An interesting thing happened after Daily Metagame went live. David, a local battleground competitor-turned friend, sent me an e-mail asking for help with the upcoming Darkmoon Faire.

David asked if I would be willing to share some "insider" knowledge on sealed deck strategy to help him get up to speed for the DMF, his first non-battle ground event.

Me, being somewhat masochistic when it comes to extra work, agreed without any hesitation. I asked David to crack an Icecrown Epic Collection and send me his pool and notes. Here's what he I received:

Hero: [Dalronn the Controller]

Allies: 22

[Fel Infernal] x2

[Bronwyn Lightborn]

[Justicar Andra Goldblast]

[Kysa Shadowstalker]

[Jaina, Lady of Theramore]

[Banshee Soulclaimer] x2

[Rhyllor of the Glade] x2

[Akiko the Alert]

[Madrea Bluntbrew]

[Wesley Shadowsworn] x2

[Vylar Whitepaw] x2

[Cynthia Masters]

[Darktwister Kern]

[Crypt Fiend]

[Ymirheim Chosen Warrior]

[Malefic Necromancer]

[Stonespine Gargoyle]

Abilities: 2

[Embrace of the Nether]

[Metamorphosis]

Quest: 6

[Everfrost]

[Cold Hearted]

[That's Abominable!]

[The Boon of A'dal]

[The Boon of Remulous]

[The Boon of Alexstrasza]

I’m not super thrilled with it.

I had my timer set to 25 minutes, hit start, then I unsealed the cards and arranged them by type.

Looking at my abilities, I didn’t see anything overwhelmingly calling my name except for Shaman, so I decided to look at allies next.

Jaina caught my eye + the Scourge allies seemed dangerous so I decided on a Scourge Hero.

Ally-wise, I tried to keep protectors + anything that would cause grief to my opponent… to keep me alive and safe long enough for [Metamorphosis] and [Wesley Shadowsworn]. [Malefic Necromancer] would be used to bring back any Wesley’s I may lose in battle + Everfrost would help with that.

I chose Warlock for the following reasons: 

1)   It had [Metamorphosis]

2)   I couldn’t pick Shaman because there isn’t a Scourge Shaman Hero in the Icecrown set

3)   Every other card I had from the other classes didn’t seem that appealing – I felt the Scourge allies were more beneficial

Well, let me know what you think.  Feel free to rip me apart

-David

Thanks for the e-mail Dave! I had fun dissecting your pool and your subsequent build. While your pool offered some interesting choices, I'm not in love with what you put together.

That's not to say that your build is a complete abomination. In fact, you would probably be able to squeeze out a reasonable amount of wins with what you have put together. But that doesn't mean it can't be improved on.

Allies

You were right to highlight the value of the Scourge in your pool. Icecrown dedicates a lot of space exploring the new reputation, and the allies are quite formidable— especially in multiples.

They are so good, in fact, that you should be playing all of them. In your build you inexplicitly left a [Stonespine Gargoyle] on the bench who I would say is one of the best non-rare 2-drops in the format. I can justify [Marauding Geist] on the sideline because of its inability to attack on turn 2, but depending on the class cards we end up with and the match-up, he can definitely find playing time as well.

Making the choice between the Horde and Alliance, I first look for a bomb then I look at the curve and relevant powers.

While both factions have a rare, [Jaina, Lady of Theramore] clearly separates herself as being bombilicious in quality. Being able to not only slingshot your cards into play quicker, but stunt the progression of your opponent, make her a tempo hog and a serious threat.

Jaina has another power that is often over looked and that's Frost Resistance. In an all-Icecrown format, having this keyword makes a huge difference as so many allies deal Frost damage. Each set in the Wrath of the Lich King block has focused on a specific damage type and that theme will continue with Worldbreaker. Like Frost Resistance in Icecrown, players in L.A. should be putting a higher priority on allies with Nature Resistance, as that will be the featured damage type.

Because of this, I'm more inclined to like the Alliance more-so then the Horde in this format. While both factions share a slew of frost dealing allies, the Horde only have two with Frost Resistance and one of those is epic in rarity. Alliance on the other hand has a small handful, including four in this sealed pool.

I put a high emphasis on my ally curve when putting together any deck, and its one of the primary indicators I'll use to decide on the final 30 cards for this sealed deck. We know I want to be Alliance but I'm not going to run every ally opened. To help put perspective on this build, I'm going to leave the allies alone for a minute and focus in on what abilities are going to work best.

Abilities/ Equipment

Dave went with Warlock because of [Metamorphosis]. I mean, its a master hero so it has to be bomb, right? Unfortunately, [Metamorphosis] really doesn't do anything all that exciting. To quote Brad from last week, "For all intents and purposes, [Bloodbane's Fall] is generally more desirable." The epic definitively falls within the category of trap cards.

The turn you play it, you gain a static + 1 ATK on both offense and defense and an extra 7 health. While that's actually decent, the upkeep makes this a particularly difficult card to keep in play. Keep in mind that the start of turn destroy qualifier is a mandatory cost. If you don't have an ally in play, or don't have one that you want to destroy, you'll revert back to your regular old self. To put it simply: this ability is far too conditional and requires too much of an investment to be worthwhile.

After we cross [Metamorphosis] off the list, Warlock is left with a few 4-drop pets and a so-so removal ability. Certainly not enough for us to continue down this path.

Reviewing the other classes in this sealed pool, I didn't find anything overwhelmingly pulling me in a particular direction. As David mentioend, Shaman had some decent cards, highlighted by triple [Lava Burst]. But Shaman's inability to play Scourge allies makes choosing the class a tough concession.

Not all is lost, however, as Warrior has an even better suite of removal abilities.

[Pierce] is among the best removal for its cost in the format. Being able to trade it with an ally from 1-4 cost gives it a great amount usage at every stage in the game. Ideally you want to play it in the middle turns removing their latest ally while adding one of your own to the board. Making plays like this are how you gain tempo and eventually win the game.

We also have a pair of [Payment of Blood]s. Depending on how much room we have for our final 30, we may or may not want one of these in our main deck. Regardless, its an awesome card in that it will allow us to answer normally tough-to-beat equipment.

[Heroic Throw] is in the same vein as [Pierce]. 90% of the time you're going to just throw it at an ally. 10% of the time you're going to burn out your opponent.

Similar to [Metamorphosis], [Warbringer] is another rare we could play, but won't. Even though it has a super cheap cost, we don't have enough cards to build around this rare to make it good enough. I prefer my abilities to either count as removal, or immediately effect the board in some way. [Warbringer] does neither.

Unlike Warlock, Warrior gives us access to a particularly nice equipment in [Legplates of the Endless Void]. 4-cost for 3 armor value is considered pretty good. The fact that this has a sweet power takes it from good to great. I've used this card to keep me from falling behind when I need to find gas to close out my opponent. If you're already behind, the 3-armor will help stop the bleeding.

Quest

David did a nice job singling out most of the best quest in his pool though I'm unsure on [The Boon of A'dal]. Seven is a big number. Often I'm only going to run a quest like this if I have an incredibly high curve.

I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss [The Last Line of Defense]. Sure, you have to destroy a resource. But you can complete it the same turn you've exhausted all of your resources for other cards. It also works nicely with [Everfrost], destroying a powerful facedown ally to later recur might make for a strong endgame.

Putting it together

Hero: [Thane Ufrang the Mighty]

Allies: 17

[Vishala]

x2 [Bronwyn Lightborn]

x2 [Stonespine Gargoyle]

[Malefic Necromancer]

[Kysa Shadowstalker]

[Ymirheim Chosen Warrior]

[Jaina, Lady of Theramore]

[Cynthia Masters]

x2 [Banshee Soulclaimer]

[Rhyllor of the Glade]

[Madrea Bluntbrew]

[Crypt Fiend]

x2 [Wesley Shadowsworn]

Abilities: 4

x2 [Pierce]

[Heroic Throw]

[Payment of Blood]

Equipment: 1

[Legplates of the Endless Void]

Quest: 8

[Everfrost]

[That's Abominable!]

[The Boon of Remulos]

[The Boon of Alexstrasza]

[Cold Hearted]

[The Storm King's Vengeance]

[The Last Line of Defense]

[The Boon of Adal]

While I stayed in Alliance, the deck as a whole is quite different. Notice I cut down the ally count by five. Guys like [Vylar Whitepaw] are close to blanks in my opinion. The fact that they can't attack is a huge drawback. I also cut [Darktwister Kern] and [Akiko the Alert]. While these guys have reasonable stats for their cost, they're not quite good enough when compared to the other allies I settled on.

I tried to avoid it, but ended up sticking with the double [Wesley Shadowsworn] plan. My preference is to only run cards this expensive if they will win me the game quickly, and I'm not sure Wesley will do that. The alternative was to include more less expensive allies, but they too were pretty unexciting. I feel a little more at ease since Jaina is there to help get him into play quicker.

To compensate for the higher curve, I upped the quest count a little bit. Sometimes you might worry about actually running out of cards with this much card draw. Luckily we have [Everfrost], so there's no real threat of that here.

So there you have it, nothing fancy, but I think this pool is above average. We have removal for every card type, a couple nice rares, and a decent collection of allies. Really, that's about all you can ask for.

What do you think? Did I miss the mark somewhere? Click the blue "Discuss Article" button and let me know.

Before I go, I wanted to give a quick reminder that its not too late to sign up for the DMF: LA Fantasy Contest. It shouldn't take much more than 60 seconds and you will have the chance to win some seriously nice loot including a Blazing Hippogryph Loot Card. Make sure you check it out!

-Phillip Martin