Incinerate Them - A Full Guide to Piloting Galakrond Warlock on the Wildest of Wednesdays

Wild Hearthstone has thousands of cards, and a wide variety of possible decks. This incredible deck diversity is sometimes lost when only looking at the few decks common in the highest ranks. Wednesday, the Wildest of Days is a series aiming to highlight a different off meta deck each week with an in depth guide into its strategy and gameplay. The decks are selected for having interesting synergies and using rarely seen cards.

The strongest card in Odd Paladin is arguably Quartermaster. Well, a rarely seen wild off meta deck has received a more powerful version of Quartermaster in the latest expansion. That deck is Galakrond Warlock, where Shady Bartender has the same effect as Quartermaster but with better stats and Tradeable. Galakrond Warlock is the perfect wild deck to take advantage of Shady Bartender due to its consistent stream of Imps from each Invoke card, with Shady Bartender able to help buff those imps into a major threat. Galakrond Warlock also makes use of the new Stormwind card Traveling Merchant, which can often be a 3 mana 6/7 or better in addition to being Tradeable.

Now, let's get into a guide on playing the deck. It's going to go through major overarching strategies to keep in mind, how to mulligan, gameplay tips on key synergies, and card choices.

Strategies

Galakrond Warlock's gameplan is very similar for any type of opponent it might face. The goal is to get on board fast, and start buffing it to snowball a lead. If your initial waves are dealt with, you have plenty of refill and card draw. Finally, if it's getting to turn 7 and the game still hasn't been won, you have Galakrond, the Wretched and Kronx Dragonhoof to make a final push to win.

Aggression - Most games will be won in the early turns without ever needing to play Galakrond himself. I've had multiple turn 4 lethals against a variety of decks. Your aim is a Kobold Librarian turn 1, an egg turn 2, into any of your 3 cost cards turn 3, ideally generating enough imps so that you have 5 minions and can use Ritual of Dooms on turn 3. From there, you are going to keep playing Invoke cards for more imps, buff the imps with cards like Grim Rally, Fiendish Rites, and Shady Bartender, and have large threats like Darkshire Councilman and Traveling Merchant.

Finisher - The aggression strategy is usually going to be repeated a few times, where you can keep pumping out and buffing boards of imps if your early waves are removed. Eventually though, you will start running out of imp generators and will want to go for a stronger finisher. First of all, you can use Loatheb to protect your board and then buff it for lethal the following turn. You can use the fully upgraded Galakrond to both summon 4 random demons and equip a 5/2 weapon which is often great as 10 damage to the enemy hero over 2 turns. After you've played Galakrond, you can use Kronx Dragonhoof to give your minions a 2/2 buff or deal 5 damage to the enemy hero.

In general, this deck is going to struggle against aggressive decks that can get on board faster than you and then keep removing your 1/1s before you can buff them, and will do well against midrange, control, and combo decks where you can get your initial wave going and then win with buffs and more full minion boards if necessary.

Mulligans

Galakrond Warlock has a ton of really high quality 3 cost cards, but not a lot of 1 and 2 cost minions that you can play on turns 1 and 2. The 1 and 2 cost minions you do have are great early plays, so getting them is really important.

Keep a Kobold Librarian, and one copy of one egg among Nerubian Eggs and Serpent Eggs, preferably Nerubian Egg, or keep two eggs and no Librarian if you have the coin.

If you have an egg, keep one Fiendish Circle and one Ritual of Doom. If you have both an egg and a Fiendish Circle, keep two copies of Ritual of Doom. If you have Fiendish Circles and Ritual of Dooms but no eggs, keep one of each and mulligan everything else to try to get an egg. This is for your ultimate turn 3 highroll.

All other cards should be mulliganed away.

Gameplay

You generally want to start with dropping Kobold Librarian turn 1 and an egg turn 2, or coining out an egg turn 1 into another egg the next turn. Then you have many powerful 3 cost cards to start filling the board and buffing it, and Galakrond, the Wretched, Loatheb, and Kronx Dragonhoof for finishers if your early boards are dealt with.

Below are gameplay tips regarding many of the synergies in this deck and how to use them effectively.

The Ultimate Highroll

This deck has an ultimate highroll to keep in mind and do whenever you can. To set it up, you need an egg played on board turn 2. Then, turn 3, play Fiendish Circle. You will now have 5 minions on the board, and can play Ritual of Doom on the egg. If you have your second Ritual of Doom, play it on a 1/1 imp. In the best case scenario, this will result in 2 5/5 demons, a 4/4 Nerubian, and 2 1/1 imps on the board on turn 3.

This sort of highroll can be done with cards other than Fiendish Circle if a Kobold Librarian happens to survive from turn 1, and is a generally strong play to look out for even if you don't get it turn 3.

Here is an example of getting the ultimate highroll, also with coining out Grim Rally for an overall result of 21/21 worth of stats on turn 3.

Egg Synergy

Nerubian Egg and Serpent Egg are both really important for this deck. First of all, they make for a really sticky board and help enable the ultimate turn 3 highroll to occur more consistently. 

Furthermore, they are going to synergize with Ritual of Doom and Grim Rally. For both of these cases, you get a huge payoff in either a 5/5 demon or a 1/1 board buff without having to sacrifice a useful minion while also generating either a 4/4 or 3/4, depending on the type of egg. 

If you don't happen to draw your sacrifice cards, eggs are still great as hedges against board clears, and they can be given attack and traded into enemy minions by using Fiendish Rites.

Eggs are going to turn into threats with 4 hp which are harder to clear than 1/1s, making your boards extra sticky. Overall, they are amazing in this deck both on turn 2 and later in the game due to all of the strong synergies.

Various Midgame Synergies

You want to have a mix of wide boards and high hp minions, making it difficult for opponents to clear efficiently with just a hard removal or AOE. The major big threats you can make are demons from Ritual of Doom, Darkshire Councilman, and Traveling Merchant.

It's usually better to keep the tempo up and keep flooding and buffing your board, only play Veiled Worshipper if your hand size is getting low and you are running out of more board oriented plays. 

Sometimes it's better to trade with non demons if you have a Shady Bartender in hand and can set up a big board buff. Other times, if you have a wide demon board, don't trade at all, just go face or pass turn if against one big taunt. This way, a few of your imps may be destroyed but you will have some left over to buff. Even 2 imps buffed by Shady Bartender is ok value. Also, keep in mind that the minion summoned from Ritual of Doom is in fact a demon and can be buffed by Shady Bartender.

Synergies with Brann Bronzebeard

Brann Bronzebeard becomes key in the later stages of the game, where using him with Loatheb to almost guarantee a board surviving against a control deck or using him with Kronx Dragonhoof to buff your board by 4/4 or deal 10 damage to the enemy hero is going to be very powerful to end games in your favor.

You can also use him in the midgame to draw an extra 3 cards when combined with Veiled Worshipper, buff your demons by 4/4 with Shady Bartender, or make a really huge Traveling Merchant.

Card Choices

This section is going to go through the main packages of cards in the deck. Each package has cards that help the deck with a specific goal. When playing the deck, it's useful to know what purposes each card serves and what other cards in the deck have synergy with it or help achieve the same purpose. This section might also be useful if you're interested in the reasoning for why each card was included in the deck.

Early Plays

These cards are all great early plays, while also remaining powerful later in the game. Kobold Librarian can be used as a 1 mana cycle while using eggs with Ritual of Doom and Grim Rally is good even in the mid and late game.

Board Generation

These cards all generate multiple minions, mostly demons.

Wide Board Synergy

These cards benefit from either having or generating wide boards.

Buffs

These cards buff your boards, due to your ability to have wide boards the buffs are usually very high value.

Invoke Synergy

These cards will be very strong after you play multiple Invoke cards. Veiled Worshipper becomes amazing value as a 4 mana 5/4 that draws 3 cards, while Galakrond, the Wretched is going to give you 5 armor, summon 4 random demons, and equip a 5/2 weapon in addition to changing your hero power to summon two imps.

Finishers

These cards are all powerful finishers. Brann Bronzebeard is flexible and can be used in the midgame with other cards, it depends on how much pressure you are under - if you're against a slow control deck that keeps clearing your boards it's better to hold him to use with a finisher. Also, due to how important Kronx Dragonhoof is as a finisher with his Devastations, it's better to try to draw Galakrond naturally rather than using Kronx to do it unless you are really desperate.

Galakrond Warlock is sort of like a less consistent but potentially more explosive version of Odd Paladin, with the additional element of having Galakrond, the Wretched to summon random demons for a little bit of rng variety. If you like Odd Paladin's playstyle, or in general aggressive decks that generate and buff wide boards, consider giving this one a try. If you have a question or comment, or are wondering about a card substitution, post below.

What are your favorite wild decks? Which off meta decks have you been playing? Let us know in the comments below!