by OtakuMZ - 5 years ago     show comments

Introduction

(Note: You may skip this section if you already read it in the Rastakhan’s Legendary Crafting guide.)

All new expansions have them, shiny new Legendary and Epic cards, but trying to collect all the new toys can get expensive. The question that haunts everybody who is on a budget is which ones are really worth crafting and which ones are just trash. As we are now one Season into the Rastakhan meta, and about two weeks after the nerf, this article will give you answers to those questions. Keep in mind, that the answers are given for the state of the meta as it is right now. There are still decks that are not figured out that may change the evaluations given over time. In regard to that, we will additionally try to indicate cards that may become relevant in the future.

As Epics and Legendaries are the expensive ones, we will give you reasoning why those cards seem relevant and which decks they are played in. We will split those over two separate articles. We will also categorize them into “staples” and “nice to have”. The cards with future potential will be labeled “sleeper cards”. For Rares, we will list those played right now but we will not go into detail as they are relatively easy to come by. They will be appended to the bottom of this guide. To see which decks those cards are played in, you may want to take a look at our Rastakhan’s Rumble Deck Compendium.

Crafting Guide

Neutral Epics – Staples

As of yet, there are no ubiquitous Neutral Epic staples. There are, however, a few Epics that are staple to specific decks.

Crowd Roaster: This dragon was underappreciated in many reviews of the set before release, but it claimed a staple spot in both Odd Control Dragon Warrior as well as Control Dragon Priest – both being top tier decks. In Priest and some of the Warrior lists, Crowd Roaster is played as a one-of.

Masked Contender: Masked Contender quickly took his staple spot in Tempo Mage and Secret Hunter. Nowadays, this Troll is usually played as a two-of. The card is still a bit underappreciated, but we are sure it is the new “Mad Scientist” of Standard.

Neutral Epics – Nice To Have

Snapjaw Shellfighter: Already, some deck architects claim this 5-drop is insane in Aggro decks by protecting key minions against direct damage and board clears. Murloc decks in particular like to tech in this card, but other hyper-aggressive minion-based decks do so too. One interesting thing to note is that the card protects from one damage source, even through overkill, and even if the source hits multiple times before it finishes resolving. That is, it will absorb all 15 Volcano damage if it is next to your only minion(s). Volcano, in particular, weakened with the fall of combo Shudderwock, but that is still a relevant point of consideration.

Neutral Epics – Sleeper Cards

Untamed Beastmaster: The dwarf saw some experimentation in Odd Beast Rogue and even Odd Mage. You would think it good in Hunter, but Master’s Call is too powerful drawing three Beasts to risk disrupting it with this Epic. Nonetheless, Untamed Beastmaster is an interesting build-around card that is worth exploring in the sets to come.

Class Epics – Staples

Master’s Call: Again, as with Zul’jin on the Legendary side, it is a Hunter card at the top. This card single-handedly enabled the return of Midrange Beast Hunter and then promptly catapulted it on the top of the meta. You do not run this card in every Hunter deck, but it is staple to a few of them.

Smolderthorn Lancer: This Dragon synergy card is the “Execute” of Odd Control  Dragon Warrior. It coming on a stick (a 3/2 minion) renders this card insane for slower archetypes. The conditional part is not a big problem with lots of good Dragon synergy present in Warrior. Odd Warrior is one of the few meta-relevant archetypes that is not hurt by the upcoming Standard Rotation, so this particular investment is safer in that respect.

Class Epics – Nice To Have

Soulwarden: As long as Doomguard is a thing, Soulwarden may be too. There is no feeling worse than discarding Gul’dan or another key card to the charging Demon. Soulwarden is the answer and in our opinion very underappreciated right now.

Treespeaker: Although not popular right now, the Treant theme is strong in Druid and might have some merit to it. Living Mana leaving with the next Standard rotation is a bummer for the card, though.

Class Epics – Sleeper Cards

Cannon Barrage: This card was dismissed prior to launch, then immediately hyped up through the roof in Aggro Kingsbane, and has since come crashing back down to Earth. We think that aggressive Pirate Rogue may become relevant again in the future. As shown, Cannon Barrage could be a way to close out games or clear the way for the Pirates on board to hit face.

Sul’thraze: This weapon is meant to clear the path to face for more aggressive Warrior archetypes. It can buff a Frothing Berserker along the way too. Tempo Warrior hasn’t quite made yet it this expansion, but the card is powerful in the right deck, and we suspect its day may yet come.

Wild Play Mode

In Wild play mode, Masked Contender is already showing the same impact as in Standard. It turns out running four Mad Scientists is even better than two. The other Epic that is played in Wild is Auchenai Phantasm, which only sees fringe play in Standard. It is mostly run in Reno Priest, being a strictly better “Embrace the Shadows”.

Rares

As already mentioned in the introduction, this will be a list-only section without any explanation.

Rares – Staples

Neutral: Firetree Witchdoctor

Class: Bloodscalp Strategist (Hunter, one-of), Mass Hysteria (Priest), Pyromaniac (Mage),  Raiding Party (Rogue), Spirit of the Shark (Rogue)

Rares – Nice To Have

Neutral: none

Class: Grave Horror (Priest), Likkim (Shaman, upgraded to “Staple” in Wild), Spirit of the Tiger (Paladin, one-of)

Rares – Sleeper Cards

Neutral: Soup Vendor

Class: Revenge of the Wild (Hunter), Shriek (Warlock), Spirit of the Frog (Shaman)

Conclusion

This concludes our crafting guides for Rastakhan’s Rumble. If you missed the Rastakhan’s Legendary Crafting Guide just hit the link. We hope you enjoyed these articles and did save you some unnecessary crafts.