Welcome to the first edition of Building Blocks. I tried to make a funny little joke with this title, but let’s be fair, you come here to read about awesome new decks!

In case you haven’t heard about the block format, I’ll fill you in. Block is taking over for classic at the next Darkmoon Faire in Philidelphia, and will be the format for State and Provincial Championships later on this year. The format consists of the newest starter decks, the sets Worldbreaker, War of the Elements, and Twilight of the Dragons, and lastly, the crafting cards related to those respective sets.

When a new format is introduced to us, what I look for is not the coolest combos, or best control decks, but the fastest aggro deck. While the deck may not run the format over when a season concludes, it will define the format in the beginning when staring down poorly practiced midrange and control decks. A wise man once said, “there’s no wrong threats, just wrong answers”. Therefore, if a deck can apply a significant amount of pressure in a short amount of time, especially at the birth of the format, it’ll be in a good place. One of the classes to do that the best is Shaman with the help of the weapon [Crul'korak, the Lightning's Arc].

Hero: [Bragvi Stormstein]

Allies: 32

4 [Garet Vice]

4 [Emerald Captain]

4 [Windspeaker Nuvu]

4 [Vakus the Inferno]

4 [Loriam Argos]

4 [Varandas Silverleaf]

4 [Emerald Soldier]

2 [Twilight Shadowdrake]

2 [Magni, the Mountain King]

Abilties: 12

4 [Primal Strike]

4 [Favor of the Elements]

4 [Ancestral Recovery]

Equipment: 4

4 [Crul'korak, the Lightning's Arc]

Quests: 12

4 [Corrosion Prevention]

4 [Challenge to the Black Flight]

4 [The Crucible of Carnage: The Twilight Terror]

The theme of the Scourgewar block was class matters. The sets contained hero flips requiring you to have allies in your deck that shared a class with your hero, and the set of lessons allowed you to play abilities for free by exhausting allies that shared a class with your hero. In the Worldbreaker block, the themes are dragons and damage type matters. Scourgewar block touched on damage types, but never went to the lengths that the current block format does. The nature, arcane, and fire damage types are really focused on, and reward you for building decks with emphasis on those types. The [Bragvi Stormstein] shaman deck is a product of the nature damage theme.

The goal of the deck is to simply kill the opponent by overwhelming them with allies that are simply more powerful than their own. One of the key combos of the format is the [Twilight Citadel] and [Etched Dragonbone Girdle] allowing plate wearers to create an army of cheap card draw. However, those decks spend so much time trying to gain card advantage that they are weak to aggressive pushes. With the exception of [Bronze Drake], most of the deck is positioned to take control after turn three.

The deck is centered on the nature damage type, but really revolves around [Crul'korak, the Lightning's Arc]. The new weapon allows all of your nature allies to push through more damage, and punishes your opponent for trying to play higher cost cards. Because there is a lack of weapon pumps in this format like [Surprise Attacks], it is difficult to find a way to get great use out of the axe without cards like [Primal Strike]. While seemingly awful, and don’t get me wrong, the card is hardly Limited playable, [Primal Strike] is the real deal. Pumping up your entire team is truly unreal, not to mention using your weapon to destroy more than 60% of the allies in the format is amazing.

Many games end up looking like this because of the slow nature of the format at the moment. Turn one you get two allies, one from a Stashed [Magni, the Mountain King] and the other from a one drop. Turn two, you play two more one drops, and if you’re on the play, the opponent hasn’t done a thing. Turn three you land your [Curl’Korak, the Lightning Arc], play a [Primal Strike] targeting the weapon, and the game essentially ends. All your allies (excluding the Magni/Magni’s tokens) receive four extra ATK for the turn, you eat their ally with your hero if they’ve played one, and they take upwards of 33 damage.

Should the deck not hit one of its insane draws involving the axe, there’s still a great amount of burn potential in the deck. Most of the allies in Block are understated in exchange for their utility effects. Therefore, the deck can continue to bash the opponent, and force the opponent to trade many of their two and three drops for your one drop two attack allies, generating a large amount of tempo. Also, cards like [Vakus the Inferno], [Twilight Shadowdrake], and [Ancestral Recovery] give the deck an element of reach by regenerating threats and pseudo burn abilities from your graveyard.

I expect this deck to do really well, especially at the beginning of this format because people will try and play their slow control decks. There’s little to no equipment hate in the format, and even the [Obsidian Drudge] can be too slow in order to shut down your explosive starts.

On the other side of the damage type matters in an aggressive Shaman deck I want to talk about, which is a Horde fire based Shaman. This decklist is almost completely untested so take it with a grain of salt, but it still has very explosive turns that occur well before many of the midrange decks in the format.

Hero: [Akumo of Thunder Bluff]

Allies: 38

4 [Waz'luk]

4 [Onnekra Bloodfang]

4 [Rosalyne von Erantor]

4 [Gerwixicks]

4 [Abysswalker Rakax]

4 [Ruby Flameblade]

3 [Dagax the Butcher]

4 [Sava'gin the Reckless]

3 [Warchief Garrosh Hellscream]

4 [Carine, Earthmother’s Chosen]

Abilties: 15

4 [Ancestral Recovery]

3 [Twisted Fire Nova]

4 [Favor of the Elements]

4 [Blazing Elemental Totem]

Quests: 7

4 [A Fiery Reunion]

3 [Entrenched]

In case you didn’t listen this week’s podcast of A Question of Gluttony, I highly recommend it. What they say is quite harsh, but it is true: the quests in this format aren’t that awesome. Therefore, there are only 15 “happy” resources in this deck, which is still more than many other decks play. I actually struggled justifying to myself that [Entrenched] was a quest I would find myself completing, but I could complete it on a slow draw on turn seven or so. The lesson to learn here is that Stash is an amazing keyword, and cards like Sava’gin that can be resources that are also removal are insane!

The goal of the deck is to deal fire damage while [Gerwixicks] is in play, thus giving your hero Assault to keep their allies off the table. The deck also has some of the greatest one drop allies ever printed for aggressive decks, and all of them have the ability to trigger [Gerwixicks] the turn they enter play! Also important to note, if you can create a critical mass of allies, [Gerwixicks] can turn your hero into a [Death Wish] like force, by creating multiple triggers. Speaking of dealing fire damage, [Blazing Elemental Totem] is the true power of the deck, giving most of your allies Ferocity. Your opponents cannot ignore this, thus attacking the totem before your other allies, but when they do that, you have the ability to [Ancestral Recovery] it back to your hand creating a bigger army of fire elementals.

While the totem is a great card, my favorite card in this deck is [Warchief Garrosh Hellscream]. This guy is a truck, and I’m surprised I’m not seeing more discussion about how to destroy your opponent with this guy. There’s a lack of good instant speed removal in the format, and a large absence of playable protectors in Block, meaning Ferocity allies screaming towards your face are really scary. I imagine anytime you ready up with this guy in play, the opponent will lose as you drop the rest of your hand and go to town, not to mention he has six attack on his own.

[Twisted Fire Nova] totem is the last thing in the deck that converts this deck from a “draft strategy” into a real constructed deck. I feel that what this deck lacks that the Alliance version has is a hard to kill card like the axe that can just kill them. Therefore, the deck needs a tad bit more reach than the other version, and in my opinion [Twisted Fire Nova] is that card. I love [Lightning bolt] and [Chain Lightning], both of which were reprinted in one way or another, but I feel dealing seven damage by sacrificing your in play totem, or a one drop ally is enough to kill most opponents. I doubt it will come up frequently, but sacrificing [Dagax the Butcher] to [Twisted Fire Nova] is actually like a 1:1 because Dagax was going to kill himself at the end of turn anyways.

Hopefully, you guys enjoyed this first edition of Building Blocks! This format offers a ton of deck building room, and that many different brews that can be successful with a little work. Next week I want to take a look at one of the most powerful control decks in block from my initial testing [Summoning Portal] Warlock!

-Corey Burkhart