Top Standard & Wild Legend Decks - Showdown in the Badlands + Delve into Deepholm (Week 16) - March 2024

By Stonekeep - March 3, 2024

We're in the middle of the card reveal season for Whizbang's Workshop, but that's still over 2 weeks away - for now the current meta has mostly been shaped by the last balance update. On top of a few nerfs, lots of cards that are about to rotate out were buffed to give them a sort of "last hurrah" in Standard. Most of those buffs didn't change much, and the cards are still unplayable, but there's one standout buff.

Energy Shaper was turned from a mediocre card into a powerhouse. While it might not be very popular at lower ranks, the deck is insanely popular in high Legend. It's by far the most popular deck in Legend, where it has around 20% popularity. But trust me, at high Legend it's closer to 40%. The goal is basically to have a bunch of spells in your hand (generate as much as you can from minions, spells, The Sunwell etc.) and then drop Shaper. That will turn your cheap, weak spells into something way more powerful. For example, your Coins are now 3 mana spells, but they still cost 0. Your 2 mana spells are now 5-mana spells. You can get some insane tempo swings this way. And you still run Sif just in case you need to OTK your opponent in the late game.

Another pretty successful buff was Spell Demon Hunter (with Souleater's Scythe of course). The deck is unexpectedly viable now. It's not great, probably low Tier 2, but you can play it and it's going to work quite well.

Other buffs weren't nearly as successful, although decks like Big Shaman or Thief Priest are maybe at least low Tier 3 now (as opposed to being completely unplayable before).

The current meta is kind of all over the place. I think that outside of high Legend, Rainbow DK is actually the strongest deck right now. People just don't talk about it so much because it feels more "fair" to play against than many other overpowered decks we had in the past. Other than that, the aforementioned Shaper Mage is really strong, especially in high Legend. Sludge Warlock is also alive and well, then Control Warrior (multiple different variants in fact), Aggro Paladin and Plague DK probably close the list of most popular/strongest decks.

I expect the meta to stay the same for another week, but then the week after we should get a big shake-up with card unnerfs. Devs already confirmed that they will happen in Patch 29.0 (so probably March 12). Many cards that are about to rotate out to Wild will get their nerfs reverted, because they would be too weak for that format in their current state. However, it also means that for the entire week, we'll get to play with old versions of many powerful cards. Think stuff like Lady S'theno, Sire Denathrius or Anub'Rekhan in their pre-nerf form. Of course I don't know if those specific cards will get reverted, but my point is that it can get pretty crazy. Then Whizbang's Workshop drops on March 19 with another shake-up. So the next few weeks are going to be quite interesting.

Below is a full list of the Legend decks from last week, sorted by the highest placement.