself because I wanted to go for consistency over speed. It’s up to you, and if you lose the dragon you can always just restart.

You’ll note a good deal of text here is dedicated to the dragon, because it really is your best chance of winning. It is not, however, only a boss damage tool. Your hero power heals for 2 and the vast majority of the enemy minions have 2 or less attack. It isn’t a bad idea to heal the dragon and using it to remove an enemy minion while you fill your board, especially if you have a Northshire Cleric down so the heal draws you a card. The rest of your board is going to be important later on for protecting the dragon when you push damage to finish the game so its important to preserve your board where possible. Power word: Shield may seem like a weird choice here since the damage will just be taken off, but the +2 health can be really useful for trading and the card draw on its own can justify its usage when you need to dig for Silence. A good move is to use it on the Magma Rager to get yourself a good board control minion instead of the dragon, but don’t worry too much about saving it for that.

This strategy section is a little bigger than the previous 2 and seems to be part guide and part little tricks that can help. This is because Lady Deathwhisper was a far headier boss fight on a budget deck than the previous ones, don’t be surprised if it takes you more than one go while you get the hang of it.

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Things to look out for:

Haunted Creeper, because at least one card needed to synergise with the hero power:

This is a 1/2 minion that drops 2 1/1 minions on death. The boss also likes to coin and then drop this turn 1, leaving you with 3 minions capable of one hitting your board as you develop it. The easiest solution is to potion of madness it and run it into an enemy minion so that the deathrattle spawns the 1/1 minions on your side. You can silence before killing it as well, if you got both silences in your opening hand, but you need at least one silence to activate the dragon when it’s safe to do so. It’s not inconceivable to simply not play a minion the first turn or 2 while you figure out a solution, but careful you don’t give the boss too much opportunity to build her board while you do so. It may be better to sacrifice some minions just to get it clear for other drops, but potion is always the best option if available.

Taunt minions, because who doesn’t like a wall:

There are a fair few boss minions in her deck, each of which is going to be a roadblock for your dragon. Early on its going to be better to heal the dragon and use it to kill a low attack taunt rather than your other minions, simply because later you’ll need your board to protect the dragon for the last one or two hits. Shadow word: Death can be good for killing the Evil Hecklers, or a taunt minion buffed by Cobalt Scalebane. Also, keep in mind that for the last hit you can Potion of Madness a low attack taunt to clear the way for your dragon to finish off the boss.

Shadow Madness, the only real burst damage:

Shadow Madness is a priest spell that gives you control of an enemy minion with 3 or less attack until the end of turn, much in the same way Potion of Madness does for 2 or less attack minions. There isn’t an awful lot you can do about this other than to try to have 2 taunt minions up when you can. if you do, and the boss takes one of your taunt minions, they’ll be forced to run it into your other taunt, thus protecting the rest of your board. I am unsure as to whether the boss will ever run the afflicted minion into your dragon since it did have the opportunity once during playtesting but went for my cleric instead.

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Crafting cards:

All cards are basic or common.

Circle of Healing – This is an important card in priest. Although it does still see play its use is less ubiquitous in the current meta than it used to be. However, it’s still a solid card and a good one to have in your collection. For this adventure it helps with consistently having the dragon swing option until you find the silence, or healing your board for trades later on.

Silence – This currently sees play in top tier priest decks. It’s a good card to have access to and there’s no direct replacement for this adventure since you really do need to silence the dragon to win.

Binding Heal – This serves the same purpose as Circle of Healing in this adventure. It may seem expensive to have both but it will make life so much easier. This card sees a lot of play in priest at the moment.

Potion of Madness – A great priest card that sees play in virtually every priest deck. It’s a cheap card, a priest staple and an essential board control tool.

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Other choices:

Spellbreaker – At one point I tried both Silence and Spellbreaker in the deck but the cost of Spellbreaker made it too ineffectual against this boss. If you have Spellbreaker it shouldn’t hurt to have it as well, but don’t expect it to be a replacement.

Any other 4 or more healing effect – If you have it, it won’t hurt to bring it. Don’t go too overboard because you will need some minions to protect the dragon and close out the game.

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Closing:

This was a really technical boss to fight on a budget deck. It may take a few goes while you get a handle for the style of play and what things to play around. Focus on protecting your dragon and controlling the board.